Angela's Summer Favorites

I'm going to start doing something a little new and at the "end" of every season I'll be giving a little wrap up on some of my favorite things. The main reason it's a little different is because I'm not just going to be talking about books. De-stress yo chest, and don't worry I'll still talking about books and bookish items. I'll be listing off things like my top summer reads, movies, reviewer, and discussing some of the other things I got into this past season. These are my choices for the months of June, July, and August.

Top Five Summer Reads:
These are my favorite reading picks of the summer and the ones I gave the highest ratings on Goodreads and our blog. These will only include fresh reads for me and nothing that I happened to re-read. (in no order): 

1. The Wrath and the Dawn by Renee Ahdieh. A young Prince takes a new bride every night and then kills her the following morning. After Shazi's best friend meets the same fate she decides to seek revenge. For fans of Sarah J. Maas and Sabaa Tahir.
2.  Dirty Rowdy Thing by Christina Lauren. Harlow and Finn hate each other. This probably explains why their Vegas marriage only lasted 12 hours. Even after separating these two constantly find themselves drawn back to one another. For fans of Colleen Hoover and Helena Hunting.
3.  Fractured Suns by Theresa Kay. With time running out Jax must find a way to save both the human race and the alien race she's come to know. For fans of Rick Yancy and Demitria Lunetta.
4.  The Devil's Intern by Donna Hosie. Mitchell Johnson has been living in Hell working as the Devil's intern since being hit by a Greyhouse bus. When he hears about a time traveling device he decides this might be his best chance of getting out of Hell. For fans of Cristin Terrill and Libba Bray.
5.  Every Last Breath by Jennifer L. Armentrout. Layla has a lot going on in her life. She has to chose between the sexy prince of the under world Roth and long time best friend gargoyle warden Zayne; all while fighting demons and trying to keep up with school work. For fans of Amy Bartol and Victoria Scott.

If you haven't had a chance to pick any of these up, after this post run straight to your local bookstore and buy them all!  

Top Summer Movies:
We all know I see a lot of movies, and I thought choosing just one or two favorites would be hard. Turns out it wasn't My top movie of the summer are:

1. Me and Earl and The Dying Girl. Me Earl and the Dying Girl is about an unlikely friendship and how it can make the difference in a time of darkness. This movie had everyone in the theater laughing till their sides hurt and then crying their eyes out. This film could easily be the best book adaptation I'll see this year.
2. Dope. Dope is about how stereotypes and racism still effect us even in 2015. This movie smacks you with a huge message, and will leave you with your jaw dropped. The closing scene of this film gave me head to toe goosebumps.  Lindsey and I saw this movie on a whim and were both surprised by how much we liked it and walked out the theater satisfied. 

Even though these films are polar opposites they both have two things in common. First they both gave us a cast of amazing, fresh, and talented new comers. Second I think both these films were way under-hyped. Neither of them getting the spotlight they deserve.

Top Summer TV Shows: 
Okay, so not all of these came out this summer, but these just happened to be the shows I got really into. (in no order)

1.  Arrow. This would probably be my top pick as far as shows went. I didn't think I was going to like it, but was completely wrong!!! I'm obsessed! Even from episode one I was hooked. I spent many a night curled up in a blanket marathoning this guilty pleasure. The story line is crazy insane and with a full rosters of hotties Arrow is a must watch.
2. Game of Thrones Season 5. This might not have been my favorite season so far, but still packed a mighty punch... Oh and way to leave us hanging on everything and everyone! 
3. Switched at Birth. Yup, I got sucked into this show. It's so bad good. I constantly found myself wondering why I was watching it, yet couldn't turn away. 
4. How to Get Away with Murder. Even though I just finished watching season one (perfectly in time for the premiere of season two) I started watching it at the beginning of the summer. All I'm going to say about this amazing show is that Viola Davis is a total Badass.

Top Summer Book Reviewer:
This summer I stumbled upon a Youtube channel that has quickly become one of my favorites. This booktuber is quirky, funny, interesting, and it doesn't hurt that her choices in both clothes and makeup are so on point. *Drum roll please*... Ms Riley Marie.

This little firecracker of a booktuber does everything: hauls, reviews, book tags and more. All her videos leave me in stitches and it always brightens my mornings when I see she's posted a new video. Love seeing this girl share her awkward social book situations and completely relate to her "no book buying bans" that turn into massive book buying hauls. Girl I get it, book buying situations escalate quickly and who can say no to Bookoutlet's crazy amazing sales???!!! No one I want to know! Another reason she's become one of my favorites is because she's also not scared to talk New Adult and even sometimes smutty reads. Riley's love for books can be clearly seen in all her videos and reviews. 

If you love watching booktube videos as much as I do I would high recommend subscribing to her page. 

Top Summer Music: 

This was an easy easy pick... Halsey's Badlands album. I have been playing this on repeat all summer!  Gasoline, Hold Me Down, Colors, and Coming Down are my  jams. There's no doubt you've seen this artist popping up everywhere lately. Recently named on of Elle magazine's 2015 Women of music. This entire album is perfect for early morning runs or as light background music while reading.

Added bonus this cd is like ten dollars at target.
 

Fractured Suns by Theresa Kay

While Jax and Lir fight separate battles, their missions have more in common than they realize. It’s a race against time to stop men driven only by greed and power. But the people they trust the most might be the very people working against them—and "family" doesn't mean what it used to. Will they recognize their friends from their enemies in time to save the people they love or will they lose each other in the process? 

Just gonna go ahead and get this out of the way... Fractured Suns does not suffer from second book syndrome... it was AMAZING!!!!  

The Broken Skies Series is a true hidden gem! This is a series that is WAY under-hyped! Theresa Kay makes writing look easy. Fractured Suns is the second book in the Broken Skies Series and again doesn't disappoint. When Theresa contacted us again to review her second novel I have "give me hands" flying all over the place! I knew I needed it but had no clue how much I was going too get out of it. Fractured Suns picks right up where Broken Skies ended. I'm going too keep this review 100% spoiler free because if you cant tell by now I'm very pro team-read this series.

We have Jax our leading lady. She continues to be a strong willed, stubborn, powerhouse of a heroine. She is such a strongly written female character and in this book we continued to get so much out of her. With her new found strength and power she really becomes a force to be reckoned with. Then we have Lir, who really steps up his game in this book. He is strong, supportive, swoon worthy, amazing male character. Since this book is written in dual POV (100% A POSITIVE THING FOR THIS NOVEL) we get so much more out of both these characters and it made their stories intertwine so seamlessly and it really pulls this novel together. Their relationship is just such a joy to read and get to experience. Though their relationship, of course, is a fictional one it feels so real. They are still new to it and are learning that trust and communication is the key to getting past anything. These two together have me head over heels with being head over heels in love. They have sky rocketed and easily have become one of my favorite book couples. I can't wait to see where they're relationship heads in book three. Especially with how the story is left off.

We also have a lot more secondary characters in this book. Sadly, I wont get to mention all because some are new players. We do however get a lot more Rym time! Which made this girl a happy camper. LOVE HIM!!! and his horrible comic timing. We also get a lot more Jace and Flint. These two characters were ones I knew would be important, but going into this book had no true sense on how much we were going to get out of them. Their characters took this book to a whole new level! (I wish yall could see my face right now.... It's.... Ugh... My mouths open my hands are fan-girl flapping around... I'm struggling to form actual words!) These two... Just wow. These characters are what would have made this novel a "make-or-break" for me. They made this novel.

The best part of Fractured Suns in my opinion is it's pace. You're never overwhelmed by one certain aspect. It has the perfect mixture of action packed scenes, romance, character development, and set this series. Even the scenes that are not fast paced action moments are still filled with amazing Easter eggs and little hidden treasures. Wait, did I say the pace was my favorite part?... I might have lied, the plot twist was my favorite part. Trust me when I say you think you'll have the "big reveal" figured out.... BUT YOU ARE WRONG!!!!!!!! You might be right about a few things that will happen, but you still wont be ready for what happens. I thought I knew exactly where this book was headed... but when the actual twist happens... I seriously jumped off the sofa, started throwing pillows around, pulling my hair, and then balled my eyes out. I'll never again make the mistake of turning my back to you Theresa, because it's clear you're not above shoving a knife into it and then twisting!
 

What an amazingly perfect, gripping, and heart breaking twist... No, not just twist, but story. This series needs to be on shelves everywhere and moved to the top of your TBR list. Theresa was clearly born to write. She is a writer I could easily see slip into other genres like New Adult and Contemporary and again make it look like she has been doing it forever  

This is a knock out novel and series that continues too surprise me. Fractured Suns will have you paying for the whole seat... but you're only going to use the edge of it.

10/10 Stars 
-Angela 

Angela's July Wrap up

Darkfever- Karen Moning
Bloodfever- Karen Moning
Faefever- Karen Moning
Dreamfever- Karen Moning
Shadowfever-Karen Moning
Clipped Wings- Helena Hunting
Inked Amor- Helene Hunting
White Bird in a Blizzard- Laura Kasischke
The Cage- Megan Shepherd
Dirty Rowdy Thing- Christina Lauren
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close- Jonathan Foer
More Happy Than Not- Adam Silvera
The Devil's Intern- Donna Hoise
Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist- Rachel Cohn, David Levithan
Untethered- Jax Spenser 
Singularity- Jax Spenser 
Freefall- Jax Spenser  
Coherence- Jax Spenser 
Redshift- Jax Spenser
Maud's Line- Margret Verble   
Fractured Suns- Theresa Kay
World War Z- Max Brooks
IM BACK!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm no longer sick! If you couldn't tell by the ridiculous spike in my reading from June to July. So happy to be back in the game!  If you can't tell from just eyeballing, there might have been a tiny common variable between the books I chose mainly to read this month. I read a lot of Book to Films. I decided to pick up books that I knew were movies and hadn't read yet so I could read them then watch them. I'll probably follow this trend into next month as well since I still have a few I'd like to knock out. The books to films I choose were: White Bird in a Blizzard, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, and World War Z. I had already seen WWZ and Nick and Norah as movies so picking up the books were really fun. With the other two I got to read them then see the movie and it made it even better. Both White Bird and Extremely Loud were amazing books and the movies were the same. Both surprised me by how well they played out.

I also managed to knock out a few TBRs I had planned and a pretty hefty series. So that leads me into my July favorites. I had the best kind of problem when it comes to my favorites this month, I have so many! The entire Fever Series- (especially ShadowFever), Dirty Rowdy Thing, The Devil's Intern, and Fractured Suns top my list this month. When I started the Fever Series I had no idea how much I was going to love it. The first two books were good but the last three were phenomenal! It had everything I ever wanted in one series.  Dirty Rowdy Thing kept true to the Christina Lauren ways and had me swooning all over the place. They are so creative with their books and never let me down. The Devil's Intern was hands down my biggest surprise read in July. I had no true idea what this book was about. Tying time travel with a boy who is living in Hell seems like it would end up a cluster F, but this book was amazing. Lastly Fractured Suns. No clue why I was so nervous to start this book. Think I feared it would suffer from second book syndrome, but NOPE! This book blew me out of the water! The cover reveal is in August and that's when I'll have my review up for it. Each of these books knocked my socks off. I want do too mention the duology I read this month, Clipped Wings, it might not have made my favorites list but this series was still great, and it did end up having one of my new favorite leading males in it.


When it comes to my least favorites this month I only have two. Maud's Line and The Cage. Maud's Line was just not my cup of tea. If you like a little bit more of realistic-historical-fiction this book might be something you're into. I however ended up not liking it and barely making it through the whole thing. I will eventually put a review up for this I'm just struggling a little with getting all my thoughts together on it. As for The Cage, well it was the definition of let-down. When I started writing the review for it I ended up stopping and deleting it because it just got a little nasty and out of hand. When I heard that it was a book about Aliens taking humans and throwing them into a Zoo like cage it had me so interested. However the idea, though great, wasn't executed well on paper. It was another book I had to struggle to get through, and ended up annoyed  that I even ended up reading it.

Till august
-Angela