Forgotten by Cat Patrick

MY RATING: 3/5

BLURB: 

I remember forwards.

I remember forwards, and forget backwards.

My memories, bad, boring, or good, haven't happened yet. 

So I will remember standing in the fresh-cut grass with the black-clad figures surrounded by stone until I do it for real. I will remember the funeral until it happens - until someone does. 

And after that, it will be forgotten. 

Here's the thing about me:

I can see my future, but my past is blank. 

I see the future in flashes, like memories. I remember what I'll wear tomorrow, and a car crash that won't happen till this afternoon. But yesterday has evaporated from my mind - just like the boy I love. I can't see him in my future. I can't remember him from my past. But today, I love him. And I never want to forget how much. 

REVIEW: 

Forgotten by Cat Patrick was a very interesting story. The concept of someone not being able to remember their past, but remember their future, was what originally drew me to this book. I'm still a little unsure about how I felt about this book. I didn't love it, but i definitely liked it. I felt like it had some things missing, but it was a very interesting story. 

The characters seemed to not have very much depth, I felt that I didn't really know anything about London or Luke or Jamie. London was an interesting character to view this story from. Forgotten reminded me a bit of 50 First Dates, London writes herself notes to remember things about her past and her boyfriend. It was lots of fun to watch London meet and fall in love with Luke over and over again. 

Jamie's character annoyed me a little (which is sad because my name is Jammie), I just felt as though if I were to be in her position that I would listen to London more. Even when London (knowing how some of her choices will turn out in her future) tries to warn Jamie against certain things that she know will hurt Jamie horribly, she just continues to ignore her which leads to a temporary chip in their friendship. 

I felt a little strange about Jamie and London's friendship, it sort of seemed like it began a little more out of necessity than their genuine connection. With Jamie being portrayed as the "slut" among her class mate, and London being thought of as weird because of her seemingly very bad memory, neither of them really have anyone else to turn to. 

I did enjoy this book. It wasn't fantastic, but it wasn't bad either. It was a very interesting concept to read about. And made for an interesting story. 

Jammie the Book Nerd 

xxoo

If I Stay by Gayle Forman

MY RATING: 4/5 


BLURB: 

Life can change in an instant.

A cold February Morning . . .

A Snowy Road. . . 

And suddenly all of Mia's choices are gone. 

Except one. 

As alone as she'll ever be. Mia must 

make the most difficult choice of all.

Haunting, heart rending and unltimately life-affirming, If I Stay will make you appreciate all that you have, all that you've lose - and all that might be.

REVIEW: 

If I Stay by Gayle Forman is a story of a girl who has a tragic and life threatening accident. When Mia feels as though everything she has is lost forever she doesn't know who she'll turn to or how to carry on. This leaves her with the ultimate decision, will she stay. It grips you from the very first few pages; with the crash happening so soon into the story I found that I couldn't put it down once I started, I read hungrily wanting to know what was going to happen at the end. 

If I Stay switches between Mia's present where she is stuck in the hospital, and her past. Sometimes the constant switching between time periods can be very confusing in books, but i feel that Forman handled it really well, I think that it flowed nicely. Asterisk's represented the switch to Mia's past memories , and the digital time represented the switch back to her present. Mia's memories flowed in no particular order and sometimes went from her being 8 playing her first concert and then all the way to her relationship with Adam and back again. It flowed nicely with the story and I didn't feel confused with it.  

Mia and Adam's relationship is a very interesting one. On the outside they both seem like completely opposite people, Mia being the presentable, classical music cellist and Adam being the cool, punky kid who's in his own rock band, but they fit together so well, and their relationship is so wonderful. The kind of thing that you spend your whole life looking for. I really liked Adam, he's sweet and cute and he's a musician. i wish I that I had a guy that I could sit and read with for hours! :P

"This is the you I like. You definitely dressed sexier and are, you know, blond and that's different. But that you who you are tonight is the same you I was in love with yesterday, the same you I'll be in love with tomorrow. I love that you are fragile and tough, quiet and kick-ass. Hell you're one of the punkest girls I know, no matter who you listen to or what you wear." - Adam, page 89. 

I really liked that Forman included the short 'The Story Behind The Story.' It gives you the chance to see where the story came from, the inspiration (which I personally always love to know); it is heart breaking to see so many people that you love leave you all at once. I like the themes explored, and the idea that the author got the chance to try and answer some of her own questions, and likely others, surrounding death. 

"That's how we manage to survive loss. Because love never dies; it never goes away; and it never fades. As long as you hold onto it." - Gayle Forman, January 2010

Saving June by Hannah Harrington

MY RATING: 5/5 

BLURB:

'If she'd waited less than two weeks, she'd be June who died in June. But I guess my sister didn't consider that.' 

Harper Scott’s older sister has always been the perfect one - so when June takes her own life a week before her high school graduation, sixteen-year-old Harper is devastated. Everyone’s sorry, but no one can explain why.

When her divorcing parents decide to split her sister’s ashes into his-and-her urns, Harper takes matters into her own hands. She’ll steal the ashes and drive cross-country with her best friend, Laney, to the one place June always dreamed of going - California.

Enter Jake Tolan. He’s a boy with a bad attitude, a classic-rock obsession and nothing in common with Harper’s sister. But Jake had a connection with June, and when he insists on joining them, Harper’s just desperate enough to let him. With his alternately charming and infuriating demeanour and his belief that music can see you through anything, he might be exactly what she needs.

Except June wasn’t the only one hiding something. Jake’s keeping a secret that has the power to turn Harper’s life upside down - again.

REVIEW:

Wow. . . I am in love with this book. I just finished it and i already want to read it again.

Harper knows that her sister's dream was to get out of Grand Lake and move to California. After June takes her own life Harper feels as though she wasn't there enough for June, that she should have done more, and that this was somehow her fault because she didn't see it coming. Harper decides that the only way that she can make up for everything that she hasn't done for June, she is going take her to the one place that she always wanted to be, California. 

I loved all of the characters in this book. I really liked Harper's character. She's so strong and will do anything for her friends. Even though Harper herself is a wreck and doesn't know how she is going to cope with anything, she is always there for Laney. I don't really know what it was that I liked so much about Harper, but I really liked her character. 

Laney is Harper's best friend; the two have very different personalities but have such a wonderful friendship. They are always there for each other and will do anything for the other. Even if that means going on a sudden decision road trip to spread Harper's sister's ashes. Laney wants to be an actor, and has a strange interest in old actors who died young. Harper is the kind of girl that always sticks up for what she believes in and won't take crap from anyone. I admire that about her. It reminds me of myself, I guess that's why i like her so much.

Jake. . . Where to start. He is sweet, sexy, completely music obsessed and an arse hole. But I love him. I really do. He is on the top of my literary crush list right now. I really enjoyed all of the music references, it was really cool to read about someone who owns so much music and just loves it so much. While he may say and do some horrible things to Harper and Laney, in the end you can see why he is the way that he is, he's been through some tough times, but he really is the sweetest guy ever. And he'd do just about anything for these two girls that he's only known for like a week. 

There so many things about this book, and scenes from it that I love. But I don't want to spoil anything for anyone. So I am not going to say anything. but all in all I think this book was a fantastic read! I was a little worried about it at first, I had really high expectations of this book because of all of the good things that I had heard about it, but it definitely reached, if not surpassed, my expectations. I am so glad that I got the chance to buy it when I did. This is definitely going to be one of my favourite books. I laughed, and I cried a lot throughout it. I think the writing was beautiful and it was a fantastic debut. I look forward to seeing more from Hannah Harrington. 

So have you read Saving June yet? If so, what did you think? Did you love it as much as I did? If you haven't I think you should get your hands on a copy of this book as soon as possible! :D Hope you enjoyed my review, sorry if it's not very good I am still really new to this. I'm sure i'll get better the more that I do :P 

For other reviews of Saving June check out:

The Tales Compendium

Irresistible Reads

Jammie the Book Nerd

xxoo

Passion by Lauren Kate

So today I thought that I would do my very first book review type post. Sorry if it's really bad, this is my first time doing anything like this. Tell me what you's think :)


So first off, a short recap on what has happened in the first two books in the Fallen series: 

The Journey of Luce and Daniel begins in Fallen by Lauren Kate. Luce meets Daniel at her new school, and instantly feels a connection to him, she feels as though she has met him before, as though they have a history. Luce discovers some unsettling things about herself and also about some of her other class mates at Sword and Cross.

In Torment the sequel to Fallen, Daniel sends Luce away to another new school for her own protection, but also in the hopes that she will be able to uncover some of the secrets of her and Daniels’s pasts. Luce makes a few good friends who help her learn more about the shadows that have haunted her, her entire life.

Passion is the next book in the Fallen series. It follows Luce as she travels through her past and meets previous incarnations of herself in an effort to learn more about the love between her and Daniel and try to break to the curse that was put on them. In Passion we also get to see some of Daniel’s side of the story, we are following Luce through her past, but also Daniel as he tries to catch up with her but always seems to be one step behind her. 

When I first read Fallen I didn't really like it, I had very high expectations of it and it just didn't meet those. But the second time around I really enjoyed it. For me the Fallen series are like fantastic, but they are still pretty good books. 

To begin with in the series I really didn't like Daniel, I think that he annoyed me because he wouldn't give Luce any answers and we didn't really know anything about him. I know he couldn't tell Luce anything, but it was annoying none the less. 

Throughout Passion we get to read from Daniel's point of view (POV) as well as Luce's, the chapters alternated between the two. I personally really enjoy books that have the POV of both the female and male leading characters. You get to see inside both of their heads, get to know them better. And for me, that is exactly what happened. I am much more fond of Daniel now, having read Passion, we really got to know him more, see what he has been through over the thousands of years that his and Luce's love has been cursed. You really get to see the extent of Daniel's love for Luce. 

So all in all I really enjoyed Passion, and we finally got some answers! :) 

 Sorry about this pictures being put all down in a row, I couldn't figure out how to get them lined up next to each other, if anyone can help me out it would be greatly appreciated.

So I LOVE the covers of Fallen and Torment, they are some of my all time favourite book covers. They are just absolutely gorgeous!
Because of how much I loved the covers of Fallen and Torment I was really looking forward to seeing the cover of Passion. When it was revealed I was really disappointed.

The picture just doesn't work for me. In Fallen and Torment the model has gorgeous dresses on and their hair is beautiful and their poses look 

 fantastic.

On the cover of Passion the dress doesn't seem to fit the model properly, when you look closely you can see that it digs into her arm pits and it sits too high on her chest. I also don't like the way that her hair sits across her face. It look's very unnatural to me. The way the hair sits and the dress doesn't fit makes the position that that the model is holding very awkward and uncomfortable looking.

So I was a little disappointed with this cover, but the first two are favourite's of mine. Absolutely beautiful.


So let me know what you thought about my first attempt at a review. In future if I do more they won't be as long as this one as I won't go on about all of the books in the series and their covers. For me Fallen just seems to be one of those series that you have to re-read the series before you read the new one, maybe it's just me.
Anyway, I hope that you enjoyed and that I did well :P Let me know what you thought.

Jammie the Book Nerd
xxoo

Books, Book Cases, etc

A few days ago I bought another book case :D I had massive overflow in my first one and should have bought an additional one quite a while ago. But being at uni I haven't had a lot of money to be able to afford another one. But over my holidays (which, sadly, are almost over) I have had more work and have had more money, so i bought a new one. Here is my bookcase with all of the overflow. 

I know that the picture is side ways, I didn't think to rotate it before I uploaded it onto my post. Oh well, you get the general idea. You can see how many book I had that were kind of massively over flowing. You can't quite see but I have about 8 books on that bottom shelf and four more book stacked on top of the books on the 4th self, and I have three more lent out :P Haha. See, I was definitely in need of a new one. 

So over to the right there is my new book case now with all of the over flow in it. I'm still not really happy with the way that the books have been stacked in there. But once I get more books to put in I think it will be alright :)

So, onto other news. I have bought heaps of other new exciting books over the past month so far. Look at them all :D So beautiful. My lovelies. I am so very excited to read so many of these books. I have already read Die For Me by Amy Plum and Divergent by Veronica Roth, both of which I absolutely loved.And I am just finishing up reading Torment by Lauren Kate so that I can move onto Passion. So many new books, I love it. The other ones that I have there are Saving June by Hannah Harrington, Heist Society and Uncommon Criminals by Amy Carter, The Girl in the Steel Corset by Kady Cross, Before I die by Jenny Downham, Forgotten by Car Patrick and If I Stay by Gayle Forman. I have heard many good things about lots of these books and all of them bar one where on my TBR list. So I have had a very exciting month this month with lots of new exciting books, my new blog, new book cases and soon to be going back to uni. 

Have you bought or received any new books recently that you are really excited to read? I would love to hear about them :) 

Jammie the Book Nerd

xxoo

Harry Potter

Hey, 

So as you all know, Harry Potter has finally come to an end. My entire life I have been waiting for the next Harry Potter book and when they finished the next movie. But now it has all come to an end. I cried a lot during the last movie when I went to see it. Instead of seeing it on Friday like I had planned, we went to see it on Thursday morning. Turns out I was supposed to work Friday not Thursday and I wrote down my roster wrong :/

Anyway, my thoughts on the last movie. I really think that they did a really fantastic job with this one. So over all of all of the movies, I think they did all of them well up to number four (that's including number four), the only thing that I didn't like about the Goblet of Fire (only you guys who have read the books will know what I am talking about) was that they didn't include the fact that Rita Skeeter was an animagus, and that was how she got all of her inside info when she was banned from coming near them. I know that it wasn't a very important thing so it's okay that they left it out, I just thought that it was really cool.

I personally feel that they did a terrible job with the Order of the Phoenix. I mean did you guys who haven't read the book even know what those orb things everywhere were? I feel that they didn't go into enough explanation about the prophecies and what  they meant and how it could have been Neville Longbottom that was the chosen one, and that the only reason that Voldemort had his downfall was because he didn't hear the rest of the prophecy. If he had of heard everything that Professor Trelawny had said he never would have gone after Harry and he would have been in power, probably forever. So I didn't like the Order of the Phoenix at all.

With the Half-Blood Prince, I did like the movie. The only thing that I was really upset about was the cut of all the fighting. Everything else was good. I mean how truly horrible was it when Dumbledore was having to drink the poison stuff to get the locket out? Amazing. The loss of the fighting was the only downfall for me. 

I loved everything about the two the Deathly Hallows movies. I think that they didn't cut anything that was too major, and they just did a wonderful job with it. The things that mattered to me most in this one where down true to the book.

Now I am majorly biased to anything Harry Potter, so no matter how bad any of the movies are I love them to bits anyway. I am actually planning on re-reading the entire series again this year. I have been putting it off for a while because there is just so many of them and I am trying to not be reading anything when other books that I have been waiting ages to read are being released. But I am definitely going to read them again some time  this year.

Sorry about the long post. I just love Harry Potter and making myself a blog seemed to be the perfect way to fill my need to babble continuously about everything. I would love to hear your thoughts if you have seen the latest movie. If not I hope that you enjoy it as much as I did! :D 

Jammie the Book Nerd 

xxoo 

My First Follower :)

Hello again Everyone,

I am so excited to have my first follower. Even though it is just one of my friends (love you Tash!!), I am still very excited for myself. So I would just like to say thank you Tasha for being my first follower, you are awsome :) Well Tasha, I hope that you enjoy my random ramblings and I look forward to seeing you when you get back.

Anyway, some other exciting news today! The last, but not least, Harry Potter movie ever comes out today! I am thoroughly excited yet upset. It is so very upsetting to finally see the end of a series I have loved and been waiting for over the course of practically my entire life. I am a huge Harry Potter fan, as I have previously mentioned I love all of the movies and all of the books and everything Harry Potter related.

I was very upset with the result of the 5th movie (the Order of the Phoenix) they cut a very large amount out of it, parts that I felt were very important to the story line. I feel that they did a slightly better job with the 6th movie (the Half Blood Prince) although I was upset with the fact that they cut so much of the fighting out. I mean who didn't want to see Mcgonagall kicking butt! Anyway, I really liked the first half of the Deathly Hallows and I am definitely looking forward to how the second half is going to be. I am going to see it on Friday night! I am so excited! :D So I hope that all of you that love Harry Potter get to go and see it today or sometime soon and that it is fantastic for us.

Jammie the Book Nerd

xxoo

New To This

Hey Everyone,

I know that I probably don't have any followers at the moment but I just thought that I would do an introductory post for all of my (hopefully) future followers. I know, I'm dreaming right :P

Anyway, my name is Jammie. I had actually been thinking about making myself a blog for a while. And hey, I finally got around to it. One of my friends even thought up an awsome name for me. So I am currently 18 years old and I live in Brisbane in Australia. I am studying a Bachelor of Marine Science at Griffith University which I am really enjoying. A few of my favourite things are reading, arguing with people, Harry Potter, having my opinions heard and understood, oh, and did I mention Harry Potter? So this blog will be for me to talk to myself about my opinions and views on certain things and some books :) As I am obviously a book lover.

My blog currently looks pretty lame. I got a bit confused with the settings.

Anyway, I don't know what much else to say except that I apologise in advance for any future punctuation errors and I hope that you enjoy :)

Jammie the Book Nerd

xxoo