Snowflakes and Spider Silk

Title:  Company Town Author:  Madeline Ashby Genre: Science fiction, mystery My rating: 5 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary: Meet Hwa. One of the few in her community to forego bio-engineered enhancements, she’s the last truly organic person left on the rig. But she’s an expert in the arts of self-defence, and she’s been charged with training the Family’s youngest, who has been receiving death threats – seemingly from another timeline. Meanwhile, a series of interconnected murders threatens the city’s stability – serial killer? Or something much, much worse...? I loved everything about this book! The main character reminded me of one of my best friends and I loved how complex and gritty the worldbuilding was and I ADORED how much this book features empowered women and women helping each other out. AMAZING. Plus the story was full of twists and turns and impossible to put down. Company Town is set in a future version of the earth that's a bit of a toxic wastelan...

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by  The Broke and the Bookish . This week's theme: Top Ten Books I picked up on a whim I don't often pick up books on a whim, but sometimes I'll be at the library and a random book will catch my attention. I've found some pretty awesome books this way!   Believe it or not, I grabbed this one on a whim for my birthday. The book I actually wanted was out of stock, and this one seemed cool. I'd heard nothing about it because it was before it blew up into a phenomenon, and I really enjoyed it!   My first Terry Pratchett book was The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents, which I read in 5th grade and promptly forgot who the author was. I randomly grabbed this at the library years later and rediscovered how awesome Terry Pratchett is!   Somehow I lived under a rock and didn't hear anything about how awesome this book was before I picked it up. I read it a year before I starte...

Hello blogosphere, It's been a crazy couple of weeks (as usual), but things are finally getting back to normal and I'll have time to actually write more than one blog post per week! I just got my first real job, which is really exciting. I'm working part time until I graduate next month, and then I'll be full time and a real adult and I'll get to do real adult things...like sitting at home with a mug of tea and an excellent book. Or maybe a glass of wine and a really good book? Who knows? :) One thing I'm really going to miss about being a student is reading on campus...these benches were an awesome spot to relax between classes or get lost in another world. To commemorate my favorite reading spot, me pretending my graduation sash is a book :) The tricky thing has been adjusting to the additional 10-15 hours of work on top of being a student still, which is why I've been so bad about writing my blog posts. Also when I do have downtime I...

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by  The Broke and the Bookish . This week's theme: Top Ten Childhood Characters to revisit as adults To be fair, some of these characters have  been revisited as adults but I just want to share more of their lives :)   Liesel Meminger and Max from the Book Thief. (And Rudy...*cries*) Cinder, Kai, Cress, Thorne, Scarlet, Wolfe, Winter, Jacyn, and of course, IKO. I want to hear all of their stories :)   I loved this series as a kid - magical cats, evil great aunts, a magical school, and friends that last a lifetime. I'd love to see Charlie, Tancred, Lysander, Olivia, Emma, and the rest all grown up.   It's entirely possible that by book 7 (or 8?) Artemis Fowl is already an adult and I just haven't caught up, but Artemis Fowl captured my 4th grade self's imagination and I'd love to see what adventures he finds himself in as an adult. With Holly Short, of course. ...

Let me start off this post with a universal truth: Neil Gaiman is freaking brilliant, and his imagination is unparalleled. There, now that that's out of the way, we can talk a little bit about why I have such a love-hate relationship with his books and stories.  Some of his books are truly some of the most gorgeously written books I have ever read. They're so rich and full of fantastical creatures that I would never have been able to think of my own head; even cliche creatures like fairies and princes and every-day-nobodies all have some sort of endearing or terrifying twist that makes them seem fresh and new no matter how many times you've read that kind of story before. Stardust and Neverwhere are two of my favorite Neil Gaiman books, and Neverwhere is one of my favorite  books, period. I also really liked the hilarious  Anansi Boys , and I don't know if "liked" is the right word for how 3rd grade me felt about Coraline  when our teac...

Title:  His Majesty's Dragon Author:  Naomi Novik Genre: Fantasy My rating: 4 of 5 stars Goodreads Summary : Aerial combat brings a thrilling new dimension to the Napoleonic Wars as valiant warriors ride mighty fighting dragons, bred for size or speed. When HMS Reliant captures a French frigate and seizes the precious cargo, an unhatched dragon egg, fate sweeps Captain Will Laurence from his seafaring life into an uncertain future – and an unexpected kinship with a most extraordinary creature. Thrust into the rarified world of the Aerial Corps as master of the dragon Temeraire, he will face a crash course in the daring tactics of airborne battle. For as France’s own dragon-borne forces rally to breach British soil in Bonaparte’s boldest gambit, Laurence and Temeraire must soar into their own baptism of fire.  Temeraire is so cool! Laurence...not so much. I first heard of Naomi Novik a couple of years ago, and I put His Majesty's Dragon on my TBR pile. Uns...

It's been a couple of months since I updated my A-Z challenge, so here's how I've been doing! I've made quite a bit of progress without consciously trying to read certain letters, and I even managed to knock out a particularly difficult one (Q)! I'm just a little under halfway through, which is great because I still have 2/3 of the year to get to the other half :D If anyone has recommendations for books that start with E, J, U, V, Y, or Z, please let me know! A: And I Darken by Kiersten White (2/26) B: The Bands of Mourning by Brandon Sanderson (2/8) C: Court of Thieves by Kate Elliott (1/12) D: The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater (4/3) G: A Great Hunt by Robert Jordan (1/22) H: His Majesty's Dragon (3/30) I: The Immortal Heights (1/5) M: Me Before You by JoJo Moyes (3/21) O: Of Metal and Wishes by Sarah Fine (3/12) Q: Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a world that cannot stop talking by Susan Cain (3/27) R: Rook by Sha...