Hello all!
I am now officially back from my holiday and although I didn’t get as much reading done as I had hoped I managed to get three off my TBR! Again I decided to stray from my original list, maybe I should give up with lists as I’m finding I tend to mood read more and more? Anyway lets get on with the reviews….
Book 8
How do you outwit a Twit? Mr. and Mrs. Twit are the smelliest, ugliest people in the world. They hate everything — except playing mean jokes on each other, catching innocent birds to put in their Bird Pies, and making their caged monkeys, the Muggle-Wumps, stand on their heads all day. But the Muggle-Wumps have had enough. They don’t just want out, they want revenge.
After reading Fantastic Mr Fox and being a little disappointed I decided to try another one of the shorter reads. I actually found Mr and Mrs Twit quite entertaining and the silly things they did to each other did give me the giggles!
As a short read this book was very enjoyable and so I am giving it 4*s.
Book 9
Set amid the austere beauty of the North Carolina coast, The Notebook begins with the story of Noah Calhoun, a rural Southerner recently returned from the Second World War. Noah is restoring a plantation home to its former glory, and he is haunted by images of the beautiful girl he met fourteen years earlier, a girl he loved like no other. Unable to find her, yet unwilling to forget the summer they spent together, Noah is content to live with only memories…until she unexpectedly returns to his town to see him once again.
Like a puzzle within a puzzle, the story of Noah and Allie is just the beginning. As it unfolds, their tale miraculously becomes something different, with much higher stakes. The result is a deeply moving portrait of love itself, the tender moments and the fundamental changes that affect us all. It is a story of miracles and emotions that will stay with you forever.
Now some of you may call this a reread as I read it when I was a late teen/early adult after watching the film. I don’t usually watch the film before reading the book but I wasn’t aware that the film was based on a book until I started watching it. I guess you could say my love for Nicholas Spark’s books came after reading this one many years ago and I fancied reading something that I knew I would enjoy.
I was surprised at how many details I had forgotten from the book and at points it did feel like I was reading new material. The ending gets me every time however I was a lot braver this time and managed to fight back the tears. There is something about Noah and Ali’s story that sits deeply with me and I could probably read this book 1000 times and still enjoy it, hence why I am giving it 5*’s!
Book 10
There was a time when the world was sweeter…when the women in Beaufort, North Carolina, wore dresses, and the men donned hats…when something happened to a seventeen-year-old boy that would change his life forever. Every April, when the wind blows in from the sea and mingles with the scent of lilacs, Landon Carter remembers his last year at Beaufort High. It was 1958, and Landon had already dated a girl or two. He even swore that he had once been in love. Certainly the last person in town he thought he’d fall for was Jamie Sullivan, the daughter of the town’s Baptist minister. A quiet girl who always carried a Bible with her schoolbooks, Jamie seemed content living in a world apart from the other teens. She took care of her widowed father, rescued hurt animals, and helped out at the local orphanage. No boy had ever asked her out. Landon would never have dreamed of it. Then a twist of fate made Jamie his partner for the homecoming dance, and Landon Carter’s life would never be the same. Being with Jamie would show him the depths of the human heart and lead him to a decision so stunning it would send him irrevocably on the road to manhood.
There seems to be a theme going on here. I thought one soppy romantic book wasn’t enough lets really put my emotions to the test and add a second one in there.
I always find that Spark’s has a way of restoring my faith in human kind and makes me see the world in a more positive light. Although some of the endings to his stories can be very sad and emotional I don’t find them depressing in a strange way they can be up lifting. One of the parts I liked was how naieve Jamie appeared to how everyone perceived her when in actual fact she knew exactly how they saw her but rather than respond in a hateful or hurtful way she choose to respond with kindness. It is her kindness that wins people over and makes them realise that it doesn’t matter what they think of her, she is secure enough in herself. Another 5* read but I think my tear ducts could do with a rest so perhaps I should read something along the crime/mystery line next.
Whilst I am pleased to have made it to the half way point I think I may need to admit defeat here and say there is no way I am going to read 10 books in 13 days! Sadly I am going to miss my original target however I have very much enjoyed the challenge and shall be trying to squeeze in at least one, if not two more books before the end. If this is repeated again next year, which I hope it is, I shall maybe lower my expectations or rethink the length of books I choose.
I hope everyone else is enjoying their summer reading and the last two weeks of the challenge!
Bookworm Blogger 
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