Tag: s4s

S4S – Books to give as gifts

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Hello friends!

It’s week 2 of December does #SixforSunday. Thank you all so much for joining in last week, it was so lush to see you all joining in! 

This week’s prompt sees us taking on something that I LOVE doing:

Books to give as gifts

I LOVE BUYING BOOKS AS PRESENTS OK? I’m going to choose 6 people from my life and gift them a book (which they might actually be getting or not, who knows) and tell you WHY I’m gifting them that! 

  1. My goddaughters – Pages and Co (1 and 2) by Anna James
    My goddaughters are 8, nearly 9 now, and they have been AVID readers since they were proper little. I’m the auntie that brings them books. I think it’s about time they were introduced to the wonderful world of Tilly and her book wandering adventures. I love these books and I think they will too!
  2. My cousin, Kate – A Curse So Dark and Lonely by Brigid Kemmerer
    Kate is a massive reader and a MASSIVE Disney fan. Me and her are quite alike in many ways and I really enjoyed this Beauty and the Beast retelling, so I think she would enjoy it too!
  3. My mam – Scythe by Neal Schusterman
    My mam loves stealing books from my shelves. She’s a big fan of YA books ever since she started stealing my books. We all know I LOVE a bit of Scythe and I think it would be right down my mam’s alley.
  4. My cousin’s husband, Graeme – Frostheart by Jamie Littler
    Graeme is a big reader and I’ve got him into reading kids books (because they’re the best). I devoured Frostheart when I read it and I think Graeme would really enjoy it too. Who doesn’t wanna read an icy adventure?!
  5. My friend, Sally – The Exact Opposite of Okay by Laura Steven
    Sally is one of the people I work with who I just adore. She’s recently started reading YA books with her daughter. I think she’d LOVE TEOOO because who doesn’t?!
  6. Anyone who doubts how good kids books are –  Why You Should Read Children’s Books, Even Though You Are So Old and Wise by Katherine Rundell.
    Kids books are BRILLIANT and I challenge ANYONE to a duel who argues otherwise.

That was a fun prompt for #SixforSunday! You can bet that if I’m buying you a present for Christmas that there’ll be a book in there/book related thing in there somewhere! 

What are you buying for others?
Which of my gifted books are you most interested in?
What would you buy for me?

See you next week!

S x 

S4S – Books set over Christmas

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S4S DEC 1

Hello friends! It is Sunday again which means only one thing… it’s #SixforSunday time again! 

We are in a new month now… it’s December! A new month means a whole new bunch of prompts!

December: It’s the most wonderful time of the year!
1st: Books set over Christmas
8th: Books you want to give as gifts
15th: Fireside reads
22nd: All I want for Christmas is…
29th: New year, new books

I love a new month of #SixforSunday! I’ll be posting the first half of 2020’s prompts in the next 2 weeks, so keep your eyes peeled for that! 

But anyway, you’re here to see my choices for this week’s #SixforSunday… the one where Steph struggles, but ultimately manages to find 6:

Books set over Christmas

What can I say? Clearly children’s books have a place in my heart here on this blog! 

Also, a shout out to How Winston Delivered Christmas and The Christmas Mystery (not a children’s book) for both being advent books – where you get a chapter a day for every day in Advent. The best kind of books in my opinion! 

I initially found this quite hard, but once I started, I was HERE for 100s of books. Naturally, I could only use 6. 

I’d love to see what you all used for this prompt! Remember to leave your link in the comments so others can check out your #SixforSunday post for this week! 

See you next week for more #SixforSunday December fun!

S x 

S4S – Books to throw in a fire

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Hello there! 

How are you all? What’s goin on this chilly, wet Saturday? Have you been reading anything wonderful lately? I finished 2 books yesterday (the first books I’ve read this month) so I’m thrilled! 

Anyway… you’re here to find out my choices for this week’s #SixforSunday! This week we’re talking about:

Books I’d wanna throw in a fire

WOAH. Controversial choice of prompt Steph. Most unlike you. Well… here we go. Six books I’d wanna chuck in a fire. I’m totally gonna cheat here… I’m going to chuck in the longest books I own/have read so the fire burns for longer! 

  1. Game of Thrones books! (there’s like 7 of them… that’s a whole chunk of warmth for a cold gal like me)
  2. Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon (1000 pages of warmth!)
  3. The Harry Potter book that is the longest… it was my least favourite because it just goes on FOREVER. Order of the Phoenix maybe?
  4. The Toll by Neal Shusterman (I loved it, but it’s 630 pages so that’s gonna keep me warm for at least a little while right?)
  5. Kane and Abel by Jeffrey Archer (not my usual cup of tea, but I really enjoyed this! Again, just chucking it cause it’s a BIG book and therefore lots of warm!)
  6. According to Goodreads, Deathly Hallows is one of the other books that I’ve read that is very long. So that too.

HA. Way to cheat the system Elliott. I’m going to be a warm bean with all those pages! (Ironically The Book Thief is one of the longest books I’ve read, but that felt wrong to chuck into the fire since yknow that’s what happens in the book!)

Has anyone else tried to cheat the system for this week’s #SixforSunday? Now that I’m done, I could have gone a different direction – endings you wanna chuck in the fire anyone!? I have at least 4 that I can think of off the top of my head! 

Anyway! Have a happy Sunday everyone! See you next week for December realness! 

S x 

 

 

 

 

S4S – Books to snuggle with

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Hello there friends!

IT is Sunday once again. How come Sunday comes about so quickly? I hope you are all having a lovely relaxing Sunday! What are you up to? Have you had a lovely week?

Welcome back anyway for another #SixforSunday post! This week, we are sticking with the winter-y theme and we are thinking about:

Books to snuggle up with

I’m going for “books that have filled me with joy and could melt away even the coldest of hearts and weather”. I love a good heartwarming book, so this should be easy (she says…)

Nov 17 1

Unconventional by Maggie Harcourt is a book that is OFTEN on my lists of books that make me feel happy, so it would not be right to miss it out. It made me smile so much when I read it!

The Star Outside My Window by Onjali Q. Rauf is a book I read recently, and while it made me cry, it filled my heart with so much joy and love that it definitely could melt away the cold!

The Day I Was Erased by Lisa Thompson was a book I read to my class last year and we absolutely adored it. It’s funny, charming and poignant. It’s one of those books that we still now talk about (even though they’ve moved on to Year 6!)

Nov 17 2

Boot by Shane Hegarty is a book that I absolutely adored. Boot is the most adorable robot and he wants to just make sure that his human is safe. I loved this story and I can’t wait for the second one to come out!

A second appearance on this list for Lisa Thompson with Owen and the Soldier because this book has an awfully big space in my heart. It’s just so lovely. I wanna read it and read it again. If you haven’t read it yet, please do.

Me Mam. Me Dad. Me by Malcolm Duffy is a bit of a selfish choice here because reading a book that is written in my dialect just warmed my heart so much. It’s so rare to read something set in Newcastle, never mind written how I think and speak, so this book has a very special chunk of my reading identity. I just adored it.

And there you have it! My six books that I wanna snuggle up with. I can not recommend these books enough – they’re all faves for me!

Thank you so much for stopping by for my post for #SixforSunday! Don’t forget to leave your link in the comments so others can check out your post. I’m loving seeing your posts! You guys make me so happy!

S x

 

S4S – Books with blue covers

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Good afternoon friends and foes alike!

How are you on this chilly Sunday day? I hope it is warmer where you are than it is in Newcastle as it is CHILLY. I say that… in the sun it’s warm enough, but in the shade it is CHILLLLLL.

Anyway, enough of my whinging about the cold. You’re here for this week’s #SixforSunday post and I’m loving seeing what you all are sharing! Share your link in the comments for everyone to go and check out! This week’s theme was:

Books with blue covers

Now as I recently realised, I read a lot of books with blue covers, so I literally could have been here for EVER showing you different ones. I’m going to try and share 6 books that I don’t share often in the hopes of recommending something new to everyone! I’ll also share my Goodreads review too so you can see what I thought of the book!

Storm Witch: Storm’s story is brilliantly told and I am very curious about what’s to come. This is perfect for Y5+! Danger, magic and acceptance are encapsulated in this story, with a dash of the importance of being kind. I loved the sense of community life on the island and Storm’s kind, if not a bit stubborn, nature!

Look Both Ways: Just finished this and it’s a proper delight. Jason Reynolds keeps writing absolute winners. This book tells the same walk home from a wonderful mix of characters and I just adored each of them. The friendship, the love, the sense of community in the book gave me such warm vibes. The stories are the perfect length and I think this would make an absolutely wonderful read aloud to a Y5/6 class!

Frostheart: GUYS. This is exceptional. It’s fun, daring, dangerous and cool. I absolutely loved my journey on Frostheart with Ash and the crew. A proper icy cold ride, with a massive heart. The illustrations throughout add so much too. Absolute smasher!

Amelia Fang: I love Amelia Fang stories and they just keep being wonderful! They’re full of fun and gorgeous illustrations!

All The Things We Never Said: Well this is bloody amazing. It made me cry, made me cross and made me happy. I don’t have words right now for this. The power of friendship, but also the power of negative thoughts is discussed in this book.

The Boy Who Steals Houses: Deary me. Sam – what a pickle you find yourself in. This book is just magnificent. I am a crying mess. This book is hard edges and summers days. It’s light and dark. It’s love and hate. It’s everything I needed. The thing that really makes this book is it’s characters. I just adored every single thing.

And there you have it! My 6 books with blue covers!

Don’t forget to share your link in the comments so me and other people can check out your #SixforSunday post!

See you next week!

S x

S4S – Snowy books

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Hello friends

How are you all doing? Welcome to a brand new month here at #SixforSunday where we are taking a new load of prompts! November sees the weather taking a turn for the chilly and therefore our prompts are a little chillier!

Today we are taking on:

Books with snow/ice in the title!

I found this trickier than I should have ha!

I went ALL SNOW. ALL OF THE SNOW ALL OF THE BOOKS. (I hate snow in reality! It’s lush to look at, but if I have to go out and be a human in the snow I am NOT down with that!)

I can’t wait to see if you all struggled with that as much as I did (ha!).

Thank you so much for sticking with me this year! If you have any ideas for prompts for #SixforSunday for 2020 then let me know! I’m going to do some thinking over the next few days and I’ll post the prompts before the end of the month!

You’re all amazing! See you next week for ‘Books with blue covers’ 

S x

S4S – Witch-y books

Hey pals!

How you all doing today? Sorry for my absence of late. It’s been a mad busy week, but now it’s half term so I’m hoping for lots of time to write blog posts!

You’re here today for #SixforSunday and today we are honouring Halloween with the prompt:

Witch-y books

So 6 books featuring witches… let’s see what I can give you!

    Sanctuary by V.V.James (bloody magnificent)
    The Deathless Girls by Kiran Milwood Hargrave (definite witch vibes)
    Song of Sorrow by Melinda Salisbury (the witchiest of witches)
    The Burning by Laura Bates (loved the historical witch tale in this)
    The Wicked Deep by Shea Earnshaw (witches all over the shop)
    We are Blood and Thunder by Kesia Lupo (don’t mess with the witches in this!)

And there you have it! Six witch-y tales to fill your Halloween with!

See you next week!

S x

S4S – Books to take on an autumn walk

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Hello loves and lovers alike!

How are we all on this chilly Newcastle Sunday? What have you been up to today? Anything of note? I’ve been into town to get my eyebrows threaded and then I met my friend for a coffee. I’m posting this and then I’m off to get myself a cup of tea and mark my Maths books (thilling life of a teacher guys!)

If you’ve popped by its because you’re curious about today’s #SixforSunday post! Today we are taking on more Autumn realness with:

Books you’d like to take on an autumn walk

So I’m going for books I wanna take on an autumn walk because I wanna talk to the main characters about their life choices, ha!

State of Sorrow – Melinda Salisbury
I wanna go for an autumn walk with Luvain Fen. Enough said.

I, Cosmo – Carlie Sorosiak
Let’s be real, who is going to love a walk more than Cosmo? He deserves to go ona  brilliant little walk because he’s the best doggo there is!

Against All Gods – Maz Evans
I’d love to take Elliot for a walk to talk to him about what happened. I think he needs a hug and someone to listen to him, and I’d like to be that person!

Over the Top – Jonathan van Ness
I think going for a walk with JVN would be the most incredible walk ever. I think he’s absolutely wonderful and I’d learn so much about the world, his life and I can imagine it would be a very empowering walk… I’d come out full of self confidence and self care tips, and maybe even a brilliant haircut!

Jemima Small versus The Universe – Tamsin Winter
I wanna go for a walk with Jemima for 2 reasons. One: she’s s clever that I bet she could teach me a thing or two. Two: I wanna tell her that there’s people in the world who won’t judge her based on what she looks like; that she’s brave and brilliant and that she can do and achieve whatever she wants in life.

Scythe – Neal Shusterman
I’d love to go for a walk with any of the scythes to be honest, just to talk to them about what their job is like. However, I think Scythe Faraday would be my first choice because I just think he’s wonderful. 

So there we go! The 6 books (characters, I cheated, sue me) that I’d like to go on an autumn walk with! I’m loving seeing your responses to this prompt so far, so keep them coming! Remmeber to tag me on twitter (@eenalol) and use the hashtag #SixforSunday so I can keep track of your brilliant posts.

See you all next week for Autumnal covers!

S x

S4S – Books with leaves on the cover

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Hello #SixforSunday pals!

How are you today?

Here we are in #SixforSunday does Autumn weeks! I hope you’ve all had a lovely start to Autumn… all it’s done in Newcastle is rain, so typical Autumn here! However, to cheer us all up, here’s this week’s prompt:

Books with leaves on the cover

I don’t know why I do this to myself because this is HARD.

It’s funny how apart from Circe, all of these books are blue/green. However, there you go… 6 covers with leaves on them! I couldn’t not include Mel and Cosmo (he’s the goodest boy. If you’ve not read this book yet, my god please get on it!)

And that’s it for this week!

See you next week for #SixforSunday Autumn Feels does Books You’d Take On An Autumn Walk!

Thanks for being such brilliant humans!

S x

S4S – Books I read at school

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Hello #SixforSunday crew!

How are you all doing today?

What is going on in your worlds? It’s a cold and wet day here in Newcastle! The perfect day for snuggling up with a book and not facing the world. A perfect day for thinking about books in lots of capacities! The perfect day for today’s #SixforSunday prompt:

Books you read at school

Now I could cheat here becuase I read books at school EVERYDAY (being my job and all), but I’ll play fair and go for books that I genuinely remember reading myself! I don’t know what it says about me, or my education, but I struggled to recall more than a few… I had to do some serious thinking to recall the rest… hence all of the plays mentioned!

  1. Goodnight Mister Tom
    I remember reading this VIVIDLY. We did a whole thing around WW2 and there are some really vivid memories I have around this time. I’ve not read this book since school (not all the way through anyway), but I think I’d love to revisit this sometime!
  2. Nineteen Eighty Four
    Our GCSE literature book was Nineteen Eighty Four and guys, I absolutely adored it. I just thought it was fascinating. I don’t know anyone else who studied it for GCSE, so it feels lovely to have done it! 
  3. Charlotte’s Web
    I remember that we used this book and rewrote the story from the perspective of one of the other characters. I don’t remember which character I chose, or what I wrote though!
  4. Othello
    If I remember correctly, we studied a different Shakespeare play every year, but Othello was one of the ones that I loved the most. 
  5. Macbeth
    I think we were in Year 8 when we studied Macbeth. I remember having an exam and the question was about Lady Macbeth’s demise and another question about who was to blame for the death of Banquo. 
  6. A Midsummer Night’s Dream
    I remember studying this and making loads and loads of notes about it and then we didn’t even have a question that I wanted to answer on the exam.

My memory clearly isn’t very good! We did a lot of poetry in secondary school too, but I don’t recall anything well enough to name it ha!

Thanks for stopping by! Remember to tag me, or if you’re joining in to use the hashtag #SixforSunday so I can see your post!

WHILE YOU’RE HERE… I HAVE A QUESTION ABOUT THE FUTURE OF #SIXFORSUNDAY.

Now, I’d love to start a twitter chat using the #SixforSunday prompts. I used to join in Sunday YA and I absolutely loved it, so I’d love to do something with #SixforSunday. It’d be a really cool opportunity to talk to authors and fellow bloggers (and joiner in’ers of S4S) about the prompts that week. It would probably happen on a Sunday late afternoon/early evening (6pm UK time) and there’d be questions based around the prompts, or even based on specific books.

WOULD THIS BE SOMETHING YOU’D BE INTERESTED IN?

I’d love to know if you have any other ideas about how we can keep #SixforSunday evolving and make it even better than it is now! I really respect your opinions and would love to know your thoughts!

See you next week for the start of our October journey: Autumn feels!

S x