Category Archives: Uncategorized

Book of the Month

A couple people that I watch on Booktube have recently shared their Book of the Month collections and I thought it would fun to share mine today. Not only am I an avid reader but I am a book collector and I take pride in my little library. (My oldest was doing a project about himself a few months ago and his fun fact about himself was that his mom has her own library *insert heart eye emojis here*).

Just to give some background, Book of the Month, is a monthly subscription box where for $14.99 you get to choose one book from five new releases for that month. For an additional $9.99 you can add a second book to your box. You can also add a third for another $9.99. Which is pretty freaking great in my book (ha) since they are hardcover copies and most of them have a Book of the Month emblem on the spine so they look so nice all shelved together. You also get a bookmark with every order and it is free shipping. The only downside is that is a U.S. only service but hopefully one day that will change. They recently adopted a reward system once you get your 12th box which is exciting because I’m only one box away!

Already Read

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Goodreads

Review

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Review

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Unread

Circe by Madeline Miller

Before She Knew Him by Peter Swanson

The Winter Sister by Megan Collins

On the Come Up by Angie Thomas

Miracle Creek by Angie Kim

Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

Not That I Could Tell by Jessica Strawser

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The Lies We Told by Camilla Way

Nine Perfect Strangers by Liane Moriarty

For Better and Worse by Margot Hunt

Sleeping Beauties by Stephen King and Owen King

Dark Matter by Blake Crouch

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

The Killer Across the Table by John Edward Douglas, Mark Olshaker

The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn

Necessary People by Anna Pitoniak

Bought Used

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Goodreads

I love this book service so much and I highly recommend it to anyone living in America to give it a try. I am going to leave my referral link below if you want to use it to sign up for Book of the Month. You get a free book for using the link and I get a free book as well. Or if you are interested but want to support a favorite American booktuber that uses Book of the Month they almost always have their referral link in their description boxes. (I signed up using ChelseaDollingReads code.) Or you could just go to the website and sign up that way if you want to.

Book of the Month referral link

~Cassie

 

Do I Still Want to Read it?

Currently on my want to read shelf on Goodreads I have 651 books. What??! That is a ridiculous amount of books especially since I can’t even think of what half the books on there could be. So I thought it would fun to periodically go through that shelf with you and see what I actually want to read and what I am no longer interested in.

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11/22/63 by Stephen King

Yes, I very much still want to read this! My plan for the past few years is to read it during the month of November so maybe this year will finally be the year 🙂

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Deception Point by Dan Brown

I’m going to leave this one on here because I physically own it and it does have an interesting synopsis. I have been putting this one off because there are so many other books that I would rather read first but I definitely plan to read this sometime. In the vague future. So perhaps this is a maybe?

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The Queen of the Damned by Anne Rice

I have quite a few Anne Rice books on this shelf but I plan on removing all of them. I no longer have any interest in the stories so I am happy to let them go.

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The Boleyn Inheritance by Philippa Gregory

I used to love Philippa Gregory’s books but for whatever reason I haven’t read one in years. I do still want to read this. Her Tudor books are my absolute favorite and she is how I discovered my love of historical fiction.

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If Looks Could Kill by Kate White

I had totally forgot that this book even exists but I reread the synopsis and I still want to read this one. It sounds like such a fun chick lit mystery and I am a total sucker for a mystery.

The only books that I took of my TBR shelf were the Anne Rice ones so maybe there really are close to 600 books that I want to read! I also rediscovered a couple of books that I had forgot about so I would say that this was pretty successful.

~Cassie

Buzzwordathon Day 1

Today was the first day of the Buzzword readathon and it went ok… I still have a couple of books that I want to read this week so I spent a chunk of this morning reading those. One is a library hold that I am part way through and want to finish as soon as I can because someone else has it on hold for when I’m done. I also am really into a book on my Libby app and I don’t want to lose my momentum on that one. But for a first day I feel like I did pretty good. Here is how my day went:

8:00 am

I woke up and didn’t really do much for a couple of hours. My 7 year old slept in until a little after 9 (its spring break this week) so myself and my two other sons just had some quiet time until he woke up. Well, as much quiet time as a 2 year old can manage 🙂 This is when I read those two books I talked about above and also caught up on some Youtube videos. I also just hung out with kids and enjoyed a slow morning with them.

10:00 am

I finally got dressed and got my youngest dressed as well. We then went grocery shopping and came home and put away the groceries. Putting away groceries is one of my least favorite chores. I would much rather put away laundry than put away groceries.

12:18 pm

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I have no intentions of finishing this book durning the readathon but I thought I would include it since it does have a buzzword in the title. This is a really great parenting book and I have already learned so much from it. My 7 year old, Hunter and I sometimes clash and I don’t want to unnecessarily argue with my kids. I also don’t have this problem with my 9 year old so I want to learn a better way to communicate with Hunter. So far it has really opened my eyes to how I’m diminishing his feelings without even realizing it. I will do a full review of this book when I finish it but I thought I would mention it here if you are interested. I will probably only be reading this when I eat my lunch so I’m guessing it will take me at least a couple of months to finish it.

1:05 pm

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My little one goes down for a nap after lunch so I took this time to take some photos for my blog.

1:13 pm

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Once I finished taking pictures I went downstairs to hang out on the couch next to my sleeping son. I started my first official book of the readathon, The Nowhere Girls by Amy Reed. I got 18% through it before Spencer woke up. I am loving this book so far and I can’t imagine not giving it 5 stars.

4:11 pm

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It was such a beautiful day here that after nap time we hung out outside until dinner. When we lived in the Bay Area we didn’t have a backyard so we are all really loving having one now. I was planning on reading while my kids played but I ended up playing with them. I’m happy we got some good outside time in because the rain is supposed to come back in a couple of days.

6:55 pm

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After we played outside I did some work around the house and made dinner. 7 is when bath/showers start for my boys so I came upstairs to put away some laundry and finish my blog post for Tuesday (which is up now if you want to check it out :)).

7:53 pm

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My husband got home from work around this time so I got myself ready for bed and went downstairs to hang out with my family. My boys usually go to bed at 8 (my oldest reads for awhile before he falls asleep) but we let them stay up until 9 because it’s spring break.  My plan was to read a chunk of Little Fires Everywhere once they were in bed but I only got a couple of chapters in before me and my husband decided to watch Game of Thrones and eat some ice cream. We are on the finale of season 4 and we plan on being done before the last season premieres. Which really cuts into my reading time because most of my reading gets done when the kids are in bed but how does one say no to GoT.

Thats a wrap for day one. I hope you found this interesting or somewhat enjoyable. My days are a lot more go with the flow right now because there is no school or homework that needs to get done. I will see you back here tomorrow for Buzzwordathon day 2. Hopefully I will have gotten a lot more reading done.

Stats:

Little Fires Everywhere: 2 chapters

Nowhere Girls: 34%

~Cassie

Fox Book Club

Last year I didn’t read a single big book. I read 92 books and they were all under 500 pages. When I realized that I was so disappointed in myself. I used to prefer big books when I was younger because there was more story, more word building, more everything. So going into this year I knew that one of my goals would be to read big books. It ended up working out perfectly because one of my favorite booktubers, BookswithEmilyFox announced at the start of the year that she was going to create a book club where we could all read her monthly big book along with her. During her monthly TBR videos she picks a big book at random from a Harry Potter mug and I have really been looking forward to her picks. Since it is March there have been three picks and two are books that I have been wanting to read for a while. The other was a young adult fantasy that I enjoyed so all the picks been working at really well so far.

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January Pick: The Passage by Justin Cronin

February Pick: A Winter’s Promise by Christelle Dabos

March Pick: The Secret History by Donna Tartt

I have been behind since the beginning the book club started though which is the only downside. I am falling further and further behind every month so I think I might have to skip a month to catch back up. It is March 18 while I write this and I still have not started the March pick. It is the Buzzwordathon this week so I’m not going to be able to pick it up until next Monday at the earliest.

If you like reading big books or want to start reading big books I will leave a link to the Goodreads page here. I would be so proud to update you all at the end of the year and have completed all the book picks for the year but I think I can happily settle for reading 10 of the 12.

~Cassie

Reading Challenge Update #2

August 2017 I posted a Reading Challenge of 15 thrillers that could be this year’s Gone Girl. I posted an update to my challenge in May 2018 and then I kind of just forgot I was doing this challenge. So that’s a little awkward but then I thought to myself, “Hey, they are a group of thrillers which you read almost exclusively last year so I bet you at least knocked one off.” I haven’t looked at the list yet so let’s all find out together how well I did.

  1. I See You by Clare Makintosh
  2. Ill Will by Dan Choan
  3. The Girl Before by JP Delaney
  4. Everything You Want Me To Be by Mindy Mejia
  5. The Secrets You Keep by Kate White
  6. A Simple Favor by Darcey Bell
  7. Behind Her Eyes by Sara Pinborough
  8. Into The Water by Paula Hawkins
  9. Little Deaths by Emma Flint
  10. The Child by Fiona Barton
  11. Every Last Lie by Mary Kubica
  12. Final Girls by Riley Sager
  13. The Breakdown by B.A. Paris
  14. The Lying Game by Ruth Ware
  15. A Stranger In The House by Shari Lapena

I have read four more books since my last update! I can’t believe I only have two more books until I am done. I’m going to insert any reviews I have for the books I have previously read now.

The Girl Before by JP Delaney

The Child by Fiona Barton

ILL WILL by Dan Chaon

When I finish the two last books left on this list I will do a full update with my ratings and thoughts on all of them. With the Buzzword Readathon starting next week (my TBR for that will be posted on Saturday) I don’t think I will get a chance to read the two remaining this month but I am aiming to read them in April. I have Everything You Want Me To Be on my kindle already and I did a quick check and The Secrets You Keep is at my local library so I will be picking that up soon. Once I wrap up this reading challenge I will be starting another one. I haven’t decided what I want to do yet but hopefully it won’t take me the better part of two years to read fifteen books!

~Cassie

Welcome Back

Hey everyone! It has been a long while since I have updated my blog. Lots of life has been happening but through it all I have really been missing this space. I’m excited to get back to making my blog a part of my daily life and I hope you will all be able to see that with the changes that I have made. I have really spent some time the last few months thinking of what exactly I want my blog to look and feel like. I really worked on making this space more “me” and personalized, my blog is named Books With Cassie after all! I will be posting every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday at 10 am. Thanks so much for stopping by and I hope you like all the new content coming your way!

~Cassie

Her Pretty Face by Robyn Harding

Thank you to Netgalley for allowing me to read this book for free in exchange for my honest review. 

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Title: Her Pretty Face

Author: Robyn Harding

Pages: 352

Genre: Thriller (Domestic)

Publisher: Gallery/ Scout Press

Publication Date: July 10, 2018

Rating: 3/5

A few years ago I watched a documentary on a couple that kidnapped, tortured and killed girls together and this book is based on that idea. (I have no idea if the author got the inspiration for this story based on that particular real life event, this is purely my own conclusion that I am drawing based on my own experience. When I say idea, I just mean the broad idea of a couple doing those sick things to a woman.)  Pretty quickly into the book I recognized the story and I was very intrigued.

This book is based on the idea that we don’t know which woman is the killer but I think that is was pretty obvious from very early on. I feel like that just made me more invested int the story though because I couldn’t wait for the reveal. I love how dark and twisted the killer is and I wished we could have seen more of it.

One of the perspectives that we read from is Daisy, Kate’s daughter, and I love the suspense that her character’s arc brings to the story.  Another perspective that we read from is DJ who is the brother of the victim that one of the women murdered. His perspective was my favorite of the three. I liked his perspective the most because it really showed how dark and twisted the murderess is. Also, I think the author did a really great job of showing how devastating it is for the victim’s family that is left behind.

I was not a fan of the predictable twists that were in this story but I think the ending was really good so I feel like that brought my rating up . I liked how the story unraveled and there were a couple of things at the very end that I really enjoyed. Overall, this is an average thriller bust still an enjoyable read. If you are a fan of domestic thrillers than I would recommend this book to you.

~Cassie

May Book Haul

I can’t believe May is already over! My boys only have a few more days left of school and summer will be here. Summer is my favorite time of the year and I definitely enjoy the more relaxed pace of life after a hectic school year. I hope you all had an awesome May and have an even better June!

Here’s the books I bought in May:

I bought these to have the whole trilogy of The Girl In 6E by A.R. Torre. Although I’m still not 100% sure that Torre isn’t going to come out with more books in the series. I read the first one earlier this month and I enjoyed it so much I bought the other two.

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I’m super excited to read this one. I will definitely be reading this next month.

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I have already read and reviewed this book.

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I received this book yesterday in my PaigeHabit box. I also really want to pick this one up soon. It’s only 200 pages and it’s and Irish ghost story which just sounds so amazing.

That’s the end of my book haul. I don’t track my ebooks because I get a lot of them for free or extremely cheap and I honestly get them knowing that I won’t be reading them for awhile. Which is terrible I know but I have a need to just own all the books. I should also add that I bought more books then this but they are all preorders so I will just share those the months they come out.

~Cassie

Reading Challenge Update

Last August I found a reading challenge that I wanted to complete before the end of last year. I didn’t complete it but I have read most of the books on the list and I hope to finish the last few this year. I thought it would be fun to update you on the 15 books that could be this year’s Gone Girl and show you what I have read and what I still have to read.

  1. I See You by Clare Mackintosh
  2. Ill Will by Dan Choan
  3. The Girl Before by JP Delaney
  4. Everything You Want Me To Be by Mindy Mejia
  5. The Secrets You Keep by Kate White
  6. A Simple Favor by Darcey Bell
  7. Behind Her Eyes by Sara Pinborough
  8. Little Deaths by Emma Flint
  9. Into The Water by Paula Hawkins 
  10. The Child by Fiona Barton
  11. Every Last Lie by Mary Kubica
  12. Final Girls by Riley Sager
  13. The Breakdown by B.A. Paris
  14. The Lying Game by Ruth Ware
  15. A Stranger In The House by Shari Lapena

I have I See You on hold with my library and I just bought A Stranger In The House so I will be reading that one soon.

Happy Reading!

~Cassie

Beautiful Broken Girls by Kim Savage

REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS

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Title: Beautiful Broken Girls

Author: Kim Savage

Pages: 336

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (Byr)

Publication Date: February 21, 2017

Genre: YA Contemporary with Magical Realism elements

Rating: 2/5

Remember the places you touched me.

The parts of Mira Cillo that Ben touched are etched on his soul.

Palm. Hair. Chest. Cheek. Lips. Throat. Heart.

It was the last one that broke her. After her death, Mira sends Ben on a quest for notes she left in the seven places where they touched—notes that explain why she and her sister, Francesca, drowned themselves in the quarry. How Ben interprets those notes has everything to do with the way he was touched by a bad coach years before. But the truth behind the girls’ suicides is far more complicated, involving a dangerous infatuation, a deadly miracle, and a crushing lie.

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This book started off with Virgin Suicides meets 13 Reasons Why type of vibes and then quickly turned into a not fully actualized magical realism YA contemporary. The switch between the two was kind of jarring but this is also the first magical realism novel that I have read so maybe that’s why? I feel like I would have liked it more if I had known about it going in so I could have been looking for signs of it. Which may have been my fault because I didn’t really look into this book too much before reading it.

There was so much I didn’t like about this book and one of my main issues was that Ben and Mira were supposed to be in love and I just didn’t buy into at all. They seemed to barely know each other and Mira even believes an obvious lie about Ben without ever confronting him about it and that’s what “broke them up”. I say that with quotation marks because I don’t think they were ever really dating. Hooking up yes but dating no.

My other big issue with this book is that neither the characters or the story felt fully developed. I found Ben to make the most ridiculous decisions and I was annoyed reading from his perspective most of the time. His character sort of just became a sponge for whatever character he was interacting with at the time. Ben had no real ideas or thoughts for himself. When another character mentions something so far fetched he just immediately believes it and starts spreading it around. Also, why the hell did Mira do everything Francesca wanted to do. Even when her ideas were dumb as hell there was Mira just going right along with it. None of the the other characters are even worth mentioning because they were pretty much the same person just different names. All people that were standing in the way of Ben figuring out Mira’s story. The only other notable character is Ben’s friend Kyle who had some kind of mysterious relationship or interaction with Francesca that we never get to know about.

I did like the darkness of some of the characters and once I got over my shock about the magical realism I enjoyed that too. I just wish so badly that things would have been more fully actualized because I really did enjoy the premise of the story. Also, the ending for me fit into the weirdness of the story and I liked the full circle aspect of it.

This book definitely romanticizes a lot of heavy duty stuff, such as suicide and molestation so I wouldn’t recommend this if that is a deal breaker for you. If you want to know more about how this book romanticizes these issues, you should check out some of the Goodreads reviews of this book because they do a much better job than me at detailing them. I have heard good things about Savage’s other novel, After The Woods, so I think I am going to give that one a try before I decide if this author is for me or not.