Book Haul | July 2016

So I bought some more books. Did I need them? Probably not. Do I have space for them? Not really. So why did I buy them? I had an Amazon voucher and they are very pretty. I feel like those are the only justifications needed. My mum constantly moans at me when I buy books or clothes which is when I try and remind her that she is lucky her daughter would rather buy books, clothes or pretty stationary rather than alcohol at pubs and clubs. She has yet to see this is a valid point but we'll get there, especially when there are A LOT of books on my wishlist. For now though I have six more books to add to my collection.

The first book added to my basket was The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. I technically already own this book on my Kindle but it is most definitely one of my favourite books so I just had to have a physical copy to display on my shelf too! The Book Thief is quite well known because of the film that was made but for those of you who haven't heard of it... go out and get yourself a copy asap. It is set in 1939 Germany, during the height of the Nazi hierarchy. The book is narrated by death and follows nine year old Liesel as her parents are sent to a concentration camp and she is sent to live with a foster family where Liesel uses books as her coping mechanism. This book is beautifully and cleverly written and I would recommend it to anyone.

The second book added to my basket was actually because of Zoe Sugg's video about her WH Smith Book Club Picks. She mentioned Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell in her video amongst numerous others. I already own one of the other books she mentioned in her video (All The Bright Places by Jennifer Niven) and all the other books she spoke about weren't really for me; I don't tend to enjoy books about love and relationships. However, Fangirl caught my fancy. I am excited to read this book as it follows twin girls, Wren and Cath, as they head off to university. Wren is the more outgoing one who wants to embrace the student life and go to parties, meet boys and let her hair down whereas Cath likes to keep to herself and write but is slowly opening herself up to new experiences. I was initially drawn to this book because of Cath's character as I feel like I am very similar, hence the reason why I'm looking forward to reading it.

The Art of Being Normal by Lisa Williamson is about a transgender boy called David who is desperate to keep his secret and be a 'normal' kid at high school. I was immediately drawn to this book as I haven't really came across any books with a transgender story line before and as a psychology graduate and a person who views people as people regardless of gender, religion or sexuality, I thought it would be an interesting read. Hopefully it will provide people with more knowledge and understanding of the topic so that others do not have to live in fear. The book also has a hashtag that can be used on Twitter to go along with the story which I like a lot, #WhatIsNormal. I love this message because it is so incredibly true, no person is the same as another and that is an incredibly positive thing that isn't shown or embraced as much as it should be within society.

The fouth book I purchased was actually in the recommended section on Amazon and I am not going to deny the fact that I clicked for more information because of the pretty cover and strange name. The Smell of Other People's Houses by Bonnie-Sue Hitchcock is set in Alaska in 1970 and follows four people experiencing difficulties in their lives. Ruth wants to be remembered, Dora wishes to be invisible, Alyce wants to leave but can't summon the courage and Hank is running away. I have read books before that are narrated by different protagonists and I quite enjoyed them so I'm looking forward to making my way through this one too.

The last two books I purchased were also in the recommended section on Amazon and are both by the same author, Ruta Sepetys. Between Shades of Gray explores the life of Lina, her mother and her brother as Soviet guards rip them from their home and everything they know and love and deport them to Siberia. Lina doesn't know if she will ever see her friends or the rest of her family again but she refuses to give up hope. Salt to the Sea is also set in Germany during the war and is narrated by four protagonists. Each of them come from different lands, each of them are effected by devastation and war and each of them are hoping to board a ship that promises safety, security and freedom; The Wilhelm Gustloff. Both of these books sound incredible and appear to have similar themes to The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini (which is one of my all time favourite books); destruction, survival and strength. Based on that alone, I think I am going to really like these books.

I am really looking forward to working my way through these books. They all sound so good! I am being kept fairly busy at the moment between my first aiding and work but hopefully I can find some time here and there to delve into them. No doubt at least one of these books will end up in a monthly favourites at some point or I might even write a Book Review on the ones I really like. Let me know if you have read any of these books or if there are others you would recommend that you loved and think I might like!

xxx 

Childhood Favourites: Books :)

I haven't posted as much as I would have liked to this month, I've just been extremely busy with university and volunteering. To make up for the lack of blog posts, I am going to do a double post today. As a child I read a lot. I would devour book after book. I remember at primary school we had fortnightly trips to the library which I loved, but it wasn't enough, so my mum would take me to the library every other week as well. Another thing I remember from primary school is that when we had finished a book, we would have to fill out a fun book report sheet and put them in our folders (to try and encourage reading), most of the children in my class would fill out maybe one of these fun report sheets a week but I was nearly filling out one a day! I have always loved to read and still do and I thought that I blog post on what I used to love reading would be perfect!

 

 

Early Childhood

 

My mum would read to both me and my brother every day and night before bed and we both absolutely loved it. When we were really young, the go-to books were almost always the Walt Disney Ladybird Classics (top right). Every single book in that collection was owned by us and had it's own place in our rooms on our bookshelves. Because of this, my parents created a personalised Disney book for me, The Little Mermaid starring myself, Stephanie and Sarah (friends at the time) and Stuart received a Batman version. As I grew older and learned to read myself, I would read the books to my brother and we would make up our own versions of the stories. Winnie the Pooh and Beatrix Potter both had there place in everyone's childhood, for me that place was at my nana's house on her big armchair or in the spare bedroom when I would stay the night. She would read me the stories of Peter Rabbit and Winnie and then I would fall asleep to the accompanying VHS tape. I remember opening the Alice in Wonderland Jigsaw Book one Christmas and instantly going for the pages with the Jigsaws on them and completely forgetting about the story itself. I absolutely loved Barbie when I was little and when my mum gave me the Barbie as Rapunzel book, I carried it almost everywhere with me for around a month, I must have read the book at least twenty times!

 

Mid Childhood

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I could read before I went to school, so when I did go to school and we had fortnightly public library trips, our own school library and bookshelves in each classroom, I absolutely loved it. I had a pretty rough time in primary school so reading became my way to escape. Animal books where a particular favourite and I had plenty of them! The Animal Ark, Puppy Patrol, Twins at St Clare's and Sheltie the Shetland Pony Series kept me occupied for hours at a time, I would finish a story a day with these books and often had audiobooks of them to listen to as well. My Secret Unicorn series was one of my all-time favourites which is why I still own all the books in the series to pass on to a child of mine in the future. One of the things that I loved the most about this series was the fact that the main character who owned a the horse that turned into the unicorn at night was called Lauren. The first time I read Ballet Shoes, I was about 7 and it took me quite a long time to read because the writing was so small and it was a good couple of hundred pages long but when I did eventually finish it, I loved it and became obsessed with Ballet as a result. It quickly became one of my favourite books and still is to this day.

 Later Childhood

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I found the transition to high school quite difficult so reading was still my way primary way of escape. Television and writing also became ways of escape. Besides Harry Potter, Jacqueline Wilson was a must have for pretty much all pre-teens and teenagers. I own all the Jacqueline Wilson books and would often stay up all night finishing her books. I remember when I bought my first three books of hers in a shop in the local shopping centre; Dustbin Baby, The Illustrated Mum and Secrets, I had saved my money up for three weeks. Those books where quite lengthy but nevertheless finished within five days of purchasing them. The only thing I really liked about high school at first was the size of the library and the variation of books it contained. I started reading different genre's of books including fantasy. The Inheritance Cycle in hardback is one of the best purchases I ever made, the books are amazing and don't really have an age limit. It took me a whole month to read Eragon (the first book in the series) when I was twelve but it was most definitely worth it and certainly didn't put me off reading the other books in the series. I would recommend this series to absolutely anybody even if you might not think it is your preferred type of book. The Darren Shan Series was also a childhood classic for me. Images of me reading these books on a beach in Spain comes to mind and I read six of the twelve books whilst on a family holiday. These books where originally my brothers but he wasn't reading them so I thought I would. They have just the right amount of adventure and horror in them to make them very enjoyable to read and gripping from start to finish. Another genre that I began to read was crime and young adult. Catherine MacPhail books occupied quite a bit of my bookshelf when I was about 13 and I was lucky enough to meet her and for her to sign my favourite book of hers; Roxy's Baby. It has quite a sinister story line involving a pregnant teenager but was gripping from beginning to end and I read the book in one sitting. Quite a lot of the books I read from the ages of 12-14/15 involved teenage pregnancy when I think back, what can I say, I was a unique child.

 

 

I hope you have enjoyed the first in hopefully a series of Childhood Favourites blog posts in the future. Thanks for reading and I'll have more blog posts up soon xxx