Top 5 Tuesday – Star's Top 5 underrated #LoveOzYA of 2019



This week Star brings us her Top 5 Underrated #LoveOzYA books that were published in 2019

Each year there are so many incredible #LoveOzYA books published, which I adore so much. I just have found that some get overshadowed, as is the norm with books. But here are 5 books that I’d love to see have more attention on them.



This is Poppy Nwosu’s first published book, and I found it really sweet and lovely. There’s something to be said about soft books, and this was one of the softest I have read this year.



 
2) Love Lie Repeat by Catherine Greer
I need to talk more about this book. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I love the cover so much, and the story was absolutely captivating. Please go pick this up if you haven’t already.




3) Underdog edited by Tobias Madden
I was lucky enough to win a copy of this book! And it was so good. There’s many stories in here that I think a lot of people will connect with. And I’ve discovered some new authors I’d love to see more books from, too.



4) How It Feels To Float by Helena Fox
This book! Oh my word, this book was just so good. I love books about mental health, and this book was so poetic and incredible. And it had wonderful friendships in it, too.



5) It Sounded Better In My Head by Nina Kenwood
While I didn’t connect with this book as much as I would have liked to, I still appreciated the story line, and enjoyed the content.



Follow Star at Little Miss Star, Twitter, Instagram, and Goodreads


What's your pick for this week? Share on your blog, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, or in the comments below! Make sure you tag your posts with #AusYABloggers so we can share the love.

Seventy-Seven Saturday (#13) You Must Be Layla


Every Saturday we will bring you a short snippet from page 77 of a book. It might be a book one of us is reading or perhaps just the book closest to us.

The Rules:


  1. Pick up a Book (your current read, or the closest book to you, or your next read, etc)
  2. Turn to page 77(or 77% if you are on an e-reader)
  3. Find a Snippet, Sentence or Paragraph you like.
  4. Share it on your blog or Twitter or Instagram and link back to us (AusYABloggers) and use #77Saturday

Star's Choice

Title: You Must Be Layla
Author: Yassmin Abdel-Magied
Released: 05th March 2019
Publisher: Penguin
Add it to Goodreads
Sure, all her other role models also had examples where they encouraged their followers to be non-violent or forgiving, but they also stood up for what was right.


Star's Thoughts

I think this is something a lot of us can relate to - seeking a role model who stand up for what they believe is right.

Follow Star at Little Miss Star, Twitter, Instagram, and Goodreads



Seventy-Seven Saturday was inspired by The Friday 56 by Freda's Voice. If you decided to share your Seventy-Seven Saturday on your blog please link back  to us and tag us on Twitter of Instagram @AsuYABloggers and #77Saturday

Top 5 Tuesday - Star’s Top 5 Middle Grade Books Read In 2019



This week Star brings us her Top 5 Middle Grade Books Read In 2019




1) Redwood and Ponytail by K.A. Holt
I recently read this book and it is so darn sweet and cute. You can read my praising review over on my blog.
Redwood and Ponytail is written in verse, and it is about two girls who are navigating their first crushes – on each other! This was everything I wish I’d had when I was a young baby gay. 



2) Other Words For Home by Jasmine Warga
This book is also written in verse, and it follows the main character, Jude, who moves from her home country of Syria, for Cincinnati, USA. She has to navigate not only a new country, but a new school, and new friends.



3) The Peacock Detectives by Carly Nugent
I’m a massive fan of important topics, like mental health, being talked about in middle grade books. The Peacock Detectives follows Cassie, who, as it says on the tin – is a peacock detective. In the midst of searching for her neighbour’s missing peacocks, she finds more out about her family, and life, than she thought she would.
This precious book is also a #LoveOzMG novel! You can read my full thoughts in my review on my blog.



4) Drum Roll, Please by Lisa Jenn Bigelow
This book is another book baby gay me wishes she could have had.
Melly’s parents drop her off at summer camp right after telling her that they’re getting a divorce. Which is enough to rock any 12 year old’s world. She also has to navigate her BFF not being in her band group, and also her developing crush on a fellow girl camper.
I found this book was just so utterly wonderful.




5) The Little Wave by Pip Harry
Another book told in verse! I adored the first book of Pip’s that I read – Because Of You, so when I found out she had written a middle grade book, I leapt at the chance to read it.
This book follows three main characters, all of whom have their own issues going on, and are dealing with it in their own ways.
I loved how everything intersected and came together, it was such a sweet read.
This precious book is also a #LoveOzMG novel! You can read my full thoughts in my review on my blog.


Follow Star at Little Miss Star, Twitter, Instagram, and Goodreads


What's your pick for this week? Share on your blog, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, or in the comments below! Make sure you tag your posts with #AusYABloggers so we can share the love.

Seventy-Seven Saturday (#12) Black Panther: The Battle For Wakanda


Every Saturday we will bring you a short snippet from page 77 of a book. It might be a book one of us is reading or perhaps just the book closest to us.

The Rules:


  1. Pick up a Book (your current read, or the closest book to you, or your next read, etc)
  2. Turn to page 77(or 77% if you are on an e-reader)
  3. Find a Snippet, Sentence or Paragraph you like.
  4. Share it on your blog or Twitter or Instagram and link back to us (AusYABloggers) and use #77Saturday

Sarah's Choice

Title: Black Panther: The Battle For Wakanda
Author: Brandon T. Snider
Released: 16th January 2018
Publisher:  Marvel Press
Add it to Goodreads
Cheers erupted from the hills as the White Gorilla Cult descended on the Great Mound. Shuri was flanked by two Dora Milaje, Ayo and Aneka. Nakia and Okoye, an additional pair of fighters, stood ready for Shuri's direction.
"Be careful, warriors. Repel these invaders at all costs," Shuri commanded.


Sarah's Thoughts

Riley (my son) is really into super hero's at the moment and we have been read Marvel Chapter Books. Our current read is Black Panther.
The art on page 77 shows a battle between the Dora Milaje warriors and the White Gorilla Cult.

Follow Sarah at Blog, Twitter, Instagram and Goodreads



Seventy-Seven Saturday was inspired by The Friday 56 by Freda's Voice. If you decided to share your Seventy-Seven Saturday on your blog please link back  to us and tag us on Twitter of Instagram @AsuYABloggers and #77Saturday

Top 5 Tuesday – Dear Santa, I’d like these books, please!



This week Star brings us her Top 5 Books I Want For Christmas

Let me start this off with: Dear Santa, I have been a good girl this year, I promise.

Now, if only I had the time and money to read everything.

But, here are some books I’d really like, and ones I hope to get to buy, and actually read, in 2020 (that’s so gross writing that, by the way. 2020 isn’t a real decade! Pft!)
Note: These are all 2020 releases, which is why I’m not really expecting Santa to deliver them to me. Though, if he’s as good as he says he is…


1) Loveless by Alice Oseman
Georgia feels loveless – in the romantic sense, anyway. She’s eighteen, never been in a relationship, or even had a crush on a single person in her whole life. She thinks she's an anomaly, people call her weird, and she feels a little broken. But she still adores romance – weddings, fan fiction, and happily ever afters. She knows she’ll find her person one day … right?

After a disastrous summer, Georgia is now at university, hundreds of miles from home. She is more determined than ever to find love – and her annoying roommate, Rooney, is a bit of a love expert, so perhaps she can help.

But maybe Georgia just doesn’t feel that way about guys. Or girls. Or anyone at all. Maybe that's okay. Maybe she can find happiness without falling in love. And maybe Rooney is a little more loveless than she first appears.

LOVELESS is a journey of identity, self-acceptance, and finding out how many different types of love there really are. And that no one is really loveless after all


2) We Used To BeFriends by Amy Spalding
Told in dual timelines—half of the chapters moving forward in time and half moving backward—We Used to Be Friends explores the most traumatic breakup of all: that of childhood besties. At the start of their senior year in high school, James (a girl with a boy’s name) and Kat are inseparable, but by graduation, they’re no longer friends. James prepares to head off to college as she reflects on the dissolution of her friendship with Kat while, in alternating chapters, Kat thinks about being newly in love with her first girlfriend and having a future that feels wide open. Over the course of senior year, Kat wants nothing more than James to continue to be her steady rock, as James worries that everything she believes about love and her future is a lie when her high-school sweetheart parents announce they’re getting a divorce. Funny, honest, and full of heart, We Used to Be Friends tells of the pains of growing up and growing apart.


3) The Henna Wars by Adiba Jaigirdar
When Nishat comes out to her parents, they say she can be anyone she wants—as long as she isn’t herself. Because Muslim girls aren’t lesbians. Nishat doesn’t want to hide who she is, but she also doesn’t want to lose her relationship with her family. And her life only gets harder once a childhood friend walks back into her life.

Flávia is beautiful and charismatic and Nishat falls for her instantly. But when a school competition invites students to create their own businesses, both Flávia and Nishat choose to do henna, even though Flávia is appropriating Nishat’s culture. Amidst sabotage and school stress, their lives get more tangled—but Nishat can’t quite get rid of her crush on Flávia, and realizes there might be more to her than she realized. 


4) The Falling InLove Montage by Ciara Smyth
Saoirse doesn’t believe in love at first sight or happy endings. If they were real, her mother would still be able to remember her name and not in a care home with early onset dementia. A condition that Saoirse may one day turn out to have inherited. So she’s not looking for a relationship. She doesn’t see the point in igniting any romantic sparks if she’s bound to burn out.

But after a chance encounter at an end-of-term house party, Saoirse is about to break her own rules. For a girl with one blue freckle, an irresistible sense of mischief, and a passion for rom-coms.

Unbothered by Saoirse’s no-relationships rulebook, Ruby proposes a loophole: They don’t need true love to have one summer of fun, complete with every cliché, rom-com montage-worthy date they can dream up—and a binding agreement to end their romance come fall. It would be the perfect plan, if they weren’t forgetting one thing about the Falling in Love Montage: when it’s over, the characters actually fall in love… for real.


5) The Long DistancePlaylist by Tara Eglington
Taylor and Isolde used to be best friends - before THAT FIGHT, 18 months ago. It's been radio silence ever since - until Taylor contacts Isolde to sympathise with her breakup: the breakup that she never saw coming; the breakup that destroyed her confidence and ended her dreams of joining the National Ballet School.

Taylor's had his own share of challenges, including a life-altering accident that has brought his hopes of competing at the Winter Olympics to a halt.

Isolde responds to Taylor, to be polite. But what starts out as heartbreak-themed Spotify playlists and shared stories of exes quickly becomes something more.

And as Taylor and Isolde start to lean on each other, the distance between them begins to feel not so distant after all ...

A boy. A girl. A one-of-a-kind friendship. Cross-country convos and middle-of-the-night playlists. With big dreams come even bigger challenges.



Follow Star at Little Miss Star, Twitter, Instagram, and Goodreads


What's your pick for this week? Share on your blog, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, or in the comments below! Make sure you tag your posts with #AusYABloggers so we can share the love.
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