Love-A-Thon 2016: Book Spine Poetry

Here's to spreading love and positivity! The 2016 Love-a-Thon is hosted by Alexa, Cee, Hazel and Mel.

Setting the scene -

Two people who used to be friends, face off in a battle to the death. They draw their blades...

The assassin's blade splintered,
When we collided.
A thousand pieces of you linger,
Until we meet again -
Under the never sky.

My shoddy attempt at a shattering blade lel. Original image from Sword Art Online

2016 Book Blogger Love-a-Thon

Here's to spreading love and positivity! The 2016 Love-a-Thon is hosted by Alexa, Cee, Hazel and Mel.

QUESTIONNAIRE

1. What’s your name? 
Jaz, short for Jasmine. Jasmine is too long to type so yeah. Why so serious?

2. Where in the world are you blogging from? 

Sydney, Straya!

3. How did you get into blogging in the first place? 

I got back into reading when I went back to full-time uni (no internship) so I had all this time to also write my thoughts after reading. My friend Mariam introduced me to the blogosphere.

4, How did you come up with your blog name? 

Ok my URL 'pixelski' I thought it sounded cool because I like gaming so 'pixels' and I tapped on 'ki' onto the end because it had a nice ring. It's pronounced pixel-ski (skiing).

Then my blog name 'Fiction in Fiction in Fiction' comes from my favourite Korean song Fiction by B2ST. The song is a wonderful story about someone who can't get over their love. They keep re-writing their story because they can't understand how it could've ended. It is so bittersweet.

5. What genre do you read and review the most on your blog? 

My blog is young adult but I occasionally have the adult review. Within YA I review a lot of fantasy, dystopian and contemporary.

6. What other types of posts do you do on your blog, apart from reviews?  

I try to do weekly and monthly wrap-ups, blog tours with guest posts/author interviews, the rare discussion post.

7. Best blogging experience so far?

Having Sarah J. Maas on the blog in an interview for the ACOTAR blog tour AND THEN MEETING HER IRL LAST YEAR.

8. Favorite thing about the blogging community? 

How friendly and welcoming/accepting everybody is

9. Name the 5 books you’re most excited for this 2016!

Throne of Glass 5 and A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas; A Gathering of Shadows by VE Schwab; Gemina by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff; The Song Rising by Samantha Shannon

10. Name the 5 books you want to read this 2016 that you didn’t get to in previous years! 

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo (actually just finished it!); The Martian by Andy Weir; The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson; A Mad, Wicked Folly by Sharon Biggs Waller; All Fall Down by Ally Carter

11. What’s an underrated book or series that you think everyone should read? 

Vengeance Road by Erin Bowman - how does this book only have 2.2k ratings on Goodreads? It's such a great Western and vengeance is real!

12. Which book boy or girl would be your book BFF? 

Celaena Sardothien (Throne of Glass). I want a kick-ass assassin as my bestie!

13. Which book boy or girl would be your book boyfriend/girlfriend?

Ok in a fantasy world Jem Carstairs from The Infernal Devices (I know you all thought Chaol Westfall but he's for Celaena I SHIP IT FOREVER) he is the biggest sweetheart and so constant.

However, in reality guys like that don't exist (crrryyy) so CONNOR COBALT from the Calloway Sisters by KB Ritchie.

Hands down James Carstairs though <3 THIS BOY OMG.

14. Who would you recruit for your apocalypse squad (5 characters max) 

Celaena Sardothien (Throne of Glass) because I need a sassy assassin princess on my side.

Rose Hathaway (Vampire Academy) for her sass and quick thinking.

Hermione Granger (Harry Potter) to keep everybody level headed with her logic and brains.

Aiden St. Delphi (Covenant) for the eye candy. Oh yeh and his fire power.

15. Apart from reading, what are your other hobbies or interests? 

Gaming! I love Final Fantasy (X and X-2) and Kingdom Hearts.
Listening to music - K-pop is my love and I go to as many concerts as I can.

I like to watch anime, read manga/graphic novels and going to see ballets.

Also food. Exploring new cafes for brunch. I'm also on a mission to try as many of the hatted restaurants in Sydney as I can. Especially the 3 hat ones.

Why are all my hobbies so expensive?

16. Apart from book shopping, what else do you like shopping for? 

Clothes/handbags (omg the monies), makeup, home decor (cushions and bed sheets), stationery and mugs.

17. At a party, the DJ suddenly changes the song – and it’s your song. What song would be playing? 

Something to dance to aye? YeY by B2ST :D 

Oh no K-pop you say? One Last Time by Ariana Grande.

18. Pick out either a book you want turned into a film/TV show, or a film/TV show you want turned into a book. 

I would love to see Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn trilogy in movie form. And done properly like Lord of the Rings style!

19. What would your dream library look like?

Beast's library from Beauty and the Beast

THEY DID A PHOTOSHOOT THOUGH TO TRY AND REPLICATE IT LOOK

http://elitedaily.com/envision/real-life-beauty-and-beast-library-beautiful-photos/924254/

20. Author you want to meet and sit down to tea with?

JK Rowling

Review: Bro by Helen Chebatte

Firstly, thanks to Hardie Grant Egmont for this review copy <3



Date Read: February 11-14
Date Released: February 01 2016
Publisher: Hardie Grant Egmont
Source: Review copy via publisher
Genre: Contemporary
My Rating:

Synopsis:

"Romeo knows the rules.
Stick with your own kind. Don’t dob on your mates, or even your enemies.
But even unwritten rules are made for breaking.
Fight Clubs, first loves and family ties are pushed to their limit in Helen Chebatte’s explosive debut novel."

---

I’m a bit conflicted on how I feel about Bro. On one hand I thought it could be an accurate depiction of teenage high school life and the racial issues we are STILL dealing with in Australia. On the other hand I felt it was really stupid to be so largely centred on a fight club.

At first glance, main character Romeo “Romes” Makhlouf has no trouble with cultural identity. He sees himself as Leb (Lebanese) because he eats Lebanese food, has a Lebanese family and hangs out with his ‘bros’ who are all Lebanese. But his mother was Australian (of Anglo-Celtic descent I assume) and as the book progresses I could see how he’s raised the question before of what it means to be Australian. He got on well with everybody and is the type of person that doesn’t want to cause trouble. Poor kid gets stuck in a lot of dilemmas – do the right thing or defend his bros? It’s a hard decision to make and for teenagers who are at that stage in life where they feel they have a reputation to uphold at school, stupid things will ensue. I definitely felt bad for him because he gets dragged into so much shit by his friends, the other racial groups at school, and even runs into girl problems. But Romes my man, get a spine and learn to speak up for yourself. Yeah I get it – high school equals peer pressure. Which is a serious problem and it sucks.

Secondary characters wise I loved Romeo’s best friend Diz. Diz is this really chill kid who’s always there for Romeo. He always manages to say the right thing for the situation, has a smile or a joke for you and is the kind of best friend I wish I had. Diz is also obsessed with Oprah. LOVE. HIM. Not that I watch Oprah but I think it’s cool that he gives no fucks because he likes what he likes. He’s probably my fav in the story. Then there are all the guys who fit into the racial groups (mainly Lebs, ‘Ozzies’ and ‘Fobs’) and are the epitome of high school idiocy with their need to be manly and tough. These sort of guys pissed the hell out of me and I’ll be honest, they’re the kind I’d stay away from when I was in high school. They’re freaking teens and they’re getting into punch ups and attacking each other after school. What the actual eff? Maybe I’m too far removed from high school now to understand. The relationship I really appreciated was the one between Romeo and his grandmother. I liked that he respected her and it’s ingrained into their culture. If he ever snapped at her he apologised and I could just see that he really loved her - no need to hide it. As someone who respects my elders as that’s how I was brought up, I really like to read about other kids brought up this way.

Sooooo the romance. It was cute. Kind of. Romes gets pretty whipped though *cracks whip* I wasn’t too pleased with the love interest. She was indecisive (again is this me being too old to understand high school drama?) and basically is the cause of a fight. I didn’t see her try to do anything about it except text Romeo if he’s ok. She doesn’t tell the other guy off. I just… Wow cannot even. I really needed more character development and dimension on her part. I think overall there was a lack of character development – so many people I couldn’t keep track with lots of surface mentions and not enough detail.

Anyway there’s a fight club. That's the main plot. It’s stupid. The whole idea of a fight club is stupid but these guys have race against race. Like a Leb versus an Ozzie. Or Fob versus Leb. If that didn’t drive the already tense racial issues, then I don’t know what does. And the guys glorify it. Does this really happen in schools? It probably does sadly. I’m not sure how I feel about using this a plot device. Racial tension was enough to be honest. On the topic of that it was sad to see how high school kids still separate themselves. What I’m assuming to be the ones of British decent were the Ozzies (true Australians? Please) and everybody else was categorised according by their culture/background. Nononono. As one of the characters so correctly put it “You’re all Australian. You put each other down for having different backgrounds but your different backgrounds are what make Australia today.”

The teachers don’t help either. There’s this one teacher in the book who actually seems to pick on Romeo a lot and is a poor teacher in general – the kind that just reads from a textbook, makes you copy stuff from overhead projectors and doesn’t explain. The reality is that teachers like that do exist. She totally disregards that Romeo is half-Anglo and assumes he knows how to read Arabic. How is she a teacher again? Yay more school issues, as if the students weren’t enough of a problem.

Well this was a mess of a review and it shows all my jumbled thoughts about this book. Chebatte gives us a glimpse of the male high school life - an MC who’s struggling with typical teen issues and cultural identity, egged on by increasing racial tensions at school, a lot of side characters and a stupid fight club that has everything going down in shit. Welcome to Australia?