Apologies!

Hi all! Sorry for the lack of updates recently, my husband and I are in the process of buying a house, and my jewellery business is taking off, which means I've had little time to post blog updates!

I've read a few books recently though and will post reviews for them soon. I think my favourite recent discovery is the Lux series by Jennifer L Armentrout. If you haven't read these books yet, you must!

Anyway, more updates coming very soon!

Kim

To read...

Does anyone else have those moments where you have a huge list of books you want to read, but you can't actually find one to read?  It's almost like having too many toys to play with and getting bored.

Between books, I'll often refer to my extensive to read list on goodreads.com and even though I want to read all of these books eventually, I don't want to read any of them right now.  It will often take someone recommending a book completely randomly, and then I will finally read it.

A good example of this, is the book I am reading at the moment, Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi.  Shatter Me has been sitting in my To Read list since the start of March, but each time I went to choose a book from my To Read list, I decided on something that wasn't originally in that list.  It's almost like the books in that list were forgotten.

Then suddenly this week, a friend on goodreads posted that she gave Shatter Me 5 stars.  All of a sudden, I had  to read this book ASAP, and started reading it as soon as I had finished Unwind.  I am enjoying it, and wondering why I didn't read it sooner!

Does anyone else have this with books?  Or am I the only one?  

Book Review: Unwind by Neal Shusterman

Rating:  6/10


In the near future, abortion is illegal.  A child's life is protected until they turn 13.  Between the ages of 13 and 18, parents can decide to have their child 'unwound', a process where the child is taken to a medical facility to have all their body parts separated, to be donated to those who need or can afford them.  As 100% (well, 99.44% to be exact) of the body is used, it is believed that the child is still alive, just in pieces, so according to law never dies.

Connor, Risa and Lev are scheduled to be unwound and are on the run.  Their very different lives collide and this book is based around their journeys after that moment.

A few months ago, I accidentally bought this book online.  Since then, some of you will have been aware that I have tried to read it numerous times.  I've shelved it, and come back to it between other books.  Finally,  this week I was determined to finish it.

It's not that Unwind was poorly written or slow paced, I just kept getting bored while I was reading it.  My mind would drift and I struggled to stay focused on the story.  I liked this book, but I didn't love it.  


Something that Unwind did really well was changing perspective/focusing on different characters each chapter.  Instead of causing the story to feel disjointed, it brought it together and helped me to understand each character more.


I personally found the whole 'unwinding' a little far fetched.  Yes, I know, books of this genre do not have to be realistic, but the difference with other dystopian books, is that as horrible as some worlds are in them, I still understand how earth has ended up this way.  I personally don't see any government ever allowing people to be born just to be 'unwound' as a teenager and think that they are still technically 'alive'.  

However, it seems that most people loved this book and I'm in the minority, so if you've been thinking about reading it, you still should.

Welcome!

Welcome to No Rest for the Bookish!


After using Goodreads.com for the last 5-6 months, I decided that I needed a central place to post all of my reviews.  Thus, No Rest for the Bookish was born.

I've posted some of my previous reviews from goodreads.com.  These reviews are less detailed than what I will be posting from now on, so keep posted for bigger and better reviews from now on.

At the moment I'm currently reading Unwind by Neal Shusterman.  If you are my friend on goodreads, you will have seen that I have struggled with this book.  I've picked it up to read it around 4 times now, but this time I'm determined to finish it.  I'm starting to enjoy it more now, so will hopefully finish it in the next couple of days and have a review up soon after that.

Thanks for checking out my blog, I'm hoping this will be the start of something pretty good!

Kim

Book Review: The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han

Rating:  7/10


This book left me with mixed feelings, which I think is going to cause this review to be a little bit all over the place. 

Overall, The Sumer I Turned Pretty was an okay read. I enjoyed the general storyline, but it's the ride along the way that caused me to only give this book 3.5 stars. 

The first issue I had with this book was the flashbacks. Some fitted and contributed well to the story, however I felt most of them were out of place and caused the main storyline to become disjointed. It's not that I thought they shouldn't be in the book, it's more that there needed to be more of the main story between each flashback - sometimes it was only one short chapter, a few pages. It was like being interrupted while reading by someone talking to you, and having to find your place again. 

My other main issue was with two of the main characters, Belly and Conrad. Belly was selfish and immature, and snapped out like a child continuously. I know she's only 15 in the book, and I'm sure I was similar at her age, but it meant I found it hard to like her, which is very important to me when reading a book. If I can't like a main character, I can't enjoy a book as much. 

Conrad treated her like dirt during the entire book, both in the flashbacks and the main storyline, and we're supposed to believe there might be something there? I know he had reasons for his attitude that summer, but in my opinion it didn't excuse his behaviour. I wish there had been more focus on Jeremiah. I'm hoping there will be in the next book (but I doubt it).

In saying all of this, I didn't dislike the book overall and will be reading the sequel at some point. I just hope the characters have matured a little bit by next summer.

Book Review: Inside Out by Maria V. Snyder

Rating:  7/10


A good read but a but confusing at times with the date system. 


While this book could've been good as a standalone book, I am still going to read the sequel.

Book Review: Article 5 by Kristen Simmons

Rating:  9/10


I started off REALLY not liking Article 5. I found it depressing, and hard to keep reading. Almost too morbid to carry on. But I am so glad I did.

Article 5 COMPLETELY redeemed itself. I found myself starting to care about Chase and Ember and hoping for their successful escape and freedom. I began thinking about them when I wasn't reading the book.

Because of this, my view of this book went from 1 star to 4.5. Loved it.