ash122's reviews
146 reviews

The Stationery Shop of Tehran by Marjan Kamali

sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.5

Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo

adventurous medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No

5.0

i took scary scary longass breaks while reading it dont ask me why i shall pretend theres no why i dont want to be critical with the rating dont ask me why this book was beautiful pretty gorgeous o em gee i love mal and i love how at ease alina and mal are with eachother and i hate the darkling he's a bad bad guy and i like tolya and i like tamar and i like nikolai and i dont like vasily and i like david and i like genya and i like sturmhond and i like the tree under which i would have sat to read the last 30 percent of this book but couldnt because it was hot and some people had the audacity to get all the leaves of said tree chopped off and i hate how on the first page of this book i scribbled "i plan to spend less time on this book" (because i took months(?) to finish shadow and bone) yet this book ended up being on my currently reading for more than a year 
i can('t) wait to read Ruin and Rising.

City of Bones by Cassandra Clare

slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.25

Winter by Marissa Meyer

adventurous medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

3.5 ⭐

below are my completely jumbled up thoughts typed out when i was suffering from having-completed-awesome-book-adrenaline. am not even bothering to sort them into what i disliked and what i liked:

ONLY SPOILERS AHEAD

1. superficial relationships. except jacin x winter
2. jacin x winter oml
3. loved that jacin doesnt giv 2 shits abt the revolution he solely cares about winter
4. how did wolf retun to his human senses almost effortlessly
5. thorne x cress what the fuck?
6. if cress was a dude we'd call him a gaslighting guilt tripping manipulative jerkwad. i call cress a gaslighting guilt tripping manipulative jerkwad regardless of her gender. her being smitten with thorne was acceptable but then she's like "oh thorne i want you to kiss me and fall for me and confess your love to but not like you confess your love to all those other girls." wtf? 
7. somebody tell marissa its not a crime to have happy single main characters. 
8. somebody also tell marissa you cant get away with using the insta love trope for all of the romantic relationships of your characters.
9. how did cinder know garan hid the software in iko's personality chip
10. cinder using the recording thingy inside her brain. it was never mentioned before
11. face reveal was useless how did cinder know it would completely destabilize levana
12. why was levana alone in the throne room at the end? why were there no guards around her? why wasnt aimery there?
13. how did thorne come to her? 
14. why did cinder trust levana and agree to let her live? dont try telling me because "cinder is a nice person!!" No she's not. She humiliated her based on the way she looks which was not in her control. That was unnecessary. AND cinder herself was chastised for being "ugly" kevana having one eye and burn marks was NOT in her control. 
15. levana in the throne room: "hey guards bring thorne. thornes here? yeah now go away shoo shoo i will just glamourize thorne and use him as bait because obviously cinder would spare me if i threaten to kill thorne of course she will. what if she comes with her friends? oh obviously they wont be under cinders control and they wont immediately kill me i willl just glamourize them and attack cinder with them. whatcha say i can keep you guards here under my control and use yall as shields and warriors? no sorry can do i want to die haha"
16. scarlet is spposed to be the rational one. winter is the crazy one. when they were going to the wolf guards, scarlet ACTULLY agreed to do that wtf again? scarlet darling you pulled a gun when you saw a wolf guard for the first time who was not even in his naatural habitat (luna's kava tubes) and who looked HUMAN. and you know how dangerous these wolf guards can be AND YOU, of all people YOU WHO DOESNT EVEN HESITATE TO CALL WINTER CRAZY TO HER FACE AGREED TO HER AND LED HER, didn't follow, led her to the wolves?
17. ???
18. wolf going through even worse mutation could have been a GREAT plot twist.
19. cinder losing her cyber brain shit THANK GOODNESS FOR THAT PLOT TWIST IT BROUGHT SOME SPARK TO THE BOOK
20. she hated her stepmoma and her stepsista, rightfully so, why did she invite her to the meeting? why did she decide to compensate with royalty?
21. why were jacin's parents alive?
22. why didn't maha inquire about her other son?
23. she didnt sign the treaty during the meeting
24. WINTER WAS BROWN. I LOVED THAT.
25. jacin x winter needed more pages. they were the best couple. their romance was somewhat realistic unlike for example thorne x cress who had tediously lengthy scenes
26. winter finally using her gift and NOT to save herself but to save jacin oml
27. did i mention jacin x winter>> ?

Cress by Marissa Meyer

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

Scarlet by Marissa Meyer

medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Cinder by Marissa Meyer

lighthearted slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

I SHOULD HAVE READ THIS EARLIER. THIS WAS REAL GOOD. 

except when it wasn't:

1. Was her brain computer? Was her brain part-computer? How did she feel human emotions then? How did she dream? We needed more explanation.
2. Lie detector: how exactly did it pick out the lies? HOW CAN A COMPUTER KNOW FOR SURE IF A PERSON IS LYING? "but it's set in the future, OFC they invented a lie detector that can never be wrong." Well then I would very much want to know its working principle. 
3. The other two women not thinking Cinder being immune is sort of a breakthrough in their Letumosis research? And if they did know that only Lunars are immune to the blue fever, why did they keep quiet about Cinder's true identity? Or what action did the Doctor take to make sure they keep their mouths shut? He couldn't have brainwashed them into silence forever. Did he unalive them (since they weren't mentioned again)? ANSWERS
4. Kai not taking no for an answer from Cinder = lowkey harassment {but since Cinder passionately kissed him, without any consent, for her "ulterior motives", it cancels out} [okay on a serious note, both the acts were harassment and I’m not excusing them]
5. Cinder gave the antidote to that little boy (whatever his name was) without paying ANY heed to the consequences, she's dumb for that. Erland didn't even question cinder about the antidote. There’s no way it didn’t occur to him even once that what if Cinder gave the antidote to this miracle child instead of her sister. He's dumb for that.
6. Why did she not even TRY comming Kai before barging into the ball and making a fool out of herself? She assumed he’d be too busy to check his comms. She should have given it a shot.
7. If she is the most popular most skilled mechanic WHY is she so poor? In a world with so much tech, she should have been more successful as a mechanic.
8. I get that Kai is a royal child and royal children are pampered but Kai is also the ONLY heir. Why wasn’t he trained to take the role of the emperor he was bound to be one day. He seemed to be very immature, at least until his long speech at the end. Heck he was also discussing government and somewhat confidential sh and stuff with an ordinary teenaged girl he had no history with.
9. The setting new Beijing was just a name. Linh was just a name. there isn’t any actual Asian or Chinese rep. {for the record, this does not bother me one bit} {for the record, I am not white}
10. Okay the Lunars were ordinary humans but they got their gift/magic/biotechnical energy manipulation abilities by evolution. There are more interesting explanations. I HOPE the detailed back story of the moon is provided further in the series.
11. WHY did Queen Levana have to become the empress out of the emperor’s free will? Couldn't she brainwash him and his advisors and all and carry out the wedding ceremony? It was established she is strong enough to control a WHOLE crowd of vivacious protestants.  
12. WHY TELL US ABOUT THE DREAMS. IT WASNT FORESHADOWING. IT WAS STRAIGHT UP SPOILING THE BIG REVEAL FOR US.

Special mention:  The discrimination. I am by no means a sadist when I say that I LOVED IT, solely because it was completely believable + completely senseless. Cyborgs are just cooler humans and are a reminder to the world how far science has come. YET they were frowned upon. Look at the real world. Don’t we too kill one another for senseless reasons?

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Fire/Fire injury, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Esio Trot by Roald Dahl

2.25

The Witches by Roald Dahl

5.0

The Reptile Room by Lemony Snicket

dark funny sad fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Loveable characters? Yes

5.0