October: Read, Reading and To Be Read

Despite the fact that I have got so much studying to be doing and whatnot, I somehow managed to read books and will probably read more books. Do not follow my example. It's been a month of very lightweight reading because of my exams. My head can barely handle the capacity of the Russian Revolution.

Read:

The book that I have read this month is a book I picked up at the library one day when I was studying there. I just wanted to read it because I was going crazy trying to study. I read Katie Lender's, Marie Antoinette Serial Killer. It's a very different type of book then I'd usually read. It's a horror, mystery, contemporary type novel. It focuses on Colette Iselin's high school trip to Paris, France. Every girl's dream right? Unfortunately for Colette, her dream trip is haunted by the ghost of Marie Antoinette who seems to be responsible for the murders happening around Paris. Whilst the primary focus is the mystery, there's also focuses on romance, friendships, families and how you treat people. This book keeps you on the edge if anything. I couldn't put it down because I constantly wanted to know what was happening. It was constantly in my handbag because I was reading it everywhere I went. You can't help but need to keep reading to find out what is going to happen. It's really a book I couldn't find any fault with. It was just a nice read to pass the time and keep me sane whilst I studied for exams!

Colette is one of those characters that you hate at the beginning of the book and then grow to love as she starts making smarter decisions and I think this is the point of Lender's. At first she is self-centred and shallow and really has no concept of friendship, despite being sixteen. By the end of the book you can tell that she's grown and that she thinks about other people more than she thinks about herself. Character development is always lovely to see! I also like the setting because due to the fact that the main character is in another country and is a tourist, there are historical and cultural elements of Paris lurking within the book and it's really nice to read about. My inner history student is coming out.

Reading:
The book that I am currently reading is Since You've Been Gone by Morgan Matson. Everyone goes on about Morgan Matson's books like they've been dropped from the heavens so I knew I had to read them. One of my friends referred to her as the 'Queen of Contemporary'. This is the first of her novels that I've read and I was pleasantly surprised with it. The book is about Emily who comes home from a weekend trip in the Summer and realises that her best friend Sloane is nowhere to be found. After about two weeks, she starts to get worried about where her friend is, (you know, as you would). It's around this time that she gets a list from Sloane of things to complete this Summer. And it's a whole bunch of crazy things like go skinny dipping, hug a Jamie, kiss a stranger and other types of weird and wacky things. Along the way, Emily sort of comes out of her shell and makes friends with other people. She's always someone who's sort of stuck to Sloane and did everything with her best friend. But when her best friend leaves, she becomes her own person and makes her own decisions and it's great because she becomes someone less dependent on her best friend and more self-reliant and strong.

Of course the mystery of where is Sloane is the main focus of the book. Because seriously what kind of best friend leaves her own best friend with nothing but a list as an explanation, which even then is not an explanation. I don't know if I want to ever know where Sloane is. So far, I'm about 3/4 through the book and readers only get to know Sloane through Emily's memories. Emily seems content with her new life. I feel as if Sloane coming back could be really cliche for an ending and for me would ruin the, so far epic book.

To Be Read:
The book I have yet to read this month is Queen of Babble in the Big City by Meg Cabot. I started reading this series about mid-year this year when I finished my exams and I splurged on reading. This is the second book in a trilogy. I have already read the first book in the series and I really liked it so I had to keep reading the series. It's one of those series that once you read the first book, you're kind of dying to keep reading even though there are no cliffhangers or any dire consequences. The book is about Lizzie Nichols after her trip to Paris, (this seems to be a recurring theme here) where she has decided to move to New York City with her hot boyfriend Luke and she is looking for a job and an apartment and trying to juggle being a grown up basically. Almost everyone has heard of Meg Cabot and the Princess Diaries Series which very much made up my primary school and high school reading. For me this is like that but grown up. You still get to have Cabot's witty sense of writing and dialogue, (I love how she writes dialogue, oh my goodness) but just from an older perspective.

I hope you've enjoyed reading about what I have been reading about. If you're curious as to why in all of the pictures the bottom of the book isn't seen it's because they are all library books and I didn't want to show the bar code in case it's illegal and I get arrested or something like that. Hope you're all having a wonderful day, if not make some changes and get it going.

Much Love
-E