Adult Dystopia Challenge

This great challenge comes from Lea at Uncorked Thoughts. The idea is to read as many adult dystopia books off the list of 70 as possible. It's an open-ended challenge so you can take your time with it.

Personally, I think this is a wonderful idea. I'm a huge fan of dystopian books, but find it very hard to find any adult dystopian books, mainly due the the huge trend in YA dystopia. Trust me, I love YA dystopia, but sometimes it's refreshing to read a dystopian book aimed at adults. It's especially great to read old ones so we can see how authors' ideas of the future have changed over the years. Hopefully this challenge will get me reading some more of the best adult dystopian fiction available.

So without further ado let's look at the list. I've crossed off all the books I've already read.

1. White Horse by Alex Adams

2. Feed by M. T. Anderson

3. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood 

4. Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood

5. The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood

6. The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi

7. Nod by Adrian Barnes

8. City of Bohane by Kevin Barry

9. Jennifer Government by Max Barry

10. Mountain Man by Keith Blackmore

11. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

12. The Postman by David Brin

13. The Sheep Look Up by David Brin

14. Armageddon’s Children by Terry Brooks

15. The End of This Day’s Business by Katharine Burdekin

16. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

17. The Wanting Seed by Anthony Burgess

18. Veracity by Laura Bynum

19. The Death of Grass by John Christopher

20. The Passage by Justin Cronin

21. The Twelve by Justin Cronin

22. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick

23. Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde

24. Alas Babylon by Pat Frank

25. The Carhullan Army by Sarah Hall

26. The Gone-Away World by Nick Harkaway

27. Into the Forest by June Hegland

28. The Unit by Ninni Holmqvist

29. The Possibility of an Island by Michel Houellebecq

30. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley 

31. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

32. This Dark Earth by John Hornor Jacobs

33. The Children of Men by P. D. James

34. When She Woke by Hillary Jordan

35. The Trial by Franz Kafka

36. In a Perfect World, by Laura Kasischke

37. The Stand by Stephen King

38. Always Coming Home by Ursula LeGuin

39. Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. LeGuin

40. The First Century After Beatrice by Amin Maalouf

41. I am Legend by Richard Matheson

42. The Road by Cormac McCarthy

43. A Creed for the Third Millennium by Colleen McCollough

44. I Have Waited and You Have Come by Martine McDonagh

45. A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr.

46. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

47. V for Vendetta by Alan Moore

48. 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami

49. Bend Sinister by Vladimir Nabokov

50. Sulphuric Acid by Amelie Nothomb

51. 1984 by George Orwell 

52. Anthem by Ayn Rand

53. Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson

54. Blindness by Jose Saramago

55. Seeing by Jose Saramago

56. The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson

57. Earth Abides by George R Stewart

58. Dies the Fire by S. M. Stirling

59. The Domination by S. M. Stirling

60. A Voyage to Kazohinia by Sandor Szathmari

61. Battle Royale by Koushun Takami

62. Far North by Marcel Theroux

63. The Traveler by John Twelve Hawks

64. The Sleeper Awakes by H.G. Wells

65. The Time Machine by H.G. Wells

66. Julian Comstock: A Story of 22nd Century America by Robert Charles Wilson

67. The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe

68. The Crysalids by John Wyndham

69. We by Yvengy Zamyatin

70. Corpus delicti by Juli Zeh

There we have it. As of the 15th of April 2013 I've read 4 books off the list, and have many more on my to-read list. To join this challenge head over to Uncorked Thoughts and sign up.

Top Ten Tuesdays: Books dealing with tough subjects

Top Ten Tuesdays is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week's theme is:

Top Ten Books Dealing With Tough Subjects

  

  

 

1. Ma, He Sold Me For a Few Cigarettes by Martha Long -This book records Martha's terrible childhood from the ages of 4 to 13. It tackles subjects of physical, sexual and emotional abuse but the author manages to keep it lighthearted at the same time.
2. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosk  - Most of you probably know at least something about this book. Hidden within the amazing story is molestation of children, drug use and mental health issues. These are so well disguised with the interesting story that I barely realised the severity of what I was reading.
3. Unwind by Neal Shusterman - I'm a huge fan of this book. Not only does it have an amazing story-line and a scary vision of the future but also manages to tackle issues of death and pro-live vs pro-choice arguments, which are really big deals in some parts of the world.
4. The Fault in Our Stars by John Green - This book mixes humour, wit and interesting characters with the reality of cancer and what it does to the sufferer are all those around them. Very sad, but very good.
5. The Almond Tree by Michelle Corasanti - I reviewed this book just last week, which describes in more detail what I'm saying here. Really this book is such and eye opener to all the suffering in third world counties.
6. XVI by Julia Karr - Tackles issues of teen sexuality in a world where the media constantly shoves sexual ideas down our throats.
7. A Child Called "It" by Dave Pelzer - The very sad real life account of the author's childhood while being abused terribly by his cruel mother. When I read this as a nine year old I was utterly terrified and shocked.
8. You Against Me by Jenny Downha - About a rape trial and the effects such an accusation has on both families involved.
9. Noughts and Crosses by Malorie Blackman - In this dystopian book the roles of different races are switched round, giving us a closer look at racism and prejudice.

That's all, I don't have a number 10. I really liked this week's theme. It was a little dark but sometimes it's good to read books that tackle tough issues.

P.S. I've decided to only do Waiting on Wednesdays every other week.

Review: Unravel Me by Tahereh Mafi

Title: Unravel Me

Author: Tahereh Mafi

Series: Shatter Me #2

Genre: YA Dystopia

Pages: 461

Rating: ★★★★☆

Goodreads Page

4.5 stars

This. Was. Amazing.

Seriously, this book was really really really good. I absolutely adore Tahereh Mafi's wrting style. I can't believe I didn't read this book when it first came out in February. I went a whole year without reading Tahereh Mafi's amazing writing!

I especially love the crossing out of sentences. It's so much more effective in this book than it was in Shatter Me, when it was mostly to show how crazy Juliette was. Now it just shows her conflicting emotions and really adds so much to the book. And the repetition of words when she's stressed out and just can't can't can't can't handle it is great too. I mean, it's exactly how a person's mind works in tough situations.

Honestly, I think the writing is what makes this series great. Without it you'd still get a pretty interesting book but you wouldn't feel half as connected to all the characters. Juliette would just seem like a normalish teenage girl if the writing wasn't so unique. Instead she is this complex character with so many different thoughts and battles going on inside her head.

I think it was partly due to this that the author was able to wrench my heart out a few times during the book. This and the pure intensity of every scene. I changed my mind about what Juliette should do about certain things so many times while reading it. At one point I even shouted at the book! I was so mad about what she was doing!

The whole book was just tension, romance, action, tension, romance, tension, action, romance, tension, tension. It was great! So fast paced and unputdownable! I seriously couldn't put it down at all and devoured a huge part of it in one afternoon. Now I just need to sequel.

ASAP!

Letter To: Shane Collins

I've decided that from now on every week I'll post letters to fictional characters from my favourite books. This is my letter to Shane Collins, from the Morganville Vampires series by Rachel Caine.

SPOILER ALERT: Contains spoilers from The Morganville Vampires books 1 - 13!

Dear Shane Collins,

May I first may that I LOVE YOU! I love you so so so much Shane, you are the best book boyfriend out there and I can't believe I only get to spend two more books with you! You've no idea how sad that makes me! I love everything about you, from your witty sarcasm to your super amazing looks to your soft inner self. I just had to tell you that Shane, because I really do love you.

Now, let's get down to business. Here's what I need to say to you: get back together with Claire. You would be lost without her and you know it. Remember the time you thought she'd died?? Remember what you nearly did?? Eh? Eh? I remember. That's right, I remember what you were going to do. You don't want that to happen again do you? Nope.

The only way you can stop that happening is to get back together with your wonderful girlfriend. She is the best thing that ever happened to you. Now that you're out of Morganville and don't even have Michael and Eve you need her more than ever. Look after her while she goes to college. Do whatever she needs you to. Do whatever it takes to get her forgiveness. She will forgive you in the end, as long as you are super nice to her and NEVER betray her again.

After all, if you're not nice to her then I know someone else who will be. Someone with cute fanged bunny slippers  Someone who's not human. Do what you have to do, just make sure you get back together with her before she realises her love for someone else.

Please Shane, I'm begging you. Just do me this one favour.

Thanks,
Lilac

Waiting on Wednesday: Noble Conflict

"Waiting on Wednesday" is a weekly meme hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine, which highlights upcoming book releases we're really looking forward to. My pick this week is:

Noble Conflict by Malorie Blackman

Release date: 6th June 2013

Goodreads Page

Goodreads synopsis

Years after a violent war destroyed much of the world, Kaspar has grown up in a society based on peace and harmony. But beyond the city walls, a vicious band of rebels are plotting to tear this peace apart. It is up to the Guardians - an elite peacekeeping force - to protect the city, without ever resorting to the brutal methods of their enemy.

When Kaspar joins the Guardians, he has a chance encounter with a rebel - a beautiful girl named Rhea. Haunted from that moment on by strange visions and memories - memories that could only belong to Rhea - he realises he hasn't been told the truth about what the rebels really want, and what he's really fighting for.

My Thoughts

Well, it's a YA dystopia, which is my favourite genre at the moment (and has been since autumn 2011 when I discovered the genre). Plus, it's written by Malorie Blackman, who wrote the really interesting Noughts and Crosses series. And the synopsis is just so intriguing, isn't it? All of that mixed together makes a really really good book that I can't wait to read!

Anyone else excited for this book?

Review: The Almond Tree by Michelle Cohen Carasanti

Book: The Almond Tree
Author: Michelle Cohen Corasanti
Series: N/A
Pages: 348
Genre: Historical Fiction - War
Rating: ★★★★☆


I won this book through Goodreads First Reads but that does not affect my opinion on the book.

I usually really like historical fiction books, and this was no exception. Just like any good books from this genre it provided insight into how people used to live. But this is different in one way: it is set in wartime Palestine (1955 and onwards).

Now, I'm ashamed to say that prior to reading this book I knew nothing, absolutely nothing, about the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. I knew that there were always wars in the Middle East, but that's it*. You can imagine how shocked and disgusted I was to discover that Jews, after everything that'd happened in the second world war, had then gone and done something so terrible to Palestinians. It's explained more further into the book, but at first it was just a "wow" moment.

This book was such an eye-opener into how they lived too, and how terrible they got treated. I was so disgusted and saddened to read about the main character's life as a child, all the hardships and injustices his whole family faced. And the thing is that this sort of thing actually happened to millions of people, it's not just fiction. That was the thought that was nagging at me the whole time, that countless other people had to live through this.

I think what made this story good was that it was based on real history and exposed so much of the terrible life Palestinians had. But it was good in other ways too, of course. I was completely unable to put it down while I read the first two parts. It grabbed my attention from the first page and didn't let it go until I was 200 pages in. I was put off reading it around that point because I really didn't like the person that Ichmad (the protagonist) had become. In fact, I just wanted to slap him across the face. He didn't want to solve any of the problems in his home country, only take everyone to America, which he seemed to think was so perfect. He was just so selfish and naive when he was an adult, much more than he had been as a child/teen/young person. I forgave him in the end, and realised that the author was just trying to show us what a life like that can do to a person and show us that Ichmad was a real person, not a Mary-Sue.

All in all, a wonderful book which I highly recommend to anyone, even if you do not like this sort of thing. The Almond Tree really raises awareness about so many issues and everyone can learn from this book. If you read this book then I'm sure that the next time you're watching the news and see x number of people in ______ country killed and wounded, it won't just be more of the same thing, you'll feel connected to all these people suffering miles and miles away. Yes, you might feel guilty, but at least acknowledging that this sort of thing is happening is much better than turning a blind eye to it all.



(*Isn't that terrible that I knew nothing about any of it? I mean, we're not taught anything to do with this is school. We spend countless history lessons learning about the first and second world wars, yet get taught nothing about things in other countries, unless it's related to our country and we were in the right. That's really  annoying me right now)

The Book Notes Project

So, I've just come across this post at A Wordless Blogger. It's basically about putting nice little notes into library books when you return them so the next person to check them out can get a lovely surprise. I think this is a really great idea! You can't imagine how excited I'd be to find a note in a library book. I'd feel like there were actually other people like me in my area, fellow bookaholics. I'd probably start squealing in excitement  that's how great I'd find it!

I'm definitely going to do this next time I check a bunch of library books out, and just hope hope hope that there's someone else out there who'll do the same. Now that this is like "a thing", there might be, but most of the books I check out look almost unread, so I don't even know if any teens in my area read books from libraries. Oh well, whether I get one back or not it'll be a nice feeling to know that someone might be smiling because of a note I left in a book!

Thank you for thinking of this great idea Emma!