Hello readers out there!
The woman behind this 'Blythes & Books' Blog goes by the name of Mandy.
I'm a 30-something woman living with her husband (for over 6 years) in their humble home, which is situated in the eastern part of The Netherlands. January 21st 2013 I gave birth to our son Connor. A true miracle for us, after hoping,wishing and undergoing several surgeries for seven years.
This house of ours is filled to the brim with my hobbies: I have a scrapbooking room and a room where my Blythe dolls (9 of them) are sort of living in their still-not-finished homes surrounded with tiny shoes, outfits and vintage Skipper clothing. As of lately I have seriously started collecting books as well. By that I don't mean special books or editions, simply great amounts of books I need to have ;) Real books, that is, not e-books. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but I love the weighty feel of a book in my hands!
After a reading break of many, many years (courtesy to the high school reading list which spoiled all the fun for me...) I rediscovered reading again. I love getting lost in a story, in another world, feeling like I'm someone else, while still sitting comfy on my couch with tea and chocolate. It's sort of embarrassing to admit with all the controversy surrounding the franchise, but the 'Twilight' books got me started again! From which you can conclude what my favorite genres are: fantasy, paranormal romance, supernatural stories, steampunk, sci-fi, historic, dystopian, YA in general.
Like so many others out there, I decided to start a blog about books (and maybe some Blythe stuff as well). It'll mostly be about the ones I've read and reviewed, but I intend to extend my blog to cover reveals, books I'm anxiously awaiting and maybe some book trailers as well. My goal is to keep readers informed by writing well-argumented reviews. Someday I hope to be able to review ARCs as well. It would be a great honour to read and review a book before it has hit the shelves. Consider this an invitation if you have anything to offer
I joined 'Goodreads' (http://www.goodreads.com/) this year and I love keeping track of my books there, reviewing them, being on the prowl for interesting new reads, discussing books and finding more reviews on a book if I'm not sure about it. I read in English, mostly because I find the atmosphere is somehow lost once the book is translated into Dutch. Also because there aren't many great Dutch YA books.
In my first post (after this one) I'll leave you with one of the first reviews I did since I joined Goodreads. It's not much, but I started doing more extensive reviews after a while, so bare with me. I will re-write these reviews some day, but for now they will have to do. Whilst reading I already keep track of many things now, and some of the early reviews on Goodreads were done some time after reading.
If you want to contact me, you can email me at: blythesandbooks at hotmail dot com
Have a nice day and leave me a comment here, it's much appreciated!
