 back to my channel, Reading Warrior. So for today's video, I'm going to reviewing all of the books that I read during the reading rush that ended about a week ago. But before I jump into that, I do want to talk to you guys about some upcoming plans because fall, there are a lot of different readathons going on. And they all sound so much fun and like I would love to do them all, but I don't think I will be able to. I don't think I'll have the time because I'm also going into my freshman year of college this fall and so I really want to make sure that like I'm on top of my classes and I'm responsible with my time and things like that. So while I do hope to do some readathons, I'm not sure I can do all of them. And even if I do do a few of them, a couple of them, or however many, I don't know if I'll be able to do daily vlogs like I did for the reading rush, even though that was like a day or two at a time. I might just do week-long vlogs or I'm, I don't know, but I'm not sure I'm going to be able to do all of them. And if I do, I probably won't be able to do daily videos. But I am going to try and do them, but I'm obviously going to put my school work first because I am paying a lot of money. More accurately, I'm going into a lot of debt in order to do this. So I'm really going to do my best, but school does take a priority for me. I have about three weeks until I head back to school. So until then, I'm going to be trying and making as many videos as I can so that I don't have to worry about that as I'm settling into a new place because I'm actually moving from Michigan to Minnesota for school. So I'm not going to be even close to my home and it's going to be a whole new area and everything's going to be different. So we're going to have to say goodbye to my bookshelf. And I'm going to be very busy packing everything and sorting everything and just getting prepared for that. I'm going to miss my bookshelves a lot, but I have to pack up all these books. But I do hope to do a video of books that I plan on bringing to college with me and how I'm going to store them in my dorm room. But yeah, that should be it for now. And without further ado, I'm going to get in today's video of reviewing the books that I read during the 2019 reading rush. Okay, so the first book I read, I actually did talk a lot about in the vlog because that was the day where I had just a ton of time on my hands and so I read the entire book. And that was the Once Upon a Dream, A Twisted Tale by Liz Braswell. It's a retelling of the story, Sleeping Beauty, but it's told through Sleeping Beauty as she is asleep. And so what all happens in her dream? Like I said, I really enjoyed this book. I liked the twists in it. I liked that there were multiple twists so that when one came earlier on in the book, that wasn't going to be like the major thing for the entire book. I would have to say that some of the character ideas I wasn't super thrilled with. I feel like Maleficent could have been flushed out a little bit more. The Prince was interesting. I go back and forth on the Prince because he is very much like the original story, which I appreciate, but I just don't know how well that really meshed with this newfound Sleeping Beauty, Aurora, Briar Rose, whoever she is. There's that fight going on of Rose, Briar Rose versus Aurora kind of thing and I'm left slightly confused still. But other than that, I thought the characters were great. I appreciated the changes with Sleeping Beauty with the girl. I just don't know how all that meshed with the Prince and I just wish there had been more for Maleficent. Although I did also appreciate the backstory, I guess what I'm trying to say is that at the end we did get a lot of her backstory, but I don't think there was enough of her in the present in the beginning to give her that now personality. There was her backstory near the end and her presence, but there wasn't much of a person there in the moment for the first half of the book. But other than that, because of that I would probably give this a 4 out of 5 stars because I liked the writing style. I related to the character a lot just by fact of she wasn't afraid to ask the questions that I had in my head and so then I was like yeah no see I get it like what's going on, why, who, how, where, etc. So that was really nice. It kind of made like a fantasy story slightly more like realistic or relatable even though to me stories like this don't need to be relatable it was just like hey that's a nice surprise edition thing. But yeah so like I said like 4 out of 5 stars I would definitely recommend it especially if you're looking for a new read but an old story especially just kind of something that's familiar but can still add those twists and turns. I see why they're called a twisted tail. So there we go. The next one that I read that I started and finished so the next one that I finished was Psych Sky to crime fighting for the totally unqualified and I loved this book. There wasn't much of a plot line but that's because that's not the purpose of the book. It's a guide so there's a whole bunch of tips and tricks and a lot of explanations about Sean. If you haven't seen the TV show I would definitely recommend watching the TV show because then you'll understand this book so much better because like different characters from the TV show kind of add their own opinions and their own expertise in different parts of the book and not a lot of it will make sense to you if you haven't. There's also a movie that came out just like a year ago maybe something like that and that was an amazing movie so if you have seen the show and you haven't read the book or seen the movie I would also recommend the movie which like movies off of TV shows really aren't my favorite thing but my brother who gave me this book was so excited for it and we watched it and I ended up really really liking it and so he actually got me this guide and it was a hilarious read absolutely funny and it was very quick too just because there are lots of pictures and diagrams and big words and it's just absolutely hilarious and I know I keep saying that over and over again but that's because it's true so I don't really want to give this much of a rating because for as it is I say it's perfect so like as the book is an individual it's a five out of five but if you were to relate this book to other books that I've read that I would give a five out of five I mean it's just really different so I don't want to group it with anything so I'm just gonna have it be its own independent really well written book I honestly think it was like written by Sean Spencer I don't know if the actor wrote it or if the writers of the show wrote it or some collaboration because it actually says Sean Spencer with Burton Guster the character names and I couldn't find any other like author credit but it's amazing and that just makes it all the more real and the next book that I read and finished again and finished was the Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi this one I don't have the physical book for because it was actually an audiobook which I had on my phone and I already returned it to the library and I'm using my phone to film so can't really get a picture of it but I also really enjoyed that book it's definitely something new for me to read but I really love the author's ties to the story and I so I thought the story was fine I thought it was great you know I'd recommend reading it it was a lot of fun very interesting very entertaining but then reading the author's note at the end of the book changed the whole thing for me so for those of you who don't know this book is about this book takes place in in and around Lagos in Nigeria but they call they refer to it more as Orisha which is more of a concept of like a people or a land by the gods rather than like a set country that you can see on the map but the city names are all from Nigeria so I I say it takes place in Nigeria even though they will only refer to it as Orisha um but this is about a group of people who don't have magic and then a group of people who are born with white in their hair meaning that they can do magic they are diviners but those who actually have their magic are magi so it's kind of like three separate things but the thing is is like all diviners would eventually become magi except the gods are gone and so there's no one to give magic and magic is gone so it's like all the diviners can no longer become magi and magic is gone from the land so it follows a girl who is a diviner and how she tries to restore magic back while at the same time being hunted by the prince whose father has been the one who's gotten rid of magic he hates it he's all against it and so is the prince so it's that story of them being hunted and different challenges that present themselves on this journey but reading the authors know about she wrote this because her people are in real life being mistreated and killed for no good reason for being who they are which is not right it is an injustice in our world and it has gotten some attention recently recently but attention is not going to change it it is a way to make move forward to change but you actually have to do something you can know about it and then you can do something about it and she wants people to be able to know about it so that they actually do something about it because this does really need to change everyone needs to be treated with equality and just our world is a mess and we need to be trying to fix it rather than ignoring it or just making it worse anyway slight political rant in there but that's it's one of those books where it's really entertaining to read but then when you stop and think about it there's actually like a huge modern-day moral behind it and it you just really rethink about how you live about how others live and what you can do about it so I would recommend reading it whether you're reading it for fun or if you need to rethink about life I guess and how you treat and see other people but I'm gonna leave that up to you because but I would definitely recommend this book it was very well written it was a lot of fun and she has her next one children of vice and virtue coming out this December and I am excited to read it as long as I as long as it becomes available somewhere near me and I'm sure it would because I'm sure there has to be like a barge in old Minnesota like that story is everywhere so I'm gonna be really excited to read that one as well I'm very interested to see how she continues on and what else she brings to the table both literally in the story and figuratively about the story so yeah again definite recommend please read it no matter who you are what background you come from point of view whatever it's a good book I like the characters I like although the ending did frustrate me a little bit but that's kind of how I know it's a good book like if an ending of a book can frustrate me or make me feel emotional whether it's positively or negatively if there is some strong feeling that I have at the end of the book it generally means that I liked it or I was invested enough in it to read it well even if like the book ended I was so mad that just means I was invested in the story and therefore it was written well and should be rated well even if the ending just right now I'm gonna move on to the last book that I read for the readathon and the one I read and finished in the nick of time I literally started it the first day of the challenge and I finished it in that little last hour of the challenge what was wrong with me I don't know I was really busy but you know what let's just not dwell on it I got it done that book is I am number four by Pidekis Lore so I know that there are at least two more books after this is like the power of six and then something of nine this book I think was alright I don't honestly know if I'm gonna pick up the next one just cuz I don't think either there was enough of a cliffhanger or there's just enough invested I didn't have enough investment in this book to want to continue I might start six and see what it's about and then decide because if it's a continuation of this maybe not but if it like starts from the beginning of number six maybe I don't know but this book came out years ago so I know a lot of you are just like oh I know sorry I just didn't read it when it came out and then I bought it and now I'm finally read I read it yeah we'll see like it was a good book I'm the characters were alright the the story the the idea of the book was really cool I enjoyed the whole idea of aliens coming to earth to reserve the race running from another alien race and then being hunted on earth like that was just fine and I loved Henry Henry was my favorite character other than the dog but my favorite some humanoid so not human humanoid character was Henry I mean number four was buying Sarah was fine they were fine together that's really all I have to say just because like it was a fine book you know like I enjoyed reading it I finished it but I wasn't super emotionally invested into it like for example with the romance it was fine I keep using that word over and over again but I don't really know what else to say it was alright like I support them as a couple and I feel bad about all the challenges they went through I almost spoiled the book but no spoilers in this video I mean that was really just kind of it like it happened okay they got together okay things happened okay but as the couple got closer together I didn't I didn't really feel like it felt like a very young high school relationship like they're 15 years old and it felt like a very 15 year old relationship which normally I should be happy about because like they're 15 and they have a 15 year old relationship like that's how life should go that's how things should go I just don't think it was done that well or yeah normally I should be saying this is good but no and I'm just gonna end it off there like that sorry I have to move my phone a bit it's overheating yeah so I'm honestly gonna end this book review right there just cuz there's a lot I don't want to spoil there's also not a lot that I want to talk about just cuz it was okay okay so that is the end of this video I just reviewed all the books that I read and I was able to complete all seven challenges that they posted about through these four books so if you like this video feel free to like it give it a thumbs up even subscribe to my channel and click the bell so that you know the next time I upload I hope to upload every other Thursday Friday ish so hopefully I'll start getting that regular schedule going soon and yeah feel free to comment down below what you liked about the video what you didn't like about the video so that I can improve or if you have videos ideas of what you want me to do if you want me to read a book so I can share my thoughts about it and then we can have a discussion or relates yeah just feel free to comment below click the subscribe button like it you know do whatever you want just let me know if you actually like it and you want me to continue doing these kinds of things or would you rather me do other things if you have any ideas yeah let me know so happy reading