Right so, if you’ve been a follower of my blog or any of my social media accounts for the last few months, you’d know that I’ve been in the worst reading slump I’ve experienced since I started reading—ever. I could read, honestly I spent most of my reading slump actually reading fanfiction than doing anything else, but I just couldn’t finish a book. Literally, anyone could send me a 200K worded fic and I would be able to get through it in a span of two hours, but send me one book and I’d barely be able to finish it. My Twitter has turned into a full BTS account (I still tweet about books, hah!), and the ARCs I’ve had on my shelves have slowly been gaining dust. So, as I’m typing this now, I’m arranging them out and planning on getting through all of them one by one.
More excitingly though, over the last four months, I’ve been able to intern at not one, but two publishing companies! Last summer, I was able to intern at Hachette Book Group—the house that published Twilight, The Cruel Prince, Jade City, etc, etc—and this time around, I’m an intern at Simon & Schuster’s Children’s Publishing! It’s been an interesting ride so far, and whenever I brought up the idea of my slump to my supervisors and coworkers, they’d nod knowingly and many even told me a lot of people actually get into slumps when they first enter the publishing industry. There’s just something to learn about separating the books you read for work versus the books you read for fun—not to say that you can’t read a book for work for fun, but hopefully some you know what I mean! So if any of you were curious as to what I’ve been up to recently, there you go!
TLDR: Reason for my absence? I’ve entered the publishing world as an intern in the last few months, and I’ve had one of the worst book slumps of my life.
But, the opportunity to get out of that slump presented itself in the form of Disney’s new Maleficent movie. I wasn’t aware that there was gonna be a middle-grade original novel based on Maleficent—let alone that Holly Black was gonna write it—but I knew I loved Holly’s work, and I love the characters of Disney even more. So the night before I was to watch the movie, I laid down in bed and opened the book.
Now, this is a middle-grade novel that assumes you know a lot about the world of Maleficent and Sleeping Beauty already. This definitely picks up from the events of the first film, and it sort of served as a refresher for me since I haven’t seen it since it was in cinemas years ago.
Plot-wise, things moved really quickly. I tend to have a hard time getting through books with slow pacing, but I barely batted an eye with the way Heart of the Moors progressed. Aurora has become the queen of both Perceforest (the land of the humans) and the Moors (the land of the fae), and her plans as her first task as queen is to unite both kingdoms—not that any of her subjects really want to be united as there’s animosity on both sides. Her advisors actively try to sway her against this, and even Maleficent herself is hesitant, but Aurora remains steadfast. After all, she, a human, grew up loving the fae. So why can’t others learn to do so?
What really set apart Heart of the Moors from any retelling I’ve come across is its worldbuilding. Holly has a way of writing in this particular book that really immerses a reader in her world. The descriptions written about the Moors was just breathtaking and as I was reading, I could really visualize myself in place of the characters.
Despite being an enjoyable and original story, I feel like Holly had to noticeably dumb down the content for middle graders. I know it’s a middle-grade novel, but whenever I read MG, I rarely come across the issue where I just felt like the author was holding something back from the story. Maybe it’s because I’m more used to seeing her work with steamier content? The characters felt a little two-dimensional as well, and overall the romance was just……lukewarm I guess. Either way, this novel was a quick and entertaining read, especially to me as a big lover of the film franchise.
Fans of the Maleficent movie will love this book, for sure. I closed the last page when I was about to see the sequel in theatres, and the book itself was at par with the movie in terms of enjoyment for me. Holly definitely made up her own world (which is really impressive given the page count of this book), and if you’re a fan of The Cruel Prince and her other works, you’ll definitely enjoy this as well!
That being said, it’s no surprise that it took the powers of a Disney movie and a Holly Black book to get me out of my reading slump. And while I have had a lot of support from my workplace, I’d love to hear about what you guys usually do to get out of slumps (whether you’ve had one recently or not) as well as book recommendations as I haven’t been up to date with the newer releases! Let me know in the comments what recommendations you have for me!
Buy Links:
Amazon | B&N | BookDepository
Title: Heart of the Moors
Author: Holly Black
Genre: Middle Grade, Fantasy, Retelling
Source: ARC via Netgalley
Publication Date: October 8, 2019
Add to Goodreads
Rating: 4/5
I have been struggling with a reading slump as well. It hasn’t been as bad but it is still frustrating. I think the main reason for my slump is that I have been struggling to get through an eARC which I have been forced to read on my phone. And I hate reading on my phone and the ARC wasn’t particularly good either… Sooo that was kind of a buzzkill.
What I have been trying to do to get out of by slump is reading a book I have been really excited about and most importantly reading in my preferred format which is paperbacks :))) I have also tried to create content for my blog which made me feel more productive and that was really helpful.
Happy to hear you got out of your slump and your internship sounds sooo cool and exciting! <3
Ah! I’m not sure if you’ve been able to get through that eARC but from personal experience, if a book isn’t enjoyable, I pick up another that looks a little more interesting to get through before going back in. Sometimes though, DNFing is the best way to go! I definitely agree with you on the paperbacks bit!
The past few weeks I have been struggling with a reading slump as well, and I hate it. Not even fanfiction seems to work. The worst part is that I want to read but everytime I think about picking up a book suddenly that desire to read just evaporates. I have 2 books I’m in the middle of, and I’m enjoying them a lot but?? It’s the absolute worst, and I’m glad it seems to be getting better for you ♥ A Holly Black novel sounds perfect honestly!
I hope October is kind to you and that you enjoy your internship ♥
Ah that sucks! Honestly, I feel like the whole fall season has been really unkind to me and my relationship with books. Hopefully you get out of your slump soon, but either way, putting yourself first is always the priority!
And thank you <3 <3 Hope the start of this month is going well for you too!
I’ve been on an on-again-off-again reading slump as well. But I did manage to finish City of Bones by Cassandra Clare audiobook, which is technically a reread lol. But it’s still progress! Congrats on the double internship! I did an internship with Entangled Publishing last year and it was a lot of fun but I too didn’t have time to read much on my own, outside of working there.
Oh that DEFINITELY counts! Which CC book was it? Audiobooks seem like such a daunting thing to me because I feel like I’ll lose focus about five minutes in. BUT I plan on getting into that soon…it just sounds like I can get a lot more done while at the same time being able to read a book you know?
And that’s amazing! Thank you for your kind words. I’d love to hear more about your internship experience too! I don’t do a lot of reading at mine, but I do get a lot of ~inside look~ which is amazing.
im glad that you found a book to bring you out of theslump, and its one that im very interested in too! 🙂
Good luck with your time in publishing, i hope you continue to enjoy it and you find yourself at home there <3
Thank you so much! I hope all is well with you too <3
I can’t say I’ve ever been in a big slump. But I tend to find I let myself do other things at home (watch TV, play games etc) but coz I don’t really have anything else I can do on the bus to and from work every day that kinda forces me through books until I get to one I enjoy which gets me out of my slump. I guess that comes down to sheer determination and force of will?
OhhhhHH I envy you! I think for myself as my interests continue to diverge from books, I’m finding myself doing more and more things that technically still count as reading….just not like….books. LOL. Like I’m big into BTS right now, but instead of reading books, I’m reading fanfiction. Your strength is amazing though. I WISH THAT WAS ME
Congratulations on your internships. What amazing opportunities! I’m in a reading slump too. I have been for about a year, but my excuse is called “being a first time mom”, heh. I’ve been struggling to find the balance between work/wife/motherhood and just doing something for myself. I’ll get there eventually though!
Thank you! And HAH—that’s definitely a more valid excuse than mine. I can barely read with all my academic stuff going on, I can’t even imagine how I would be if I was a parent! I have heard a lot of people say audiobooks work in this scenario though 😀
Hope all is well!!!! Reading can wait, your new kid for sure can’t! Hahaha!
Congrats on your internships, that sounds really exciting! I can relate to you so hard on the reading slump — I am reading books kind of but just meh about them when I do. It’s frustrating.
I was wondering about this book, and I wasn’t aware it was so tied into the universe so I am glad I read your review. i am trash for villain origin stories and dig Maleficent, but I’ve only see then cartoon version of Sleeping Beauty like 20 years ago, haha.
KAL!?!?!?!!?! THE ONE I MISTAKENLY DMED??!?!!?! I THOUGHT WE HAVE NEVER HAD ANY INTERACTIONS BUT HERE YOU ARE. HELLO!
And thank you!!!!! I wish I could just be meh about the books I read too—but as you can see on Twitter—instead of reading books that could possibly count towards the goodreads challenge I’m horrendously behind on (I think it’s now 85 books behind schedule), I just read fanfiction instead. IT’S SO BAD.
OH MY GOD THAT WAS YOU!?!?!?! I am forever laughing right now, this keeps getting better and better! also, I legit meant what I said about the oops DM being the best intro!