How to use this Page

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme created by The Broke and the Bookish. This week, the theme is “Top Ten Books of 2015 (So Far)” and we’re happy to be participating!       Golden Son by Pierce Brown The second installment in this sci-fi series upped the ante from its predecessor smartly moving the majority of the action from Mars into space. The first book is all world building and war games in a future-dystopia. Golden Son is war and space, political intrigue and betrayals, and perhaps a smidgen of romance. And if you like wham!bam! endings that’s likely to leave you with your jaw somewhere past the floor then this is definitely a book for you. The Mime Order by Samantha Shannon Another 2015 second in a series that dramatically improved upon the first. Whereas the The Bone Season was a sort of jailbreak story, The Mime Order is a murder... Read more »

The post Top Ten Tuesday (7): Top Ten Books of 2015 (So Far) appeared first on The Midnight Garden.

There’s an interesting trend I’ve noticed online, particularly in the last month or so as the show got deeper into its controversial fifth season: people love to hate on Game of Thrones. “Now wait a minute, Kim,” you might be saying. “Are you trying to say I have no right to hate Game of Thrones?” Of course not. You have every right to think Game of Thrones is the vilest piece of misogynist trash you’ve ever had the misfortune to behold. What I’m talking about is the hate-on: the disturbing phenomenon of people who attack media (and its fans) with gleeful relish seemingly for no other reason than: 1. It feels good to put down what other people love and 2. It gives the hate-oner a sense of moral superiority. Let’s get into it. It’s okay to not like something. I feel like this goes without saying, but I really,... Read more »

The post Game of Thrones: On Fandoms and Criticism (and crossing the line) appeared first on The Midnight Garden.

  Top Ten Tuesday is a meme created by The Broke and the Bookish. This week was a “choose your own topic” week so, me being me, I chose Top Ten Girl Power Fantasies.         Graceling by Kristin Cashore Katsa’s grace is killing and in many ways she personifies the “Strong Female Character” trope. But the presence of romance is nearly always a must in my fantasy books and I love Katsa’s journey because she learns that having love and having independence are not mutually exclusive. You can be a traditional bad ass and also be invested in the traditionally feminine. Plus, I sure would love to have her with me in a zombie apocalypse. Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine The first fantasy novel I read and I adored it! This also remains one of my favorite works of feminist fiction to this day (and what a great intro... Read more »

The post Top Ten Tuesday (3): Top Ten Girl Power Fantasy Novels appeared first on The Midnight Garden.

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme created by The Broke and the Bookish. This week, the theme is “Ten Books I’ll Probably Never Read” and we’re happy to be participating. This is our first outing!       The Lord of the Rings trilogy by J. R. R. Tolkien  So maybe I’m cheating a little bit because I have attempted to read these books before. I made it to the second book in high school before I gave up in frustration of the endless, endless amount of boring detail. All they do is travel! Does anything ever actually happen??? I read The Hobbit in 8th grade and I hated that too. To be fair, when I first attempted to read these I was just a baby fantasy fan, having recently devoured Harry Potter. Maybe now that I’m an old pro with fantasy I’d find it different. Every time I look at the... Read more »

The post Top Ten Tuesday (1): Ten Books I Will Probably Never Read appeared first on The Midnight Garden.

Welcome to The Midnight Garden discussion of Tuck Everlasting, which is posted to coincide with the 40th Anniversary Blog Tour. This book has been a special favorite of mine since one of my best friends pressed it into my hands in 5th grade. At the tender age of 10 fiction suddenly posed me with the question: “What if you could live forever?” There is such  a unique relationship with stories you loved specifically as a child. I’m so glad I read this at the age of 11 when the magic of the book couldn’t escape me. But we certainly hope to hear all of manner of opinions about this book! We’re also so excited to be giving away a beautiful hardcover of the special anniversary edition, which includes a foreward by Gregory Maguire. Did you know that this book has never been out of print in all that time? Let’s discuss why... Read more »

The post Classic Readalong Discussion: Tuck Everlasting appeared first on The Midnight Garden.

  Since we’re coming up on All Hallow’s Eve, we thought it would be fun to discuss our favorite ghostly reads. It’s been fun to look over our choices and see just how varied the genre is. There are so many possibilities with a ghost story–creepy, sad, vengeful or harbinging–and we’ve hit just about all of them. So which are our favorites?   Peyton’s Favorite Ghostly Read I don’t read a lot of ghost stories because it is ridiculously easy to scare me with the supernatural. I was the child who cried when her friends brought out the ouja board at sleepovers. So, my favorite ghost story is one I stumbled upon and loved, rather than something I actively went looking for. (Spoilers Ahead!) The Burn for Burn series by Jenny Han and Siobhan Vivian was what I thought was an entertaining, high school revenge story. We follow three girls... Read more »

The post Discussion: Ghostly Reading Recs + Giveaway appeared first on The Midnight Garden.