I still miss the times when I managed to read 15 or more books per month and not just eight as in April but at least the quality of the books I’ve read improved compared to the rather poor March. 6 out of 8 books got 4 stars or higher but some of them still felt like a little disappointment because my expectations had been so high that some books didn’t manage to live up to them even though I really enjoyed reading them.

Books & Audiobooks

One of these „disappointments“ was Brandon Sanderson’s „Calamity“, the last book in the Reckoners series. As usual I had a lot of fun with the Reckoners and Epics but the ending was just a bit underwhelming since too many questions remained unanswered and the last chapters seemed too rushed.

I had a similar feeling about „Vicious“ – my first Schwab book, yay! – which I really liked a lot but for me it didn’t live up to the hype since I found the plot quite predictable and the characters not that extraordinary that it would completely work as a character-driven story for me.

My April highlights were definitely „Evil at Heart“, book 3 of Chelsea Cain’s Gretchen Lowell series, which was SUPER disturbing and really shocking and the audio drama „Monster 1983“ which had a great mystery plot, superb atmosphere and amazing narrators and I’m already impatiently waiting for season 2.

I also enjoyed „Labyrinth – Elixier des Todes“ („Blue Labyrinth“) by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child and can’t believe that it was already the 14th (!) book in the Agent Pendergast series and Stephen King’s horror classic „Friedhof der Kuscheltiere“ („Pet Sematary“) which started a bit too slowly for my taste but was pretty good in the second half even though I found it rather painful than actually creepy.

My two biggest disappointments last month were two review copies I’ve read: „Die Totentänzerin“ by Max Bentow was a new low in the Nils Trojan series and felt more like a soap opera than a thriller and „The Wolf Trial“ by Neil Mackay – a historical thriller about one of the first reported serial killer cases in the Middle Ages – wasn’t that bad but not as exciting as I had hoped for.

Movies

    

• BATMANvsSUPERMAN: First of all, this movie was better than I had expected and Ben Affleck was surprisingly far away from being the worst Batman ever (Hellooo, George Clooney :P) and there were tons of scenes that I wanted to frame and hang on my wall because they were so fucking epic… BUT I often had the feeling that this movie somehow didn’t have a real plot and most things happened rather randomly which made it quite boring sometimes. So I definitely have mixed feelings about this movie – but I need to see more of Wonder Woman! 😀
• IDENTITY: One thing I love about about my „Make Maraia watch all the awesome movies that she missed while living under that massive rock“ challenge (there’s that title again :P) is that I get to re-discover my favorite movies and I LOVE this one because it’s not only dark and violent but also has a really good story with an amazing plot twist.
• INSIDE OUT: I finally watched this movie and it was awesome. I love how Pixar always succeeds at making movies for both children and adults and deals with serious topics like depression in such a great way. I guess it’s no real surprise that my favorite thing about this movie was Sadness? I mean she’s the personified cliché of a depressive person which is kinda insulting (I think they only forgot to give her a grumpy cat^^) but she’s still by far the most lovable character and also has the best lines.
• STRANGER THAN FICTION: Some people might be surprised that Will Ferrell doesn’t only do stupid comedy movies but is also quite a good actor when it comes to more serious movies. This movie has a great cast (Ferrell, Dustin Hoffman, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Emma Thompson…), quite a unique story with Ferrell playing a book character that is about to get killed by his author and just the right mix of hilarity and melancholy – if you like movies about books (not movie adaptions, but movies that deal with literature), this is one you shouldn’t miss.
• LOCK, STOCK AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS: I still have to look up the correct title every time I want to write it down and also had to watch the whole movie with subtitles because I didn’t understand a single word due to the heavy accents of the actors but I still had a lot of fun watching this one. It was definitely very weird and not my typical kind of movie since I’m not really into drug stories but also quite hilarious and very violent 😀

TV shows

    

• DAREDEVIL: I was so excited about season 2 but it was such a big disappointment. The story was lame, I missed a great villain like Fisk was in season 1 and I disliked way too many characters and even began to dislike Matt Murdock and overall it was just meh… let’s hope the Punisher spin-off will be better…
• MAKING A MURDERER: I finally finished this show and on the one hand it’s a bit sad that I mostly mocked it because it’s actually a really good show and I was shocked by how the police acted in this case but I don’t think I would have been able to stand Family „We love sweatpants and bad grammar“ Avery for another month xD
• MODERN FAMILY: What can I say, I’m in the middle of season 6 now and still love it.
• CRIMINAL MINDS: My re-watch has reached season 3 which means that Rossi is now part of the BAU and gosh, I definitely remember now why I hated him in the beginning 😀
• MR. ROBOT: Crini and I tried to continue this show because it got so many good reviews but we didn’t manage to watch more than 2 episodes which were again far away from being as good as the pilot AND ALSO I HATE DRUG EPISODES WHERE THE MC IS STONED ALL THE TIME.

    

• AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.: I don’t even know how to comment on this show without spoiling anything but EEEEEEEEEEEP. But there’s also way too much Ward in this show lately 😀
• GOTHAM: With every new villain that is introduced into the story this show gets even better and better.
• THE X-FILES: Still stuck in season 2 and it still hasn’t gotten any creepier…
• LIP SYNC BATTLE: I haven’t watched a single episode of season 2 so far but just couldn’t resist the final chapter of the dubsmash wars between Clark Gregg and Hayley Atwell and it definitely didn’t disappoint. I might never be able to erase the pictures of Clark Gregg dancing to Britney Spears‘ „Toxic“ while wearing a stewardess costume from my mind again but it was so worth it xD
• BROADCHURCH: I’m so glad Maraia pushed this show on me because it was so fucking good! I’ve watched all 8 episodes of season 1 in less than 48 hours because it was so addictive and I just had to know who the killer was and maybe I’m still recovering from the ending because I definitely hadn’t expected THAT conclusion.

Reviews

   

   

Other blog posts in April:

• [Bookish Scene: Project 52] Humour
• [New books on the shelves] March 2016
• [Roundup] March 2016
• [Bookish Scene: Project 52] New Beginnings
• [Bookish Scene: Project 52] Blue Ombré Spines
• [Bookish Scene: Project 52] Earth Day
• [Bookish Scene: Project 52] April Showers
• [Das Jahr des Taschenbuchs] Meine Bücher für den April