It's a Tough Job: Tales about Your Dream Career and More

Hello sweeties!

A few weeks ago, a Twitter meme about your 5-year-old-self dream career and my own musings about jobs gave me the idea for this post. This is going to be a conversation prompt about the kind of job you wanted to do when you grew up, the one you got (instead?) and/or the one you would like to do one day. I'll go first...

Rehabilitating YA: 20 Trope-Free Standalones/Series to Read if You've Given Up on It (Pt.2)

Hello sweeties!

I've been wanting to write a post like this for a while. Every now and then, I hear someone say they've given up on YA (or are reading much less of it lately) because they got fed up with the tropes that come with the "genre". Now, while of course it's not mandatory to read YA at any age, and while I'm not denying the existence of such tropes (though really, any literary genre/age range has got its share of them...), I made it my reader's life mission to discover YA books that stand out for any reason and employ as little of those overused plot devices as it's humanly possible (hence, of course, my blog's name). So I thought I'd put together a list of YA novels blissfully devoid of tropes (or employing them in minimal doses), hoping to prove those reluctant/jaded readers that there's so much more to YA than meets the eye. And I ultimately decided to make this post into a series, because my list was too long for a single one. Here goes Part 2 (broken down by genres/my blog's Reading Rooms)...

(Note: these are not necessarily my favourite books - though some of them are. I only choose them for their lack/minimal amount of tropes. Also, there are a few mature YA/NA/adult friendly books in this list).

Tell Me Something Tuesday: What Personality Traits Do You Love/Hate in a Character?

Tell Me Something Tuesday is a weekly discussion post on Rainy Day Ramblings, where the blog's owner Heidi discusses a wide range of topics from books to blogging. Weigh in and join the conversation by adding your thoughts in the comments. If you want to do your own post, grab the question and answer it on your blog.

Here is what is on deck this week:

WHAT PERSONALITY TRAITS DO YOU LOVE/HATE IN A CHARACTER?

First off...I proposed this question to Heidi, and she gladly accepted to incorporate it into her list. Thank you!

Overall, I'm not awfully picky with my characters - I have been known to like a few unlikeable ones (at least based on the general consensus, or lack of it...but heck, even "I" could see those characters were a little - or a lot - off the track, so to speak), as long as they were interesting to read about, or the story they featured in was interesting as a whole. But the key word, to me, are "depth" and "growth". Even characters with a questionable history can provide both. Also, let's face it, not a single one of us is a saint - why shouldn't we be equally lenient with book characters? Maybe we would never be best friend with them IRL, but that doesn't mean they can't provide an interesting perspective book-wise.