maegan mariee: March 2018

Hello Lovelies!

If you're like me, YouTube is a good way to pass the time. And these days, it's a career, it's a library of video knowledge, and most people I know have their own favorite YouTubers. Here are some that I love to watch and think you should check out if you're looking for some different channels.

High Carb Hannah; a recent addition to my list of YouTubers, Hannah is a Vegan blogger who lost an incredible amount of weight on a plant based diet. I'm not vegan myself, but I'm interested in switching and so I've been watching her to kind of gauge where to start and how to keep on track. Weight loss is something I think a lot of people, especially women, struggle with and seeing how she has done it herself makes me want to do it as well.

Lavendaire; a very relaxing channel, and one focused on bettering yourself and learning more about what makes you tick as a person. I love her notebook suggestion videos and have found that I always get super energized to be creative after watching her.

LilyCReads; a book vlogger and reviewing and oh my god. I love her videos. I love the way that she reviews books and goes on complete rants on some of them. She completely captured my attention with her rant review on some romance novel and I've been hooked ever since. She's funny and relateable and I highly suggest watching her!

bookishpixie; an author in her own right, Ava Jae has tons of videos up offering help to people who also want to become writers. She shares her favorite books, her TBR lists, her favorite tips and writing techniques, how the process of getting published is like. She's incredibly informative and it's always super easy to binge her videos.

Good Mythical Morning; I've been watching Rhett and Link for a while now and these two are just hilarious. They do challenges with one another, discuss light topics of what's going on in the world, and they have celebrities join their show every now and then. If you need a good laugh, these two will definitely provide.

♥

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"Did we just let them go?"

I am determined not to spoil the ending of this book because even I was shocked, and I think I've read enough of Sara Shepard's books to know who the criminal is by at least the middle of it.

However, I was so so wrong in this instance and I'm both impressed and disappointed with myself for not knowing, because it's definitely staring at you in the face for ninety-five percent of the book.

I'm in the process of playing catch-up with my reading goal for the year. I've kept it at a safe fifty instead of bumping it up to say, sixty or so, but that was obviously a good thing as I'm already two books behind schedule. I don't know what it is lately but I've just been having a hard time jumping into a book. I keep telling myself, 'Okay, let's start this one'. And I'll carry it around in my purse so when I'm on the train I can whip it out, but I've been putting headphones in instead. Clearly, I've been lazy on the reading front.

Thankfully, once I start a book, it's easy for me to burn through it. So I won't be behind for long! When rereading my TBR List post, I noticed how I mentioned I'd be doing full reviews on all the books listed. Whelp, surprise! I definitely did one for Meddling Kids, which you can find here. Good thing I double checked that post! Otherwise, I would have made a liar out of myself. So here we go!

So if you've read Sara Shepard before, you know that most of her stories involve teenagers trying to figure out murders and constantly switching to different POV's. Well, I'm proud to say that this one doesn't change at all. 😂

To keep a rather LONG review short, I'm going to keep this rather simple. The Amateurs is one of those books that I found really fun to read, but it wasn't exactly thrilling from start to finish. It was interesting in some places, with a few twists thrown in to catch you off balance, but it was definitely no Stephen King. I think the main thing that bothered me the most was the unnecessary drama. It's easy to tell when a character is blatantly over-reacting, and this book was full of those moments. It just wasn't realistic, especially with the fact that they were trying to solve a murder/disappearance.

I also didn't really love any of the main characters. There wasn't too much development with them throughout the book, so I'm hoping once I get into the second one, they'll be more substance added to them. All in all, if you don't mind reading cheesy, teenage mystery, then this is the book for you. I finished this in two days, so it's a quick, satisfying read!

I also managed to get a hold of the second installment and breezed through it. I have to say, I liked this one a lot better than the first. The characters had a little bit more growth to them, though they're still not as clever as they like to think they are. And the killer; oh man, do I love learning more about this one. They have a very calculated way of thinking and it's super intense. One of those 'one step ahead' types of killers. I can't wait for the third book, so I can learn even more about how this killer got to be how they are.
♥