Tales Post – #IBW2016 Tag
This week has been Independent Bookshop Week and today is IBW Bookshop Crawl day!
Woooohooooo we can go and buy all the books from all the independent books shops!
I’ve seen this brilliant tag knocking around the internet in celebration of IBW’s 10th anniversary which was created by Will Rycroft at Vintage Books – here
We are being encourages to share the love of great independent bookshops and books and after seeing Jim’s fab post here and Grace’s fab post here I thought I would give it a go!
1. What book(s) are currently in your bag?
I’m currently reading a proof copy of this fab book, The Deviants by CJ Skuse which is due for release in September 2016. I’m about 100 pages in and throughly drawn into the plot and no CJ book is complete without a bit of creepniess! I’m loving it!
Heres the blurb ….
Growing up in the sleepy English seaside town of Brynston, the fearless five – Ella, Max, Corey, Fallon and Zane – were always inseparable. Living up to their nickname, they were the adventurous, rowdy kids who lived for ghost stories and exploring the nearby islands off the coast. But when Max’s beloved older sister Jessica is killed, the friendship seems to die with her.
Now years later, only Max and Ella are in touch; still best friends and a couple since they were thirteen. Their lives are so intertwined Max’s dad even sponsors Ella’s training for the Commonwealth Games. But Ella is hiding things. Like why she hates going to Max’s house for Sunday dinner, and flinches whenever his family are near. Or the real reason she’s afraid to take their relationship to the next level.
When underdog Corey is bullied, the fearless five are brought back together again, teaming up to wreak havoc and revenge on those who have wronged them. But when the secrets they are keeping can no longer be kept quiet, will their fearlessness be enough to save them from themselves?
2. What’s the last great book you read?
I have recently finished The Square Root Of Summer by Harriet Reuter Hapgood and I LOVED it!
Love, loss and heartbreak all with added wormholes made this a fantastic read!
Here’s the blurb…..
My heart is a kaleidoscope, and when we kiss it makes my world unravel . . .
Last summer, Gottie’s life fell apart. Her beloved grandfather Grey died and Jason, the boy to whom she lost her heart wouldn’t even hold her hand at the funeral. This summer, still reeling from twin heartbreaks, Gottie is lost and alone and burying herself in equations. Until, after five years absence, Thomas comes home: former boy next door. Former best friend. Former everything. And as life turns upside down again she starts to experience strange blips in time – back to last summer, back to what she should have seen then . . .
During one long, hazy summer, Gottie navigates grief, world-stopping kisses and rips in the space-time continuum, as she tries to reconcile her first heartbreak with her last.
3. What book have you gifted the most?
100% Seed by Lisa Heathfield! This was one of my favourite books of 2015 without a doubt!
I fell in love with this book from the minute I started reading it right through to the heart stopping end and have not stopped talking about it since! This book is hauntingly beautiful and deals with such sensitive and often rather unnerving subjects and situations including one of the most hated controlling characters I think I have ever read! Lisa Heathfield’s writing is stunning and beautiful in such a tender way. Every sentence is enriched with so much care and imaginative description that you fall in love with it. This is Lisa’s debut! It’s inspiring.
You can find my full review here
4. What’s your favourite independent bookshop?
I have to say that I am sucker for Foyles when I’m visiting London! I just love that shop so much!
Locally I love Astley Book Farm and Kenilworth Bookshop! I even wrote about them here!
5. What’s been your favourite book recommended by a bookseller (or fellow Booktuber/book blogger)?
Arggghhhh this is so hard as I have received so many recs mainly from twitter peeps. I totally credit my streak of reading fantastic books becase or recomendations on twitter.
I think I have to go with Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta. Recomended and gifted to me as part of a secret santa I took part in at the end of 2015 by the lovely Caitlin Lomas I read this in the period between Christmas and New Year and it completely swept me off my feet.
“I fall in love with these kids over and over again and my heart aches for their tragedies and marvels at their friendship”
That above quote from this book basically sums up my feelings about this book completely. This has now become one of my favourite EVER books. This book made me cry on the bus and my son told me I was so embarrassing. The story of friendship, family and love that all happens around the Jellicoe Road. I highly recommend. Taylor the main character is a reluctant leader in the towns territory wars with Cadets and Townies and with flashbacks to a past story unfolding as we read hit me right in the heart and I cry just thinking it about it. The writing is powerful and full of emotion throughout and also introduced me too one of my favourite YA boys ever….Jonah Griggs! To him my heart will always now belong.
You can find my full review here
6. What’s your favourite indie bookshop memory?
I think one of my fave Indie Bookshop memories has to be being asked by Kenilworth books to help them put together a YA window display. I grabbed my list of recs and discussed them with them and they created this fab window display!
Still so very thankful to them!
7. What do bookshops mean to you? What do you love about them?
Bookshops mean the absolute world to me. I can walk into a book shop and feel instantly relaxed almost like I’ve left the world outside behind. I can sit and relax, browse books, talk to people about book and sometimes if I’m brave enough say to the person standing next to me holding a fave book of mine that that book is fab go and buy it immediately. But obviously not so much that I scare them 🙂
8. What are the books that made you? Which books have most affected or influenced you?
Oh this is a good question!
Okay first off I’m picking my favourite childhood book Watership Down. I read this book when I was a young wipper snapper and it has stayed with me ever since. A book about loyalty and friendship and survival and of course rabbits. Not only did this book teach me and perhaps shaped me a little it gave me a love for rabbits….I now have 3 🙂
More recently I read All The Bright Places by Jennifer Niven would be a book that really affected me.
“You make me feel like I just stepped out of the wardrobe and into Narnia”
I simply cannot even talk about this book without crying. I was left an absolute emotional wreck because of it and can feel myself welling up thinking about it whilst typing this. This book was completely heart-wrenching and tells the love story of a girl who learns to live from a boy who intends to die who meet on the ledge of their school bell tower. Together they embark on a journey and Jennifer Niven writes with complete honesty, beauty and emotion about depression, those suffering and the people around them. This book made me think and feel so much. It is lovely and beautiful and will stay in my heart always.
9. What book do you recommend readers gift for Father’s Day?
By the time this post goes up it will be past Father’s Day…but I cannot resist a good rec!
I would recomend this fun MG read, Demoltion Dad by Phil Earle! Super fun and perfect for Father’s Day!
10. What book is currently at the top of your TBR pile?
I am SUPER excited for this new book by Kerry Drewery! The blurb speaks for itself with this one….
A world where justice and the fate of those accused of murder is decided by the public, but has moved on from the Roman Gladiator ‘thumbs up or thumbs down’ public vote, to a public vote by telephone. If you are voted innocent you are set free; if you are voted guilty you are committed to death by electric chair. Those awaiting their sentence reside in ever decreasing cells, getting smaller each day, until Day 7 and Cell 7, where they hear their fate. Sixteen year old Martha has confessed to killing a famous celebrity. But has she done it? And if not, why has she claimed the murder? Perhaps she wants to show up the flawed and brutal system by sacrificing herself in the hope of a better world…
So there you have it!
Happy Independent Bookshop Week / Day everyone!
Now go and buy some books!
Happy Reading!
