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If We Were Having Coffee: A Week of Writing Fiction

If We Were Having Coffee 01

Hello everyone! I hope you’ve been having a wonderful week and an even better weekend. I’m sorry I didn’t do a coffee post last weekend. I did the Great Strides walk with my best friend last weekend, but I also just didn’t have too much to talk about. But that’s okay, because I have more things this week for you to make up for it.

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that the Great Strides walk I went on last Saturday was quite a bit of fun. It’s the second time I’ve done this walk with my best friend, and I’m glad I could make it. I was a little worried at first because the weather was calling for rain, but luckily it didn’t rain at all when we were there so we were good. I really enjoyed doing it though because it really got me walking, which is something I don’t do as often as I need to. But I managed to do okay, considering it was a 3 mile trek and I haven’t walked like this since I’ve been away from work. I also managed to talk to one of Erin’s dear friends while doing this walk because Erin and her husband were busy managing their son. He walked with me the whole time and we just talked about all sorts of stuff. It was just nice having the company, having someone there to keep you going until you completed the 3 miles.

Last weekend was also Mother’s Day too so I spent my Friday cleaning the house for my Mom while she was away at work. I couldn’t think of anything in particular to get her (which quite frankly, wouldn’t have been enough anyway, because my Mom has done so much for me and my sister), but I figured having her come home to an already clean house would be a nice gesture. It meant she would have one less thing to do, and it would allow her to just spend the weekend relaxing if she wanted to. I also bought her dinner Saturday night too at our favorite Mexican restaurant, and we rented two movies: Patriot’s Day and Star Wars: Rogue One. Originally we were going to eat dinner then go see a movie, but none of the movies in the theatres that day were anything either of us wanted to see. So we just figured renting some movies for at home would be better. And it was, because both the films we rented were great.

Star Wars Rogue One Darth Vader

What I enjoyed about Patriot’s Day was how true it stuck to the real events that transpired with regards to the Boston Marathon bombing. I also liked it because it felt real personal. Besides having family members who lived in Boston around the time it happened, I felt like it was just a great film showcasing the real life of those who the bombing really affected. Especially near the end when they showed interview clips from some of the survivors and the police officers who handled the case. What I enjoyed about Star Wars: Rogue One was the characters, and how the storyline connected with the rest of the Star Wars series. Though the ending caught me completely off guard and mad me sad, I felt like it was a good side film that could hint at what could come in the rest of the series.

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you I’ve gotten a lot of writing done this week. I made the decision to write a post about journaling, because it’s something I’ve been doing since middle school. It’s also something I think every writer should do so I wanted to talk about how keeping a journal has benefited my life. I also have this story I’ve been working on since middle school too that I hope to one day get published into a book so I was working on that one day during the week. I’m planning on working on it some more once I get the chance because it’s a project I seriously want to complete. I’ve also completed another Flash Fiction Challenge, which I also think has some serious potential of becoming a novel. It’s a story I started working on that I believe is going to take a while to complete, but once it’s done could be a really good piece. I don’t know yet necessarily if that’s something I’m really going to do with it, but I’m just going to wait and see how far I can get with it at least before I make that call. I’m also going to be doing another guest writer post for my friend Lesley. So look out for that in the next couple weeks whenever it comes out.

Gardenscapes App Game

I’ve also been playing a couple of App games on my phone. In particular, I’ve been playing a game called Gardenscapes, which is a matching level game that allows you to build the outside garden of your dreams. It’s a game I stumbled upon by accident while on Facebook, and I haven’t been able to stop playing it since. Part of it is because it’s such a cute game, and I like the look and feel of it when I play. There’s also just enough of a challenge that makes me come back to it again and again, even when I run out of lives. I don’t know how else to explain it just yet, but I’m considering doing a review of it in the near future. I know I’ve definitely been playing it enough that I could. Plus, I haven’t done any video game reviews in a really long time.  I don’t know, I guess I’ll just wait and see.

I also recently started and finished this book called The Shotgun Arcana this week. It’s a book that’s equal parts western, fantasy, and historical. But it was a really enjoyable book, so be sure to see my book review for it this upcoming week.

Next weekend, you probably won’t be seeing one of these posts because my sister is coming home this Memorial Day weekend, and her boyfriend will be coming too. So we’ll be spending some time together and I’ll get to meet her boyfriend for the first time. But either way, that’s really all I have to say for now. How’ve you all been doing? Did you all have a wonderful week too?

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Book Review: Wintergirls

Rating: 2 stars

“Dead girl walking”, the boys say in the halls.

“Tell us your secret”, the girls whisper, one toilet to another.

I am that girl.

I am the space between my thighs, daylight shining through.

I am the bones they want, wired on a porcelain frame.

Lia and Cassie are best friends, wintergirls frozen in matchstick bodies, competitors in a deadly contest to see who can be the skinniest. But what comes after size zero and size double-zero? When Cassie succumbs to the demons within, Lia feels she is being haunted by her friend’s restless spirit.

Laurie Halse Anderson explores Lia’s descent into the powerful vortex of anorexia, and her painful path toward recovery.

I didn’t like this story as much as I’d hoped. Lia’s story of battling anorexia is intense. But the writing and characters made it difficult to enjoy, and I’ll tell you why shortly.

First, I’ll tell you what I do like about Wintergirls. It’s an interesting story about a girl named Lia. Dealing with issues of her own, Lia looses her best friend Cassie who she hasn’t talked to in a long time. As she’s dealing with this loss, Lia continues pushing herself to be skinner until she realizes she needs help. While this is going on, Lia gets regular visits from Cassie’s ghost who wants Lia to join her in the in-between. What I like about the story is seeing all of these different elements emerge together. While at times it doesn’t make sense, the way Laurie Halse Anderson brings it all together makes for an interesting read.

I also like that Anderson doesn’t shy away from serious topics. In her novel Speak, which I absolutely love, she talks about rape but does it in a way where you feel like she’s really bringing awareness to the subject. So while this book is definitely not one of my favorites, I appreciate reading a story about a young girl and her struggle with anorexia. I think it’s a good way for people to become really aware of what it’s like to have an eating disorder. I especially like it because you can see it in Lia’s behavior. She’s always aware of the food she eats before she puts it in her mouth. You also see it in the way Lia’s family deals with her eating disorder. They are worried about her well-being throughout that they are keeping track of her weight, hoping to get her back to health again.

What I also like about Wintergirls is the message Anderson is sending her readers. The whole time Lia is struggling with eating, there’s a message she is trying to tell us. The whole story is basically about how you can’t help someone unless they want help, which is a very powerful message. This is apparent with Lia because when her family weighs her, she deceives them by having the scale fixed to be a higher weight than what she truly is. She does this every time without any sign of remorse. Even when the one person she truly cares about finds her in terrible conditions, she doesn’t want help. It isn’t until the end of the book when she almost dies that Lia realizes she wants to live and gets the help she really needs.

I also really like the cover. It looks intriguing, makes me want to read the book and find out what’s going to happen. But it’s also really pretty because it reminds me of the cold, which I don’t mind quite as much as heat.

But there are so many things about this book I didn’t like. For one, the characters are pretty horrible. I feel like there’s no character development with any of them and I had a difficult time sympathizing with them. All of the characters were really flat to me because I couldn’t get any sense of personality from them. For example, Lia is supposedly shy, but Anderson never gives us an example of how she’s shy or anything. I also had a hard time sympathizing with Lia or her parents because of the way they treated each other. Lia’s biological parents are hardly around and when they are, there so focused on work or obsessed with getting Lia to eat. But Lia doesn’t treat them any better either, especially her mother, who seems like she wants to help. The only parental figure in the story I felt any sympathy for was Jennifer because she acted more responsible than even Lia’s father. She’s the one parent in the story I felt any sympathy for because you can tell she cares about Lia and wants to get her back to health. I also hated Lia because she just wasn’t at all likeable to me. I get she has an eating disorder so she’s going to act extremely selfish, but damn. She’s probably one of the most coldest and unfeeling characters I’ve read in a young adult book. I just felt nothing for her but pity and sad because if her character was more developed, I could’ve liked her.

I also had a hard time enjoying Wintergirls because the writing is terrible. There was nothing that kept me reading this book other than hope it would get better. It was a read I made the decision to keep exploring, but there were many times I wanted to stop and not finish, it was that awful of a read for me. The most interesting thing about it to me was reading all of the crossed out words and seeing how Lia kept count of the amount of calories in the food she ate.  I also didn’t like the writing because it didn’t feel clear to me with certain moments what was going on. For example, I didn’t realize Cassie’s spirit was visiting Lia until she mentioned wanting to make sure Cassie’s body was being put into the ground. This story is so poorly written that I’m still surprised I finished reading this book.

The plot of the book is just as bad to me too. One example is Elijah’s character being in the story. I felt like he didn’t add anything important to the plot or played any sort of purpose that made sense to me. He just happened to have a room in the same motel Cassie stayed in when she died and that’s it. He also calls Lia after Cassie’s death, but you never find out why. There also wasn’t any explanation for anything, like how Lia developed her eating disorder. You know she and Cassie made an oath to each other during the New Year, but there’s no explanation of how this started for either of them. My guess is that their friendship sparked these problems, which would make sense to me. There’s so much in the story that isn’t explained it made the story difficult to read.

I know I’m in the minority when I say I dislike this book. I know a lot of people enjoyed reading this from what I saw on GoodReads, but I’m definitely not one of them. I appreciate it talks about anorexia because eating disorders are a topic that needs to be discussed. But there were so many things with the way it was written and the plot that I had a hard time enjoying it. To me, its just not a good read, as unpopular of an opinion that may be.

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Book Review: Seven Minutes in Heaven (The Lying Game #6) 

Rating: 4 stars

Warning: This book review may contain spoilers that are pertinent to the overall plot of the story. Read review at your own discretion. 

My sister wants the truth.

But sometimes the truth hurts.
For months, my long-lost twin, Emma, has been living my life and trying to solve my murder. She’s unearthed dark secrets about my friends, my family, and my tangled past. But when it comes to finding my killer, she keeps running into dead ends.

Until my body shows up in Sabino Canyon. Suddenly everyone knows there are two girls who look like Sutton Mercer – and that one of them is dead. At first the police assume the body is Emma’s. But as questions and accusations start flying, it’s harder than ever for Emma to keep playing me. The truth is bound to come out eventually. And when it does, Emma will be suspect number one in my murder investigation. If she can’t find my killer before time runs out, she’ll end up behind bars… or worse.

This book is my favorite overall in The Lying Game series. I enjoyed it because Shepard really picked up the pace of the story. But she did it in a way that didn’t rush the plot forward and made it enticing enough for me to finish reading within a couple hours from when I started. It was to the point where I couldn’t put this book down until I learned who killed Sutton and why. 

Along with being well-written, it was a very emotional book too. As you follow Emma on her journey to discover her twin’s killer, you as the reader begin to feel like you’re a part of their lives. In many ways, the reader is very similar to Sutton because we are also on the sidelines watching all of this unfold and can’t do anything to help Emma find the killer. But we are just as much a part of her journey as Sutton. We experience everything Emma feels and find ourselves feeling emotionally involved in the story. So when all of the pieces finally come together, you are both happy and sad. Happy because Emma is finally getting answers, but sad because the one person she trusted so much since she came to Tucson turns out to be the person who hurt her the most. You experience her pain when the family she’s come to know and love kick her out because they think she’s responsible for Sutton’s death. You feel sympathetic to Emma because she’s had to work for everything she has and it still isn’t always enough. And these emotions make you want to continue reading to see if Emma gets the happy ending she deserves. 

It turns out the person who killed Sutton is the person I suspected from the beginning. This makes me sad because I was really hoping someone else was involved, not the one person she trusted the most and went to when things got really bad. But there are many reasons why I suspected this character. One of the reasons I suspected Ethan’s involvement was because of his reaction to when Emma told him that she wasn’t Sutton. He didn’t seem as surprised as I’d expect, considering all of the information she confided in him through the short period of time they knew each other. I felt like he just accepted her as she was too easily and by being that way with her, he was able to keep his eye on her to make sure she didn’t slip up. I also felt like he was one of the characters in the story who didn’t have a real solid alibi. In the series, Emma suspects everyone around her until she is able to get an alibi from them. Except she never gets one from Ethan, even when she suspected him when they first met. But she doesn’t question him because of the feelings she had for him. It’s because she trusted him that when she discovers Ethan has a file at the hospital in Cross My Heart, Hope to Die, she asks him about it because she thinks he’ll tell her the truth. This file is one of the things that made me suspect him because it shows there’s something wrong with him even though he’s acting rationally. I also suspected him because she conveniently received those notes from the killer when he wasn’t around. He also manipulated himself into her life very easily, which made me question his intentions when I started reading this series. Then, there’s where she wants to look for clues and every time she does, Ethan tells her what she’s doing is dangerous. You think it’s because he wants to protect Emma from harm. But it turns out that’s far from the truth once Sutton finally has a flashback of her last moments. 

I’m sad Ethan killed Sutton because he and Emma were really great together. As a couple, they seemed perfect. Both of them were outcasts with difficult lives, which was why Emma felt like he understood her. He seemed like a great guy who loved Emma very much and was the only person by her side when things really got rough in the series. He was the person she trusted the most to have her back, but turned out to be the person who did her the most harm. Then again, he was the one person she never suspected while she was searching for clues. But I also enjoyed finding out he was the killer because he played the part very well. Emma never doubted Ethan’s love for her because she cared about him so much that she wanted to protect him from being hurt. But it turned out she was the one who needed protection from him. Even though Ethan being the killer is considered a predictable move, I love it because it makes the series come together perfectly. 

The one thing with Seven Minutes in Heaven  I didn’t like was that it ended. I felt emotional after I finished reading this book because it was finally over for Emma. Her real family now knows who she is and she can finally be herself again. It was also really touching to see the tribute Sutton’s friends did for her at her funeral and I was happy to see Emma get the happy ending she deserved. I just enjoyed it so much that I didn’t want it to be over, especially considering the person who killed her sister. But it’s also nice that she’ll finally have a family of her own. 

As a whole, my rating for The Lying Game series is 3.5 stars. I loved the characters, the plot of the story and all of the suspense behind finding out who killed Sutton. I also enjoyed the supernatural element of Sutton being on the sidelines, experiencing flashbacks about the day of her murder because it added a completely different element to the story. But I felt like the set up of each of the books in the series became predictable. I really disliked that in each book, Emma suspected someone of killing her twin only to discover evidence contrary to her suspicions. Then the person she ends up believing to be her killer in the final book is completely innocent and she doesn’t find out until it’s almost too late for her to help herself. Having the books play out this way almost took out the fun of guessing Sutton’s killer, even though I already knew who the killer was and didn’t realize it. It made it that much easier to eliminate people who were just as capable of killing her, which allowed me to continue following my instincts on who I suspected. 

However, I really enjoyed reading this series and am completely glad I stuck with it. I definitely recommend reading it to those who like reading suspenseful stories and people who enjoy young adult literature as much as I do. I know I’ll definitely be reading it again in the future. 

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Book Review: Cross My Heart, Hope to Die (The Lying Game #5)

Rating: 3 stars

It’s not easy being me.

But my twin sister has no choice.

When I died two months ago, my killer told my twin sister to become me – or else. Now Emma has it down to a T. She tosses her hair with the signature Sutton Mercer flip and can lead a Lying Game prank with the best of them. She’s even repairing my relationship with my adoptive family. The only thing she hasn’t done is solve my murder.

Then our birth mother, the woman who abandoned us, showed up in Tucson. Emma hasn’t seen Becky in twelve years, but Becky recognizes Emma immediately – as Emma. Is it mother’s intuition… or does Becky know I’m already gone?

Out of all of the books in the series so far, I’d have to say this one is my least favorite. Now, it’s not a bad read or anything. I just wasn’t able to immerse myself into it like I could the rest of the books in the series. But before I talk about why I didn’t enjoy this book as much as the rest of the series, I’d like to mention what I did enjoy with Cross My Heart, Hope to Die.

One of the aspects of this series I continue to enjoy is how Shepard develops her characters. In this book in particular, Emma has become close to Sutton’s family. She’s repaired Sutton’s relationship with Laurel to the point where they aren’t arguing anymore. The Mercer family is finally acting like a normal happy family, somewhat. Yes, there are some secrets and lies being told. But they are doing a whole lot better than before. I think the family’s development is important in this book in particular because this book is heavily focused on their family, which is something I do like. When Becky comes to town, you know there’s going to be some trouble. You as the reader just don’t realize how much. 

Along with her character development with regards to Sutton’s family, her friendships also continue to grow and be tested. When Emma allows her twin’s rival to help with a prank, she befriends another person her sister wouldn’t have thought of giving a chance. You’re also introduced to a new girl to the school named Celeste whose character is pretty strange in some ways. She supposedly is very in tune spiritually and warns Emma several times throughout that she’s in serious danger. I really like her character because despite her odd personality, I honestly believe she cares about people even those she’s not friends with. I have a feeling Celeste is going to play a significant role in the final book, though I don’t yet know how that’s going to take shape. 

One of my favorite parts of this book is how it ends. Emma is having a really happy moment with her family when she receives some really bad news, the type of news nobody wants to get. Then the story ends with you wondering how Emma and her family are going to react and how this all plays into what’s going to happen next in the story. I love it because you’re reminded that Sutton’s killer is still out there watching Emma’s every move and that the killer is far from being done with her. 

What I don’t like with Cross My Heart, Hope to Die is that I feel like the plot is really slowing down. Out of all the books in this series, the pace in this book moved too slow for me. It was like Shepard put brakes on this book so that the story wouldn’t move too far along. I didn’t like it because it made me not want to finish this book, even though I really want to know how this all will end. 

But even though the pace was slow, it’s not my least favorite thing in this book. I absolutely hated how mental illness was portrayed through Becky in this book. It’s pretty obvious that she has mental health issues with the way Emma was raised by Becky before she abandoned her. But I feel like the way Becky’s illness is portrayed is really terrible. What made it so awful to me is that she’s never given the help she really needs. In the book, she escapes from the hospital only to find Emma so she can tell her she’s leaving Tucson. She apparently also finds Mr. Mercer to tell him the same thing, yet they are both completely okay with her leaving them despite that she really needs help. Yes, Emma does show more concern for her well-being, but it’s very obvious that neither of them are trying to get her any help. I get with Mr. Mercer that he doesn’t want his wife to know Becky is back, but to me it just seems like he doesn’t care about his daughter’s well-being. He knows she’s very sick, but does very little to really give her the help she needs. 

I also find the portrayal of mental health in this book to be awful because Emma does suspect her mother of killing Sutton at one point. This brings up the stigma that only really sick people with mental health issues are the only ones capable of killing someone, though there’s no way her mother was capable of the crime Emma was suspicious of her committing. And it also uses mental health as an excuse for why people do terrible things, which makes it even harder for people with mental health issues to actually want to get help. This is pretty apparent when Emma finds out Ethan has a file at the hospital and wonders why he kept it secret from her. While I appreciate Shepard writing about mental health, I don’t necessarily think she portrayed it properly. Or in a way where the reader could really sympathize with Becky and understand what she’s going through. 

But despite these problems with Cross My Heart, Hope to Die, I’m still planning on reading the last book in the series. Since the next book in this series is the last one, I’m planning on talking about the series as a whole and give you my thoughts on who I thought could’ve killed Sutton and why. I have a couple people I suspected and really can’t wait to share with you my thoughts on this series as a whole. 

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Book Review: Hide and Seek (The Lying Game #4)

Rating: 4 stars

My friends and I used to play lying games. Now my twin sister is living one.

When I was alive, my family seemed picture-perfect. My adoptive parents adored me, and my little sister, Laurel, copied my every move. But now that my long-lost twin, Emma, has taken my place to solve my murder, we’re both learning just how flawed my family really is.

Laurel is shooting Emma nasty looks and sneaking around with my ex-boyfriend. And it turns out my parents are keeping a huge secret – could it be the reason I’m dead?

How far would they go to keep the truth buried? No one can harm me now, but Emma is still fair game. And if she’s not careful, she’ll end up buried, too…

Like the rest of the series, I found Hide and Seek to be such an enjoyable read. After ruling out Thayer as Sutton’s killer, some of those she holds dear become the next suspects on Emma’s list. Each has a potential motive for killing Sutton, but when Emma finds out what they’ve been hiding, she learns more about her and her twin than she knew before. But knowing these truths helps her realize there just might be someone she never expected to be behind Sutton’s death. 

I like this book in the series for different reasons than its predecessors. For one, you learn more about Emma and Sutton’s family, secrets you didn’t expect to uncover about their mother and how Sutton’s adoptive parents are connected to her. I like how this is included in this book in the series because we as readers actually don’t know too much about their family at all. I also think it gives this story more character development because Sutton continues to grow as a person when she realizes how little effort she put in to try to connect with her family. I honestly think family is the central theme in Hide and Seek because as Emma begins to bond with Sutton’s parents, she forms a stronger connection with them, which opens up to her being able to have a family to call her own for the first time. I find it to be a part of the story I truly enjoy because family is one of the most important things to me. So I’m rooting for her to finally have a home to call her own. 

Another aspect in this book I enjoyed is that there were a lot of surprising moments I didn’t see coming. These moments in the story made me want to continue reading in order to see Emma and Sutton’s reactions to what was going on. You discover the secret Sutton’s parents are keeping and how it reveals a new suspect to them that we all didn’t expect, someone who plays an important role in this series. 

I find with each page I read how much I love Shepard’s writing. The story is intense, full of mystery whenever it needs to be and she does a wonderful job of bringing detail through the flashbacks we experience. I find them to be interesting because she does a good job using them to bring new information to light. What I do wonder with them though is if Emma experiences them too, or if Sutton is just slowly recalling memories to unlock her murder. From what you read, I don’t think Emma is a part of those moments, since Emma and Sutton can’t communicate on their own right now. It’ll be interesting though as I get closer to the end of the series to see how Shepard decides to end Sutton’s part of the story. 

The one thing with Hide and Seek I don’t like is the same thing I don’t like with the rest of the series. The reason I hate this pattern so much is because I feel like she’s revealing a little too much to us. Because with each person eliminated as a suspect, we have less of a chance in feeling surprised when the suspect is finally revealed to us. It also makes these books a little predictable too because the reader already knows to suspect the person Emma and Sutton are suspicious of to be innocent of the crime committed. However, there is still a good side to this too. We get to know these people a little better, watch their character develop as the story reaches its climax. We get to better understand why this character is important in Sutton’s life while watching Emma learn something new about her lost twin everyday. It also eliminates people she knows, taking us one step closer to the actual killer. So while at times this pattern can be so predictable, it does have its benefits too. 

However, despite this one flaw in this book/series, I’m still enjoying it and can’t wait to see what befalls Emma next. It’s definitely been worth the read to me. 

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Book Review: Two Truths and a Lie (The Lying Game #3)

Rating: 4 stars

Sutton Mercer watches from the afterlife as her long-lost twin, Emma Paxton, takes over her identity to solve her murder. But after ruling out her early leads, Emma still hasn’t found Sutton’s killer. A lot of people wanted her dead—but one name keeps popping up: Thayer Vega. When the gorgeous and mysterious Thayer returns to town, Emma has to move fast to figure out whether he’s back for revenge…or if he already got it.

When I first started reading this series, I wasn’t sure how I was feeling about it. The Lying Game was an intriguing read, but it lacked direction and character development, making me wonder if deciding to give this series a chance was a mistake. But I continued on anyway, knowing I could call it quits if I felt the need. Never Have I Ever upped the ante, bringing with it stronger writing, the character development The Lying Game was missing, and moving the plot further in ways I wasn’t expecting. As a reader, you finally could see where Shepard wanted the story to go and we’re looking forward to go on the journey. 

With Two Truths and a Lie, I still feel like the story continues to be enthralling. In this book, Madeline’s mysterious brother Thayer returns to town. While Emma doesn’t know too much about him, she’s heard of him and is immediately suspicious of him. She wonders whether he’s involved with her death, doing whatever means necessary to figure out what connection he has with Sutton the night she’s murdered. 

What I like about this book in the series is the reader gets introduced to Thayer and learns more about him. He’s someone we don’t really know too much about so it’s exciting to see him reappear and see how everyone reacts to his return. It’s also good he’s come back because you learn he’s with Sutton briefly on the night she’s killed and that it’s possible he could hold the key to who killed her. I also like his character because he’s the bad boy guy in this series.  You can also tell from the flashbacks that he had a strong connection with Sutton, to where you have a better understanding of his character and all he’s gone through to get to the point where he decides to return. 

I continue to enjoy Sutton’s flashbacks. They provide an interesting perspective on the characters. And when she has one, I always wonder what we’re going to see, what piece of the puzzle that’s Sutton’s death will be revealed. I also like that she’s been going through her own development while these events unfold. While Sutton was alive, it’s clear she didn’t cherish the life she had. But since her death, she seems to realize her own shortcomings and becomes better because of it. 

I also continue to enjoy the plot in this series. I think it’s continuing to move forward in incredible ways, bringing plenty of conflict for the reader to want to read more. It’s also well-written because I’ve yet to truly figure out who killed Sutton. I have a couple potential suspects in mind, but want to wait and see how this series ends before voicing them aloud.

I still don’t like Emma and Sutton’s process of elimination when it comes to who killed her. While it intrigued me because we get to learn more about the people Emma suspects killed Sutton, her suspects are never solid, sure picks. In many ways, suspecting these people has begun to show signs of Emma being paranoid because she feels like she can’t trust anyone around her. But then she finds a small amount of proof, believing she’s cleared someone’s name and everything becomes all right in her universe. Until she stumbles upon more information that makes her paranoid all over again about someone else. I don’t think this is the best way for Emma to find her sister’s killer, though I understand there’s only so much she can do to find this person without putting other’s lives at risk. But I think this is the pattern in this series, from what I’ve read so far. 

Even with this key issue for me, I still really enjoyed reading Two Truths and a Lie. It was a page turner that just kept me going because I want to find out what really happened to her and how this series will ultimately end. 

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Book Review: Never Have I Ever (The Lying Game #2)

Rating: 4 stars

My perfect life was a lie.

Now I’d do anything to uncover the truth.

Not long ago, I had everything a girl could wish for: amazing friends, an adorable boyfriend, a loving family. But none of them know that I’m gone–that I’m dead. To solve my murder, my long-lost twin sister, Emma, has taken my place. She sleeps in my room, wears my clothes, and calls my parents Mom and Dad.

And my killer is watching her every move.

I remember little from my life, just flashes and flickers, so all I can do is follow along as Emma tries to solve the mystery of my disappearance. But the deeper she digs, the more suspects she uncovers. It turns out my friends and I played a lot of games–games that ruined people’s lives. Anyone could want revenge . .. anyone could want me–and now Emma–dead.

When I finished reading The Lying Game, I initially wasn’t sure if I wanted to continue reading this series or not. But after reading Never Have I Ever, I realized this is a story I want to continue. 
This book is so much better than its predecessor for a number of reasons. For one, the story telling has drastically improved, almost as if Sara Shepard already had a plan in motion of what she wanted her characters to do next. I found myself following Emma and Sutton along on the edge of my seat, waiting to see what would happen next. 

The characters are another reason I want to continue reading this series. In The Lying Game, Shepard did a horrible job at developing them in a way that made me want to learn more about them. However, in Never Have I Ever, she truly brings the characters to life via Emma’s dialogue with Sutton’s friends. In this book, I felt like Shepard did a really good job of making these characters more relatable to where I understood their problems and wished I could comfort them. She made me feel really sympathetic to them, which made me want to continue reading. 

The mystery surrounding Sutton’s death also drew me further into the story. I felt like the flashbacks Sutton experienced helped better understand her character while also helping eliminate potential suspects to her murder. So far, every person Emma suspects killed her twin has been proven wrong, making you want to continue reading to find out who her killer could be. 

What also makes me interested in wanting to continue reading this series is the amazing progress Shepard has made in moving the plot of the story along. A lot happened to Emma in this book than in the first one that added excitement to the story. The amount of conflict that occurs really spices things up, to where you think you have it figured out, but then another suspect is eliminated. This all makes you wonder whose going to appear in this series next, which is both exciting and annoying.

The reason I find this annoying is because there are so many people who could’ve killed Sutton. While I find it nice Emma has been able to eliminate some people as being her sister’s killer, I feel like we still aren’t anywhere close to getting the right suspect. This worries me because I’m concerned that this could drag the series on in a way to where I’m not going to want to read it anymore. I also think that even though she’s been able to eliminate some people, she should still be suspicious of them anyway, because they still have a motive, even if Emma and Sutton don’t see it that way anymore. 

Another thing I don’t like is how this book ended. I hate that she ended this book with a cliff hanger, because now I feel like I need to know what happens next. 

But despite these two things, I really enjoyed reading Never Have I Ever  much better than The Lying Game. I hope the next book in this series is just as good because I can’t wait to read it. 

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Book Review: The Lying Game (The Lying Game #1) 

Rating: 3 stars

I had a life anyone would kill for.

Then someone did.

The worst part of being dead is that there’s nothing left to live for. No more kisses. No more secrets. No more gossip. It’s enough to kill a girl all over again. But I’m about to get something no one else does–an encore performance, thanks to Emma, the long-lost twin sister I never even got to meet.

Now Emma’s desperate to know what happened to me. And the only way to figure it out is to be me–to slip into my old life and piece it all together. But can she laugh at inside jokes with my best friends? Convince my boyfriend she’s the girl he fell in love with? Pretend to be a happy, care-free daughter when she hugs my parents goodnight? And can she keep up the charade, even after she realizes my murderer is watching her every move?

From Sara Shepard, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Pretty Little Liars books, comes a riveting new series about secrets, lies, and killer consequences.

Let the lying game begin.

This book is an interesting read, good at keeping the reader guessing at every turn. However, I sometimes found the storyline to be completely unrealistic and silly due to the nature of these characters and their lives. 

The main storyline of this book is about a girl named Emma, whose twin sister Sutton is dead. Emma knows completely nothing about her and doesn’t even know she has a twin until one day she sees a video of a girl being choked on the internet. She then searches for her sister, hoping to meet with her and maybe become a family. Instead, she finds herself having to take her sister’s place if she wants to live, quickly realizing there’s more to her twin than she realizes. Meanwhile, Sutton is watching all of this unfold and there’s nothing she can do to interfere. Her memories of her family and friends are completely blank and there’s nothing she can do to fill in the pieces and help Emma find her killer. 

What I enjoyed about this story was the dynamic between the sisters. Emma grew up in a completely different environment than Sutton, yet seems to be the one who truly has her head on her shoulders. Yet, Sutton is the one who had a much better life, but from what the reader learns of her character she isn’t really that great of a person. But you sympathize with her anyway because she’s dead and doesn’t remember what she was like when she was alive. I find it interesting that they have these two different dynamics because the reader is given the chance to see a different side of Sutton’s character. I also found myself emphasizing with Emma too because she’s put in a difficult predicament. She’s always wanted a family, yet the one time she’s given that opportunity is snatched away from her with the discovery that her twin sister is dead. Instead of spending time with her twin getting to know her better, she’s busy trying to find her killer. You sympathize with her because you want things in her life to go right for once. 

I also enjoyed this read because of Sutton’s perspective. She’s dead, yet she’s with Emma the whole time, trying to help find her killer. She can’t talk to Emma or communicate with her in any way, but is able to follow her around and see everything she does. I found it interesting that they had her character like this because they made her different than when she was alive. I also feel like it adds more to the story, because it feels like there’s something she’s not telling you. At the same time, I find it too convenient that she doesn’t remember anything. I know she’s dead and that probably has her memory wiped clean. But I feel like she has so many secrets already that I wouldn’t be too surprised about her lying either. 

However, while the mystery surrounding Sutton’s death makes for an interesting read, there are some things with The Lying Game I just don’t like. For one, I feel like Sutton’s character is a cliché. The popular girl dying just seems like something that happens in a lot of novels. Especially when it’s a popular girl who acts like a complete bitch, both towards her friends and those she’s not close with. I know it’s done with the purpose of making it that much harder to find her killer, since even her own friends could’ve done it, but to me it’s a really silly way to go about this story. It makes it harder for the reader to sympathize with her death and enjoy the story because even her friends become a cliché too. 

And I think they are because I’m surprised they haven’t figured out Emma yet. I think that’s one of the things I find unrealistic about this story, because Sutton is their friend. So they should be able to tell Emma doesn’t act like her even though they’re twins. Then again, if they’re responsible for her death, they wouldn’t act any differently. But I still find it hard that if they aren’t involved they don’t notice her acting differently than usual. Especially with the amount of time they’ve been friends with each other. 

Either way, The Lying Game is an interesting read. While I don’t know if I’ll stick with the series completely, I want to try and give it a chance by reading the second book and see. 

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If We Were Having Coffee: Recovering From the Spring 

Hello everyone! I hope you all are having a good day today. I know I haven’t made a coffee post in awhile. I’m sorry about that. I actually got sick so I’ve been doing the best to recover before writing another one of these. I hope all of you are doing well today. 

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you I’ve been quite the busy girl before I’d gotten sick. The weekend before I was sick, I went to a park with one of my friends. It was really nice, a perfect day to be outside and walk around. I think we walked two miles or so while we were there and it was a park we hadn’t gone to together before. It was nice though, one of the national parks in our area. I actually took quite a bit of pictures, some of which I’ll include below. 

In this picture, you can see some of the seating areas, along with the tree’s reflection through the water.

This picture is probably one of my favorites of the little stream we passed as we walked. 

I really like this picture because you can see the sun shining through the trees.

When we were there, I was joking with my friend about trying one of these canoes out. But he told me there was no way he was going to get into one of them.  

While these aren’t necessarily all of the pictures I’d taken while we were there, they are some of my best shots that I really enjoyed taking. This park was just such a beautiful sight to see and I can’t wait to go there again and take some more amazing pictures and walk among all the trees. 

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that even though I’ve been sick, I’ve still managed to keep myself busy. I’ve mostly been at work, but when I wasn’t working, I was at home, reading or getting back into watching Criminal Minds again. I also had the amazing opportunity to go to Dave & Buster’s for Valentine’s Day, which was quite a lot of fun.

The books I’ve read since I last did one of these posts are Crown of Midnight, the second book in the Throne of Glass series and The Girl On the Train. I just started reading The Lying Game on Friday, which so far is an okay read. I’ll talk more about it on here once I’ve finished reading it completely.

Other than that, I really haven’t been up to too much. Spring is finally upon us, which is probably why I wasn’t feeling quite so well for the past week. Luckily, I’m doing much better now so I can actually get back to doing some more writing in the near future. Also, this upcoming week is Spring Break at my college, which means I don’t have work this upcoming week! So I’m really excited to have a break from there. Trust me, it’s really much needed. 

Speaking of which, before I end this post, I have something exciting to share with you. One of my friends from college, who also has a WordPress blog I follow, has asked me to write a post for her blog. On her blog, she talks about psychology related stuff, with a focus on mental health. So with the post I’m doing for her blog, I decided to focus on my own mental illness journey and how reading has played an important role in it. With this post, I’ll be talking about a lot of personal stuff that I haven’t shared with any of you, but that has had a major impact on my life. It’s stuff I usually have a hard time talking about, but I’ve lately found myself more open to talk about lately. Anyway, she’s going to be posting it on her blog Tuesday, which when she does I’ll write my own post here about it. But if your curious and want to check out her blog, here is the link to it. She has a lot of good information regarding mental health so I highly recommend checking her out whenever you get the chance. 

Other than that, there really isn’t too much more left for me to say. I just returned home from a baby shower a couple minutes ago. One of my Mom’s friends adopted a baby completely out of the blue so we wanted to be at the shower to congratulate her and wish her well. But that’s petty much it for me. I hope you all are doing well today and having a fabulous weekend so far. I know I’m definitely looking forward to this time off. 

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