The 5 Stages Of A Reading Slump

The two words that send fear into a blogger's heart, that makes them weep while looking at their growing TBR piles.....those two words? Reading Slump. 

It is something most readers and bloggers will experience at some point, I have encountered it many times this year alone, but it is something that you can and will get over.....eventually! 


Here are the 5 common stages of a reading slump: 


Stage 1) DENIAL 

This is the stage where you may be starting a new book but you can't get into it so you pick up another and its the same again. 

What? I'm not in a reading slump....no way 

*tries unsuccessfully to begin fifteen different novels and fails*

Stage 2)  NOLSTALGIA

Hey remember that time you weren't in a reading slump? Yeah, good times. 

At this stage you think about the books you've read previously or that one book you just finished that was so good it has put  you into this reading slump because you. cannot. stop. thinking. about. it! 

Stage 3) OTHER ENTERTAINMENT SOURCES

At this stage you remember all those TV shows you used to watch before you used that time for reading. 

Movie Review: Mockingjay Part 2

So you may or may not know, that The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins is one of my favourite book series of all time. It is also the first dystopian series I read.

I also am a big fan of the film adaptations and feel they have been done well. Usually I'm so hesitant about book to movie adaptations because I think all book lovers have felt the pain of having their favourite book turned into an awful movie.

In terms of Mockingjay Part 2, I left the cinema thinking of just how well the movie portrayed the book and stayed so true to the book. I absolutely loved the movie and I think if I had to rank the film series from least favourite to favourite, it would read;

1. The Hunger Games
2. Mockingjay Part 1
3. Catching Fire
4. Mockingjay Part 2

So lets talk a little about what I felt about the movie. 

First off, let me apologise if this review reads as being a little disjointed. I just have too many feels about this movie to organise my thoughts! 

Okay so one of the scenes I really enjoyed because it was so action packed was when the "star squad" aka squad 451 went to the Capital. The scene when they were in that courtyard and the pods went off....oh my god so intense. I loved how they portrayed the pods in the movie.

  I also loved the relationship between Finnick and Peeta in this film, the constant checking he was fine and talking to him and reassuring him. Honestly Finnick is the best kind of person. I also was somewhat sad the film did not fully show the friendship that grows between Johanna and Katniss.

Dept Con 1 | Event chat & Haul

Dept Con 1 was something myself and my friend Cooleen (Youtube Channel) had been looking forward to since it was announced back in August. 

Dept Con is a book convention organised and ran by the Easons and Department 51 (the YA side of Easons) staff  and head children's and YA book buyer Dave O' Callaghan. The convention took place over two days in Smock Alley Theatre. 

The convention featured 26 speakers and authors along with signings, a YA breakfast and plenty of other fun things!

The authors featured at the event included: 

Books I got signed: 

 Over the course of the Con, I mostly tweeted my reaction to all the bookish awesome-ness (@Shannonbookworm) 


Day One: 

On the first day of the event, the con kicked off at 3pm and ended at 10pm.

Panels on the first day included discussions on "The World of YA & How it is Perceived & Represented by Hollywood" which Jenny Downham, Sally Green & Patrick Ness discussed YA adaptations and Patrick Ness' upcoming A Monster Calls adaptation (Review) . 

The next panel was on the topic of "LGBT* in YA Panel" held by James Dawson, Cat Clarke, Deirdre Sullivan and David Maybury . This was one of my favourite panels of the day as I felt that all the topics raised such as representation of LGBT main characters in YA and discussion on whether "Gay YA" was a trend in YA lit (the answer was an obvious no). 


The "Future of YA & Its Audience (Adult readers vs Teens) panel was hosted by Holly Bourne, Sheena Wilkinson and Julia Bell which talked about the new stat released that 55% of YA book buyers are aged between 30 - 44, and whether an author should write with their reader in mind or focus on the story. 

The final panel of day two was a great panel which featured Holly Smale and Louise O'Neill (Review) on the topic of "Death to the patriarchy!" and feminism in YA. I loved this panel and the discussions on abusive relationships being shown as the norm in YA and the representation of women in YA. Such a great panel and a wonderful way to end the first day. 

YA Tropes I'm Sick of Reading

Hello readers!

So I'm back today with a post that I feel a lot of you may relate to.

So being a blogger and having a love of books means that I get to read a lot of books and, even better, talk about them with other people who love books!

Although I love reading, I can't help but notice a that there are few tropes that are repeated through out YA literature often. Sometimes, although a novel contains one or two of these tropes, it can still be enjoyable as the author may be taking a different spin on it.

 Unfortunately, and too often, novels that contain a lot of these tropes can put me off reading them as I find these recycled themes boring and sometimes frustrating.

Reading these tropes can sometimes leave me feeling like this:

So here is a few of my most loathed YA literature tropes: 

1)  The Love Triangle

The love triangle is an extremely common trope in YA fiction. This trope can sometimes be executed well but most of the time it goes something along the lines of  "Protagonist (usually female) has been described as incredibly plain looking then falls for super hot boy who all of a sudden lusts after her while her male best friend from her childhood has suddenly declared he is in love with her" or something similar. 

I honestly find this so incredibly boring and feel it is so unrealistic. How can the protagonist be so indecisive about who she loves? Why are the protagonists in the center of this love triangle always described as plain? Why is always women in the center of a love triangle and not a man? Why does every story need romance?