Wednesday 2 March 2016

2016 Reading Challenge - February

This month was not as productive as the last for reading since I didn't have a concussion so I was slightly more busy.  As of the 28th I've only completed two books and unless I spend the next 24 hours straight reading I expect the month will end that way.  The books I completed are Robert Galbraith's (aka JK Rowling) debut detective novel The Cuckoo's Calling and Grace Helbig's tongue-in-cheek style guide Grace & Style: The Art of Pretending You Have It.  The book of the month for me this month was The Cuckoo's Calling, and I now only have 25 books to go to complete the challenge.



The Cuckoo's Calling - Robert Galbraith
This novel has been my favourite book I've read so far this year.  The novel introduces down-on-his-luck detective Cormoran Strike a former military investigator who lost part of his leg in Afghanistan and now works as a private investigator.  We're introduced to Cormoran through Robin, a young, recently engaged woman who has been hired through a temp agency to work as a receptionist for the private investigator.  Although Robin was originally only meant to stay for a week she quickly becomes a kind of partner for Strike throughout the course of the case.  On the same day that Robin starts working for Strike he is hired by John Bristow to investigate the death of his sister, and famous model, Lula Landry.  The original investigators have ruled her death a suicide but her brother is convinced she was murdered.

I was (like everyone else) intrigued to read this book when I found out that it was written by JK Rowling.  I read a few reviews on GoodReads where people said that they didn't like her writing style when she was writing for adults but for me it's one of the things that I enjoyed most about the novel.  Rowling creates these characters that feel very real through her descriptions of them and through their flaws and although the book was long it was very easy and I loved reading it to the point where I was carrying it with me wherever I went in case I had a spare second to read.  I really enjoyed this book and I've added the next two Robert Galbraith books to my reading list.

Grace & Style: The Art of Pretending You Have It - Grace Helbig
In many ways I feel like Grace Helbig just gets me.  I don't know if it's her preference for giraffes (my favourite animal),  her honesty about her underlying anxiety, or her love for sweatpants (my favourite type of pants).  This is the first 'YouTube' book that I've bought since it was more than just an autobiography and I was interested to see what someone who seemed to have a similar view and relationship with fashion and beauty that I do (although she is a lot funnier and better at expressing herself).

The book includes some personal stories and favourites, some random and silly sections, and a recurring story about a pair of sweatpants going off to college called "The Sweatpants Diaries."  The personal stories and favourites were probably my favourite part of the book because I felt I could relate to them and I am a nosy person and I love to know what other people have in their makeup bags etc.  As someone who wrote a short story called "The Land of Lost Socks" in elementary school I was able to appreciate the personification of clothing in "The Sweatpants Diaries" and in general I just thought it was fun.  Some of the more silly parts were very reminiscent of one of her videos but I'm not sure if they translated as well on paper.  I think that if you like Grace Helbig and you enjoy her videos and sense of humour you will have fun reading this book, I know I did.

No comments:

Post a Comment