READING VLOG: READING ONLY MIDDLE-GRADE BOOKS FOR A WEEK ✨ cozy reads, victorian mysteries + magic!

I've still left myself one day at the end to read a whole book. Hey clown. Jester, you have done it again. Hello friends. Hello, hello, hello. I am so unbelievably excited for this week's video. A couple of months back, I guess, Believeathon happened, run by the king of middle grade, Gavin, icon, legend. And I was very unprepared. Nothing new, nothing changed, same old ----. And I did not participate. Very, very sad about it. However, I have since bought quite a few middle grades. And so what I thought we would do this week is just read middle grade books for a week. I've been a bit of a slump lately. A bit of a reading slump. I've been finding it difficult to read. So I'm hoping by having a week where we just read middle grade, it'll be like really, really fast paced. It'll be great. It'll be wonderful. First is Pages and Co. Tinnie and the Book Wanderers by Anna James. I've heard so many wonderful things about this. It is about a girl who lives above her grandparents' bookshop. And then the book characters start coming out of the books and chatting to her. And I think they go on this wonderful adventure. And yeah, this is just one I've heard so many, so many good things about. I'm going to be reading it with Molly, who has a booktube channel, which you should definitely go check out. I'll be linking her down below. I cannot wait to buddy read this with her. I think we're going to start it tonight. We've got illustrations in here. I'm just so ready for the vibe. I'm just so ready to be reading middle grade books. I feel like it's really what my soul needs right now. But wow, what a moment I will never forget. A moment that is most pleasing to me in my career. Then I'm going to be, I'm so excited to read this. I'm going to be reading The Clockwork Sparrow, which is the first in the Sinclair's Mysteries by Katherine Woodfine. So this is set in like Victorian London, I believe. And I remember I read the blurb out on my book haul, but it's like, oh, it's just so good. I just love it. I believe Sinclair's in this book is like a department store. I'm really in the mood for like a middle grade historical mystery. It's everything I want right now. So if it's bad, I'm suing. I am relying on this book to be good. And then lastly is a book that has been getting so much hype, especially around Believathon. Like I remember so many people read this and it is A Pinch of Magic by Michelle Harrison. So many people that I'm friends with have read this and loved it. This was gifted to me by the lovely, amazing, wonderful Keris. This is about three sisters who are like cursed by this ancient curse. I said curse twice. And I think they decide to go on like an adventure to break it. That's all I really know. I don't want to know too much more going into it. I'm going to go start Pages & Code by Tilly in the... By Tilly in the Book Wanderers? By Anna James. And yeah, I'll just update you when I have some thoughts on what I think about it. I am only 60 pages into Pages & Code, Tilly... I'm going to call it Tilly in the Book Wanderers because obviously Pages & Code is the series and then Tilly in the Book Wanderers is the book as far as I am aware. Okay, is it weird that when I'm reading this, I'm imagining reading it to my future child? Imagine reading it to my future child. Is that weird? That is a bit psychotic, isn't it? Is it? Security! Can you please escort this lady over here out? I think it's a sign of what a great middle grade this is because although anyone can love middle grade, any of us can love and read middle grade, I think it's a really good sign. I think we have to remember that like this is for children and so when we're reading it, we should be thinking how great is this for children? Like, is it a great book for kids to read? And I think this is. I think it is so magical. It is set in this bookshop with a girl called Tilly. Her grandparents own the bookshop and they live above it and it's in London and it is like this warm, cosy bookshop with all these nooks and crannies for people to sit in. It's got a cafe where these wonderful cakes are made and I just feel like I can imagine what this bookshop looks like. Oh my god, it makes me want to go to London to one of these bookshops right now. It is so warm and comforting and nostalgic almost to like how you would feel in a cosy bookshop when you're a kid. I'm loving that part of it. And Tilly's mum left and no one knows where she went just after Tilly was born so she lives with her grandparents and I think that like her relationship with her mum leaving and what she knows about her mum is going to play quite a big role in the book going forward. From what I know about the story going forward and I think we're just about to start to hit that is that characters start coming out of the books that Tilly loves and we've already seen that with one character that she's met but from what I can understand they have always appeared to her grandparents too because I think we walked in on her grandmother talking to Lizzie Bennet. Mr Darcy. Miss Bennet. Hiya here. I did not expect to see you. So we must leave you at once. I think I love middle grades that deals with familial grief and difficult familial relationships. One of my favourite middle grades ever is Love, Aubrey by Suzanne Lafleur and this makes you sob. I don't know if this is gonna make me sob but I think it's gonna examine similar relationships. In this the girl's dad and sister die in a car crash and her mum abandons her like from her grief afterwards and in this Tilly's dad died just before she was born and so like her mum I think it was too much for her. I guess we'll find out maybe further on maybe in the book or the series but it's very similar to that and I think that's a dynamic I like to see played out in kids books. Yeah I'm just really enjoying it. It's so whimsical and magical and perfect. It's like just the perfect kid's book and you can't go wrong with a book set in a bookshop. 308 pages into Pages & Co so I'm just over halfway. I feel like right now I don't have much to update you on. Hang on, I'm cutting half my head off. Who do I think I am? I would have loved, loved, loved, loved to have this book as a kid. It is the perfect balance of like cosy but also magical. It has that magicalness, that aloofness but also that warm and cosiness. We're just starting to explore the concept of book wanderers so Tilly and her friend being able to travel into books and explore them and get to know the characters in them and how to do it safely. I think I know who the villain is. It's a kid's book actually so I do know who the villain is. I don't need to be so like I'm a genius. Mastermind. See I'm telling you I have the mind of a master... I have the mind of a mastermind. What's that? I don't know but you know I'm so creative like that. But like the conflict hasn't necessarily started yet. There's seeds of the conflict but we're not actually worried about anything yet. It's kind of just coasting along and almost still introducing the story. That is the one thing I would say about this is that I still feel like we are only maybe just getting into the middle of the book and so I just wish we kind of had got into a bit more of a conflict scenario. I just took my makeup off because I was like oh I'm not gonna film again tonight. But a plot twist just happened that I did not see coming and that I really like and that makes total sense and I'm really glad that I wasn't expecting there to be any plot twists. Do you know what I mean? So I'm really glad that something has happened which has actually surprised me. Made me go oh okay and has taken the story in a really interesting direction. So I'm actually way more excited to finish this now. So I am here with my new redesigned bookshelves. If you want to see me reorganising my bookshelves then I'll link to the last video I posted where I do that and I paint my bookshelf that is over there, paint it pink. I had so much fun. I'm so happy with the way they look right now. So let's come back to me though. I'm what's important here. Somebody lied to her several times and told her that she was fly, hot and sexy and beautiful and she's nothing like that. She's nothing of the sort. I finished Pages & Co. Tilly and the Book Wanderers last night and I'm gonna give it like a 3.5 stars. I'm giving it a 4 on Goodreads. I loved throughout how this reminded you of the magic of being a kid reading. Do you know what I mean? There's you lose that magic at one point along the way and I loved being reminded of that. I loved feeling like a kid reading this again. I had a bit of a problem in the middle of the book. Nothing was wrong. I just didn't want to pick it out and so I think there was a bit of a pacing issue or something just wasn't really interesting me. However, the ending was great up until like the last 20 pages when I felt like there was a bit of a pacing issue where everything just got revealed straight away. I know it's a kid's book but it had been going really, really well and then it's just like the villain kind of appears and gives this monologue on why everything that's happened has happened when before things have been revealed in a really interesting way and so I felt like it was a shame that after the pre-ending ending that we just had then when that all happened we reached the climax it was kind of just like this is why this happened we're done. But I really loved the story. I loved the direction that the book took. I talked about that plot twist I didn't see coming and that impacted really the way the story went and I loved it. I really didn't expect that to happen and I thought it was such a heartwarming interesting storyline for us to go and pursue so I really, really loved this. I think it's a great kid's book and I did cry a bit at the last page. The very last page in the epilogue, tears were formed. So now I'm going to start The Clockwork Sparrow by Katherine Woodfine. I'm so excited to read this. This is probably out of the three the one I'm most excited to read. I'm really excited to be in this like mystery in Victorian England at this department store. I just feel like the vibes of this are going to be brilliant. So I'm going to go start it now and I'll let you know what I think a bit of the way through. I am maybe just over halfway through The Clockwork Sparrow. I am enjoying it but maybe not as much as I anticipated. That's so upsetting. There's nothing wrong with it. There's nothing I'm not liking and there's not really anything I can point out as wanting to improve. However, I just kind of don't think that the writing is as engaging as I want it to be if that makes sense. I love the setting that we're in. So basically we are at this department store in Victorian London that has just opened and our kind of protagonist and all our main cast of characters are working there when a lot of jewellery, in particular this jewelled clockwork sparrow, is stolen. The group of friends trying to figure out what has happened, who has stolen it and trying to solve the mystery because of a lot of different factors that I don't want to spoil. But they've got a lot of reasons to want to solve the mystery and I really enjoy the kind of department store setting. I really love the kind of Victorian London setting. There's just like something about it that isn't a five star. I guess I kind of wanted it to be a bit more campy and it's kind of like Victorian England vibe. I wanted to play up on that a bit more. I wanted it to be more over the top. I wanted it to be unashamed and it's campiness, you know? And it just isn't quite that. I do love the characters in this though. I feel like kind of our three main characters that we have are each individually really fleshed out, bring something individual and interesting to the table. I want to finish it tonight. I've only got 140, 150 pages left. So I'm going to go for a run now in the woods. I'll try and get some shots of the woods. I don't know why you care. It's such a readable book. I think all mysteries are, but because it's middle grade, it's extra, extra readable. I finished The Clockwork Sparrow and I'm going to give it three stars. There were points in the story where I just felt a bit bored. If I'm honest, I didn't feel fully engaged with the story. You know, a book needs to immerse you. A book needs to fully draw you in and like surround you with the story. And at times I just kind of felt like I was just reading words on a page. I'm sad. I can't even look at the wall with that freaking sad face. About it, I'm so disappointed because this was the book I was most excited for out of one of these three. Still in theory, it's one I should have loved. Like I should have loved the atmosphere, but there was just something about the writing in this that I really, really struggled to engage with. And it's difficult for me because there was nothing overtly wrong with it. Do you know what I mean? There's nothing where I can say I didn't like this. I didn't like this. I just felt like it was very surface level and I just didn't ever get into the story in the way that I did, for example, Pages & Co where you feel immersed in what's going on. You feel totally convinced with what's going on. But I still think that eventually I am going to try the next one in the series because I have high hopes for it. You know, like it's everything I should love. It's everything I want. The plot of this was really good. The pacing of this was really good. The ending I thought was really good and it made me realise how often I read stuff, mysteries in particular, and I don't look for the answer. Like, I don't try and theorise of what's going on because this is a middle grade and the answers of everything and kind of the reveals were very obvious and should have been very obvious, but I didn't clock them because I just don't... I just read along in these clips going, oh yeah, okay, yeah. Yeah, yeah! You may say I'm a dreamer. So I didn't see the reveals coming, but it's just made me realise how often I don't look for those things. I just read along and just have a nice time. Yeah, I had no problem with the plot, the pacing, the reveals. I thought that was all very good. I just never really got into the story or the writing. I think there was just something about the writing at this point in time that didn't work for me. I have actually started A Pinch of Magic. I was listening to the audiobook yesterday and I'm actually already 100 pages in, so I've only got 250-ish to read today, which is good because somehow having two weeks to read these middle grades, I've still left myself one day at the end to read the whole book. Hey clown. Jester, you have done it again. Constantly raising the bar for the circus and doing it foolishly. I'd say I'm surprised, but I know who you are. I've seen it up close and personal. The audiobook is so good. The narrator is great. I want to know what else she has narrated because I will listen to it. This is about three sisters who are trapped by this ancient curse and they each have a magical object which will eventually become theirs, which is supposed to help them in their situation somewhat. They are currently, at the point I'm at, they're trying to figure out a way to break the curse that they're in. I'm loving the kind of normal setting we're in, I guess, with the location, but it being so magical. Just the little hints of magic in an otherwise normal life. I'm really loving. I do love that in my fantasy. I'm really enjoying this. So far, I think this has had the best start for me out of all three books. I think the setting is so vivid, so engaging. You want to go under the covers? Come here. So I just finished A Pinch of Magic and I think I'm going to give this four stars. It was a 3.5, 3.75. Up until I would say the last 60 to 70 pages, I loved the ending. I loved the turn we took at the ending. I did not predict it at all. I did not see it coming at all. And I thought it was a lovely ending and it really rejuvenated the story for me. Like the story, I said, I guess with all of these middle grades, that like in the middle, I just found like myself getting a bit stuck. Whereas I found the ending of this just like fully made me just get into the story so much more and I loved it. I was like, wow, okay, this is a great turn to go on. We've really flipped the story a bit. I'm really excited for where the story's going to go. I don't see almost where the story can go for the sequel. So I'm very interested to read the next book in this series. I think it's A Sprinkle of Sorcery or something like that. It kind of wrapped everything up very nicely. This could be a standalone and I became really attached to the characters by the end of it in a way that I was really surprised. So I think this was my favourite out of the three and I really didn't expect it to. I expected this to be my least favourite. Again, this captures so well that child magic. If you're wanting to get into reading more middle grade, I would really recommend this. The audio book was incredible. I listened, I read the whole thing through the audio book. I read along physically for a lot of it as well, but the audio book was like the primary way I read this and I would really recommend it. The author does a great job. She's so expressive for all the characters and again, I've had like a really good stint with audio books lately, but one of the best audio books I've read. I really, really loved it. I thought all the characters shone, a lot of the minor characters shone, the atmosphere shone and really, if you're looking for a middle grade with a really strong location, setting, atmosphere, eeriness, this is it. Great family relations and not even just within the three main sisters. I don't want to spoil anything, but there's also other really interesting looks at families. Let me know down below what some of your favourite middle grades are. I would love to read more and let me know whether you've loved or hated any of these books I read in this video. Thank you so much again for watching. Please subscribe if you haven't already and I will see you very, very soon with another video. Bye.