An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir

Rating: 4 Stars 


Summary: Laia is out on her own after the Masks set her house on fire, killing her grandparents and her brother ending up in jail. Elias is a day away from graduating and becoming a Mask, and the hopefully successfully running away. When Laia strucks up a deal to get her brother out of jail by being a spy as a slave at the Mask school their lives intertwine. 

This is what I needed. The can stop reading you look up and it 5 in the morning kind of read. The edge of your seat can't tear your eyes away read. The blinking through your tears and snatching them away quickly so you can read on. The hitch in your breath when you think predicted something bad will happens. The stop in your breath when something bad happened.  

Pros: Kept me engaged from the beginning, a great set up for the following books. Plot and storyline great. 

Cons: World building could've been better and the dialogue sometimes got long, speech and peachy and cheesy. I would find myself zoning out and skipping. Most characters weren't that fleshed out.

Great read. Great set up. Would recommend to people who liked the Legend Series by Marie Lu and The Throne of Glass Series by Sarah J. Maas or just fans of dystopians. 

Everybody Sees the Ants by A.S. King

3.5 Stars

Summary: Lucky is being bullied while his dreams are haunted by his POW Grandfather.

I read this a while ago and forgot to log it so this one is gonna be quick.

Pros: Feminist plays about vaginas, King's writing, funny

Cons:  annoying main character, not interesting magical realism,

I may add to this later.

Overall it was a pretty good read but not A.S. King's best. I have reviews fro every book of her's that I've read and I'll list them from best to worst. Glory O'Brien's History of the Future, Ask the Passengers, Everybody Sees the Ants, and Please Ignore Vera Dietz .

I Was Here by Gayle Forman

Rating: 3.5 stars

Summary: Everything changed when Cody's best friend killed herself. It changed when Meg swallowed a bottle of industrial strength poison in a motel room next to a 50 dollar tip fro the maid. When Meg's parents sent Cody to Tacoma to pick up Meg's stuff. After Cody met Meg's college friends and roommates. And when Meg's death gets turned upside down all the while Cody is falling for one of Meg's friend. 

It was average. The characters didn't stand out to me, the plot and mystery not as surprisings or out there as I wanted, and the writing not that great. It seemed mostly a reflection on suicide, which is great, but that wasn't what I wanted. I didn't really want to read this in the first place, as I feel like I've read so many books about it. There was also a section of online chatting I had to skim through because they were kinda triggering me. The characters were kinda flat and the romance unbelievable.  I It wasn't exactly insta love. It was we've known each other for an appropriate amount of time but I've never indicated the I love you but now I'm suddenly confessing my love for you - love.


tl;dr Okay read. Entertaining. Would recommend the other Gayle Forman books first.  

The Wrath and The Dawn by Renee Ahdieh

Rating: 4.5 Stars

Summary: In a country where the young king marries a new girl everyday and then kills her the next morning Shahrzad wants revenge. After her best friend is victim to the king she volunteers herself as the next queen.
...

How am I suppose to go in with my life after that ending? 

How could Renee do this??? 

I'm so confused right now I have no idea what that ending was please send help. 

...

Okay, now with some sleep I may be able to piece together some thoughts. I liked The Wrath and The Dawn. I really, really, liked it. It was a 3rd person narration with switching focus of the character. After a while the sub plots would get annoying because I would just want Shazi's and I didn't care about anything else. The writing was beautiful and Shazi would tell stories, which were also great. The world building and magical elements in the book were really good too. Every character was so complex and great and wonderful and ohmigosh I love Khalid so much I might cry. My opinions and feelings of the King were so up and down it hurt, as was Shazi.

My only complaint was, even though I love the couple so so so much, it did seem a little insta-love-y but even by the end of the book, to me, it seemed they still didn't really know each other. I did love how they fought like a real couples (and more than once) , something most YA couples do. 

Read this now. Do yourself this favor. Please.

Me And Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews

Rating: 4 stars, 75/100

                                          

Summary: Greg is in his senior year and instead of being in a clique he chooses to be "friendly" with each of them and subsequently doesn't have any friends. When a fellow student, Rachel is diagnosed with leukemia Greg's mother forces him to hang out with her. This is the story of him, his coworker, Earl and the dying girl, Rachel fucking around and Greg being an all around ass hole. 

When I first finished this book I had good thoughts around it but now, a couple days later, its kinda angering Mr. Greg, was an annoying, problematic asshole. I'm not sure how much of that was the author's intent and how much of that was the author. All I'd heard about his book before reading it was that it was hilarious, but honestly I didn't think it was that funny.  Except fro Earl who cracked me up and one scene with Vietnamese food. The oh-this-isn't-your-usual-young-adult-book got annoying after the 10th time. There's a random conversation that's just pure biphobia and it doesn't fit in with the character at all. I think it was suppose to be a funny reflection on teenagers or to have the characters be  more 'real' or 'raw' but it was just untasteful. However I did enjoy how chill the writing was and there's a whole chapter that just in bullet points which i liked.

tl;dr: Kinda funny and entertaining but you gotta deal with asshole narrator

Never Always Sometimes by Adi Alsaid

Rating: 4 Stars
Summary: Dave and Julie are best friends. Their freshman year they made a list of all the high school cliches they would never do. A few month before graduation they find the list again and decide to do them all, especially rule number 7, Do not fall in love with your best friend. 

The last few books I've read haven't been outstandingly bad or outstandingly good. They've all been in that weird middle ground where I don't regret reading it at all, but I'm not like crying over how beautiful it is or no being able to sleep because Jessica Fictional Character might do this or that or... Maybe its because I've been reading romantic contemporary and i need to get back in my warm bed of science fiction fantasy...

Anyways, as you might've guessed Never Always Sometimes was mediocre. I enjoyed his other book, Let's Get Lost, a lot more. This one was slightly predicable, about thankfully didn't follow the typical romance book plot. I think the biggest thing that didn't make this book stand out to me was the characters. I didn't root for them, they were annoying and didn't have much depth to them. The writing sometimes seemed that there were holes in description/ narration and always left me a little distant from the book. It was difficult to fully engage myself in the book as well.

Overall, it was an okay read that was actually pretty funny. It's an fun, summer read that doesn't follow the usual romance book plot point but has lackluster characters.

Emmy and Oliver by Robin Benway

Rating:4 Stars

Summary: When they were seven Emmy's best friend Oliver was kidnapped by his father. 10 years later Oliver is found and brought back to southern California and everyone must readjust. (It's the TV show Finding Carter but a book).

I really enjoyed this. I start most of my reviews this way, I apologize. The characters were great, the plot steady and overall very very cute. I really related with how Emmy's parents treated her, as something similar happened to my parents. It was more then the usual surface level typical love story as well.

Overall great read, very relateable, very cute would recommend.

Saint Anything by Sarah Dessen

Rating: 3.5 Stars
Summary: Sydeny lives in the shadow of her brother. When she is greeted with open arms by a new family she starts to feel the sun.

I've read every single Sarah Dessen book out there. They re my guilty pleasure I'm not so guilty about. I was disappointed in her last book she released, but  it seems shes getting back on track with this one. It was definitely better than the last one she wrote, To The Moon And Back, but its not as good as her earlier books.

Overall this book didn't stand out to me in any way, the plot predictable the charters ordinary, but it was still an enjoyable read.

The Five Stages of Andrew Brawley by Shaun Hutchinson

Rating: 3.5 Stars 
    Andrew Brawley killed his family and then hid. At night he sleeps in a abandoned part of the hospital where his family died and during the day wonders around with lies as excuses for being there. Then, he meets a boy and people start to get suspicious. 
      Really can't remember much about my feelings for this book. I've had this tab open for like a month now. Wow this is such a great review. It made me think deeply about my mortality though, that wasn't very nice. The writing wasn't the greatest either. I should leave. No one is reading this anyway. 

Tell Me Again How A Crush Should Feel by Sara Farizan

Rating: 3 Stars
Leila is a Iranian american high school student lesbian. Thankfully, she has gone through high school without crushing on any girls. That is, until Saskia shows up.

Tell Me Again How A Crush Should Feel  at first glance I thought was a good read but then I realized it felt like this book was written for a 12 year old. I liked the characters and it was surprisingly entertaining.  The story was also slow and I wish it had more depth. My major complaint with this book though is, Leila the main character is on the, as they said, theater tech crew, and I, as some body who is also on theater tech crew, was just cringing a lot by how wrong the author got it.

Overall, this book was an okay story with okay writing.