Hello everybody, my name is Cara, and today I'm here with my August Wrap Up. I have a
lot of books to talk about, so grab a snack you guys *laughs*. I will link my TBR for
all of the readathons I was participating in so you can get more info on the challenges
and the hosts and all of that. So going in the order of the NEWTs Readathon challenges
[b/c all of the books I read count for those, whether or not I doubled them up w/other readathons.]
An A in Arithmancy was to read a book of at least 300 pages and I read The Truth Commission
by Susan Juby. This is actually a recommendation from Kathleen at worthathousandwords and I
loved this book so much. Our main character has an older sister who does this kind of
series of graphic novels that are based around her family. And they're incredibly unflattering,
even cruel, but she's made a lot of money, she's become famous. And the plot of the book
starts when Normandy, our main character, so NOT the sister who does the graphic novels,
decides with her friends to kind of take on this truth-telling project. And that leads
to a lot of secrets that they don't know what to do with and then her sisters' graphic novel
kind of business or inspiration gets tangled up in that. And again it is so hard to describe
this plot, but there's a lot of discussion of truth and how that informs art and how
the two overlap and this was just such a brilliant book. I absolutely loved Normandy's voice,
like it was just so much fun being in her head 'cause she was so clever and funny and
I loved the setting of this weird arts-focused high school in Canada. And I actually feel
like the author did an amazing job of like balancing the believability with the cleverness
of it. So many great things about friendship and family and art, again, and just--I--please
go and read this book, it was so good and it kind of blew my mind a little bit and I
gave it 5 stars. For an A in Astronomy you were supposed to read a book with stars on
the cover and I actually did a reread of A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle. This
is the first book in the Wrinkle in Time Quartet or Quintet, depending on how you count it,
and I think a lot of people know the story for this one but it's about Meg Murray and
she goes on a journey with her brother Charles Wallace and sort of a friend of theirs named
Calvin, to try and get her father back and they kind of end up on this big adventure
along the way to kind of fight the forces of darkness in the universe. I really liked
this book, I liked it when I was younger and I like it a--I still like it now, I feel like
there are certain aspects of it I can actually appreciate even better now; I know some people
feel like the themes of this book are too obvious but personally I don't mind that?
I don't mind in books if there's a very clear theme or like throughline or message as long
as you actually show it to me in the plot and in the characters rather than just telling
it to me in the narration over and over. This book is definitely not perfect, you can tell
that it was written many years ago because some of the language used is definitely not
something we would use today, like I believe there are some derogatory words about mentally
challenged people if I'm correct but in almost all cases I think those were challenged or
it was clear that we were not supposed to go along with that description but that's
just something to keep in mind. And finally I would have liked for Meg to be a little
more active for more of the story. Like she definitely was active at the end and I really
like that, but I just wish that she had done a little bit more earlier on, I think, but
other than that I really enjoyed this one and I gave it 4 stars. For an Acceptable in
Care of Magical Creatures you had to read a book with an animal on the cover. And I
read The Stone Girl's Story by Sarah Beth Durst. This book is about a girl who's--who's
carved out of stone. She was created by a human man as kind of like his child and he
created a bunch of other animals made out of stone as well but at this point this human
man has died many years ago and she and these animals just kind of live in harmony by themselves.
But now their markings that kind of keep them alive and that have enchanted them in order
to walk around and talk and do all these other things, are starting to fade, and the--some
of the animals are starting to basically die and she decides that she has to go to a city
and find a magical stone carver in order to rescue her family and to save everyone she
cares about. This was a really lovely story, I really liked the world, I really liked the
way that storytelling and the power of stories and of how we can make them our own, I really
like how that was a part of the plot and the magic but also kind of the bigger message.
This is definitely not a book for you if you don't like strong messages in your books,
kind of like what I was saying for the--A Wrinkle in Time, because this one is definitely--like
it's very clear that it's saying things about art and storytelling, but I actually enjoyed
that. I really liked Mayka our main character, I really loved some of the side characters.
One of my only critiques is--and I don't know exactly how to say this but there were some
places in the book where I felt like we were just kind of marking time almost? Like it
felt like something should have already happened and it hadn't yet. It wasn't boring exactly,
and it wasn't like the pacing was off, but there were just some gaps I think where I
felt like we should have been doing something, if that makes any sense. But I did really
enjoy it and the ending of this book got really emotional for me in a way that I was not expecting
so I definitely highly recommend this one. For an E you were supposed to read a book
under 160 pages, and I read the play Red by John Logan. This is about the life of the
artist Rothko and he gets this assistant and it's kind of about their two lives sort of
and how they, I don't know, how they interconnect and of course along the way there is a lot
of discussion about the importance of art and about what kinds of art are worthwhile
and which kinds aren't, and things like that. Um. This was an okay play. I felt like a big
chunk of it was extremely pretentious, and to an extent I think it was supposed to be,
and that did get better near the end of the play because the characters themselves started
to recognize *laughs* how pretentious they were being. I don't know, I didn't love it,
there were some great passages. This one felt like a like talk-piece on art itself, with
some character stuff thrown in. And there was also some things about the um, the assistant
character, I can't even remember his name now, there were some things about his life
that I thought were kind of weird [and unnecessary.] Some of the symbolism I thought was done really
well, some of it just got over-the-top...it was fine, I gave it 3 stars. For an A in Charms
you had to read a book with magic in it. And for that one I reread a short story collection
that I haven't read in many years and that was Book of Enchantments: Ten Tales of Wonder
by Patricia C. Wrede. I have a full non-spoiler review where I kind of go [briefly] in-depth
on these stories, so I will link that down below. And I just really loved this, I loved
it so much more than I thought and this is coming from someone who's not a fan of short
story collections in general. For an E you were supposed to read a book with a cover
that charmed you, in other words you would read but without knowing more about it, so
kind of a cover buy. And I don't do this very often but one of the only ones that applied
was A Nearer Moon by Melanie Crowder. This was really disappointing for me. It's about
a young girl whose sister gets very sick from this infected kind of magical swamp that her
and her village live on and this--this sickness is always fatal so she decides to try and
do everything she can to find some way to save her sister's life. And we kinda get like
dual stories because there's also this story of a fairy character and kind of what happens
with her and her sister and I just like--this book just didn't work for me. The writing
style I found really just kind of annoying. I think it was trying to be very lyrical and
beautiful but it just got--everything just got bogged down in so much detail. I found
the characters just hard to connect with, I didn't really like the plot of the story,
and I found some of the character motivations really frustrating and unbelievable. I did
end up giving it a 3 stars, it was going to be a 2.5, but there were some things about
the ending that I did like and that I think helped make the story a little better, but
honestly it probably is more of a 2.5, I haven't decided. For O you had to read a book that
you think will leave a mark and I read The Abolition of Man by C. S. Lewis. We actually
read an excerpt from this in one of my high school classes and I was really really interested
and impressed by it. So this is kind of nonfiction or essays, basically I feel like this is arguing
against moral relativism, like "oh we can never judge that something is wrong because
what's right for one group of people may be wrong for another and vice versa, like we
shouldn't judge." I feel like this collection among a lot of other things, it really refutes
that in I think a very convincing way. I think C.S. Lewis writes brilliantly, actually my
favorite part of this, 'cause it's sort of like 3 mini-essays that are definitely connected,
my favorite was the first kind of section that was called "Men Without Chests." And
it's--it's so powerful and interesting because it talks about things having intrinsic value
outside of just how people view them. I'm not sure I'm describing this well at all;
I will link a review from Goodreads down below that I think did such an amazing job of describing
this collection and was really what made me want to pick up this very short very important
book. So please check that out, I will say he does talk about a dissection in that review
so be aware of that, but I just felt like this was brilliant, I think he did so much
in such a short amount of pages. He talks about how despicable eugenics is and he talks
about some really just important things about the way that we live in the world and what--what
good means. Anyway, as you can see I think it definitely is going to leave a mark. And
I gave The Abolition of Man 5 stars. For A in Divination you were supposed to read a
book set in the future and this was for the BookTube Rereadathon project and I reread
Fairest by Marissa Meyer. This is a novella between the 3rd and 4th Lunar Chronicles books
that is a prequel and it talks about the backstory and the life of Levana before she became the
villain that we know her as in the Lunar Chronicles series. And this was okay. I appreciate what
it was doing but I just don't enjoy it very much. I really like Marissa Meyer's writing
style, I really like the setting of Luna and getting to see more of Artemisia, the capital
city. But I just don't--I just don't enjoy this as much as the Lunar Chronicles books.
I do think that it's worth reading because it really does help you understand some things
about Levana. And I actually think that's very impressive when a villain origin story
doesn't like sway you to one side or the other you're kind of in the middle, like "yeah,
I get you, Levana, but you're still crazy." Also there is a trigger warning for rape in
this book. And I ended up giving Fairest 3 stars. For an E you had to read a book under
200 pages and I read The Legend of the Poinsettia, retold and illustrated by Tomie dePaola. In
a recent tag video which I will link down below I got super emotional about Tomie dePaola's
books and about how much they influenced me growing up and how much I loved them. And
I had never read this one and I really enjoyed it, it's kind of a--a Christmas legend about
the poinsettia in Mexico and kind of how that came to be associated with a Christmas flower.
And I really liked this, of course the illustrations are always beautiful and colorful and just,
just so lovely. I ended up giving this 4 stars just because I think in comparison to some
of his other books, I think there wasn't quite as much actual text or like story, I would've
liked that to be a little more fleshed out. But I don't know what original sources he
was working with so maybe there wasn't a lot of room to do that. But I gave The Legend
of the Poinsettia 4 out of 5 stars. For an O you had to read a mythology book and for
that one I read Legendary Ladies: 50 Goddesses to Empower and Inspire You by Ann Shen. And
she is the author and the illustrator of this book. And I really really enjoyed this. First
off, the illustrations are just gorgeous. And I really like--I really like the variety
of goddesses and countries this covers, like they're not all you know classical mythology
that we're all very familiar with, I think there were a lot of popular goddesses but
there were also a lot of ones that are not as well-known. A few that I had never even
heard of, and I'm a big fan of books like this so that was really exciting. Another
thing I liked about it was that it actually includes at the end of each entry like suggestions
or recommendations for if you want to call on a particular goddess for help with something,
which I thought that was a really cool addition 'cause I haven't seen many--many books like
this that do that. And the only thing--the only thing I wasn't as pleased with and the
reason I gave it 4.5 stars instead of 5 stars is that I would have liked there to be more
description of the goddesses themselves and like some of their--some of the myths and
stories surround them because they're pretty short entries, some of them, like there's
not a lot of information. And like I said I read other books like this and I think that
there are some other ones that had a much more detailed entry on each goddess where
you really felt like you got to know their place in the religion or mythology that they're
from. So that was the only thing but again gorgeous illustrations and like I said I gave
Legendary Ladies 4.5 stars. For an A in Herbology you had to read a book with a green cover,
and for that one I read Warcross by Marie Lu, it does have some green on the cover *laughs*
and this was actually a buddy read with my lovely friend Olivia from ReadbyLiv, I will
link her channel down below. And this is a sci-fi story set in a world where this kind
of virtual reality game has become really popular and everybody's involved with it.
And our main character Emika Chen is a hacker who kind of accidentally hacks her way into
a big tournament of this game, of this game called Warcross, and then she kind of gets
recruited by the creator of the game to help him figure out something that is going wrong
with the game. I enjoyed this book, I thought that the plot was really well-done, I really
liked the writing style and the worldbuilding. I think Marie Lu did a fantastic job of really
getting the reader to see clearly these things that we don't have that many comparisons for
in our regular lives, I thought that was done so well. I did have a few complaints though,
one of them--one of the big ones was the characters. I feel like the relationship between Emika
and her love interest I feel like that went a little too quickly for me. It was like "okay,
I understand he's hot, but like...you've got bigger problems? You've got bigger things
going on now, like this is not the time!" And I just felt like they didn't know each
other that well. That being said, a lot of people have talked about what an amazing bunch
of plot twists this book is, and I would have to agree. Even though there was some of this
I had figured out, I did not see all of it coming, there were some big things that happened
that I was completely blindsided by, which was really actually kind of exciting for me,
so I ended up giving Warcross 3.5 stars. For an E you had to read a book with illustrations,
and for that I read Cinnamon written by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Divya Srinivasan.
First off, the illustrations are just breathtaking, *sigh* I just--I'd give it 5 stars for the
illustrations alone. The only thing I didn't like quite as much about this book, and I
understand it's a picture book, it's an illustrated story, but I still felt like there wasn't
quite enough story, or at least I felt like we got to the end of the book and I thought
we would have gone on a little further: I felt like there was something missing at the
very end of the story. But again the illustrations are gorgeous, the writing was beautiful as
well and I did really really like the story and the folklore elements that we got so I
gave Cinnamon 4 stars. For an A in History of Magic you had to read a book that you think
would fit right in at the Hogwarts Library. And I read The Apprentice Witch by James Niccol.
This is a recommendation from Lorra at BookyLorra. So in this book our main character Arianwyn
is in training to become a witch, unfortunately she fails her witch test, becomes kind of
demoted to an assistant or apprentice witch, and gets sent to this little town, kind of
just pushed out of the way, and then she discovers that there are all these strange and creepy
things happening in the town and she has to actually use her magic and fight these bad
things. I really liked some of the side characters and I really like the descriptions of the
animals. I've talked about in a previous video how I'm super bad at picturing animals, like
magical animals that are described but these were done so well that I could picture exactly
what all of these creatures were supposed to look like. There's one little creature
called a moon hare that I absolutely adored and I kind of want one *laughs* they just
sound so cute and wonderful. However I found Arianwyn to be kind of a frustrating character
at times. I got really irritated because a huge chunk of the plot would have been solved
or would not have even happened if she had just told somebody what was going wrong before
it blew up in everyone's face. But other than that I did like this book and I ended up giving
The Apprentice Witch 3.5 stars. E was to read a book published at least 5 years ago and
I read Poems from the Book of Hours by Rainer Maria Rilke, which was translated from the
German by Babette Deutsch. And I'm so sorry, I'm going to look up how to pronounce all
of those names. So this is a very short collection of poems and I'm actually going to hold off
on reviewing this one until I do my wrap up for Women in Translation, even though this
was not written by a woman, it was translated by a woman so it still counts kind of. For
an O you had to read a book that was at least 400 pages long and for that one I finally
read Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi. This is a fantasy that is inspired by West
African mythology and folklore and it is set in a world where magic was banished from the
land, the evil king of this area actually hunted down and killed all the practitioners
of magic and now our main character Zelie has the opportunity to go on a kind of quest
and bring magic back. I really loved the worldbuilding and the setting of this book, and I also just
loved the descriptions of magic and the magic system and everything. There were multiple
passages that covered kind of the magical events that actually gave me goosebumps because
of how beautifully and evocatively they were described. And I really love the incorporation
of the gods and goddesses and how that worked into the world and into the magic system itself,
I really liked that aspect and I really liked some of the side characters. Like I was surprised
at how much I really liked Zelie's brother Tzain, I think that's how you say it, I really
enjoyed him, and I also ended up really liking Amari, who's kind of this spoiled princess
character who is also along for the ride. I did actually end up really enjoying her
and really enjoying her growth. I do think there were some things that got kind of repetitive
about her character because she was sort of motivated by this one thing or this one character
for like a huge chunk of the book, but once she started actually developing and kind of
learning more about the world she lives in and how it's not the same as what she was
taught growing up, I really really liked her. I was not a fan of Inan, her brother, as much
as I liked Amari. And he's kind of the character everyone says is a lot like Zuko from Avatar:
The Last Airbender, and in some ways I can see that but as the book went on I felt like
he got less similar to Zuko, 'cause Zuko has like such an amazing character arc, no one
ever shuts up about it 'cause it's that good *laughs* but Inan, it just--he felt so inconsistent
sometimes. Like some of his changes of heart just felt incredibly quick and unmotivated
or kind of unconvincingly motivated. And another thing is this book is really long, it's like
500...it's more than 500 pages. I don't have a problem with long books, but this book felt
really long. It's not like there's not a lot happening, because there is, there's a lot
of plot and a lot of intrigue and adventure and fighting and dying, there's a lot of that
happening at any given moment, but so much time was spent on every part of that, that
it felt slow even when it wasn't. Like we spend so long describing this one battle scene
that it felt like this battle had been taking place over like a day and a half, and it was
really just like 10 minutes? But I did think the social commentary of this book was handled
just phenomenally. Like I think it had such important things to say about oppression and
privilege and there was so much interesting discussion about like if they succeeded in
bringing magic back, like would that fix everything or would it just kind of fuel further violence,
like there were some characters who felt very strongly in opposite directions, and so that
was really interesting to see and I think that was just really well done as a part of
this book. So I ended up giving Children of Blood and Bone 3.75 to 4 stars. Also as you
can probably tell by the premise, this is an incredibly dark book, so definitely go
in knowing that, there is sexual assault, there are lots and lots of deaths and horrible
abuse and torture so there is quite a bit of heavy material in this book. For Muggle
Studies to get an A you had to read a book written by one of your favorite authors, and
for that one I read Spindle by E.K. Johnston. This is a companion sequel to A Thousand Nights,
which I absolutely adored. This is a retelling or reimagining of Sleeping Beauty and I really
enjoyed this one, I didn't like it quite as much as A Thousand Nights but I still think
it was a fantastically creative version of the Sleeping Beauty story which is not one
of my favorites to read retellings of. I'm not going to really try to attempt to summarize
this one because it sounds more confusing than it is and also I'm not sure how much
to give away, especially because of how that affects what you know about the first book
if you haven't read that one yet. There were just so many things I loved about this book:
I really really connected to our main character Yashaa, and that was really interesting because
it was first person and I'm not usually a huge fan of first person narration. But I
thought his voice was done so well, like I just really liked him and I liked how complicated
he was and how his feelings about his kingdom [he was from] and like spinning and everything
were all just kind of mixed up together and how sometimes it made him angry and sometimes
he missed it. There was also more romance in this one than there was in A Thousand Nights
and I--for the most part I liked it, I think there was a certain part of it that happened
a little too quickly, but other than that I actually really liked the development. And
one of my absolute favorite things about this book were the friendships and the intense
and beautiful bond between Yashaa and his 3 friends, Tariq, Saoud, and Arwa. I just
loved all of their interactions, I loved how passionately devoted they were to protecting
each other and just their deep friendship was just so meaningful and it was just so
well done. There were some things about the ending that I didn't quite like, or I wasn't
completely happy with, but I understand why they happened the way they did. And I do think
it was a good ending for the story like it makes sense. And I ended up giving Spindle
4 out 5 stars. For and E we had to read a biography, and I read kind of a collection
of mini-biographies and that is Bad Girls: Sirens, Jezebels, Murderesses, Thieves, and
Other Female Villains which was written by Jane Yolen and Heidi E.Y. Stemple, illustrated
by Rebecca Guay. And this was super disappointing for me. I really love other books that are
in this vein that kind of tell the stories of a lot of underrepresented or misunderstood
women, this one was just not good. The one thing I will say that I consistently loved
was the actual illustrations of the women themselves were absolutely beautiful, and
I already knew that I liked Rebecca Guay's art so that was not a surprise. But I did
really enjoy that, I didn't like the comic strip style of like the two authors talking
to each other about these women. Other reviewers have pointed that out, it was really weird.
I feel like [the authors] were just incredibly flippant about some of the things they were
discussing, and it was really weird because there were some women where they seemed to--I
feel like they handled it better and like they weren't...I don't know they didn't make
it like such an awkward comedy, but there were some people, there were some of these
women where they were talking about them and like they made it sound super like corny and
they were making all these stupid jokes and like just--they were trying to be conversational
I think in the writing style, and it just irritated me like it just really rubbed me
the wrong way and I don't think it was an effective way to tell the story of these women.
I will say there were a few of these that I hadn't heard of or I wasn't super familiar
with them, like for example I had heard Typhoid Mary referred to before but I didn't know
her story and like...what the heck, Mary?! So I did learn about some women that I didn't
know of before, but I just really didn't like this, I think there are similar books that
do a much better job. Actually I have one behind me and that is Rejected Princesses
by Jason Porath. I don't recommend this one. I gave it 2.5 stars. For an A in Potions we
had to read a book that had the name of a color in the title and I read Six-Gun Snow
White by Catherynne M. Valente. This is a Western-inspired retelling of the Snow White
story. Our main character is actually biracial, her father was white and her mother was one
of the Crow Nation. So that is also handled in this book and I just thought this was such
a beautifully written and intense story. It's very strange *laughs* like I'm not gonna--I'm
not gonna lie to you, it's incredibly bizarre and there are some parts of it that just read
like a very disjointed kind of classic fairytale where things don't really make sense all the
time but I think that worked. And I just loved the mix of Native American kind of folklore-style
of storytelling with the original fairytale and with this like Western-style of speaking.
And there are also several illustrations by Charlie Bowater at certain--certain chapter
breaks, like that one, they're just incredibly detailed and beautiful and the reason I didn't
give this a full 5 stars is there were some things about the ending that I think went
in too strange of a direction, so even though I liked some of--some of the way it was done,
I just wasn't quite on board for the way it ended or kind of how we got to the ending.
So that's why I gave this 4 out of 5 stars, but I definitely recommend this one if you
like super weird fairytale retellings. And if you like absolutely gorgeous wonderful
beautiful prose, it's just...oh my gosh. Catherynne M. Valente is obscenely talented and I love
it. Also there is a trigger warning for abuse and attempted sexual assault in this book.
For an E we had to read a book with a male lead character, and for that one I read The
Lost Hero by Rick Riordan. This was a buddy read with my fabulous friend Amy from Blonde
and Bookish, again I will link the channel down below. This is actually a reread for
me. It was 8 years *laughs* 8 years since I read this, so it kind of felt like I was
reading a book I hadn't read before. And I really liked it. I really liked some of the
new characters we got, I especially really loved Jason as a main character, I know a
lot of people hate him because he's not like Percy. I personally really enjoyed him and
I actually would have been more irritated if we had gotten just like a carbon copy of
Percy. So this book without giving too much away, it follows a new quest about this like
dark kind of creature or this dark presence that is rising and it is causing all these
other monsters to--to form, and the *teenagers in this book have to of course get together
and save the world. There were a couple of characters who like I didn't connect with
quite as much as I wanted to, like Piper...I always feel like I wanted to like her more
than I did. But on this reread I do think I appreciate her more. So much of this book
would have been shortened or avoided or just like done in a less frustrating way if a certain
character just like told her friends what was going on and like I understand there were
some reasons why she didn't that kinda make sense, but it just took too long *laughs*
so that was one thing that really frustrated me. But I really like that we get more detail
on the Olympians in this book, like on the gods, they feel more like fully developed
characters. I love the scenes with Aphrodite, there are a couple with her in this book and
I just really enjoyed those because it made her seem like a much more complex character
than I think some of the Percy Jackson books kinda did. But I ended up really enjoying
this, I was kind of thinking like around a 3.5 because of some of the character stuff
and like the frustrating--a couple of the frustrating aspects with the plot, but I ended
up giving it 4 stars because man, can Rick Riordan write an ending! I had forgotten how
amazing this ending was, so 4 stars. For an A in Transfiguration we had to read a book
with a grey cover and I read The Crying Rocks by Janet Taylor Lisle. So this is about a
girl named Noelle and she has grown up with her aunt, I believe, and she was adopted.
And her parents may have actually been Narragansett Native Americans so she kind of goes on this
quest to learn more about her family and about her past and this is another one where it's
hard to explain. It's a very short book, but there's a lot of kind of interconnecting story
threads. There's a lot about like discovery, like finding who you are, and like family
and found family versus kind of your birth family. I ended up with really mixed feelings
about this book. So for one thing, Noelle is a really really unlikeable character for
the majority of the book. And I do understand why, because she has gone through some really
awful things even if she doesn't remember all of it, like she's had a past that would
definitely cause somebody to be kind of abrasive to the outside world and to other people.
So I totally understand that, but I feel like we would--I feel like her development was
choppy. She'd seem to be heading in a direction of like getting to know people better and
like kind of I don't know making friends, and then all of a sudden for no reason she
would suddenly revert back to how she was at like the very beginning of the book. And
I completely understand that when you are recovering from traumatic experiences, it's--it's
not a smooth like linear progression, but I feel like even taking that into consideration,
it just felt like the writer wasn't sure what she wanted to do with Joelle. I really liked
Carlos, her best friend, and I really liked some of the settings and like, I don't want
to say this book is magical realism, 'cause it's really not, but there are some--there
are some things about the world and about certain places they go like the Crying Rocks,
there are some things about it that you're never quite sure exactly how much is really
happening and I actually felt like that was really well done for the most part. I also
want to say that if you are at all sensitive towards children being harmed, this is maybe
a book you want to steer clear of. I don't think we ever see it on page, but there's
like quite a bit of like children getting hurt or being neglected, there's a death of
a child, [2 actually], like there's a lot of really intense stuff. There's a lot of
issues that are handled in this book, like homelessness and of course adoption and mental
illness and--there's a lot. I think for the most part, those things got the right amount
of attention? Considering how short of a book it was. But honestly I don't even remember
some of it, like this book was just a very strange reading experience and I ended up
giving it 3.5 stars. And finally for an E we were supposed to read a book from an author
you hadn't read anything from before. And I read Grounded: The Adventures of Rapunzel
by Megan Morrison. This was a recommendation from Giselle from Giselle Bradley, this is
of course a retelling of Rapunzel and I loved this book. Our main character Rapunzel has
of course never left her tower. So she has to go on this quest to save her--her kind
of adoptive mother who she just calls Witch, because Witch has always taken care of her,
and so she goes on an adventure with Jack 'cause there's also these like Jack and the
Beanstalk elements kind of mixed in, too. She and Jack kind of go on this quest for
a group of fairies and along the way Rapunzel starts learning that some things about her--the
place where she lives and about Witch and all this, may not be what she thinks they
are. The beginning of this book, you're not really sure what's going on or like what the
world is like or how all these pieces kind of interconnect. But I think it never got
to the point where I was frustrated: I was always--like I could always see why the author
was doing it, because Rapunzel is incredibly sheltered, so it totally makes sense that
she wouldn't actually know much about how the world works. So the reader also doesn't
get that understanding until a little bit later on. Rapunzel had so much amazing, amazing
character growth in this book, like I saw reviews from people who like quit at the very
beginning of this book because she was so like frustrating and sheltered and like just
nonsensical, seemingly, at times, but I--I don't know, it makes me kinda sad because
if you push through it's SO worth it. She becomes like so strong and so brave and I'm
just like really proud of her by the end of this book. And I actually really liked the
worldbuilding. It's so like surprisingly complex, like with the way that the fairies interact
with this world and the way that the kingdoms are set up and all of this. And it seems so
cheesy because you hear about the kingdoms and they're all named after colors, and there's
all these things that make it sound like it's gonna be this really kind of corny fairy story,
and it's absolutely not like there was so much like darkness or depth to this book that
you wouldn't necessarily expect from like again the way some of the worldbuilding starts
out. But I loved it. And this is another one where I was like not expecting the end to
be such a kick in the gut, like I actually cried near the end of this book because something
was so like emotional and like it really--it really hit me and connected with me in a way
that I was not anticipating. So I gave this book 4.5 stars, but now I can't remember...like
what I docked half a star for? So maybe I'm gonna bump this up to 5, but I really enjoyed
this, I am so excited to read the sequel which has a black Cinderella character who I believe
takes on unsafe workplace practices, which sounds amazing. Okay everybody that is FINALLY
all of the books that I read in August. If you stayed to the end of this video, bless
your heart *laughs*, thank you SO much. I will see you guys soon with another video,
and I hope you love the next book you read. Bye!
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