Series I have yet to read

Hey Fellow Readers!

Today, I'm going to throw myself under the bus and call out popular series I either haven't finished, or straight up haven't started yet.  Hopefully this will give me the motivation to finish these this year!

Unfinished

Daughter of Smoke and Bone series
By: Laini Taylor
Books of the series I've read: Just the first one.




The Lunar Chronicles
By: Marissa Meyer
Books of the series I've read: Just the first one again.




The Hunger Games series
By: Susan Collins
Books I've read: Actually most of the series, I got partially into Mocking Jay, got mad and stopped reading.

Not even started yet

Miss Peregrines Home for Peculiar Children
By: Ransom Riggs



Throne of Glass Series
By: Sarah J. Maas





The Mortal Instruments Series
By: Cassandra Clare



The Maze Runner series
By: James Dashner




I've heard some great things about these and want to love them too!  The Lunar Chronicles is probably at the top of my list right now.  Have you read all of these, or are you like me and have more reading to do?

Thank you for reading and your support!

A Book Review: The Martian

The Martian
By: Andy Weir
My Rating: 5/5

Guys, stop what you're doing at this very moment and go read this book!  Yes, even if you're in the middle of reading my review, I'll wait.

*Waits patiently on you*

Okay, now that you're done, we can get into the review!

Mark Watney, botanist, engineer, and first man to be alone on Mars.  After a severe dust storm forces the crew to evacuate Mars, Mark finds himself alone on the surface clinging to life.  His crew believing him dead flee from the red planet just before their only form of escape fatally tips over.  Having made it safely onto their escape ship, the whole crew wishes there was something more they could have done to save him.

Mark is on his own.  The first step was to grow some food.  Being a botanist did come in handy on Mars!  To grow food, Mark needed to "make" more water.  This is where the book lost me a little.  I'm sure someone else could read this and understand just fine, but it just went slightly over my head.  With some potato plants growing he started to use his engineering skills.  Mark starts brewing up ideas for communication.

After about a month of mourning, NASA takes a look at Mars. They would have to make any images they found public, so for obvious reasons they were very hesitant.  With a nudge from an administrator of NASA Venkat finally caved and gave him the satellite time he was after.  They expected to find a body, but instead they found Watney alive!  There was no way to communicate with him, but they knew he was alive and were working on a way to get to him.

Mark planned to travel to the Pathfinder site.  NASA lost contact with that rover long ago, but he's an engineer, fixing things is his job.  All he knows is if he can make it there he may be able to communicate with Earth, and let someone know he is still alive.

Its been a long time since I've actually wanted to read a book so full of suspense.  After seeing the movie, and hearing such good things about the book I talked about it so much I got it for Christmas. (Thanks Issac!!)

I have so much that I want to say about this book.  I'm a sucker for anything written in journal format and most of this book was done just like that.  Watneys humor kept me laughing through the darkest parts of his journey.  It kind of made me want to be an astronaut.  Kind of.

Stephanie Need this book for yourself? Here's a link to its Amazon page! I do get a small commission if you use my link so it's a win-win! Thank you for your support! The Martian Amazon Page

Your Public Library

Hey Readers!

Alright, my question of the day is, Library or bookstore?

I saw this question raised the other day on a group on Goodreads, and it got me thinking about my own bookish habits.  I love supporting local bookstores, and buying books brand new.  There is just something about the way new books smell, and feel.  It's pretty close to an addiction for me.

As you know, the down side of doing such things is the fact that books can get expensive, and quick. So I started buying books secondhand to save myself some money.  It worked, but in turn I had ended up with too many books on my TBR shelf to be acceptable.

My plan to remedy this was getting a library card at my local library.  At first I was a little skeptical, I mean, do I really want to touch a book that so many other germy hands had been on?  Not to mention the state of some of the books there are slightly depressing.  Looking past all of that, I walked up to the counter ready to get a card of my own.  The process was completely computerized (at least at my local library) and it was really quick.  They even took my picture to make sure it's really me checking out books.

Libraries have so many resources available to card holders and its all free! Yes, free! There is a fee to do things like sending or receiving a fax, making copies, and printing things from the internet.  Those fees are relatively low, and seemed reasonable to me.  My local library even had a section dedicated to researching family history, which I thought was super cool. There is even a "family history specialist" available some days to help with your research.

Did you know they even have foreign language programs you can check out? You could learn a new language for FREE!  That is another cool thing that I have yet to check out, but I am super interested to look into all the options they have.

Your local library may even have some E-Book options for you E-Readers out there.  Personally, I can hardly read from a screen, whether it's my phone, laptop or a tablet.  I really, really like the feeling of a physical book in my hand and getting the satisfaction of turning the pages, which brings us back to my book addiction.

Overall I love the library and will continue to check out books, along with picking up a few new ones as well. Let me know what you think, will you be giving your public library a chance?

Thanks for reading!!
Stephanie

About the blog

Hi!

The name is Stephanie (or Stevie if you're paying attention to the blog title) and I am finally starting my book blog!

I know, you're thinking "ugh, not another book blogger" and I don't blame you at all.  I do plan on being different and not just doing a constant stream of book reviews.  I want to share my love of reading with you and hopefully inspire you to pick up more books yourself.

I haven't always been a reader, to be completely honest, there was a time when I dreaded reading.  In school I always skimmed books I was supposed to read fully, and kind of fluffed my way through all the tests and that got me by. Don't look at me like that, we've all used a Spark Note or two!  Reading never seemed "fun" to me, just something I had to do for my classes.

All of those feelings changed when I found Harry Potter, then the Twilight saga and realized I did like reading more than I thought I did. I spent many nights in my room reading all night to find out what happened next to Harry, Hermione, and Ron. I can not tell you how many tears I shed during that whole series, but I would not change a thing.

So please, give me a chance to ignite a love for reading within you.