Recent Reads and Reviews (& Win a Giveaway Copy)

It's been a while since I sat down and did a book review on what I've actually read lately so rather than write up individual posts I thought I would do a quick in-a-nutshell run through of what's been floating my boat lately. So far 2016 has actually been pretty awesome reading wise and I'm super stoked to be giving away two copies of one of the books I've read in January! Here goes:

Tears of the Cheetah by TM Clark :: I've mentioned before that I love reading books set in different exotic locations especially if I have actually travelled their myself. Tears of the Cheetah is an amazing fast paced action adventure novel set in South Africa and follows the story of an American artist who escapes her past in the States. Mackenzie moves to South Africa to escape the media attention that comes with being a senator's daughter, but despite her attempts to isolate herself from anyone her friendship with Cole, a local game park owner is too hard to ignore.

Neither Mackenzie nor Cole are prepared for the events to come when poachers target Cole's beloved cheetah's and endanger someone Mackenzie holds dear to her. I loved the mix of action, romance and the beautiful African backdrop to this novel and I'm so excited to be giving away two copies of this novel thanks to the lovely people at Harlequin Books Australia! (See below for entry details).

Rating: ****

Hello From the Guillespies by Monica McInernay :: In December I was feeling quite festive and decided I wanted to read a Christmas kinda story to get me even more in the mood. On that front I actually failed a tiny bit because although this book is set around Christmas it's also set in Australia (which I didn't know from it's candy-cane cover) and wasn't quite the snow and snuggle fest I was after. That being said I actually really loved this book which centred around three sisters whose lives had all kind of fallen apart rather spectacularly in the lead up to the Christmas holidays.

There's something very relateable reading about other twenty somethings still trying to figure their lives out and Monica McInernay does write funny and heartwarming family drama. A great holiday read.

Rating: ****

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell :: I love Rainbow Rowell so there was no doubt in my mind that I wouldn't love her Young Adult book Fangirl and I totally did. Firstly I just gotta say that her writing is just brilliant and every time I read a Rainbow Rowell novel I marvel at how she effortlessly makes the characters personalities unfold throughout the story.

If you don't know the premise, Fangirl centres around a girl called Cath who loves writing fan fiction and isn't surviving her first year of college very successfully. Although I wasn't a big fan of the actual fan fiction extracts in Fangirl - which are like a Harry Potter-ish boarding school wizard called Simon Snow - I still think the book benefited from having them included. Well it's safe to say that I won't be reading Carry On (as it is the story Cath was writing in Fangirl) the character progression and Rowell's wonderful writing had this book stealing my heart. I also just loved all her side characters too.

Rating: ****

Giveaway Details:

Want to win a copy of T.M Clark's Tears of the Cheetah? Simply follow me on twitter to enter and retweet the #giveaway link to enter again! Giveaway open internationally.

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