Top Five Books To Read In The Holidays

Today, we are teaming up with Bookworld to bring you a post on our top five favourite books to read in the lead up to the holidays. If you don’t already own these books (or maybe you’re just looking for an early Christmas present for yourself), you should head over to Bookworld so you can spoil yourself! Without further ado, let’s get onto the post.

I’ve always found that the days leading up to the holidays are best spent reading some wacked up book with crazy world building and quirky characters. After all, you did just spend months with school or work and what better way is there to prepare yourself for holidays then letting your mind go crazy.

VAMPIRE ACADEMY by RICHELLE MEAD
So if you have read Vampire Academy or are one of the odd few who haven’t, then now is the time to read it again or for the first time! I really have no words for it and I haven’t really met someone who hasn’t enjoyed the whole series. One of the best things is that you don’t have to wait for all the Vampire Academy books to come out as they all have already been released. You can just constantly feed your obsession every second of the day until it is done. It is a good option to go with if you’re not ready to go into epic fantasy or hardcore dystopian. It has just the right level of realistic and fantastical elements in it that you won’t feel totally jolted going into the holidays! If you are put off by this book just because of “Vampire” in its title, then I will personally kill you. In this series, Vampires are a culture so please don’t discriminate before you read it. Give it at least two books until you seriously get into it!

MAXIMUM RIDE by JAMES PATTERSON
Ugh, I don’t know if I am going to regret talking about this damn series because Ely can vouch for me that this series seriously messes her and I up so badly. Picking Maximum Ride is my way of saying; pick something you’ve read before! Rereads are the best, especially when they are childhood reads that you loved. There are too many books to count in this series and sometimes it is not the best of times, but it will earn a place in your heart after having gone through such an extensive journey with it!

Just like Chami, I think series are the way to go during the holidays. There’s nothing quite like marathoning a series you’ve been looking forward to and falling completely in love with the story and the characters (hopefully). I’m also a big believer of re-reading during the holidays, especially re-reading series that I read as a child.

HARRY POTTER by J.K ROWLING
First and foremost, Harry Potter. I think this is probably pretty self-explanatory, but I’m going to explain my personal reasons anyway. For me, Harry Potter has always meant Christmas for me – I watched the first movie for the first time on Christmas Day when I was six years old. Even more than that though, it’s just one of those series that makes me incredibly happy (and also incredibly sad in parts) but it’s my go to series when I need something I know I’ll love.

A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS by LEMONY SNICKET
A Series of Unfortunate Events is my other go to series. I’m sure those of you who’ve read it will probably understand where I’m coming for, though I admit it isn’t the happiest series in the world. I read these when I was a child as well, so it just brings back all these happy memories of my childhood and reminds me why I fell in love with reading, which is especially great when I’m going through a bit of a reading slump. If you’ve never picked these up, then you definitely should these holidays!

SHATTER ME by TAHEREH MAFI
Finally…Shatter Me.
Did you guys actually think we’d make it through a whole post without mentioning this series? (If you did then you clearly don’t know us at all). We both adore this series more than anything in the whole world. It’s such a great trilogy – the characters are amazing (Warner and Kenji are the best, of course), they’re easy to get through and the writing is absolutely beautiful. Together we’ve probably re-read this series about a hundred times – that’s how obsessed we are. What better way to spend your holidays then re-reading your very favourite series?

So those are our top five choices of series to read leading up to the holidays. Leave us a comment below telling us your favourite books to read during the holidays. If you’re interested in any of the books we’ve mentioned, make sure to check them out on Bookworld and take advantage of their free shipping Australia wide!

COLOUR SCHEMES #2

As it turns out, I really like making these colour scheme things and it seems like some of you do too. Today, I've got a couple more for you! I've decided this is going to be a weekly feature, so check back every Saturday for more colour schemes...

I will eventually get around to doing the whole series, and I'll do a separate post of just those when it comes to that.

I picked this one thinking it would be a nice bright, summery one but apparently not...

I've been reading this book for ages but I just don't have the desire to keep going. I was hoping that this might give me the boost I needed.

This is actually one of my favourites. The colour scheme fits so unbelievably well with the story- I just love it.

Mint green is one of my absolute favourite colours, so I had to do Fangirl, obviously.

So that's it for this week. Next week is going to be incredibly awesome as we have my lovely friend, Ebony of Daring Damsels joining us. See you all then!

DISCUSSION: My Favourite Female Characters

I think I should start this discussion post but saying that this is list isn't all of my favourite female characters, in fact if I was going to list all of them then we'd be here for an awfully long time. I decided to do this post today because I've been thinking about female characters in YA a lot lately- a lot of them get labelled as being 'strong' just because they're kickass. Strong for me means being not just physically strong but mentally strong too. Some of these characters are physically strong, others aren't but let's get started.

1. Violet Baudelaire from A Series of Unfortunate Events
I've talked about Violet many, many times here but I just really adore her. She's definitely not physically strong, but god is she smart! Violet invents things you see, throughout the series she comes up with these brilliant inventions that save her and her siblings. Violet was one of the first characters I ever seriously loved and I think she was a great role model- I know I always wanted to be just like Violet when I grew up. (Okay, so the inventing thing totally never happened)

2. Hermione Granger from the Harry Potter series
Of course no list would be complete without Miss Granger. I admit that Hermione isn't my favourite character in the entire series, but I think she's still incredibly amazing. Like Violet, she's incredibly intelligent too but she also has her flaws. (Can you tell I read these two series at the same time?) Also, Emma Watson is just a glorious human being.

3. Liesel Meminger from The Book Thief
If Liesel were a real person, I would totally adopt her as a cute younger sister- I love her that much. I know she's only young in the book but she's so incredibly strong and wise, but she's also a troublemaker. The best thing is, of course, she's a reader!

4. June Iparis from the Legend trilogy
June is one of Chami's favourite characters, and while I'm not as obsessed with her- I still think that June is a wonderful character. Again, she's extremely smart but also extremely badass. I admit, if I was ever going to live in a dystopian world, I'd want June on my side.

5. Celaena Sardothien from the Throne of Glass series
If you know me at all, you probably know that Celaena is most definitely my favourite character right now. She takes badass to a whole new level, and while she isn't exactly the nicest person- she's just so interesting to read about and I can't help but love her.

So those were the five characters I wanted to talk about today. Like I said, this is a very abridged list but I thought I'd just start with these! I hope you enjoyed this post and I will see you tomorrow with another new post :)

Ely's Recommendations #2

Heeeello, and welcome back to my second recommendations post. Firstly, if you'd like to see my first post, just click here. So I've got another five books/series to recommend today. This list is more about series that are hugely popular, but in case you may not have read them, I've decided to mention them today!

1. Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead
This one probably goes without saying. I started this series way back when I was thirteen and I have loved it ever since. The story is amazing, but one of the main reasons I love this series so much is because of Rose Hathaway. I'm a big fan of kick-ass girls, and I think Rose is the reason. She's incredibly bad-ass, but at the end of the day she's really a normal girl- she makes mistakes and bad decisions just like everyone else, but I will continue to love her until my dying day. Plus, I'm not ashamed to admit that I adore Dimitri, Adrian and Christian too!


2. Shatter Me series by Tahereh Mafi
Again, for anyone who's been following our blog for a while, you should not be surprised by this one. Both Chami and I absolutely adore this series to no end. Warner is definitely the main reason for this, but Tahereh's writing is so lovely and so unique which makes us love it even more. We honestly never shut up about this series, to the point that we just make references to the characters and quotes way more than is healthy. We have no regrets though.


3. A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket
This isn't one that is really talked about anymore, I suppose because it finished a few years ago back in 2006 but this is one of my ALL-TIME favourite series. This is probably one of the first series that I religiously read as a child and to be honest, I think I even read all of it way before I got into the Harry Potter books. I remember counting down the days until the next book would be released and then buying it the moment it came out, only to finish it within a few hours and go back to counting down again. I don't think any series ever could replace the spot in my heart that this series dominates.

4. The Body Finder series by Kimberly Derting
This one doesn't have quite the same scope as the others, but this one is still quite popular. I had my doubts about it before I begun but this series is truly awesome. The premise of the book is so unique and it's definitely pulled off well. I think my favourite thing though is the romance in these books, it's so sweet and realistic and I just love Violet and Jay so much! I haven't actually read the final book yet but I can't wait to get my hands on it!

5. Gemma Doyle trilogy by Libba Bray
This is the same sort of deal as The Body Finder in the sense that I have yet to read the final book (in my defense it's 800 pages long!) but I love the first two books so much that I had to include it. These are quite different to what I usually read, the series is about witches in Victorian England. They're incredibly amazing, although quite dark and heavy at times. The characters are all amazing, and I can't wait to finish the series!

Top Ten "Gateway" Books/Authors In My Reading Journey

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, and you can find more about this meme here.This week's list is the top ten "gateway" books/authors in my reading journey.

1. Harry Potter series by J.K Rowling

I think this is sort of a given for lists like this for most people. My love for this series started when I was only five years old, when the first movie came out. I wasn't allowed to watch it or read the books  until I was a little older. My older brother was never a big reader, but my mum used to read Harry Potter to him every night and I used to stand in the doorway of my bedroom and listen to her read it. I can remember the day the books were handed down to me, after my brother lost interest in them (at the fifth book). I can remember making space for them in my shelves and carrying them into my room, then devouring the ones the brother had refused to let me read.

2. A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket

This was probably the first series I ever read, even before Harry Potter. I don't remember exactly how I came to read this books, but I remember reading the first four books in a matter of days and then having to wait until the fifth book came out. Every time a new book was released, I would force my mum to drive me down to the bookshop so I could pick the next book up and read it within the night. I definitely consider this to be the series that really got me into reading and I think I'll love them forever.

3. Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead

After the end of the Series of Unfortunate Events in 2006 and Harry Potter in 2007, I sort of lost interest in reading. I picked up a few books here and there, but I just couldn't find one that I loved as much as those two. Then in 2008, my friends and I discovered Vampire Academy. We'd been through the Twilight stage, which lasted approximately a year for us, but now we'd moved on. I wasn't really that interested in Vampire Academy for the first few months in which my friends read it, but then on one weekend while my family and I were up in the mountains (no internet, no phone reception...13 year old Ely hated it) I picked up the first book. I read all first three books in that weekend and my obsession only grew from there.

4. The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare

By the end of the Vampire Academy series, I was back in a reading rut. A collection of horrible school books did not help the situation at all. I read a few books but again nothing too my fancy. Then I discovered Goodreads in 2012, and my life was forever changed. One of the first books I discovered on there was City of Bones which I promptly went out and bought a box set of the first three books for. It was summer break and I was off on this week long camp (possibly the worst week ever), but rather than you know...socialise, I sat in a stinking hot tent and read these three books. Then I came home and ordered the fourth one as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, my love for this series has slightly diminished over the years (mainly because of the unnecessary sequels).

5. Agatha Christie

Around April 2012, I discovered my love for Agatha Christie when I picked up my first mystery novel ever- And Then There Were None. If you know me at all, you'll know that I now considered Agatha Christie one of my favourite authors and mystery as one of my favourite genres. It was literally all because of this little four dollar book I bought from one recommendation. I honestly don't know where I'd be without Agatha now!

6. The Gatekeeper's Saga by Eva Pohler

This is another author/series who has absolutely dominated our blog. Eva was the first (and one of the very few) authors who has ever been kind enough to send us their books, all the way to Australia. Even more than that, she's honestly the sweetest person! But that's not what this is about, I included The Gatekeeper's Saga on this list because it is the series that got me into mythology. That's right, the only reason I ever read Percy Jackson was because I read this first and I needed some more mythology in my life. You can actually get the first book free, so you should definitely check it out!

7. The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

I'm one of those people who loves books about World War Two and the Holocaust way more than I really should. This book right here is the sole reason for that. I knew hardly anything about Anne Frank before I read this, but by the end I was sobbing so badly because of her. I can't really describe how much this book broke my heart (we're talking like TFiOS level here, guys) but I loved it. Interestingly, my review for this was the first review I ever posted here!

8. Sarah Dessen

As a child, I was never really into romance/contemporary books- I read a lot of Sleepover Club and Saddle Club books but they aren't romance-y. This Lullaby was my first 'romance' book as well as my first Sarah Dessen book. I loved it, and so I read two other books by her that same month. I believe Just Listen is my favourite so far. But it was because of these books that I read John Green, Maureen Johnson, Stephanie Perkins and many others!

9. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

I'll be the first to admit that I absolutely hated Gatsby when I read it for the first time back in 2012. In fact, for a while there I would have said it was my least favourite book ever. You see, it was the first classic I ever read. I know a lot of people got to read classics in school like To Kill a Mockingbird and Pride and Prejudice (like Chami) but my school never did this. Looking back at it now, it wasn't a good choice for my first classic because I just didn't understand the amazingness of it, but now I've had some more experience and I'm actually re-reading it for the first time this month. I know I'm going to love it this time...thanks to the movie adaptation.

10. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

This is another all-time favourite of mine. I actually read this one for school in 2012 (but quite a few months after Gatsby) and I adored it. I love dystopia, though at this time the only experience I had with them was Divergent and Animal Farm/1984 (these two we also studied in class as a comparison between them and BNW). I don't know why I fell in love with this book so quickly, but I loved the world and Huxley's writing. I think this is definitely the book that got me into dystopian literature.

If you participate in this weeks list, feel free to leave your link in the comments and I'll go check it out! And if you didn't, then what are some your 'gateway' books and authors?