The Welcome Spring Blog Tag | where i bombard you with bookses

A Duet for Home by Karina Yan Glaser is one of my favorite middle-grade books of all time! ^^ It is very much a book about music and hope and love, and the characters are brilliant!!

One of the main characters, June, plays the viola (which is one of my favorite instruments!), and it is such a heartwarming book!! (I also enjoyed reading The Vanderbeekers by the same author, and so I was most pleased to discover more of her books!)

Enola Holmes by Nancy Springer.

Really, what else could I choose?? *realizes I actually do have a lot of favorite mystery books that I could choose*

*ignores this because I am in love with these novels*

These are such good books — Enola is the younger sister of Sherlock Holmes and is a witty, determined protagonist (her name backwards spells “alone”). I love the Victorian era setting of this and how well written and fast-paced all these mysteries are!! All the characters, the description…

Just such a brilliant novel! And the graphic novels are utterly gorgeous!

A debut novel… Hmm…. Well, a debut middle-grade fantasy novel that I read and adored recently was The Missing Magic of Sparrow Xia by Leia Ham.

I reviewed this on my blog earlier this year and was lucky enough to be an ARC reader for this book, and I love it so much!!! The magical world and the characters are brilliant, and it reminded me a good deal of Harry Potter by J.K Rowling and Paper Dragons by Siobhan McDermott.

There is also a delightful raven named Sahir. “Bird-child,” he called Sparrow, and I adore that nickname!!

I have yet to forgive Leia Ham for this ending though. *glares scathingly at her* I desperately need book two now.

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. I read this classic novel a long time ago, when I was around ten, and I remember not being so taken with the story. However, after a friend of mine convinced me to re-read it, I absolutely fell in love with it!!

The four March sisters are brilliant, and the novel is so cozy and full of love and goodness!! I loved seeing how the characters grew throughout the novel and what they learned, and it is just such a comfort read for me now!

Should you wish to read a very, very long review of it, accompanied with lots of Pinterest moodboards, I have one on my blog here. XD

A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett!!! I recently finished reading The Secret Garden by the same author (which is a gorgeous book, by the way, and so very spring-y!! Dickon! Secret gardens! A robin!!), and I remember reading A Little Princess a few years ago and loving it as well!

While I’m afraid I don’t remember much of the story, it means it’s the perfect time to re-read it!! I’m very much looking forward to getting the Puffin in Bloom hardcover edition of this book at the end of the month!

(And also, doesn’t the cover just look gorgeous?? I love all of Anna Bond’s cover illustrations and I need all the Puffin in Bloom editions desperately.

A book that made me cry, hm? I haven’t been reading so many books that’ve made me cry (at least not recently, though I confess I do cry easily at books and movies!).

The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank, I think, and I actually did get this book recently. It is both full of sadness and also hope, is how I would describe it. As a girl the same age as Anne, I related so much to her as a person, and it is most certainly a book that made me cry.

When You Trap a Tiger by Tae Keller. This book very much made me cry my heart out. It is so beautiful and so full of hope and all the things that I think we all struggle with — change, growing up, loss, etc.

The way the story is written and the tiger stories and all the magic and such… it is really one of my favorite books of all time. I love Lily’s character and the way she grows and learns through this book, and the author is such a talented writer. <33

And Halmoni!!! Dear old Halmoni. She is a brilliant character. She’s most quotable as well.

This one has to be, of course, the classic Anne of Green Gables by L.M Montgomery. I read this book when I was a child and soon fell in love with it!! Anne Shirley is such a relatable protagonist. She has a wild imagination, is funny, determined, strong, and I love her so much!! The shenanigans she gets up to throughout the book (some accidental, some not, some humorous, some tragic) never fail to make me smile (or cry) and the book has such beautiful themes woven into it!!

Green Gables is also such a beautiful setting, and I so yearn to go there myself… Alas. If only bookwandering were really possible.

The book is so cozy and sweet as well and a perfect read for any time of the year! (Also, this cover is SO gorgeous and I want this edition so bad.)

Kate DiCamillo.

*clears throat rather awkwardly* And yes, I am most aware that some of y’all might be duly shocked by this. After all, Kate DiCamillo is the author of so many beloved children’s books and has won the Newbery Medal twice.

Well, regardless, I’ve never read her books till now. But I did read The Tale of Despereaux in the beginning of May, and I absolutely fell in love with the story!!! I must say, I do regret not picking her books up sooner, because I just know that Younger Me would’ve adored her books. But oh well, better late than never, and I am very much looking forward to reading more of her books!

Writing Magic by Gail Carson Levine.

This is a craft book for young writers on writing, and this is a book that is so very special to me because it was the book that really pushed to become a writer myself.

It was the book that made me realize just how fun writing could be! How you could create your own worlds, your own characters, and so much more. And it was also the book that made me realize that I actually could become an author. That, yes, being a writer is indeed a real job and it is something that you can actually do, and you don’t have to wait till you’re all grown up.

Short as it is, it was such an encouraging and inspiring read for me as a writer!!