So I realised something this month and it was I read only one book on this TBR and that was City of Bones by Cassandra Clare. What I am going to do going forward is to not pick books for the prompts as I am a mood reader and just see if anything I am currently reading fits the prompts.
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Book Review
Title: The Bane Chronicles: Vampires, Scones and Edmund Herondale
Author: Cassandra Clare & Sarah Rees Brennan
Genre: YA/Paranormal/Fantasy/Romance
Rating: *****
Review: I loved both What Really Happened in Peru and The Runaway Queen, the first two stories in the Bane Chronicles and this story takes place in 1857 in Victorian London. Magnus is recovering from the events in France and is harbouring quite the grudge against vampires, that is until he meets the lovely Lady Camille Belcourt who is also attending to Consul to discuss peace accords with many other Downworlders. Here we get see some names we are familiar with like Morgenstern and Fairchild.
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Book Review
Title: The Bane Chronicles: The Runaway Queen
Author: Cassandra Clare & Maureen Johnson
Genre: YA/Paranormal/Fantasy/Romance
Rating: *****
Review: Where What Really Happened in Peru took place in 1791 in Peru, this story takes place in the same year but in Paris. The Runaway Queen sees Magnus in Paris around the time the French Revolution was taking place and he seems to be doing quite well despite the fact that Paris is a home of many vampires, some of whom have their eyes on Magnus like Saint Cloud who invites Magnus to a party and he can’t refuse the invitation. However, in the time meaning Magnus is visited by a man called Axel asking for his help in getting the royal family safely out of Paris and Magnus agrees.
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Book Review
Title: The Bane Chronicles: What Really Happened in Peru
Author: Cassandra Clare & Sarah Rees Brennan
Genre: YA/Paranormal/Fantasy/Romance
Rating: ****
Review: After re-reading City of Bones and changing my rating for the better I have decided to reread the series in chronologically order in terms of the story. This means I will be reading the first 3 stories in The Bane Chronicles then The Infernal Devices trilogy, but I am going to review the short stories individually as I read them. I am really excited to read these stories since Magnus is one of my favourite characters in the whole series and he constantly reappeared throughout the timeline.
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Book Review
Title: City of Bones (The Mortal Instruments #1)
Author: Cassandra Clare
Genre: YA/Paranormal/Romance
Rating: ****
Review: I read the full Mortal Instruments series years ago and I didn’t love it but I didn’t hate it either, it was pretty meh for me. I went on to read the first book in the Infernal Devices and didn’t like it and DNF’d the second and I haven’t read anything by Cassandra Clare since because all her books are set in the same universe. However, this is my last chance read meaning this is the last chance for me to change my mind on the book and/or author, if TMI doesn’t vibe with me this time I will not be reading anything more by Cassandra Clare. The opening chapter was interesting to be fair as we see Clary and Simon going to a club called Pandemonium where Clary witnesses a murder but it is clear to her that only she can see and speak to the people responsible as Simon and the bouncers can’t see them. I was surprised that Jace, Isabelle and Alec didn’t cart her off straight away when they realised that Clary could see them but they let her go and she heads home with Simon troubled by the events of the night but unable to do anything about it. I was also surprised that there was a mention of Valentine so early on in the series, since Valentine plays a large part in the latter half of the series. After the events at the club, Clary’s mother wants to take her on vacation for the rest of the summer which doesn’t sit well with the 15 year old Clary but Luke, her mother’s friend has a strange conversation telling Jocelyn to tell Clary about something and mentions someone called Magnus.
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Book Review
Title: The Midnight Library
Author: Matt Haig
Genre: Literary Fiction/Contemporary
Rating: *****
Review: I haven’t read anything by Matt Haig in the past, but I have heard nothing but good things about The Midnight Library and I decided to give it a go. We are introduced to Nora Seed, first as a teenager where she has just quit swimming which she was extremely good at and is pondering on her life, specifically the life she is going to live. We then jump forward to when Nora is 35 and witness the events that led her to decide that she is going to take her own life. This process starts with the death of her cat, Volts which spirals into her losing her job and her part-time piano tutoring job and she begins to realise how she isn’t needed by the people around her. We also learn that Nora has had the opportunity to do a lot with her life and ran away from them. She could have been an Olympic swimmer and ran because of the pressure, the band she had with her brother was offered a record contract and she ran away from it, she even ran from the opportunity of having a husband and family which had led to where she is now as she leaves her brother a voicemail and writes a suicide note before taking her life.
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Book Review
Title: Randomize (Part 6 in the Forward Collection)
Author: Andy Weir
Genre: YA/Sci-Fi/Short Story
Rating: *****
Review: I haven’t read anything by Andy Weir before despite having both The Martian and Artemis on my bookshelf and requesting Hail Mary on NetGalley, but I am hoping I like his writing style in this short story. Randomize is the final story in the Forward Collection and centres around Vegas casino games being completely scam proof in the future and it may include a heist aspect to it as well. The protagonist is an IT genius who is enlisted to upgrade the security for the game of keno and its random number generator but not everything is as it seems.
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Book Review
Title: The Last Conversation (Part 5 in the Forward Collection)
Author: Paul Trembley
Genre: YA/Sci-Fi/Short Story
Rating: ***
Review: The Last Conversation is the last but one short story in the Forward Collection and while it was interesting, I didn’t enjoy it as much as have with other stories in this collection. It follows a nameless protagonist as awake with no memory of who they were before awakening in a lot of pain. There is a disembodied voice of Dr. Kuhn or Anne as the protagonist comes to know her. Anne explains that it is her job to help the protagonist get back into shape as they have been asleep for a long time and help them recover their memories.
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Book Review
Title: You Have Arrived at Your Destination (Part 4 in the Forward Collection)
Author: Amor Towles
Genre: YA/Sci-Fi/Short Story
Rating: ****
Review: This is first story in the Forward Collection that I am not giving five stars. I have a specific reason for this and it is that the whole story felt a bit disjointed and you couldn’t really figure out what was going on. You Have Arrived at Your Destination follows Sam and his wife, who are considering using a new fertility lab, Vitek to conceive a child. Vitek doesn’t just deal with the physical aspects of IVF but allows parents to pick their child’s personality as well.
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Book Review
Title: Emergency Skin (Part 3 in the Forward Collection)
Author: N. K. Jemisin
Genre: YA/Sci-Fi/Short Story
Rating: *****
Review: I have never read anything by N. K. Jemisin but I have a lot of books by this author on my TBR right now so I am hoping that Emergency Skin will give me an introduction to the writing style the author uses to see if I like it before committing to larger series. Emergency Skin is about an explorer who returns to an Earth than has been ravaged by climate change but receives several warnings about what might be found on Earth.
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