How are you? I hope your weekend is going well so far!
Title: Miss Understanding (Miss #1)
Author: Aubrey Bondurant
Date Published: December 17, 2019
Rating: 2.5/5 stars
Date read: February 23, 2020
Miss Understanding is an office romance following a lawyer named Liam and his assistant, Kendall. Liam isn’t an enjoyable boss to work for and is extremely cold to Kendall. At the beginning of our story Liam needs to visit his hometown for the funeral of his father and because he is in the process of an important case, he decides to bring Kendall along in order to facilitate working remotely. Romance ensues.
I was initially enjoying Miss Understanding because I liked the premise, but ultimately I did not enjoy the execution. At some point in the novel I felt that Liam made Kendall feel that he was embarrassed to be seen with her, or to have their relationship known, and this is just one of those things that I have a really hard time forgiving when it comes to romance. This paired with the fact that Liam was a jerk for majority of the novel made me really dislike this romance. I don’t actually have a problem with mean or rude characters, my issue was more so that I felt we were supposed to like Liam. Kendall was a bit too nice, and understanding, and forgiving, and it made her really unrelatable and unrealistic for me. My other issues were that Liam’s character development happened way too fast for me to be able to believe it and the pacing was a bit uneven, some parts felt too long and boring.
Title: Whistleblower
Author: Susan Fowler
Date Published: February 18, 2020
Rating: 4.25/5
Date read: February 27, 2020
Whistleblower is a memoir following Susan Fowler throughout childhood until after her difficult experiences with Uber.
Susan is such an inspiration, her passion towards education and her drive to get one was incredible. The hardships she faced before entering the workforce truly built her into a person capable of facing and exposing the toxic and abusive work environment at Uber. Memoirs from whistleblowers might be my new favourite thing, I mean why wouldn’t I want to read about an inspiring person who strives to do what is right and is firm in their morals?
Title: Stardust
Author: Neil Gaiman
Date Published: 1997
Rating: 4/5 stars
Date read: March 3, 2020 (reread)
Stardust follows a young man named Tristan who is tasked by the woman he loves, to catch a fallen star. Tristan’s love is unreciprocated and he hopes that by collecting this star he can win her over. In order to retrieve the star he needs to venture over the mysterious wall and into Faerie.
This was a reread for me. The first time I read Stardust I found it quite charming, but a bit odd. This second time around I decided to listen to the audiobook and I really feel that Gaiman’s narration added a whole new layer of depth to the story and made me enjoy it a lot more. This truly is a fairytale for adults, with all the whimsy and magic you’d expect of such a story.
If you’ve read any of these books or plan to read them, I’d love to hear your thoughts! Happy reading 💗.
A Bookish Balance 
I haven’t read any but you made me curious about Whistleblower! I’ve seen the movie for Stardust so many times I don’t think I will enjoy the book as much now 😦 But maybe I will give it a try in the future
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Whistleblower was quite an eye-opener for me! I’ve never seen the movie adaptation of Stardust, but I hope to eventually, I hear it’s quite different from the book so it might be worthwhile for you to check out the book 💗😝
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