From April 2-29th, the O.W.L Examinations - Ordinary Wizarding Levels - are being held and I'm so excited to sit mine!! G at BookRoast has created this readathon and you can get all your information about it on her announcement video.

I am planning to take at least 4 O.W.Ls though I have books picked out for all 12 subjects so I can pick and choose - plus, I need 5 to get an Outstanding! 

Each subject has a challenge and you cannot double up a book. If you want 12 O.W.Ls you must read 12 books! I will detail below each subject and what their challenge is as well as my pick! Head on over to my BOOKTUBE channel and leave a comment letting me know what you're reading and be sure to subscribe <3

OH.

MY.

GOD.

1 YEAR.

It really doesn't feel like a year ago I was sat in a caravan setting up "booklycat.weebly.com". It's been a crazy year with domain purchases and name changes but it's also been so much fun! From chairing my first event to receiving some amazing ARCs and best of all, sharing my thoughts with everyone who reads I've come a long way in a year. 

This blogiversary happens to coincide with my return to booktube and reaching 100 subscribers there so to celebrate I thought I'd give you all a good giggle... I decided to react to my first ever TBR video.

It's been three years since I shared all the books I owned at the time and was yet to read and you'd think with the title "teeny tiny TBR" that it would have been easy to read them all within a year... let me know in the comments how many you think I'll have read - there's 23 books in total!

If you enjoyed the video please be sure to like the video and if you feel like it, leave a comment letting me know if you want to see more reaction videos! Also, to let my blog readers in on a secret - when I hit 1000 subscribers I'll be hosting an INTERNATIONAL giveaway! So be sure to subscribe now to be in with a chance :)

// emma

Across the Galaxy is not a theme I would usually find myself interested in unless it involves Doctor Who, but even though Sci-Fi isn't my thing and this box wasn't my favourite I still enjoyed this months Owlcrate and I hope you guys enjoy my unboxing!

I've hit 100 subscribers on my youtube channel (emmanovella) and it's almost my first blog birthday soon so there *might* be something exciting coming your way in a few days!! <3

// emmanovella

I'm sure you all saw the news that Little, Brown UK are publishing the screenplay for The Crimes of Grindelwald and I'm also sure you fall in to one of two camps: hyped and uhhhh how shall I say it?? pissed.

This announcement comes not too long after that of the paperback editions of the illustrated Harry Potter books and at this point I just feel a little... frustrated. It feels like... in fact I KNOW that we, the Harry Potter fans, are being taken for as mugs. Not muggles - just downright mugs. 

They KNOW we will pay the money for more *official* books EVEN if we already own it... in several different editions. I currently have SEVEN editions of Philosopher's Stone.

Wait... no... I have 8.

It's crazy and completely unnecessary but I like collecting books. Even so, I collect books in different editions, cover changes, foreign countries and even in different languages yet I haven't been meaning to collect the philosopher's stone. Four of the 8 copes have the original cover art. I haven't collected any of the other UK covers. I have so many copies not because I want them, but because there is such a buzz surrounding a "new" Harry Potter that I feel I have to buy it, or I think I "need" it. I don't. 

I don't need nor want to spend my money adding more and more of the same book to my collection. I don't want a screenplay or a script. I read Cursed Child when it came out and DEVOURED it but a year and a half later when I saw the stage show I realised how bad the book was. The book wasn't there for us to read (trust me, the play is INCREDIBLE but the book does absolutely no justice to the story) it was there so we'd all rush out at midnight (ahem... WORK yup. I had to work the midnight release. Madness that was) and spend our money on it. 

It's the same with this. It's to make money. I know that's what all book releases are about but there's a difference. Books are written to tell and share a story. This screenplay was written to make a film. A film everyone will want to see and will make millions at the box office. This screenplay was obsolete. The film is made. They don't need it. It's redundant. So how to make even more money off a fandom who will throw any amount of money at anything saying "JK ROWLING OFFICIAL"? Bind it and sell it. 

Don't get me wrong - I probably will do the same as I did when I saw Fantastic Beasts on release day: go straight round to Waterstones and grab the book and a pop figure or two (Grindelwald pleaseeee).

But I can't help feeling a little disgruntled by the blatant money grabbing now. It's been nearly four years since the first illustrated edition came out so why only now are they announcing the paperbacks? It's like the forgot about them and in some meeting someone just went 'umm... you know we could totally convince people to buy the illustrated books if they were cheaper so why not make them paperback? and I don't know... include a poster of a dragon or something". 

I don't know guys. I love that the magic is still alive but I'm a bit fed up of screenplays and new editions. Give us a marauders book or something and if JK doesn't want to write that then stop milking a book that came out 21 years ago? 
It's getting to the point that it has more editions than classics have (not quite but you get my drift). 

I know, I know, it's us the readers and fans who keep buying them but they could make it seem a little less... ugh I don't know. I guess I just think that in the last year and a half since the Cursed Child release it's been non-stop new editions and I'm just over it. Gimmie a break in between lads.

What do you think? Should we be getting so many editions or should they chill? Would you like to see more books/series get special editions?

// emmanovella

Anyone who knows me knows how much I love a musical. Dear Evan Hansen is one of the few I adore just from listening to the soundtrack. I have a rough idea on what the story follows but I haven't seen the show so I don't quite know the full story. 

But I just found out that author Val Emmich is writing an adaptation that will be published by Little, Brown in October. Are you excited? Because I am SO excited!!

The best part is that I'll be in NYC the just after publication so if it doesn't get picked up in the UK for release around that time I can grab my copy then.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with DEH, goodreads provides this for a synopsis:

I absolutely cannot wait to read this book and I am a BIG fan of that cover. Let me know what you guys think: is this a good idea and would you like to see more musical to book adaptations? 

// emmanovella

Well... if getting a new John Green* last year was exciting, Markus Zusak sure knows how to up the game.

Obviously, nothing will ever replace The Book Thief, but I have high hopes for anything that comes from its author so you can imagine my delight when I received an email from Waterstones informing me that after over a decade of work on it, Bridge of Clay is finally ready for publication... ON MY BIRTHDAY!
​

I don't have words to talk about my love for Jerry Spinelli. He's not a hugely talked about YA author and most people only know him as the author of Stargirl - which is definitely one of my favourite books. 

When I was in Paris, I spotted his name in the YA section of Shakespeare and Co and as it was a nice floppy paperback in a slightly larger size for only €11 I knew I had to buy it.
​

In my last post I talked about my writing and told you that I've decided to share my first draft on Wattpad. A lot of people wouldn't dream of sharing an unedited piece but personally, I was getting too afraid, too doubtful of myself and I knew I just had to put something out in the world.

I chose to share a first draft that I was very critical of as, if people thought it was shit and told me so... well at least I was in agreement with them and wouldn't feel completely heartbroken. I'd also hopefully get some critiques which would help me in the future to spot issues in my writing. On the flip side of that, if people leave good comments then it's helping me to realise just how critical I can be of myself and it also gives me feedback from actual readers. 
Sure, it's nowhere near the caliber of a published novel. It's not something I'd want publishers or agents to look at because they'd be judging my writing and grammar etc, but to have people read it just because they want to read a book and tell you they like the story, asking for the next update etc... that's invaluable. It reminds me why I write and it keeps me going. I worked so hard to get that first draft out and I very nearly left it in a folder on my laptop. I was going to move on to another project believing what I had written before was awful and that nobody would ever want to see it. Wattpad has allowed me to still move on but to move on knowing that there are people out there who want to read my stories. And that means more to me than anything.

So, I figured I would share the first part here. I'll link to the wattpad page too so if you want to vote on it you can <3

As some of you probably know, I recently started taking my writing seriously again.

I won NaNoWriMo, somehow, with a contemporary piece but after months of trying to edit it I've realised that contemporary romance is not my bag. I've got a new idea in the works which I am very excited about but I can't help but feel a little sad at leaving my other manuscript in the dark... so I did something I never thought I'd do...

HAPPY WORLD BOOK DAY!!
If that wasn't good enough, today, March 1st marks (Justin Bieber's birthday... just saying) haha no seriously... Today is one year of my bookstagram account! I'm really not sure where the time went but such is life I suppose! 

February wasn't as successful a reading month as I had hoped but with my trip to Paris and my gran being in hospital I haven't been too hard on myself for slacking.

I'm not actually bothered that I only read three books in the month but I am annoyed that out of the two novels, only one was a good read. However, it's World Book Day and I've just finished a book (that's taken me about a week to get through) so March is off to a good start and I'm hoping to catch up with my reading challenge (I'm five books behind schedule!! Ahhh!)

So, rambling's done; onto the books I read in February!