Coraline by Neil Gaiman // Reviews

When Coraline finds a door that leads to an alternate universe with another set of parents, everything starts to go wrong.

Genre: Fantasy, Middle Grade Fiction

Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks, an Imprint of HarperCollins

Publication Date: August 29, 2006

162 pages, paperback

series: –

Synopsis: Goodreads

I read this book at night and although I’m not that easily scared when reading books, this book managed to creep me out.

Coraline just moved to a new home and a peculiar home at that. There are no other children to play with and her parents are always working and don’t seem to have time for her. So she gets to know her neighbors as well as her new home. While exploring she finds a door that leads to another world and that’s where the story takes off.

I loved Coraline as a character. She was smart, had always something witty to say and was very brave for such a young girl. Her curiosity got her into some uncomfortable situations, but she managed to get out of them by thinking things through.

I loved Coraline’s neighbors: the gentleman living above her with his rats and the two old ladies from downstairs. They were so strange, but also very likable and funny.

The people in the other world were rather terrifying after the second glance, but they were nonetheless great and very mean villains and I really enjoyed the “games” that the other mother let Caroline play in order to get back into her real world.

The writing was engaging and easy to follow. I think this is due to the target audience that can be children as well as adults. I fell in love with how simplistic the story was overall and also highly enjoyed the illustrations.

I would have loved to read this as a child and now again and compare the creep-factor as well as the enjoyment-factor.

This will definitely not be the last time I picked up a Neil Gaiman novel. I am excited to venture into his worlds!

Bout of Books 14.0 Wrap-Up // Updates

Updates

I don’t even know how much I read every day. I just know that I read until Friday and then had a massive book hangover, so that I couldn’t read any more and haven’t read much since then.

Wrap-Up

Number of books finished: 1
Number of pages read: 270

I finished the second half of The Assassin’s Blade and I highly enjoyed it. My heart was torn out of my chest due to unexpected feelings for Sam and Celaena 😥
Since then I feel like I’m in a major book hangover and am not really in the mood to read anything. I need to continue with Heir of Fire, though, because Queen of Shadows will be released in less than a week and I want to be up-to-date on that series.

I think I’m taking it a bit slower with the read-a-thons for now. Although it is always a lot of fun, I think I’m burned out and need to take a few steps back and start to write all of the reviews that I’m behind on.

There are also a few things that will be happening soon (hopefully!). I’ll let you know soon what it actually is 😉

Until next time: happy reading! 🙂

Bout of Books 14.0: Book Scavenger Hunt // Updates

It is already Day Two of the Bout of Books 14.0 Read-A-Thon and it is time for another challenge, yay!

Kristen over at The Book Monsters has challenged us to do a Book Scavenger Hunt. So I am going to show you the books I chose for each category.

The Scavenger Hunt

1. A Book that begins with “B”  (for Bout of Books!) – Beauty Queens by Libba Bray
2. A book you’re planning to read/currently reading for Bout of Books – The Assassin’s Blade by Sarah J. Maas
3. Blue Book(s) – Wonder by R.J. Palacio
4. Books from your favorite genre! – All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven
5. A book on your TBR shelf, or your full TBR shelves – The Year of the Rat by Claire Furniss

Updates

Number of books finished: 0
Number of pages read: 109
Books: The Assassin’s Blade

To be honest, I haven’t gotten around to reading much today, either. I really am loving this story, but headaches and chores got in the way of reading much today. I do hope to finish it tomorrow!

Bout of Books 14.0: Fictional World Travel // Updates

The read-a-thon has begun! More info can be found in my previous, here.

Leann over at Between Library Shelves has started this week with the first challenge for this read-a-thon.

Fictional World Travel

The challenge is to show three to six books that take place in countries other than the one I am living in. I live in Germany, so everything apart from that is possible.

Divergent by Veronica Roth (dystopian Chicago, USA)
All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven (Indiana, USA)
Ask the Passengers by A.S. King (Pennsylvania, USA)
The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot (New York, USA)Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins (San Francisco, USA)

It might not be a very diverse list, but I have never been to the United States and I would love to see so many places there. So that’s why 😀

Updates

Number of books finished: 0
Number of pages read: 36
Books: The Assassin’s Blade

I didn’t get to read much today because…well, I guess because I was being a lazy bum. Hopefully I’ll get to finish The Assassin’s Blade tomorrow, though. It’s definitely an interesting read.

Bout of Books 14.0 // Read-A-Thons

One read-a-thon is over and the next one starts. As I already participated in the Bout of Books 13.0 read-a-thon (my TBR can be found here), I definitely wanted to participate in the upcoming one as well. Here’s the gist about this read-a-thon:

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, August 17th and runs through Sunday, August 23rd in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 14 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. – From the Bout of Books team

I have a few books that I plan on reading that I’m in the middle of and where I haven’t gotten around to finishing them. I also plan on participating in all of these fun challenges. Check out my blog from time to time to see these challenges.

For now, here’s my TBR:

1. The Assassin’s Blade by Sarah J. Maas
Probably everyone knows that Queen of Shadows will be released next month and as I still haven’t read the novellas and Heir of Fire yet, it is time to change that. I’m about halfway through the third novella and I’m really enjoying it so far.

2. Night Film by Marisha Pessl
This book has been on my shelf for more than two years probably and it was the book pick of the month for July for the We the Book Dragons book club over on Goodreads. I am about halfway through this book and although it is a very intriguing read, it’s not easy to read. I hope I can get through it this book, though.

3. Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng
I’ve started this book for the BooktubeAThon, but only got a chapter into it, before putting it down and reading other things. The premise sounds very sad and interesting at the same time. I cannot wait to get drawn into the story.

4. City of Bones by Cassandra Clare
I started this book finally in April and over the course of four months I managed to read a bit over 100 pages. I got distracted here and there by other books and just didn’t have the chance to finish it. As it is a very popular YA fiction story I have the need to at least read the first book in the series. I hope I’ll like it. We’ll see whether I manage to finish it this book, though.

I don’t want to put too much pressure on myself because I have to work full-time and I also plan on doing social stuff with family and friends this week. So I hope to finish off these books so that I have at least have no guilty conscience because I left those books unread, ha-ha.

Until next time: happy reading! 🙂