Insurgent - Veronica Roth

FIGHTING

FOR SURVIVAL IN A
SHATTERED WORLD...

THE TRUTH

IS HER

ONLY HOPE.

Yes! Let us begin. I cannot wait to see how this turns out! It really left it on a cliff hanger there really. Almost nothing is resolved - and there was so much death. I would like to see how everyone copes with what has happened thus far, and what will happen as a result!

'I HAVE DONE BAD THINGS

I CAN'T TAKE THEM BACK, 

AND THEY ARE PART OF WHO I AM. 

Tris has survived a brutal attack on her former home

and family. But she has paid a terrible price. 

Wrecked by grief and guilt, she becomes ever more

reckless as she struggles to accept her new future. 

Yet it Tris wants to uncover the truth about her world, 

she must be stronger than ever ... because

more shocking choices and sacrifices lie ahead.' 

She just can't catch a break can she!? 

Divergent - Veronica Roth - Complete

I rather enjoyed reading this one - it took me a few chapters to really get into it on an addicted level - but once I did, I didn't really stop reading it. I am even more excited to watch the movie now and see how it was interpreted into a motion picture. 

I liked the characters. I thought they were simple (as in, simple personalities, characteristics etc), but still realistic and engaging. I think with all the things that happen though, it would have made more sense if Tris was a little older. She's 16 in the book. I think even if she was 17 or 18, it would have been better. 

I must admit, being a Divergent doesn't seem as special as I thought it was supposed to be - in the way that by the end of the book, there were actually several who were 'Divergent'. 

But still an awesome concept. It does remind me slightly of the Hunger Games - with the different Factions, created to maintain peace amongst a broken world. The politics and thirst for power is also very similar. But still not similar enough to actually compare it to the Hunger Games in any way really. 

I am looking forward to beginning Insurgent! 

I would give this one 4/5 - I really enjoyed it :) 

(For those who don't know the STARS: 1= Did not like it, 2= It was OK, 3= Liked it, 4= Really liked it, 5= It was amazing!) 

Divergent - Veronica Roth

Finally I am getting around to reading this one!
There has been so much hype about these books and the movie that was released earlier this year. My mother has already read the series and she really enjoyed it.
I am excited to read these ones, I wonder if they're anything like The Hunger Games..?
It's an extremely interesting and intriguing story this one!

'In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago world, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue--Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is--she can't have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself.

During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles alongside her fellow initiates to live out the choice they have made. Together they must undergo extreme physical tests of endurance and intense psychological simulations, some with devastating consequences. As initiation transforms them all, Tris must determine who her friends really are--and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes exasperating boy fits into the life she's chosen. But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers unrest and growing conflict that threaten to unravel her seemingly perfect society, Tris also learns that her secret might help her save the ones she loves . . . or it might destroy her.' 

Well that is one mighty big blurb! Let's do this. 

The Mortal Instruments: City of Heavenly Fire - Cassandra Clare - Complete

Wow. Now that was an intense book. Cassandra stepped it up again! This book was so much more gross, action-packed, romantic, hilarious and I really liked the way things were wrapped up for the most part.
I thought the adventure had by the characters I have come to know and love, was incredible and fierce. I love how people I have known since the Infernal Devices were in this book, and even their stories were resolved. Everyone was just kind of wrapped up, and I love that.
Well, almost everyone. There are some young Shadowhunters that definitely have a story! And some Fair Folk who have some serious disdain for what the Clave and Shadowhunters in general have done to them after the War.
This next series is called, The Dark Artifacts. Apparently, Cassandra thought it was time to get me addicted and fall completely in love with a whole new set of characters - these ones still come from the family line we know and love! I just admire how everything in Cassandra's world so seamlessly intertwines and makes perfect sense. She's just thought of every little detail of these books.
This book was very well written and I barely put the book down. The chapters are long, and the book is 733 pages. But I enjoyed every single word of it. This is just one of my most favourite series ever. And definitely some of my favourite book characters ever. She has a way with creating these fictional people that you would give anything for them to exist in reality and that we would love to be friends with.
Thank you for another amazing adventure! Even if it is seemingly the last for Clary, Jace, Alec, Isabelle and Simon, I hope there are more Shadowhunter experiences for me to enjoy! - Who knows, maybe they'll pop up again :D
5/5

The Swiss Family Robinson - Johann David Wyss - Complete (kind of)

OK. Truth be told. I didn't actually "finish" this book. Which goes against all book-worm rules. Usually I cannot help but finish a book, even if I'm confused or not enjoying it immensely. However. This book, this book is an exception to the rule. And I am so OK with that. I've heard such good things about stories like this, and I think I enjoyed the movie when I was younger. But this book, was honestly ridiculous.
There were too many things that bothered me about this book. For one it is repetitive. Secondly it is repetitive. Every single day is the same in these people's lives. I got 11 chapters in, and nothing had actually happened. Something else that I didn't like, at all, was the fact that they just kill things for no good reason. They do not kill these animals for survival, they over-indulge themselves at every turn. If I was trapped on an island, I would be invading their space, I wouldn't be killing them all - for goodness sake, especially not a flock of flamingoes!! They kill anything that moves for no good reason. I was losing interest by the time they had shot a shark thrice in the head, a tiger, a flamingo and injured another, some other birds.. The list goes on!
Maybe it's because I am an animal person, but seriously, no one needs to kill that many animals. Plus. They have chickens. They could survive on that without killing the beautiful, wild, endangered ones purely for enjoyment and then figuring out what they could use it for afterwards.
1/5. Didn't like this one unfortunately. I'll stick with the movie where they live in an awesome tree house thank you.

The Mortal Instruments: City of Heavenly Fire - Cassandra Clare

OH MY GOSH! I AM SO EXCITED!
I feel like I have been waiting for this book for years! (It has been about 10 months of waiting!) And it's finally here!!
This is my favourite series ever so far. I just absolutely adore all the characters. Never have I ever been so obsessed with people who do not exist anywhere but on the page and in my mind! (Well, and now on the screen I suppose with the movie coming out and all).
This book is humongous! It's almost intimidating :P Very beautiful cover once again. I cannot wait to see how this whole things ends! It's been one intense, beautiful, hilarious, romantic, action-packed journey, and now it is ending with this sixth book!

'Sebastian Morgenstern is on the move, systematically turning

Shadowhunter against Shadowhunter. When one of the greatest

betrayals the Nephilim have ever known is revealed, Clary, Jace, 

Isabelle, Simon and Alec mu st flee - even if their journey takes them

deep into the demon realms, where no Shadowhunter has set foot 

before, and from which no human being has ever returned. Love

will be sacrificed and lives lost in the thrilling and long-awaited final

instalment of the bestselling and acclaimed Mortal Instruments.'

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer - Mark Twain - Complete

I have been listening to Tom Sawyer as I have been going to sleep, around ten minutes a night. It wasn't a book that one had to read/hear every single word because it was just a bunch of exciting adventures of a boy named Tom and some of his friends. So it was a good one to fall asleep to.
What I heard, I rather liked. I think this is also one I would love to read to my kids when they exist. I found a lot of it quite funny too! Tom is a very mischievous fellow, and I very much enjoyed his adventures. The ending was interesting. It almost didn't end at all. Which I suppose was very much the point of the author. He said that one can always end a book about a man at marriage, but one doesn't know when to end a book about a boy.  I kind of like that actually. It implies that the boy (or child) in us never really goes away and Tom's boyish adventures may never actually end.
3/5 :)

Mary Poppins - P.L Travers - complete

Sometimes it's hard when something has been made into a movie. Depending on which one you grew up with, the other can never really reach the standard you expect it to. 

The book was good, and I imagine I would love to read it to my children. It had an Alice in Wonderland-like quality to its writing. Simple. Very creative. And you find yourself unable to decipher whether it is real or simply a dream or whether it is both real and imaginative. 

And honestly, I still find it hard to imagine Mary Poppins not being a musical :P I fell in love with the characters in the movie, Bert, Mary Poppins, the children. But in the book, this didn't happen. I wasn't attached in any way to the people it was about. Bert was barely even in it! 

All in all though, I did like it, and I would very much like to read it to my kids when I have them. 

3/5