January Reading Wrap Up
I'm a bit late in posting the January reading-wrap up because I have offline exams coming up and it'll be hard for me to keep up with my writing schedule till March or at least till the date my exam end.
I read around 29 books in the month of January and thought I should do a Reading Wrap-Up. Although I have not included Wattpad Books in my review. Only those books which are on Goodreads are being counted here for the list. January was a good reading month for me. I don't know how February will be as a reading month but I hope it's not bad.
AUTHOR - Tahereh Mafi
SERIES - Shatter Me
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐
TROPES - Enemies to Lovers, Found Family, Dystopian
ABOUT - Unravel me and Ignite me are the 2nd and 3rd books in the Shatter Me series. The series is about Juliette, who has a power that makes her touch fatal to everyone. Now the Re-establishment wants to use her as a weapon.
MY REVIEW - I was forced to read this book by my best friend, and I did not like it. I'm not going to sugarcoat anything, and I know thousands of people love this book, but I hated this book. One of the reasons I think I hated this book was because I was too old for it. I'm sure 12 or 13 year old me would have loved this book, but now it was just not it. I found almost all the characters annoying (Especially Adam and Kenji), except Warner; I only read the 3 books because of Warner. I feel like this is a pattern wherever 2 brothers love triangle is present. I hate love triangles more than I hate any trope (I can bear even pregnancy trope, but the love triangle trope is one that I hate with everything I have.) I DNF'd this series after 3 books because I can't even.
2. Fix her up
AUTHOR - Tessa Bailey
SERIES - Hot & Hammered
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐
TROPES - Brother's best friend, Fake Dating, Childhood Celebrity Crush
ABOUT - Georgette Castle is tired of everyone treating her like a child. She wants to upgrade her life and prove to everyone that she's not a child anymore. The hottest rookie baseball player, Travis Ford had to move back to his hometown after an injury that ended his career, now he's flipping a house to keep himself busy. They both decide to fake-date so Travis can get a job and Georgie can improve her "reputation".
MY REVIEW - Our main girl, Georgie, had so much potential for character swear, and I swear if Tessa Bailey had forgotten the romance and just focused on Georgie's development, I would have given this book 5 stars. Georgie was stuck in her childhood, wanting her family and childhood crush's approval at every step of the way, not seeing that it was stopping her from developing. She didn't want to be treated like a child, but she didn't treat herself as an adult. I didn't like the MMC because he held her back until he solved his own damn issues, and I hated it. I found almost all characters annoying except Bethany. Stephen and Kristen were so annoying, and I actually want to praise Tessa Bailey for her writing because I think she wanted to make all of them annoying. I've read so many of Tessa Bailey's books, and she has never disappointed me, but then I read this book. I have very low patience, so I would just not recommend this to anyone with low patience.
3. Twisted Hate
AUTHOR - Ana Huang
SERIES - Twisted Series
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐️⭐️
TROPES - Best friend's Brother, Enemies to Lovers, One Bed Trope, Enemies with Benefits, Forced Proximity, Best Friend's Brother, Interracial couple
ABOUT - Jules Ambrose and Josh Chen hate each other, but their chemistry is exploding. Now, they are forced to work with each other in the same place and battle their own demons.
MY REVIEW - Ana Huang woke up one day and decided to add all my favourite tropes in a book and make it exactly like something I've been craving to read for the past few months. I literally stayed up till 6 am to finish this book in one go because I directly could not put it down after I started it.
I did a full spoiler-free review on Twisted Hate; you can check it out here - Twisted Hate Review
4. Throne Duet
AUTHOR - Rina Kent
SERIES - Throne Duet
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐.5
TROPES - Mafia Romance, Forced Marriage, Almost second chance (but not really)
ABOUT - Raina Solkov agrees to marry Kyle Hunter so she can protect her little sister. She also marries him to gain control of the Bratva.
MY REVIEW - This book was good with the romance aspect, but even in the end, the author left a lot of loopholes with the mafia aspect of the book. I did realize I should have read like 10 other series before and after reading this series, but I don't want to. Maybe I will read it later, but I don't like the aspect of it being 5-6 different series. The main character Kyle was an alphahole with a capital A. But it was kind of expected with it being Mafia Romance. In the end, it was a good read, but I won't re-read this book.
5. Doc W. and The Cursed Undersea
AUTHOR - Lou Rusty
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐️
TROPES - YA Fantasy
ABOUT - Doc, an orphan child, has been enslaved to work in the mines. On his twelfth birthday, a book from a local Witch Doctor changes his life forever. Inside, Doc reads of strange creatures that live hidden beneath the Asperatus Cloud.
MY REVIEW - I received a copy of this book to review, and I absolutely loved going back to that Teenage and YA vibes. The world-building and the unique characters in this book were spot-on fantastic.
I did a full review on this book which you can find here -Doc W. and The Undersea Review
6. Boyfriend Material
AUTHOR - Alexis Hall
SERIES - Boyfriend Material
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐. 5
TROPES - Fake Dating. BxB
ABOUT - Luc has a famous dad who was never there, but "the famous dad" causes a lot of problems in his life, so to clear up his image in the media so he can retain the job, he decided to Fake-Date Oliver, an uptight Criminal Lawyer.
MY REVIEW - I thought this book was okay, It wasn't bad, but it wasn't that great either. One of the main reasons why I think this book did not hit for me was because I went into thinking I'd be getting something as amazing as Red, White and Royal Blue. And I was very obviously wrong. It was something else, something new, and I liked it, but it missed that mark. Not much angst, not much slow burn, not much tension; everything was mediocre so well that explains the 3.5 ratings. It was good as a one time read, but I'm not going to pick it up again.
7. The Cruel Prince Trilogy
AUTHOR - Holly Black
SERIES - The Folk of The Air
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐️⭐️
TROPES - Enemies to Lovers, Fantasy, Dagger to Throat
ABOUT - Jude is a human who lives in the fae land of Elfhame. Cardan is the Prince of Elfhame and absolutely loathes Jude. She continues to defy him and then faces the consequences.
MY REVIEW - I absolutely love the Cruel Prince Trilogy. It's one of the best series ever, and I recently got the paperback version, so I read it again and damn, I loved it again. The plot of this book stood up to the name of it, with so much betrayal going on. I mean, there wasn't one person in that book who didn't betray anyone. I mean, some of them were shocking, I'm going to keep this spoiler-free, but people who know, know. One thing that I particularly liked about this book was that none of the characters were good. Like all of them had some kind of malicious intent. Even Jude was terrible.
8. Trapped with you
AUTHOR - Marzy Opal
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐️
TROPES - Second Chance, Best Friends to Lovers.
ABOUT - Ella gets paired with her ex-boyfriend for St. Victoria's initiation night. He still loves her more than anything. he hates his guts. Now they are trapped together in their worst nightmare.
MY REVIEW - I found this book on booktok, and let me tell you, I did not expect it to be this good. Dark Academia style castle? Check. Rich People School? Check. Initiation Night where they have to complete tasks? Check. Forced Proximity by being in the same group? Check. I usually don't like second chance romance, but I absolutely loved this. The setting, the plot and the characters were absolutely amazing. I definitely recommend it.
9. Punk 57
AUTHOR - Penelope Douglas
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐️⭐️
TROPES - Best Friends (Pen Pals) to Enemies to Lovers
ABOUT - Misha and Ryen have been pen pals since 5th grade, but one day Misha just stops writing, and Ryen is left to figure out what happened. He could be gone forever, or he could be right under her nose, and she wouldn't know.
MY REVIEW - I re-read this book after 3 years, and damn I can't even believe how I went 3 years without re-reading this book because it was so awesome. I, personally, related to one of the characters, and it was like someone took my deepest fear/secret and laid it bare in front of everyone. I cried the first time I read and cried the second time I read, but there's nothing in that book that I would cry abo t. here's this quote in this book "I can't love you if you stop being you", and the raw emotion in that sentence tore me apart.
10. Sinners Duet
AUTHOR - Sophie Lark
SERIES - Sinners Duet
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (If I could I would give it a thousand more stars)
TROPES - Serial Killer, Dark Romance
TRIGGER WARNINGS - Stalking, Murder, Violence and Gore, Kidnapping (I do suggest looking up all the triggers carefully before starting this series. It's a very dark book)
ABOUT - Alastor Shaw and Cole Blackwell have been nemesis in the art world and the dark world. Both of them are artists as well as murderers. They both fixate on a girl, Mara, for different reasons.
MY REVIEW - To sum up my feelings for this book, I have a single sentence "Mama, I'm in love with a criminal." Oh my god, Cole Blackwell was something else. He's a serial killer, and I get that I'm not supposed to like serial killers, but god damn. I even liked the Antagonist of this book, Shaw, but the amount of love I have for Cole Blackwell is too much; he's right there along with Christian Allister in the "People I love that I'm not supposed to love." There's this scene where Cole forced his tattoo on Mara, and then Mara tattoos him back, and I wanted to scream so loud at that scene I can't even. Cole and Mara are both so messed up in their heads and so psycho I'm concerned for myself with how much I loved this book. It doesn't help that I was reading this series book right before my Business Exam. I will definitely recommend this book to everyone who can stomach this much gore because bloody hell did I love this book.
11. Born in Blood Series
AUTHOR - Cora Reilly
SERIES - Born In Blood
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐️
TROPES - A whole set of different tropes with different couples like Arrange Marriage, Mafia Pre-Dominantly.
ABOUT - There are a whole lot of different sets of couples, so I'm going to link each couple's first book.
MY REVIEW - I loved this series right until the last book, where Dante literally helped everyone and received shit for it. I also hated the plot repetition in the 6th and 7th books and Twisted Pride and a few other of her books. Like, I'm sorry but showing us the same plot from 10 different POV's ain't helping anyone? Dante and Valentina were one of my favourite couples, and they didn't receive an ending I think they deserved, but I'm going to wait for Anna's book, I guess.
Aria, Luca, Matteo, Gianna, Lily and Romero being such a great family together made me happier than ever. It made up for the lack of one in Dante and Valentina's case. I can't wait to start Marcella's book, but I have exams, so I will study first read later. Though not going to lie, I am a bit scared of the next-generation series because I don't want Reilly to "Villainize" the parents even though I know they aren't nice people.
12. The Love Hypothesis
AUTHOR - Ali Hazelwood
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
TROPES - Grumpy x Sunshine, Fake Dating, Slowburn, I hate everyone but you
ABOUT - Olive decides to fake-date her grumpy professor to convince her friend that she has finally moved on from Jeremy, her so-called ex.
MY REVIEW - I recently got the paperback version of this book, and I couldn't help but re-read it. It was so cliche but adorable with its tope being in my God Tier. It was, of course, cliche cause it was meant to be fanfiction but got published. I'm so glad it got published because otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to read it. He's always been a little in love with her, and now they are fake dating, and some sparks will definitely be flying. Everyone loves this book, and I am counted in those people. I love when relationships are developed through these seemingly small moments instead of the whole one big scene of love confession, so slow burn when done right is definitely going to be on top reads.
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