Tag: lara jean

August Summary

Leave a comment

Okay, August was the best! Well, for books anyways. The wildfires in BC are totally out of control and the air quality was atrocious, so I didn’t do quite as much outdoor stuff, which is one of the reasons it was a great month for books! But also, my August monthly challenge just totally re-vitalized me and got me out of my reading slump!

I was getting a bit hung up with my monthly challenges and the pressure to read specific books, so in August I just set myself the challenge to read pretty much whatever I wanted by trying to read as many of my existing books as possible. I have a lot of un-read books, so it left me with lots of selection to choose from and I finally read some books that I’ve been meaning to get to for a while. Here’s my summary:

Books read: 11
Pages read: 4,208
Main genres: Young Adult
Favourite book: Nevermoor and Women Talking!

I started off the month with Leah on the Offbeat, Becky Albertalli’s newest book. I’ve heard really great things about this one and I’ve been meaning to get to it for a while, but unfortunately I didn’t love it. I’m really hit or miss with Albertalli’s books and I’m finding myself counter to popular opinion on her books. I liked but didn’t love Simon vs. the Homosapiens Agenda (but I LOVED the movie) and I really liked The Upside of Unrequited, which I would say is her least popular book. But I didn’t like this one either. Leah kind of rubbed with the wrong way and while I still loved all the diversity in this book, I found parts of it problematic.

After that, I decided to participate in the 25infive readathon, which challenges people to read for 25 hours over the span of 5 days. I didn’t quite finish the challenge (I read 23 hours over 4 days), but I read 4.5 books, so I was super pleased with myself. I started with Nevermoor by Jessica Townsend and Radio Silence by Alice Oseman. I totally flew through both books and I am not slightly obsessed with Nevermoor. Nevermoor is totally Middle Grade fantasy at it’s best and I confirm that the comparison’s to Harry Potter are valid and that everyone should read this book because it is just so much fun! I also loved Radio Silence, which is about the struggles of senior year and the pressure to go to University, and I will definitely be reading more of Alice Oseman.

I followed up those with Ten by Gretchen McNeil and To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han. I pretty much hated Ten and found it problematic and kind of offensive, but I thought To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before was really cute. I was only inspired to pick this one up because the new Netflix movie looked really cute (can now confirm – it is cute). Lara Jean seemed like the type of YA book that I gave up long ago, but I loved that this was more a story about sisters than it was about boys and I thought it was really cute. I also read the sequel this month though, P.S. I Still Love You, and unfortunately I thought it was no where near as strong as the first book and basically unnecessary.

While I did read P.S. I Still Love You in August, it wasn’t part of my 25infive reading challenge. The last book I tried to squeeze into the challenge was Uprooted (I got halfway through during the challenge). Uprooted was a challenge for me. It’s a well written, traditional fairytale type story, but I found it so slow moving that it was really hard for me to get into it.

I interspersed my reading of Uprooted with The Last Time I Lied, which was definitely the opposite in terms of pace. This was my first Riley Sager book and it wasn’t quite as scary as I was anticipating, but I really enjoyed it. It was a solid mystery thriller book about a girl name Emma whose 3 friends disappeared at summer camp when she was 13. She’s returned to the camp as an adult and 3 more girls disappear, forcing her into a race against time to figure out what really happened 15 years ago. I was convinced that I had the mystery figured out and I was thrilled to find out I got it totally wrong and didn’t see the twist coming at the end at all.

I had one book that I had to read in August, which was for my book club, was Circe by Madeline Miller, the new fantasy book that came out this year and has super good reviews. I had a bit of a love-hate relationship with this one, similar to Uprooted. I thought the story was really good, but it was a slow read for me and the reading experience overall wasn’t great, even though I did like the story.

I read Women Talking by Miriam Toews towards the end of this month and it was definitely one of the best books I read this year! It’s a fictional account of the true story of a community of Bolivian, Mennonite women who were attacked and raped in their sleep over the course of 4 years. After the crime is discovered, the women meet to discuss what to do about it and the whole book is basically a group of them talking about whether they should leave the community or stay and fight. The writing in this book is wonderful and the content is so thoughtful. I would recommend this book to absolutely anyone and everyone.

Finally, I finished the month with a re-read of The Assassin’s Blade by Sarah J Maas, which is the prequel to the Throne of Glass series. I am a bit obsessed with this series and with the final book coming out in October, I’ve decided to re-read the whole series! The Assassin’s Blade was just as good as I remembered and I can’t wait to jump into the rest of the books in September!

P.S. I Still Love You

7 Comments

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐
Author: Jenny Han
Genres: Young Adult
Pub date: May 2015 (read Aug. 2018)

Okay, I’m definitely not as enamoured with this as I was for To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before. I really don’t think the first book needed a sequel, much less a trilogy, but I’ll admit I do still find these characters charming.

I don’t have too much to say about PS. I Still Love You. What made the first book so great is that it was only really partly about boys and mostly about sisters. This book is mostly about boys and it just wasn’t as engaging for me. There are a million and one books out there already about love triangles and the minefield that is managing your emotions as a teenager. To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before offered something new to the genre, and I don’t think this did.

That said, I do still think Lara Jean is a relatable character to a lot of young girls. Again, there are lots of books about teenage rebellion, partying, and poor decision making. But I like that Lara Jean is relatable to those girls that play it safe in high school and are intimidated by some of the experiences of their peers (in this case sexual experiences). Lara Jean knows Peter has had sex before and she also knows she’s not ready, which leads to a lot of insecurity about what Peter thinks and feels about their relationship.

However, I did really like that Lara Jean realizes that some of her hang ups actually have to do less with Peter and more with Genevieve. She constantly compares herself to her ex-best friend and how she might measure up alongside her. I liked that Lara Jean and Peter were both comfortable talking to one another about sex and I also liked the way Han wrote about Peter’s feelings on sex. It would have been so easy to write a character that was hung up on the fact that he and Lara Jean weren’t having sex, but Peter understood that Lara Jean wasn’t ready and just didn’t bring it up. Their relationship was about more than just sex for Peter.

I can’t decide if I’m going to read the last one or not. The first book ends on a cliffhanger that was annoying resolved within about 2 chapters of this book, but this one doesn’t end on a cliffhanger. The final book seems unnecessary to me, but I kind of want to see the series through. Plus they don’t take very long to read and I’m not sure I’m ready to part with Kitty Song Covey yet. What a smart and funny character – definitely my favourite!

To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before

7 Comments

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Author: Jenny Han
Genres: Young Adult
Pub date: Apr. 2014 (read Aug. 2018)

I’ve known about this book for ages, but it sounded pretty juvenile and vapid, so I decided to give it a pass. But then I saw the ad for the Netflix movie and it looked super cute, so I decided to finally pick this up and give it a read. I flew through it in my 25infive readathon, reading it in a single day. I definitely still think it’s juvenile, but it was also really cute and did have more depth than I was expecting.

The main reason I liked this is primarily because it’s about sisters. Lara Jean has 2 sisters, Margot and Kitty, and together they make up the cutest little family. Kitty was easily my favourite and I loved how this book focused so much on the relationships between the sisters, not just on boys.

The premise of the story is that whenever Lara Jean has a crush that she wants to get over, she writes them a goodbye letter (that she keeps in a hat box in her closet) and that helps her move on from her crush. Embarrassingly, one of her crushes is her friend Josh, who is now Margot’s boyfriend. But Margot and Josh break up at the start of the book when Margot moves to Scotland for University, causing a resurgence in Lara Jean’s feelings for Josh.

She vows to do nothing and move on, but then her letters somehow end up getting sent out to the 5 boys she has loved before and everything changes. Josh is totally taken aback by the letter, and to save face, Lara Jean starts a fake relationship with one her other former crushes, Peter.

I’ve read some criticisms that Lara Jean’s voice is too young for a 16 year old, but her naivete is actually one of the other things I liked about this book. She’s interested in boys, but at the same time totally scared of them and puts all her efforts into her relationships with her sisters instead. I thought it was great to showcase relationships between sisters and that not every teenage girl is just obsessed with boys.

There’s not really any surprises in this book. It’s a short, feel good YA book. Nothing groundbreaking – but a fun quick, summer read.