My Taste in Books, According to My Nook

Pesky migraines have had me incapacitated for a couple of days. Hopefully, though, today will prove to be headache free!







Onward to newer, better things!!

So, I was sitting here trying to think of an awesome post that people might actually care to read about, and I realized something. This is a book style blog with a weird name. Had I stumbled across a book blog with a name like Drunken Space Penguin, I'd be expecting weird randomness and stuff about writing and about books. Well, my lovelies, I can share with you a wealth of information about all of the above. But we'll start with books.

I have a Nook, and on that Nook are a bajillion books, maybe more, I haven't counted recently. And a lot of those are lesser-known books that are either self-published or were put out there by a small, possibly independent publisher. I have just as many books on my Kindle app of the same variety. So why, then, don't I tell you a little about what I like to read?? Just to finally introduce myself to you properly. :)

So, for starters, I have the required books, such as The Hunger Games trilogy, some Vampire Academy and House of Night, all of which are pretty popular. (This alone should tell you I'm deeply into Young adult novels. If you didn't already know it, that is.) I also have the Fallen series by Lauren Kate, and I'm still working on reading Rapture. Love the series, but I'll admit, it's going on far too long, and it's increasingly unbelievable...

Moving on, I found a bunch of books by Terry Spear about the fae. Oh, these are wonderfully written books!! Look for The Dark Fae, The Deadly Fae, The Winged Fae, and The Ancient Fae. I think they're all part of The World of Fae series, I know the first 3 are. But they're very good, and they all tie in together nicely.













Another great series (I like series, btw...) is Slave Empire, by T.C. Southwell. They're futuristic books that are simply wonderful. I had never really gotten into the whole sci-fi/dystopian style novels, but this series made a believer out of me. I was reading these books at warp speed, and they're not short books. I had purchased the first one just because it was either free or dirt cheap, and I needed new stuff to read. Well, I was hooked from the first chapter. LOVED it. I had the series completed in about a week only because I was working at the time and I wasn't able to answer phones and read at the same time. Plus, eReaders weren't allowed except in designated break areas. Which I took full advantage of and read as often as I could. But if you're looking for an interesting, young sci-fi/dystopian series, this is an excellent choice. Even if you're not looking for something new or aren't into sci-fi, give this a shot. It's worth it.

When I was in middle school or high school (I don't remember which) I was told I had to read Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. I refused, stated it was against my religion because it involved encouraging children to have sex as toddlers. Well, that part still weirds me out, but as an adult, I figured I'd give it a second shot. While it was far more tame than I remember (or perhaps I'm far more freaky, it could go either way) it was also far less interesting and literally painful to read. It was poorly written, lacking in descriptions, skipped around far too much, and downright insulting. Yes, yes, I know this book was written in the 80's and it was a completely different world back then. Don't care. It is not a book that should be recommended or required for a child or teenager to read, and once you become an adult with the ability to judge a book by the quality of its words, you won't want to read it.



Ah, I forgot I had The Mortal Instruments series on here until I was scrolling through my library. Oh, I won't spend much time here because it's so commercialized now, but this is one of my favorite series. Although, I cannot lie, it too seems to be go on a bit longer than it should, and unless something spectacular happens, the series should really stop soon.



The Gwen Sparks series is another great find, including Craved and Deceived, and hopefully an upcoming third installment that completes the series. This series centers around (tada!) Gwen Sparks, a witch living among her kind and other paranormal beings in a world outside our own, veiled by magic, but, well, Stephanie Nelson explains it way better than I can in the books. So she falls for a vampire, vampires are killing witches for their blood, eventually the witches decide to go to war with the vamps, and it's just a fun read with lots of great twists. I loved the first two, I can't wait for the third.








There are a few books in my library NOT part of a series, and Daniel's Gift is one of them. Oh, I cried. This book is a tear-jerker, but it's SO good. I can't tell you more of what it's about, because I'm already fighting the tears thinking about it. But seriously, get this one. It's good.














Oh, The Immortals series, by Alyson Noel, is another treasure to read. Lots of good plots, well written, not indie but still an amazing journey. The Immortals includes Evermore, Blue Moon, Shadowland, Dark Flame, Night Star, and Everlasting. It follows a girl named Ever (weird name) as she meets Damen, and her world gets flipped upside down. She can hear people's thoughts, and he is, well, immortal. There's a fight between immortals, there's a bad bad curse, there's a world called Summerland where you can talk to dead people and go into this massive library that holds more than just books...there's so many things to take in, but the author does a great job of making it all tie in and make sense. I really enjoyed the series.

So, there's this high school, and it's overrunning with demons that are possessing young girls to make them powerful and well-off. Sounds almost bittersweet, right? Well, it's quite the adventure for the girl coming from a broken home who goes to live in an orphanage in Peachville, especially when she joins the cheerleading squad and gets inducted into this special sorority that gives her abilities and powers that she had never even dared dream about. It's all fun and cheerleading until she learns the terrible truth-everyone in the sorority ends up playing host to a demon when they hit 18. Sure, the demon gives you a great life, but I'm not sure I'd be willing to pay the price for that great life. I kinda like my soul. I recommend the Peachville High Demons series, Beautiful Demons, Inner Demons, Bitter Demons, and Shadow Demons. Very good, liked them a lot!

Amanda Hocking. Now, here's a girl I aspire to be like in the short-term sense. Her series, My Blood Approves, was good. It wasn't GREAT, but it was good enjoyment. It wasn't poorly written, I didn't want to claw my own eyes out...but I didn't jump up and down with excitement. Still, she has become quite well-known in the literary world, and she's an indie author. Now, THAT is something I could handle. I'd absolutely love it if my books sold as well as hers. Right now, I need more exposure, but eventually I have faith that my books will sell like hers. Better even. So go buy my books. :)








Beauty and the Beast meets the new world in Beastly. I really loved this book, but I have to warn you, the book and the movie are NOTHING alike. Sure, they both have the same concept, but the book has so much more to offer, and it's just a far better story. Okay, the movie had Neil Patrick Harris and one of the Olsen twins. Fine. I'll give you that. But the book...oh, it's a literary treasure with more scenes, more description, more insight, and more quality. Read the book. Don't watch the movie.









There's a book in my Nook Library called The Blood That Bonds. Holy crap, now THIS was good. It was still young adult, but the vampires don't sparkle. They don't become your best friends. They're fierce predators and they're dangerous. And a girl named Two (again, weird name) finds herself being saved from working the streets for heroin only to be condemned to an even more terrifying fate. I loved the darkness of this book. Even thought the vampires in my story are nice and friendly, vampires really should be thought of as monsters. Horrible and fierce, dangerous and scary. Definitely a good book. Read it.








The last one I'm gonna talk about (though there are many others, some of which not worth mentioning) is Glamour (Rae Wilder #1). This was a good book. Now, granted, it's been a couple years since I read it, so I don't remember everything about it, but I do remember it's about a girl living in a world where humans are nearly extinct, courtesy of the numerous demonic creatures roaming the earth. Including fairies. And she happens to meet one fairy who claims that she is just like him. She faces a lot of dangers, and I actually just learned there are several books in this series that I have to now go buy. Great. More stuff to read. Because, you know, I don't have enough books to read or anything, right???






Well, this is a short list of books on my Nook. It doesn't even come close to the number of paperback books I have (many of which are written by Stephen King or Nicholas Sparks) nor is it all the books I'm interested in, but this should give you an idea of what I like to read. This is going to prove especially important when it comes to book reviews. PLEASE please please do not ask me to review a non-fiction book. I'm sure it's great, and you'll make a ton of money selling it, but as you can CLEARLY see, I don't read non-fiction. 

Know of a book I might like to read?** Leave me a comment below! I love good books, and I love suggestions, especially from others who read the same things I do! 

(**NOT your own book, please, unless you really truly think I'd absolutely LOVE it. I'm willing to review many types of books, but I also like to read stuff that I really dig, like the ones mentioned above, and I'm always on the lookout for new good books. Contact me with the contact form if you want me to review your book!)