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“We loved each other and we lost each other. And now, even though we still love each other, the pieces don’t fit like they used to.

I could make myself fit for him.

He could make himself fit for me.

But that’s not true love.”

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“Falling out of love with someone you still like feels exactly like lying in a warm bed and hearing the alarm clock. No matter how good you feel right now, you know it’s time to go.”

— Taylor Jenkins Reid, One True Loves

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It breaks my heart to be loved like this, to be loved so purely that I’m capable of breaking a heart.

— emma blair // One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid

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"I am who I am because I loved you once."

- One True Loves - Taylor Jenkins Reid

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“After all, everyone’s entitled to be the hero of their own story. So I must be permitted to be the hero of mine. Even though I’m not. I’m the villain.”

— Alex Michaelides, The Maidens

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“‘It was written’ is the Greek expression. Meaning, quite simply, from that moment on, their destinies were sealed.”

— Alex Michaelides, The Maidens

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“She was also a little drunk, and unprepared for his sudden switch from romance to murder.”

— Alex Michaelides, The Maidens

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The Maidens by Alex Michaelides

“It felt as if a kind of pestilence, a plague, were spreading through the college—as in a Greek myth, the sickness that destroyed Thebes; an invisible airborne poison drifting through the courtyards—and these ancient walls, once a refuge from the outside world, no longer offered any protection.”

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A list of the most notable books I’ve read since Verity (and what I rated them on Goodreads)

Circe by Madeline Miller ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I read this one a long while ago so I don’t remember much but I do remember feeling Circe’s sadness and heartbreak flow from the pages and wishing that I could give her a better life than the one she was given.

The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Absolutely cheesy with fan fiction vibes but I still really enjoyed reading it. It was predictable and the characters probably weren’t as flushed out as they could’ve been but I enjoyed it nonetheless.

Ugly Love by Colleen Hoover ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

A heartbreaking romance that I remember pissed me off more than a few times with the way that it played out. I enjoyed the way that it incorporated poetry into the story.

The Entire Princess Diaries Series by Meg Cabot ⭐️⭐️⭐️-⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I love the Princess Diaries movies so I knew I would eventually have to read the books. They were a lot different from the movies but Michael was one of the best male love interests that I’ve encountered in a YA novel. They definitely dragged at parts and it was clear that they were written for a much younger demographic than I am a part of but even when they were repetitive, they were still enjoyable.

Teen Killers Club by Lily Sparks ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Absolutely wild and not what I expected in the slightest. I don’t remember the romance aspect being my main draw; instead I really enjoyed the way the main cast interacted and the setting was wildly different from most of the novels I read.

The Lost Girls by Sonia Hartl ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Sapphic tragic vampire teen romance, what’s not to love?

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Horrific in every sense of the word, the world that Margaret Atwood creates is not one I wish to live in but I don’t really want to exist in the one that inspired the book to be written either. Atwood pulls out the horrors of life in America and highlights the worst possible outcome of taking these horrors to their extreme.

The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Well-written but it truly glorifies the mental struggles of the sisters and their paths to suicide in a way that I feel is harmful to readers. Please don’t pick up this book if you are in a negative headspace.

While We Were Dating by Jasmine Guillory ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Cute romance between an actress and a producer set mostly in San Francisco. They help each other to overcome their biggest fears and in the end they come out the other side as stronger people for it.

Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Picked this one up because Taylor Swift wrote a song for the movie adaptation and I was not disappointed! The story is enticing and it pushes you to care for Kya, flaws and all.

I Kissed Shara Wheeler by Casey McQuiston ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

YA mystery-romance featuring a quartet of love-hatable main characters. If you know Casey McQuiston you can very easily guess who the main couple will be, but the other leads will draw you in just as much to their lives and the lives of their friends. Set in a Southern Private Catholic School, it tackles the intersection of religion and queerness and refuses to leave out the messiness and the beauty that come when they interact.

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I felt my heart break for Evelyn Hugo and I felt myself waiting for a happy ending where I only ended up with a bittersweet goodbye. The ending was satisfying in a heart wrenching way.

Beach Read by Emily Henry ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Adorable. My first Emily Henry read and I am so excited to pick up her other books. January and Gus have such great banter between them and their story is so intriguing that I read it in one sitting.

As you can tell by this list, I love romance novels and I almost never rate a book below three stars. Some of these I disliked more than others and some of these I wholeheartedly adored. One of these books on the list I was so excited for its release that I waited in line for three and a half hours to get my copy signed by the author. I’m sorry to say, I don’t have many words on the books I’ve read (unless you get me talking about them in person) but I’m not really the best at writing reviews. See you all again in a few months when I once again remember to update this blog on what I’ve been reading!

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beach read by emily henry

when you love someone,” he said haltingly, “. . . you want to make this world look different for them. to give all the ugly stuff meaning, and amplify the good. that’s what you do. for your readers. for me. you make beautiful things, because you love the world, and maybe the world doesn’t always look how it does in your books, but . . . i think putting them out there, that changes the world a little bit. and the world can’t afford to lose that

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Emily Henry, Beach Read

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jane austen was once alive writing things like “if i loved you less, i might be able to talk about it more” that remain so poignant to this day... her brain... is just enormous

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“What you read will taste so bad at times, you’ll want to spit it out, but you’ll swallow these words and they will become part of you, part of your gut, and you will hurt because of them.”

— Verity, Colleen Hoover

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Today, I finished Verity by Colleen Hoover. It was absolutely captivating and it was so chilling that I had to take a break about halfway through and make myself a cup of tea and listen to some Taylor Swift in order to be able to be in the right headspace to finish the book. I’d definitely say to look up content warnings for the book before setting off to read it as some of the content is disturbing. Overall, it was a brilliantly written novel with intriguing characters and I am glad to have read it. The ending was absolutely insane and I definitely was not expecting it, I don’t think I’ve stopped thinking about it since I finished it.

Verity by Colleen Hoover - 5/5

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At the end of 2021, I got back into reading for the first time in a long time. Before December, the last time I had read more than 3-4 books a year was probably back when I was in middle school. I decided to get back into reading. I found my library card and renewed it (apparently they lapse if you got them as a child once you turn 18, I’m currently 20) and now the highlight of my week is heading to the library. I figured that starting a tumblr to organize all my bookish posts would be very helpful in allowing me to express my love for books, while also not annoying everyone I know.