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.

Agree to Disagree

For the most part we have very similar book tastes. We like the same genres of books, we like the same kinds of characters, and we especially like the same kinds of endings. Every so often we will come across a book where we just have to agree to disagree. Usually one of us ends up LOVING it while the other ends up HATING it (because we have no emotions between OMG ALL OR OMG NOTHING). Here are a few of the books that we had this issue with... 

Vampire Academy (book one) by Richelle Mead
What Leah Loved: EVERYTHING! Oh my gosh, I love this series. Vampires are to me what aliens are to Angela, so a school full of hot angsty vampires is right up my alley. I love Rose and how feisty she is. She's a smart Alec and often gets herself into trouble because of her big mouth. Dmitri is HOT HOT HOT (btw I refuse to watch the movie because I have Ian Somerholder in my head as Dmitrti and I don't want to let bad casting ruin my view). I also really love the plot and how much drama there is. It's basically like reality tv meets vampires.

What Angela Hated: BORING!!!! I didn't like either of the main characters, Rose or Lissa. I hated the Dmitri. I will admit that I probably hated him more that I might have if I hadn't had seen the movie first... But sadly I did and I hate who they chose to play him... Which made me hate him in the book. Did I say I hated Rose?.. Because I really did. I hated the stroganoffs... The plot was predictable. I know everyone says that you have to get to like book three before it gets better but I just can't. I know that I'm in the minority with hating this, and that my sister would hate me for saying I didn't like it but IDC. I was hoping this book would make me fall for vampires, but I think it just made my hate-seed for them grow.

Uninvited by Sophie Jordan

What Leah Loved: I think this book is basically the stereotypical dystopian YA book where girl has some sort of issue, government sucks, huge problem happens, falls for the boy from the wrong side of the tracks, and world domination is the goal to solving all the problems. I think this is why I liked it. The plot is simple, but there are a few plot twists (most you see coming, but whatevs) and the storyline is sort of unique. While the book isn't my favorite by any means, it is sort of a throwback to when YA really started getting popular and dystopian was a HUGE theme. I like the writing style, and I think it is a good starter book for people who are just getting into YA. I am excited for the second book to come out because I think the series has a lot of potential to get better as the story grows.

What Angela Hated: CAN MY ANSWER BE EVERYTHING??? Sadly Uninvented was SO predictable. I knew what was coming WAY before it would happen. I also felt a lack of "bonding" with any of the characters. I just really got tired of hearing Davy complain about how shes nothing now and has nothing and blah blah blah... WE GET IT... and with that attitude you're probably right about sucking so much.. like come on girly you're surrounded by buff dangerous boys stop crying and start living. Grab Sean by his face and kiss him... do something!!! YOU'RE ALREADY BRANDED BAD! DOESN'T MEAN YOU NEED TO BE BRANDED BORING TOO!!! UGH I think if the books romance would have played out better then I would have liked this book more. It's what really brought this book down. The other thing that bothered me was that EVERY single dude had rape eyes for Davy... like come on there are six other girls. Like everyone even her boo keep talking about how she's bound to be raped... All the boys see Davy and automatically must rape her! It was just a little much. I don't know; this book wasn't the worst book I've read but it wont be making the top of my list either. I just wanted more.

The Winner's Curse by Marie Rutkowski 

What Angela Loved:  I loved Kestrel! LOVED HER... She's quick witted and for once wasn't a girl who was all about being able to physically harm someone (most the time I like tough fighter girls but this was a wonderful change in pace). She actually used her brain! I loved Arin (The leading male). He sounded super hot. And I couldn't get over how much he was constantly surprising me. I liked the idea of buying something and then paying the ultimate price for it (hints the title of the book). I loved how the narrator was kind of all knowing and that you were just waiting for all the information and lies to come out. The twist and turns in this book had me gasping for air. AND THAT ENDING OMG!!!! THAT ENDING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! A-freaking-mazing!!!!!!!!! One of my favorites.
 
What Leah Hated: THE MAIN GIRL IS SO DUMB. She just is la la la la la la I'm in love and yolos all over the place and falls for everything everyone is telling her. The main dude is a D and lies all over the place. Seriously, he spits more lies than truth. BUT THE KICKER OF THIS BOOK IS THE ENDING. SERIOUSLY THE ENDING ALMOST ENDED OUR FRIENDSHIP BECAUSE WE INTERRUPTED IT DIFFERENTLY AND ALMOST GOT INTO A MORTAL COMBACT STYLE BATTLE OVER WHO WAS RIGHT. Luckily we actually got to meet the author and asked her WTF she meant at the end. I'll go ahead and admit that I was wrong. I WAS WRONG. I GET IT. BUT IT DOESN'T CHANGE THE FACT THAT EVEN AFTER THE AUTHOR BROKE DOWN THE ENDING FOR ME IN WITTLE SMALL WORDS I STILL HATED IT.
 
RAW by Belle Aurora 

What Angela Loved: OK yes yes yes I get this story is FAR, FAR from anything that

would ever happen to anyone EVER... BUT I DON'T CARE!!!! I loved it!!! I've never thought stalking was so hot in my entire life!!!! BUT ALL I CAN THINK ABOUT IS STEPHEN JAMES AS TWITCH UGH!!!!! LOVE!!! and his candy eating habit whoooosh swoon. I can agree that the leading lady, Lexi, wasn't my favorite, but AGAIN DON'T CARE I JUST LOVED EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS BOOK. The banter between the two is amazing, and manipulative. The Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde thing he has going on was oddly super hot. He owns his evil and doesn't really care who sees it or when it happens. It was the right place right time read for me.  There's a big secret from the start that has you guessing left and right until she has tortured you enough and finally does the big reveal. Raw had so many twist and turns I didn't breathe the whole time I was reading it! One of my all time favorite books.

What Leah Hated: OMG don't even get me started on this book. I love a good scandy read and I love a good hottie who likes to get weird, but this book was JUST.TOO.MUCH. I mean, the scandy parts of it aren't even what bothers me. I just hated the characters. HATED. The main chick is supposedly this social worker who loves her job and is super dedicated to her kids, but as soon as she meets the main dude she loses her doggone mind. Doing blow and putting her kids in really really bad situations... I just... OMG. AH. The dude sounds hot, I'll give him that, but the way he acts goes beyond everything and goes straight into the abusive catogory. Do what you want in the bedroom. Get weird. I don't care, seriously.. but when you admit that you have an anger problem and start bringing your punching and strangling outside the bedroom. Seriously, dude, you need to take your crazy damaged self and do not pass go and head straight to therapy. I was SO mad reading this book that I literally almost ripped it in half and threw it against the wall. This is probably one of my all time most hated reads, if not THE most hated read. GROSS. AHHAGAREGASDFSDf

(Vampire Academy BookDepo)

(Uninvited BookDepo)

(The Winner's Curse BookDepo)

(Raw BookDepo)