November 9 by Colleen Hoover

"You'll never be able to find yourself if you're lost in someone else." 

COLLEEN HOOVER YOU COLD HEARTED SHE DEMON!!! HOW CAN YOU DO THIS TO PEOPLE!?! I must seriously love abuse because I keep coming back for more of it when it comes to your books!  This could be the last book I read all year and I would be perfectly content with it. November 9 is stunning. 

All us book nerds have one serious thing in common when it comes to reading... We love book quotes! We love to say them, we love to share them, we love to make pictures with them, we just seriously love them. November 9 hands-down has some of my favorite book quotes in it. Not just from things I read this year, from things I've read in general. If I could, I would just copy and paste the entire book as my review and just leave it at that. It's all just so beautiful.

November 9 follows Fallon, a girl who meets a young writer (Ben) the day before she's set to move cross country. With a seriously silly introduction it leads these two characters to spend her last night in town with each other. This becomes the inspiration for Ben's first novel and for the two too met up every year on the same day. I seriously can't get over these two. They're both so easy to fall in love with. Fallon with her insecurities and Ben with his boyish charm will win your heart over within a few pages. Fallon is this character who is struggling to find her footing again in life, and Ben who knows what direction he wants to aim, but needs the arrow guided. I liked their ups and downs. I liked how their struggles became our struggles. We get to grow with these characters and we get to go through so much time with them. Fallon and Ben will make you feel every single emotion. One page these two would have me dying laughing then I would turn it and the next I would be crying so hard I couldn't breathe. Their relationship will have you second guessing your hate for insta love. That's all I'm going to say character wise... Vague I know, but if you've ever read a CoHo book (if you haven't where the hell have you been?!?) you know the last thing you want is to be spoiled on characters.

"What are you waiting for? He drags in a raspy breath. 'To wake up, I think.' He lowers his mouth and kisses my neck. 'I'm dreaming, right?'"

Okay, I'm just going to warn you now, the vague character description is going to be the only organized and put together part of this whole review. From here on out it's going to be a jumbled mess of spoiler free fangirl talk... You've been warned.

The plot... OMG the plot. It's a sucker punch from all directions. It's an uppercut to the face, an elbow to the stomach, a smack to the ear of pure emotion thrust upon you. Let me break this down for you... The first few pages I was all lah-tee-dah minding my own business being all swoony over all the possibilities of where this story could head... WHEN OUT OF NOWHERE I GET FREAKING THROAT PUNCHED BY THE MOST ROMANCE SCENE I HAVE READ IN MY ENTIRE LIFE... AND THIS IS FROM A GIRL WHO'S READ A BUTT TON OF BOOKS!!! I mean good God and it's only 50 pages in!!! I wanted to lay a book worthy kiss on Ben so hard, because that moment is pure perfection. Every girl deserves a Ben! Maybe someone can invent a pocket sized version of him, and whenever were having an ugly day (ladies you know what I'm talking about) you can pull out your pocket sized Ben and he can pay you compliments and make you feel like the princess you are. If you can't tell by that bizarre thing I just said, then let me just come right out and say it, I was completely hooked. I was just sitting on the sofa sobbing. Then it's scene after scene of these perfect stolen moments, breathtaking events, and heart stopping romance that you'll be rooting for... But don't get too comfortable because you know one of those epic CoHo twist are going to happen... AND THIS ONE IS THE PITS! When it happened... I couldn't breathe and I swear I almost threw up. Feeling all emotions at once hit me so hard it almost induced vomiting... But mainly just caused me to do that heavy cry where you can't even function or form words and all your sentences come out in broken fragments. Pain swept my legs out from under me.

Yeah, safe to say overall I could barely function reading this. This story is just everything. None of that probably made any sense and I don't care. You know a book is good when you're so jumbled and have so many emotions that it's physically hard to get all of them down. Oh and don't get me wrong with this review. It's not just love and pain in this novel. CoHo has this hilarious thing where she pokes fun at the everything she is doing with this book. Not just that she has this fun way of poking at everything all of us secretively love in books. It's just great! If this wasn't all enough for you there's something a little extra special she puts in this novel that had me jumping all over the place that I can't freaking wait for y'all to read. You can really tell she put her whole heart into writing this book for fans and really set out to give them something to love. 

November 9 is a beautiful book with a wonderful message. It's a novel filled with so much passion, humor,  with such a dreamy aspect that leaps off the pages and pulls you in. November 9 was my most anticipated New Adult book of the year, and again Colleen Hoover didn't let me down. By the end of November 9 I promise your heartstrings will have been pulled in every single direction.

10/10 Stars 
-Angela 

Auto Buys

If you're big on books and book buying then you already know what auto buys are... For those of you who don't let me explain. It's this freaky weird thing book people do when they can't help buy a book because (insert bizarre reason here). As a book collectors ourselves we know all reasons for auto buying are usually odd and pretty off the way. You also know if you collect books that everyone has their own auto buying reasons. Sometimes its genre related sometimes it's just because of who wrote it. We decided to share a few of ours. 

Angela: I love to collect books. Love it! (Clearly right?!) I also prefer owning actual dead tree copies to downloading E-books. I'm so very, very guilty of buying books for the reasons listed below... Not kidding I'll buy just about any books that fall under these things. 

I will buy any book that has half a girls face on it. Why? I don't know. I wont even read what the book is about before purchasing it. If I'm strolling down my local B&N aisles and see a book with a girl with half a face on it I will just pick it up! Sometimes it's like a knee jerk reaction. I'll even try to talk myself out of it, but then my inner book girl wins out and I purchase it. 

The other cover related auto buy I'm guilty of is buying any and every book with a girl underwater. Under water covers are my favorite!!! I'm obsessed. Not kidding, I have always been in love with pictures taken underwater, so it figures my love for it would flow into the book world. Again these are books that I automatically add to my cart and wont even care what the synopsis are. I have never met a cover with an underwater picture on it that I didn't like. The pictures to the right are only some of the ones I own.

Of the half face and underwater covers I think The Kricket Series (Under Different Stars/ Sea of Stars) and Unteachable are my favorites. 

Books Featured: The Ring and Crown, Mystic City, Branded The Lux Series, Unteachable. Wicked, The Kricket Series, Ten Tiny Breaths, The Mara Dyer Trilogy. 

The next two things I'm guilty as charged of doing are buying books that are written by two authors. I will not only automatically buy anything by these two authors, I will drop anything I'm currently reading to pick up one of their new books... Jennifer L. Armentrout and Colleen Hoover. These are my two favorite authors! I'm obsessed with them. They are two authors that never let me down. Between the two I'm sure you all know that my all time favorite however is Colleen Hoover. She is the ONLY author who has never let me down. Her books are both amazing and life Ugly Love, Maybe Someday, and Maybe Not are my favorites. As far as Jla her Lux Series and The Dark Elements Trilogy are my favorites.
changing. Of all books

I saved my favorite auto buy for last... My all time favorite purchases to make are *drum roll please* Alien related reads. I AM FREAKING ALIEN OBSESSED!!! I can't stop! I will read, purchase, see, watch anything alien related. Of any "genre" (because I don't really think Alien is a genre, even though it should be) Aliens are my favorite. All this alien news about a Lux movie actually happening now has me all jazzed up. Daemon Black on the big screen, whoosh, don't even get my started! I also am barely breathing waiting for The 5th Wave movie coming out next year and the last book in the trilogy, The Last Star, coming out later this year. Alien books are almost, probably, my most own books. Of all my Alien books/series I think The 5th Wave Trilogy, The Lux Series, and The Broken Skies Series are my favorite.

Featured books: Wait for You, Wicked, The Lux Series, The Dark Elements Trilogy, The Half-Blood Series, The Return. Hopeless, Slammed, Point of Retreat, Ugly Love, Maybe Someday, Confess. The 5th Wave Trilogy, Alienated Series, In the After Duology, The Taking Series, Fire in the Woods Series, Broken Skies Series, Gravity, Rush Series.  

Leah: Like Angela said, auto buying is a knee jerk reaction where you've ended up buying something without even realizing it sometimes. Being a fangirl is tough sometimes! I'm SUPER notorious for auto buying because along with reading and collecting books, shopping is my other favorite hobby. It really makes for an expensive hobby.

First, my usual auto buy is a series. Doesn't sound weird, right? Well, I will buy an entire series of something before even reading the first book on the assumption that I will love the first book and feel the need to devour the rest of the series. Well.... if y'all have read any of my recaps, you know that I am also notorious about getting bored in the middle of a series. I'm not one of those people who like to binge read through a super long series. I like to read a book or two then go to something else then come back later. For example, I have the full series for Vampire Academy, The Mortal Instruments, The Hunt, The Covenant, and The Pledge all on my bookshelves right now. I'm about 3-4 books deep into each one of those series. I'll finish them eventually, but I probably could just bought one book at a time instead of the entire series at once. #autobuy 

I'm also very loyal to my favorite authors. If Colleen Hoover, JLA, John Green, or Gillian Flynn releases something new, I'm buying it no questions asked. Like Angela, I will put down anything that I'm reading and dive straight into my new book. These authors have never given me a bad book or disappointed me, so I know no matter what kind of slump or mood I'm in, they will give me a good pick me up. The Fault in Our Stars is my favorite reread, but I also absolutely adore Looking for Alaska and Paper Towns by John Green. My favorite CoHo books are Slammed, Maybe Someday, and Ugly Love and I will pick those up if I need a good cry/romance in my life (I plan on reading Point of Retreat this week when I'm alone so I can ugly cry all by myself). JLA knows how to bring the steaminess and also bring the action. My FAVORITE JLA is Wicked, hands down. I love that it is just the start of the series so there is so many places for it to go! And when I'm feeling a little darker and need to indulge my inner serial killer, I turn to Gillian Flynn who never disappoints with her mind-effs. 

My last two big auto buy categories I'm going to partially blame on Angela because before she and I became raving fangirls, these two were never things I cared about. UK cover editions and signed copies of books. I don't care if I already own an entire series, if a sweet UK cover releases, I'm 

buying it. For example, I have two full (well, full so far since the series isn't complete) sets of the Throne of Glass series in both the US editions as well as the beautiful white UK editions. My favorite UK edition that I've bought so far is the florescent graffiti style Hunger Games set. So beautiful! 

Lastly is the signed copy problem that I've developed. Ok, it's no secret that we love going to book signings. Cool, that's not weird. The auto buying weirdness comes in when I go into a bookstore and see a book that is an autographed copy. MUSTBUYNOW. It's kind of weird having a signed copy of a book for an author you haven't met,  I can't resist. I need to see that signature on that title page. Must collect them all. For example, I have signed copies of The Fifth Wave and To All The Boys I've Loved Before that I have picked up in bookstores. 

Featured books: The Mortal Instruments series, Vampire Academy series, The Covenant series, The Hunger Games series, Throne of Glass series, To All The Boys I've Loved Before, The Pledge, Looking for Alaska, Paper Towns, The Fault in Our Stars, Wicked, Maybe Someday, Ugly Love, Slammed, Point of Retreat, Dark Places, and The Fifth Wave.

Angela's March Reads

Ahhhh March, you came and went so fast. March was.... well it was a climb reading wise for me. Saying I was in a slump would be an understatement. I couldn't seem too truly get into anything. As usual I had some high highs and low lows. This month I read a total of 20 books. Not my best numbers, but still ahead in my reading. I wasn't as active as I usually am on here or any bookmedia. I had some vacation time this month and just caught up with friends, family, and my home life. It was also my birthday this month so I was rather busy. (Planning on posting my birthday book-haul soon.) Leah and I have been planning some up-coming events so that ate up a lot of time as well. Hopefully I can catch up on some reviews in April. As far as my March reads go, here you have them:

Transparent- Natalie Whipple
Conviction- Kelly Lou Gilbert
My Heart and Other Black Holes- Jasmine Warga
Confess- Colleen Hoover
Hopeless- Colleen Hoover
Maybe Not- Colleen Hoover (Re-Read/Audio Book)
Obsidian- Jennifer L. Armentrout (Re-Read)
Onyx- Jennifer L. Armentrout (Re-Read)
Opal- Jennifer L. Armentrout (Re-Read)
Origin- Jennifer L. Armentrout (Re-Read)
Opposition- Jennifer L. Armentrout (Re-Read)
Beautiful Disaster- Jamie McGuire
To All the Boys I Loved Before- Jenny Han
The Last Time We Say Goodbye- Cynthia Hand
Keep Me Safe- Maya Banks (DNF)
Lovely Vicious- Sara Wolf
Savage Delight- Sara Wolf
Brutal Precious- Sara Wolf   
Sisters of Shiloh-Kathy Hepinstall, Becky Hepinstall Hilliker
We All Looked Up- Tommy Wallach 

My top picks this month are: Confess, Lovely Vicious, and my two re-reads, The Lux Series and Maybe Not. I usually wouldn't pick re-reads in my top picks for wrap-ups but since I was so sluggish with my reading and nothing else really stuck I'm going to go ahead and toss them in. Lovely Vicious was the book to break my reading slump, and I'm sad I read it so late in the month. This book had me laughing hard with it's strong leading lady and catchy one liners. Maybe Not is a book you've recently heard me talking about... I saw recent because I read it last month, and yes again this month. Well listened to it this month. The audio book for Maybe Not is amazing, even the second time around it still had my sides splitting. One of my all time favorites. The Lux Series, yes all five, are making in my top picks because even as a re-read I still loved everything about it. Daemon Black. That's all I need to say. My very top spot goes to Confess. Confess easily made it's way to number one this month, and on to my list of all time favorites. A new March release from Colleen Hoover had me balling in the first ten pages, with an unforgettable ending. Colleen Hoover write life altering books and a favorites list wouldn't be complete without on of her books on it.


My book fails were easy to pick as well. The biggest letdowns were: Transparent, To All the Boys I Loved Before, and Beautiful Disaster. Transparent was a book I was really looking forward to. With it's pitch comparing it to X-men I found myself letdown with its lackluster story and predictability. To
All the Boys I Loved Before was a contemporary read that has a lot of hype following it... I however found the story boring. When I heard a girl writes love letters to her ex loves and then the letters get out I figured the story would be filed with a lot of poetic thoughts and drama. Sadly there was nothing specials about it. And for my biggest disappointment, well I know you all saw this one coming, Beautiful Disaster. Saying it sucked would be going easy on this gross little number. It's not only one of the worst things I've read all month, it's one of the worst things I've read all year. Ugh thinking about it again puts me in a rage.

I'll just stop right there... See y'all in April.

-Angela

Confess by Colleen Hoover

"I'll love you forever. Even when I can’t.”

"OMG"... THIS BOOK!

THE NOTEBOOK, UGLY LOVE, TFIOS, AND HOPELESS HAD A SECRET LOVE CHILD! AND THAT LOVE CHILD IS CONFESS.

If you know anything about me then you know Colleen Hoover is my favorite author. If you don't know anything about me than that is pretty much all you need to know. She is the only author who has never let me down. Confess didn't let me down. I think Leah and I can both agree, the main thing we heard about this book was that it would induce tears within the first chapter.. And I had my doubts. Ten pages in. I REPEAT TEN PAGES IN, I WAS A COMPLETE MESS. 

Confess follows the intertwining stories of Auburn and Owen. Both characters come from very separate yet equal backgrounds. Both facing more in the 20-something-years they've been alive than most will their entire lives. When Confess starts out right into Auburn's story you're more than likely, within the first few chapters, going to be thinking the same thing I was, "Ha I got this whole thing figured out". Please don't think that. If you've ever read a Hoover book then you know you'd be a fool to think that (yes I just called myself a fool, because God was I).

Auburn is desperate for a second job when fate shines its light on her and she get offered one by Owen. When stopping in front of a studio covered in anonymous people's confession she never thought things would turn out the way they do. Both Auburn and Owen are perfectly written characters. Always revealing the perfect amount of themselves at the perfect time, always giving banter at the right moments, and always pulling out all the romantic stops at the right time.

"I'm scared I'll never feel this again with anyone else," I whisper

He squeezes my hands. I'm scared you will."

I can't (sadly) say much more about them, because I know once I got started talking about them I wouldn't be able to stop!Then I would spill out all the wonderful things that make this book up! That being said I will tell you the spoil free things I loved about this book. There are four things that stole my heart and won me over. First, of course, the Art. When you think about pictures being included into a book you automatically think it'll be cheesy. It's not, it's a wonderful addition and takes this book to a level others wont reach. Second, the real readers confession that are sprinkled throughout this book and also fit so well with the art theme. Third, is the romance. It's Georgia peach sweet. And Four, well you'll have to wait a minute for that one... Promise I'll get to it in a second.

When it came to plot, I had a lot of fears. I feared that with so much hype to this book that it would let me down. Then once the first chapter brought me to tears all I could think of was "This book can only go down from here"... All that was laid to rest. The plot starts strong, stays steady, and just when you're winding up on the end of the book and you're thinking "ok that was great and all but what am I missing?"; Colleen hits you right in the face with one of her famous big reveals.... That brings you to my number four love. The ending. I never ever thought the story would end the way it did. Didn't think the story would come together and collide how she had it. The closer it got to the end the more I had to know what the ending was going to be. What the big secret was. I couldn't have been more happy with the ending! With everything perfect laid out, and the expression "somethings are better left unsaid" taking a whole new meaning, Confess will leave you wanting more. It was perfect, amazing, and I don't think I took a single breath the whole last chapter. I constantly wonder if Colleen woke up one random morning and said "you know what I'm going to be a writer" or if she has always planned on becoming one... And I don't care, I thank the literary Gods every time she puts out a piece of work. Not only does she give us something of her own, but the way she constantly finds ways to shed light on others art as well... It's just astounding.

1.. 2.. 3... 10/10 OMG STARS  
-Angela  

(Confess BookDepo)