The Bedtime Book Tag

*Creator credited at the bottom of the blog

1. A book that kept you up all night reading?

Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo. Anyone who knows my reading knows that I’m a big Bardugo fan so I highly anticipate all of her releases and have yet to meet one I haven’t enjoyed. This book is quite long (almost 500 pages) but I ate it up. The further into the book I got the more invested I became. It’s the sequel to Ninth House and is a dark, dangerous adventure from start to finish.

2. What book made you scared to go to sleep?

Hide by Kiersten White. This is a supernatural horror/thriller that I actually had a nightmare while reading. I don’t typically read horror because I’m a scaredy-cat but I read this one for Booksandlala’s book club. The fact that the reader doesn’t see (just hears) the monster for most of the novel is what really got me because it’s that unknown factor that terrifies me.

3. What book almost put you to sleep?

Reckless Girls by Rachel Hawkins. This is sold as a thriller about a group of people on a deserted island where they find a dead body and another person goes missing. Sounds super suspenseful and intriguing, right? In reality 90% of the novel is just a group of obnoxious characters partying which isn’t what I signed up for when I picked it up.

4. What book had you tossing and turning in anticipation of its release?

Any release by one of my favorite authors, really. This year I’d say my most anticipated releases are Vanessa Len’s Never a Hero (sequel to Only a Monster), What the River Knows by Isabel Ibañez, and Two Twisted Crowns by Rachel Gilig (sequel to One Dark Window). These are three YA fantasies that I can’t wait to get my hands on!

5. What book has your dream romantic partner?

I recently read a romance book with a love interest character who is total book boyfriend material. Kai from Lucy on the Wild Side by Kerry Rea is a humble hunk who loves animals – seriously, can he be real? If he was I'd snatch him up!

6. What book would be a nightmare to live in?

Any of the Goosebumps books by R. L. Stine that I so loved as a child (and still sometimes reread when I crave some nostalgia). The thing they all share in common is that they have endings in which everything seems to have worked out and the characters are safe and happy – only to have a last sentence twist in which you find out the danger is far from over. If I lived in a Goosebumps book I’d literally never be able to relax.

7. What book reminds you of nighttime?

Caraval by Stephanie Garber. This is about a grand game that is sort of like a magical scavenger hunt (there’s a lot more to it, obviously, but I don’t think you’re here to read an entire synopsis). The game is played after sundown so it naturally makes me think of the nighttime.

8. What book has a nightmarish cliffhanger? The Ballad of Never After by Stephanie Garber. Ma’am, Ms. Garber, you know what you did. I’ll consider forgiving you when the finale releases later this year provided it has a happily ever after ending. In all seriousness, though, the ending to the second book in the Once Upon a Broken Heart trilogy wrecked me. I would have included the finale (A Curse for True Love) in the anticipated releases question but I knew I wanted it for this one and didn’t want to repeat any answers.

9. What book have you actually dreamed about?

I can’t think of any book I’ve actually dreamed about outside of one of my own stories (I’m a writer). In fact, sometimes I have great story ideas come to me in the form of one of my wildly vivid dreams!

10. What fictional monster would you not like to find under your bed?

I said I didn’t want to repeat any answers and technically this isn’t a repeat since I’m naming a specific book/character, but Slappy the dummy from the Goosebumps Night of the Living Dummy books. Slappy is one of Stine’s most iconic monsters but those living dummy books are the only Goosebumps books that genuinely frightened me as a child. The mere image of the cursed dummy still gives me the shivers.

The Tag's Creator: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZN-dG_cHv8&ab_channel=KellyRob