Hey everyone, this is Miz Moffatt
from Across the Litoverse,
and yes, it is here once again—
it’s time to call it a wrap
on another month of reading,
and it’s time to bid a fond farewell to
November,
so let’s get started!
First off, I’m getting a wee bit nervous
about my 2017 TBR Reading Challenge—
I have to finish two more books
to complete the challenge,
and I'm coming up to a month of December
retail,
so fingers crossed.
Oh, ho, fingers crossed.
In November, I read 4 books, which totaled
927 pages.
First up was Warcross by Marie Lu.
If you follow anyone in the YA BookTube community,
then I am confident you have heard of Warcross
at this point.
I’ll be honest, I’m always a touch skeptical
when it comes to buzzworthy books,
especially on BookTube given how often videos
are sponsored,
but when a book combines virtual reality with
bounty hunting,
I have to say yes.
Emika Chen is the bounty hunter in question,
and she causes quite the international scene
when she accidentally glitches herself into
a Warcross tournament.
Warcross itself operates on two levels—
on one hand, it’s a fully immersive game
that’s a little like Capture the Flag on
steroids;
on the other hand,
it’s a layer of virtual reality we use to
modify our daily lives.
Hideo Tanaka, the founder of Warcross,
flies Emika over to Japan
and recruits her to help him find a mysterious hacker
called Zero
who’s confounding the Warcross system.
Emika's entered into a major Warcross tournament
as a wild card
in order to monitor other high profile players,
but Zero’s plans are not what she anticipated.
When I first started reading Warcross,
I thought it was standard YA fare—
there’s a young girl who’s exceptionally
talented,
but she doesn’t recognize it as anything
special,
and, oh yeah, she has to save the world,
but there’s this wolfishly attractive boy
who she hates, but not really…
That being said, I did not see the end of
this one coming.
All I can say is,
I love it when villains think they’re the
heroes,
and I love it when authors make that division
murky.
I gave this one three out of five stars,
and I’m a little on the fence as to whether
I’ll read the next book when it comes out, but we'll see.
Next, I re-read Fahrenheit 451
by my man, Ray Bradbury.
I filmed a detailed review of this book
and I’ll leave a link to that below,,
but man, this book gets better with age.
I think this is the third time I’ve read
this book,
and I actually found myself liking Mildred,
Montag’s wife, this time around.
I misunderstood her in my younger days,
and I thought she was a character you were meant to hate,
but I get her this time.
And that is why re-reading books
is an excellent exercise, folks!
I gave this re-read four out of five stars.
Next, I read A Natural History of Dragons
by Marie Brennan.
I know, I’ve managed to cross another book
off my 2017 TBR Reading List,
but I’m a touch nervous that
I will not be ale to finish my goal.
When you work in retail,
December plays out quite differently from
everyone else.
Lady Trent is the premier dragon naturalist,
and this is book one of her highly anticipated
series of memoirs.
Lady Trent reveals to us
how her childhood obsession with dragons
lead her to the mountains of Vystranna
and to dangerous dragons' lairs in her teens as well.
I think I might film a detailed review of
this book,
I enjoyed it that much.
A Natural History of Dragons is set in a loosely
Victorian era,
and it’s got all the high adventure and
the fantastical elements I could dream of.
I gave this one four out of five stars,
and be on the lookout for my review!
And last, I continued my dragon theme, apparently,
and I read The Tea Dragon Society by Katie
O’Neill.
So, I love tea, I’ll say that now.
and I was even selected to help judge some tea
for the 2018 Toronto Tea Festival,
and I’ll leave a link below to my tea tasters
box unboxing as well.
I was sold on the combination of tea and dragons,
but I was not anticipating just how adorable
this tale would be.
Greta is learning her family’s blacksmithing
trade,
and she loves what she does.
One day in the market,
she saves a little dragon called Jasmine
from a pair of wild dogs—
she returns Jasmine to her home at the town’s
tea shop,
and from there, Greta learns about the quiet world
of tea dragons.
These little critters grow tea leaves from
their horns,
and these leaves are infused with the memories
they share with their owners.
It’s just wonderful and cute and life-affirming
and everything I could want in a book.
And look at the art work!
Like, so cute, am I right?
There’s even a section in the back
that describes the different tea dragons and
their personalities,
and I need some art prints for
my room.
I gave this four out of five stars,
and I need more, please and thank you.
Now, we’re running head-long into the holiday
season,
which means I'm going to be selling a lot
of comics, graphic novels, and manga
to good little boys and girls.
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As always, thank you for watching,
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from Across the Litoverse.
On that note, signing off.
There's been a plane flying overhead
every two minutes
since I started filming this video
Ugh, dear God…
