November Wrap Up!! (new favs + emotional reads)

guys it's regan and welcome back to another video today i'm gonna be chatting through my november wrap up and now for the month of november i had a really grand plan by no means do i think i failed i did read six books which for me i think is like a solid number of books read but i will say the tale end of my month did get taken over a bit by the holidays in bts so i did not get to all of the books i wanted to this month nonetheless i did read some really fantastic stories in particular i started a new series which i am all in on and very excited to talk to you guys about today so without further ado let's go ahead and dive right in the first book i completed this month was the great hunt by robert jordan and this of course is book two to the wheel of time i continued my wheel of time read this month in preparation for the show release which is out now and i have been watching and enjoying the second book also introduced me to the wheel of time audiobooks which i kind of listened and read i swapped back and forth and i have to say i really enjoyed the audiobook experience not only are there two different narrators they swap back and forth depending on if it's a more female-led perspective chapters or male-led not to mention they also do a variety of different voices they just make the listening experience very fresh and easy to follow along despite the fact that there are so many different names and characters to keep track of it was also really helpful for me as someone who is terrible at pronouncing things i do feel like between the show and the audiobook i have a much better handle on how to pronounce many of the names and places within this story so big shout out to that but i would say if you are looking to read the wheel of time i would highly recommend checking out the audiobook i was able to grab my copy from my local library so in general i just highly recommend but more about book two the great hunt itself i would say the great hunt essentially takes place almost immediately after the events of the first one it is another classic quest structured fantasy story and we are still following our cast and crew of characters we met in the first book the story is kind of structured in two main quests the first one we are following rand matt and paren as they're going off on this great hunt to try to find this mythical artifact in hopes of using it to fight against the dark one and his rising power fight against his various minions both monster and human and within the second questline we are following more closely naive and a queen as they're traveling with more moraine and other members of the i sedai traveling to kind of the seat of power of this magical group their particular chapters were my favorite within the great hunt i really loved learning not only more about the i said i and how the magic system worked further but also just naive has been completely cemented as my favorite character so far in the series i love all of her scenes i love all of her dialogue i just think she's honestly hilarious like so often i would be listening or reading her chapters and just laughing out loud so many of her comebacks and just her overall curiosity but also her suspicion to the eyes to die and just everyone around her i find to be very commendable structurally the story i would say is pretty similar to the first one following all these characters kind of thrown headfirst into their destiny and into this world all of them are kind of coming from this small remote town and in the very first book they're basically attacked by these creatures from the dark one called trollix and from there they basically have to escape and also try to learn more about their own powers also prevent the rise of the dark one himself rand i would say is kind of centrally our main character he's a very reluctant hero he's not really interested in being the chosen one all the ladies have the hots for him everyone is like are you a prince and he's like no i'm a shepherd he's endearing and i find his bumbling honestly pretty adorable and seeing him interact with matt and parent as well i think they're wonderful sort of sidekick and seeing these close friends kind of work through some turbulence in their friendship after the events of the first one and the continuing events of the second one i felt like was a good dimension that robert jordan added to the story i find all the characters within this series to be very very likable they're young and they're just like trying their best and the story itself i find to be very approachable the writing is very engaging and again very classic sort of fantasy feel which i find to be very very fun learning more about the magic system and the history and the past of this world is always my favorite part and i'm really looking forward to learning more about the wheel of time fate and destiny and all of that kind of wrapped up within our characters as i said about the first one while i really enjoyed the plot i do feel like elements of it are a tad bit predictable and i think the particular issue i have with robert jordan is that things sort of wrap up very quickly at the end it's like we have so much time and so many things are fleshed out throughout this story but then boom it ends and you're kind of left of it with whiplash and i would say two things happen a little conveniently at times other times where just like characters conveniently run into each other once again obviously i know the wheel of time is constantly working and characters almost by fate and destiny brought back together but for me that doesn't totally excuse some of the more convenient run-ins some of our characters have that being said i really enjoyed the great hunt i do feel like it was a great continuation off of the first book which is the eye of the world i love the characters even more i'm really invested in the story and i'm looking forward to reading the third book very very soon and i would give this second novel a 3.5 or 3.75 out of 5 stars they're just really charming i think is what i would say which is not what i expected in picking this book up but it feels super charming and i wish i read these growing up because i feel like i would absolutely love them not that i'm not loving them but you know what i mean but this was the first book i read in the month of november from there i was craving some space action so i picked up taliban's war by james s a corey which is actually a pen name for two authors which i did not know so thank you to everyone for letting me know that fact i found that to be very interesting but this is book two to the expanse series i read leviathan wakes last month and flew through it it was just an explosive plot forward space opera series that i needed i could just not put it down i was propelled through the book i hadn't read a book so quickly in a very long time i was very inclined to continue with the series and see if i would be just as invested in the book two plot as i was with the book one and i'm happy to say i was this was another book i just could not put down and in fact i actually feel like i liked this one even more than the first one i felt like with the first one i loved the plot but i wouldn't say i was super drawn to the characters um but with book two we were introduced to some new perspectives two characters in fact that quickly became my favorite characters within this entire series and i'm so looking forward to reading more from them throughout later books in this world but yes i just feel like this had plot and character so had everything to offer but if you're not familiar the expanse series is a space opera story and in the first one a variety of events occur that basically spark outright war within the planetary system one of the characters we follow is holden and he is a ship captain and he basically stumbles upon a scientific military secret that people have killed for in the past and will continue to do so in the future and again this kind of acts as a spark bringing about war between earth mars as well as the system of space stations called the belts the second book basically opens the following holden and we kind of actually jump to a new planet in station and there seems to be some after effects of the thing that was found in the first book happening again here there is an unusual monster there's also another armed conflict between earth and mars and very quickly the situation begins to escalate between these two interplanetary governments what i feel like james essay corey really likes to do is create two different sort of main story lines one a larger multi-government war political level conflict that's kind of macro in scope as well as a more micro level conflict that's impacted by these macro problems that are happening within this system the micro level conflict focuses more on holden's chapters as we follow a father trying to locate his lost daughter within the system and he basically hires holden to help him do so and this particular mystery has also become very publicly famous and then the macro level conflict i would say has to be my favorite part of this book the macro level conflict follows our two new perspectives the first is bobby who is a martian marine and she finds herself first in the beginning of the story on the battlefield itself but somehow transported from what she knows and what she's very skilled at to the un hired by a very powerful earth politician named ava solara both of these women obviously have incredibly different skill sets um i think that's very clear one is a marine and one is a very seasoned politician but they're working together to basically crack open a conspiracy involving both of their governments their chapters are just the best not only is their dynamic hilarious but also just kind of seeing both of them depend on each other in different ways as well as just the component of a more political arena within the story i thought was just very cool to see unfold we obviously still have a lot of space fights lots of combat we're traveling all over the place but to have a level of diplomats and politician also kind of scheming behind the scenes that was a really great element added within this story of course all the story lines do begin to blur and blend together as the plot begins to spiral out of control this continues to be absolutely breakneck in terms of its pacing i'm just fully fascinated by this world i really enjoyed the characters again a lot more in this one so overall i would say this book i did prefer over leviathan wakes and i'm very excited to see how this story continues to expand as i just don't know how they continue to top themselves in terms of keeping me engaged by the plot things are just wild from page one and it's just a lot of fun to read and i would give this book a 4.5 or 5 stars next up i wanted to read a bit more of a fantastical historical fiction option and so i grabbed the night tiger by yongshi chu i was really looking forward to picking this book up as i read the ghost bride by this author earlier this year and really enjoyed it and this is another historical fiction fantasy novel set in malaysia and this one is set in the 1930s and we followed two perspectives within the story the first is jilin and she works as an apprentice dressmaker but she also moonlights as a dance hall girl to help pay off her mother's mahjong debts she comes from a very controlling family her stepfather particularly has a lot of control over her life in the decisions she gets to make so her dancehall girl employment is very much a secret at the beginning of the story one of her patrons leaves her a very gruesome souvenir and that is a finger the other character we follow is ren and he is a young 11 year old houseboy and at the beginning of the story his previous master who was a doctor passed away and he promised his master to basically reunite his severed finger with his dead body and he only has 49 days to do so or his master sphere will be forced to roam the earth forever and we follow ren as he travels from his previous town to a new one and begins working in the employment of a new doctor and as the days relentlessly tick by both ren and jilin's life begin to become intertwined and very unexpected ways that have to do with kind of the spirit realm in ghosts as well as the town itself begin to experience murders that seem to be tied to tiger attacks i really enjoyed aspects of the story first and foremost i love yongshichu's writing i just find how she pieces together stories to be so beautiful i also really enjoyed the 1930s malaysian setting yongshi does this really amazing thing where she combines elements of real history and real historical influence with elements of folklore and superstition and stories and they become so intertwined it just creates such a stunning story to read combination of the 1930s setting from the fashion to the dance hall as well as the different cultural influences of this particular setting just absolutely shined within this story including the sort of tiger werewolf superstition that was included within this book i also really enjoyed reading from ren and jilin's points of view they were very likable characters they're very rootable characters and both of them were on their own personal journeys that very much felt like individual coming-of-age tales for both of them as they try to seize their own lives for themselves there was also a heavy component of medicine hospitals and just the medical field in general was definitely a large plot element and setting of this book which i thought was pretty cool and this combination of like modern scientific advancements in medicine in combination with these sort of stories from the past i will say there were some elements of the story that kind of pulled me out of it for one i would say the romance kind of caught me a bit off guard i just want to be forthright and say it is a stepbrother stepsister romance i do feel like it is tied to a very specific folklore story so for that i can kind of overlook it but the element i did not appreciate was sort of the possessiveness and the jealousy and the controlling nature of some aspects of the relationship so that was more of the red flag for me personally i do feel like the story itself was very very engaging but it did sort of drag at some points within the middle but i found the overall mystery to be one that i enjoyed reading and trying to uncover myself um all in all i would say i enjoyed this book i didn't like it as much as the ghost bride but i would still really recommend it it had youngshi choose beautiful writing it had a wonderful and very captivating historical setting i can't wait to read more books by this writer because i just know i will love them but i will say there were a few moments that i was a little surprised by nonetheless i would say i liked this book and i would give it a three star the next book i read is the start to a new series i could not be more excited to have begun my journey on because i have to say i really liked this first book it's kind of a hard one to describe but from what i encountered of it it's just i feel like i'm going to be a big fan and that is the blade itself by joe abercrombie the first book to the first love trilogy which is a grim dark fantasy series i really enjoyed this book i will say it's incredibly hard to kind of talk about it because it is so character focused and i know that's what everyone says when they talk about this series so i will truly try my best but what i mean by that is it's kind of slow moving when it comes to plot but it's not that there wasn't a plot what joe abercrombie basically does is he sort of just drops you into all of these different characters lives into their perspectives from no real like specific starting point um and you kind of work your way through the story and i would say by the end not only are you attached to a lot of these characters very much um i am a big fan of so many different uh characters within this fantasy world that i wouldn't expect myself to love so much but by the end you basically have an overview of the chessboard that you're going to be working off of for the rest of the series first one is really just about setting the characters up and kind of getting them into the places they need to be for the rest of the plot to unfold there wasn't an incredible amount of world building there were some and i feel like it was purposeful and how it was kind of just slowly letting you in on something sort of dropping things as you moved along like little breadcrumbs but this was really primarily just kind of introducing you to all of these different perspectives and watching them kind of go about their day doing their thing and you slowly just became very attached to them in ways you would have never guessed but to give you a bit more context i would say this is a six point of view book but i would say for the first one at least there are three main characters with three kind of very important supporting characters that surround them we have logan who is from a land to the north and he was a part of a very powerful sort of warrior group that he has left at the very beginning of the story he's kind of listless he doesn't have a specific goal in mind but at the beginning of this book he basically decides to travel south and find a magi and he does that and he just begins to follow this magi around within this story through his point of view you kind of begin to see glimpses of his past i would say all of these characters backstories are kind of murky and i think that's done on purpose but you slowly begin to see what happened to logan in the past and begin to sort of understand his motivations for the present but he's just a big powerful warrior who does not speak much and is just kind of interested in uh you know seeing where life takes them next the next character you follow is galocta who i would say is my favorite character if you ask me going into this book if i would be really into reading about a guy who likes to torture people i would be surprised but listen glocta i just think is such a fascinating character for so many different reasons he is an inquisitor and he is part of this land to the south and it is a land that's kind of fighting this sort of tension between landed aristocrats and the up-and-coming powerful merchant class and glocka is kind of at the middle of this and he is part of the inquisition and he's basically investigating a slew of different people for other powerful people to basically prevent other people from gaining too much power if that makes sense and he's basically just trying to maneuver himself into a powerful position himself glocta was once a soldier but he was captured in the previous war and tortured which has left him with a lot of different lingering medical issues because of this he's kind of pivoted his point of view and what he wants to do with his life and that is i guess to become politically powerful in an unusual back alley way i find lacta to be charming in his own way and i just appreciate his intensity as well as just his tenacity i suppose to get what he wants his chapters also tend to be very politically heavy which i like as well as very dialogue heavy because he loves to make people uncomfortable and i find his chapters to be just very very engaging and then the last sort of main character chapter we follow is giselle and he is a good-looking military officer who is training for a sword competition he's kind of useless he's kind of terrible he gambles he drinks he's a womanizer he thinks way too highly of himself but like oddly a little bit charming and we basically follow him as he prepares for this competition you would think all of these characters have nothing in common and you would be right but their storylines and their paths slowly begin to intersect throughout the course of the story and you slowly begin to understand all of these characters a bit more and more as you read this book speaking more largely to the fantasy world i think why this book is really successful especially with it being so character-led is that it is grim dark meaning all of the characters are reading from are very morally gray which makes them incredibly unpredictable i do not know um in many different like decision points within this plot what these characters are going to do because it's not like they're the typical hero we're kind of defying a lot of different tropes that we encounter often in fantasy with this cast and crew kind of seeing how they're going to play out in some of the political events that joe abercrombie slowly put together for us by the end of this book i'm very much looking forward to in books two and three we're going to have war we're going to have quests going to have political conflict between i think three different kingdoms i'm hoping that the next two books have a bit more world building not that i feel like it needed to be in this i'm just curious about the world itself this book is gruesome this book is bloody this book is unusual in kind of its structure but i personally really really appreciate it and i feel like it was really refreshing i'm also trying to get my hands on the audiobooks as i've heard excellent things about them from you guys i really loved this i honestly would give this 5 out of 5 stars i just feel like it is so good like it's dark it's weird i'm here for it i want to know more glock does my fave i don't know the next book i was able to complete was a very anticipated read for me and that is under the whispering door by tj cloon i read the house on the cerulean sea by tj clune last year and loved it so i was very much looking forward to a new fantastical emotional heartwarming read by this author and overall i would say this definitely delivered that right off the bat i would say i did not like this book as much as the house on the cerulean sea but that is also just one of my favorite books so i feel like it's very hard to top that but i did find this book to be very enjoyable and engaging but a bit more about the book itself we follow our main character wallace and he in life was a grumpy hard difficult not very likable person and at the beginning of this book we basically find wallace at his own funeral and he's beginning to suspect that he is dead and he quickly realizes that yes he must be dead when he meets a grim reaper named may and he's brought to a very unusual tea shop owned by a man named hugo and there he basically begins to reflect look back on his life kind of have a second chance in life after death if you will i would say for anyone who's curious about this book do not read the synopsis basically past the first two paragraphs i do feel like it gives a little bit too much away without maybe meaning to but this is a really charming story truly about wallace in death as a ghost allowing himself to sort of open up and change as a person because honestly it's never too late to get a new outlook on life this has a wonderful and very lovable found family component as we follow wallace hugo may and nelson as well as apollo within this very adorable and quirky tea house this tea house also straddles both the living and the dead as hugo basically works to help shepherd ghosts into the afterlife but he also serves very alive customers as well i will say i do want to give a trigger warning as this book does dive really deeply into topics such as mourning and death and grieving and those are incredibly central to the plot itself i do feel like tj clune sort of featured and discussed all of those topics with a lot of empathy this is a story that really is trying to pull out your heartstrings it will make you cry but it's also kind and funny as well i always describe this author's works as they kind of remind me of wes anderson movies they're very very colorful they're very quirky but they also have a lot of heart kind of behind the scenes and you quickly just fall in love with everyone within this book overall if you want a very touching story about life and death and moving on in grief and just kind of like finding love in unexpected ways and places this is a very good book to pick up again incredibly charming i would give it a 4 out of 5 stars i didn't enjoy it as much as the house on the cerulean sea but i still really loved it quite a bit and would highly recommend it the very last book i read in the month of november was the girl who circumnavigated fairyland in a ship of her own making by catherine m valente and this was a reread for me and i'm happy to report this book still absolutely rocks i loved this story if you like whimsical middle grade like you have to pick this book up this is just some of the most well done hilarious just fun and also like very very thoughtful middle grade books i have just ever read and i just loved every single second of it this follows our main character september and she longs for adventure so when she's invited to fairyland by the green wind in a leopard she decides to jump at the chance but once she arrives in fairyland she quickly realizes that it's a bit more sinister than she realized initially and now she kind of has to go on a quest across fairyland to help save a lot of her new friends that she's been making along the way i just writing in the imagination of the story is just so so good i also just love the plot again we follow september as she arrives in fairyland and there are so many quirky rules and regulations the main sort of villain within the story is the marquis i think that's how you say it and she's basically a ruling body within fairyland and she's putting in place all different types of rules and is controlling fairyland with an iron fist and we follow september as she confronts this meets new friends one a book loving dragon and an almost human boy named saturday and they basically tried to vanquish this evil marquess and restore order in fairyland this book is just delightful the writing the thoughtfulness just the unusualness of the story just for me it's just so fun to read i love sort of richly imaginative middle grade sort of quest stories and this fits the bill to the t it's just fun i really want to read the second one hopefully next month and i also want to check out the audiobook but if you're looking for just a great middle grade quirky adventure story this is the book for you if you love fairy tales if you love imagination this is it i gave this book 5 out of 5 stars alrighty guys that is my november wrap up please let me know down below some books you've read recently as i would love to know and i will see you soon with another video soon goodbye

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Id: 2_HRJB32AW4

Length: 25min 4sec (1504 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 02 2021