10 Mini Book Reviews + Spark Blog Tour

Hi everyone!

I hope you’re having a nice Wednesday morning, or whatever it is wherever you are. 🙂

I don’t normally do book posts on here, but I thought it’d be fun to do one for a change and give you some mini reviews and my thoughts on books I’ve been reading lately. And this post is part of the blog tour for my sister’s book, so that’s exciting!

Alright, let’s dive right in.

*splash*

S P A R K  by Allison Beery

First up, of course, we have Spark! This is Allison’s second poem book and I was so excited to read it! Wait, backing up a bit, isn’t the cover AMAZING? 😀 It’s so pretty! And I really love the poem it was inspired by.

Anyway, I think these poems can be a bit harder to uncover than the ones in Unfurling, but that’s not a bad thing. You can read it several times and still get something new out of it.

I really love her style of poetry. It’s not rhyming, so it’s not too poetryy (how am I supposed to say/spell that?) which is fine by me because I’m not normally a huge fan of poetry! They’re sort of a mix between little snippets of pose and poems. Some of my favorites are “rooftop supper”, “hay day”, “spark”, and “looking back”.

So yeah! The link to buy it is right HERE so… GO READ IT! Although wait, keep reading to the end of this post because there’s more blog tour stuff down there and information about the giveaway.

Moving on…

M E M I O R S   O F   S H E R L O C K   H O L M E S  by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Sherlock Holmes! This was a school book, actually. But I really enjoyed it! I read stories from both this book and “Adventures of Sherlock Holmes”. I did begin to get a little tired of them by the time I was done, but they’re definitely better than most other detective stories.

W O L F   H O L L O W  by Laura Wolk

This book was given to me by Clara. Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure all of the books in this post are either from Clara or school reading. I haven’t really done much reading otherwise. But, as I was saying, Clara sent me this book a few months ago. We’ve been doing a monthly book swap this year where each month we send each other one of our favorite books. It’s been a wonderful way to find new books!

Wolf Hollow is actually one of the saddest books I’ve read. But I think that’s mostly because I had no idea that it would be sad and for some reason I was expecting a completely happy ending. SNIFF. I have never cried because of a book, but this made me gasp softly. (Be impressed. *nods*) I really liked the story line of this and the characters and everything! It also seems like a book that would be good for rereading so I plan to do that eventually.

F A W K E S  by Nadine Brandes

Next up we have Fawkes. I now have two copies of this pretty book, thanks to Clara and someone who sent it to me for my birthday and I have no idea who they are. But thank you, Clara and Person! I was excited to read this because I’d been hearing about it for a long time and it sounded really interesting.

The genre is, I believe, historical-fantasy. Which is definitely a genre you don’t hear about very often. I love historical fiction, but I don’t really love fantasy. In this case though, the historical fiction part won me over and I did enjoy the book. But I personally think I would have preferred a Guy Fawkes retelling without the fantasy elements.

So yes, it is a Guy Fawkes retelling, which I was excited about! I had very little knowledge about who he was and what he did and it was interesting to learn a little more about him, through the perspective of his son. The light power stuff wasn’t terribly well explained in my opinion, but maybe I just needed to pay closer attention. And the Emma plot-twist was great!

That was a kind of conflicting review, but the bottom line is that this is a good book, especially if you like fantasy.

C I R C U S   M I R A N D U S  by Cassie Beasley

This is a Clara book too! Circus Mirandus was another book I’d heard about and was interested to read. I didn’t overly love the characters in it, but the story was good! I think there’s a sequel that has just recently been released so I’d love to read that too.

The lighting changed from here on out so sorry about that.

B E O W U L F  translated by Seamus Heaney

Beowulf was definitely a school read. I didn’t love it, but it really wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. I didn’t feel particularly drawn into the story but I could definitely understand what was happening, so that was nice! I wouldn’t recommend this book unless someone specifically asked for ancient book recommendations, but again, not bad for a school read. 🙂

T H E   I M P O R T A N C E   O F   B E I N G   E R N E S T  by Oscar Wilde

The Importance of Being Ernest is hilarious! The characters in it are so funny and the plot is sort of Shakespeare-esque. Lots of tangles and mix-ups with plenty of witty quotes from all of the characters. I also read this for school and it has been one of my favorites so far. We’d watched the movie earlier so I knew what was going to happen, but it was still hilarious to read. I very much enjoyed the muffin part.

T H E   M Y S T E R I O U S   B E N E D I C T   S O C I E T Y   A N D   T H E   R I D D L E   O F   T H E   A G E S  by Trenton Lee Stewart

OOH! Yes, we can’t forget the fourth Mysterious Benedict Society! This is one that isn’t a Clara book or a school book.

The title sure didn’t get any shorter than the other ones, but it was definitely different in a lot of other ways. Mostly because the characters are several years older than they are in the previous three books. It took a little getting used to, but in the end I was glad that they were older so it gave a satisfying end to the series. Well, I’m assuming it’s the end. And kind of hoping it is, too. I LOVE all of MBS, but I have a feeling four books + a prequel is about the max. I really hope Trenton Lee Stewart writes other books though! His writing style is amazing and you should definitely read his books.

R A Y M I E   N I G H T I N G A L E  by Kate DiCamillo

(This is another Clara book.) I love Kate DiCamillo’s writing style so I was excited to read this! And I really enjoyed it. I liked how the three main characters had such different personalities and how there was a certain thing for each character that motivated them. I’m hoping to read the Louisiana and Beatrice books eventually!

M O O N   O V E R   M A N I F E S T  by Clare Vanderpool

We’ll end on one last Clara book. This one was amazing! It had historical fiction (yay!) from two different time periods tied in, and the way the author fit everything together was amazing. I also really love the characters in this book and how the main character sees them in her daily life and also hears about them in the stories from several years before. It’s just a great book, and I definitely recommend it to those of you who like historical fiction and/or middle grade fiction!

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There you have it! My thoughts on ten books I’ve read (somewhat) recently. Now, as I promised, onto the rest of the Spark Blog Tour stuff.

I never properly introduced you to the author, so let me go ahead and do that!

Allison Beery is a Christian teen with a passion for creating and capturing beauty, whether it’s through writing, art, photography, or taking a walk in the woods. She lives on a big farm in Central Virginia with her parents, four siblings, and a multitude of pets. She strives to glorify God in everything and love people genuinely. Learn more about her at her blog, A Farm Girl’s Life, or stalk her art Instagram @thecolorboxstudio.

I am one of those four siblings, in case you didn’t catch that. And Eeyore is one of the multitude of pets! But anyway, about that giveaway.

*photo credit to Allison*

Hopefully by now you all want to read the book, but there’s a very good possibility that you would rather not buy the book. *sigh* Such struggles. Never fear though, there’s a chance to win the book for free in Allison’s giveaway! If you aren’t so sure you’ll like the book, you should still enter for the fuzzy socks, chai tea, fairy lights, playlist, and art print. That way you can be all aesthetic and wear the fuzzy socks, curl up under your fairy lights with the little art print clipped to it, sip some tea, listen to music, and read the poem book! And then when you actually start reading it you’ll realize that it really is amazing and you’ll get a copy for everyone you know, and they’ll read it and get a copy for everyone they know, until there will be a lot of people with a great poem book! See, I have it all planned out. So, go enter that giveaway! The link is right HERE. And if you don’t win the giveaway, you can always spend a few dollars and buy the book for yourself. (The link to do so is HERE in case you didn’t catch it the first time.)

Now that I’ve gotten you all excited for reading Spark, you’ll want to hear more about it. You can do so by checking out the links in the full blog tour right down there.

October 25

 

Allison @ A Farm Girl’s Life – Blog Tour Kickoff, Author’s Intro, + Giveaway Begins

 

October 26 (Saturday)

Aria @ Aria Lisette – Book Review

 

October 27 (Sunday)

Amie @ Crazy A – Book Review, Author Interview

 

October 28 (Monday)

Jo @ Pananaw – Review, Snippets, and Author Interview with a slight twist 😉

 

October 29 (Tuesday)

Sam @ The Chocolate Box – Book Review & Poem Snippets

 

October 30 (Wednesday)

Megan @ A Barefoot Gal – Mini Book Review

 

November 1 (Friday)

Hannah @ The Striped Plaid – Book Review & Poem Snippets

 

November 2 (Saturday)

Charis @ Charis Rae – Mini Book Review & Instagram Q&A

 

November 3 (Sunday)

Heather @ The Frozen Library – Author Interview

 

November 4 (Monday)

Clara @ Clara & Co – Book Review & Author Interview

 

November 5 (Tuesday)

Allison @ A Farm Girl’s Life – Blog Tour Wrap-Up + Giveaway Winners!

 

Yup, I think that’s it! Thanks for reading this bookish post and GO READ SPARK! 😀

blank verse (non-rhyming) or rhyming poetry? 

do you like drinking tea/coffee/hot cocoa while reading?

(unrelated but) are you excited for Christmas yet?? 😀

GO NATIONALS GO GO GO! BEAT THE ASTROS!