Published: January 13, 2015 

Publisher:  Riverhead Books

Author: Paula Hawkins

Pages: 336
Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Thriller, Suspence

Rachel takes the same commuter train every morning. Every day she rattles down the track, flashes past a stretch of cozy suburban homes, and stops at the signal that allows her to daily watch the same couple breakfasting on their deck. She’s even started to feel like she knows them. “Jess and Jason,” she calls them. Their life—as she sees it—is perfect. Not unlike the life she recently lost.

 And then she sees something shocking. It’s only a minute until the train moves on, but it’s enough. Now everything’s changed. Unable to keep it to herself, Rachel offers what she knows to the police, and becomes inextricably entwined in what happens next, as well as in the lives of everyone involved. Has she done more harm than good?

Rachel had her life perfect and planned out five years ago. She had a nice house, a husband, but now lives in the duplex of an old friend from university and has a serious drinking problem.

The story is told form 3 different POVs - of Rachel, Megan and Anna. It is also divided in little sections by the time of day - for example - Morning, Early afternoon, Evening.

If you have every known someone who has/had a drinking problem or was a drug addict you would know it's really not easy for them to stop. They cannot just decide that today is the last drink they'll have. It doesn't work that way. That being said, I've read a handful of books where the character goes through a stressful couple of days and suddenly stops their bad habit.

Book Review: The Lover's Dictionary by David Levithan

Published: January 4, 2011 

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Author: David Levithan

Pages: 211

Genres: Romance, Fiction, Young Adult, Contemporary

 

A modern love story told through a series of dictionary-style entries is a sequence of intimate windows into the large and small events that shape the course of a romantic relationship. 

How does one talk about love? Is it even possible to describe something at once utterly mundane and wholly transcendent, that has the power to consume our lives completely, while making us feel part of something infinitely larger than ourselves? 

"The Lover's Dictionary is told in the way as it sounds - it's essentially in a dictionary format and the uniqueness come from the fact that the story is told within each of the word's definitions.

Even if you didn't necessarily know what a word meant in the beginning, you get the entire picture within the snippets of story that were told.

Book Review: Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas (Throne of Glass #1)

Published: May 7, 2013 

Publisher: Bloomsbury USA Children

Author: Sarah J. Maas

Pages: 404
Genres: Young Adult, Fantasy, Romance, Fiction

 

In a land without magic, where the king rules with an iron hand, an assassin is summoned to the castle. She comes not to kill the king, but to win her freedom. If she defeats twenty-three killers, thieves, and warriors in a competition, she is released from prison to serve as the king's champion. Her name is Celaena Sardothien.

The Crown Prince will provoke her. The Captain of the Guard will protect her. But something evil dwells in the castle of glass--and it's there to kill. When her competitors start dying one by one, Celaena's fight for freedom becomes a fight for survival, and a desperate quest to root out the evil before it destroys her world.

I have a lot of thoughts on this book. Not all of them are positive. 

Book Review: Divergent by Veronica Roth (Divergent #1)

Published: February 28, 2012 

Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books

Author: Veronica Roth

Pages: 487
Genres: Young Adult, Dystopia, Fantasy

In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago world, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue--Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). 

On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is--she can't have both.

So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself. During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles alongside her fellow initiates to live out the choice they have made. Together they must undergo extreme physical tests of endurance and intense psychological simulations, some with devastating consequences. As initiation transforms them all, Tris must determine who her friends really are--and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes exasperating boy fits into the life she's chosen. 

But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers unrest and growing conflict that threaten to unravel her seemingly perfect society, Tris also learns that her secret might help her save the ones she loves . . . or it might destroy her.

This story is just full of action and has so much going on I absolutely loved it!

The plot is really good. I am a big fan of distopian novels and this was no different. I love this book so much! The world is so interesting, society is completely split up and in each of these factions you have to embody a certain element.

The characters are amazing!

I LOVE Tris. She is probably one of my favourite female characters! She is incredibly strong, she is selfless and very brave. I felt really connected to her as a character, I felt what she felt all throughout the story. I could really establish a connection with her emotions and I would feel them too.

And then there is Four. Oh, Four. He is delish. He is just this really mysterious guy and has this really hot exterior.. Eventually you learn who he really is, what he's really about, what his story is and I loved learning about Four as a character. His really in-depth character. He's had a pretty though history. He was an amazing, amazinnnngg character.

The romance in here was really good. It wasn't an instant thing, it was more gradual, but it did not take away from the story at all. It was a nice little side plug.

And then there's all the other people. Damn, these characters are freakin' awesome. Christina and Will especially, I loved them. 

"I have a theory that selflessness and bravery aren't all that

 different."

The dialogue in the story is just really good. There's a lot of light and humorous conversation. And just overall it was really well written, I was really impressed.
It's a fairly long book but I whizzed through this book, I seriously went through it so fast! It has a really nice pace, it keeps you turning the page, I just could not put this down! I would bring it to the restaurant and put it on my lap, reading. AND THAT'S SO RUDE, but I just couldn't.

Recommend this to:

Everyone.

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