ellaellaellaetc's reviews
480 reviews

Avatar: The Last Airbender - Smoke and Shadow Omnibus by Gurihiru, Gene Luen Yang

3.0

 hi so tbh I actually completely forgot about this. I enjoyed it in the moment but it's only been two months and I already don't remember it at all! as always with the comics I did really enjoy the humour and it fit perfectly in the world of atla (I would assume). I think that atla in general is really bad at doing romance and one thing I remember being annoyed by was the relationship aspects like idgaf.the others in the series were just a lot more memorable! 3 stars ig 

Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert

4.0

cute! this was all about finding your creativity and showing up every day. the author views creativity as "big magic" and talks about how to nurture your art and just let it be bad sometimes. similar to most self-help books, this didn't really introduce anything new but I still found it very valuable! I listened to the audiobook which was narrated by the author herself and she has a very soothing voice😌😌 I would highly recommend this to people who feel like they've lost their creative spark and are feeling a bit in the dumps about it, this was a very encouraging read :) 4 stars

Cleat Cute by Meryl Wilsner

2.25

 ugh. december was the month of reading romance books that I so desperately wanted to enjoy but was not able to. instead of writing my own description of what this book is about, I am just going to quote the a goodreads review from user jessica j "Imagine if Ted Lasso was about American lesbians instead of (predominantly) straight British men. Now imagine that Ted was a rookie player instead of the coach, and that he and Roy Kent banged it out." actually perfectly describes this book except it wasn't nearly as funny as the show.

unfortunately this was just not what I wanted :// my main complaint is that this just felt underedited, so many little errors and weird pacing issues. one that particularly stand out is a scene where the main character puts her phone on do not disturb and then literally the next page is "she is woken up by the buzzing of a text message" bruh. this is so stupid. 

another issue is that it didn't really take advantage of its setting. this is about two girlies playing professional soccer in the us in the year of the fifa women's cup and I thought that it would span across the whole season and include the cup, but no. it's literally just all about preseason training and then like the first 5 games of the season and doesn't even include the fifa world cup unless you invlude the team us training camps???? huh???? what is even the point of writing a sports romance. like you lose any tension you get from the sport and just lost so much interest cause I LOVE the sports aspect of sports romance. especially cause these two are on the same team and the dynamic is one of them has been playing professional soccer since she was a teenage and the other one played for her college team and is now the rookie on the team playing her first season. how are you gonna have that dynamic and then not show it on the pitch??? I'm upset. anyway. 2.25 stars

p.s. not related to my the actual reading of the book but I got a free drink bottle and had it in my bag when I was reading it and it leaked all over the book😭😭😭 fuck aascf!!! bruh actually devastating had to pay the library $23 and it was so embarrassing

Milk Fed by Melissa Broder

4.0

pls don't read this if you have an ed but pls read this if you're actually crazy and weird. pls read this if you're lowkey a deranged sapphic stalker. pls read this is you love books about odd women. anyway... this is about a thin jewish girl who has a really horrifying relationship with food (and food restriction). she ends up meeting another girl that's fat and who works at her favourite frozen yogurt place, the girl won't stop trying to feed her and then things happen. 

guys I've been meaning to pick this up for literally years and I'm so glad I did! melissa broder is a weird little freak and I love her for it. this character's voice was so strong and idk if I would say that I enjoyed following her on her journey but I felt feelings and was intrigued which is always good. slay :) 4 stars

Seven Days in June by Tia Williams

2.75

okay so I actually thought that I was gonna be obsessed with this and was gonna die for these characters but then I was just like oh okay sure when it ended. like I cared but I didn't really. this book (if you can believe) is about two authors and follows two different weeks in june, one in high school when they met and then when they re-meet like 10 years later. and it was just like. yeah. okay. idk guys I wanted to read this for so so long cause I saw so many reviews saying it was one of the greatest love stories and I'm upset that I didn't fall in love with this. I started reading it back in august or something but dnf'ed when I was like 25% of the way through cause I wasn't liking it and thought it was my fault cause I was just depressed and didn't like anything (I was but that turned out to be unrelated to my enjoyment of the book). I picked it back up in december (literally in summer when this book is set) but I still didn't like it :(( and I'm sad :(( I thought the daughter character was really funny though! 2.75 stars.

The Outsider by Albert Camus

4.75

GUYS NOOOOOO😭😭😭 FUCK😭😭😭😭😭 I'VE BEEN GENRE FICTION PILLED!!! I'm what people talk about when they say that tiktok book readers do not appreciate classics. cause lowkey guys as I was reading this I was so impatient. I was like omggggg this is so boring pls get to the point!!!! and this book isn't even long. and then when the book got to the point I was like 😳😳😳 oh. I now understand why all of that was necessary 😳😳 and I realised how I had gotten used to snappy plots and knowing exactly what to expect from a novel. not that this is necessarily bad but I think I went into this book with the wrong expectations and I was super unfair to it and got highkey humbled when I realised 😭😭 guys this is a good book and I'm sorry for judging at first sight, everything was necessary!!! highly recommend to pull yourself out of your "easy book slump" (not that "easy" books are bad!!!!!!! I love them!!!!! but quality literature has it's place also!!!! it's not elitest!!!!) 4.75 stars :))

Check & Mate by Ali Hazelwood

4.5

omg guys😍😍😍😍😍 this was so cute!!! I think I finished this in like a day! first ali hazelwood book to really charm me! shoutout to natasha for slaying with the book recs as per usual :) this is a ya romance about ex chess champion who enters a charity chess tournament as a favour for her friend even though she quit chess a few years ago for mysterious reasons. She ends up having to vs. the world no. 1 (who is a cute boy her age🤭). this is a massive upset as he literally hasn't been beaten in forever so she gets heaps of media attention and eventually she is asked to do a one year fellowship by this lady. she really doesn't want to do this cause she hates chess (once again, for unknown reasons) but she's just been fired from her mechanic job and needs money so she agrees to do it :) this book follows her and with her evenutal romance with the world no. 1. I don't really have much to say about this book but mostly just so cute! this was my more preferred style of romance book where you have one main pov character that you learn a lot about and they have their whole arc and then you have their love interest that is just the icing on the cake :) i think mallory's personal journey was just so heartwarming and her and the main guy's relationship (forgot his name soz) was just so, like, awwwwwww🥺🥺 anyway highly recommend if you're looking for a ya contemorary romance! 4.5 stars <3 

The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood

3.0

  girls. I'm so late to the party but this hit lowkey. this is THEE tiktok fake dating book (rewritten reylo fanfic) about phd student olive and supervisor (NOT HER SUPERVISOR!!) adam. now you really have to meet this book where it's at if you want to enjoy this. I really love it's silly goofy tone and ended up liking this book quite a bit but by no stretch of the imagination would I call this good. I am so behind on my reviews that I have since read two more ali hazelwood books (tlh was her debut) and I can definitely say that she has definitely improved with time. I think she has this really charming writing style that just puts a smile on your face but that couldn't make up for the fact that there were too many moments in this that were just manufactured cringe and general unrealistic levels of craziness that I could not get behind😭😭 there's a level of disbelief you just have to roll with when reading most genre fiction but homegirl hazelwood takes it to a new level😭😭 I won't get into the specifics because there are so many really articulate reviews that explain the strangeness of the portrayal of academia and every character just acting so illogically so I will just say this: I didn't really think that this was bad, but the main strength of this book (the lighthearted tone and humour) is something you can get from so many other romance books so I would recommend either reading one of hazelwood's later novels if you still want that STEM aspect or read another romance author with a silly goofy sense of humour (should I make a top romance books list similar to how j made a top 100 books of the 21st century list????). anyway. 3 stars. if you haven't read it by now I wouldn't bother picking it up tbh. 

The Wedding Forecast by Nina Kenwood

4.5

 guys :) I love nina kenwood! I went to the book launch for this and homegirl signed my copy of this book and also my beloved copy of unnecessary drama (one of my favourite books of all time! my favourite australian book definitely). it was my first time at a book launch and it was so cool to hear kenwood talk about her book, the process and just romance in general! such a good atmosphere there and it really hyped me up to finally read the book and it did not disappoint! this book's plot actually really crazily matched real life events for me in a way that actually kind of frightened me. this is about anna who goes to the wedding of her best friend (and she knows she will see her recent ex, joel). she ends up getting into her own romantic shenanigans with a guy with whom she gets into a long-distance situationship with..... DOES THAT SOUND FUCKING FAMILIAR TO YOU?????? lowkey I feel like nina kenwood used a time machine to go into the future milk my friends' personal lives for her plot. it really doesn't help that there is also a character called patrick who is a photographer and I have a friend called patrick and guess what one of his jobs is😭😭 despite it's relevance to the lives of my loved ones, I really really enjoyed this! I vibe nina kenwood's humour heavy and I just loveeee being inside anna's head. I read this at a time where I just needed a good romance to get me through and nina kenwood delivers on fun romance vibes that also hits quite hard in the emotional department and strikes a perfect balance between the two. I love you nina and catch me front row and your next book launch, whatever that may be🫡🫡 4.5 stars 

The Staff of Serapis by Rick Riordan

3.75

 the second of the pjo x kane chronicles crossover! this one is from annabeth's perspective and is about her and sadie. I think that the way that the egyptian and greek myths were tied together for this novella was really smart and you know I'll never always take an annabeth pov wherever I can get one. I liked this one slightly better than the first and once again I am so thankful that these are short and low stakes. 3.75 stars