Hi guys, it's Olivia here from Olivia's Catastrophe and today I'm here to give you my
April wrap-up. In the month of April I
successfully completed my 30 books in 30
days challenge and I mostly stuck to my
TBR. And I'm here to tell you about all
30 books that I read this month. I'm not
going in chronological order but I want
to talk about Six of Crows by Leigh
Bardugo. First, this one is a very popular
book on booktube and it is following a
gang of criminals who go on a heist to
break into one of the most secure places
they possibly can in this magical world.
I really really enjoyed this one. And
actually it became a new favourite. In my
vlog I do mention that I have some
reservations about making this a new
favourite. It's not because I think it did
everything perfectly.
It is a flawed book but it was just so
much fun. And I had all those emotions of
fangirling after reading it that I had
to give this book 5 stars.
It takes place in Ketterdam which is
essentially, a magical Netherlands. And I
absolutely love that element of it. And
we follow this different crew of
criminals and there were some characters
of this criminal gang that I liked more
than others. I wasn't a really huge fan of
Kaz. I felt like he was too closed off
from us as readers as well as from the
people who are members of his gang. And I
didn't understand how they all trusted
him so much because he showed no reason
to actually have developed such so much
trust from them. I also was very
skeptical as all of these characters are
supposed to be about 15 or as teenagers,
yet they all talk like and act like
adults. And I didn't really believe their
ages at all. However, there was somebody
who rescued this story for me and that
was Jesper. I found his character to be
fantastic. I give a list of reasons why I
love Jesper in the vlog so I won't go
into that here. But Jesper and Nina
really carried this book for me. There
was some other characters I didn't like
like Mattias. But that's just a story for
another day.
All in all, it was really good. I felt
like the first half was a bit slower
than I expected for a book that's
supposed to be a heist, and so plot
driven. It really delved into their
backstories in the beginning. And it kind
of weighed the story down. It wasn't as
fast paced but in the second half, it was
everything I wanted from a heist book
with a fast paced plot that just
encaptured me completely. And I needed to
know how it would end. I was able to predict
some things. Leigh Bardugo leaves clues
and I felt like she was a bit obvious
with her clues. So I was able to predict
quite a bit of this book but it didn't
matter that I found it predictable. Because I
still able to enjoy it quite a lot while
reading. Moving on, we have When Dimple Met
Rishi by Sandhya Menon. And this was
another new favourite. That's two of my
favourites
right when we get into the video. In this
one we follow Dimple and she is
someone who's really into coding. She
really wants to win a competition which
involves coding. And she has to go on
this program. And her parents really want
her to get married or to find the person
she is going to get married to. Whereas
Dimple is not interested in that at all.
However, her parents do send her there
with the intention of her meeting a
certain someone. And that someone in
particular is Rishi and this is When
Dimple meets Rishi and what happens at that
coding program. I thought this one was
just an absolutely adorable cute
contemporary. It's a rom-com so it does
have some funny moments in there. But it
also has some really adorable ones. I
really felt like Rishi and Dimple both
developed a lot. And this book really
touches on a lot of themes like
different ones where it comes to class,
and money, and then to discrimination
against minorities. I appreciated that
Dimple's into coding and Rishi was into
art. Those hobbies are very very much at
the forefront of this book and discussed
about whether you can actually make a
career out of being into art or if you
can't. And things like that. Basically,
there was so much about this book that I
liked. The parental relationship -- it could
just do no wrong and I was smiling so
much by the end of it. And it wasn't as
predictable as I thought it was going to
be for a contemporary. This one is
definitely one you should read. Everybody
was right when they recommended it to me.
I buddy read When Dimple Met Rishi with
Gaia from Gaia Athena. Moving on, I want
to talk about A Wizard of Earthsea by
Ursula K Le Guin. And I read this for Le Guin
Along which is hosted by Ashleigh
from A Frolic Through Fiction. And she's got
some other guest stars who will be there
with her. And I really did enjoy this
book. I have read Ursula Le Guin before
and I liked A Wizard of Earthsea.
I think the best way to describe it is a
quiet book. It's about a wizard who makes
a big mistake and kind of spends the
rest of his life trying to resolve it. I
don't think I could give you a better
description than that. But if you're
looking for a big magical adventure with
lots of all-out battles and lots of
magical creatures... this is not it. While
he does fight a dragon, he's more likely
to use words than weapons to fight a
dragon. And he is someone who develops a
lot in the story. Ypu'll find Ged to be
very unlikable in the beginning,
but he's so likeable by the end. I really
enjoyed all the magic. I loved the
friendship that the main character
has with Vetch. I just thought it was a
really good book. But it's slow paced. I
described it in my vlog as a cross
between The Alchemist and Lord of the
Rings, but better than Lord of the Rings
and that's what I'll stand by. Next up we
have The Sin Eater by Megan Campisi and
this was recently gifted to me by Panmacmillian Australia which I talked about in
my Australia haul. However, I've read this one and I think
the synopsis that I gave in my haul does
not quite match up to the book. So yes we
are following a Sin Eater and those are
people who eat the sins of those who
have sinned. So for example, if you die,
you can tell the sin eater -- well, no, if you
die then you're dead. If you're dying you
can tell the Sin Eater: I've lied, I've
cheated and I have pickpocketed. And then
you can--and then the sin eater will tell
you I need to eat lamb, grapes and butter
on your grave. And that's what the sin eater
does. And then your soul is lighter and
you can go up to heaven. So that's
essentially what a Sin Eater does. And it
follows this girl who gets chosen to
become a Sin Eater. And she has to eat
some sins for people in the royal family.
Yet there is a big conspiracy going on
and she decides she needs to find out
what happened in this conspiracy. I buddy
read this with TheFeministReader on
instagram and we both really enjoyed
this one. I feel like again, it's a slow
and steady book. But it's so immersive. The writing style just sets the perfect
atmosphere and tone for the historical
fiction, conspiracy book. The plot was
interesting. I felt like one plot point
was rushed at the end. But other than
that I really was digging the plot. But
most of all I loved the character and
how she developed through this. How she
goes through highs and lows of being a
Sin Eater, because it comes with major
trials and tribulations. I just thought
it was very believable. Really in-depth,
and it just captured my whole heart
while reading. I really did enjoy this
book and definitely recommend it. Then I
want to talk about Dreamology by Lucy
Keating. And this is a young adult
contemporary we follow Alice and as long
as she can remember she dreams of the
same boy each night. And they go on dates
and they have such a great time.
Basically, her dream guy. But when she
moves house and she goes to her new
school,
there is her dream boy sitting in the
class. And it turns out he is real. So
this book is basically following the
connection that those two characters
have and whether it truly is her dream
guy is a real, or was she just fabricating
all of it. Basically, I don't tell you any
more than that, but that's what the
story is about. But I really did enjoy
this. I thought it was adorable and cute.
I really liked all of the characters. I
really liked the concept of dreams and
where this book went with that. However, I
do think that dream plotline was rushed
a little bit at the end and things were
resolved too easily. But that said, I
didn't even mind because I was digging
the characters. I was digging the
conflict that this book has going in it
for herself and how she needs to grow. And I really liked the friendships. I
actually ship her with another character
than the one she ends up with but
there's no love triangle, really. Then we
have Airhead Runaway by Meg Cabpt and
this is the third book in the Airhead
series. I did not like this book at all.
So in the first book the person that we
follow is Em and she goes to a party... like...
show thing... I don't have to explain it. But she goes somewhere where there is a
model who is very famous, Nikki. A TV
crashes down and is about to hit her
younger sister. So she dives in the way
and gets knocked in the head by this
massive falling TV. And her body
essentially dies but her brain is still
alive. At the same time Nikki. Nikki
the famous model has a brain aneurysm or
something, and they do a quick procedure
which ends up with Em's brain in Nikki's
body. However, there's a lot more going on
in Nikki's life. It's very dramatic and
being a model is not easy while trying
to solve a conspiracy. This is the last one
in this series and I read this series
ten years ago? So I didn't quite remember
everything that happened in books 1 & 2.
Wikipedia helped me. And then I
remembered a lot more. But I had a lot of
problems with this book. I found that it
was so far-fetched and unbelievable that
I couldn't wrap my head around it. I also
found the main character to be very
two-faced. She complains about being
beautiful but then when it comes to an
opportunity where she might end up being
ugly, she doesn't want to do it. And she
is talking about the benefits to being
beautiful and I just found that very
two-faced.
She also throws around the word love a
lot. She says I love him, I love him and
everybody falls in love really quickly. And it doesn't feel genuine or real. So
basically, I just found this to be so
unbelievable. And I didn't like them. The
characters, they talked about feminism but
then they just do things that don't
really vibe with feminism to me. It was
just a bit... it was a bit outrageous. It's
just not really my kind of book. Then
towards the end of the month I read
Attack on Titan by Hajime Isayama and I
have watched the anime for this. So I
kind of knew what was gonna happen in
vol 1. However, I did really like reading
the manga. So in this one we follow this
post-apocalyptic world where humans have
to live behind this huge barrier because
there are Titans on this earth. And the
Titans main goal in life seems to be
eating humans. Yet, this book begins when
the Titans have started to breach the
walls that protect the city. And they need to
do something about it. The anime is A+
fantastic and while I did enjoy
this manga because I know I like the
characters, and already, I know I like the
plot - which is genius. And I love how it's
action and so emotional at the same time.
Action can sometimes devolve into being
all of this fighting and all of this
these cool scenes where the emotion is
not really present in there. But in
Attack on Titan it perfectly combines
the emotional side of things with the
action scenes. And that's one of my
favourite things about the series. However,
I do think this book does quite a few
jump cuts which can get confusing if you
haven't already watched the anime. And
sometimes it's hard to see what is
actually happening during the action
scenes in the manga, so it actually
recommend watching the anime and then
reading the manga kind of like I'm doing
at the moment. Next I want to talk about
the three books I've read from The
Chronicles of Narnia. I did not finish
the series but I read Prince Caspian, The
Voyage of the Dawn Treader and also the
Silver Chair. So let's run through them.
First, we have Prince Caspian and this
was one I really did enjoy. I'm not gonna
really tell you the plot of any of these
but collectively they follow these
children who end up disappearing into
this magical world called Narnia and
while they're in Narnia they end up
going on different quests or adventures.
So Prince Caspian... I essentially knew what was going to happen because I have
seen the film. But I found it to be such
a fun adventure. It was a little bit
slow-paced in the first half because
it's more of a travel story in that
point, but there
towards the end. It got a bit more
action-packed, and a bit more magical and
I really did enjoy it. The Voyage of the
Dawn Treader was one I liked a little
bit less but I still managed to enjoy. It
was very much an adventure travel story. So they tend to be on a boat in this one
and they go to different islands and in
each Island they have a different
adventure. Again, I liked it but I did
think it was not as interesting as the
other ones. And then lastly we have the
Silver Chair by CS Lewis and in this one
we don't have any of the original gang
that you see in the first three books.
There's a second book where the gang
aren't there at all and I also didn't
like that one so you can see the trend
that when we get characters who are not
from the original gang I am less
interested. And that's because the
sibling dynamic is gone. It's more about
friendship and in this one I don't
particularly like these two main
characters. I feel like they still have a lot
of developing to do, which they do do
across the course -- which they doodoo. Which
they do develop across the course of the
book. But still it just wasn't a
particular favourite. It had some cool
adventures but they didn't really
intrigue me. It was less of a travel,
travel, travel adventure here, adventure
there, kind of book . But still it didn't
intrigue me as much. But what I can say
for all three of these books is that
reading these as a Christian is
definitely interesting because for me I
felt like the Christian imagery was very
obvious and very in-your-face. But I have
mentioned on Instagram that while I
found the Christian imagery really
obvious I asked people who have read the
series who aren't Christian and they
said they couldn't gather any of the
Christian imagery or messages. So I feel
like it's depending on how much you
expect the Christian representation to
be in here. You can see it, but if you
don't expect it or you're not looking
for it, I guess you can miss it. And that
means you can enjoy these as religious
middle grade books or you can enjoy them
just as fantasy adventure. Next up I'm so
excited to talk about the first five
books in the Cathy Cassidy chocolate
books girls series. These I reread half
of them and read some new ones because
I'd read Cherry Crush, which is book one,
Marshmallow Skye, which is book two, and
Summers Dream and Coco Caramel before
when I was younger. And then I just got
distracted by a more mature young adult.
However, I read Sweet Honey for the very
first time. And this is back on my list
as one of my new favourite series
because I just loved reading them. And
I'm going to tell you what they're all
about. So this is a middle grade slash
young adult series. We start with middle
grade as they're very young and then
they get older. And in this one we follow
these two families essentially, who
are becoming one family. Paddy and Cherry
lived somewhere in England and they
didn't have the best life. They came from
not that much money. And then we also
have Tanglewood and the Tanberrys, 
which are a family of a mother and four
daughters who have recently gone through
a divorce. When the parents start dating
Cherry and Paddy move up to this
wonderful place where they get to live
with the family. So in this across these books I
definitely say that the themes of
divorce and combining two families
really runs through it. Honey, the oldest
daughter, is especially finding it
difficult to move on. She misses her dad
and she doesn't trust Paddy and Cherry.
She wants them out so her dad can come
back and join the family again. So it's
definitely about combining the two
families. I'm gonna talk about each one
individually because they all have their
own plot lines as they follow different
siblings in the books. So we first start
with Cherry Crush and we follow Cherry
who is half Japanese. And she she likes
to tell stories. She has a very creative
imagination. And she gets in trouble
often for telling these creative stories
which she can't see as lying because
it's just storytelling and making her
life more interesting. Embellishing it,
but she decides she wants to stop
telling tales when she moves to join her
new family in Tanglewood because she
just wants to blend in and finally feel
like part of the family.
However, the oldest sibling in the family, Honey decides that she hates Cherry and
has it out for Cherry. Which is not very
good because she's starting to fall for
Honey's boyfriend. I was very impressed
with this book because it managed to not
do any cheating while she's falling for
her stepsister's boyfriend. And I felt
like I related to Cherry. I could
remember what happened in this book so
I'm not going to say the plot was too
surprising for me but I immediately
loved the setup. I loved Paddy being so
passionate about his chocolate business
and I loved the setting and the siblings.
I just thought it was a really really
good book . Then we move on to Marshmallow
Skye and this one was another one I just
really liked. I would still say it's kind
of middle grade young young adult. And
we follow Skye who is a twin, who's very
interested in history. She's struggling a
bit because while she's twins with
Summer. And Summer is very very much
seen as the perfect child. She feels like
she wants to be independent and do her
own thing. She doesn't always want to be
in Summer's shadow. So while they are
identical twins she wants to be her own
person.
Her friends are about 12/13 and they're
all getting into boys. However, Skye has no
interest in that. She's much more
interested in solving the family's
history mystery and I thought it was a
really good job of showing how you don't
have to have a boyfriend to grow up and
feel mature. And I really liked how she
was starting to develop her own
independence. Again, while these books do
switch focus on different siblings we
can still see Cherry and Honey
struggling to accept each other. This
book does a good job of having an
overarching plot that does connect all
of the stories, so I really liked that
aspect of it. And how they're struggling
with the change that their family brings.
I felt like this book got a bit cheesy
within the last two pages alone, but it
was still really good in my opinion. Then
we move on to Summer's Dream and this
was another book that got five stars
from me and is an absolute favourite,
and my favourite of the series so far. So
in this one we follow Summer who is very
ambitious and she wants to be a
ballerina. She's very much aspiring to be
one, especially now that she has a chance that she might be able to go to a
professional ballet school. But
everything is not going well. Her family
seems to be falling apart. Her older
sister Honey seems to be spiraling
because of the divorce. And these
families coming together. And in order to
be perfect Summer decides that she needs
to eat less and less so she can have the
ballerina body. So I have trigger
warnings down below for everything that
this book deals with but there's no
surprise it does deal with eating
disorder. And it deals with it heavily. I
found this one very very emotional. And I
didn't expect it to be so blatant and upfront about an eating disorder. For such
a young age audience. But I guess it is a
problem especially for those ages when
girls are being a
bit more critical of each other's bodies
and etc etc. So I felt like it handled
the eating disorder side of things. Very
sensitively and realistically, Summer is
also struggling from Skye seeming to be
different and not being focused on her. Summer has a boyfriend at the start,
at the beginning of the novel. But she
finds out that her boyfriend is not
really what she wants. She's not sure
she's ready for all of this grown-up
stuff of having a boyfriend and leaving
home to go to this boarding school even
though it's everything she's dreamed of. Aand I can really relate to Summer
struggling to always be the perfect
child. And also struggling with her
ambition, but not knowing if she's ready
or not...
I was just relating to Summer an awful
lot even though Summer is a 12 to 13
year old girl. Anyway, I just thought this
book was fantastic. I'm speaking of these
two. We have a male side character in
this one who is in the background of
each of these books and yet you can
still see his storyline and him
developing across these two books. And
that impressed me a lot. Moving on, we
have Coco Caramel which is the one that
follows Coco. Who at this point in this
series, is now 12 years old. I would
classify this one as a middle grade. Coco
is the youngest of all of them including
Cherry. And she feels like she's had
enough of being the youngest. People
don't take her seriously. She just cares
about saving endangered
species and looking after animals. She
finds out that a horse is being abused
while she's taking horse riding classes
and she decides that she wants to rescue
this horse. And this boy gets in the way
at school who seems to be really
troubled and doesn't like anybody. Again,
I thought I was not gonna like this one
because it focuses on animals and
animals are not my favourite thing to
read about. And yet I really did enjoy it.
It does again, come with some trigger
warnings. Again, it managed to shock me
that it dealt with such a heavy topic
which I won't name because some people
might consider it a spoiler. But yeah, I
was able to predict this one. Again, it
was still a reread so I think I was
remembering from the past rather than it
being too hard -- too easy a plot twist to
predict. Coco grows up a lot in this book
she's also not ready for romance like
Skye was. So I appreciated a no romance
book. Can't really say much more. But it
was really good. And yet we go to my last
five star of the month and that was
Sweet Honey by Kathy Cassidy. This one is
definitely a young adult novel because
Honey is 15 this one. It takes place in
Australia for quite a lot of it and I
appreciated that so much because since
coming back from Australia I've
definitely felt homesick for Australia
in some ways. Dare I say homesick even
though I was only there for nine months??
But yes, I was feeling homesick for
Australia and you get to see some of the
Australian sights and settings in the
one. It's not at the forefront of the
novel but it's still ingrained there. Ingrained in the book. Honey
is a train wreck and she decides she's
going to turn her life around.
However, turning your life around is
quite hard when you are being
cyberbullied and stalked. So this one, it
deals with cyberbullying and stalking as
I just said. And I felt like it handled
that side of things well. But I
especially, especially appreciated how it
handled divorce because especially in
Summers Dream and this one, these two
girls are the ones who really feel a
connection to their father who is no
longer with them. And they're really
struggling with melding the families
together, getting used to having paddy
and the mum around together. And honey
especially has been a nightmare
throughout all the previous books. It was
so interesting to see behind the scenes
of what she's thinking and what she's
been through. And she's just got a really
cute boy in this book who I just adored
so much, And then she's got some really
good friends. She's really struggling. But
she's really trying and I appreciated
seeing a character who's really trying
their best to turn everything around.
Because boy, can that be difficult to do. All in all that series just made me so
happy. It made me feel so many emotions and
therefore, it's one of my favourites. I've
got one more book in the series to read
and hopefully I can get to that next
month. On a similar note of rereading
childhood favourites I read the Falling
Fast series by Sophie McKenzie. Which
starts with Falling Fast, then you have
Burning Bright, then you have Casting
Shadows, and lastly you have Defy the
Stars. So I read the first two when I was
younger, stopped reading, got distracted
by other young adult books like Twilight,
and then continued on with this series
just now. I did not like this series. I
had a lot of problems with it and the
main one is that the relationship in
this is very very toxic and they try to
pass it off as -- well they mention it
being toxic and yet River still does all
the things that everybody tells her not
to do time and time again. I'm not going
to talk about these books individually
because actually they're very very
repetitive. All of the first three books
seem to follow the same plot. Basically,
they all start and end at the same place. And that repetitivity was exhausting.
River meets Flynn, and Flynn has anger
management problems. And she just decides
that she wants to kind of help him through
that while also having a romantic
relationship. However, her parents do not
approve in the slightest. And a lot of
her friends do not approve either. And
yet she still continues to
do the same thing and Flynn
continues to be the person that he is
and River continues to be ignorant of
everybody else. She does a lot of things
that I find harmful ideas to promote
such as getting drunk when she gets
ignored by her boyfriend, and just
putting herself in lots of positions of
danger when she has a bad experience
with her boyfriend. And I feel like her
boyfriend was problematic in that he
has anger-management (problems), he knows it. In
the beginning he comes across as someone
who's trying to do something about it
but then towards the end it just becomes
a huge mess. The parents are angry yet
she's always disobeying her parents
never telling them where she is or what
she's doing. And I feel like the
reconciliation between her parents or
any discussions that she has with her
parents were just not enough to signpost
that this behaviour is bad and dangerous. All the times where she gets drunk off
her face because something bad happened
in her life... it doesn't... the book doesn't
call out that behaviour and she doesn't
change that behaviour so it's still part of
who she is by the end of it. So I just
felt like it was exhausting to read
these three books. At some point I
thought the series was getting better
but then it just relapsed into the same
thing. The last book Defy the Stars is
quite different because it suddenly
becomes an action book. So I just thought
it was a bit outrageous, far-fetched and
unrealistic. And I was not about the
series. And the way it ended... I could see
it coming. It was predictable and it was
absolute rubbish. Nothing gets resolved in this book or
reconciled in a way that I would want. This series... don't recommend it. Moving on,
I read Stories from Arendelle which is a
Frozen short story collection. I don't
have much to say about this. It just
follows the two main characters doing
some pretty cute stuff. It was funny. It
was entertaining. I liked it more than I
thought. And it did have some good
messages in there although it does
overuse exclamation marks and always
talks about how pretty the two
princesses are. We know they're beautiful
you don't have to yell at us all the
time. Then I want to mention the only new
adult romance I read this month and that
was American Sweethearts by Adriana
Herrera. I had 5 5 stars this month
because that was also a five star read
from me. I forgot about that one! It was
fantastic. This is the end of the
American Dreamer series. So it's just the
last book of a series that I have loved
from beginning to end. In this one we
follow
Juan Pablo who's getting his story and
he has had an on-and-off relationship
with Priscilla for years. However, their
last argument was a final one and a
said no, we're not going to be doing this
anymore. And yet when they have to get
together for a wedding the sparks fly
and they start to consider having
another relationship or another go at
their relationship. Juan Pablo has
definitely changed his story. He has
developed a lot behind the scenes that
we don't get to see, and he's ready to
start again. And yet, Priscilla who is
this independent strong woman, is now
suddenly struggling with her job. She
doesn't know if she wants to keep going
working in this profession. And at the
same time she's worried that if she
drops her job and tries her side hustle. Which is quite unique, that she would
lose some of her independence , need to
start relying on her friends more, maybe
start relying on Pablo more . She's not
sure she's ready to lose that level of
Independence. I thought this book was
just fantastic. First of all we get a
wedding that's set in the Caribbean. I am
all for that. I love weddings in my books.
This was the second book where I got to
read a wedding and I was so happy. Also,
it's a wedding of some of the characters
we've met in previous books. So that was
all the more reason for me to feel all
the feels while we were there. I thought
that the romance between them was very
very good and the explicit scenes were
definitely very steamy and well-written. At the same time I can relate to
Priscilla about being independent and
wanting to be seen as independent, while
still needing to trust and rely on your
friends from time to time. Those things
are not mutually exclusive. You can be
both of them. And Priscilla definitely
needs to learn that. I loved her
character development but I also loved
how it was talking about black and brown
people who go to therapy, who discuss and
talk about mental health. You don't get
to see that too much in books. And I know
it's sometimes a struggle to do in real
life as well as in black culture. But it was
nice to see that being discussed openly. You get props for that. You get props for
the lgbtq+ representation. We have got a
bisexual main character in this
relationship that is male/female. I also
like some of the little mentions such as
Priscilla putting on a silk pillowcase or
putting on a shower cap before going in
the shower. These are parts of black
culture that don't get mentioned in
books but are very much ingrained in the
culture. And it just made me so happy to
read this book. It was the cutest thing, it was the cutest end to a
series ever. Let's continue. And now for
the last part of this wrap-up I'm going
to be talking about some of the classics
that I read this month. I'm gonna start
with The Invisible Man by HG Wells. This
was a book that I've been meaning to
read for a while. And I'm glad I finally
got to do it. It's kind of a classical
science fiction kind of book. But it's
definitely a monster kind of book where
you have a main character, a monster, it
follows the Invisible Man and what he
does
while he's invisible. And we do get an
explanation for how he became invisible
as wel.  I don't  have to say too much but if
you like Frankenstein I would recommend
it. And if you like Frankenstein but
didn't enjoy some of the nature and
philosophical deeper parts you'll like
this one because it's much more just
about the actions that the Invisible Man
does. And yeah, it's very much an active
kind of story.
I feel like it doesn't run too deep but
it's just a lot of fun to read. And such
a creative concept that I was smiling
while reading it. Really really enjoyed
this one. Need to read more HG Wells. I
then read three Sherlock Holmes books
and I listened to them all on audio by
Stephen Fry. These were the last 3. So now
I've read all 9 of the Sherlock Holmes
books and I just want to quickly say
that the best way I think you can
consume these books is by audiobook
because when you listen to it, it's more
like you are watching BBC Sherlock or
you're watching one of the Sherlock
adaptions where the characters come to
life. Whereas I think if I read the
actual physical book it would come
across as quite dry to me, and I'd be a
lot less interested. So that's just a
note recommending the audiobook. Especially the one read by Stephen Fry.
So the first one I read was The Valley of
Fear. Which is the last novel I needed to
read. And in this novel it's a classic
murder mystery with Sherlock and Watson.
However, I found part one to be really
interesting and following the classic
mystery and getting their friendship
which was enjoyable. And then part two
delved into a lot of info dumpy
backstory that we didn't need. So if you
do want to readThe Valley of Fear. I
actually recommend you just read part
one and then when you get to part 2 just
DNF the book. You literally don't need it.
I also read The Return of Sherlock
Holmes. It's just a short story
collection that happens after a big
event that happens in another short
story collection and I really really
enjoyed that short story collection. I
felt like it showed the connection
between Watson and Sherlock so well. It
had some really good mysteries in there
and it was just very enjoyable to listen
to all of those short stories. And
last but not least I read His Last Bow
which is again a collection of short
stories. And you can read these books in
different orders. But I would recommend
finishing with His Last Bow because the
last short story in His Last Bow is
such a bittersweet story that seems like
a very good place to end all the Sherlock Holmes and Watson stories together
collectively. Well, it wasn't my favourite
short story collection because there was
some that I just wasn't interested in. And to be honest they felt a bit
repetitive. It still was good enough for
me to just be satisfied to end the
Sherlock Holmes reading there. Overall
up and down with these books. I rated one
of them one-star and the highest it
got is four stars. So it's definitely
been an up-and-down ride. Some of them
are a bit racist, some of them are a
mixed bag. But I do like the characters
quite a lot. Then I want to talk about
the three Henrik Ibsen plays I read. So
the first one I read was Ghosts and the
fact that I can't remember what Ghosts
was about already shows that it's not
that memorable. It's not that wowing. I
thought it was okay as far as I remember
and I felt like it didn't do a very good
job of representing disability. I
remember thinking that when I was
reading it but I can't remember why. But
that's not really helpful for you guys,
I'm sorry. But I just don't recommend
Ghosts by Henrik Ibsen. However, I then
read Hedda Gabbler and I really did
enjoy that play. It has a female villain
character and it really talks about
greed and willing to put yourself at the
top of your career path and what you
have to sacrifice and what you can't
sacrifice. And I found the ending to be
quite shocking. Again, with all of Henrik
Ibsen's plays he has quite shocking
endings and I'm gonna leave trigger
warnings down in the comment box -- down in
the description box below. And then last
but not least I ended on the
Master Builder by Henrik Ibsen and the
whole time I was reading it, whenever I
heard the word master builder
I kept thinking oh the Lego Movie. But as
for the play itself it follows the
master builder who comes across as a
very unlikable character. You might still
think he's unlikable, yet by the end you
might not. I'll leave that for you to
discern. But I found this to be a very
clever play because with each character
that's introduced we get a new
perspective on the master builder. You
see him in a sympathetic light, you see him in
a light of someone who hates him, I just
felt it was a great way to layer his
character and really bring a lot of
depth. It deals with grief, it deals with
ambition, and I felt like it handled
the themes really really well. And then lastly
I have two Lord Byron plays that I read. The first one was Cain and as you can
tell from the title it follows the story
of Cain and Abel which is a biblical
story, but in play form. It's kind of like
Paradise Lost. Like, I would read Paradise
Lost and then move straight on to Cain
by Lord Byron. Which is what I did
because it follows after the events of
Paradise Lost and you can kind of
connect the two even though they're by
different authors. And in Cain I really
liked the themes of good and bad. I
really liked seeing the sibling
relationship and the tensions that were
there. And I also think it was really
interesting to see this perspective on
the devil or Lucifer, who said he wasn't
the one who did the things of the Garden
of Eden. And then he gives like,
justifications and such. I just found it
such an interesting play. Really
interesting to read. And the ending was
just as satisfying as I thought it would
be. And then last but not least after
that I read Manfred by Lord Byron and
this one follows a suicidal man who says
that he's done something terrible and
that's the reason why he wants to commit
suicide. Which is essentially the plot of
this book. So the trigger is fairly
obvious for this one. And while the play
does give hints for the reasons why he
feels suicidal I don't particularly like
the play because it doesn't cement the
reasons why. And if it doesn't cement the
reasons why what is the point? I don't
want to just see his spiraling emotions.
I want to know why.
So I struggled with that quite a lot.
There were two endings to this play. I'm
not sure which is the ending you see in
the typical book that gives you one
ending. But there was one ending I liked
more than the other because it gave the
character more autonomy, responsibility
for his actions that he does throughout
the play . And there you have it those are
the thirty books I've read in the month
of April and what I thought of them.
Please let me know in the comment
section down below what was your
favourite read in the month of April? Have
you read any of these and what did you
think of them? Please give this video a
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what they say: onwards and upwards. Excelsior!
