The Institute follows our main character Luke, a very intelligent child who is kidnapped from his home in Minneapolis and woken up in a room that looks exactly like his own but no windows. Luke suddenly realizes he's at The Institute; home for other kids with telekinesis and telepathy. As Luke realizes something isn't right with this place, he desperately tries to escape; but no one has ever  escaped The Institute before. 

I really wasn't expecting to like this book as much as I did!

When this book was just announced, I was really excited; mainly because I was worried that Stephen King wasn't going to publish anything this year. The more I read about the plot, the more I was really excited to read this.

The Institute screams Stranger Things. I know Stranger Things is based on several Stephen King works, including Firestarter, IT, and The Mist. But if you were to compare Stranger Things with one Stephen King book, it would be The Institute.

  There's so many aspects of this book that made it absolutely incredible. For starters, the characters in this novel are so genuine. I find that Stephen King creates the best characters, especially his child characters; Danny Torrence from The Shining, young Jamie from Revival, Gage from Pet Sematary, The Losers Club from IT, etc. Luke Ellis was definitely no different. 

I realize that I seem to love King's child characters more because you feel more sympathy for their pain opposed to his adult characters. Not that I didn't feel bad when John Coffey from The Green Mile was put on death row and executed for something he didn't do. But when kids are put in dangerous situation, it gives you a different feeling. 

The torture Luke's friend Avery had to go through because he lied to protect Luke during his escape broke my heart. Luke's constant beating and being electrocuted because he didn't want to admit he "saw the dots" broke my heart. Seeing innocent children go through pain gives you a different kind of feeling in comparison to an adult.

I found the group dynamic to be super sweet and genuine as well. I loved Luke's interactions with the other kids at The Institute and have quickly fallen in love with each of them as they were my own children. Which by the way, if you've read The Institute at all, is it just me or does anyone else picture Jacob Tremblay as the perfect Luke Ellis? Intelligent yet funny and sweet.

Every single person Luke has met from Kalysha to Maureen to Tim to Avery was so genuine and they all wanted to help Luke and like-wise, Luke wanted to help them.

Which, speaking of characters, Avery and Maureen's deaths were both something I wasn't expecting. More so, Avery's I thought was really sad, although things were leading up to it and it was bound to happen now looking back, but Maureen's was so sad because I really wasn't expecting her to kill herself. When I read her death scene, I really did gasp out loud.

Writing-wise, Stephen King is known to write every single detail in his books. That means, some readers aren't a huge fan of his books because they sometimes seem to drag on. I personally don't mind it as I love reading anything King writes but I found The Institute to be one of his more gripping books. 

This book is constantly go-go-go. There's very little moments that felt too slow or that King added parts that weren't necessary. Every part of this book was not only fast-paced but eventful as well.

I really enjoyed reading this mainly because it was so hard to put this book down! I think I easily finished the last 200-300 pages in about a day or two, it was just that good!

Now, I've seen mixed reviews for this book, mainly because Stephen King has been getting more and more political in his writing lately so I can see how some of the parts in this book (especially the last 200 pages) can be a miss for some. I personally don't really mind although I understand that most people are here to enjoy the content and not the politics added.

The only real problem I had with this book was that I really hoped they expanded a little more on why they're doing all the torture and testing on kids and how it affects them, generally.

I know it's expanded throughout the book, but very roughly. There's a scene at the end of the book where Bill (I believe is his name) is educating Tim on Precogs, BDNFs and why The Institute was made, but I was a little disappointed that King decided to throw all that detail at the end and give us a small piece of the apple.

If I were to pick, I'd love to have this information spread throughout the book, generously because I think that element is just as interesting and important as Luke's experience at The Institute.

Otherwise, I really enjoyed the book! I loved that King threw in his little references to his other works like he always does, where in this novel they mentioned several books but The Shining reference with the Grady Twins stuck out to me the most!

I know that before The Institute was out, a lot of people said it was similar to Firestarter and said it's a must to read Firestarter first and honestly, if you didn't I think you'd be okay! I ended up reading Firestarter though but found very little connection to the two other than the fact that the kids had similar powers!

If you, or anyone you know loves Stranger Things, I highly recommend this book!

If you've read The Institute, what did you think? I'd love to hear your thoughts! 

Happy Monday friends!

I'm back with more tag posts because I love doing them and you all seem to love reading them. 

For a while now, I really wanted to do emmmabooks' Shadowhunter tags (TMI vs TID and TMI vs TID vs TDA). If you aren't aware by now, I love the Shadowhunter world and always love diving into this world whenever I can.

I decided to do The Mortal Instruments vs. The Infernal Devices because they are the only two series I've read so far; although I am slowly getting through the first book of The Dark Artifices because I want to catch up before Chain of Gold comes out next year!

If you want to watch Emma's original video, the link will be here. With that being said, let's see which one I prefer better. (Although I think I know which one it is already and I think you guys know too lol)

Favourite Main Character: Clary or Tessa?

So I bet you all know how I felt about Clary during the first three The Mortal Instruments books, so I'll definitely have to say Tessa. I feel like I loved her character right from the start and she will definitely be one of my favourite female YA characters.

Favourite Herondale: Jace or Will?

Oh the Herondale boys. I end up loving any Herondale Cassie Clare writes, but you all know how much I love Will.

Favourite Love Triangle: Simon, Jace and Clary or Will, Jem and Tessa?

I personally didn't see Simon, Jace and Clary as a love triangle, whereas I was stuck on who Tessa should have ended up with so I'd say Will, Jem and Tessa are the better love triangle.

Favourite Villain: Sebastian or The Magister?

As much as I enjoyed The Magister's character, I didn't seem to hate him as much as I hated Sebastian. And I loved to hate Sebastian. I thought he was a very complex and dark villain so for this one, I'd give TMI a point.

Better Army: The Clockwork Army or The Dark Army?

If I'm being honest, both were quite terrifying. The Clockwork Army were terrifying because they were animatronics built to kill but I'm going to have to say The Dark Army for this one. Only because they're Shadowhunters themselves against the system and rules. "It really be your own people" 

Better First Book: City of Bones or Clockwork Angel?

Clockwork Angel, hands down. I feel like because City of Bones was Cassandra Clare's first book, there was a lot of things lacking and it wasn't as well written or entertaining as Clockwork Angel in my opinion.

Favourite Female Sidekick: Isabelle Lightwood or Cecily Herondale?

I personally really love both characters, but I feel like Izzy can take the throne for this one. Only because she was in all 6 books whereas Cecily was only really in one.

Better Setting: The New York Institute or The London Institute?

I absolutely love both institutes. But I agree when I say as much as I'd love to live in The London Institute, The New York one seems to be more dated and technologically advance. It's also the first institute we are introduced to so it's easier to become attached to it.

Favourite Last Book in the Series: City of Heavenly Fire or Clockwork Princess?

To be honest, City of Heavenly Fire was an amazing last book. Not saying that Clockwork Princess wasn't because I do think it was just as good; I just feel like the suspense was built and I loved every moment of it. Clockwork Princess was a good ending but not a great ending in my opinion; a lot fell short for me and I think it's my least favourite book of the trilogy.

Better Epilogue: City of Heavenly Fire or Clockwork Princess?

Both epilogues are amazing. Although, I really have to give it to Clockwork Princess for this one. I really sobbed while reading it and I was quite satisfied with the epilogue itself. (I can't wait for Chain of Gold because of it!!)

Tallying up all my answers, I'm really surprised it's a tie!

The first three books from The Mortal Instruments series wasn't the greatest in my opinion in comparison to all of The Infernal Devices but I do admit that it picks up in the last three books!

I'm really vocal about how much I love The Infernal Devices so I'm really surprised that it was tied for me!

Take the little this or that quiz and let me know which one won for you: The Mortal Instruments or The Infernal Devices!

I had already written this post but I never ended up posting this because I went on hiatus -- where I also decided to rebrand everything, shortly after. But I asked on Instagram if you guys still wanted to see it and majority of you all said yes, so here we are!

I've been meaning to dive into more blog post topics other than reviews, as you guys can probably tell, and I've decided I really want to start getting into book box reviews as well.

I decided to purchase my first book subscription box (kinda, because I used to get comic ones a couple years back lol) and review it for you.

This was my first time buying an OwlCrate box. I see them often on my feed but I've never really been interested until recently. The only reason why I'm never really interested in subscription boxes is because you do get random items for random book series and sometimes, you aren't a fan of all of them.

The purpose of these reviews is to give you guys my opinion on the box, my first impressions, and whether or not I think the products are worth it.

With that being said, let's get into my review of my very first OwlCrate box!

Like I said above, I got the April 2019 box which the theme was The Dark Side.

For starters, what really drew me to this box was the fact that April's theme was based on YA villains, whom I love the most. I believe OwlCrate said there would be items based on books like Throne of Glass, Shadow and Bone, Six of Crows and something Schwab related; which I'm a fan of all of them so I decided to go for this one.

I wanted to mention that I do live in Canada, so for the box and shipping, I believe I paid roughly $50 and it arrived in a fair amount of time; probably a week to a week and a half since I got the shipping notice.

When I purchased this box, I wasn't really sure what to expect. Like I said, I've only really received comic-related boxes in the past and I was honestly quite pleased with them because the themes weren't so generalized.

I had previously received a Doctor Strange box that included all things Doctor Strange (from mugs, to Funko Vinyls, to shirts, etc.) and I've also received a general Marvel box (which again, I received comics, and collectibles). But because this box is so broad, I wasn't sure what to expect.

Guess what I'm bringing back to my blog! Reviews! A couple of people had asked me to bring back reviews because sometimes Goodreads isn't as easily accessible to them and what not, so I thought I would start bringing them back onto my blog! 

But, because it was super draining that I was reading faster than I was blogging, I'm only going to post reviews of select books onto my blog; that might be because it's a popular book or because I have a strong opinion on the context itself. So, not every book I'll read will be reviewed on here to save me more time on blogging and will make me feel less drained!

I've been really excited to bring these posts back and hope you guys are excited too!

Strange Weather by Joe Hill 

Strange Weather is a bind up collection of four novellas written by horror writer Joe Hill and it consists of Snapshot, Loaded, Aloft and Rain.

*So I wanted to do something a little different with this review, and I wanted to not only talk about this collection as a whole, but I also wanted to talk about each of the stories individually as well.*

**Trigger Warning for gun violence**

I definitely wanted to read this collection before Full Throttle had come out - which it is out now and I definitely did finish reading beforehand, mainly because I wanted these to be the expectation setter for the next collection as weird as that sounds. I just thought that four stories would be easier to consume first than the eight or however many is out with Full Throttle and I'm happy I did.

I genuinely enjoyed this collection as a whole and seemed to really enjoy Joe Hill's writing throughout the whole collection. I'll admit, a couple of stories were a little off for me or some parts bored me, which I'll get to in a little bit but I did really like this set for the most part. 

Snapshot

Snapshot follows a kid who is haunted by a man that carries a Polaroid camera which steals memories. This story is probably one of my favourites in the collection because of how much the characters really consume you. (I cannot remember the kid's name for the life of me, so we're going to call him kid throughout the review lol) Right from the very start, I felt very attached to the kid as if he was my own son - as if we're that much apart age-wise lol, but I genuinely wanted to protect him at all costs. The fact that he's so driven to protect his previous babysitter who is now elderly was so precious to me, but he figured everything out when it came to the Phoenician and wanted to defeat it right away. I had watched an interview with Joe Hill after reading this novella and I loved how he related this novella to a person witnessing a loved one suffering with dementia and I thought that was the sweetest thing.

Loaded

Loaded follows a mall cop who had just gotten custody of his son, and has just witnessed a mistress shooting her boss. This was the story that made me feel the most uncomfortable. I can read anything; you guys know how much I love horror and all that, and I can even bare scenes with sexual assault and what not, but gun violence always gets to me, so this was a hard pill to swallow. For starters, this is the longest story between the four; I believe it's at least half the book. This story also has multiple ways of portraying gun violence, not just the one with the mistress who kills her boss; but also, the mall cop automatically assumes the lady who is Muslim and also in the shop (held hostage) is the reason why the gun violence is occurring, so he shoots her, not knowing it was not her and that she was also carrying her baby - which by the way, was so heartbreaking. What made me so uncomfortable is that this is a real-life thing; like it could potentially happen and thats scary. I also read an interview from Joe Hill about this story and he says he wants the readers to be uncomfortable because it seems like media coverage doesn't make people worry enough and after reading that interview, I get what he means. More people seem to be concerned about books and movies than they do with what's happening in reality so it makes sense that Joe Hill has incorporated this in his collection as well. It's a hard pill to swallow, but also a huge slap in the face.

Aloft

Aloft follows a man who skydives but falls on a strange cloud. I think this was my least favourite of the four. Not because it was written poorly but because I was really bored for most of it. I really liked the fact that Joe Hill tried to incorporate the whole "aliens are real" within this story and it seemed to fit the reality of what people in our society believe. (I think aliens are real, fight me). I'll admit it was quite interesting at first but it seemed that the more I read through the story, the more I was losing interest.

Rain

Rain is about a storm occurring across a city in Colorado, although it isn't raining water, but sharp crystals than can kill anyone or anything that isn't under a sustainable shelter. This was my second favourite of the four. I found the concept to be very interesting especially because of how vivid Joe Hill draws the scenes! You witness the main character's pain as he sees his future wife being ripped to shreds just a couple of feet in front of him and you can feel his heartbreak and devastation. And I think this is an important twist to a story to make people be afraid of all the climate change we are dealing with right now. I mean, I can't say if the sky will ever rain nails though.

Overall, I quite enjoyed this collection by Joe Hill. You can really see a lot of writing techniques and what not that Joe has inherited from his dad because at some points, I forgot that I was reading a Joe Hill book and not a Stephen King collection. 

I also really enjoyed the fact that Joe Hill decided to dive into different societal occurrences that are popular right now and give it a little more horror twist - as if some of them even needed it; Snapshot with dementia, Loaded with gun violence, Aloft with aliens, and Rain with climate change. Although I did have a couple of rough spots with some of the stories, I do think some of them I'd read again (Rain and Loaded for sure.) 

What do you guys think? If you'v read Joe Hill's Strange Weather, I'd love to hear your thoughts! Also, what do you guys think of this way of reviewing short stories? Love it? Hate it? Let me know on here or on my Instagram! 

It's been a little while since I've written any of my book advice blog posts - and some of my readers probably have no idea that I have this segment.

Because I'm nosy but also quite observant, I like to see what other people in the community are curious about; or even need advice on. That's when I decided to make these kinds of posts. I don't have very many and it's been over a year since I've written them so I thought I'd bring them back and rebuild this segment; mainly also because I have a whole list of things I could write advice for. 

If you want to read some of my previous posts, you can search them up at the top right of my blog via web browser, but if you're lazy like myself, I'll link them all here: Where to Get Signed Books, Where to Find Cheap Books, How I Write My Reviews, How to Find Time To Read More. (Please keep in mind theses were published over a year ago when I was still getting in the hang of blogging lol) 

Something I've noticed people as a lot is how to take off stickers from a book without the sticky residue. I mean, have you ever been so excited to read a book that you just purchased but first, really wanted to take off the sticker that's been bothering you? So once you get around to taking the sticker off, there's sticky residue and even worse, some parts of the sticker still stuck to the book. And no matter how hard you try and pick it at, it doesn't come off. 

Well first of all, you wouldn't have this problem if you shopped at Indigo *winky face* and I'm not saying that because I work there and am a blog affiliate, but because the stickers peel off so smoothly. But, if you aren't able to purchase from the wonderful Indigo, then I suppose this blog post is for you.

(I wanted to just say that this isn't a step by step how-to; but more so but what I do and hopefully, if you try it out, it'll help you guys as well.)

Clockwork Princess is the final book in Cassandra Clare's The Infernal Devices series.

I can't believe this series has ended.

(I also think it's the second series I actually fully finished besides A Court of Thorns and Roses)

But for the first time ever, I wasn't dreading the ending. I wanted to continue this series until the end because I wanted to consecutively spend as much time as I could with these characters.

For starters, I've grown to love these characters so much throughout this trilogy. Even if that does include Gideon and Gabriel whom I didn't really like at the beginning.

I love the relationship made between Gideon and Sophie as well as Cecily and Gabriel.

I have also started to like Gabriel as a character as he starts to realize much of his flaws and moving past it throughout the series. During Clockwork Angel, Gabriel is shown to be very annoying and somewhat transgressive, per se. Although he was very loyal to his father, he wanted to protect his father even though he did horrible things.

From the start of the book where his father is turned into a worm through demon pox, up until the end where Jem is sent to be a Silent Brother, Gabriel as a character has grown a lot and I truly appreciate that. I also love the loyalty that has grown upon him towards Will and Charlotte.

As for Cecily, I wasn't a huge fan of her character at the beginning. She really starts to grow on you though and I think I really started to appreciate her character once she started accepting her brother's fate as a Shadowhunter.

A lot of people tend to relate Cecily as a side kick character in The Infernal Devices, but I've never seen her as such. I see her as more of an extra side character, per se, like Gabriel and Gideon. When it comes to side kicks, I see more of Sophie being Tessa's side kick to be honest.

I loved seeing more of Will, Jem and Tessa as always. Although, seeing the bond between Will and Jem during the time Jem was dying and Will losing his parabatai was heartbreaking. I think I cried the most during those parts because you truly felt Will's heartbreak. His mourning when Will thought Jem died because his parabatai rune started to fade and bleed, when Will found out Jem was Brother Zacariah as they were fighting Mortmain. Even as Will goes through the depression because although Jem isn't dead, he won't get to see Jem as much as he used to. You can tell how much Will loves him by the way he talks about Jem. He never talks about him in passed tense. (He never says he was his parabatai.) It was truly heartbreaking.

As for Tessa, I think her character development was the weakest in this book. I mean. yes, we get her backstory and yes, she does defeat Mortmain and the Clockwork Army by shapeshifting into an Angel and defeating them. But it wasn't anything like I would've imagined for an ending impression and I was really disappointed in that.

I think a lot of the ending was based on Will and Jem's relationship alongside building relationships with other Shadowhunters (Will and Tessa's included) that Tessa didn't get that huge character twist most of us were waiting for.

I mean, we know that her mom was a Shadowhunter and her dad was a demon (which is technically impossible) and her mother is actually Starkweather's daughter switched with a mundane at birth.  But it wasn't a huge wow factor to me for some reason. I was just expecting a lot more to it.

The last character I really wanted to talk about was Charlotte. And it's mainly because what she's going through is what many women still go through to this day. It's frustrating to see Charlotte doubted and her ideas discouraged because she's a women. Like, the Consul trying to use Gabriel against Charlotte so he can "find proof" and kick her out was such an annoyance. I'm really happy that Consul Wayland's goal was diminished because he was killed and Charlotte became the new Consul (as Will was turned into the new head of the institute) because she deserved that. They both really did.

Something I really wanted to touch upon that I didn't in the earlier reviews was the use of different languages. I'm really happy that Cassandra Clare incorporated the use of different languages in this novel. For example, Jem's mom is from Shanghai and dad is from England, I'm really happy that Jem knew how to speak Mandarin and taught Tessa throughout their engagement. I loved that he talked to her in his Native language and she was learning to understand certain phrases. I loved that Will did the same but with Welsh. I really loved that element because it really humanized these characters, if
that makes sense. It didn't make them seem like regular, English speaking characters, but it allowed them to stick to their cultures they were based in.

I also really love how all these series' are tied together. Like how in this book, we see Magnus and Henry create the portal for the first time which Clary and Jace use in City of Bones or City of Ashes (one of the two, I can't really remember lol). I love how in the Epilogue, Jem mentions the new generation of Fairchilds, Lightwoods and Herondales (referring to Jace, Clary, Alec and Izzy) to Tessa. It truly gives you such excitement and extends your love for this series. Because you get to see different characters grows and families expand.

I'm so sad this series is all over, but I'm super excited to see Tessa and Will in the future series Cassie is coming out with, and I'm excited to dive into the rest of the Shadowhunter world!

What Shadowhunter series do you like most? Let me know in the comment or on my Instagram, I'd love to know!

Hey, hi, hello!

It's been a while, hasn't it? 

Before I get into my actual movie review, I thought I would give you a little update on how my life has been. I've been making a lot of changes to my lifestyle lately and have been trying to work out what works best for me and how I can balance work, blogging, reading and leisure. 

I've been struggling to find balance for a while now and although I seem to have figured out ways, it just never ends up working out for me because I'm stubborn and I want to get everything done at once, to the point where I get so exhausted and drained; therefore making me lose interests in everything until I find something to give me a new motivational boost.

I don't want to keep being super active at one point then disappearing again for another because I really do want to be consistent and so I think I've found a way that can help me do all things I want/need to throughout the week!

I've decided to make a little posting schedule on my blog which was something I was previously against, for a while! 

Originally, I just wanted to get all the content I could out at once and although I did successfully at some points in having this blog, it didn't consistently work for me because I was so drained from pushing myself to write all the time; every day.

My new posting schedule will now be every Monday, and Wednesday which will give me time to write the blog posts I want to but don't feel obligated to rush them and will give me more time to pre-write and schedule posts. 

I'm also working on a couple of other personal things like sleep (which I've had horrid insomnia for maybe 10 or 11 months now - I've been sleeping a lot better lately so hopefully it stays the same), and eating healthier so hopefully I'll gain a lot more energy and motivation!

So yeah, apologies for that long intro; I really wanted to get that whole update out of the way! 

With all that being said, let's get into my review of IT: Chapter 2!

So, I guess you all really liked my painting edges experience so I thought I'd make a new series on my blog about this.

I am not a very crafty person. I'm a perfectionist though, so it may seem that I am crafty most of the time but I'm really not. I'm not very good at cooking things out of the ordinary. (It took me two years to perfect eggs and I'm still struggling with not burning grilled cheese lol) 

So I thought I'd take advantage of my two flaws and make a series out of it - because thats what we do to be a little positive! 

I've decided to try out fun crafty and food related things that have some relation to books, and talk about my whole experience. With that being said, none of these blog posts will be tutorials (I'll mention what products I used and recipes I follow, but the post itself isn't a how to) because honestly, I don't think you'd want to learn how to do these things from me.

Today, I decided to do something I've always wanted to do and that's customize my own Funko Pop!

I think it's quite evident that I collect Pop! Vinyl Figures. I mean, they're all over my library and bedroom. I even got my boyfriend to start collecting them! I thought I'd use this as an opportunity to try and create one of my favourite characters at the moment: Will Herondale from The Infernal Devices by Cassandra Clare.

I've decided to follow the somewhat tutorial of this YouTube video, so if you want to see how the original owner made it, the link will be here.

With that being said, let's go and make our own little Will Herondale!

I used very simple products, most of which I used in my sprayed edges blog post!


For starters, I used the same dollar store paint brushes to change up the hair colour and outfit on our Will Herondale. For a pack of 5 (I believe), I think I paid roughly $2 which isn't so bad if you're trying to do this project on a budget!


The next thing I used was also the same black dollar store paint that I used for my sprayed edges. I believe this was a couple of dollars as well. (I can't really remember, it's been a while since I've bought it.) The paint is acrylic which dried a little more matte than I would've wanted but I think it turned out really well!


And lastly, I used a Newt Scamander Funko as the base of my Will Funko Pop! These usually aren't that expensive; I'm pretty sure you can get these for as cheap as $9. When I ordered this Pop Figure, I had the option to get the original Pop with the wand (I was originally going to cut it down and make it into a steele like the video tutorial) or the chase variant in which he's holding a book.

As you can see above, I got the Chase variant, which, originally, I was pretty bummed about it. But then I remembered that Will loves books so I managed to work it all out.

I followed the video tutorial and painted his hair black, alongside his pants and it was already looking like a new Funko Pop. The only thing I would've changed in this process is the type of paint I ended up using. Like I said earlier, the paint job ended up a bit more matte than I would've liked it too.

To separate this Funko from looking like a regular man and into more of our Shadowhunter, Will Herondale, I decided to draw a couple of runes throughout the exposed skin as well.




As for the book, I decided to write "Vatek" which was one of Will's favourite books that he mentioned in The Infernal Devices.

I think, overall, Will turned out beautifully. I didn't end up putting painters tape on any of the parts I didn't want painted, but I still managed to stray on the areas I really wanted to.

I'm really excited to be doing more of these kinds of blog posts! If you have any suggestions on what creative bookish things you'd like me to try out, definitely let me know!

Hi lovelies, it's been a while since I've posted.

I know what you guys are thinking; "Jessica, I'm really tired of your excuses!" and I don't have one at the moment, other than the fact that I have been in an incredibly harsh reading slump. But, I've been slowly getting back into the swing of things and I'm hoping I'll be back to reading and blogging more avidly soon.

So, a couple of weeks ago, I stumbled across a post by NunuKz on Twitter (TheperksofbeingNoura on Insatgram) basically announcing a BTS-themed Read-A-Thon. I'll admit, I've never joined a Read-A-Thon held by other people before; I've had my own 24 Hour Read-A-Thons by myself but when I found out this was based on BTS, I was sold.

If you don't follow me on my social media accounts, I am kpop trash. I post about them often and I know a lot of people who don't like kpop are probably so tired of my posts, but it is what it is. (My twitter header always switches between Jaehyun from NCT, Baekhyun from EXO and Wooseok from Pentagon and you guys seem to love calling me out on it lol - they're my ultimate biases, fight me.) 

BTS is one of my favourite groups, not necessarily my ultimate group but definitely one of my top 10, so when I found out about this Read-A-Thon, I was sold! (I also have a BTS and Kpop book tag that are both coming out very soon, so look out for that as well.)

Today, I wanted to share my TBR (to be read) list for this fun little Read-A-Thon which starts on August 20th!

Here are the prompts for ReadAThon Of The Soul.

If you've skimmed through the prompts a little, it says that you don't have to read books for all the prompts, but I thought, why not? Since I've been in such a reading slump lately, I definitely want to use this Read-A-Thon as an opportunity to catch up on some reading. 

I tried to pick books that could be used for more than one prompt so I'm not forcing myself to read that whole month which will put me into another reading slump, but I also tried to pick books that would really interest me and hopefully get me back to reading 15 books a month.

Patron Saints of Nothing by Randy Ribay

Ever since I found out about this book a couple months ago, I've been dying to read it. From my knowledge, this book follows a Filipino teen whose cousin was killed by the president of the Philippines' drug war. For those who don't know, I am Filipino and my family has gone through something similar a couple years back with extended family. I haven't actually read any Filipino rep books yet because they're pretty hard to find in YA, so I'm super excited to have stumbled across this one. 

For this book, I'm going to read it for the Persona and Dionysus prompts because it is an own voice book as well as a diverse read.

Aurora Rising by Jay Kristoff and Amy Kaufman

Ao Haru Ride Vol (?) by Io Sakisaka

Every Last Word by Tamara Ireland Stone

Bonus Books:

Now, like I said earlier, I don't want to push myself to read more books than I don't really need to, especially because I just came out of a reading slump. But I did want to add a couple of books to those prompts that are being executed by one book (like two prompts under one book), just in case I'm in the mood to read more (which tends to happen a lot.)

I'm only going to read and add these books to my Read-A-Thon list if I've completed all the previous books and still have time to read more/am still in the mood to read more. It's not something that I'll necessarily push myself to do if I don't feel like it, because the main purpose of this Read-A-Thon, for me, is to not only have fun and meet new kpop book stans, but to also get back in the hang of reading!

So the prompts that I've decided to execute with one book are Persona, Dionysus, Mikrokosmos and Jamais Vu.

Vicious by VE Schwab

This Time Will Be Different by Misa Sugiura

So it's been quite a while since I've been able to post avidly and I bet a lot of my readers who don't follow me on Instagram have been confused as to where I've been or the changes made to my branding.

I wasn't going to leave you guys in the dark, of course and I had to do this quick little blog post just to explain everything that has been going on.

For starters, I'd like to say hi to those who are new to my blog. I'm Jessica. I am a book blogger from the outskirts of Toronto and I read almost everything but my favourites seem to be Horror/Thriller and Young Adult Fiction. I'm a huge horror junkie and love a good scare. I'm also a huge fan of Stephen King which I bet you've seen from my previous blog posts or just on some of my other social media accounts. I'm also Kpop trash as you'll also see on my social media as I tend to post about them often.

With that little intro out of the way, I thought I'd keep you guys updated with a couple of things.

The first being, where the heck have I been?! 

If you follow me on my other social media accounts, you'll see that I am quite active on them, especially Instagram which I almost always post on my story. If I haven't posted at least once, you should probably be a little concerned. 

But I haven't posted that much on my blog in a little while. I don't really have much of an excuse. Honestly, it's just that my Macbook's battery had died and needed to be changed. (This has been an ongoing thing for a couple months now and I never really thought to change it because me being me, thought everything would stay the same. lol) 

Of course, I was very wrong and it ended up dying to the point where it wouldn't even work when it was plugged into the charger. So, with that being said, I obviously needed to get my battery changed (which you should do every couple years or else you'll end up like me lol - I got my mac in 2016 so it works perfectly fine and I don't need an upgrade, okay) and was unable to post anything.

I tried blogging on my iPad, but it was really difficult and frustrating so I decided against it. You guys will also realize a lot of old blog posts that needed to be posted will be up in the next couple of week - including my April Owl Crate Box review.. lol

So yeah, that was the small little reason as to why I haven't been blogging much.

As for my branding, I don't know if you guys have noticed my new banner, my new website name and everything else in between. For those who are completely new and have no idea what I'm talking about, my brand name used to be jessreadsalatte, which you'll still find in some of my business mediums like my booking email and what not. (because it's such a hassle to change my email for publishing groups and what not.)

I was getting a little tired of seeing a lot of "jessreads_____" or "_____readsalatte" in the book community and it made me feel like I didn't stand out as much - there's also a lot of Jessica's in the community so I've found. And if either of your handles are those above, that's good for you! But it wasn't really up my alley.

I decided to change my whole branding so I'd be able to stand out as my own brand rather than "one of the Jess'"

It took me quite a while to pick a new brand name but will a lot of help from my friends Johely from astoldbyjohely and Victoria from readwiththedevil, I decided to pick terrifyinglyfictional which captures two of my moods: being in love with horror and books AND captivating my sense of sadness after finishing a great book, only to realize it was all fictional.

I really love this new brand and I hope you guys do too!

(Also, really sorry this blog post was rushed. I really just wanted to update you guys before I started writing the blog posts I really wanted to post lol love you guys though and see you in my next post!)

Eliza and Her Monsters follows Eliza, a normal girl to everyone except her family and two online best friends. To everyone else, she is LadyConstellation. The creator of the best webcomic Monster Sea which is read by millions of people. The public has no idea Eliza is LadyConstellation. But when a new boy moves to Eliza's school, Eliza finds out he's one of the biggest fanfic writers for her webcomic. Should she tell him who she is?

There's so much about this book that I loved so much.

I wasn't expecting this book to hit me as hard as it did. I was really expecting this book to be a love story between a comic creator and a fanfic writer, and I was hoping it would be so cute and fluffy, but I was so wrong.

This book has so much more to that than just the generalized plot. It talks about mental illness: anxiety, depression, suicidal thoughts, dealing with loss, dealing with bullying, growth and so much more.

I wasn't expecting any of it. I've never found a book that hit me as hard or I related to as much as Every Last Word by Tamara Ireland Stone, but this is definitely right beside it.

Eliza's character, I related to so much and saw myself in high school when I read through her character. I cried so hard during the events occurring her worst of the depression. How she only wanted to sleep and had no interest in dong what she loved. I understood how she felt when she was annoyed at everything and everyone.

I don't talk much about my mental health, but I surely related to every element of Eliza's depression and anxiety as I did growing up in high school that I sobbed for hours because I knew how she felt and I wanted to hug her and tell her she's going to be okay.

I also loved her friend group. Although we've only seen Eliza interact with her friends Max and Emmy online, I really did love the two of them. I had a lot of online friends through twitter (I had a One Direction fan account, among other things when I was growing up, okay) and I saw a lot of those friendships through Max and Emmy and I loved that element. Heck, I still have a lot of online friends with you guys!

I also really loved Wallace's character. Hearing his backstory with his dad's suicide and then Eliza wanting to take her life at the same place, but Wallace finds her, really broke my heart. That was the second time I ended up crying while reading this book. It was just so heartbreaking for me because of Wallace thinking it was his fault, but Eliza also thinking the same.

One of the things I absolutely love how this book executed was the description of environment. If you read my review of Supermarket by Bobby Hall, I mention how I wasn't a huge fan of how he describe the environment because I felt like it was too specific. This book, however, I think did it perfectly. It flowed nicely, the way everything was placed and we were told things that were important. I also loved how the descriptions weren't all in the same paragraph, but in several throughout the novel.

Another extra that I loved was how one of Eliza's characters in her webcomic, Kite is Filipina based. I loved that! For those who don't know, I am also a Filipina, both of my parents are from the Philippines, and I never seen Filipino characters so I was so happy to see that incorporated.

And finally, I loved how this book included "text" or forum messages, little comics from Monster Sea, and all the other mediums as if we were looking through Eliza's computer. Everything Everything also included something similar to this and I loved that element so I was excited to see Eliza and Her Monsters include that as well. I also thought it was quite fitting for the plot as well.

Overall, I loved Eliza and Her Monsters and I cannot wait to re-read this book again.

What is your favourite book you related to? Let me know on my Instagram or in the comments! 

With the Fire On High follows our main character Emoni, a teenager trying to balance school, work - and a baby. Thankfully, Emoni has a lot of help from her abuela as she's trying to finish up her senior year of high school. But Emoni has a cooking talent like no other and nothing is driving her away from that passion.

My second Acevedo book because of Johely and I loved it just as much as I loved The Poet X.

Again, like The Poet X, I wasn't really planning on writing a blog post for this book because I only had good things to say. I had no critical opinions or things that make me say "omg, wtf."

I have nothing but love for this book. But then I thought about it, and well, I decided to write a review anyways just talking about how much I loved it.

Therefore, my review will be significantly shorter than my usual ones because I'm just going to say what I love, and that's all. No spoilers or anything.

First of all, I love Elizabeth Acevedo's writing. I said it in my review of The Poet X, and I'll say it here, I love her writing so much. There's something to it that just feels so strongly to your heart. Like it hits you in all the right places and it makes you feel genuinely good.

Her writing has improved per se (as if anything needed to be improved) but I loved reading a novelization of her writing, rather than poems; although both are so good and well written.

I loved the characters so much, and how easy it was to love Emoni. Usually contemporary main characters are a hit or miss for me. But I absolutely loved Emoni and could feel her passion through the words.

Her abuela also made me laugh like a true Hispanic; she's a very genuine character. From the humour to the love and care she has for not only Emoni but Emma as well.

I loved the plot as well, and how, although there is a love interest, it isn't a typical romance story. It follows Emoni and her loves, yes. But her love for cooking, her family and most importantly her daughter.

It talks about the struggles of high school, academics, relationships and everything in between. And I love how accurate all the points are. I never felt like anything was over dramatic. It was purely genuine and I loved that.

The chapters are short as well which makes the read go so much faster as well and I loved that.

(There's also added recipes in the book that sounds delicious and I honestly want to try them all.)

I think the only negative thing about this book, was how much Emoni reminded me I can't cook. To sum it all up.

Overall though, I loved this book and I can't wait to re-read it soon. (Very soon, it's a nice summer read.)

Have you ever read a book you loved so much, you couldn't find any negative aspect about it? Let me know in the comments section below or on my Instagram. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Clockwork Prince is the second book in Cassandra Clare's second Shadowhunter series: The Infernal Devices. If follows the events that take place from the previous book.

I do discuss some spoilers that had occurred in this book. That's a massive warning. If you'd like to read my review on the previous book in this series, it will be linked here.

I don't even know where to start with my review.

I absolutely love this world more and more as we dive into it. I say this in every review, but I'm really happy you guys pushed me to continue this series after debating whether or not I should when I read City of Bones.

I heard emmmabooks on Youtube (she is also Shadowhunters obsessed) talk about how, with every book Cassandra Clare writes, it gets better and I definitely agree with that statement. You can tell that her writing progresses throughout each book and it really shows.

With that being said, this book was indeed enjoyable, but not in the same way as Clockwork Angel, if that makes sense.

There isn't much occurring in this book other than world building and backstory; unlike the previous book where everything was happening at once. I didn't really enjoy the lack of events that this book had, but I'll admit that the world and character building really made up for it.

I love Will as a character; he's so complex because of his backstory and I love that we really get to see that from him. We get to see him really vulnerable and leaving the institute because of a curse he thought he had for so many years but in reality, never really had. We find out about his family, and how heartbreaking it is when he finds out his best friend is engaged to the love of his life. He's a little cinnamon roll to me, he's definitely added to the book boyfriend list, I genuinely just love his character and I'm really happy we got more backstory from him.

I also really love how we got to see more of Sophie. I really like her character. I love how, even though she is a servant in the institute, she's never treated as one. It's really enjoyable seeing her being incorporated more in the plot and I'm hoping she's a prominent character in the next book, as well as the rest of the other books. (I'm also hoping something blooms between her and Gideon. We ship.)

We're still a little iffy on Tessa's back story, but I'm definitely okay with that because I know it'll all flood at once in the next book and probably slap me in the face.

The only probablem I really have with Tessa, is that she's okay about being engaged to Jem, even though she still has feelings for Will. Like I understand why she did it, but I still don't think its right. I really do love Jem and Tessa together though, but I'm not excited for the heartbreak Jem is going to have to go through when he finds out how Tessa really feels.

I also thought the whole relationship with Tessa and Jem was a little rushed. I mean, don't get me wrong, I do ship. But there wasn't really much of a flirtatious vibe, other than that one time Tessa was in Jem's room. I feel like a relationship between Will and Tessa would be more reasonable because of their connection throughout these last two books, so we'll see how this love triangle unfolds.

Something that I don't think I remember mentioning in my last review is that I love that Tessa and Will love for literature (more reason to love Will, just saying) because they constantly make classic book references. I'm currently obsessed with Classic Novels so I always get a little giddy when I see them talking about certain books.

I also thought it was so cute how Jem wanted to write a poem for Tessa because of that same topic. Like he's really trying for her.

As always, this book made me feel a lot of things. I laughed at a lot of parts which is quite usual for any book, especially the Shadowhunter books, but I feel like I felt more with this book than the last.

I was truly devastated reading the scene where Will confessed his love for Tessa to her, and she tells him that she's engaged with Jem. Heck, even though I hate Nate, I felt so sad when Tessa watched him die. I feel like, because there is a lot of character development in this book, you feel a lot more than the other ones.

I really did enjoy this book. I'm so obsessed with this world now and I can't stop reading the books.

With that being said, look out for all my Shadowhunter reviews in the next little while. Because I feel like that will almost be all I'm reading in the next coming weeks.

Who is your favourite Shadowhunter? Let me know in the comments section or on my Instagram!