ya fiction – Page 2 – Amy Leigh Reads

📚Book vs. Movie🎥

January 29, 2019January 30, 2019by amyleighreadsLeave a Comment

I thought I would start this fun new series on my blog where I compare a book with their movie adaptation and I give you my thoughts and opinions on both. Whether or not you should just stick to the book or if the movie is better than the book, pros and cons and what I would recommend overall!

This month I decided to go with To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before because it’s pretty fresh on my mind as I just read it a few weeks ago. I see the hype for the movie all over my social media but I try not to watch movie adaptations if I haven’t read the book first. I don’t know it’s just a personal preference of mine I would prefer to read the book and then watch the movie and kind of know what’s going on.

So with all that being said these are my thoughts on To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before are:

Pros: I believe they cast Lara Jean very well, she is exactly how I pictured her in my mind! She was also a lot more mature in the movie compared to the book, which I appreciated. I liked that the movie stayed with the original storyline of the book, it didn’t really deviate all that much from the original.

Cons: I wanted to see more of the connection she shares with her family, especially Margot. They kind of skated over the fight that they had and it was quite a significant scene in the book. Also it didn’t quite depict how close the Covey’s were to Josh. Lara Jean especially had quite a close relationship to him and that wasn’t really shown in the movie. They didn’t quite go in depth with her relationship with Peter either. They had a lot of scenes together that really deepened their connection that wasn’t shown in the movie.

Overall thoughts: It was a great adaptation in my opinion. Both the book and the movie were super entertaining, a little bit cringey and very fast paced. They do tackle some deep emotional topics that are very current in today’s society which I thought made both the book and the movie very relevant.

My Recommendation: Either depending on your chosen format. You definitely don’t need to read the book first to enjoy the movie! I slightly enjoyed the movie more but I think it was because I had already read the book and was already informed on the plot.

mv5bmjm1njm4nta1nv5bml5banbnxkftztgwnti5mdmxnjm@__v1_sy1000_cr007131000_al_-642x900

Reviews

The Wicked King Review

January 18, 2019January 18, 2019by amyleighreads2 Comments

26032887 Similar to my experience reading The Cruel Prince, I just didn’t really gel to this book.

Its five months into Cardan’s reign and Jude has been running the kingdom under the guise of his Seneschal. With Cardan under her command she has complete control over the land and is finding it difficult to manage. Cardan is finding ways to undermine her orders and she has to circumvent many plots against the throne, her life as well as her king’s.

Jude again really got on my nerves in this book. I don’t know what it is about her but I can’t seem to warm to her. I thought she was a lot more thoughtful in her planning and processes in this book, but her lack of modesty in the sense that she feels like she’s untouchable just grates me. Like the fact that she’s warned time again to have a guard with her at all times and she rides off to Madoc’s property by herself and gets ambushed. She is told that someone she trusts has betrayed her by a Fae who cannot lie and all she does is speculate as to who it might be, she doesn’t actively try to pin point who… Little things like that where she thinks she is smarter than everyone else and can do things on her own. I enjoy a strong, powerful female protagonist who doesn’t need a man beside her to help her but Jude is on the other side of the spectrum to the point where I don’t care what happens to her. Every bad decision she makes that results in something bad happening to her I think well she deserved it.

The pace of the book was a little off for me as well. I found the first half of the book to be very slow but it did pick up towards the tail end of the story. Around the last 100 pages or so I did actually enjoy the plot and how things were unraveling but it took too long to get there. There were a few twists in the plot that I liked and piqued my interests, but they were too few and far between to keep me thoroughly entertained and intrigued.

I just think maybe this series isn’t for me right now. If you read The Cruel Prince and liked it you are probably going to really like The Wicked King. I tried The Cruel Prince and thought it was just ok and now I’ve read The Wicked King and again it’s not my cup of tea, I don’t know yet if I’m going to pick up the next book in this series…

⭐️2.75/5 unfortunately this book/series just isn’t for me…

Reviews

Flame in the Mist Review

January 11, 2019January 14, 2019by amyleighreads2 Comments

23308087 I really loved this book!

Marika is on her way to the imperial city to meet with her betrothed. A marriage her father a prominent samurai arranged for her as she had known would happen her whole life. On the road her convoy is attacked by the Black Clan, a rogue group of bandits, who’ve been hired to kill Marika. As the lone survivor Marika makes the decision to take her life into her own hands, track down the Black Clan and find out who wants her dead.

I really enjoyed Marika’s character. She wasn’t naïve or overly innocent and immature which I kind of don’t like in female protagonists. I thought she was quite forthright and speculative and unwilling to bend. She asks questions, she wants to be informed, she doesn’t want to be in the dark or unaware and she pushes for information. Her growth over the course of the book was great to read. She has decided she doesn’t want any man to make decisions for her. She is in charge of her own destiny. I also really liked how self-aware she became towards the end of the story. She understood how much she overlooked as the daughter of a samurai and how skewed her perception of the world and those around her were.

At first I didn’t find any of the members of the black clan to be likeable. I didn’t really connect with any of them until around the half-way point of the book. When they decided to trust Marika and we got a few more details about who they are and what they are doing and that’s really when I started to be more invested.

I loved reading about the backstory of Ranmaru and Okami. Everything about their father’s and the emperor and how it wove together into the plotline was beautiful. I loved that their friendship was based on loyalty and honour. You could really get a feel for the lengths that they would go to protect each other and the rest of the Black Clan.

I love that this book is so unique and different culturally, learning about the samurai’s and the different clans in the empire. Seeing the political manipulations of the emperor and his son’s and how they interact with others around them. How the plot unfolded and the way the characters interacted kept me highly entertained. Though there were passages at the start where it got a little boring and I was skimming a few paragraphs but overall the actual story was fantastic!

⭐️4.5/5 Twists and turns, samurai’s and sword fights!

Reviews

To all the Boys I’ve Loved Before Review

January 9, 2019January 14, 2019by amyleighreads3 Comments

item_xl_8917056_9117895 I liked it, I didn’t love it….

This book follows the story of Lara Jean, she is a quiet, shy girl who wrote a letter for each of the guys that she had crush on. Unfortunately somehow the letters got mailed and she now has to face the consequences.

For the first half of the book Lara Jean kind of got on my nerves. She read a little younger than what I was expecting to be quite honest and she was a little too naïve for my liking. She kind of grew on me the second half of the story though, when obstacles started propping up and she was finding herself in the middle of various problems she has never had to deal with before I thought she worked her way out of things well and stood her ground.

I loved Chris. I thought her character contrasted with Lara Jean perfectly. The fact that they has so much in common back in middle school yet Chris evolved and rebelled and they somehow still remained friends was a nice element to the plot. I liked the fact that she wasn’t always around all the time but she still made an appearance at crucial moments in the plot to have Lara Jean’s back, which made me really like her. She is unaffected by what people think of her and she is true to herself which I think are pretty decent characteristics.

Peter and Josh I haven’t quite made up my mind yet between the two. I like the separate relationships they share with Lara Jean and how the counteract. I like that we see so many different sides to the two characters and I felt they differed enough from each other to be distinguishable. I just don’t have a distinct favourite of the two though, they both had there cute and obnoxious moments so I’m not convinced on either just yet.

I love the relationship that Lara Jean has with her family though. I thought they were very supportive and open with one another. Her father in particular I really liked! I thought he was present in her life without being too overbearing and really wants her to experience high school, which I found super endearing.

It was a cute, light, fluffy contemporary with just the right amount of conflict and cringe to keep me entertained.

⭐️3.75 I just need Lara Jean to be a little bit more self-assertive!

Reviews

The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer Review

January 7, 2019January 7, 2019by amyleighreads2 Comments

11194970 I loved this!

We follow Mara Dyer after she has woken up in the hospital. She was involved in an accident that killed her best friend, her boyfriend and another girl in her year but she doesn’t remember anything about that night. Eager to move on her family agree to relocate to give her the space to heal.

I really liked Mara as a character. She was deeply flawed, yet still so persistent and dedicated to trying to pick up and continue on with her life. She hasn’t lost touch and completely succumbed to her condition, she is still trying to maintain some form of normality, which I thought was commendable. I thought she was witty and the banter she has with Noah and Jamie was fun to read.

I loved Noah… I found his surety and his arrogance very appealing. I think he was written in a way where you can’t help but find him likeable, even when he’s kind of being duchey. I like that we get such a thorough backstory and we see that there is this completely different side of him that he doesn’t show.

I also really liked Jamie. I thought that he was a great friend to Mara and I think it was purely the fact that he only wanted to be friends with her. There were no strings attached, he just seen a kind of awkward, new girl in his year and was nice to her. He gave her some pretty sound advice based on his personal experience but he still let her make her own decisions and still supported her regardless. You don’t really see a lot of these characters and I appreciated him a lot in this book. It kind of sucks how his arc sort of ended abruptly but hopefully he makes a reappearance in the rest of the series.

I also really enjoyed the relationship Mara has with her brothers, especially Daniel. I thought he was so supportive of Mara and didn’t judge her in any way. They still had the typical big brother little sister dynamic but there was a protectiveness that he has for her that I found very endearing.

I was very much sucked into the book from the start! I liked how it was paced; it started off pretty slowly but gave me enough information that I still needed more and that really kept me turning the pages. That paranormal element to the story I felt was executed very well. That aspect of the story was always kind of floating around the edges and then finally when Mara came to the realisation of her powers it was thrilling.

I think this a highly entertaining read and honestly after that plot twist at the end it just made me want to pick up the next book and start reading it right now!

⭐️4.5/5 I loved my experience reading this!