All Signs Lead Back To You | Book Review

10:00 AM Ally M.G. 0 Comments



I was given All Signs Lead Back to You by Aniesha Brahma as an Advance Review Copy for an honest book review through Book Tours.

2013.
As the final bell for the day rang on their last day in school, Diya Rai, had a chill run down her spine. The chill of not knowing what the future holds for her and her high school sweetheart, Ashwin Chowdhury.
So she does a preemptive strike.
She dumps him before he can hurt her.

2015.
Two years later, Ashwin and Diya, cross paths. Each holds grudges, feelings and only one half of the story that completes them.
Told from alternating points of view, through a non-linear timeline, this is the story about first love, second chances and ALL the SIGNS THAT LEAD BACK TO YOU

All Signs Lead Back to You is a short love story, but not about the usually lovely dovey romance, but the love in friendship. A friendship that grew apart to later find one another and reconnect.

Aniesha Brahma uses a non-linear format in order to tell the story of Diya Rei and Ashwin Chowdhury. It goes from the present time of 2015 to 2012 or 2013. Using these time shifts the reader can understand the characters personality and the relationship they had with one another.

The writing is quite simple and very straightforward. It is not very description heavy and at some points I wish it was, because I had a difficult time picturing the characters clearly. 

It was an overall enjoyable book, but I wished the characters were fleshed out more. We were given glimpses to several characters like Nina, Trina and Rishabh but we weren’t really explained their purpose. Nina was fleshed out more than the other two. Trina and Rishabh are the significant others of Ashwin and Diya Rei. But other than that readers are to given much, especially when Trina and Rishabh are described as the complete opposite of our leading characters. There was brief mentions of Diya’s and I feel like that could have been milked more.


Like I said, it was an enjoyable book. And as someone who does not read contemporary I did not find myself bored or annoyed with the characters which is a massive plus. With only having 140 pages it was a very quick read, I personally read it in one sitting.

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YA in the Miami Book Fair

3:46 PM Ally M.G. 0 Comments


I will be attending the annual Miami Book Fair November 19 & 20th! Super excited because there will be a bunch of Young Adult authors attending and a few with books I have already read*. There are also some authors whose books are on my current To Be Read list and I do not know if I should purchase the books in order to get them signed or not. Especially when I do not own them...it is quite a predicament...

If you are attending as well, let me know and maybe we can meet up and chat for a bit!


YA Authors Attending


Sara Shepard:  The Amateurs: Book1
Ryan Graudin: Blood for Blood
*Leigh Bardugo: Crooked Kingdom: A Sequel to Six of Crows
*William Ritter: Ghostly Echoes: A Jackaby Novel
*Alexandra Bracken: Passenger
Nicola Yoon: The Sun is Also a Star
Box Brown: Tetris
E.K. Johnston: Spindle
E.K. Johnston: Star Wars Ashoka
Margaret Stohl: Black Widow Red Vengeance (A Black Widow Novel)
Liz Braswell: As Old As Time: A Twisted Tale
Maggie Thrash: We Know It Was You (Strange Truth)
Conor McCreery: Assassin’s Creed Vol 2: Setting Sun
*Renee Ahdieh: The Rose and the Dagger (The Wrath and the Dawn)
Mindy McGinnis: The Female of the Species
Katherine Mcgee: The Thousandth Floor
Maria Dhavana Headley: Aerie (Magonia)
Kimberly McCreight: The Outliers
*Victoria Aveyard: Glass Sword (Red Queen)
Lauren Gibaldi: Autofocus
Carolyn Cohagan: Time Zero
Rachel Cohn: Twelve Days of Dash and Lily
M-E Girard: Girl Mans Up
Kara Thomas: The Darkest Corners
Molly Booth: Saving HamletGeoffrey Philp: Garvey’s Ghost

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Former.ly by Dane Cobain | Book Talk + Giveaway

3:04 PM Ally M.G. 0 Comments


I received this book from Dane Cobain for an honest book review. 

When Dan Roberts starts his new job at Former.ly, he has no idea what he's getting into. The site deals in death - its users share their innermost thoughts, which are stored privately until they die. Then, their posts are shared with the world, often with unexpected consequences. 

But something strange is going on, and the site's two erratic founders share a dark secret. A secret that people are willing to kill for.


Let's begin with how interesting that sounds. When I read that blurb for the first time I was beyond curious. I am not a one to go away from my fantasy genre of reading, but this book really caught my attention. A social media that deals with the dead? All I wanted to know was how, and what is the secret that people kill for?

Former.ly is a small start-up tech company that has a social media website. Think like Facebook but it is private, only the user can see and it becomes public when he or she dies. And our leading character finds himself coding here.

Dan Roberts is the main character of Former.ly, but I could not click with the guy, which caused me many problem because I always seemed to be putting the book down to do something else. Dan is a very chill guy, maybe too chill. Nothing seemed to really faze him and it bothered me. Having girlfriend problems. Shrug. Company founders being sketchy and secretive. Shrug. Someone died for the first time. Shrug. 

When Dan finally started showing more effort and emotions about the occurrences around him is when I finally got intrigued and hooked with the story. Watching him risk his safety for the truth that surrounded Former.ly kept me gripped. Watching him from going from a loner and a guy that did not really care about anything to someone who threatens the very people who are capable of stealing his life away was beautiful. 

Unfortunately this took more than half the book. I personally enjoy complex characters that keep you wondering about who they are, and Dan did not give me that.

The plot was slow. Too slow for my personal taste, but once the first mysterious death happens it begins to pick up and questions begin to fill your mind. You, like Dan, will begin to distrust every single character in the story. Then end comes and catches you by surprise. Let’s just say the “good guy” doesn’t always win.

Cobain writing is simple and straightforward which makes it into a quick and easy read. While it has hints of a mystery novel it does not follow a generic mystery novel scheme. It felt more that I was reading a journal, in this case, Dan’s journal as he writes out his experience with Former.ly. Having lack of explanations on certain things made sense, even when it drove me a bit mad, but like many unreliable narrators this lackness is expected. ( Kinda like Nick was super unreliable in the Great Gatsby )

My only real complain about this story is that it was too techy. Some of the things would go over my head as some one who is not techy. But if you understand techy coding terms than you should be fine.

Overall, it was an interesting experience out of my fantasy genre. If you are looking for something quick/simple and set in our modern time this is a book you should give a try.


About the Author

Dane Cobain (High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, UK) is an independent poet, musician and storyteller with a passion for language and learning. When he’s not in front of a screen writing stories and poetry, he can be found working on his book review blog or developing his website, www.danecobain.com. His debut novella, No Rest for the Wicked, was released in the summer of 2015.

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All Signs Lead Back to You | Cover Reveal!

11:49 AM Ally M.G. 0 Comments



All Signs Lead Back to You by Aniesha Brahma


2013
As the final bell for the day rang on their last day in school, Diya Rai, had a chill run down her spine. The chill of not knowing what the future holds for her and her high school sweetheart, Ashwin Chowdhury.
So she does a preemptive strike.
She dumps him before he can hurt her.

2015
Two years later, Ashwin and Diya, cross paths. Each holds grudges, feelings and only one half of the story that completes them.
Told from alternating points of view, through a non-linear timeline, this is the story about
first love, second chances and ALL the SIGNS THAT LEAD BACK TO YOU.

About the Author
Aniesha Brahma is an author who realized her passion for writing at the tender age of six. She also happens to be the social media manager for BEE Books. Her debut novel, The Secret Proposal (2012) was published by General Press and was followed by When Our Worlds Collide (2015) by the same. She blogs at: www.anieshabrahma.com and runs an online magazine, BUZZ Magazine (www.buzzmagazine.in). She can be contacted at: aniesha.brahma@gmail.com. She lives in Kolkata with her family and her five super adorable cats! 

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