Summer Reading Goals – Wrap Up!

I made some goals back in May and now it time for the results! I think we ALL know where this is heading right? Anyway let’s enjoy my fail! My summer holidays finished July 27^th…

Goals:

1. Read 30 books = I read a total of 19 books which means I failed but also meant I surpassed my GR goal! =]
2. Read 3000 pages = I surpassed this easily thanks to reading lots of Manga! ^_^
3. Finish 2 Manga series = failed.
4. Finish as many already started series as possible = I finished The Selection trilogy but that’s all =/
5. Finish as many ARCs as possible (I have like 18) = I failed even though I read quite a few ARCs, I requested a bunch of new ones!! =/

Blog Goals:

Post consistently = I think I did pretty well on this one.

Comments on others more = this one too!

Re-Organising My Shelves:

Those shelves are gone and some have gone to family/friends, charity or locked in storage waiting for me to come and pick them up when I go back to England for a visit.

—

Not too bad…right? xD

Armada by Ernest Cline

Quickie Review: 3 out of 5 on GR.

This was a solid, entertaining read with tons of SF reference goodies! I thoroughly enjoyed the characters, and the story. Favourite characters being Lex and Red. At times I felt the book was very reminiscent of Ender’s Game which I’m not saying is a negative at all! I loved that >.< My favourite parts were definitely the fighting sequences!

However, sometimes the amount of referencing was a little over the top for me personally, and I can’t decide if the alien’s true motive was a good reveal or a cheesy, bad one… at the minute I’m leaning towards ‘Lightman’s feeling at the end of the book makes me like the motive’ but honestly, jury is still out on that one.

Nevertheless I was entertained thoroughly and will definitely read his other work in future!!

Life Update – Japan, Reading and Other Stuff

I just wanted to quickly say a few things, although it probably won’t be quick at all. First quick thing: HUGE thank you to all you guys that read my blog and comment and such! Makes my day! =]

This summer has been so much fun ❤ even though I only left the house like 10 times in the past 9 weeks xD As most of you know I’m off to Japan on Sunday – that is if I don’t die on the plane (a fear of flying struck me last year and still hasn’t gone away and has caused me to have nightmares and not sleep properly for over a week now!) *fingerscrossed* – and so that means a few things.

Firstly, for my pre-Japan news:
I graduated officially last Thursday from Uni
Packing is almost done (just need to put in shoes and some everday clothing, and if there is room, books and DVDs and CDs!)
I finalised my living arrangements today! I am going into a beautiful new Share House in Yokohama (anyone seen that dorama ‘Share House’? It’s pretty good)
And um… I’m still shitting myself about work and have no confidence I can do it!

Now of course moving to Japan means some changes such as:
It’ll take me a while to get back into a routine schedule of commenting and posting on here.
Comments and postings will be a more apart rather than on a daily basis most likely.
My reading will drop even more dramatically than it already is most likely =/ so I think that means no longer doing TBRs for the rest of the year depending on how it goes.

BUT! There is a horizon which is… *drum role*
I will definitely not abandon and leave you guys here on your own!
AND! Being in Japan means I can get ALL the Japanese books I’ve ever wanted! xD

The first things I need to get done when I get to and move to Japan are:
Move into apartment [Internet should be available as soon as I move in too!]
Bank
Mobile Phone
Sign Contract
Intial Training

After that comes the fun stuff like buying books, D-Boys and KAT-TUN Membership, seeing baseball games, buying a bike, paying for Hulu and Netflix etc.

If you have any questions or requests or whatever about anything do let me know or ask below!! ^_^

Summer #CramaThon Wrap Up

The TBR is here

Challenges:
1. Read a Children’s Book
2. Read a Hardback
3. Read 2 books in 24 hours
4. Read a Graphic Novel
5. Read a book written in verse
6. Read a Novella
7.  Read 5 books total

Books Read

How did you do?!

Camp NaNo Update #2

It’s been about 9 days since I last updated and I gotta be honest; I haven’t written in like 4 days =/ I realised early last week that I hadn’t written out my plan fully and so had to spend time doing that which lead me to realise that I don’t remember my story at all! And it was rather disheartening trying to remember it but then realising you don’t and now knowing that whatever I write won’t what I originally intended… but hopefully I can power through the last 6000 or so words xD

Summer #CramaThon TBR!

Cram-a-Thon video here.

When: July 10th (Midnight Your Time) – July 13th

Challenges:
1. Read a Children’s Book
2. Read a Hardback
3. Read 2 books in 24 hours
4. Read a Graphic Novel
5. Read a book written in verse
6. Read a Novella
7.  Read 5 books total

My YT Video TBR

TBR

And if I have time, carry on with:

I can definitely get numbers 3 (due to manga) and 4 (manga shh!). I am not doing number 5 because I am not attempting my wonderful Shakespeare for a Read-a-Thon, he deserves more time and respect! Also, I don’t own an Novellas unless I change that to ‘short story’ (so anything under… 50 pages?) but we’ll see!

Are you participating?! Link me to your TBRs! xD

Summertime Madness Book Tag

Originally created here

1. Show a book with a Summery cover! i.e Sun, Beach etc.

I shall show a few =]

2. Pick one fictional place that would be the perfect destination for your Summer Vacation! 

The Shire? … Camp Half-Blood? …

3. You’re about to go on a flight to your Summer Vacation. But you want to read a book that lasts for the whole flight so what novella do you choose?

My flights are 6 – 12 hours at a time so I can’t choose a novella cos it’ll be read before we even leave the tarmac! So any of the following will definitely take me hours to read…

4. You have a case of Summertime Sadness what happy book do you pick up to shine a smile on your face? 

Anything Brandon Sanderson… Tolkien… Harry Potter… Percy Jackson…

5. You’re sitting at the beach all alone…which fictional character would be your beach babe?

As in beach buddy or like beach hottie? Hmm… Tyrion? We can just have witty comments, bitch about everyone we see and drink wine all day long! Also, we can discuss books!! But a hottie? … Kelsier from Mistborn? Maybe…

6. To match your ice cream you want an icy cool sidekick! Which fictional sidekick do you pick?

Can I choose Tyrion again? For the same reason as mentioned above?

7. Share the Summertime Happiness! Who do you TAG?

YOU!

Top Ten Tuesday #42

This Week’s Theme: Top Ten Hyped Books I’ve Never Read – I’m gunna split the books I pick into two groups ^_^

Hyped Books I’ve Never Read and Plan to Never Read

Hyped Books I’ve Never Read but Plan to Read

What are on your TTT lists?

What’s The Story Saturday? #10

A meme-thing created by me. All are welcome to join!

Rules:

Pick a book cover (preferably one where you don’t know the plot).
Guess what the story e.g. who’s our mc; female? male? what genre is it? what happens?.
[Optional >] After that actually read up about the synopsis and comment on whether you think yours is better xD

This Week’s Cover:

My Story: O wow! This cover looked exciting! So it’s about two best friends; one is a night and one is an assassin pirate and they are going against ‘knights’ in a rebellion. But the main guy (with the blonde hair) has a secret! He can transform into a leopard! It’s a fantasy book with lots of battles! (I’m tired tonight so the creative juices ain’t flowing much).

The Actual Synopsis: Ahjvar, the assassin known as the Leopard, wants only to die, to end the curse that binds him to a life of horror. Although he has no reason to trust the goddess Catairanach or her messenger Deyandara, fugitive heir to a murdered tribal queen, desperation leads him to accept her bargain: if he kills the mad prophet known as the Voice of Marakand, Catairanach will free him of his curse. Accompanying him on his mission is the one person he has let close to him in a lifetime of death, a runaway slave named Ghu. Ahj knows Ghu is far from the half-wit others think him, but in Marakand, the great city where the caravan roads of east and west meet, both will need to face the deepest secrets of their souls, if either is to survive the undying enemies who hunt them and find a way through the darkness that damns the Leopard.

After Thoughts: Sounds a hell of a lot better than my idea! But I was right about having an assassin! xD

This sounds awesome! Do you not agree?

3rd July 2015 #FridayReads + Camp NaNo Update #1

Don’t kill me… I am still reading Order…. like I said earlier, my mind just isn’t in reading at the moment. But I am currently on their first Quidditch Match of the month and the whole “Weasley is Our King” has started xD

But I received an ARC of Ernest Cline’s Armada earlier this week, so I got right on that as soon as I got it! It’s really good so far even if I’m only on chapter 2 >.< I am loving the pop references!

SO I really need to finish that for the 14th =]

Camp Update:  Yes it’s day three but thought maybe Friday Updates are a good idea as July finishes on a Friday also! xD Progress so far is = I am overwritten for the first two days so I am definitely doing well. It was really easy for me to get back into the story, I am enjoying writing it and I’ve already finished a chapter! =] I am currently on 1346 words!

What’s your Friday Reads this week? Have you gotten an ARC of Armada? If not, do you want it? xD How’s your Camp going?