First Lines Friday #23!

It’s back baby!! It’s been a little while since I’ve posted one of these so I thought I would bring it back again!

It’s time for another First Lines Friday! Hosted by Wandering Words!!

What if, instead of judging a book by its cover or its author, we judged the book by its opening lines?

Here is how it works:

– Pick a book and open to the first page.

– Copy the first few lines without revealing which book it is.

– Reveal the book!

So… do these first lines entice you?

Jan 30, afternoon (hour of the monkey)

• dumped by boyfriend last night
• horrendous fight with mom this morning
• forgot about math test this afternoon

<screen goes wavy– cue FLASHBACK sounds f/x for scene from our heroine’s morning, ornin, rnin…>

Scroll down to reveal the book!

One of the books I mentioned in my haul yesterday! This is a book that I wanted to read when I was like 13, and I’ve only just been able to get my mitts on book 1 so I’m really excited to finally get to this! Because it’s been a few years, I’m not expecting this to be 5 stars, but I am hoping that it’ll be fun! Have you heard of it before?

A Sky Painted Gold

A Sky Painted Gold is released today! (5th July 2018) and I urge you to pick it up! I nabbed an ARC at the NYALitFest purely based on the pretty cover, of which the final copy ended up being even more stunning! See my bookstagram pic for the ARC cover.

This book is a coming of age story based around a teenage girl in the late 1920s, in the UK, who feels like she is a meer shadow of her sister. As her sister gets engaged she feels like they are drifting further apart and withdraws into herself, not knowing who she is alone. In withdrawing she ends up escaping frequently to the abandoned house, left by a rich brother and sister after their father passed away. This is, until the siblings return to the house.

Lou manages to get herself tangled up in the 1920s party scene, and is fully enjoying herself. However, her family keep reminding her that this is unlikely to last, and Lou has no delusions of this. This bittersweet reality nags at her and alters her actions and her perception of those around her.

This is an absolutely lovely book, and it has made me want to read more literature based in this era as it was so enjoyable. Lou is relatable and very realistic, and the other characters all seem to have an etheral and “above it all” feeling to them which is very appropriate for the storyline. Laura Wood does use the cliche of “releasing a breath she didn’t know she had taken”, which did take me out of the story a little. However, other than that I can’t really find any faults to the story. I have rated it 4/5 on Goodreads but I can’t really think of a reason that it doesn’t have 5* from me. Possible I will change that in the future after more deliberation.

This is such a unique and engrossing story and I would absolutely love to return to these characters. I’ll be picking up Laura Wood’s next release for sure!

Book Launch! May by Naomi Kruger

A lecturer at my University (The University of Central Lancashire) has recently published a book! She is the lecturer of one of my friends (as I didn’t do a book related degree) so we decided to go along and support her at her book launch!

Click here for the Goodreads page for this book!

I and Ash headed along to our local Waterstones in Preston, they had set up some wine, juice and nibbles for us to enjoy!

Naomi read out part of her book to us, which focuses on the memory loss of an older woman and how this affects the lives of those around her, from multiple points of view.

The excerpt was so interesting and definitely piqued my interest. Sadly, as expected from a Uni student, I couldn’t afford to buy the book. It has such a beautiful cover and the concept is really interesting to me, and from what I have heard from those who have already read it, it’s done very well.

If this book sounds like something you would be interested in I definitely recommend looking into it. Naomi is an amazing lecturer who really helped my friend to improve her writing style, as well as being a lovely woman. This book looks like it is such a good read and I can’t wait to be able to afford to buy it and give it a go for myself! If you live in the North West of England this book will spark a lot of recognition for you, with references to many areas in and around Lancashire. It’s nice to see a book set somewhere within the North of England, as so many books are set much closer to London. Northern Pride!