As promised, for today’s post I’ve reviewed my ARC of Joanna Hathaway’s debut YA novel, Dark of the West. Unlike Alone Together, which I reviewed here, today’s novel is the first in a new YA series (called Glass Alliance), rather than a standalone text. The publication date has been pushed back, but I wanted to post this review now while the book is still fresh in my mind. This novel is set to be released on February 5, 2019, so I’m going to stay clear of any major spoilers. But, as always, a few details not included in the book blurb will be included in my three-part review. This is the last ARC I’ve had the pleasure to get my hands on, but I’ll be on the lookout for more opportunities to read and review other new YA reads.
Erika Romero
PhD Candidate and Education Blogger
Tag: YALit (page 1 of 2)
I’ve been lucky enough to receive advanced reader copies (ARCs) of two YA novels set to be published in May 2018. It seems, then, that this month is the perfect time for blogging about these two new releases! I’m especially excited to share my thoughts on these books, as they are both debut novels. This week, I’m reviewing Sarah J. Donovan’s verse novel, Alone Together. In two weeks, I’ll be reviewing Joanna Hathaway’s historical fantasy novel, Dark of the West. As a disclaimer, my ARC reviews will be pretty spoiler-free, but of course a few details not found in the blurbs will be included in my reviews. If you’d like to see the other book reviews I’ve done, you can check them out here, here, and here.
The weekend after I received approval from my dissertation committee to defend my proposal (otherwise known as last weekend), I read three novels and quite a bit of fanfiction. Reading is my go-to activity when I’m feeling nervous, and with Axis 360 (a library app that I wrote about here) just a click away, I had plenty of books to pick from when I wasn’t in the mood to find a new fic or reread some of my favorites. Unplugged was the first novel I read this past weekend (Fan Art was the second, and I reread Simon vs. the Homo Sapien’s Agenda in order to prep for teaching my classes this week). Unplugged is the first book in The Wired trilogy, and I haven’t read the second and third installments that came out last year, The Body Market and The Mind Virus. The first book was an interesting read for multiple reasons, which I’ll get into in today’s (very spoiler-y) book review.
As I’m in the middle of teaching my Young Adult Literary Narratives course for the first time, I’m currently rereading a novel a week as part of my preparation for class discussions. With all my other responsibilities -and the fanfiction I read – I haven’t had much time to read novels not directly related to my class in the past few weeks. I’m the type of reader who has trouble not finishing a book in one sitting (or at least one day) if I am really enjoying it. With this lack of willpower in mind, I’ve compromised by making a list of books I want to read once I have a bit more time on my hands. Spring break is only a couple weeks away, and I’m definitely planning on doing some non-work reading during that time. In today’s post, I’ve listed five of the books I’m most looking forward to reading along with a short explanation as to why I’m feeling this way.
I’m three weeks into the spring semester, and I uploaded my feedback on my students’ first major assignment a few days ago. I’ve never assigned this project (a literary autobiography) before, so I didn’t know what to expect from it. It’s pretty small stakes, in comparison to the other major assignments, but it was something I decided I wanted to try this semester for multiple reasons. In today’s post, I thought I’d describe the assignment and my reasons for creating it, just in case someone reading this is looking for some classroom inspiration. I think this assignment would work well across many education levels, in case any high school or even middle school teachers have stumbled across this post.
Last year, I completed the Ultimate PopSugar Reading Challenge 2017 with one day to spare. I actually read about ten books during the first half of my winter break in order to reach that goal. I’m hoping not to cut it so close this year. For 2018, I’ve designed my reading challenge as part of my Christmas gift to my brother. He had challenged himself to read 12 books last year, I challenged him to do 40 with me instead, and he ended up at 30 (here’s his list from 2017). As he wanted to try again this year, I created reading prompts that have connections to each of us, along with more general prompts that can inspire us to branch out from our usual genres and topics. A few of the prompts were inspired by challenges I saw online while creating the list. So, without further ado, here’s the “Romero Sibling Reading Challenge of 2018.”
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