April Reads! (Mindscape Reviews)

Hello Readers! You need to make up your mind now, because all of my posts this year are going to be book posts. For 2020, I had only 2 travel plans anyway, but now obviously it’s not possible. So, just putting it out there… Books! In April, I read 5 books & re-read 2 books! I have decided to re-read the Harry Potter series. So, those 7 books will be outside of the specific 52 books which are in my 2020 Reading Challenge! Before we head into April, you can check out my March Reads here!

As much long as March was, I think April was quite as short. Still, I managed to read 7 BOOKS! I have already done a detailed review for 3 of those, so here goes the review of the other 2! (Rest 2 are Harry Potter books.) Here we go!

~~SCRAPPY LITTLE NOBODY BY ANNA KENDRICK~~

After I read ‘A Little Life’, I obviously needed to read something extremely light! This is why I went with Anna Kendrick’s ‘Scrappy Little Nobody’. I have (and I’m hoping everyone has) found her tweets to be hilarious, so I was pretty sure I would like the autobiographical essays written by her.

To be honest, I really enjoyed it in the beginning. The first 30% was really good & quite funny. But, later on, it was all about Hollywood. I know she’s an actress so what else was I hoping for? I know. But, those Hollywood parts just weren’t that funny. I still love Anna Kendrick & binge watched Pitch Perfect movies to make up for my guilt of not loving her book. I rated the book at 3/5 on Goodreads! By reading this book, I have completed the ‘Autobiography’ category from my 2020 Reading Challenge.

~~YOU’RE NOT YET LIKE ME BY EDAN LEPUCKI~~

One of the categories in my ’52 Books in 52 Weeks’ Reading Challenge was ‘A BOOK I CAN FINISH IN A DAY.’ Obviously, there are a lot of really good books I found when I searched. ‘You’re Not Yet Like Me’ kept popping in several of the articles, so I decided to give it a try.  ‘A few pages in & I was hooked. The writing was refreshing. The topic was so entirely generic yet put in a different perspective. But, alas, that love at first sight faded soon enough. The genre was romantic comedy & yet I couldn’t find either of those in the span of the novel. It also ended abruptly & then the next chapter was another bizarre short story which was also disappointing. I ended up rating this book at 2/5 on Goodreads.

If you are on the hunt of reading a good book to finish in a day or a book with less than 100 pages, I’m sure you can find better options than this. Don’t get swayed like me. I think some good examples (and these are just my opinion as I have not read any of these) would be ‘The Metamorphosis’ by Franz Kafka, ‘The Little Prince’ by Antoine de Saint-Exupery & ‘The Yellow Wall-Paper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.

The good ones which I did read are ‘We Should All be Feminists’ by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, ‘Animal Farm’ by George Orwell & ‘The Great Gatsby’ by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

~~A LITTLE LIFE BY HANYA YANAGIHARA~~

THIS BOOK! OH, THIS BOOK! I think I decided to write about the ‘Books I Read in April’ only so that I could boast my love for this gem a little more! Needless to say, I have already written a GIANT book review on this! (Check here!) & words still fall short. It is also in my Top 5 Favourite Books of All Time.’

A Little Life is the example of the most wonderful story writing, brilliantly distinct characters & a melancholy of a dance between pain, hope, love, friendship, death & a little life. My heart is always going to be too full whenever I talk about this modern-day classic. I have come to love historical fiction, but Hanya Yanagihara has taken it to a whole another level of reality. Not just the reality of life, but also every-day realities of friendships, over-thinking, self-value, depression, trauma & so much more! I think I should stop now (even though I don’t want to.) Go read it!

~~WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING BY DELIA OWENS~~

I need a minute to get out of the world of ‘A Little Life’ to concentrate on this one.

Okay! So, ‘Where the Crawdads Sing’ was another novel I enjoyed reading. There wasn’t anything special about it nor was it flawless & yet I liked it, just simply. I rated it at 4/5 on Goodreads. Check out the full book review here!

~~MIGUEL STREET BY V.S. NAIPAUL~~

I had always wanted to read V.S. Naipaul’s books. Unfortunately, I started with quite a dull one. ‘Miguel Street’ is a collection of interlinked short stories of the people residing in Miguel Street. I rated it at 2/5 on Goodreads. You can check the full book review here!

~~HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER’S STONE & HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS BY J.K. ROWLING~~

It was high time to re-read the Harry Potter series. It has been the main factor in keeping my sanity & joy. The thing is, I read multiple books at a time, mostly 2 or 3 these days. And, if I am reading depressing or boring books like ‘Miguel Street’ or even worse ‘Lolita’, then I need a SURE-BOOK, which will make me happy. Enter Harry Potter! (Insert heart emoji!)

I am enjoying reading. Sometimes it becomes tough to complete god-awful books, but I always do. The first book I completed in May was ‘Lolita’, which I utterly hated. Now that I have completed something like that, I believe I can complete any book! Currently, I am reading Untamed by Glennon Doyle, Origin by Dan Brown, Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling & just sometimes A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles. Happy Reading!

Until next time,