Books To Read If You Loved Red, White & Royal Blue

History, huh?

Casey Mcquinston’s debut novel, Red white and royal blue was an amazing read for me. It had just the right amount of romance and humor which we all need a little bit of. The book is set in an alternate reality where the president of the united states is a democrat woman and the story follows her son, Alex Clairemont Diaz, and his “forbidden romance” with Prince Henry of Wales.

Like i’m sure all readers do when we finish a good book, i wanted something with the same “amazing in the moment” type of feeling that this book gave me and so i went on a quest, journeyed through five cities and dark green forests with glassy lakes to find similar stories.

So if you do read and enjoy/enjoyed Red, white and Royal blue, here are some stories you can check out:

HER ROYAL HIGHNESS by Rachel Hawkins.

Millie Quint has a best friend who is sort of also her girlfriend and so it’s no surprise when she decides to apply to boarding schools far away from Houston after being cheated on. Luckily, Millie is accepted into one of the world’s most exclusive schools in Scotland and her roommate just happens to be the Princess of Scotland whose high class attitude she can barely stand. Well, until they both open new chapters filled with love in each other’s stories. Are the chances of happy ever after after too slim for them?

THE GENTLEMEN’s GUIDE TO VICE AND VIRTUE by Mackenzi Lee

(I added this to the list because it was given five stars by my favorite author, Rick Riordan.)

Monty can never be tamed, even though he was born to be one of the finest gentlemen and was educated in the finest schools in England. He prefers to spend his night with bottles of alcohol and men and women, much to the disappointment of his father who expects him to take over the family’s estate. Monty decides to go on a grand tour of europe to find a life filled with pleasure with his best friend, Percy whom he has a big crush on. When his tour of england turns into a manhunt that takes him across Europe due to a reckless decision, the journey leaves him questioning everything including his relationship with Percy.

CARRY ON by Rainbow Powell

Simon is the chosen one. He probably shouldn’t be the chosen one because he sucks at it, but he is anyway. His life is not so fun either. It’s his last year at the Watford school of magicks, his girlfriend broke up with him, his arch nemesis Baz didn’t show up to school and there’s a magic eating monster who looks just like him running around.

FELIX EVER AFTER by Kacen Callender

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to be in love, but just can’t seem to find the right person? Well, that’s the problem for Felix, and he is quite desperate to find it. However, when an anonymous student starts sending him transphobic messages and photos of him before his transition, Felix orchestrates a plan for revenge only to end up in a love triangle.

THE TWO LIVES OF LYDIA BIRD by Josie Silver

Lydia and Freddie had been inseparable for over a decade. That is, until Freddie dies on Lydia’s twenty eighth birthday in a car accident. That must suck.

Lydia would most rather stay inside and float in a pool of her own tears but she knows Freddie would want her to move on and live life happily without him. With the help of his best friend and her sister, Lydia takes the steps she needs to go back into the world, life and maybe even find love again.

But then a chance at her old life with Freddie appears. It should be impossible, she can’t explain it but she is pulled back into her past and begins to live two lives at once. Stuck with making a choice on whether she should return to a world where Freddie is alive and they’re in love or remain in her real life where someone new wants her to stay, Lydia must make a choice.

MY REBEL YEAR OF READING

I’m always a little bit scared to try something new, even when it comes to reading books. Giving a new genre a chance is something I always force myself to do but I decided to rebel a little when it came to my reading this year.

The chance to do this was one of the few pros that came with starting a little book club with my friends and taking a reading challenge the year. It was an amazing experience if you want to ignore how I had to beg most of them to have monthly reviews with me (I hope you all see this). I call this year my rebel year of reading because I strayed far from my usual re-reading of the twilight series, the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series as well as the heroes of Olympus series, and decided to venture into other genres and different authors to see what I would find there.

RED, WHITE AND ROYAL BLUE by Casey McQuiston

So, let’s take a look at 5 of my favorite reads from this year, in no particular order.

“History huh?”

Do you know how I know this year went by really fast? This was the first book I read this year and I can still remember quotes from it and every single emotion that I felt while reading it.

Red, white and royal blue is an LGBTQ romance novel that centers on the relationship between Alex Diaz, the first son of the president of the united states, and Henry, a British prince. Combining the enemies-to-lovers trope and well-written declarations of love, red, white, and royal blue took me as a reader on a journey that taught me about acceptance of oneself and what joy comes with celebrating our true identity.

My thought at the end of this story?

Sometimes, we plan to be one person and end up as another.

- Adraine

SNOW, GLASS, APPLES by Neil Gaiman

I wrote a review on this at the time when I read it because it was too good to shut up about it. I found this book because I was looking for something short to read in the smallest amount of time possible and not only did snow, glass, apples do that for me- it also left me wishing it were a longer novel.

Because i would have given time i did not have to it.

Snow, glass, apples is a horrific, intense retelling of the fairytale of snow-white that even inspired me to write my own retelling of cinderella, which was one of my favorite stories written by me this year.

My thought at the end of this story?

Not everyone who shows you their teeth is really smiling at you and thus not every thing is at it seems

- Adraine 

Tap to read my review of snow, glass apples

CINDERELLA IS DEAD by Kaylnn Bayron

Not long after I read snow, glass, apples and wrote As Dark As Cinder, a lovely human thought it would be nice to introduce me to “Cinderella is dead”- a retelling of the story, Cinderella that blew my mind away.

Cinderella is dead takes a much darker turn into the story of cinderella, ripping apart everything I thought I knew about the story and bringing in sicker, jaw-dropping plot twists with a sprinkle of romance.

We have black girls dressing up in ballgowns to take down the patriarchy. Of course, I’d fall in love.

My thought at the end of this story?

Honestly, who names their child, Charming?

- Adraine

WORDS ON BATHROOM WALLS by Julia Walton

Adam sees things. He also hears things. The only problem is most of the things he sees and hears are not always there. After an accident at his old school, Adam writes to his therapist about moving to a new, Christian school and falling in love with a brilliant student, all while struggling to keep his disorder a secret, understand life itself, and trying to be normal for once.

When I found this, I actually just looked up “books like All the bright places by Jennifer Niven” because I really wanted a main character that would make me cry the way Theodore Finch did. Adam didn’t make me cry though (sadly) but he did make me fall in love with his awesome personality. I’m not sure if Adam’s character is a 100% accurate representation of what a person with schizophrenia is like but I will say that the story really sheds light on how disorders like schizophrenia mess with the lives of people.

I read the book in about two days and decided right after that I needed to see someone play Adam so i thought, “why not watch the movie?”

We won’t be talking about how i felt when i did that.

My thought at the end of this story?

Just as we have a variety of people and things in the world, so also do we have a variety of problems that these people go through- none of which are bigger than the other.

- Adraine

GONE GIRL by Gillian Flynn

Permission to scream?

Thank you.

You know how I said I delved into other genres this year? One thing about me is I absolutely hate thrillers. I have no logical reason why. I have no urge to explain either, I just do not like the tension that comes with me. I’m 20 years old. I should not be feeling hypertensive because of a book.

However, as I said at the beginning of this post, I took a reading challenge with my friends, and in October, we had to read a thriller. Gone Girl was the chosen book of the month and I thought “why not?”

Gone Girl is about a man named Nick and his wife, Amy- who disappears on their fifth anniversary. It follows the events that happen after Amy’s disappearance and the lies Nick tells in order to save his own skin, and keep his image of the perfect, good husband intact.

I don’t regret reading this book. It was different from my usual preference, but it was such an amazing story that I may be changing my mind about thrillers and picking more up next year. I still haven’t changed my opinion on the hypertensive part though, because if you’re into yelling at your book and typing out rants in your notepad because it’s not time to talk about it to the book club yet and you don’t want to spoil for anyone then please, for the love of God, read this book.

That covers five of my favorite books from my 2021 reading list. I set a goal to read 18 different books this year and ended with 21 books instead so I guess you could say I’m pretty proud of myself. Since I could only cover five of them in this blog post, I created a list for you, oh sweet and lovely reader of all the books so you have new recommendations which you should definitely consider adding to your TBR.

Tap for my 2021 reading list

What were your favorite books from this year?

Cinderella is Dead – Book review

It’s time for Cinderella with a very very different twist.

Queer black girls in ballgowns teaming up to overthrow the patriarchy?

Sign me up!

Once upon a time, in the kingdom of Mersailles, with the assistance of a fairy godmother, Cinderella went to the ball, won the heart of prince charming and they lived happily ever after.

200 hundred years later, Cinderella’s story has become a sort of religion as young girls in the kingdom are mandated to study the fairytale, be models of Cinderella’s “grace and beauty”, attend an annual ball, be put on display and selected by the men to be their wives. However, this is no fairytale since nobody knows what happens to girls who are not chosen, as they are never heard from again.

“Cinderella is dead” by Kalynn Bayron tells the story of our protagonist, a sixteen-year-old girl named Sophia who would rather marry her best friend, Erin than attend the ball and be chosen by a man she does not know. At the ball, she makes a desperate decision to run away and find a way to fix all the things that are wrong in their society. On this journey, she meets new people and learns that there is so much more to the story of Cinderella than she (and i ) was ever told.

I thought this story was an astonishing approach to the fairytale, yet a very toxic one. From the very first chapter, I was introduced to a great sense of the abuse done to women and young girls by the misogynistic men in Mersailles and it has me wanting to go into those pages and slap some of them just to set their heads right. A few normalcies in your average fairytale are also revoked as well- fairy godmothers sometimes have their own intentions and honestly, who names their kid, “Charming”?

“When I sat down to draft Cinderella, I started with a few questions: What effect do the fairy tales we are told as children have on us? What happens to our view of the world when the characters in these stories don’t look like us or love like us? When do we get to be the heroes of our own stories?”, Kalynn Bayron says about her process in the writing of the book.

Coupled with the inclusion of LGBTQ and feminist characters, Bayron provides an experience that teaches about how a lot of people are often conditioned to believe that things are supposed to be a certain type of way, but not all ways are right so how do we carefully fix what is wrong?

While it is a story for young adults, I think it would be a fantastic read for older adults as well. My only criticism would be that there was not enough world-building to give support to the pace of the book itself. so I’m giving it an 8/10 stars.

All in all, this was an enjoyable story with twists and turns I didn’t see coming, brave heroes and some of their rash decisions as well as a villain so evil, they give Hitler a run for his money.

Happy reading!

Getting Out Of A Reading Slump

As a person who loves books, loves to read, and loves the feeling of getting lost in a good story, it can feel very weird, uncomfortable, and frustrating to be in a reading slump. We all love to do the things we enjoy doing and when you’re not particularly drawn to the things, it leaves you wondering, “what is wrong with me?”

Reading slumps are perfectly normal but nobody likes to be stuck in them, so here are some tips that could get you out of that unmotivated rut you’re in:

1. TAKE A BREAK

Do something else. There’s a good chance your brain is just not looking for a book at the moment. You never know if all it wants is a good movie, some music, or just some sleep. Listen to it. Don’t force it. Always remember- CONSENT.

2. TRY A SHORT STORY

You don’t always have to go big so drop the 2000 page novels and go for something smaller. There are amazing stories out there told in less than 100 pages waiting for you to enjoy them. They won’t take a lot of time. Read reviews and curated lists. You just might find a new favorite book.

3. RE-READ

Speaking of favorites, you could also try picking up one of yours and reading it again. Sometimes when I’m in a reading slump, I go for one of the Percy Jackson or Twilight books and it usually helps a lot. If I had a dollar for every time I re-read those books, I’d be getting ready to buy one of those tickets to mars.

4. READING CHALLENGES

Challenges give you a sense of company because you’re not the only one doing them and there’s a sense of pride when you’re done with them. There are a lot of fun reading challenges to take part in and you can even do them with friends.

5. READ WITH FRIENDS

Speaking of friends, it can be very fun when reading with people. I started an online book club with a couple of friends in January and I’m pretty sure I would not have read as much as I did this year if I wasn’t looking forward to our monthly discussions. Reading with people is great and motivating when they’re not giving you spoilers.

If you’re interested in joining the bookclub, tap this link to join

6. TRY A DIFFERENT GENRE

Cheesy love is cute and cool but dragons are way better and if a romance novel isn’t working for you, you can always try fantasy novels, thrillers, or even horror. There are so many genres and books out there. You never know what you might find when you explore.

7. AUDIOBOOKS AND EBOOKS

Still stuck in that reading rut? Perhaps what you need is a book in a different format, like an ebook you can scroll through on your phone or an audiobook you can listen to while you’re getting some work done.

8. SET REALISTIC GOALS

During my last reading slump, I decided to get back on track by reading 50 pages of an ebook every day. It was small, but it was helpful and when you set a goal, you might find yourself achieving even more than that. So set realistic goals, it could be several pages a day or a number of minutes a day. Just take your time.

There are a different ways to do things, so just find what works for you and remember, if all fails- maybe you just need a break. You’ll always have your books and you’ll always have Netflix too.

BOOK REVIEW: SNOW, GLASS APPLES

You’ve heard the tale of snow-white. How her beauty turned her stepmother into a jealous, wicked queen who sought to murder her. This causes Snow-white to run and hide in a forest with seven little dwarfs, that is until the queen finds out she’s alive and disguises herself as an old hag to bring a poisoned apple holding the curse of the sleeping death within it, to beautiful snow-white.

But even curses can be undone with a kiss from a Prince in love. For is there a spell more potent than true love?

Neil Gaiman’s “Snow, Glass, Apples” was published in 1994. It is a short story that wanders around the popular Grimm’s tale of snow-white. Gaiman has once said that he enjoys playing with a reader’s expectations when it comes to writing and that is no different in the case of “Snow, Glass, Apples”.

Told from the perspective of the not so evil stepmother, this unique story follows a woman who marries a widowed king and meets his daughter, a monstrous child with a thirst for blood and power.

This short story brings out hidden elements in the original fairytale and answers questions I didn’t even know I had, such as: was the queen really evil? And what kind of attraction would a perfect prince have for a seemingly dead girl?

Before I go on, this retelling may tell the tale of snow white but here, she is not the pretty nice princess who sings to animals in the forest that you want your kids emulating at all. Please note that this story is 18+ and not suitable for children but older readers as it features erectile dysfunction, oral sex, nudity, violent scenes, lovemaking, and a lot of other themes you definitely don’t want your kids reading about.

Moving on.

There are several things that make this story work for me. Collen Doran’s art and detailed drawing style was expressed all through the book and brought life to the story. I personally loved how all the elements of the original fairytale were put into this retelling and well, let’s just say that for everything you’ve read before, there’s something that contradicts it.

As said before, this is a short story clocking in at less than 70 pages and it can be read very quickly. I don’t mean to brag but I read it in an hour and it was a perfect balance of beautiful and unsettling.

Gaiman entertains the readers while handling each part of snow white’s story with care to create a beautiful new take that may scare you but will also delight you. Therefore, i’m giving it a rating of 8.5 out of 10 stars.

Happy reading!

Confessions Of A Bookaholic

My book journey this year started with me, re-reading all 10 books of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, and the Heroes of Olympus series respectively, followed by The Trials of Apollo all by the amazing Rick Riordan, thus fueling my obsession with Greek mythology and allowing me to love 11 year old Nico Di Angelo, the son of Hades in Peace.

After that, i went on to read other books, discovered new amazing authors and had amazing experiences in between hundreds of pages.

So here we go, my top 5 books for the year 2019 and what they taught me.

1. ALL THE BRIGHT PLACES BY JENNIFER NIVEN

I think this was my favorite book this year because it had me hooked all through. It presented itself as a love story but had a deeper meaning because it focused more on how it feels when a person is so hard to understand that they slowly get tired of it.

Finch and Violet, the main characters in the book meet each other in what might be the most awkward way ever. They don’t see each other in the hallway and go home thinking about that brief moment when they locked eyes, they don’t meet on social media and quickly fall in love with their souls but instead, they meet at the top of a building they had both planned to jump off from to their deaths and it is unclear which one saves the other but I think they saved each other.

I learned that there is good in this world if you look hard enough for it.

-Theodore Finch, All the bright places

Finch has bipolar disorder and Violet has lost her sister, coupled with other problems, however big and small they may be, the two lovers find it hard to envision a future that is even remotely okay.

What I learned in this book was to appreciate moments, no matter how little they might seem. I also learned that our perspective and view on people is not who they really are, you can be someone different to every body, what matters is what you think about yourself.

2. THIRTEEN REASONS WHY BY JAY ASHER

You must have seen the series adaptation of this one on Netflix.

Now this really messed with me. It’s about a young girl named Hannah Baker who before her suicide, releases thirteen tapes, each for a person who is one of Thirteen reasons why she killed herself. It’s one book in which I saw that the author really knew what it felt like for depressed people like Hannah and really put all that emotion into the book.

There were so many lessons I learnt while reading this and one of them is that our actions and words have consequences and the amazing power to build or destroy.

I also learned that not everyone is as perfect as they try to seem and we are all facing our own issues while still creating an impact in the lives of the people around us by the things we say and the things we do. So remember the Golden rule (because those people who received tapes in the book didn’t), be kind to people because it can always go a long way.

3. THE PERKS OF BEING A WALLFLOWER BY STEPHEN CHBOSKY

This book made me so happy to read and I felt like Charlie was a character I could relate to. It is a compilation of a bunch of letters, written by a boy named Charlie to his “friend” where he narrates his life experiences, from starting high school to meeting new friends and finally getting to “participate” in a world where he has always just watched from the sidelines like a wallflower would. He learns new things about himself and makes memories along the way.

I learned that life moves forward whether I’m willing to move with it or not and to live in the moment and participate in that moment to the fullest.

Enjoy it because it’s happening

This moment will just be another story someday.

Also, sometimes it’s okay not to be okay and we should never overthink it. During hard times, you’d be surprised at how well happy memories can get you through them.

Standing on the Fringe of life offers a unique perspective, but there comes a time to see what it looks like from the dance floor.

Accept that life can sometimes be just a gradual process of figuring out who you are, be nothing but yourself even if you don’t really know what “you” are really all about yet.

4. BY THE TIME YOU READ THIS, I’LL BE DEAD BY JULIE ANNE PETERS

By The Time You Read This, I’ll Be Dead took me to a whole new world and helped me understand how much of a major issue bullying is in the lives of kids today and the extents they could go to just to escape it.

• Nearly 75% of school shootings have been linked to harrasment and bullying.
• 90% of students have been harrased or bullied.
• Over 160,000 kids refuse to go to school each day for fear of being bullied.

Bullying can take many forms like physical, verbal, emotional and Cyber bullying.

Apart from creating enough awareness about bullying, it is important for people to know what to do when they witness a person being bullied. People should be aware of their surroundings and should not avoid addressing the issue when they have already recognized it as a problem.

We should put ourselves in a position where we are able to stop bullying before it can result in anything tragic.

5. BRAVE NEW WORLD BY ALDOUS HUXLEY

This book is a masterpiece.

Brave New World is a 1932 dystopian novel by English author, Aldous Huxley. In this book, the government retains control over it’s citizens by making them feel so happy and fulfilled that they do not care about their personal values, morals, freedom and emotions. They do this by encouraging constant consumption of an happiness producing drug known as “Soma”. In this society, there is peace but there is no real humanity because they are all void of what makes them truly human.

What I picked up from this book is that the mindset of any member of any society is solely based on what has been presented to them since the day they were born. Every single norm and value is as a result of experiences, personal and collective. At the end of the day, people are products of their society and they will scream in horror, reject and criticise whatever seems alien to them.

We will always be as misguided as the people swallowing soma every day unless we expand our minds, learn from those outside our familiar societies and gain a more universal perspective on things.

Here we are at the end of the narration of my 2019 book journey. As the year is not over, I’m currently reading ‘Lies You Never Told Me’ by Jennifer Donaldson

No matter how amazing the journey through a good book is, it’s important that we learn a few things along the way.

By The Time You Read This, I’ll Be Dead

If i saw a notification with a title like that, i would be scared so i wonder what exactly motivated you to click the link. Curiosity maybe?

This is the power of words. The ability to create certain feelings and reactions in the minds and bodies of people. The ability to create a different reality and challenge perspectives. One of the many reasons why a good book is a good companion.

“By the time you read this, I’ll be dead” is a novel by Julie Anne Peters, about a young girl named Daelyn who has been the target of bullying for many years and continues to hurt because of it. Previous suicide attempts have failed, one even rendering her unable to speak. Locked in an isolation of silence that she welcomes with open arms and protects, Daelyn has one wish; to escape school, her parents and her life and with the very structured help of Through-The-Light.com, after 23 days, she won’t fail again.

TRIGGER WARNING!
SPOILERS AHEAD!

The topic of suicide is an extremely fragile topic and when it’s time to speak on it, what are the right words to say? Are there even any right words? If there are, how does one say them?. I wonder if Daelyn’s mind was filled with these same questions because by the end of the book, it turns out she can actually talk if she wants to. She just chose not to speak. The silence kept her a prisoner as her jailer but also as her friend. Nobody understands her but herself, her parents think they’re saying the right “scripted” words when they’re really not. Everyone is shallow and they suck so what’s the use of talking to them?

A plan of escape from the world is seen as a plan for control. One thing is for sure, Daelyn is determined to die. She explores several options as she plans. She seems to have surrendered to the idea of leaving the world.

People who she tried to trust in the past, treated her badly.

Santana, a young boy Daelyn meets, who wants some kind of relationship with her reveals that he’s battling cancer. Daelyn doesn’t believe him at first and sometimes she thinks of him as a pest who won’t stop bothering her. However, she can’t talk to him so he’s not entirely sure what she thinks of him. Santana is different from Daelyn because he actually wants to stay alive despite having a fatal disease and deep inside, Daelyn is envious because she’s perfectly fine and has to think of ways to end her own life.

Santana’s anchor, his mother Ariel is his reason for fighting. Daelyn on the other hand feels her parents would be better off without her.

“I wish you could talk because I’d like to get to know your thoughts on Pantheism. A basic moral belief that doing harm to oneself harms us all. That we’re all interconnected”

-Santana (P.173)

This idea of Pantheism takes me back to Thirteen Reasons why where Hannah Baker said;

Smile at that person you lock eyes with, whoever it may be. You’ve shown them that you see them and you acknowledge them. Don’t hurt people inside or outside and treat everyone with respect in whatever way you can.

No one knows for certain how much of an impact they have of the lives of other people, we have no clue but we can try to be good just the same.