In My Mailbox - Why I'm Not Having One

As most of you know by now, there is massive drama going on in the YA blogging community once again. This time it concerns one of the biggest bloggers: Kristi from The Story Siren. Long story short: she has been accused of plagiarism, tried to sweep it under the rug, it came out anyway, she half-apologised, everyone got very angry, she apologised again, this time better. If you want more information about what happened and the evidence of plagiarism, there are a lot of blogs that have this information and are easy to find by searching for "The Story Siren" + "plagiarism".

I'm not joining the "did she do it or did she not" discussion here, this post is only meant to explain why I personally decided not to participate in the In My Mailbox meme any more. Everyone can decide for themselves where they stand on this.

The worst offence here for me isn't the plagiarism itself. No, she shouldn't have done it and she should have known better. But if she had just said "Oops! I'm so sorry! I'm adding your name as an inspiration to these posts right now!" that would have been fine with me. The fact that she tried to hide it made it worse for me. She consciously lied about it to thousands of her readers. I do not accept this, and refuse to support her blog. She has tons of ads on there, and I don't want her to make money off me after all this. I'm not going as far as some bloggers, who are not only boycotting The Story Siren but all products and publishers that are associated with her (for example - they're not buying Insurgent). I'm just not considering myself one of her readers and will not act like one.

There are tons of alternatives to show of your mailbox springing up, including memes hosted by Vicky at Books, Biscuits & Tea and Tynga at Tynga's Reviews, and I'm sure more will follow later today. I hope over time these memes can be united to one again (:

Update: Another substitute is hosted by Kimberly over at Kimba the Caffeinated Book Reviewer.

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

This is my last mailbox before I'm going to the wonderful city of London, so next week's IMM will probably be overflowing with new books. This week was pretty great too, with a nice hardback copy, courtesy of Tanglewood (thanks! <3) and another book from the awesome Flux people through Netgalley.

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

For Review: 

Silver sounds like a very fun paranormal YA book, with the typical hot guy that only has eyes for the heroine. It can turn out really well or absolutely awful, so I'm looking forward to see which one it'll be!

In last week's mailbox I got Ashen Winter, the second book in this series from Netgalley. So I requested the first book too and the people at Tanglewood sent me a beautiful hardback copy which makes me a very happy blogger. In Ashfall a super-volcano explodes and covers the world in ash. It's YA post-apocalyptic, so I'm quite sure I'll enjoy it (:

What do you have in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment! (:

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

I had a wonderful week this week and a huge bunch of Netgalley books came through (huge thanks to Tanglewood, Random House and Harlequin) and I even got auto-approved for all upcoming Tanglewood releases! *happy dance* These books will probably keep me busy for the next few months, but they all look so great!

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

For Review: 

I've seen this one around a lot lately, so I decided to jump on the bandwagon and requested it. I'm looking forward to read one of Julie Kagawa's books; her Iron Fey series is very popular.

Aww, the cover is so pretty, I couldn't resist this one. I've been reading quite a lot of historical fiction, and I think this one will fit right in. It involves some time travel to the sixteenth century, which sounds interesting.

I'm not so sure what to expect from Unspoken, but I heard a lot of great things about it and it looks like a lot of fun.

Julliet Marillier has written a YA book! How awesome is that? I've loved her adult books, so I'm pretty sure I will enjoy this one too.

The cover looks very creepy. It's about a girl who has ended up in purgatory and who is going to haunt her killer. In the blurb's words: "It'll be brutal . . . and awesome."

It's young-adult dystopian. Enough said.

What do you have in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment! (:

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

Only one book this week, which is a good thing. Gives me some more time to get through the pile! I'm a bit afraid of with how much books I'll get home from the London Book Fair. Those will probably keep me busy for months! Anyway, a big thank you to Simon & Schuster and their imprint Atria Books for this week's mailbox (:

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

For Review: 

For some reason this book is categorised as historical on Netgalley, but from the description I get more of a fantasy vibe. From the few reviews of Something Red that I've read it sounds really good, and I'm looking forward to read it!

What do you have in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment! (:

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

After my very full mailbox of last week, I'm glad that this week is a lot more quiet. I only got one book for review in the mail (I'm to lazy to make a picture). Maybe I can get through the best part of my books for review this week, who knows (:

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

For Review: 

It looks like lately I'm getting a lot of contemporaries for review, even though that isn't really one of my preferred genres. I've been reading some very good ones though, so I'm giving The Earthquake Machine a try to. Thanks to the author for sending me this book!

What do you have in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment! (:

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

This was a great bookish week - I received three books for review and went book shopping with a good friend. The Selexyz book store in Maastricht is amazing. You can see a picture here. It's built in an old church and even though their English selection is tiny, they got some very surprising books there.

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

For Review: 

A big thank you to Cedar Fort! It's a young-adult shifter book, and it looks pretty good. I'm looking forward to read it.

I was invited by Bold Strokes Books to read this title, and of course I can't say no to that. I've read one book by them before, Me@you.com. They mainly publish LGBT books which I think is awesome. Even though Love Life doesn't really look like my thing, I'll give it a try (:

This week this huge manuscript came into the mail. It's a review copy printed on A4. It's a first, but the book looks interesting!

Bought:

I heard so many great things about this book, so when I found this cover (it's so pretty! it has these awesome red swirls around the title) I knew I had to buy it. The size of it is pretty intimidating though... I hope I can find the time to read it soon

I was so surprised to find Cinder here in the Netherlands! Usually we don't get the new young-adult releases. I wasn't planning on buying it, but that cover kind of forced me to take it home anyway. I'm really looking forward to read this, it sounds awesome (:

What do you have in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment! (:

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

I really have to cut back on review books, as I will probably take a big stack back from the London Book Fair. I got two of them this week, thanks to Flux and NLA Digital Liaison Platform LLC!

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

For Review: 

I don't care that much about this cover (I don't like the model) but the book sounds great. I generally love steampunk, and I think Innocent Darkness will fit that bill quite right.

I may have a little zombie addiction thing going on. I blame Deadline. Tomorrow Land is a post-apocalyptic zombie novel set in the future. Give me please!

What do you have in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment! (:

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

I'm glad to announce that my Netgalley slump is officially over! Massive thanks to Macmillian Children's Books for accepting me for three of their upcoming releases <3. Also, Grave Mercy was auto-approved for every Netgalley member, and I definitely jumped on the opportunity! I'm very excited about this week's mailbox (:

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

For Review: 

Grave Mercy has intrigue, nuns, crossbows and assassins. What more can you ask for in one book? I'm very excited to read this one.

I love how this book looks kind of retro. It's about a girl who has lost her mother and wants to discover how she really died. Her father has a detective agency. It all sounds pretty awesome.

I have yet to read a mermaid book, but Monstrous Beauty sounds like a great story. And I like the cover, I admit it.

I love the tagline of Monument 14: "Fourteen kids. One superstore. A million things that go wrong.". I love dystopians and post-apocalyptics so I'm hoping this will be a good read. This is another debut author and so far the debuts I've read this year have been excellent.

Fire Baptized sounds like a promising urban-fantasy. Even though I've been kind of neglecting my UF series lately, I'm looking forward to dive into a book promising vampires, shifters and fairies all in one book!

So, that's it for me! What do you have in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment! (:

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

I'm in a bit of a Netgalley slump. For some reason publishers that I have been accepted for before like to decline me now. I hope it's nothing I've been doing wrong, and that it goes away again quickly. I did get accepted for a book from Carina Press (yay!) and Zondervan (never read a book from them before, but I'm looking forward to).

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

For Review: 

Interrupted is a kind of historical drama about a girl that loses her mom and she has to go live with some other woman. World War II is just around the corner, and there is some confusing love interest. It's written by a 15-yearold, so I'm a teeny tiny bit wary of the tone being too juvenile, but I'll try not to be too prejudiced. (:
Thanks Zondervan!

This Carina Press title looks really cool. I've really enjoyed a lot of their steampunk novellas so far, and I hope Heart of Perdition will be just as engaging. 

What do you have in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment! (:

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

A nice big box of bought books arrived this week. I can't wait to read them all! I didn't get any books for review this week, but that's okay because I still have a massive stack of review books to get through.

Do you have a lot of books for review too? Join us in the month March in the Review Copy Cleanup! (: We got lots of fun stuff planned, including international giveaways.You can sign up here.

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

Bought:

Have you read any of those? And what do you have in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment! (:

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

I finally cracked and ordered a big bunch of books from Amazon... But they haven't arrived yet ): So my mailbox looks kind of sad this week, but it will look awesome next week!

I still got something to show you, because I found a great book in the book store yesterday (:

Click on the cover to go to the Goodreads page.

Bought:  

This is a really cute Discworld book with lots and lots of art inside. The illustrations by Paul Kidby look great next to Pratchett's writing. Technically this is the 27th book in the series, and I've only read the first three, but so far it doesn't really matter to the story. It has pictures! I like pictures!

Hmm, I can't wait until my box of books arrives... What is in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment!

In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

Another small mailbox this week (my book buying ban is wearing on me...). I won a book and got one more for review through Netgalley! Did you know they added stats to Netgalley? Now you can see how many galleys you have requested and haven't reviewed yet... It's making me scared to request new ones!

Click on the covers to go to the Goodreads page.

For Review:  

It looked pretty interesting. Something with vampire-hunter falling in love with someone of the immortal. It's the second book in a series though, and I haven't read the first one. I'll have to see how it goes (:

Won:

I won this by participating in the Winter's Respite Readathon hosted by Michelle of The True Book Addict. The cover looks interesting, and I've seen this one around on some other blogs.

Hmm, this tiny mailbox makes me want to buy some new books... What is in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment!

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In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

A teeny tiny mailbox this week, but one that makes me very happy! I won an ARC of one of my favourite authors...

Click on the covers to go to the Goodreads page.

Won: 

SQUEEEEEEE

Ahem.

This book is so super awesome! I finished it in two days, and I LOVED it. When it comes out in June I'll probably buy the finished version too.

If you've never heard of Diana Peterfreund, you should check out my review of Rampant!

So, that's it for me! What is in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment!

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In My Mailbox

It's time for In My Mailbox, a weekly meme by The Story Siren!

I forgot to do one last week, so this In My Mailbox is a rather full one! I had a great week review-wise, and I have a lot of books to share with you (:

Thank you for all the authors & publishers that sent me their books!

Click on the covers to go to their Goodreads page.

Received for review: 

In the blurb of Dust Girl, Libba Bray's Gemma Doyle series is mentioned, which is a series that I LOVE. So if it's anything like it, I think I will like Dust Girl too (:

It has Venice in it! And even though Venice looks a bit like shit nowadays (unless you like tourist-infested cities..) it's still a magical place that I love to read about. It seems to be a young-adult historical romance, which isn't usually my thing, but the plot seems interesting enough to keep my attention. Plus, it's written in verse. Which is strange. I like strange.

Even though mermaid books seem kind of trendy lately, I never read one. When I read the blurb for Lies Beneath, I knew I had to read this one though!

After reading Mira Grant's Feed I'm a bit hooked on zombie books. Insert a high-school and a near suicidal main character, put a nice cover on it. I won't be able to resist the temptation.

Well, talk about not in my comfort zone. The author of this book was so kind to send it to me. It's quite interesting actually, I'll have the review for it written up soon (:

Another one I was approached for by the author. I haven't started it yet, but my mother picked it up and started giggling after a few pages. I think I'll enjoy it!

So, that's it for me! What is in your mailbox this week? Leave a comment!

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