The Unpopular Opinions Tag!

Today I'm here with the Unpopular Opinions Tag. This was originally created over on YouTube by TheBookArcher, and you can find the original video here!

A Popular Book or Series You Didn't Like

I feel like there have been quite a few, but I'm going to go with Divergent by Veronica Roth, which I ended up DNFing. Me and that book just didn't click. I thought the protagonist had zero personality and the world was entirely unbelievable; I haven't gone near any dystopia for a while because with the whole hype around it I just got sick to the back teeth of looking at it, but for me a good dystopia has to be threatening. I have to believe that the events in the book are possible - that's why The Hunger Games works so well, because we are obsessed with violence and reality TV and celebrity culture. Sadly the society that Roth created just didn't do it for me, but props to her for finishing the trilogy the way she did - that takes guts!

See? Even Tris doesn't believe it.

A Popular Book or Series You Love but Everyone Else Hates

I'm not sure if there is one. I tend to be the grumpy person who doesn't like the popular book/series, so I have no idea.

A love triangle where the main character ended up with the person you did NOT want them to end up with

I'm still really mad that Katniss ended up with Peeta. I didn't want her to end up with Gale, either, I just wanted everyone to leave the poor girl alone. I wrote a post about My Problem with Peeta if you're interested in hearing my thoughts!

A Popular Genre that You Rarely Reach For

Contemporary I guess? I mean I think the genre I read the least of is horror, but I don't think horror is hugely popular amongst the other readers I know anyway. I don't mind contemporary, but it's not my first choice.

A Popular/Beloved Character You Do NOT Like

I was going to say Peeta again here, until I remember how much I hate Snape. I know Snape is a favourite amongst quite a few Harry Potter fans, but I hate the guy. I hate that he's a teacher who bullies his pupils (seriously what kind of adult bullies children?) I hate that Neville hates him so much that Snape is his boggart (really think about that for a moment; Neville's living during an incredibly dangerous time of wizarding history and he's seen what the cruciatus curse can do firsthand, but what terrifies him most in the world is one of his teachers) and I hate that everyone dismisses his horrific behaviour as okay because he was in love with someone who didn't love him back. Boo-fucking-hoo. I'm glad he died.

A Popular Author You Can't Seem to Get Into

I tried reading Throne of Glass and just couldn't get into it, and A Court of Thorns and Roses doesn't interest me in the slightest. I know she's hugely popular, but I'm sadly not a fan.

A Popular Book Trope You're Tired of Seeing

I loathe love triangles with a passion. I really, really, really hate them.

A Popular Series You have No Interest in Reading

The Shatter Me trilogy by Tahereh Mafi. There's another love triangle in this trilogy, and I know everyone loves Warner but I hate it when a character's shitty behaviour is excused by daddy issues.

What movie or TV adaptation do you prefer to the book?

For the most part I do think books are better than their movies, but I also like to look at the two mediums separately and I'll always find adaptations fascinating, but one film I liked more than the book would have to be Henry Selick's adaptation of Coraline by Neil Gaiman.

The book is wonderful, but the film just adds more and it's marvellous. Plus Henry Selick also directed The Nightmare Before Christmas so he's always going to be one of my favourite directors.

I tag:

Anyone who wants to do this tag!

This Week in Books | 03/06/15

This Week in Books is a feature created by Lipsy @ Lipsyy Lost and Found which gives bloggers an opportunity to share what they've read recently and what they're hoping to read next.

Last week I mentioned I was thinking about picking up The Goblin Emperor as I was in the mood to get back into high fantasy, but instead I decided to start Darkhaven by A.F.E. Smith. I received my review copy from Netgalley, and I wanted to start it so that I could rate and review it in plenty of time - it comes out next month and so far I'm enjoying it!

I finished Jane Eyre's Sisters: How Women Live and Write the Heroine's Story by Jody Gentian Bower last week and absolutely loved it. It reminded me I need to read more non-fiction, which is the reason why I'm also currently reading How To Be a Heroine by Samantha Ellis.

I'm taking part in Shannon @ Leaning Lights's TBRTakedown Readathon which is running this week. There are a few challenges, but no rules, the aim is just to cross as many books off your TBR as you want to! I do love attempting challenges, though, and one of them is to read a book that's been on your TBR for over a year. I've owned Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli for at least two years, and it's super short, so I'd like to cross it off my TBR and I think its length makes it a great choice for a readathon.

What are you reading?

How Do You See Cinder?

Yesterday during Top Ten Tuesday Cait @ Paper Fury asked a question about the ethnicity of Linh Cinder, heroine of The Lunar Chronicles, that got me thinking: is Cinder herself Asian or not?

I've said before how much I love The Lunar Chronicles, one of the many reasons being that it's one of the most diverse series I've ever come across. There are characters from all different ethnicities, four completely different heroines who are never pitted against one another, a leading heroine who's missing an arm and a leg and a 'Prince Charming' from Beijing. It's such a fantastic series.

Now I have to admit that upon first reading Cinder I didn't picture Cinder herself as Asian, though I didn't picture her as white either. Something about the way Marissa Meyer describes her made me picture her as Hispanic, though I have seen many people picture her as Asian.

But the more I thought about it, the more I thought: Why on earth would a group of rebels hide someone as important as Cinder in China if she was going to stick out like a sore thumb? Surely she was taken to China because she could blend in.

Does that mean she's Asian? Personally, the more I've thought about Cinder the more I've come to imagine her as mixed race and there are three reasons for this:

1) I'm not entirely sure that Levana and Channary are/were Asian (though I could be wrong!), but there's every chance that Cinder's biological father was. After all, Luna itself is brimming with all different kinds of ethnicities, so I imagine a lot of the population of Luna is made up of mixed race people anyway; Winter is also mixed race.

2) I always thought that Cinder not being Asian was something else that distanced her from her neighbours. Not only is she a cyborg, but she's also 'not from around here'. I'm not trying to imply that mixed race people are social outcasts, but even today some mixed race people face prejudice from both sides of their heritage.

An Anglo-Indian Harry, art by Brigid Vaughn

3) I love reading books with diverse characters - I've had more white protagonists than I've had hot dinners - but I think I've read even less mixed race protagonists. The only one that springs to mind straight away is Callie from Malorie Blackman's Noughts & Crosses series. I know there are some books that don't describe skin colour, leaving it open to the reader's imagination (recently there's been a lot of reimagining of Harry Potter as an Anglo-Indian character, which I love), but sometimes authors need to take it that step further and say 'This character isn't white. End of story.'

Why is this important? Because representation matters.

The people who disagree with that statement, and thankfully I've never met a single book blogger who disagrees with that statement, are also the kind of people who would immediately picture Cinder as white. So the people who do disagree with that statement also end up proving it to be true, because they picture Cinder as they are, regardless of the fact that she's described as having 'naturally tanned skin' and that she lives in China.

What are your thoughts? How do you see Cinder?

Thanks to Cait @ Paper Fury for inspiring me to write this post!

Top Ten Tuesday | Lights, Camera, ACTION!

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature created at The Broke and the Bookish. Each week you compile a list of ten books which coincide with that week's theme. You can find everything you need to know about joining in here!

This week's theme is 'Top Ten Books I'd Love To See As Movies/TV Shows'. I love adaptations; there's always the fear that an adaptation is going to be terrible, especially if it's an adaptation of a book you love, but from a critical point of view I find all adaptations fascinating. I love to know why certain decisions were made: why the costumes look the way they do, why that setting was chosen, why that actor was cast, how the director first came to know the book if they knew it before at all.

I love films and there are a few TV shows I adore, so while I'm certainly no expert I tried to assign a director to each of these make-believe adaptations because I thought it'd be fun to give an idea of the kind of adaptation that I'd love to see!

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson: I read this not too long ago, and Jackson has quickly become one of my favourite authors - she's certainly my favourite horror writer! Heavily inspired by the above cover, I'd love to see Henry Selick create a monochrome stop motion adaptation of this. We so often associate stop motion with children's films, and I think that combined with how grotesque you can make stop motion figures would make for a really atmospheric southern gothic film. Henry Selick's no stranger to adaptations, he's the director of Coraline and also the director of The Nightmare Before Christmas and, most recently, The Box Trolls.

Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie: I had to read this during my first year of uni, and though I wasn't expecting to like it I ended up loving it. It's such a fun, vibrant story - well worth a read if you're a fan of retellings - and I think this would work wonderfully as a Studio Ghibli film. Studio Ghibli are also familiar with adaptations; they're the company responsible for the brilliant adaptation of Howl's Moving Castle!

The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris: Okay, so obviously The Silence of the Lambs already has an amazing film adaptation starring the fantastic Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster - if you haven't already, watch it, it's so good - but I'm also a huge fan of the show Hannibal, created by the marvellous Bryan Fuller who's also adapting Neil Gaiman's American Gods for TV. I'm really hoping the show gets the rights to Clarice so they can eventually tackle the Silence of the Lambs story in the show.

American Vampire by Scott Snyder and Rafael Albuquerque: I can't be the only one who thinks this would make a really fun TV series, right? I've really gotten into this series this year, and if it were to be adapted I'd love to see someone like Guillermo del Toro at the helm. I feel as though del Toro would be a wonderful fit because he could handle the darker, spookier elements, he's the director of Pan's Labyrinth and the executive producer of Mama after all, and he'd be able to co-ordinate all the action sequences, too, as he's the director of the Hellboy films and Pacific Rim. He's no stranger to TV, either - in fact he's one of the co-creators of The Strain, which just so happens to deal with vampirism.

My Life as a White Trash Zombie by Diana Rowland: Personally I think this would make such a fun Tim Burton movie. Just so long as Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter weren't playing the leads. Don't get me wrong, I love them, but it's time to give some other actors a bit of work! Burton has this habit of mixing bright, vibrant colours with really macabre situations (e.g. in Corpse Bride the land of the living is black and white, whereas the afterlife is bright and colourful) and I think that would work really well with this story.

Rolling in the Deep by Mira Grant: I mean... this story's just meant to be adapted into a found footage horror movie, right? It'd be so much fun to watch, not to mention creepy as hell if given to the right creative team.

Rat Queens by Kurtis J. Wiebe, Roc Upchurch and Stjepan Sejic: I've heard rumours that this series is going to be adapted into an animated series, and I really, really hope those rumours are true.

The Crown by Nancy Bilyeau: There have been an awful lot of historical fiction adaptations on the BBC recently - The White Queen; Wolf Hall; Poldark; The Strange Case of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell - but I'd love to see some more ladies in these adaptations, and given that so much of The Crown takes place in a nunnery I think it'd be a really fun crime drama to watch.

Feed by Mira Grant: Yet another Mira Grant book. You all know how much I love this one, and though I'd be worried that an adaptation wouldn't do it justice I do think this book would make an amazing TV show. Every episode could open with one of Georgia and co.'s blog posts, or at least that's how I imagine it.

Where She Went by Gayle Forman: I thought the adaptation of If I Stay was really good, so I'd love to see an adaptation of the sequel, too.

Which books made your list?

Reading Challenge Update!

As I'm sure you can tell by the links on the side of my blog, I'm taking part in a few reading challenges throughout 2015, and it occurred to me that I haven't actually talked about any of my progress yet. So today I'm doing a mass update talking about how my reading challenges are going so far!

2015 Fairy Tale Challenge

White Ravens by Owen Sheers

The Meat Tree by Gwyneth Lewis

Fairest by Marissa Meyer

(Reviewed here!)

The Sleeper and the Spindle by Neil Gaiman
(Reviewed here!)

Fables, Vol.1: Legends in Exile by Bill Willingham, Lan Medina, Steve Leialoha, Craig Hamilton and James Jean

(Reviewed here!)

2015 Witches and Witchcraft Challenge

Signal to Noise by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

(Reviewed here!)

The 2015 Sci-Fi Experience

Saga, Vol.1 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

Saga, Vol.2 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

Saga, Vol.3 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

Saga, Vol.4 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

The Meat Tree by Gwyneth Lewis

My Life as a White Trash Zombie by Diana Rowland

(Reviewed here!)

Even White Trash Zombies Get the Blues by Diana Rowland

(Reviewed here!)

Fairest by Marissa Meyer

Ms. Marvel, Vol.1: No Normal by G. Willow Wilson and Adrian Alphona

(Reviewed here!)

Ms. Marvel, Vol.2: Generation Why by G. Willow Wilson, Adrian Alphona and Jacob Wyatt

(Reviewed here!)

Copperhead, Vol.1: A New Sheriff in Town by Jay Faerber, Scott Godlewski and Ron Riley

(Reviewed here!)

Rolling in the Deep by Mira Grant

(Reviewed here!)

2015 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge

  

Burial Rites by Hannah Kent

(Reviewed here!)

White Ravens by Owen Sheers

The Crown by Nancy Bilyeau

(Reviewed here!)

The Earl and the Fairy, Vol.1 by Mizue Tani and Ayuko

(Reviewed here!)

American Vampire, Vol.2 by Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque and Mateus Santolouco

(Reviewed here!)

American Vampire, Vol.3 by Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque and Sean Murphy

(Reviewed here!)

Considering I was intimidated by sci-fi for so long, I'm both surprised and pleased that the Sci-Fi Experience is the challenge I've read the most for! Evidently I need to read some more books with witches as their leads, but I have a few in mind to cross off my TBR soon.

Are you taking part in reading challenges this year? How's your progress? Tell me what you've been reading!

Monthly Wrap-Up | May 2015

Wow, May flew by! It was a very busy month for me, so I didn't read as much as I might have liked, but I certainly made up for it with other stuff.

Rolling in the Deep
by Mira Grant

Reviewed here!

The Great Zoo of China
by Matthew Reilly 

Reviewed here!

Rat Queens, Vol.2: The Far-Reaching Tentacles of N'rygoth
by Kurtis J. Wiebe, Roc Upchurch and Stjepan Sejic 

Reviewed here!

Jane Eyre's Sisters: How Women Live and Write the Heroine's Story
by Jody Gentian Bower

May was a bit of a slow reading month for me, but that's alright. It was very busy at work and I figured it's about time I stop making myself feel bad for 'not reading enough'. The Great Zoo of China was a little bit of a disappointment, but it wasn't the worst thing I've ever read, and everything else I read I really enjoyed - especially Jane Eyre's Sisters, which was my first non-fiction read of the year. I really need to read more non-fiction because that book was amazing.

I continued to watch Game of Thrones, until a certain episode I'm sure many of you have been hearing about. A little further down I link to a post all about sexual violence in epic fantasy that basically sums up why I was so upset with the way Game of Thrones went; Sansa is one of my favourites and the show treats her like garbage. I also wasn't impressed with the way things were going for Daenerys this season; Benioff and Weiss don't seem to understand that a woman doesn't have to be unlikable to be 'badass'.

Never say never, but for the foreseeable future I won't be watching Game of Thrones. I'm so sick of the gratuitous sexual violence that there really is no need for.

On a brighter note, Penny Dreadful returned this month and it's great! I really enjoyed the first season, and so far I'm really enjoying this one, too. Helen McRory makes for a very cool villain, and I still love Ethan Chandler. He's such a cutie.

Okay

I also got into The March Family Letters this month. I tried getting into it about a month or so a go but I wasn't really feeling it, then I discovered they were doing some really interesting things with the sexuality of their versions of these timeless characters and now I'm hooked! I think it just took a little while for the show to find its feet.
For those of you wondering, The March Family Letters is a webseries similar to The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, and it's a modern day version of Louisa May Alcott's Little Women. I really like what they've done with it so far (although their version of Amy does take a little getting used to!) and I recommend checking it out. You can find it on YouTube here.

Oh, and this month my parents and I went to see Far From the Madding Crowd. I really enjoyed it and so did my parents. This is a very important factor, as Far From the Madding Crowd is my Dad's favourite book and he's INCREDIBLY sceptical of adaptations, but he said it was a very faithful adaptation so I'm glad he liked it. Carey Mulligan was an adorable Bathsheba Everdeen (it was a little odd hearing that surname when it wasn't preceded by 'Katniss') and I thought they cast Gabriel Oak, William Boldwood and Sergeant Troy really well, too. It's a great film - I recommend checking it out if you're a lover of period dramas!

Here are a few posts I wrote in May that I'd love more people to check out!

Speculative Fiction for Austen Fans

Food from History

An Interview with Sam Roads and Kat Nicholson

My Problem with Peeta

As I said before, May was a very busy month!

It was my Dad's birthday right at the beginning of the month, on the 1st May, so that weekend my family and I - me, my parents, my sisters, my brothers-in-law, my nephew and my nieces - took a trip up to Derbyshire, where we went to The Heights of Abraham and Gulliver's Kingdom.

It was a nice trip, but I was glad to get back home. It was a very family-orientated trip, and while both my sisters are married with children and in their 30s (there's 10 years between me and my oldest sister) I'm still finding my feet in my 20s after uni, so big family holidays aren't really my thing. It was nice to see everyone, though - particularly my youngest niece, who is 6 months old.

This month I finally succumbed and bought myself a kindle, and I love it! For years I was convinced I wasn't going to get an eReader because I love physical books so much, but I'm literally out of shelf space and to be honest there are a lot of books I want to read but don't want to read enough to buy a physical copy of. Plus now I have a netgalley account and I've got the opportunity to read and review books before they're released!

It was the Eurovision Song Contest in May. Last year I was in uni, and my best friend and I watched it together through Skype which was a lot of fun. This year I went to my friend's Eurovision party in Swansea; there were around 10 of us there, and each of us had to pick a country and bring a themed snack. I chose Greece - I love that country - and took around a bowl of Greek salad, complete with cherry tomatoes and feta cheese, and a couple of pots of honey Greek yogurt.

It's a European feast!

The party was a success, and a lot of fun!

For the first time ever I went to The Hay Festival this year. For any of you who aren't familiar with it, The Hay Festival is an annual literary festival that takes place in Hay-on-Wye - the town of books - and it's somewhere I've been meaning to go for a while now. Luckily for me I got to go with work this year, which meant I actually ended up organising a drinks reception for the centenary of WW2 writer Alun Lewis and it meant I got to go to the two Alun Lewis themed events for free!

omnomnom reception nosh

I also saw Malorie Blackman. Malorie Blackman! Only one of my favourite authors from my childhood/pre-teens and only the author of one of my favourite books of all time which was also the first book that made me cry. I knew she was going to be there, sadly I couldn't go to her event as it was on at the same time as one of the Alun Lewis events, but I did take my copy of Noughts & Crosses just in case. I did see her signing books, but the queue was huge and sadly I was too busy with work stuff to wait to meet her. But one day I will!

stealthy shot

I had so much fun, and I'd love to go back to Hay next year for a shameless book festival holiday, there was such a lovely atmosphere and it was such lovely weather and it was just lovely.

This is a new little section of my monthly wrap-ups. I've seen a few bloggers sharing posts they've really enjoyed by other bloggers, and I decided it was about time I did the same because I follow some amazing bloggers and their posts deserve to be read!

Cecily @ Manic Pixie Dream Worlds wrote a fantastic post about Sexual Violence in Epic Fantasy

Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies wrote about the tropes and genres she's So Over

Cristina @ Girl in the Pages wrote a brilliant post about whether or not we're Too Hard On Our Heroines

Cait @ Paper Fury wrote a great post on Writing Diversely

Mallory @ The Local Muse wrote a great introduction to European Romanticism

Deanna @ Deanna Writes wrote a fun post about Not Reviewing Books

Kat @ Murder of Goths wrote a guest post @ She Might Be Loved all about Body Positivity

So how was your May?

#TBRTakedown Readathon | TBR

Over on BookTube Shannon @ leaninglights has announced a casual reading challenge to run throughout the first week of June, and as May was very busy and something of a slow reading month for me I thought I'd join in!

The TBR Takedown Readathon is all about crossing books off your TBR. Shannon has created five challenges that you don't have to follow if you don't want to, but I'm going to see if I can at least tackle one or two of them. 

A book that's been on your TBR shelf for over a year

Stargirl

by Jerry Spinelli

I'm pretty sure I've owned this for at least two years, if not more, after I found it for just 99p in a local charity shop. I've heard lovely things about it and it's not even 200 pages long, so I think it'll be a good read for a readathon!

An unread sequel sitting on your TBR shelf

Mortal Heart

by Robin LaFevers

I got this for Christmas and I still haven't read it. I'm terrible at finishing series no matter how much I love them, and it's about time I finished this one!

A first book in a series on your TBR shelf

A Darker Shade of Magic

by V.E. Schwab

I've heard nothing but amazing things about this one and I've owned it since February, so it's about time I read it.

An "out of your comfort zone" book on your TBR shelf

How To Be a Heroine

by Samantha Ellis

I'm not sure if this is out of my comfort zone exactly because the last book I read was a non-fiction book about heroines and I loved it, but I still don't tend to read much non-fiction. I'd like to cross this one off my TBR!

A book from your most recent book haul

Resistance Is Futile

by Jenny T. Colgan

This is the most recent book I hauled after I pre-ordered it. This is probably the book I'm least likely to get to, only because it's been on my TBR shelf the shortest amount of time!

Are you taking part in the readathon? What are you planning to read?