TBR Challenge #4 - Being Amani by Anabelle Steele

SYNOPSIS

It's been over a year since that night and Amani hopes that starting all over again will help her move on from the past. So, when she moves to a new city, Amani wants to focus on her new life, her best friends and the boy she's been crushing on but everything is falling apart and Amani finds herself looking for happiness in all the wrong places. Can Amani confront the ghosts of her pasts so she can become the girl she's always wanted to be?

REVIEW

For Amani, it is more than clear has been through an awful lot when we are first introduced to her and her story. It is apparent very early on that she wants to break free of the chains that have haunted her past and want to look forward to a new and exciting future. But things aren't as easy as they seem and sometimes you need to accept what has happened and to take help from those who want to support you before running again.

As she is a teenager still, her outlook on life does not always present the best idea of how to cope with the scars that she has been left with and there is more than one occasion where you cannot help feeling a little annoyed about her choices.

But she is a human girl who wants more than anything to protect her mother.

Despite exposing readers to adult themes, I felt a lot more could have been done. It felt like half the plot was about how much Amani wanted to be around boys and not really caring about very much else. This did not help with her "best friend" who seemed to be absent over some argument that I can't really remember them having.

As much as I wanted to love this book it did fall flat on my expectations. It is one of those books that you expect a lot from but doesn't deliver on the plot.

RATING: ** (TWO STARS)

BUY LINKS

Amazon: Being Amani eBook : Steele, Annabelle: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store

Waterstones: Being Amani by Annabelle Steele | Waterstones

Publisher Website Being Amani by Annabelle Steele | hashtagpress

Comments

2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke

What can we truly know of the universe? Is the universe simply beyond our comprehension or are we just too ignorant to see what is actually in front of us? What if there is life beyond Earth? What if we can discover it for ourselves? What if, our curiosity gets the better of us all? This book seems to pose many questions to what knowledge we already possess yet, are we looking at life in the right way and how we come to use the environment of Earth around us. It takes us through the story of the human race and how we have expanded our skills and knowledge to become a race which is both rational and intelligent enough to discover the final frontier, space. But what comes after all of this? This is just as an important question as the one in which we ask of how we all got here in the first place. The great thing about this book is that I feel like if you read it before watching the film, you would probably have a better appreciation for Kubrick's vision. In fact, it could be believed...

Blog Tour: The Lore of Prometheus by Graham Austin-King

SYNOPSIS John Carver has three rules: Don't drink in the daytime, don't gamble when the luck has gone, and don't talk to the dead people who come to visit. It has been almost five years since the incident in Kabul. Since the magic stirred within him and the stories began. Fleeing the army, running from the whispers, the guilt, and the fear he was losing his mind, Carver fell into addiction, dragging himself through life one day at a time. Desperation has pulled him back to Afganistan, back to the heat, the dust, and the truth he worked so hard to avoid. But there are others, obsessed with power and forbidden magics, who will stop at nothing to learn the truth of his gifts. Abducted and chained, Carver must break more than his own rules if he is to harness this power and survive.

Archibald Lox and the Bridge Between Worlds by Darren Shan

It's been a while since Darren Shan has written a children's book. Focusing more on his adult audience these last few years it seemed like this was the avenue he would have stayed in. However, I'm glad he made the transition back. I can't believe how much I have missed him doing a children's book until now. Covid-19 is at least good for one thing. I get to start on a new series that I can't wait to read. This first book in the serial seems different from previous children's books that he has written in the past. Almost mysterious and part of a realm that is more metaphysical rather than anything. Yet still enchanting in a way that makes look at the world in a new-found way In some ways it kind of reminds me of Plato's cave in the sense that there is something more to reality than what most people let on. Something that can be seen to be incomprehensible to the person that has not experienced The Merge and will never understand the importance of it. Once ...

A Wedding in the Country by Katie Fforde

SYNOPSIS Lizzie has just arrived in London, determined to make the best of her new life. Her mother may be keen that she should have a nice wedding in the country to a Suitable Man chosen by her. And Lizzie may be going to cookery school to help her become a Good Wife. But she definitely wants to have some fun first. It is 1963 and London is beginning to swing as Lizzie cuts her hair, buys a new dress with a fashionably short hemline, and moves in with two of her best friends, one of whom lives in a grand but rundown house in Belgravia which has plenty of room for a lodger. Soon Lizzie's life is so exciting that she has forgotten all about her mother's marriage plans for her. All she can think about is that the young man she is falling in love with appears to be engaged to someone else...

History of a Drowning Boy by Dennis Nilsen

SYNOPSIS Dennis Nilsen was one of Britain's most notorious serial killers, jailed for life in 1983 after the murders of 12 men and the attempted murders of many more. Seven years after his conviction, Nilsen began to write his autobiography and over a period of 18 years he typed 6,000 pages of introspection, reflection, comment and explanation. History of a Drowning Boy - taken exclusively from these astonishing writings - uncovers, for the first time the motives behind the murders, and delivers a clear understanding of how such horrific events could have happened, tracing the origins back to early childhood. In another first, it provides an insight into his 35 years inside the maximum-security prison system including his everyday life on the wings; his interactions with the authorities and other notorious prisoners; and his artistic endeavours of music, writing and drama. It also reveals the truth behind many of the myths surrounding Dennis Nilsen, as reported in the media. Nils...