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Showing posts from May 19, 2019

About Reading Slumps...

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It's the end of the school year, and I've been hearing a lot of book bloggers and readers in school talking about the end of the year crush and the reading slumps it's brought. I too have fallen into this, but I'm trying to fight my way out of it! For some context, I read nine books in April and only 3 books in May. I figured I'd write a little about reading slumps and how to get out of them as I'm hoping to be coming out on the other side of my own! Below, I'm breaking down different stages of my reading slumps and then setting out the books I'm looking forward to reading this month. Book Hangover I honestly think that my reading slump started with a book hangover. I'd just finished  The Best Lies  by Sarah Lyu which I devoured super quickly and loved. It's bright and engage and bold. None of the books I picked up afterwards felt intense enough or real enough for me to fall head over heels into. I proceeded the only way I knew how: To

Into YA with Deborah Maroulis

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I got to chat with Deborah about her new book! She has a lot of interesting and important comments about the stories she tells in her new book!  1. Within and Without takes place on a vineyard which is a setting that I’ve never encountered before. What made you decide to set the story there? I decided to set Wren’s story on a vineyard for two reasons. One, Granny’s farmhouse, where she’s living since her parents’ divorce, is based on my own mom’s house. She didn’t have vineyards on her property, though. She had walnut trees. But her home is surrounded by family-owned vineyards who either make their own wine or sell their harvests to the larger wine companies in Napa, so I thought I’d combine a real house with fictionalized agriculture.   The second reason is more symbolic. Wren’s character arc mimics the life cycle of a grape vine, and I thought it would be fitting to have her in a place where the parallels would be easier to draw. (It’s the English teacher in me…gotta love

Within and Without Review

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Within and Without by Deborah Marloulis  Trigger Warnings: Sexual Assault; Eating Disorder Overview: Wren’s life is turned upside down when she has to move out of her neighborhood and into her grandmother’s rural vineyard after her parent’s divorce. Even though she’s still at the same school, she feels detached from all of her friends. Her Bulimia intensifies as she struggles for control. And then the boy she’s pined after for years, Jay, calls her beautiful. As she charts unknown territories, falling for him blindly, the relationship gets increasingly abusive. Wren must find her voice and overcome her negative self image before she becomes  unrecognizable, even to herself.  Overall: 4 Characters: 4 Wren is funny and self deprecating, but, sadly, a lot of her charm and sarcasm stems from a place of self loathing. She feels she’ll never be thin or pretty enough to stand out at school or be worthy of a date. She fosters an eating disorder that gets progressively out of control a

The Lying Woods

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The Lying Woods  by Ashley Elston (327 pages) Overview: Owen's biggest concern in life is dodging Jack's next prank until he finds out his father has disappeared with the entire company's funds. He is forced to return to Lake Crane in shame with his mother and live in his aunt's house. All of their possessions are seized. Everyone gives Owen dirty looks even though he just found out about his father's crimes. An entire town's been robbed, and the weight is on Owen and his mom's shoulders. Owen gets a job at the pecan orchard that Detective Hill directs him to, and he finds the owner, Gus. As he keeps working there, he starts to learn about their parent's romance on the orchard when they were his age... but the story doesn't amount to exactly what it seems. Overall: 4 Characters: 4 Owen starts off as kind of a jerk, but I can't really blame him. He feels as screwed over as the people in town who lost their retirement and life savings. He'