WWW Wednesdays #100 – July 20th

100TH WWW MEME CELEBRATION EDITION!!!

WWW WEDNESDAYS is a weekly meme hosted by Sam @ Taking On A World Of Words and is all about answering the three questions below.

• WHAT ARE YOU CURRENTLY READING?

I’m currently reading The Summer That Melted Everything by Tiffany McDaniel and it is turning out to be an interesting read. I’m glad the reviews I’ve seen so far convinced me to get a copy of this book! I’ve also finally started my last TBR jar pick The Hired Girl by Laura Amy Schlitz, which is ok enough so far, although I do hope the plot will get a little more interesting in the future. I still have to finish The Neverland Wars by Audrey Greathouse as well… I actually thought about DNFing it because I am really struggling with it, but since I already made it this far I will just finish it.

• WHAT DID YOU RECENTLY FINISH READING?

* The first book I finished since last week is Wanderlost by Jen Malone, which turned out to be a quick, fluffy and entertaining summer read. Not perfect and in a way a bit cliche, but I loved the road trip details!
* I then finished The Girl With All The Gifts by M.R. Carey; probably one of the first stories with zombies I absolutely loved. I still can’t believe it took me this long to pick up this book! Well written, excellent worldbuilding and Melanie is probably one of my newest favorite characters.
* I also finally continued The Stepmother by Claire Seeber, but unfortunately I wasn’t completely convinced by it. I liked the fact that  it reversed the roles of the typical ‘evil stepmother’ plot, but the pace is quite slow and I REALLY disliked the main character.
* The last book I finished is The Ice Twins by S.K. Tremayne, which turned out to be a well written, spooky read with great descriptions. The plot was a bit uneventful, but it is without doubt a great read.

• WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’LL READ NEXT?

Depending on what genre I’m in the mood for, I will read When We Collided by Emery Lord. I might read The Fire Child by S.K. Tremayne first though; especially since I really enjoyed her other novel. Talon by Julie Kagawa is most likely my next fantasy read; I have been wanting to read another dragon story for too long now! Secret Letters by Leah Scheier is another Sherlock Holmes retelling and my newest TBR jar pick.

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BOOK REVIEW: The Girl With All The Gifts – by M.R. Carey

Title: The Girl With All The Gifts
Author: M.R. Carey
Genre: Horror, Dystopia, Science Fiction
First published: January 14th 2014
Publisher: Orbit
Finished reading: July 15th 2016
Pages: 460

“It’s not just Pandora who had that inescapable flaw. It seems like everyone has been built in a way that sometimes makes them do wrong and stupid things.”

I know, I know… I should have known. This book has been recommended to me too many times to count and it’s been on my wishlist for a long time, but I was a bit wary since I’m normally not into stories with zombies. Now I’ve finally read The Girl With All The Gifts, I kind of want to kick myself for waiting this long, because I absolutely loved it! This book written M.R. Carey has shown me I can actually love a zombie story and I love his version of the ‘hungries’ and the special ‘children’. The story is well written and fast-paced, and I loved the many detailed descriptions of the dystopian world the characters have to survive in. Speaking of the characters: I LOVE Melanie! She is such a well developed and intriguing character and she is without doubt one of the reasons this story simply worked. Then again, the character development of all important characters is really well done. The plot was interesting and I personally liked how M.R. Carey decided to end the story. I would love to read a sequel though! So many possibilities… This book is highly recommended and worth the try even if you normally don’t like zombie stories. Trust me, you might be surprised by how much you will enjoy it anyway!

Melanie is a highly intelligent girl and without doubt very special; there is nothing ordinary about herself or her daily routine. Melanie lives in her cell and waits every morning to be collected for class. Two people then strap her into a wheelchair while Sergeant Parks keeps his gun pointing at her the whole time. Why exactly this is necessary Melanie doesn’t know, but most people seem to be wary of her and her classmates. She loves school though, and learning about the world outside. Her favorite teacher would be Miss Justineau, and the days she is in class are Melanie’s favorites. Though whenever Melanie talks about her dreams and future, Justineau becomes sad… Because unlike Melanie, her teacher knows what the world really looks like.

I’m so glad I finally decided to read The Girl With All The Gifts, because it’s without doubt an excellent read. The plot and plot twists are really interesting and I liked how the story ended. The detailed descriptions and character development made it really easy to enjoy reading this book and Melanie is without doubt one of my new favorite characters. The Girl With All The Gifts is a horror story and it has zombies, but that is not all that there is to it. I can’t go into details because that might spoil the story, but I can say that I would definitely recommend this book!

WWW Wednesdays #99 – July 13th

WWW WEDNESDAYS is a weekly meme hosted by Sam @ Taking On A World Of Words and is all about answering the three questions below.

• WHAT ARE YOU CURRENTLY READING?

I’m currently reading Wanderlost by Jen Malone, which is turning out to be a quick and entertaining road trip story from what I can see so far. I’ve also started reading The Neverland Wars by Audrey Greathouse because I was in the mood for a Peter Pan retelling, but I can’t say I’m enjoying it. The tone and prose don’t seem to fit the theme at all and I’m struggling to continue this one… Same goes for The Stepmother by Claire Seeber: I started reading it last week, but I couldn’t get into the story and decided to keep it temporarily on hold and read a few other titles instead.

• WHAT DID YOU RECENTLY FINISH READING?

* The first book I finished since last week is My Girl by Jack Jordan, which is probably one of the most twisted and disturbing thrillers I’ve read so far this year. If you are into the genre, definitely make sure to check out this book!
* I then finished Out Of The Easy by Ruta Sepetys, which is without doubt my new favorite of this author. The setting, prose and character development are excellent and I really felt like I was right there in the 1950s along with the characters.
* I also read The Night Stalker by Robert Bryndza, which by no means suffers from the ‘weak-second-book’ syndrome. It’s fast-paced, well written and has an intriguing plot and plot twists. It’s without doubt a very entertaining read!
* I then read The Straw King by Danielle Paige. This novella was surprisingly good compared to the last few previous stories, but I still wasn’t overwhelmed by it.
* I’ve also been able to finish Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon, a title that was on my 2015 most-antipated-releases list. I enjoyed reading it and I admit it was a ‘cute’ read, but I did have some problems with the credibility of the plot. I mean, if the main character is really that sick, doing what she did is incredibly stupid.
* The last book I managed to finish is The Sister by Louise Jensen, which I ended up really enjoying. It’s dark, messed with your mind and has many plot twists… The story jumps back and forth between the past and present and there are quite a few unreliable characters, but it only added to the whole mystery around Grace and Charlie.

• WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’LL READ NEXT?

Depending on what genre I’m in the mood for, I will read When We Collided by Emery Lord. Although I really want to read The Ice Twins by S.K. Tremayne as well, both because I’ve heard great things about it and because I want to The Fire Child by the same author. If I want something different, The Girl With All The Gifts by M.R. Carey is also high on my list… And my latest TBR jar pick is still The Hired Girl by Laura Amy Schlitz. (Which I should read soon since it’s been too long since I last read a TBR jar book.)

Top Ten Tuesday #6 – August 26th: Books I Need To Get Soon!

The Broke And The Bookish presents us every week a new top ten with a different theme. And this Tuesday’s theme is the Top Ten Books I Really Want To Read But Don’t Own Yet. When I first saw this theme, I was mostly thinking: Seriously, only ten? My need-to-get-soon list at Goodreads has about 40 titles on it alone, and I haven’t updated that one that recently. I’ve tried to make a selection for this Top Ten Tuesday though:

• All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
• The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith
• Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

• Gardens Of The Moon by Steven Erikson
• The Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss
• The Knife Of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness
• I Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes

• The Girl With All The Gifts by M.R. Carey
• Attachments by Rainbow Rowell
• The Girl From The Well by Rin Chupeco

 

Which of these have you read already and can you recommend to me? Any books I should buy first?