Book Review:The Fault in Our Stars

First as always let me state that I do not own the right to any of the image/s used in my blog. They were provided by Google search.

Introduction
In all honesty, I am not sure how to exactly "introduce" this book. I know it might sound "lame" but i actually only heard of this book from seeing the countless ads for the movie (which I have not seen). On a whim, I decided to give the book a "go".

I of course could kind of guess what was going to happen in this story as most stories about "children" or even "adults" with cancer they do not have usually have a "happy ending". I decided to give this book a try regardless of the fact that I kind of had an idea of what was going to happen.


Summary
As expected, (if any of you have seen the previews for the movie) the story revolves around Hazel Grace: a a sad girl who has cancer and really lives a sheltered life "waiting around to die", she has been told that she has terminal cancer and choose not to really do things "normal teenagers" do.

Hazel meets August or Gus (her love interest) at a support group for "teenagers" or "kids" with cancer. She also, befriends a boy named Issac who is very much in love with a girl ( I forget her name)

*Spoiler alert* .
Isaac has to get his "eyes" or should I say one "eye" removed because of his cancer. His girlfriend selfishly breaks up with him and become very pessimistic after the fact. Most scene with him in the book are a bit hard to read. Also, Isaac and his "ex" have a thing where they say "Forever" so Hazel and Gus later have a "thing" where they say "okay"; in case any of you where wondering what "okay" means in the context of the book.
*End Spoiler*
Most of Hazel and Gus's interactions are just so very cute! (At least at first) As the story goes on the book becomes more depressing. (Yes, it is true)

*Spoiler*
At one point they use Gus's "wish" and they visit Amsterdam so they can meet Hazel's "favorite author" and find out he "ends the story" because the book he writes ends abruptly without a defiant end. 
 This book also ends the same way and the Author is a washed up has been who is an alcoholic and a complete a**.

*Giant Spoiler Alert Here!!*
They have a very romantic date while in Amsterdam and they both loose their virginities  to each other.

After a their "Amsterdam Romance" together , Gus confesses that he in fact too is terminally ill and he has been hiding it from Hazel and he is actually in worse health than Hazel. Pretty much after that the book just describes how Gus deteriorates and how Hazel sticks around and stays by his side.

Gus eventually dies, after Issac and Hazel have a "mock funeral" for him which is all dreadfully tearful. At Gus's funereal the "Jerk Author" shows up and "apologizes" for being well obviously not nice. Hazle doesn't really forgive him of course and it turns out his book which focuses on a girl with cancer is about his daughter who passed away and he tells her she reminds him of her.(This is flattering I suppose)

Later, Issac clues her in about a "piece" written by Gus which is supposedly the "ending" to the book they both loved by the "Jerk Author". The "Jerk Author's" ex assistant sends Hazel a copy of what Gus wrote and basically in a nutshell it is a "eulogy" like what Hazel wrote for Gus he wants the Author to say at her Funeral. After that, the book abruptly ends.

*End Spoilers*


Review
Let me start out by saying before I write my "official' review this book is dreadful sad!

I liked this book,  I found myself dreading the ending through the entire book. This book was rather depressing well as expected; often I found myself wondering why I was reading such a sad book in the first place.

I really liked both Hazel Grace and August. I think that was probably the "crappiest" part. That being the reason, I probably read the book in the first place was because i liked the characters.

*Spoiler Alert*
I freaking of course thought, the author of Hazel's "favorite book" was of course an a**hole but that's to be expected because his character is one! I was disappointed for Hazel when he didn't tell her the ending of her favorite book. I mean who wouldn't be, they travel all the way across the globe and find out their "hero" is a crock; I think any one would be disappointed.

It was tear jerking when August died to say the least and of course of the how the book ended to "expect" to know that Hazel died as well. It was like i said down right depressing. Also, the way in the book that August is described deteriorating is awful as well. The part when he pee's the bed is probably the worse and when they read each other's eulogy.
 *Ah who am I kidding? SPOILERS EVERYWHERE!!!*

Of course I though it was cute when the couple was in Amsterdam having their little "romantic date". I think you'd have to be soulless not to think it wasn't cute. How Hazel was nervous and asked her Mom if her outfit looked okay. How August wore a suit and tie they had a cute romantic dinner and then a passionate encounter later.

Before they went to Amsterdam as well. When they first meet and he compared her to Natalie Portman and was making googly eyes at her across the room. When he made her "dutch sandwiches" and announced they would be going to Amsterdam. How cute it was when Hazel was all cutely excited!
*End Spoiler*

I didn't really enjoy the "endless rambling" or at least that's what I call it in the book I feel like there was a lot of it. Usually, I like a lot of dialog but at some points, it was annoying. I mean I get, the character are "free thinkers" or "philosophical" but still I know in real life it bugs they heck out me when people constantly talk like that and I feel the same way about books.



I think this book defiantly "goes up there" on the list of "best romance stories" that are just both "timeless" and "unforgettable".  I think you could defiantly compare this book to "The Notebook" or "Titanic" in the sense that like I said it is an "unforgettable love story".

If you are even slightly a romantic at heart, I suggest you check this book out but be prepared to have your heart strings tugged!!

I would say that I would give this book 3 1/2 stars out of 5. Even though it is a "epic love story" it wasn't really my "favorite book of all time" and there were certain things (mostly the endless dialog and the fact that at some points this book is down right depressing) that I did not like. I'm sure many people could argue that they both like the "rambling" and "depressing" or more "emotional" parts; you could say that really adds to the "hype" of the book but I did not enjoy those parts but that is of course just a matter of opinion.

Thanks for guys for checking out my blog,

Kylia aka Alaska Book Girl!

https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/3451295-kylia

Mini Review: Hide and Seek (The Lying Game #4)

First as always let me state that I do not own the right to any of the image/s used in my blog. They were provided by Google search.



Introduction/Summary
Hello, everyone! I know it has been a while. I just finished reading, the fourth book in The Lying Games series and I thought I would do a quick/mini review.

I have reviewed briefly the other three books in the series, and maybe at some point i'll edit them a bit and post them on here! For now, they are just on my goodreads account.

If you want see these and other reviews, which aren't on my blog i'll post a link at the end of this post.

I'm sure many of you have heard of "Pretty Little Liars" both the television show and the book series. Well, "The Lying Games" is also, a television show and a book series as well. Both, are book series written by Sara Shepard; they both revolve around "teenage girls" with "secrets" and other things revolving around "lies" and such.

For those who you who have never watched, "The Lying Games" or read the book series I'll give you a little bit of a background to the series. (Note: I have never read the "Pretty Little Liars" books or really ever watched the show. Though, I am a fan of "The Lying Game" Show. I'm not going to explain the differences between the books and the series in this book maybe at some point I will.)

The book series, revolves around two twin sisters: one named Emma Becker and the other named Sutton Mercer. Sutton Mercer: grew up wealthy, with a loving family, close knit group of friends, being popular and noticed in school. Pretty much Sutton Mercer was living every teenage girl's fantasy life or the "teenage dream". Emma Becker, on the other hand has a bit of a tougher up bringing: She never really had a home, She was never popular, only had one best friend, and grew up living from foster home to foster home.

Now, this where things get a little more complicated. (The story line, is different in the tv show!) In the book series, Sutton is dead. Yes, you read it right dead. So Emma travels from her home in Las Vegas to Arizona where Sutton "lives" because she receive a message on facebook from "Sutton" telling her she wants to meet her. When, she get to Arizona she discovers that Sutton is dead and is threatened, that if she doesn't "Play along" that she will be killed. So, she pretends to be Sutton all the while trying to figure out who Sutton's killer is. (Also, Sutton is a ghost who pretty much floats around and follows Emma without her knowing and kind of narratives the story)


So, this is my "quickie" summary of the series now on to the review.

Review
It took me a while to actually finish this book, book number three on the other hand I finished rather quickly. Granted, I am one of those people who reads more than one book at a time and I do have other things going on in my life but I admit I got distracted away from this book and over all I wasn't as into the book as I was at first like I was in the previous books.

This book was a bit repetitive at first, typical Emma trying to figure out who the killer is and making unnecessary assumptions who the killer actually is. So far, in the series every book there is a person in which Emma thinks is the "killer" and so far none of her "assumptions" have turned out to be true. I am excited that there are only two more books in the series (not counting the two novellas) so I can freaking find out who the killer is!!!!!!

This book, to me at least didn't really start "getting good" until about half way towards the end. When, the repetitiveness got "shaken up" a bit. There defiantly were some surprises in this book towards the end (so different from the tv show, which I must add I watched before reading the books)

I won't spoil to much about what happened but I am defiantly excited to read book number six and like I said find out who the killer is!

Over all, I rate this book three and half stars out of four.

Thanks for checking out my blog and happy reading guys,

Kylia aka Alaska Book Girl!

https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/3451295-kylia

Book Review: The one (selection #3) *Mini Review of the Entire Series*

First as always let me state that I do not own the right to any of the image/s used in my blog. They were provided by Google search.

Introduction
First let me say that I was so supper excited to read this book! I did review the other two books, on goodreads.com I'll post a link to both of those reviews so you guys can check them out!
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/833011032?book_show_action=false
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/834768627?book_show_action=false
I will say that they are both brief reviews and are not nearly as long as this book review will be.

Summary
So like I stated above this is the third and final book in the "Selection Series". I know that many of you have probably read the series already and maybe some of you haven't read the series at all.

I won't spoil anything as always, for any of you out there who might want to read this in the future.I'll give some information as a whole what the series is about.

The series takes place, in the future in what use to be The United States and now is called Illea. In this country, everyone has a number of sorts called "castes" when you are in a "castes" it pretty much limits you to certain jobs you can do, if you will be wealthy and so and so forth.

In comes the competition The Selection! It is a tradition where many different young women both rich and poor get entered into a competition to ultimately "win the princes heart" and become rich and famous during the process.

Enter, our lovely main character America. Unlike most of the other girls in the selection she doesn't really want to be a "princess" in fact she would like nothing more to just marry her "secret boyfriend" Aspen who is a lower caste then she is and live a poor and happy life.

She enters the competition not really wanting to and of course "gets selected" to come to the palace and compete for the young princes heart.

Through out the series, there is a bit of a love triangle going on between Aspen, her first love and Maxton the Prince.

The series is almost like the bachelor really, only the winner becomes and princess. There are lots of twists and turns along the way in the series.

Especially, in this last book. There are so many unexpected things that happen in the book! I won't say much because I really don't want to give too much away.

Review
This was such a great book! I absolutely loved this book! I give it 5 out of 5 stars!
I really decided to read the first book in the series on a whim and I have really enjoyed the entries series as a whole.

I think Kiera Casss, did an excellent job bringing the series to a close. She gave us readers exactly what we wanted from the start. (I won't say what but you all can probably guess)

Spoiler alert, if you don't want to know skip reading this part!
I was saddened, of course by many of the events in the series! So many deaths. :( I was happy to see Celeste change her colors in the end and become friends with America of course it would have been nice to see her at the wedding so sad!

It was awful when, Queen Amberly and America's Father passed away as well. The wedding scene was very cute as well and very much enjoyed reading it!

I like how Lucy and Aspen ended up together in the end too! (Though I must admit it was bitter sweet and of course I was always Team Maxton all the way)

I also, enjoyed the meeting some of the rebels and seeing them work together with American and Maxton.

I was pretty surprised that Kriss was rebel all along! I did not see that coming.

Some parts, I was so mad at Maxton! So freaking, indecisive when obviously he wants America! Like how he was going to choose Kriss instead! Come on man noooooo!


Read Here, no more spoilers.
I have checked out some other review for the book and I do think some parts were a bit rushed but like I said I do think this was a good ending.

So much was going on in this book, not to say that nothing happened in the others but at some points it felt "off balance" in comparison to the other books in the series.

I am sad that series is over because I really enjoyed this series! I hope maybe in the future this series could turn into a movie or a tv series. I would love that but then again I might hate who they pick for America.(That always happens in series when there go from book to tv or movie to me any way)

Defiantly, check this series out if you already haven't such a great book series!

Kylia aka Alaskan Book Girl

Book Review: Chocolates for Breakfast

First as always let me state that I do not own the right to any of the image/s used in my blog. They were provided by Google search.


Introduction
Strangely enough, I came across this book on cosmopolitan magazine's website; in an article (which I cannot now find) involving something along the lines "love these tv shows? try these books out which are similar". This book "Chocolate for Breakfast"  was compared to the popular tv show "gossip girl". Now I am not a die hard "Gossip Girl" fan but I have seen some episodes on netflix and didn't think it was to bad. So I thought I would give this book a try. I downloaded it on my kindle via amazon and started reading right away.

I am not sure, if I have ever really read a book quite like this before. Obviously this book has more a "formal" tone to it and I usually reads books which are more "informal" but this book was written in the 1950's, so obviously there are many different "cultural" or "society based" things in this book which are not current has the current year is, 2014.

Over all, I would rate this book 4 out of 5 stars. Why you might ask? Well obviously, if you are reading this review you are wondering what my opinion of this book is or maybe what it is even about.

Let me start out by saying for those people out there who are "recovering" from any sort of "self harm addiction" or "suicidal tendencies" I wouldn't recommend this book for you. All though the book's main character is in fact a girl the ages of 15 and 16, in my opinion this is a "mature book" and this book defiantly has some "mature subject matter".  Now obviously, you can do what you want to do and read this book if you so choose but please keep this in mind. I don't think this book really "encourages" sucicide or self harm or alcoholic behavior but still to be on the safe side, I thought I would mention that.



Summary
I had a hard time reading this book at first because it is a bit "depressing". The main character starts out being a trouble 15 year old Named Courtney who live at a boarding school with her only friend Janet. Courtney has trouble relating to most "young people" her age and her friend Janet who is a "partying socialite" encourages her to hang out with people her own age or at least closer to her age, go on dates with boys, drink and smoke cigarettes and most importantly "start a love affair" or loose her virginity.

While at the boarding school, she is rather close with an older woman named Miss Rosen,who is her "English teacher". Janet accuses her of having a "homosexual relationship" with the women which is false. The older English teacher, breaks off the relationship stating that she needs to talk to people her own age and it is unhealthy to talk to be who are so much older than her.

Her mother Sondra pulls her out of boarding school because she is "depressed" and not really getting along with the younger students. Sondra is an alcoholic, youth obsessed, divorce and just happens to be a washed up actress.

Her mother and father really haven't treated her as a child probably ever in her entire life. So to help her Mother and to cope with her every changing environment, she assumes the role of the "care giver" and thinks of herself mostly as an "adult" though through out most of the book everyone refers her as a "child". At first she detests to this but eventually she accepts this.

She is introduced another washed up actor and supposed "homosexual' has a brief moment with a her Mother's agent (whom is much older) and family friend. She looses her virginity the "gay actor" and has a love affair in secret with him for a while. All the while, her Mother can't seem to find any work in hollywood and they are increasing debut.


She eventually breaks off the affair with "older gay actor" and her Mother move to herself move to New York so she can get a "change of scenery" and also her Mother can see if she can get some acting work on television there.

While she is in New York, she meets up with Janet whom after being kicked out every boarding school you can think of is living with her abusive and alcoholic father and her mother who is rarely there and lives in a mental asylum.

Janet and Courtney take to partying with "Yalies" young men who either dropped out of Yale or who attended Yale. They drink constantly go on many dates with different "Yalies". Janet is pretty much labeled as a "slut" for the most part.

Janet introduces Courtney to Anthony a strange and very rich gentlemen. At first, Anthony out right scares Courtney with his "odd way of speaking and thinking". He talks almost in riddles, at talks openly about "strange" or "taboo" social subjects such as :homosexuality, ect. He wants to have an affair with Courtney and at first she refuse but eventually they do have a "fling". Most of their relationship is kept in secret, especially from Janet whom also had an affair with him.

She also meets a "straight arrow" guy who is also a "yalie" named Charles who she finds "snobby" and a bit annoying at times but grows to like him very much.

Janet has a very large fight with her Father so she stays with Courtney and Sondra for a while and all though she "lives there" she is rarely around because of Janet's moving in with her she starts seeing Charles more and more as a "cover" at first and sees Anthony less and less.


Sondra being a bit of a "control freak" or a "perfectionist" tells Courtney that she wants her to move out because of her "messiness" and she doesn't think that she is a good "influence" on Courtney.




Unfortunately, soon after Janet moves back in with her Father they get into a physical altercation (also after one of her boyfriend's breaks it off with Janet). This event results in Janet committing suicide.

Courtney of course is devastated by this and becomes a bit isolated after this. The book ends with her breaking up with Anthony who earlier on confesses that "he can never love her because he doesn't even love himself" and the book suggest that she ends up with Charles. She also makes the decision to no longer have "casual love affairs" and to stop "drinking to heavily and partying" for Janet.


Review

I enjoyed this book very much. I think this book is one of those book that will always be relevant. Being that the subject matter will always be relevant, this book is about depression, the struggle to find yourself, sexuality and the very real struggle in life to grow up.

I was surprised when Janet ended her life and of course sadden. I was secretly rooting for Anthony and Courtney to some how work out but you can't "change a tiger's stripes" and I suppose he was just to damaged.

This is such a great book! It is really worth the read and I would read it again in a heart beat!

Extra Bit



There is some  controversy surrounding the woman who wrote this book's life and all honestly I am not going to state my opinion on "suicide" stating that it is "right" or "wrong" really to me it is just a very sad thing.

Pamela Moore's story is a sad one and if you'd like to know more about her feel free to google her or even read this book ; there is plenty of information about her out there.

The fact that Pamela Moore committed suicide did not take away anything from this book to me! In fact, it interested me more to learn more about her and read her work.

Many great artists are often "pained" and I know many people believe that these people often make the best "art". As for myself, I'm unsure but I do enjoy this book very much and it was interesting at the end of the book to read her son's word about his Mother in the "foreword".


I hope you all enjoyed my review and thank you for reading,

Alaskan Book Girl aka Kylia