April Wrap Up | 2021

hey everyone my name is sam thanks for checking out this video get together like then subscribe below and give this video a thumbs up and congratulations if you could make up most of that um i forgot to check that out um i wanted to honestly i spent most of the day today trying to decide if i had the energy to film because i did spring cleaning yesterday so therefore why would i be productive but i was like gonna spend the whole day watching a kdrama which i started yesterday i want to finish today which i do still intend on getting to but then i was like no you're going to be productive so i binged amare and the knife brothers and i just finished it and now i was like okay you've already done something productive just film the damn video so you can put all your books away and i was like damn good point sam so reading wrap up for the month of april i didn't read as much as i normally do i feel like there are several books that took me two or three days that i maybe any other time would normally read in a day just because i don't know just the way and everything is happening the length of some books and everything and um i read a lot of like pretty good books actually i think for the most part this month a few letdowns but for the for the most part i think i only dnf'd one book and i liked really even even the ones that are in the middle of the pack that were disappointing were still not bad books so we are going to talk about books that i read this month in april and then talking about maybe spotlights of those and then just life successes or goals at the end depending on how much time i have left okay starting off the month of april i first picked up a thousand ships by natalie haynes as someone who didn't like cersei i've i okay that book was just like seriously disappointing to me because everyone hyped this up about it and i like obsessed with the main main couple and i was like cool like i literally don't like any this book this is what i was kind of hoping for this is i was kind of going into cersei hoping it was gonna be something like this and maybe it is because i was so disappointed by cersei that i was like oh how could this be worse that i really really really enjoyed a thousand ships we follow multiple different perspectives of stories of different levels of class um throughout the um trojan uh the end of the trojan war basically and it's all the perspective of women so everything about the iliad and the odyssey is all like achilles and and paris and all these people um but it's it's i feel like the only person even with the movies that i really knew anything of was like was it bracias is the one that hooks up with brad pitt and then um who's that actress the blonde one who she plays helen of troy can't remember what her name is i've seen her in a million things is it diane no it's not diane i don't know she wasn't in glorious bastards too but anyways um this was this was awesome this is awesome 5 out of 5 stars then i picked up winter's orbit by evarina maxwell i am glad i didn't end up i managed to go through the month without buying it even though my book started have it it is a great read i still did i'm giving it 5 out of 5 stars but i am glad i didn't buy it because i don't think i'll ever reread it it's a beautiful cover and i by no means don't think uh you shouldn't buy it it's it's an awesome story we got a spacey romance um spacey spacey not spicy um romance and i really like the politics of it actually um for standalone i feel like it actually had a whole lot of world building um or at least right now it's a standalone even if it's the first book it still had a lot of world build building and political structures um and i really liked the main characters and i really enjoyed their romance so 5 out of 5 stars then i picked a fire keeper's daughter giant trigger awarding for this one that there is an off-page um non-detailed sexual assault in it um but that being said i think this is a really important read for people um i i feel like this would i i work within um with a lot of indigenous communities in canada so i was aware of some of the things here but it's because i have had to do so much professional development over the last four or five years at work through uh conferences uh meetings and agency meetings and all this stuff but i genuinely don't think people understand the difference between um colonial borders and non-colonial borders so indigenous communities being on the american and uh canadian side of sault ste marie i thought that was really interesting um and the sports involvement that was really cool because i everyone's different but my my my recognition growing up my community was overwhelmingly white with the odd community that was black or indian people um with the odd families that were you know black or indian but that was kind of it the only time i ever interacted with indigenous communities was when we played the six nations lacrosse team and they were really hella good and it was always like my hometown's lacrosse team versus them it always came down in the last championships or semi-finals against them so it was a big competition things that's all i remember so that was really cool to see that um the complication uh the end unraveling it kept unraveling i kept being like oh okay that's him oh wait also that person is involved oh you're also involved so don't trust anyone okay anyone and i love the main character um i feel like she grapples really well with being both um urban uh an urban mixed race person which there's a whole added element to that that i can never really appreciate because each each community is totally different too with how they deal with status and non-status and urban and non-urban and it does touch in here maybe one of the reasons some of these communities do is because of funding um and money and dispersing of profits and all this other stuff so it's really really interesting it's a bigger book um but it's an excellent mystery excellent everything can't believe this was a debut book mind-boggled can't wait to see what else this author comes up with five out of five stars i also read bright raven's skies and i loved it i'm not totally oh my god my eye shadow kind of matches it hey that's fun um this is the third and final book to the sweet black wave series everyone should read this series it is a tristan and he's old retelling but with tristan and his old not being exactly the main characters i absolutely love this series each book is so so good so good i don't think there's a weak one in this whole thing and i found the ending to this really really interesting actually we've got like a captured from the enemy and finding out who is kind of tricking everyone and pitting all of these communities against each other um and then the whole finally unraveling of the po the potion love mix thing that is brought in in the first book it's so good everything was wrapped up i really liked it um not everyone gets like a complete happily ever after but like actually no i feel like everyone got the ending that they deserved is that a nice way of putting it i guess yeah i think so i think so so 5 out of 5 stars it was a really good start to this month then i read a tip for the hangman which like blocked my five star five star rankings coming into the month uh unfortunately i was really excited for a tip of the hangman by alison epstein i was also curious i've said this a few times but like props to a debut author being willing to publish with the last name epstein right now it's got our main character who's um in school and kind of gets recruited into being a spy uh for the queen at the time um and it was okay it was okay i liked that there was a not everyone in this everyone in the cast was heterosexual and i had her sexual relationship because i always see those stories and i'm like not in the tudor era i don't think so ma'am um so there were parts that i liked but i just found it really kind of slow paced even for my taste um felt myself kind of bored mentally wandered off an awful lot so this just unfortunately was not um not for me so i ended up being like a three out of five stars then i picked up the midnight library it was one of the group reads in the tbr beyond group for the month and i actually want to give this another reread i by no means hated it it's about a three and a half out of five starts with me right now i think it's very mood based um i think this is a book that i would want to read when i was in the mood to read something by like aaron morgenstern from like i feel like that was one where like i knew when i wanted to read the starless seat everyone i know read it was like it was boring i'm like you all said that about the night circus too and the night circus is boring but an amazing book so i read the starler c and same thing so i'm like i think i just want to take my time i'm gonna keep this in my collection we'll put it somewhere and it'll be one of those books i think when i'm like all of a sudden in the middle of a month and i'm like oh i finished my tbr nothing on my tbr addresses me but we'll give this another shot but it's interesting that the main character just isn't um happy with the way that her life is and has the opportunity to see what other paths she could have taken and so i'm going to give this a re-right now it's like a three and a half out of five stars and like a good girl i read king of scars by leigh bardugo and it is just mind-boggling to me that i did not like nikolai more the first time honestly the first time i read this not even the first few times i've reread it the first time i read it um i love his perspective his story also i got giant whiplash because i read this and rule of wolves this month i read them both um i finished this like i think two or three days before the show came out and the emotional whiplash i got from the end of this being like yeah i'm happy for zoya to watching the first season of shadow and being like zoya i hate that was just it gave me a headache so yeah um i finished both of these um i think i gave them both five stars for the most part yeah i in my notes i have them both as five stars i know not everyone likes this duology but i feel like a you know like people if they've grown up with the shadow and bone series like i did they're they're my age they may just be growing out of that certain tastes and tropes i really liked this but also for the love of god could we just get a nina even a novella where just something nothing but good to have happens to her her and like several of the female characters it feels as if they've like they they murdered like labor dugo's children or something like nothing good seems to happen to them and only thing that ever good the only time they ever get anything good is so that they can get it taken away from them in a few chapters you know what i mean so read these i really liked them they were what i expected the duology to give me i picked up empire of sam by tasha siri this month and noah i don't know why i was going into it being like i think this will be like a three and a half ish stars out of five stars for me um and then i'm giving it like a four or four and a half out of five stars it's actually a wonderful book i don't know what my hesitancy maybe it is because like i i feel like i saw this book everywhere right before it came out and then nothing after it came out so i was like maybe people read it and we're like me and just stop talking about it um i was wrong it was really good i really liked the character i liked the setting i liked the conflict um it's just the main character is mixed and trying to straddle that line in a time when the two communities that she's a mixture of is not um it's not a great thing to be so um i'm definitely going to be picking up booktube and i'll be reading the duology and this is one that i this is a series i would absolutely default fall back on every once in a while and do a reread of i really really really liked this i really liked the writing as well um the flow of it it never felt like a lull in the story or anything like that to me it was a good book really good book then i read sabriel by garth nix um this i could understand why this was like so um i don't know popular is the right word like a few years ago like i feel like it just has a lot of the elements that um what's that series uh by tomorrow pierce called is it like elena or lyanna i feel like the there's a cover with a horse on it that i feel like i read the first book and that was it i missed like the peakness of it i missed when it was out and everyone was freaking out about it kind of the same way with sabriel um i feel like i want to hold off on reading the rest of the series though until i'm in the mood for why fantasies because it is a very traditional yeah fantasy um it is exactly what i what i thought it was going to be but it seems to be well written i liked the characters um i liked the world i liked everything about it for the most part so i want to hold off and do a binge of the whole series um and i know there's a sixth or seventh book coming out soon so i am curious maybe i'll do them all at once and i don't know these are books that i'll ever buy honestly um but i'm glad that i read this book and i will happily read the rest of them through the library i read the last night at the telegraph club by melinda lowe and oh this book was good there were some like lols where i felt like i was a little bored but honestly i really liked everything about this and i really liked i honestly do suggest reading the um afterward and just kind of information about the research because i think they did a great job melinda did a good job of explaining that there are so few resources and when we talk about this movement for queer people it is so often centered around white white voices and white stories so when you try and go back in history to look what it was like for people who are also experiencing racism there's that whole intersectional right um there are just so few resources and a lot of the times it's just like primary sources and not really like data being run and it is hard to pull general data because there are so few sources available to pull and collate and get a get get a get a thesis i guess out of um the data unfortunately so that that was really really interesting um and i really liked this and i there's so there's a few times there it's because it's the time period and like the the language it's used to kind of cringe because it is set several decades ago so it was just parts of it i was like oh don't say that why would you say that don't please don't say that like i'm no don't say oh why would you bring that up in the conversation um i picked up burning roses by essel chong uh this is okay wasn't um wasn't crazy about it uh and despite the fact how short it is it is a novella um i did feel part of it my brain was just like you're i'm bored where are we gonna do anything with this so um didn't love didn't hate it's just in the middle then i picked up the sequel to a whoa what was it called a hero born a hero born uh a bond undone i think i call it a bound undone or something like that i don't know why a bond i'm done but young this is book two of the heroes of heroes of legend of the house of no legend of the uh of the condor heroes sorry um i have book three and book four comes out in july or august picked up the gilded ones this month it was another one that we picked up to do a group read in the tbr and beyond group and wow doesn't make sense that this is debut work um i really really really loved this book i love this honestly the end is what like really um [Music] drove the ending has this really like driving home um message i guess and everything that happens of like feminism and um the damage of sexism at a structural level um and the harm and it was just really good i loved the main character um the beginning was uh when i look at how it started to the end it's it's wild that this book isn't um massive but i feel like it goes on a long journey with a lot of character growth um so i cannot wait to see i think this second book is called the deathless ones i want to say so very curious about that and uh i picked up a kingdom of flesh and fire by jennifer l armentrout i like this way more than book one from blood and ashes has a really beginning um and then it finally picks up at the end and this is kind of the the same pace has kind of continued from um the second half from blood and ash and i don't have a crown of gilded bones quite yet quite just yet but i do plan on continuing on with the series after after this i picked up when the sky fell on splendor by i think it's katie henry and got a few chapters in and i did not like several of the characters that we kept seeing and so i dnf'd it i also picked up that way madness lies in anthology this was one that also disappointed me it was one of my most anticipated books of the years and normally i'll read an anthology and there'll be a couple that i don't like they'll be like the middle of the pack and then like you know two or maybe three that really stand out um i didn't necessarily care for any of these i picked up the bone maker by sarah beth durst this month as well um this i feel like has a lot of the similarities in the main character um to the race to the sans book as well as the the queens of the renthia series you have a main character who is very much a female grown adult she is a an adult like a grown woman um so we're not doing a lot of those ya tropes that sometimes still tend to slip into adult fantasy when you have as soon as you have a female main character none of that is there which i really love and respect that sarah beth durst is constantly able to do that i love that um this was not as good as race the sands though i will definitely say that um i think i don't i don't know i can't explain exactly why and the main character essentially is going around stealing bones so then she can use bone magic to make basically make her um husband come back to life and the more bones you have the longer he can stay alive and so we start you know trying to flash back and find her old crew and how her husband died during a previous war and that maybe everything in that war wasn't wrapped up as cleanly as we first thought um i think this would probably be a more interesting premise to expand into a series maybe that was what it was racist is very much meant to be a standalone and i got it and i was like this doesn't need to be anything longer and then i read this one i was like this probably maybe could have been a duology um and expanded on a lot of things um so race the sands was better but this was by no means bad i think it's like a three and a half yeah three and a half out of five stars i also picked up namesake by adrienne young i liked the first book fable a little bit better um i feel like i struggled a little bit more with this but it's a traditional y.a fantasy traditional adrian young stuff then i read the rise of kaioshi by fce i feel like this is a book that i didn't watch the rest of the series because i hadn't read this book yet of the avatar the last airbender cartoons i'm sure i've watched the majority of it just by osmosis because my brothers used to watch it all the time when we were growing up um so i'd always see it um but i feel like this is a book that you would more appreciate it is definitely a novel a novelization for people of for fans of the original show so i feel like this is one that i would probably want to give a reread once i have finally finished watching the animated show and we're not going gonna acknowledge whatever trash netflix is trying to come out with we don't acknowledge that then i read the duke the lady and a baby by vanessa riley finally um [Music] i really like historical romances and just like the whole structure of this really appealed to me but i found myself immensely bored and confused as to what the plot the purpose was some of the scenes i just did ask was like what are we doing here like just maybe we could have edited edited these out or made them more interesting if they are going to come back to be more helpful in the future because right now not digging it and i mentally wandered off an awful lot so unfortunately this book was meh for me it was like a three out of five stars i think and then finally i wrapped up the month doing a re-re-re-reread of the kiss quote by helen wong i absolutely love this book it's a really good um unplugging of my brain sort of book that i can just enjoy um so spotlights worst of the worst of the month there are a couple up there worst of the month or least liked of the month i guess um it's kind of a toss-up i feel like i'm saying that way madness lies because i was so hyped for it um but honestly it was probably oh where'd the book go honestly it was probably burning roses um yeah i don't think it's ever a good sign that you feel bored that a novella is too long most surprising oops most surprising read i'm gonna go with empire sand i don't know quite why i underestimated how much i was going to like this but i really did uh and it slapped me in the face and called me stupid so loved this i gave several books this month 5 out of 5 stars but i feel like it's a big testament to an author that someone could absolutely adore the first two books of a series and absolutely not hate the conclusion so i'm going with bright raven's guys i also really like to bound undone um probably a thousand ships was also up for it as well but something about bright raven sky specifically um maybe i also just want to shove it down the throat of people who haven't read this series because everyone should um but this is a fantastic ending so success is the month of april i i'm pretty sure it happened in april i finally went and saw an ophthalmologist which i've got referred to one and then they call me to make an appointment my eye had cleared up temporarily so i said i don't need it and then with all the coveted it got delayed and i had to get referred again and i finally went so i think it took like six or eight weeks to actually get them to call me to book an appointment but they're able to get me in within like five days and kind of give me a diagnosis for the most part of you have severe dry eye and it was likely just an environmental thing that got exacerbated during the pandemic since it started after the pandemic because you aren't going outside as much and it could just be like you've developed maybe an allergy to something that is also environmental so we're gonna deal with dry eye and see how that goes so i have to take a bunch of eye drops constantly and i'm not allowed to wear my contact lenses so that's fun i'm pretty sure it happened in april but i'm not even 100 sure anymore maybe early may but my glasses frames broke so that was fun and i had to get right after i was told i wasn't allowed to wear contact lenses um i was so i had to get new frames i also bought prescription sunglasses for the first time ever in my life because i was like you know what when i got my eyes checked in last june or july um they said i didn't need new frames if i didn't eat if i didn't want them so i was like cool i like my old frames let's keep those put new lenses in well that turned out really well anyways so it's like cool fine then i'll use the money i was going to use on that and use like most of my insurance payables to get myself prescription sunglasses which i was able to which is awesome um and then basically used up all my insurance for that and then found out that my frames were broken and were not replaceable and i'd have to buy new lenses at the same time too because of the shape of glasses and all that so that was fun i also for the most part kept my together had a few meltdowns uh in april because of lockdown and covid and honestly alberta's just having a bunch of nazis protesting having to wear a mask which is ironic because they seem to like to love where wearing pointy white hats that cover their faces an awful lot um but so that was fun meltdown but since that has happened because i am i'm turning 29 i will be 29 the day after i think this video goes up um i have been too young and too healthy and not fat enough to qualify for vaccines in alberta um finally though on monday so the day before this goes up um i get to fight the 13 year olds for vaccines appointments so nothing else major happened really i'm healthy my dogs are still healthy my mother's healthy my sister and my sister oh my mom got the covered vaccine that was a cool update well i don't know she had the first dose she's in ontario which has been uh i dare you if you haven't looked already go on social media and try and see how ontario's coordinating the vaccine roll up because it's bonkers um but yeah i think that's it i think that was everything that happened in the month of april oh i binged the shadow and bone that was that was my accomplishment in a single day i watched shadow and bone one and a half times i stayed up until i don't remember was it three or four o'clock watched the first four episodes and then i finally fell asleep because i couldn't stay up anymore um and then i woke up and then i watched the last four yeah it was four took the dogs out chilled for you know cleaned up or whatever for a day and then just started re-watching it again because then barnes yeah i hope it gets renewed for at least another two seasons so they can finish the trilogy and i'm curious to see what will happen if they want to after that expand and blow out the six of crows duology and how that'll look if they'll make it a new show it'll be a spin-off if what'll happen if we'll do something with king of scars i don't know either way that was my month what did you read in the month did you watch the adaptation um have you gotten the vaccine yet um i don't know who else is there yeah that's everything i'll link all of my social media stuff down below um if you follow me i'll follow you back unless you have a super sketchy account and have a wonderful rest of your day have a good tuesday why do i revert to jenna marbles at the ending of my every wow oh my god we got through this whole video i don't think watson snored wow wow

Channel: Sassenach the Book Wizard

Views: 229

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: sassenach, book, wizard, booktube, 2021, april, wrap up, end of month

Id: 9VvknySMzVw

Length: 25min 47sec (1547 seconds)

Published: Tue May 11 2021