The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides

The haunting, humorous and tender story of the brief lives of the five entrancing Lisbon sisters, The Virgin Suicides, now a major film, is Jeffrey Eugenides' classic debut novel.

The shocking thing about the girls was how nearly normal they seemed when their mother let them out for the one and only date of their lives. Twenty years on, their enigmatic personalities are embalmed in the memories of the boys who worshipped them and who now recall their shared adolescence: the brassiere draped over a crucifix belonging to the promiscuous Lux; the sisters' breathtaking appearance on the night of the dance; and the sultry, sleepy street across which they watched a family disintegrate and fragile lives disappear.

-- Goodreads.com description of The Virgin Suicides --

The Virgin Suicides will probably become one of my favourite books of the year if not of all time. It was the third book I read this year, so I'm kind of late with this review. I expected to like this book but I ended up loving it! This book is mysterious and wonderfully written. Jeffrey Eugenides has an amazing writing style! I would even say it's one of the best I have ever read. 
And man! What an amazing first sentence, I can't even describe it, you'll just have to read it! It haunted me and I needed to know how it happened. It only took one sentence for me to be gripped by this book.

The Virgin Suicides is about the suicides of five sisters. The narrator of the story is actually a (unidentified) group of boys. All this makes the story mysterious and gripping. The boys, now men, dive into their past to try once more to make sense of the Lisbon girls. And the reader will have as much trouble as they did to figure them out. 

I thought about this book often after I read it. Just the way it was written is remarkable. I'm looking forward to read other books by Jeffrey Eugenides. Although in my opinion, none of them could ever be as amazing as The Virgin Suicides.

I gave this book 5 out of 5 stars. It blew me away! I recommend this book to everyone! It's a book everyone should read at least once in their lifetime. I believe this book will become a classic if it isn't one already.

Later on, I will do a book to movie adaptation review as well once I've seen the movie. So look out for that one!

The DUFF: Designated Ugly Fat Friend by Kody Keplinger

Seventeen-year-old Bianca Piper is cynical and loyal, and she doesn’t think she’s the prettiest of her friends by a long shot. She’s also way too smart to fall for the charms of man-slut and slimy school hottie Wesley Rush. In fact, Bianca hates him. And when he nicknames her “the Duff,” she throws her Coke in his face. 

But things aren’t so great at home right now, and Bianca is desperate for a distraction. She ends up kissing Wesley. Worse, she likes it. Eager for escape, Bianca throws herself into a closeted enemies-with-benefits relationship with him.

Until it all goes horribly awry. It turns out Wesley isn’t such a bad listener, and his life is pretty screwed up, too. Suddenly Bianca realizes with absolute horror that she’s falling for the guy she thought she hated more than anyone.

--Goodreads.com description of The Duff--

I love this book! I was hoping to like this book but I ended up loving it. I read this book a few months ago and I still catch myself thinking about it a lot. So I decided to write a review. If you think that this book is going to be like the movie Mean Girls, you would be wrong. The Duff definitely treats the subject of being bullied and being told you're a loser just because of the way you look. But I found that part to be rather short in comparison with all the rest this book has to offer. 

The main character Bianca has a lot of family problems (I can relate to that even though my problems are not the same). She tries to find a way to deal with them but she doesn't want to burden her friends (plus, she probably doesn't want her friends to judge her parents either) so she keeps this a secret. But when something huge affects your home life you can't keep it bottled up. Therefore, Bianca seeks out a different way to cope with her problems and that just happens to be Wesley. The jerk that called her the DUFF in the first place.

A lot of things happen because of the choices Bianca makes. You see Bianca making the wrong decisions but you can understand why. Those bad decisions catch up with her and you get to see how she deals with that. 

This book was a lot of fun, also touching, romantic and dramatic. Bianca became one of my favourite characters of all time! She is funny, always knows something to say, loves her father and her friends unconditionally and I can relate to her, her problems and her solutions. 

This is one of my favourite books of last year and I give it 4 out of 5 stars! I'm looking forward to write a book to movie adaptation review, once the movie comes out. Granted, a first look at the trailer suggests that it will be nothing like the book, so keep an eye on this blog to see how it turns out.

Shatter Me series by Tahereh Mafi

I have a curse

I have a gift

I am a monster
I'm more than human

My touch is lethal
My touch is power

I am their weapon
I will fight back

Juliette hasn’t touched anyone in exactly 264 days.

The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette’s touch is fatal. As long as she doesn't hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don’t fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong color.

The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war – and The Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she’s exactly what they need right now.

Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior.

--Goodreads.com description of Shatter Me--

This week I finished the Shatter Me series by Tahereh Mafi, which means I read Shatter Me, Unravel Me, Ignite Me and Unite Me (which contains the two novellas Destroy Me and Fracture Me). 

I have a lot of mixed feelings about this series, on one hand I couldn't put it down, I needed to know what would happen next. I liked the story line and the majority of the characters. On the other hand, I really disliked the writing style. 
To me it felt like bad creative writing and I'm kind of amazed this even got published. I know it is supposed to represent the thoughts of the protagonist but it was terrible to read. However, I still really wanted to keep reading. So that's why I have mixed feelings. The story intrigued me, but the writing style horrified me. Mafi's style slows the plot down and quite frankly a lot of Juliette's thoughts are unnecessary to the story and most of the time just really stupid. 

Another thing I want to mention is that the ending of Ignite Me didn't really feel like a dystopian ending. It feels like there should be another book to have a better ending of their world. Now only the romance part of the story is resolved. They won a battle but that doesn't mean they won the war.
If you read this book did you have the same problem? Or were you completely satisfied with the ending? Don't hesitate to leave a comment.

So, keep in mind that this is a dystopian young adult series that is not to be compared to Divergent or The Hunger Games. This is more like a romance combined with a dystopian setting. It is less action-packed than the books mentioned above. 
Since I really enjoyed the story but really disliked the writing style I'm giving this series 3 out of 5 stars. If the writing style didn't bother me so much I probably would have given these series 3,5 or 4 stars. 
And one final thing, the covers are simply amazing!

Some Late New Year's Resolutions

First of all, I'm late with this post because I had exams in January and I didn't have any time to blog.

Moving on, my New Year's resolution is to blog more. I had to take a huge break from blogging, and I still have the feeling that I haven't really started blogging at all. So therefore I want to post something at least every week (hopefully more). Next semester is going to be a really busy one, so that's why I set the bar at one post a week.

My second resolution is to do a Goodreads challenge, I discovered Goodreads quite late, I am ashamed to say which means this will be my first challenge. I'm hoping to make a page on this blog soon so everyone can follow my progress. I have actually no idea how many books I read in a year, so this challenge will be interesting. I am hoping to read 50 books and as I mentioned before I don't know how much a I read in a year so I have absolutely no idea if this is a difficult challenge. I do know however, that since I discovered "booktube" I read a lot more these days. Furthermore, I have to read quite an amount of graphic novels for my BA paper so that will help me immensely. For this challenge I am counting books and graphic novels I have to read for university as well.

And lastly, I have a lot of ideas for this blog I'm hoping to begin with as soon as possible. For example, a monthly (or more regularly) review of a book to movie adaptation. Reviewing both the book and the movie.

I can't tell you how excited I am with these resolutions! It can be like a second start for this blog!

Pride & Prejudice Adaptations

Well, it’s no secret that there are a lot of Pride and Prejudice films out there. Here I will talk about 4 of them. There are two very obvious ones that everyone knows about: the BBC series with Colin Firth and the 2005 film version with Keira Knightley. I like both of them.

Pride & Prejudice (2005)

This is the first version I watched and that is why I slightly prefer this adaptation. I watched this movie after seeing the trailer as an advertisement on my Nanny McPhee DVD. I was already familiar with the title because it is mentioned in quite a lot of other movies, especially in Bridget Jones’s Diary. So the next day I rented the movie and I completely fell in love with it. Joe Wright is an incredible director (his movie adaptation of Atonement is also definitely worth your time!). The setting, the light, the costumes, etc. everything about this movie is impressive, it almost feels like a work of art. And if you need more convincing, this movie was nominated for 4 Oscars. If I need to compare this to the BBC series, the 2005 version is the superior movie. But adaptation wise, the BBC is better, no question about it.

Link to the trailer. I in particular love this trailer because the music at 1:33 is simply amazing!

Pride and Prejudice (BBC)

This version is famous for the wet shirt scene but contrary to popular opinion, I could have lived without it. This version is a bit dated but still one of my favourite adaptations. I love that (besides the lake scene) this adaptation is true to the book. In the 2005 film, the settings and the texts are completely different. I have to give lots of points to the BBC versions for preserving most of the book (setting and dialogue wise). That is what I love about this version. I don’t think I need to elaborate further on these famous versions.

Bride and Prejudice

This is a Bollywood musical version that is very entertaining. It is set in India and the prejudice is cultural. I thought this was a very nice and creative twist to the story and as I love musicals that part was amazing as well. This version is worth checking out but as you might already suspect, the setting and dialogue are quite different from the book. However, the main plot lines are definitely the same (but obviously more modern).

I recommend this movie but you should watch one (or two) of the above first because this is a romantic comedy and musical (quite a different genre in comparison to the book).

To get you in the mood, here is a link to a clip situated after Mr. Collins proposes to Lizzie. It always cracks me up. Enjoy!

Pride and Prejudice (2003)

This is a modern adaptation and had a lot of potential but this was just very bad. Besides the basics there wasn't much that reminded me of the original story. The acting is also very bad. I can’t really say anything good about it. It was just painful to watch. I definitely do not recommend this one, you should really stay away from this awful movie.

Top 5 Comedy TV Shows

By this I mean the more recent TV shows no longer than 30 minutes (this excludes Friends because it's already been a while since season 10). How I Met Your Mother and The Big Bang Theory should be on here but as they are already way too famous I do not feel the need to elaborate further on them. They speak for themselves. I wanted to focus on some less well known TV shows. This is a top 5 not because I don't watch other comedy shows but because later on I can have another top 5 (part 2 if you please). Furthermore, these are in no particular order, so here we go!

The Mindy Project

Season one started out a bit slow and painfully embarrassing sometimes but everything came together nicely in season 2. I love that the show is about an independent young woman, who loves romantic comedies as much as I do. It is a nice concept of making a TV show with these romcom elements interlaced in it. When the new doctor Peter was introduced in the second season, I was doubtful at first. Now Peter is quickly becoming one of my favourite characters together with Mindy and Danny, of course. And now as season 3 has started with a bang, I can’t wait till the next episodes! I recommend this show because it is extremely romantic and funny. Very enjoyable!

 2 Broke Girls

I love Max’s lines, they crack you up every time. I often wish I could have an answer ready as fast as Max but I could never be so rude! Caroline is the exact opposite of Max but as the series progresses you can see how they both change. This is one funny show that is hard to miss! Link to trailer here.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine

Brooklyn Nine-Nine is a good and terribly funny show. Jake and Boyle never disappoint me. However I have trouble with the love story between Peralta and Santiago. That just does not work. There is zero chemistry between them and it just makes the show weird and sometimes painful to watch (as in bad). I was actually hoping that the second season would start and it turned out that his confession was just another prank. Sadly that was not the case. I usually like couples in TV shows but this just doesn't work. This is the only reason I can find to not like the show so I am still going to recommend it! 

Community

I am so glad this show was picked up again even though the last season was terrible. I love Abed and Troy! You won’t be able to get “Troy and Abed in the Morning” out of your head!

I also like that they study Spanish, as I have trouble with the language as well, I can enjoy their problems even more.

Miranda

This is a British comedy and it is absolutely amazing! If you haven’t seen it yet, you have to start watching this immediately (right after reading this blog)! The cast of this show is amazing, I absolutely love Miranda, Stevie, Gary and even on occasion Miranda’s mom Penny. The situations Miranda ends up in are ridiculous and incredibly funny. I can’t really describe this show and do it justice so therefore I’m just going to let you see it for yourself! Link to clip here.

Miranda Hart recently said that the Christmas specials of this show would also be the very last episodes which saddens me greatly. However, it is probably better to quit a show when it is still good, rather than letting it drag on untill it gets cancelled. And if you couldn't get enough of the first clip of Miranda, here is the link to some of the best moments of season 1, enjoy!

Jane the Virgin

This is a new TV show and I must say I really like it. It is based on a Venezuelan telenovela and I love that they sometimes argue in Spanish. The show follows a very religious and hardworking woman, who wants to get married before having sex. Then some unforeseen events happen, like being accidentally artificially inseminated. I will include a link to the trailer but beware, the extended trailer is quite long and it might make you feel that you know everything that is going the happen in the entire series (but it is basically a summary of the first episode). If you don't want that maybe you should just start with watching the first episode.

I did not think I would enjoy it this much, but Jane the Virgin is easy to watch and puts your mind off of other things. It also has on original plot and insane things just keep happening to Jane. Things you not always see coming. It is a fresh concept and it is like a new breeze which hopefully will last a while. And Gina Rodriguez is doing a fantastic job playing the lead character Jane, just one more reason to watch this show!

If I have to describe this show in one word it would be cute! And so far I definitely recommend it, track that show!

This trailer is not the extended version so this one does not contain a lot of spoilers. Enjoy!