Hello beautiful people and happy, happy new year!
I hope you had a wonderful New Year's Eve and welcomed 2016 in style.
Today, I have my very first wrap up for you and I am so excited to talk about the books I read and what I thought of them. December has been a brilliant reading month for me, the best one I've had this year I believe. I read 7 books this month, which is not enough to finish my Reading Challenge, but at least I am not such an embarrassingly high amount behind anymore. I pledged 50 books and ended up reading 37. But that's alright for me, since I discovered the challenge pretty late in the year and 2015 has been a very busy year for me. I'm excited to try and hopefully achieve my goal of 60 books in 2016. If you are interested in a more in depth review of any of the books I am mentioning, just let me know in the comments :)
The first book I read this month is a re-read. Or more like a re-re-re-re-read. I honestly lost count of how many times I've read this book. It's Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone by J.K. Rowling. I don't think there's much to say about this one, other than that the two of us have a never ending love story. I love reliving all the feels every time I pick this up and for me the Harry Potter books are just the perfect holiday read. They always leave me feeling warm and fuzzy inside. I was lucky enough to receive the illustrated version for Christmas and it's absolutely gorgeous. I can't wait to read it yet again in that version. 5 stars any day.
The next book I read was A Thousand Nights by E.K Johnston. It's a YA book and a rough re-telling of A 1001 Arabian nights. I didn't really dig this one, but I have a full review up on here, in case you are interested. 3 stars.
This month I also finally started reading The Chronicles Of Narnia by C.S Lewis. I've been meaning to for years and after finding all the books except two at my local book swap I decided that the time has finally come. I started off with The Magician's Nephew which doesn't follow the Pevensie siblings, but explains how Narnia was founded, how the Witch came to Narnia and where the Wardrobe came from. I found it pretty interesting to read about where the whole story started. A quick and sweet read, also perfect for the holiday season. 4 stars.
I then continued the series with The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. I've seen the movie multiple times so I knew the general plot, but I loved reading the original story. There were also some quirky little details that didn't make it into the movie, which I adored. I like reading the stories as little stand alone books, rather than compressed in one big collection, because they just feel so short and easy like that. I remember borrowing a huge collection of the Narnia books from the library a couple of years ago and I think the sheer size of it put me off back then. 4 stars.
After that, I took a break from Narnia and continued with one of my second-hand bookstore purchases. I was lucky enough to find All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr for only a couple of pounds and I am so glad I did! I absolutely loved this book, it's one of the best I have read in 2015. The story is set in the late years of WWII and follows three main characters through the siege of Saint-Malo, France and the years beforehand. I love historical fiction and this is such a unique turn on WWII events. I willingly lost sleep for this book, I cried over this book, I adored this book. I'll probably post a review about it soon, so stay tuned. 5 stars!
As much as I loved All The Light We Cannot See I definitely needed something light-hearted afterward. I read Die Känguru Chroniken (The Kangaroo Chronicles) by Mark-Uwe Kling. I don't really know what to say about this book, because it's written by a German comedian and hasn't been translated to English yet. But basically it's a collection of anecdotes of a guy who lives with a kangaroo. The kangaroo is a communist and loves Nirvana. It's silly and witty and most of the time satirical. If you can speak German, I'd recommend you give it a try. 4 stars.
I got many laughs out of that book, but then moved on to something serious again. I finally finished All The Bright Places by Jennifer Niven. I had read about a third in summer but put it down because I couldn't really get into it. This time I pushed through and while I felt like the book did improve in the second half, I wasn't really a fan. I bought this book when I traveled Australia earlier this year and at the time, wasn't aware of the huge hype this book is experiencing. Now that I've read it, I still don't get the hype. To me, it just felt like so many contemporary novels I've read before, down to some of the phrases and scenes. There wasn't anything particularly special about it, nothing that wowed me. It's described as a mix of The Fault In Our Stars and Eleanor&Park which is a pretty good description, but sadly for me this book lacked any originality beyond this mix. I am hovering between 2 and 3 stars for this one.
These were the books I read in December 2015. Now, 2016 is upon us and with it a lot of new books and hopefully new favourites. Do you have any bookish resolutions? Mine is to keep this blog running and post at least once a week :)
Love,
Tabea
