Books I Read and Loved in 2014, Part 1

Hello wonderful readers, I'm on the cusp of the second half of the year, and I realise I haven't posted in months (I am pretty active on Instagram if anyone wants to follow me in my day to day life. Lots of pictures of my fur babies). So, I thought I'd talk about the books that I've read and loved in the first half of 2014. Currently, I'm sitting at 77 books read, but quite a few of them didn't really move me all that much.



Rosemary and Rue - Seanan McGuire
I kind of adore McGuire. Her characters are strong, distinct, and ridiculously hilarious. This is the first of the October Daye series, and I'm already hooked.

The Bees - Laline Paull
I love bees. I adore them. So when I saw a book about a dystopian bee colony, I kind of made a high keening noise until I had it in my hands. It's essentially a cocktail of Watership Down and The Handmaid's Tale, with a dash of Nicholas Cage's "AHHHH NOT THE BEES" from The Wickerman.

Ella Minnow Pea - Mark Dunn
This book is on the list simply because it was so fun, and I love anything that plays with language. I'm a huge word nerd, and this was so satisfying to read.

The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender - Leslye Walton
A girl born with wings, this novel starts off on a whimsical note, with a beautiful lyrical quality to the writing that makes you feel like you're flying... Then falling.

The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
I can't believe I'd gone 22 years without reading this, or anything else of Atwood's, in my life. This dystopian tale gets it so right in a way that I feel most dystopian YA's don't.

The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemmingway
I adore symbolism and metaphors, and this book is so full of it that it's practically leaking out. I suppose there's a reason why Hemmingway is so loved in the literary world.

Wonder Woman: Hiketea - Greg Rucka
If you only read on Wonder Woman story in your life, make it this one. Wonder Woman and Batman have a clash of morals, showing that yeah, Batman does make mistakes. I think this is one of the few Wonder Woman stories that actually get her right, showing her as a true hero for women.

The Bees - Carol Ann Duffy

Yeah, yeah, I know. Bees again. This time in a collection of poems by the poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, that really moved me.

Written in Red & Murder of Crows - by Anne Bishop
The first two books in Bishop's newest series, The Others, this follows Meg, a blood prophet, who's on the run from an evil corporation that's exploiting her kind for profit. Lot's of action, and even more laughs and feels in these books.

The Kingdom of Little Wounds - Susann Cokal
Well, this is definitely not a book for the faint-hearted. This is basically a fairytale about syphilis. I think the less said about this, the better.

Wuthering Heights - Emily Brontë
Much like The Handmaid's Tale, I can't fathom how I haven't read this book yet. It's a classic, for god's sake! I suppose I was worried that it would go the Jane Eyre route and romanticise Heathcliff, so I was pleasantly surprised when every character in the book essentially calls him a dickhead. Good work, Emily.


Saga - Brian K. Vaughan
THIS is what comics should be like. Full of feels, both happy and sad, tackling issues that dominate our society (sex, gender, race, war, and so many others), with a diverse cast of characters. A lot of comics (read: anything DC publishes nowadays) is painfully empty of these things, so it's a fresh feeling to come into this world.

Fairytales for Wilde Girls - Allyse Near
This book broke me. It touched too close to home, and left me crying like a big old baby. I see a lot of myself in Isola Wilde, with having a mother with a debilitating mental illness. The way Near deals with mental illness is so raw and honest that it really really hurts.

That's it for this time. The next part will be posted at the end of the year. Hopefully I'll be a bit active until then.