These are sometimes books which other people love and so I want to draw attention to them in some way because just because they weren't right for me, doesn't mean that someone else isn't going to like them and I think that books are just like shoes, different styles and different books suit different people!
This is obviously one of those books that everyone has been raving about. I didn't know anything about it going in so it wasn't the hype that killed it for me, I think I just got a little bit bogged down with all the detail of it all. I started listening to this on audio book and even got as far as halfway before I realised I really wasn't taking it in. I loved the concept and I warmed to the characters but I just found that I couldn't follow along. The description was beautiful though and so I think maybe if I read an actual physical copy of this one, I might have a better time keeping up. You can read so many amazing reviews about this book so don't let the fact that I didn't like it, put you off altogether!
Now I kind of wasn't sure about this one when I picked it up. I'm not brilliant with historical reads but I have enjoyed some historical YA recently and so I thought I would give this one a go. As with the book above, I got past the half way point before I decided I wasn't really following this one either. Obviously this is the story of Alexander Hamilton and his Eliza and I really enjoyed learning about the history of that because, not being from America, I didn't really know about him at all. I found it a little repetitive. I actually fell asleep a couple of times and I swear the point that I had reached in the book felt like exactly the same point as where I had left off. I think if you are really into the romance of it all as well as the history, you would enjoy this book and again, maybe it would be better in print form, but the audiobook wasn't for me.
Now I have a bit of a love hate relationship when it comes to Jennifer E Smith. I loved The Statistical Probability of Love At First Sight and I love Windfall. I also really enjoyed the Geography of you and Me, but this one really didn't do it for me. I thought I would read this book whilst I was out and about in New York and get the city feel but this book was all about one particular relationship, neither of them seemed to be able to make up their mind about whether they should be in the relationship or not, and going round seeing various friends at their old haunts doesn't seem to be helping matters either. This book has all the key elements that I like, it's set in that time between school and college, it has a strong female at the helm and there's also a road trip aspect to it, but it was just way to slow for me. I wanted to pick up the pace a little and so when I was 100 pages from the end, I turned to the last chapter and read that to find out the ending before leaving it on the High Line because I am sure someone else will really enjoy it!
This is another book that had a historical aspect to it and I thought I would enjoy this one because it is about a bookseller that lives in Denver. I really did enjoy the Denver aspect of this book and it was great to hear about the city as it was in the 60s and the general attitude of the city because the feeling here is so much more laid back compared to any city I had ever been to. It was also interesting hearing about being a female bookseller back then and the way the publishing industry promoted their books back then, so I definitely enjoyed that aspect of ti.
I finished the book but the reason I decided not the review this one fully was because I couldn't really say positive things about the characters or the storyline. The basis for the storyline is the main character having dreams where she lives an entirely alternate life, sometimes at the time she is living and sometimes a few months ahead. She has a husband and children in this life, one of whom has autism, which was really interesting aspect again. However I just didn't find it believable that she could carry on this whole other alternate life in this dream world. I also found the time shifts or the reality shifts really confusing. This main character as well seemed very weak willed and so I found that hard to read. Then to top it all off, the book didn't have the ending I wanted it to and so I was left with an overall negative attitude towards it.
So I loved this book and I have talked about it a little on my BookTube channel (which you can find here) but I read Note to Self by the same author first and I loved that book so much more, this one almost felt like an addendum to that one. This is a fantastic memoir, it is short and to the point and I learned a lot about Connor Franta because of it. I would definitely encourage you to read this book and I am sure you will love it. If you are a Connor Franta fan then you will probably have already read and loved it. The reason I chose not to review this one is just because I would rather focus my attention on reviewing Note to Self because I loved that one so much and I don't want to take away from that with a length review of this book which is by the same author and quite similar. I really did enjoy this read though!
So there you have it. I finished a few of these books and decided not to finish a couple of the others. There are some books on here I know people will LOVE and will be shouting 'how did you not enjoy that?' and the last book has its own reasons for not making it onto my review pile, but I have made the choice not to write full reviews for these novels.
I would love to know if you have read any of these and what you thought of them, please let me know in the comments section because, what's better than chatting about books?
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