Books, Blogs, and Reality by Ryan Ringbloom Pages: 202
Published by Createspace Independent Pub on October 24, 2014
Genres: contemporary, Humor, Love & Romance, New Adult, Romance
Source: ecopy from Author
Life can suck…
When reality becomes overwhelming, seeking comfort in fictional fantasies keeps hope alive. And while this escape may be a little delusional, it’s also therapeutic.
Sharing secrets is daunting, but virtual friends don’t often judge and they are always ready to share a glass of wine…or three…while typing out life’s latest endeavors.
Brooke believes obstacles only add to romance, not detract. Rachael longs for a more intense relationship, or so she thinks. Lizzie misses the excitement in her life, but sometimes new situations find you when you’re not even looking. And Jess believes a tiger can change his stripes. It can’t.
Bound by a shared passion for blogging about happily ever afters, these four young women use keyboard therapy to work through their expectations, anxieties, and inadequacies, all with the hopes of achieving the perfection found in romance novels.
Completely blinded by what they think life should be, they navigate their unique paths in search of what they envision is right. But when reality taunts them with persistent curve balls, will they be strong enough to choose wisely? Or will their happy endings escape them?
Books, Blogs and Reality follows four romance book bloggers. It was an interesting setup for a book. It was like reading a high school diary or watching a reality show about my contemporaries. Being a book blogger myself, a lot of the stuff were things and situations that I could directly relate with, but there were also parts of the book that made me want that kind of friendship with fellow bloggers. The four ladies became friends through their similar reading tastes. They commented on the same reviews and started up discussions, which led to a group chat. And they get online and talk to each other every night, about everything. I want that. I have always been a little jealous of the bloggers that make insta friends with other bloggers and become so close and talk all the time. So while I was reading Books, Blogs and Reality, it was really easy to imagine that these were a group of four real bloggers just chatting about books and their lives. It felt more scandalous for me that way. I liked it. 🙂
What struck me the most was how much these girls lied to each other at first. It shouldn’t have surprised me. People do it all the time on facebook and instagram. They only post super happy pictures, and fabulous events and all the great things going on in their lives to make things seem better than they might be. But these four girls were supposed to be really good friends, so I thought they would be more honest with each other. So that kind of bummed me out a bit at first, but the cool part about the book was because it jumps back and forth between each of the girls “real lives” and then their conversations online, you could watch them start to open up more and more with each other as the story went on. That made me happier with their friendships.
I liked the flow of Books, Blogs and Reality. It alternated between each of the four girls, and in between each girls section, there was a nightly group chat between all of the women. It made the book a very quick and easy read and kept you engaged the whole time. I liked some of the girls more than others. Brooke and Lizzie were my favorites and it is very easy for me to say that Rachel was my least favorite. I thought she was a freakin’ idiot. And I don’t hate on characters too much, but I couldn’t stand her. If you have read the book, please let me know because I would love to have a good rant session about her, but I don’t want to spoil anything for anyone.
If you are a book blogger, you will get a kick out of this book. The romances are all cute and each have their own issues. They are a little predictable, but when thrown together with the friendship of the bloggers and all of the blog terminology it is a fun read. It felt like I was watching a book blogger reality romance show.
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kindlemom1
This sounds really interesting! Glad you liked it and thanks for sharing the giveaway!
Valeria @ A Touch of Book Madness
I think this sounds like a good read. It is definitely something original. I recently read a book (Cinder & Ella by Kelly Oram) whose main character was a book blogger, and it was really fun, though it is an absolutely different story.
I can absolutely relate with you in wanting that kind of friendship with fellow bloggers. I see that happen all the time with most of the bloggers I follow being so tight with each other. I don’t know how they did it, but I definitely want some of that too.
Ryan
Thank you for reading and posting!! I have made some amazing online friends over the past year and this book was certainly inspired by these friendships. ❤Ryan