Recent Reads | January 2021

 Last year I set myself a goal of reading 60 books (which is a lot) and I miserably failed. I am an avid reader but sometimes it's much harder to keep up than you think it will. I have set myself a high goal again this year of 50 books and I am 6 books in already so it's a good start. I'm going to share my favourite books of each month and give a quick over view of each in case anyone else would like to read any. I own a lot of books that I haven't gotten around to reading so I have a lot to catch up on. I have also been very behind on updating my blog so I have a few more of these posts to write in a short amount of time. 

The first book I really enjoyed this month is Q&A by Vikas Swarup. This book may be familiar to a lot of people as the movie Slumdog Millionaire is based off this book. I was drawn to read the book as I really loved the movie. I knew exactly what the book would be about as I had seen the movie first but I was surprised by a lot of it. There were a few differences between the book and the movie and some of the plot was rearranged between the two. I found that because I had seen the movie first I was picturing the movie's story first rather than reading what was in front of me. I think I would've preferred to read the book first as it would've been more enticing that way as it didn't suck me in as much as I thought it would. I would recommend the book first but I honestly enjoyed the movie more. I'm sure most people have seen the movie by now as it is a very popular movie. Yet overall, the book is gritty and shows the harsh reality of living in India through the rough journey of an orphan and the character's he means a long the way. It is both a happy and troubling journey to read.

If you have never seen or read it the book is based around the main character Ram Muhammed Thomas, who starts the novel off in jail. He is accused of cheating and winning a Billion rupees in a T.V. game show. The novel starts from there - in showing how a poor, uneducated orphan could possibly know all the answers in this quiz through his life journey. Every question becomes an anecdote in his life which has given him the knowledge for the questions he is being asked. The book raises lots of philosophical, religious and political questions.  

The next read that I have loved in January is a more popular book that I think a lot of people will recognise. Midnight Sun, is the fifth instalment in the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyer. I loved the Twilight books and movies when they first came out so when this book was announced, I knew I had to buy it straight away. I bought it as soon as it came out but it took me a while to read it as it is a huge book and I knew it was a huge commitment. If you've never read or seen any of the Twilight series, where have you been?

This book is strange in it's story as it is actually the first book in the series, Twilight, written in the perspective of Edward instead of Bella this time. In a way, it is exactly like reading Twilight again, but with more detail. I really liked the new perspective of the first book and getting to read Twilight again as if it were the first time. I found that the story moved a lot slower than the original, and I spent a lot of time waiting for the next thing to happen, as I already knew what was going to happen. It was good to get to know the backstory and personalities of Edward's family a little more. For such a big book, it still seemed to not go into detail about new things and storylines, and still focus on what the readers already knew and experienced from the first reading over ten years ago. I did expect a lot more interesting insights from Edward, the story teller, but the focus still lingered on Bella, and we already knew a lot about Bella. I still rate the book very highly as I love the other books and it does fit in well with the others that have already been released. Yet, it could definitely have been more and I could understand if it disappointed some fans, but I still enjoyed bringing a teenage obsession into adulthood with me. 

Has anyone read either of these books? What did you think of them if so?