I found this very fun tag on my friend Tori’s site Zigler News.  It sounded so delicious and cake happens to be my favourite desert so I thought, why not?  I hope you enjoy this book tag and my answers to it, and as always if you want to take part just go ahead. 🙂  Let me know you’re taking part by either putting a link to this post in your own or make a comment below so I can see your answers and we can compare our choices. 🙂

1. CHOCOLATE CAKE: A dark book you absolutely love

I’m trying to think of a book other than Max which I keep mentioning in almost every tag, lol!  Although it isn’t dark throughout and takes some time to get into, when this story gets going it really gets dark and psychological which I do just love.  Small Spaces by Sarah Epstein is just brilliant and really makes you wonder what’s going on and who’s really behind all that is happening.  Tash Carmody’s been traumatised ever since her imaginary friend from childhood lured away a little girl at a carnival and Tash witnessed it.  But nobody believed her then and Tash comes to believe that she had made it up, that is, until she starts seeing her imaginary friend again.  It’s just the right amount of creepy and dark and has a very dark climactic end too!

2. VANILLA CAKE: A light read

I’ve read two books (in part-works) from Sheila Norton that feel like perfect light reading, The Vets at Hope Green and The Pets at Primrose Cottage.  Both books are just lovely light-hearted romantic stories that you just know how they are going to end but still love to see it happen.  And both books contain an added dose of animals in the mix which just makes them the perfect light read for me. 🙂

3. RED VELVET: A book that gave you mixed emotions

Ashes by Christopher De Vinck is such an amazing read!  Set during and around world war II this book starts off with the beautiful and fun friendship between two girls in Belgium shortly before the war begins.  At first nobody believes that Belgium would be invaded, it’s a neutral country, but when the German forces finally invade the two girls, one of them Jewish and both separated from family, begin travelling west in an attempt to escape them.  The story is a briliant and fast-paced novel with a lot of fun and happy moments before moving on to some darker and very emotional parts.  The whole book has a very good ending although it did leave me with a real mix of emotions, both happy and sad, but on the whole a brilliant read!

4. CHEESECAKE: A book you would recommend to anyone

Well, I said it above but right now I’d recommend Ashes by Christopher De Vinck to anyone.  It’s not too dark a read but contains a lot of real information about things that happened in world war II and so it’s a little bit educational as well as being a great novel to read.  In fact it feels very much like a novel for anyone of teen age and above.
However if you’re looking for a book for any age then what about The Wonderling by Mira Bartók.  It’s such a lovely Dickensian feeling story about a little half-fox, half-boy foundling who lives in an orphanage and who is alone, without even a proper name until he meets Trinket a kiwi-like groundling who not only gives him a name but helps him escape the orphanage where they go on a beautiful adventure.  It’s like a perfect family Christmas movie and even the book’s cover and pages have such beautiful illustrations.  It’s just the perfect story and I think anyone of any age would adore it! 🙂

5. COFFEE CAKE: A book you started but never finished

This doesn’t usually happen as I have a bit of a stubborn streak inside me and once I start a book I’m determined to finish it no matter how good or bad it seems.  Unfortunately though there were a couple of books that I have found unbelievably difficult to read, the latter which just had nothing happening.  The most recent one happened to be a book I read about four years ago and it drove me mad as I had read over half way into the book and was still waiting for something to happen when I eventually decided to just give up as I felt I was losing my sanity…to be fair the writing was unbelievably terrible too.  It may not have been the author’s fault though as that book had been published by that publisher I won’t name but had issues with a few years back – pre this blog’s existence – (you can read about it here), so I won’t name the book either but just know that I don’t usually DNF a book, not since I DNF The Hobbit when I was a child!

6. CARROT CAKE: A book with great writing

There are sooo many, how can I choose just one?!  I know one book that really is very good though and it’s the wonderfully vivid descriptions that just made me adore reading it.  Visions of Zarua by Suzanne Rogerson is a fantasy standalone which I read a long time ago now but which just blew me away.  I will never stop going on about how much I have loved her book and I urge anyone to read it as it has a brilliant story with a split plot focusing on two different times periods.

7. TIRAMISU: A book that left you wanting more

Not too long ago I read Rules for Vanishing by Kate Alice Marshall and unfortunately its ending just didn’t leave me satisfied at all.  The book in general was okay, even very good, building up an interesting and creepy plot as a bunch of teenagers travel through some sort of spooky and paranormal road that opens up in the middle of the woods.  But the whole thing, despite having an interesting build up which is a bit Blair Witch, just had an ending that was very flat.  It just didn’t really have a decent ending and after finishing the book I was left feeling like what was the point. :/

8. CUPCAKES: A series with 4+ Books

There are lots of series with more than four books in them but the real question should be how many of them have I read…? 😮  There are several series with four books in them that I’ve read but I have yet to read a series that I can think of with more than four.  Although one that I’m very interested in is The Mortal Instruments Boxed Set which I have been lucky to receive from the publisher a while ago but I have yet to read more than the first book!

9. FRUIT CAKE: A book that wasn’t what you anticipated

I think I’ve mentioned it before but Beck by Mal Peet and Meg Rosoff just wasn’t what I had expected at all.  The story is a historical fiction set around Beck, an orphaned half-Liverpudlian, half-African boy who is sent to Canada to be cared for by the Catholic Brothers, priests.  Although the book started out interesting I thought it would continue down this path but it became a weird book filled with four different stories of Beck growing up and each story just felt disconnected and different from the others.  At the end of reading it I still don’t know what to think about it which is a shame as the first part was really was very good. :/

What do you think of my answers?  What would your answers to these cake questions be?  Let me know what you think in the comments below 🙂