**Birthday Girl by Penelope Douglas**

I don't really know what this book is about but I've heard that it's very angsty lots of chemistry and also a very taboo romance. This is something that interests me because I enjoy reading stories with complex characters and relationships. Taboo romances often involve themes of forbidden love, social class differences, or other obstacles that make the relationship between the two characters more challenging. In this case, it sounds like Birthday Girl may explore some interesting dynamics and emotions.

**The Fine Print by Lauren Asher**

I have owned this book for so long, it's the first book in the Dreamland Billionaire series and I haven't started it solely for the fact that I'm in the middle of so many series right now. However, I do want to start this series next because I think the concept is really interesting. The story takes place in a super rich guy's world, similar to Disney World, where he's basically like the CEO of the park. One of his employees at the theme park becomes romantically involved with him, which adds an element of fantasy and excitement to the relationship.

**Confess by Colleen Hoover**

I've heard about this book a bunch and it is about a guy who paints people's confessions. Apparently, there are lots of secrets that come out through this process, and I think that's really interesting. I'm not entirely sure what it means for someone to paint their confessions, but I imagine it would be a unique way to explore themes of vulnerability and honesty in relationships.

**The Spanish Love Deception**

Oh my gosh, I need to find out what all the hype is about. Aaron Blackford is another character from Colin Hoover, and this book is called The Spanish Love Deception. It sounds like a very interesting story because it's about a girl who served five years in prison for making one mistake that she made. I'm curious to know more about what her mistake was and how that affects her life now that she's out of prison.

**Wait for It by Mariana Zapata**

I've never heard of this book before, but Steph said it's got the single parent trope and a neighbor romance. I don't typically read romances where the main character has a child from the beginning, so I'm really interested to see how that plays out in the story.

**Mostly You by Mia Sheridan**

I've been wanting to read this book because it's another good boy, bad girl trope. Steph said that the characters have a lot of trauma and I know that Mia Sheridan is known for doing a great job with character development and exploring themes of vulnerability. I'm curious to see how she handles writing about trauma in this context.

**Redeemed by Lauren Asher**

This book is the last installment in the Dirty Air series, which is a sports romance focused on Formula One racing. Since I've already read the first book in the series, Throttled, I'll be reading Redeemed next. The story will continue to explore themes of love and relationships within the world of high-stakes racing.

**Tortured Book Reviews**

The creator of this channel watched Steph's videos featuring five-star reads and agreed with most of her ratings. However, they also gave different reviews for certain books, so it would be interesting to see them discuss their own opinions on these titles. The viewer was inspired by the conversation and plans to create their own video discussing five-star reads. They invited viewers to share which books are on their own five-star list in the comments section.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: entoday we are reviewing steph bro rare's steph beaure steph bauer no that can't be it i do not know steph b personally but i do not know how to say her last name so i'm going to be referring to her as steph in this video as if we're besties hey steph i don't know why i said that like she would be watching this anyway today i'm gonna be reviewing steph's five-star reads if you don't know who she is for some reason she is the queen of booktube and i love her quick note though i have been preparing for this video for a while i've been slowly making my way through her five-star reads and then she came out with a part two i was not prepared for her to drop another five-star read video so this is mostly gonna be me reviewing and reacting to books from her five star reads part one video but if you guys like this video and one want me to do a part two let me know normal people by sally rooney i literally finished this book last night steph describes this book as more of a coming-of-age story than a romance and a story that takes place over many years it starts out with the characters in high school and then they go through college and then post grad and i would definitely agree that romance is the driving plot in this book but it's not really about the romance like i feel like the heart of the story is the character's own coming of age i have never read a sally rooney book before and she has a very interesting writing style and that took me a while to get used to and just in general she's kind of a depressing writing style i have read so many romance books at this point that some of them super sad tearjerker dramas some of them really light funny comedy but generally they all and really happy kind of fairy tale idealistic romance vibes and this is not that it was a very different and refreshing read to me it deals with a lot of themes of love finding your way in life mental health insecurities social anxiety and awkwardness not fitting in socioeconomic class status and how that affects your life and your social standings and i really appreciate and enjoyed reading about all the topics that sally rooney tackles in this book even though most of them were kind of depressing i don't know that i agree with steph and that this is a five star read for me i would give it four stars it is also a mini series on hulu and i started the mini series yesterday i just watched the first episode and so far it is really really accurate to the book if you like the book i really recommend checking out the mini series and while i was watching the mini series i started doing a paint by numbers which brings us to today's sponsor simple painting is a company that sells paint by numbers kits and i am no stranger to paint by numbers i love paint by numbers paint by numbers are very similar to reading in a way of really focusing on a task and spending a lot of quiet time doing it and then in the end feeling like very accomplished about completing and what i really really love about simple painting is they have such cool and complex designs that i would never be able to paint on my own i chose to do this daisy painting because i think it really fits like the vibe of my apartment so i want to hang it up when i'm done and i'm not done with it yet but when i'm finished with my daisy painting i'll definitely post an update on my instagram and then i also have a 15 off discount code which is just ally and the link and my discount code will also be in the description the first series that she mentions is the addicted callaway sister series which is also a massive five star read to me i'm actually not done i'm six books in to the ten book series one of my favorite things about the series is that as much as it's a romance series it is also a friendship series it involves six characters three of which are sisters to three girls and then there's the three boys and they're all such good friends like i would die to be in their friend group and then of course the three girls and the three boys end up together so it's three total couples and the couples are childhood friends to fake dating to lovers academic rivals to lovers and then age gap slash forbidden romance so you have three very different tropes which i also like so i think there's something for everyone and this is by far the biggest romance series that i started so it's really really cool to get to read about these characters for so many books if you ever read anything that i recommend please let it be this series this may be my favorite series books i have ever read in the romance genre and i also really need to finish the series i think i said i have four books left and i need to hunker down and read them but loki i've been procrastinating because i just don't want to finish the series next up is the off-campus series the first one in the series is the deal i have read all the books in the series except for the epilogue book which i actually just started what's really really cool and interesting about this series is that each book is a standalone so you can read them all individually but they all exist within the same world and all have crossover characters and trope wise in the series we've got enemies to lovers with the first book there's a second chance romance there's friends with benefits to lovers and then strangers to lovers oh my gosh and it is a hockey romance series so all the guys in the books are hockey players they play on the same team at briar u so it's sports romance it takes place in college so new adult romance and something that i love about l kennedy's writing style this is gonna sound like a bad thing but i mean it is a really good thing she has a little bit more of a simple writing style like very much wattpad vibes and i really like that i was a big wattpad girl so this like just fulfills my middle school wattpad fantasies but in a more adult book context hello editing ally i just realized i didn't actually give my rating for the series but it is a five star series for me then we've got ugly love by colleen hoover which i also gave five stars we're on a roll here of me agreeing with steph's five star reads uh yeah this is my favorite colleen huber book that i have ever read so far it has past and presents it has friends with benefits to lovers it has a big dark secret that you find out at the ends and it will make you understand why it is called ugly love i did not cry in this book but definitely could see this being a tear jerker for a lot of people a very very sad part towards the end and overall one of the characters very much struggles with his past and a big emotional thing that happened to him and him having never processed and reconciled with that tragedy in his life so if you want to cry or almost cry and read about a really really great love story then would recommend this book then we have november 9 by colin hoover and this is the first part in this video where i'm gonna really disagree with steph sorry girl i think i gave this book three and a half stars i liked it but not my favorite the concept of this book is that the characters only meet up one day year november 9th so we go through their life only seeing and learning about them one day every single year and i love that concept i was so so excited to read this book and i maybe had too high of expectations just because i think it's a really cool story idea but it made me feel a little bit disconnected from the characters only getting to see them one day year i just felt like i missed so much on the other 364 days and i felt like i couldn't super care about the characters because i didn't feel like i really really knew them not being able to see the full scope of their lives it also had a huge plot twist at the end which is a really cool plot twist but for some reason it came across as kind of gimmicky to me i don't really know how to explain it but the twist just didn't really land for me then we've got the hating game by sally thorne and i love this book i gave it 4.5 stars it is enemies to lovers and is a workplace romance and the character's chemistry is so good they say hating someone is really similar to loving someone i definitely butchered it but there's a quote like that in the book i also really really love the movie if you have not read this book please read it now so you can go watch the movie i actually have a whole vlog where i watched and reacted to the movie and i'm now obsessed with reading books that have turned into movies or tv shows just so i can have that moment of seeing them come across live on the screen next up we've got the on honeymooners by christina lauren i gave this book four stars looking back i feel like i'm trying to give it a 4.5 because i really like this book it is not just fake dating but it is fake marriage which that is taking a trope i already love to a whole new level it is about olive whose sister is getting married and her sister and her sister's husband get super sick so they can't go on their honeymoon and so olive and the best man whom olive hates have to pretend to be married so that they can go on and redeem the honeymoon and her sister's place i think fake dating and enemies lovers are two my favorite tropes so seeing those combined in such a fun setting was really fun to read about then we have a thousand by kisses by tilly cole and i give this book four stars i liked it it was a really cute romance it's childhood friends to lovers you literally get to see them as young children growing up together which i think is really cool it is y.a and i actually really love ya books but for some reason i just felt at certain parts that this book felt a little young for me and the character's love for each other was so strong and so intense which is part of the things i really like about this book but it was almost too strong at too young of an age that it just didn't really land for me i talked about this in my february reading wrap up i think that's just a personal thing for me because i don't know in high school i was not falling in love with anyone and i just can't imagine being like deeply deeply in love at like 15 but that doesn't mean that people aren't deeply deeply in love at that age it just wasn't relatable for me because it's not something i've remotely experienced but overall a really really cute book and a tear jerker which i did not see coming then the song of achilles by madeline miller i just posted a reading vlog to this book where i cried because this book is so sad and it stole my heart and is 100 a five-star read for me this book is greek mythology and i've said this a hundred times i didn't know i would be interested in greek mythology i was really skeptical i would like this book and then i fell freaking in love with it especially the greek mythology aspect of it and it is also romance the main character petrocus in this book is just so pure and i love him so much and then achilles i also love he's definitely a flawed character and i really loved reading about such a fantastic character and then a bit more of a flawed character i think that makes it so interesting and so human it is just such an interesting story even without the romance aspect but then of course the romance was like the main driving part and i love that so much then we have red wine row blue by casey mcquiston and i am so in love with this book if i could erase one book for my memory so that i could re-read it again and get the feeling of reading it for the first time it would be this book five star read for me it is enemies to lovers between a british prince and the son of the u.s president and oh my gosh such a cool world being that their royalty and then a president's son and all of the history and the political aspect of what it means for them to be together a lot of romance books have obstacles within the relationship like reasons why obviously the couple doesn't get together till the end but these characters literally had the weight of the world on their shoulders because of what it would mean for them to be together i didn't start another book for like a week because it felt like i would be betraying these characters by reading any other book and i believe amazon is looking into making this into a movie and if they do make it into a movie i would literally cry then we've got archer's voice by mia sheridan and this book is also so good i gave this book four stars i cried like a baby both from sad tears and then happy tears which i don't think has ever happened to me before when reading a book so a real emotional rollercoaster but it is about a girl who had something really traumatic happen to her and so she kind of literally runs away from her problems and leaves to go live in this small town where she meets archer who also had a ton of trauma in his life and he actually does not speak so they both strike up this like really great wholesome friendship because he's kind of the small town loner and outcast but they really really bond just in general as friends and then also through their trauma and they have to go on their own journeys of healing but they also help each other heal as their relationship blooms together and it is just such a wholesome and sweet book i cared about archer so much and he has a little special place in my heart then we've got the seven husbands of evelyn hugo by taylor jenkins reed i also think i cried in this book this was a solid four four-star read for me i loved that this book is a romance but i feel like really at its heart it's evelyn's own story of navigating her life and finding herself and her way and her own happiness and what's cool is that evelyn is like a super super famous actress and it goes back and forth between past and present day and during present day monique who is a journalist is interviewing evelyn and so we get to see the kind of interview style and the present and then we actually go back into the past and get to experience firsthand evelyn's life it's about love and fame and being a woman in a heavily male industry and being a minority and i think taylor jacobs read such a great job of tackling so many great topics such such a good story that will literally always stick with me then we've got daisy jones and the six also by taylor jenkins read i gave this book four stars and i would highly recommend listening to the audiobook what's really really cool about this book is it's daisy jones and then her six band members so there's seven main characters total and in the audiobook they have different voice actors playing all the characters so it literally sounds like you're listening to a podcast but when i was listening to the audiobook i kept forgetting that it wasn't real and it takes place in the 70s so very fun time period it's about a band it's about drugs partying love finding your way and you can literally be at the top of your life in the sense of money fame career status but you can still be struggling so much with your own demons and your own mental health and she did a really really good job of tackling that concept and that is all the books that i have read from steph's five-star reads i am going to really rapid fire go through the other books from her five-star read list that i have not read yet there's all your perfects by colleen hoover i feel like i've heard so much about this book and steph said that it is about a couple and you get to see them fall in love and then you go fast forward to the future when they're married and they're falling out of love so that sounds really interesting to me i've never heard anything similar to that dynamic where it takes place over that big of a time span in a couple's romantic journey then she talks about the duology of full till and all in which i have never ever heard of this duology before but she said it is about a girl who is falling into really bad habits and then she meets this really wholesome guy so we've got bad girl good boy trope and i don't know that i've really read anything with that trope so i do really want to read that trope because it sounds like such an interesting dynamic because normally it's like the bad boy good girl then the wall of winnipeg and me by mariana zapata i've heard so much about this book and marianne is upon him but have yet to read a mariana zapata book yet and i know that she's the queen of slow burn and i'm kind of scared because you know when you're reading a romance it's that big anticipation for them to get together and can my little heart take a slow burn probably but i know it's going to be torturous oh my gosh i think it's mariana zapata mariana mariana sorry about that birthday girl by penelope douglas i don't really know what this book is about but i've heard that it's very angsty lots of chemistry and also a very taboo romance so i'm intrigued by the taboo aspect love and other words by christina lauren i've heard so many people say that they love this book i plan to read this book very soon the fine print by lauren asher i have owned this book for so long it's the first book in the dreamland billionaire series and i haven't started it solely for the fact that i'm in the middle of so many series right now but i do want this to be the next series that i start it is about a super rich guy who's basically like the ceo of this book's disneyland and then it's a romance between him and one of his workers at the theme park and i think that is such a fun concept like a disneyland vibe setting oh my gosh like in love and i also love super rich characters i don't know why i think that's just really interesting confess by colleen hoover also heard of this book a bunch it is about a guy who paints people's confessions and apparently there's lots of secrets that come out and that also sounds like a very interesting concept to me i don't know quite what it means to paint people's secrets and confessions but i bet it's juicy the spanish love deception oh my gosh i need to find out what all the hype is about aaron blackford and who this man is another colin hoover book we've got reminders of him and it is about a girl who previously served five years in prison because of one mistake that she made and that sounds also very juicy to me i am so curious what she did to land in prison and how that's affecting her life now that she's out then we have wait for it by mariana zapata which is single parent trope and neighbor romance and i don't know that i've read any romance where the main character has a child from the beginning and so i'm very interested in how kind of the family aspect plays in with the romance then we have most of all you by mia sheridan which is another good boy bad girl trope which i said i really want to read and steph said that the characters have a lot of trauma and i know mia sheridan did such a good job in archer's voice of writing about the character's past trauma and so i can only imagine that this book is just as good and lastly redeemed by lauren asher which is the last book in the dirty air series and i actually own the first book in the dirty air series throttled it is a formula one racing series so a sports romance after i finish all the series i'm in after i finish the fine print then i want to start the dirty air series anyway if you want to see me do a part two where i read all the books that i just mentioned let me know and yeah thank you and yeah thank you guys so much for watching i think i agreed with most of steph's five ratings i'll put a little number up here of how many books on her five-star list i also gave five stars to let me know in the comments at least one book that is on your five-star list i need to make my own five-star reads video soon because i have not talked about that at all all right and with that i'll see you guys next week bye let's get scratchingtoday we are reviewing steph bro rare's steph beaure steph bauer no that can't be it i do not know steph b personally but i do not know how to say her last name so i'm going to be referring to her as steph in this video as if we're besties hey steph i don't know why i said that like she would be watching this anyway today i'm gonna be reviewing steph's five-star reads if you don't know who she is for some reason she is the queen of booktube and i love her quick note though i have been preparing for this video for a while i've been slowly making my way through her five-star reads and then she came out with a part two i was not prepared for her to drop another five-star read video so this is mostly gonna be me reviewing and reacting to books from her five star reads part one video but if you guys like this video and one want me to do a part two let me know normal people by sally rooney i literally finished this book last night steph describes this book as more of a coming-of-age story than a romance and a story that takes place over many years it starts out with the characters in high school and then they go through college and then post grad and i would definitely agree that romance is the driving plot in this book but it's not really about the romance like i feel like the heart of the story is the character's own coming of age i have never read a sally rooney book before and she has a very interesting writing style and that took me a while to get used to and just in general she's kind of a depressing writing style i have read so many romance books at this point that some of them super sad tearjerker dramas some of them really light funny comedy but generally they all and really happy kind of fairy tale idealistic romance vibes and this is not that it was a very different and refreshing read to me it deals with a lot of themes of love finding your way in life mental health insecurities social anxiety and awkwardness not fitting in socioeconomic class status and how that affects your life and your social standings and i really appreciate and enjoyed reading about all the topics that sally rooney tackles in this book even though most of them were kind of depressing i don't know that i agree with steph and that this is a five star read for me i would give it four stars it is also a mini series on hulu and i started the mini series yesterday i just watched the first episode and so far it is really really accurate to the book if you like the book i really recommend checking out the mini series and while i was watching the mini series i started doing a paint by numbers which brings us to today's sponsor simple painting is a company that sells paint by numbers kits and i am no stranger to paint by numbers i love paint by numbers paint by numbers are very similar to reading in a way of really focusing on a task and spending a lot of quiet time doing it and then in the end feeling like very accomplished about completing and what i really really love about simple painting is they have such cool and complex designs that i would never be able to paint on my own i chose to do this daisy painting because i think it really fits like the vibe of my apartment so i want to hang it up when i'm done and i'm not done with it yet but when i'm finished with my daisy painting i'll definitely post an update on my instagram and then i also have a 15 off discount code which is just ally and the link and my discount code will also be in the description the first series that she mentions is the addicted callaway sister series which is also a massive five star read to me i'm actually not done i'm six books in to the ten book series one of my favorite things about the series is that as much as it's a romance series it is also a friendship series it involves six characters three of which are sisters to three girls and then there's the three boys and they're all such good friends like i would die to be in their friend group and then of course the three girls and the three boys end up together so it's three total couples and the couples are childhood friends to fake dating to lovers academic rivals to lovers and then age gap slash forbidden romance so you have three very different tropes which i also like so i think there's something for everyone and this is by far the biggest romance series that i started so it's really really cool to get to read about these characters for so many books if you ever read anything that i recommend please let it be this series this may be my favorite series books i have ever read in the romance genre and i also really need to finish the series i think i said i have four books left and i need to hunker down and read them but loki i've been procrastinating because i just don't want to finish the series next up is the off-campus series the first one in the series is the deal i have read all the books in the series except for the epilogue book which i actually just started what's really really cool and interesting about this series is that each book is a standalone so you can read them all individually but they all exist within the same world and all have crossover characters and trope wise in the series we've got enemies to lovers with the first book there's a second chance romance there's friends with benefits to lovers and then strangers to lovers oh my gosh and it is a hockey romance series so all the guys in the books are hockey players they play on the same team at briar u so it's sports romance it takes place in college so new adult romance and something that i love about l kennedy's writing style this is gonna sound like a bad thing but i mean it is a really good thing she has a little bit more of a simple writing style like very much wattpad vibes and i really like that i was a big wattpad girl so this like just fulfills my middle school wattpad fantasies but in a more adult book context hello editing ally i just realized i didn't actually give my rating for the series but it is a five star series for me then we've got ugly love by colleen hoover which i also gave five stars we're on a roll here of me agreeing with steph's five star reads uh yeah this is my favorite colleen huber book that i have ever read so far it has past and presents it has friends with benefits to lovers it has a big dark secret that you find out at the ends and it will make you understand why it is called ugly love i did not cry in this book but definitely could see this being a tear jerker for a lot of people a very very sad part towards the end and overall one of the characters very much struggles with his past and a big emotional thing that happened to him and him having never processed and reconciled with that tragedy in his life so if you want to cry or almost cry and read about a really really great love story then would recommend this book then we have november 9 by colin hoover and this is the first part in this video where i'm gonna really disagree with steph sorry girl i think i gave this book three and a half stars i liked it but not my favorite the concept of this book is that the characters only meet up one day year november 9th so we go through their life only seeing and learning about them one day every single year and i love that concept i was so so excited to read this book and i maybe had too high of expectations just because i think it's a really cool story idea but it made me feel a little bit disconnected from the characters only getting to see them one day year i just felt like i missed so much on the other 364 days and i felt like i couldn't super care about the characters because i didn't feel like i really really knew them not being able to see the full scope of their lives it also had a huge plot twist at the end which is a really cool plot twist but for some reason it came across as kind of gimmicky to me i don't really know how to explain it but the twist just didn't really land for me then we've got the hating game by sally thorne and i love this book i gave it 4.5 stars it is enemies to lovers and is a workplace romance and the character's chemistry is so good they say hating someone is really similar to loving someone i definitely butchered it but there's a quote like that in the book i also really really love the movie if you have not read this book please read it now so you can go watch the movie i actually have a whole vlog where i watched and reacted to the movie and i'm now obsessed with reading books that have turned into movies or tv shows just so i can have that moment of seeing them come across live on the screen next up we've got the on honeymooners by christina lauren i gave this book four stars looking back i feel like i'm trying to give it a 4.5 because i really like this book it is not just fake dating but it is fake marriage which that is taking a trope i already love to a whole new level it is about olive whose sister is getting married and her sister and her sister's husband get super sick so they can't go on their honeymoon and so olive and the best man whom olive hates have to pretend to be married so that they can go on and redeem the honeymoon and her sister's place i think fake dating and enemies lovers are two my favorite tropes so seeing those combined in such a fun setting was really fun to read about then we have a thousand by kisses by tilly cole and i give this book four stars i liked it it was a really cute romance it's childhood friends to lovers you literally get to see them as young children growing up together which i think is really cool it is y.a and i actually really love ya books but for some reason i just felt at certain parts that this book felt a little young for me and the character's love for each other was so strong and so intense which is part of the things i really like about this book but it was almost too strong at too young of an age that it just didn't really land for me i talked about this in my february reading wrap up i think that's just a personal thing for me because i don't know in high school i was not falling in love with anyone and i just can't imagine being like deeply deeply in love at like 15 but that doesn't mean that people aren't deeply deeply in love at that age it just wasn't relatable for me because it's not something i've remotely experienced but overall a really really cute book and a tear jerker which i did not see coming then the song of achilles by madeline miller i just posted a reading vlog to this book where i cried because this book is so sad and it stole my heart and is 100 a five-star read for me this book is greek mythology and i've said this a hundred times i didn't know i would be interested in greek mythology i was really skeptical i would like this book and then i fell freaking in love with it especially the greek mythology aspect of it and it is also romance the main character petrocus in this book is just so pure and i love him so much and then achilles i also love he's definitely a flawed character and i really loved reading about such a fantastic character and then a bit more of a flawed character i think that makes it so interesting and so human it is just such an interesting story even without the romance aspect but then of course the romance was like the main driving part and i love that so much then we have red wine row blue by casey mcquiston and i am so in love with this book if i could erase one book for my memory so that i could re-read it again and get the feeling of reading it for the first time it would be this book five star read for me it is enemies to lovers between a british prince and the son of the u.s president and oh my gosh such a cool world being that their royalty and then a president's son and all of the history and the political aspect of what it means for them to be together a lot of romance books have obstacles within the relationship like reasons why obviously the couple doesn't get together till the end but these characters literally had the weight of the world on their shoulders because of what it would mean for them to be together i didn't start another book for like a week because it felt like i would be betraying these characters by reading any other book and i believe amazon is looking into making this into a movie and if they do make it into a movie i would literally cry then we've got archer's voice by mia sheridan and this book is also so good i gave this book four stars i cried like a baby both from sad tears and then happy tears which i don't think has ever happened to me before when reading a book so a real emotional rollercoaster but it is about a girl who had something really traumatic happen to her and so she kind of literally runs away from her problems and leaves to go live in this small town where she meets archer who also had a ton of trauma in his life and he actually does not speak so they both strike up this like really great wholesome friendship because he's kind of the small town loner and outcast but they really really bond just in general as friends and then also through their trauma and they have to go on their own journeys of healing but they also help each other heal as their relationship blooms together and it is just such a wholesome and sweet book i cared about archer so much and he has a little special place in my heart then we've got the seven husbands of evelyn hugo by taylor jenkins reed i also think i cried in this book this was a solid four four-star read for me i loved that this book is a romance but i feel like really at its heart it's evelyn's own story of navigating her life and finding herself and her way and her own happiness and what's cool is that evelyn is like a super super famous actress and it goes back and forth between past and present day and during present day monique who is a journalist is interviewing evelyn and so we get to see the kind of interview style and the present and then we actually go back into the past and get to experience firsthand evelyn's life it's about love and fame and being a woman in a heavily male industry and being a minority and i think taylor jacobs read such a great job of tackling so many great topics such such a good story that will literally always stick with me then we've got daisy jones and the six also by taylor jenkins read i gave this book four stars and i would highly recommend listening to the audiobook what's really really cool about this book is it's daisy jones and then her six band members so there's seven main characters total and in the audiobook they have different voice actors playing all the characters so it literally sounds like you're listening to a podcast but when i was listening to the audiobook i kept forgetting that it wasn't real and it takes place in the 70s so very fun time period it's about a band it's about drugs partying love finding your way and you can literally be at the top of your life in the sense of money fame career status but you can still be struggling so much with your own demons and your own mental health and she did a really really good job of tackling that concept and that is all the books that i have read from steph's five-star reads i am going to really rapid fire go through the other books from her five-star read list that i have not read yet there's all your perfects by colleen hoover i feel like i've heard so much about this book and steph said that it is about a couple and you get to see them fall in love and then you go fast forward to the future when they're married and they're falling out of love so that sounds really interesting to me i've never heard anything similar to that dynamic where it takes place over that big of a time span in a couple's romantic journey then she talks about the duology of full till and all in which i have never ever heard of this duology before but she said it is about a girl who is falling into really bad habits and then she meets this really wholesome guy so we've got bad girl good boy trope and i don't know that i've really read anything with that trope so i do really want to read that trope because it sounds like such an interesting dynamic because normally it's like the bad boy good girl then the wall of winnipeg and me by mariana zapata i've heard so much about this book and marianne is upon him but have yet to read a mariana zapata book yet and i know that she's the queen of slow burn and i'm kind of scared because you know when you're reading a romance it's that big anticipation for them to get together and can my little heart take a slow burn probably but i know it's going to be torturous oh my gosh i think it's mariana zapata mariana mariana sorry about that birthday girl by penelope douglas i don't really know what this book is about but i've heard that it's very angsty lots of chemistry and also a very taboo romance so i'm intrigued by the taboo aspect love and other words by christina lauren i've heard so many people say that they love this book i plan to read this book very soon the fine print by lauren asher i have owned this book for so long it's the first book in the dreamland billionaire series and i haven't started it solely for the fact that i'm in the middle of so many series right now but i do want this to be the next series that i start it is about a super rich guy who's basically like the ceo of this book's disneyland and then it's a romance between him and one of his workers at the theme park and i think that is such a fun concept like a disneyland vibe setting oh my gosh like in love and i also love super rich characters i don't know why i think that's just really interesting confess by colleen hoover also heard of this book a bunch it is about a guy who paints people's confessions and apparently there's lots of secrets that come out and that also sounds like a very interesting concept to me i don't know quite what it means to paint people's secrets and confessions but i bet it's juicy the spanish love deception oh my gosh i need to find out what all the hype is about aaron blackford and who this man is another colin hoover book we've got reminders of him and it is about a girl who previously served five years in prison because of one mistake that she made and that sounds also very juicy to me i am so curious what she did to land in prison and how that's affecting her life now that she's out then we have wait for it by mariana zapata which is single parent trope and neighbor romance and i don't know that i've read any romance where the main character has a child from the beginning and so i'm very interested in how kind of the family aspect plays in with the romance then we have most of all you by mia sheridan which is another good boy bad girl trope which i said i really want to read and steph said that the characters have a lot of trauma and i know mia sheridan did such a good job in archer's voice of writing about the character's past trauma and so i can only imagine that this book is just as good and lastly redeemed by lauren asher which is the last book in the dirty air series and i actually own the first book in the dirty air series throttled it is a formula one racing series so a sports romance after i finish all the series i'm in after i finish the fine print then i want to start the dirty air series anyway if you want to see me do a part two where i read all the books that i just mentioned let me know and yeah thank you and yeah thank you guys so much for watching i think i agreed with most of steph's five ratings i'll put a little number up here of how many books on her five-star list i also gave five stars to let me know in the comments at least one book that is on your five-star list i need to make my own five-star reads video soon because i have not talked about that at all all right and with that i'll see you guys next week bye let's get scratchingtoday we are reviewing steph bro rare's steph beaure steph bauer no that can't be it i do not know steph b personally but i do not know how to say her last name so i'm going to be referring to her as steph in this video as if we're besties hey steph i don't know why i said that like she would be watching this anyway today i'm gonna be reviewing steph's five-star reads if you don't know who she is for some reason she is the queen of booktube and i love her quick note though i have been preparing for this video for a while i've been slowly making my way through her five-star reads and then she came out with a part two i was not prepared for her to drop another five-star read video so this is mostly gonna be me reviewing and reacting to books from her five star reads part one video but if you guys like this video and one want me to do a part two let me know normal people by sally rooney i literally finished this book last night steph describes this book as more of a coming-of-age story than a romance and a story that takes place over many years it starts out with the characters in high school and then they go through college and then post grad and i would definitely agree that romance is the driving plot in this book but it's not really about the romance like i feel like the heart of the story is the character's own coming of age i have never read a sally rooney book before and she has a very interesting writing style and that took me a while to get used to and just in general she's kind of a depressing writing style i have read so many romance books at this point that some of them super sad tearjerker dramas some of them really light funny comedy but generally they all and really happy kind of fairy tale idealistic romance vibes and this is not that it was a very different and refreshing read to me it deals with a lot of themes of love finding your way in life mental health insecurities social anxiety and awkwardness not fitting in socioeconomic class status and how that affects your life and your social standings and i really appreciate and enjoyed reading about all the topics that sally rooney tackles in this book even though most of them were kind of depressing i don't know that i agree with steph and that this is a five star read for me i would give it four stars it is also a mini series on hulu and i started the mini series yesterday i just watched the first episode and so far it is really really accurate to the book if you like the book i really recommend checking out the mini series and while i was watching the mini series i started doing a paint by numbers which brings us to today's sponsor simple painting is a company that sells paint by numbers kits and i am no stranger to paint by numbers i love paint by numbers paint by numbers are very similar to reading in a way of really focusing on a task and spending a lot of quiet time doing it and then in the end feeling like very accomplished about completing and what i really really love about simple painting is they have such cool and complex designs that i would never be able to paint on my own i chose to do this daisy painting because i think it really fits like the vibe of my apartment so i want to hang it up when i'm done and i'm not done with it yet but when i'm finished with my daisy painting i'll definitely post an update on my instagram and then i also have a 15 off discount code which is just ally and the link and my discount code will also be in the description the first series that she mentions is the addicted callaway sister series which is also a massive five star read to me i'm actually not done i'm six books in to the ten book series one of my favorite things about the series is that as much as it's a romance series it is also a friendship series it involves six characters three of which are sisters to three girls and then there's the three boys and they're all such good friends like i would die to be in their friend group and then of course the three girls and the three boys end up together so it's three total couples and the couples are childhood friends to fake dating to lovers academic rivals to lovers and then age gap slash forbidden romance so you have three very different tropes which i also like so i think there's something for everyone and this is by far the biggest romance series that i started so it's really really cool to get to read about these characters for so many books if you ever read anything that i recommend please let it be this series this may be my favorite series books i have ever read in the romance genre and i also really need to finish the series i think i said i have four books left and i need to hunker down and read them but loki i've been procrastinating because i just don't want to finish the series next up is the off-campus series the first one in the series is the deal i have read all the books in the series except for the epilogue book which i actually just started what's really really cool and interesting about this series is that each book is a standalone so you can read them all individually but they all exist within the same world and all have crossover characters and trope wise in the series we've got enemies to lovers with the first book there's a second chance romance there's friends with benefits to lovers and then strangers to lovers oh my gosh and it is a hockey romance series so all the guys in the books are hockey players they play on the same team at briar u so it's sports romance it takes place in college so new adult romance and something that i love about l kennedy's writing style this is gonna sound like a bad thing but i mean it is a really good thing she has a little bit more of a simple writing style like very much wattpad vibes and i really like that i was a big wattpad girl so this like just fulfills my middle school wattpad fantasies but in a more adult book context hello editing ally i just realized i didn't actually give my rating for the series but it is a five star series for me then we've got ugly love by colleen hoover which i also gave five stars we're on a roll here of me agreeing with steph's five star reads uh yeah this is my favorite colleen huber book that i have ever read so far it has past and presents it has friends with benefits to lovers it has a big dark secret that you find out at the ends and it will make you understand why it is called ugly love i did not cry in this book but definitely could see this being a tear jerker for a lot of people a very very sad part towards the end and overall one of the characters very much struggles with his past and a big emotional thing that happened to him and him having never processed and reconciled with that tragedy in his life so if you want to cry or almost cry and read about a really really great love story then would recommend this book then we have november 9 by colin hoover and this is the first part in this video where i'm gonna really disagree with steph sorry girl i think i gave this book three and a half stars i liked it but not my favorite the concept of this book is that the characters only meet up one day year november 9th so we go through their life only seeing and learning about them one day every single year and i love that concept i was so so excited to read this book and i maybe had too high of expectations just because i think it's a really cool story idea but it made me feel a little bit disconnected from the characters only getting to see them one day year i just felt like i missed so much on the other 364 days and i felt like i couldn't super care about the characters because i didn't feel like i really really knew them not being able to see the full scope of their lives it also had a huge plot twist at the end which is a really cool plot twist but for some reason it came across as kind of gimmicky to me i don't really know how to explain it but the twist just didn't really land for me then we've got the hating game by sally thorne and i love this book i gave it 4.5 stars it is enemies to lovers and is a workplace romance and the character's chemistry is so good they say hating someone is really similar to loving someone i definitely butchered it but there's a quote like that in the book i also really really love the movie if you have not read this book please read it now so you can go watch the movie i actually have a whole vlog where i watched and reacted to the movie and i'm now obsessed with reading books that have turned into movies or tv shows just so i can have that moment of seeing them come across live on the screen next up we've got the on honeymooners by christina lauren i gave this book four stars looking back i feel like i'm trying to give it a 4.5 because i really like this book it is not just fake dating but it is fake marriage which that is taking a trope i already love to a whole new level it is about olive whose sister is getting married and her sister and her sister's husband get super sick so they can't go on their honeymoon and so olive and the best man whom olive hates have to pretend to be married so that they can go on and redeem the honeymoon and her sister's place i think fake dating and enemies lovers are two my favorite tropes so seeing those combined in such a fun setting was really fun to read about then we have a thousand by kisses by tilly cole and i give this book four stars i liked it it was a really cute romance it's childhood friends to lovers you literally get to see them as young children growing up together which i think is really cool it is y.a and i actually really love ya books but for some reason i just felt at certain parts that this book felt a little young for me and the character's love for each other was so strong and so intense which is part of the things i really like about this book but it was almost too strong at too young of an age that it just didn't really land for me i talked about this in my february reading wrap up i think that's just a personal thing for me because i don't know in high school i was not falling in love with anyone and i just can't imagine being like deeply deeply in love at like 15 but that doesn't mean that people aren't deeply deeply in love at that age it just wasn't relatable for me because it's not something i've remotely experienced but overall a really really cute book and a tear jerker which i did not see coming then the song of achilles by madeline miller i just posted a reading vlog to this book where i cried because this book is so sad and it stole my heart and is 100 a five-star read for me this book is greek mythology and i've said this a hundred times i didn't know i would be interested in greek mythology i was really skeptical i would like this book and then i fell freaking in love with it especially the greek mythology aspect of it and it is also romance the main character petrocus in this book is just so pure and i love him so much and then achilles i also love he's definitely a flawed character and i really loved reading about such a fantastic character and then a bit more of a flawed character i think that makes it so interesting and so human it is just such an interesting story even without the romance aspect but then of course the romance was like the main driving part and i love that so much then we have red wine row blue by casey mcquiston and i am so in love with this book if i could erase one book for my memory so that i could re-read it again and get the feeling of reading it for the first time it would be this book five star read for me it is enemies to lovers between a british prince and the son of the u.s president and oh my gosh such a cool world being that their royalty and then a president's son and all of the history and the political aspect of what it means for them to be together a lot of romance books have obstacles within the relationship like reasons why obviously the couple doesn't get together till the end but these characters literally had the weight of the world on their shoulders because of what it would mean for them to be together i didn't start another book for like a week because it felt like i would be betraying these characters by reading any other book and i believe amazon is looking into making this into a movie and if they do make it into a movie i would literally cry then we've got archer's voice by mia sheridan and this book is also so good i gave this book four stars i cried like a baby both from sad tears and then happy tears which i don't think has ever happened to me before when reading a book so a real emotional rollercoaster but it is about a girl who had something really traumatic happen to her and so she kind of literally runs away from her problems and leaves to go live in this small town where she meets archer who also had a ton of trauma in his life and he actually does not speak so they both strike up this like really great wholesome friendship because he's kind of the small town loner and outcast but they really really bond just in general as friends and then also through their trauma and they have to go on their own journeys of healing but they also help each other heal as their relationship blooms together and it is just such a wholesome and sweet book i cared about archer so much and he has a little special place in my heart then we've got the seven husbands of evelyn hugo by taylor jenkins reed i also think i cried in this book this was a solid four four-star read for me i loved that this book is a romance but i feel like really at its heart it's evelyn's own story of navigating her life and finding herself and her way and her own happiness and what's cool is that evelyn is like a super super famous actress and it goes back and forth between past and present day and during present day monique who is a journalist is interviewing evelyn and so we get to see the kind of interview style and the present and then we actually go back into the past and get to experience firsthand evelyn's life it's about love and fame and being a woman in a heavily male industry and being a minority and i think taylor jacobs read such a great job of tackling so many great topics such such a good story that will literally always stick with me then we've got daisy jones and the six also by taylor jenkins read i gave this book four stars and i would highly recommend listening to the audiobook what's really really cool about this book is it's daisy jones and then her six band members so there's seven main characters total and in the audiobook they have different voice actors playing all the characters so it literally sounds like you're listening to a podcast but when i was listening to the audiobook i kept forgetting that it wasn't real and it takes place in the 70s so very fun time period it's about a band it's about drugs partying love finding your way and you can literally be at the top of your life in the sense of money fame career status but you can still be struggling so much with your own demons and your own mental health and she did a really really good job of tackling that concept and that is all the books that i have read from steph's five-star reads i am going to really rapid fire go through the other books from her five-star read list that i have not read yet there's all your perfects by colleen hoover i feel like i've heard so much about this book and steph said that it is about a couple and you get to see them fall in love and then you go fast forward to the future when they're married and they're falling out of love so that sounds really interesting to me i've never heard anything similar to that dynamic where it takes place over that big of a time span in a couple's romantic journey then she talks about the duology of full till and all in which i have never ever heard of this duology before but she said it is about a girl who is falling into really bad habits and then she meets this really wholesome guy so we've got bad girl good boy trope and i don't know that i've really read anything with that trope so i do really want to read that trope because it sounds like such an interesting dynamic because normally it's like the bad boy good girl then the wall of winnipeg and me by mariana zapata i've heard so much about this book and marianne is upon him but have yet to read a mariana zapata book yet and i know that she's the queen of slow burn and i'm kind of scared because you know when you're reading a romance it's that big anticipation for them to get together and can my little heart take a slow burn probably but i know it's going to be torturous oh my gosh i think it's mariana zapata mariana mariana sorry about that birthday girl by penelope douglas i don't really know what this book is about but i've heard that it's very angsty lots of chemistry and also a very taboo romance so i'm intrigued by the taboo aspect love and other words by christina lauren i've heard so many people say that they love this book i plan to read this book very soon the fine print by lauren asher i have owned this book for so long it's the first book in the dreamland billionaire series and i haven't started it solely for the fact that i'm in the middle of so many series right now but i do want this to be the next series that i start it is about a super rich guy who's basically like the ceo of this book's disneyland and then it's a romance between him and one of his workers at the theme park and i think that is such a fun concept like a disneyland vibe setting oh my gosh like in love and i also love super rich characters i don't know why i think that's just really interesting confess by colleen hoover also heard of this book a bunch it is about a guy who paints people's confessions and apparently there's lots of secrets that come out and that also sounds like a very interesting concept to me i don't know quite what it means to paint people's secrets and confessions but i bet it's juicy the spanish love deception oh my gosh i need to find out what all the hype is about aaron blackford and who this man is another colin hoover book we've got reminders of him and it is about a girl who previously served five years in prison because of one mistake that she made and that sounds also very juicy to me i am so curious what she did to land in prison and how that's affecting her life now that she's out then we have wait for it by mariana zapata which is single parent trope and neighbor romance and i don't know that i've read any romance where the main character has a child from the beginning and so i'm very interested in how kind of the family aspect plays in with the romance then we have most of all you by mia sheridan which is another good boy bad girl trope which i said i really want to read and steph said that the characters have a lot of trauma and i know mia sheridan did such a good job in archer's voice of writing about the character's past trauma and so i can only imagine that this book is just as good and lastly redeemed by lauren asher which is the last book in the dirty air series and i actually own the first book in the dirty air series throttled it is a formula one racing series so a sports romance after i finish all the series i'm in after i finish the fine print then i want to start the dirty air series anyway if you want to see me do a part two where i read all the books that i just mentioned let me know and yeah thank you and yeah thank you guys so much for watching i think i agreed with most of steph's five ratings i'll put a little number up here of how many books on her five-star list i also gave five stars to let me know in the comments at least one book that is on your five-star list i need to make my own five-star reads video soon because i have not talked about that at all all right and with that i'll see you guys next week bye let's get scratching\n"