What I Read (and loved!) Over the Holiday

This week we're talking about favorite books and boy am I glad we are because over the holiday I read some super amazing books that I've been bursting at the seams to talk about. 

The first book I read over the holidays was ROOM by Emma Donoghue. It's an adult book and it's fabulousity! Definitely one of my favorites of all time. It's so haunting and beautiful at the same time. ROOM is about a five year old boy named Jack who lives in an 11x11 foot room with his "Ma." To him, Room is the entire world. It's all he's known. But to his mother, Room is a cell where she's been kept prisoner for the past seven years.


The next book I devoured was WINTERGIRLS by Laurie Halse Anderson. I'm embarrassed to say that this is the FIRST book I've ever read by Laurie (I know! What have I been doing with my life?) but I will definitely be reading more. Wintergirls was amazing. It was chilling and disturbing and awesome. I actually got physically cold while reading the second half. I had to read it under two blankets. That's pretty powerful stuff! Wintergirls is a teen novel about an seriously anorexic eighteen year old who is haunted by the death of her best friend, who died from a similar eating disorder.


I also recently read the arc for STRUCK by debut author Jennifer Bosworth. This book doesn't release until May but it's definitely something you'll want to look out for when it does! STRUCK is action packed and exciting, revolving around seventeen year old Mia Price, who is a lightening addict. She's been struck hundreds of times. And unbeknownst to Mia, the lightening has left behind a hidden power. A power that is highly sought after. It takes place in Los Angeles, after a massive earth quake has destroyed the city. Now two doomsday prophesies have risen--one wants to save the world. while the other wants to destroy it--and they both need Mia's help to achieve their goal.


And finally, right now I'm reading (and almost finished with) CINDER by Marissa Meyer, the first in the Lunar Chronicles, which just released last week! Marissa Meyer is a debut author published by my same publishing house (Macmillan Children's) and boy is she in for a wild ride. Not only is CINDER a fantastic, fantastic book that is so imaginative, vivid, thrilling, romantic, exciting, and super engaging, the book is getting tremendous buzz. It seems like everywhere I look I'm hearing about this book. I think Marissa is poised to be the next big thing in teen fiction. She's created a world as vast and creative as the Harry Potter and Hunger Games and I was immediately sucked right in. CINDER is a crazy retelling of the famous fairytale CINDERELLA, except Cinder is a cyborg (part human, part machine) who is living in a far future world (after World War IV) where cyborgs are second class citizens, androids do all of our dirty work, and there is a powerful nation of Lunar people (who live on the colonized moon) ready and waiting to take over planet earth. Oh, and the prince is super dreamy too!

So those are my latest faves. What about you? What have you read lately that you've absolutely loved?

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