#LITTLEreadathon | Day #5

September 6, 2014


The #LITTLEreadathon is a low-key week long read-a-thon starting from Monday September 1st. The aim is to get through as many TBR books as possible! Feel free to join in for the entire week or partway. For more information, check out the Little Book Club goodreads group HERE

Day # 5

Currently reading: 
- The Iron Trial by Holly Black & Cassandra Clare


Books completed: 
Stardust by Neil Gaiman
- Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Weis
The Mercenary Sea Vol. 1 by Kel Symons & Mathew Reynolds

Pages read since last update: 209

Total pages read: 708

Thoughts/Notes: Finally, a day where I got a decent amount of reading done! I'm almost through the books I had hoped to read, and this weekend is pretty busy, so I think I'm doing pretty good.

The Mercenary Sea Vol.1 by Kel Symons & Mathew Reynolds

I received this book for free through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Mercenary Sea Volume 1 by Kel Symons & Mathew Reynolds
Series: The Mercenary Sea
Released: September 16th 2014
Pages: 160
Source: Netgalley
Buy it: The Book Depository
     - Free shipping worldwide

Action and adventure set in 1938! The South Seas. Japan has invaded China. War in Europe is imminent. Ex-bootlegger Jack Harper captains the Venture, a refitted German U-Boat, with a crew of expats, mercenaries, and treasure hunters. They do whatever it takes to stay afloat, often running up against pirates, headhunters, and spies. Jack is always one step away from the greatest score of their lives: finding the legendary lost island of Koji Ra.

This trade paperback collects issues #1-6 of the critically acclaimed series, as Jack and the crew of the submarine Venture take a job offered by a shady American operative: rescue a British agent trapped behind enemy lines who has valuable information about the Japanese war effort.


The Mercenary Sea Vol. 1 is a promising start to what I hope turns out to be a really thrilling and exciting series. While overall I enjoyed this first volume, I feel like it has the potential to be so much more.

I didn’t quite find myself wholly invested in the story and the characters. Some of the scenes seem a bit rushed, and I would have liked to spend more time getting to know the characters. This does of course need to happen over time especially as we see each character develop and grow, but I didn’t find myself connecting with any of them until the last few pages of the volume. I would have liked to learn more earlier on as I often found myself forgetting who was who and whether they were allies or enemies.

That being said, I did enjoy the amount of action that came along with being thrust right into the story without the setup slowing down the pace. I loved how the combat scenes were executed - they were quite gripping in how fast paced they were, but also visually they were stunning and explosive.

Continuing on with the visual aspects of The Mercenary Sea, I absolutely adored the illustration style. In the absence of outlines, bold and contrasting colours created detail. The panels I found the most stunning were those with silhouettes - different shades were used in order to portray depth of field, but often these muted palettes were contrasted against a gradient of vibrant colours in the background. I couldn’t help but stop and admire them.

I’m really excited to see more of the story and the characters. It has such an intriguing premise, and with the dynamic between some of the characters, I’m sure there will be some amusing, awkward and/or hilarious scenes to come.


August Wrap Up | 2014

September 5, 2014

Thanks to the Bout of Books 11.0 read-a-thon, I was able to get a pretty good chunk of reading done! My TBR is continuing to grow, especially with uni, however...


*****

Reviews
Where Things Come Back by John Corey Whaley
- Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk (video review)

Additions to Reading Challenges
Peter Pan - Classics Challenge
Circle of Blood - Manga/Graphic Novel Challenge




Books Acquired:
- The Wolf's Story by Toby Forward and Izhar Cohen
- Beware of the Storybook Wolves by Lauren Child
- Pookie Aleera is Not My Boyfriend by Steven Herrick
- The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett
- Stardust by Neil Gaiman
- The Fire Eaters by David Almond
- Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve
- The Red Shoe by Ursula Dubosarsky
- Saree by Su Dharmapala
- Still Alice by Lisa Genova
- Combustion by Steve Worland
- Akin by Robin Murarka
- Adventure Time: Candy Capers by Yuko Ota, Ananth Panagariya & Ian McGinty
- A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
- Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie
- Elephant's on Acid by Alex Boese
- The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan
- The Iron Trial by Holly Black and Cassandra Clare
- The Assassin's Blade by Sarah J. Maas
- Prodigy by Marie Lu
- Champion by Marie Lu
- Clockwork Prince by Cassandra Clare
- Clockwork Princess by Cassandra Clare
- The Unbound by Victoria Schwab
- Hollow City by Ransom Riggs
- Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi
- The One by Keira Cass



Books Read:
- Endgame by James Frey & Nils Johnson-Shelton
- The Wolf's Story by Toby Forward and Izhar Cohen
- Beware of the Storybook Wolves by Lauren Child
- We Were Liars by E. Lockhart
- The Vanishing Game by Katie Kae Meyers
- Pookie Aleera is Not My Boyfriend by Steven Herrick
- The Night is For Hunting by John Marsden
- The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett
- Circle of Blood by David Mack
- Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie
- Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

/In Progress/
- Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm
Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke
- Furies of Calderon by Jim Butcher
- Seraphina by Rachel Hartman
- Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein
- Stardust by Neil Gaiman

September TBR:
- The Fire Eaters by David Almond
- Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve
- The Red Shoe by Ursula Dubosarsky
- The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan
- The Iron Trial by Holly Black and Cassandra Clare
- Obsidian by Jennifer L. Armentrout

#LITTLEreadathon | Day #4


The #LITTLEreadathon is a low-key week long read-a-thon starting from Monday September 1st. The aim is to get through as many TBR books as possible! Feel free to join in for the entire week or partway. For more information, check out the Little Book Club goodreads group HERE

Day # 4

Currently reading: 
- The Iron Trial by Holly Black & Cassandra Clare
- The Mercenary Sea Vol. 1 by Kel Symons & Mathew Reynolds

Books completed: 
Stardust by Neil Gaiman
- Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Weis

Pages read since last update: 153

Total pages read: 499

Thoughts/Notes: I started a graphic novel, kind of by accident, but I'm enjoying it! Past the halfway point now :S

The Empress Chronicles Release Day

Published by Diversion Books

The Empress Chronicles by Suzy Vitello
Publication Date: September 4th 2014
Buy the Book:
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iBooks | Kobo
In this dazzling first book in the EMPRESS CHRONICLES series by the author of THE MOMENT BEFORE, one courageous girl seeks keys to the past to unlock the future…

When city girl Liz is banished to a rural goat farm on the outskirts of Portland, the 15-year-old feels her life spiraling out of control.  She can’t connect to her father or his young girlfriend, and past trauma adds to her sense of upheaval.  The only person who seems to keep her sane is a troubled boy who is fighting his own demons.  But all of this changes in one historical instant.

One-hundred fifty years earlier, Elisabeth of Bavaria has troubles of her own.  Her childhood is coming to a crashing end, and her destiny is written in the form of a soothsaying locket that has the ability to predict true love.  But evil is afoot in the form of a wicked enchantress who connives to wield the power of the locket for her own destructive ends.

When Liz finds a timeworn diary, and within it a locket, she discovers the secrets and desires of the young Bavarian princess who will one day grow up to be the legendary Empress of Austria. It is in the pages of the diary that these two heroines will meet, and it is through their interwoven story that Liz will discover she has the power to rewrite history—including her own…




Nina Lemay About the Author
Suzy Vitello is a proud founding member of a critique group recently dubbed The Hottest Writing Group in Portland, and her short stories have won fellowships and prizes (including the Atlantic Monthly Student Writing Award, and an Oregon Literary Arts Fellowship).

suzyvitello.com | goodreads.com/suzyvitello | facebook.com/SuzyVitelloBooks | twitter.com/suzy_vitello



#LITTLEreadathon | Day #3

September 4, 2014


The #LITTLEreadathon is a low-key week long read-a-thon starting from Monday September 1st. The aim is to get through as many TBR books as possible! Feel free to join in for the entire week or partway. For more information, check out the Little Book Club goodreads group HERE

Day # 3

Currently reading: 
- The Iron Trial by Holly Black & Cassandra Clare

Books completed: 
Stardust by Neil Gaiman
- Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Weis

Pages read since last update: 64

Total pages read: 346

Thoughts/Notes: Super slow day... what can I say ;)

#LITTLEreadathon | Day #2

September 3, 2014


The #LITTLEreadathon is a low-key week long read-a-thon starting from Monday September 1st. The aim is to get through as many TBR books as possible! Feel free to join in for the entire week or partway. For more information, check out the Little Book Club goodreads group HERE

Day # 2

Currently reading: 
- The Iron Trial by Holly Black & Cassandra Clare

Books completed: 
Stardust by Neil Gaiman
- Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Weis

Pages read since last update: 182

Total pages read: 282

Thoughts/Notes: I managed to finish of two books today - yay! Progress! I am about to start my third book, which I am really excited about. Hopefully I can also fly through it and make a dent in my humongous TBR pile for this month :S

#LITTLEreadathon | Day #1

September 2, 2014


The #LITTLEreadathon is a low-key week long read-a-thon starting from Monday September 1st. The aim is to get through as many TBR books as possible! Feel free to join in for the entire week or partway. For more information, check out the Little Book Club goodreads group HERE

Day # 1

Currently reading: 
- Stardust by Neil Gaiman

Books completed: 
- none - 

Pages read since last update: 100

Total pages read: 100

Thoughts/Notes: A reasonable amount of reading today, and I think most of the week will be around the same due to my schedule, but hopefully I can power through some books when I get the chance!

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