Hey lovelies!

If you had seen my post last month about the diversityDecember bingo or been following me on my Twitter or Instagram, you would have known I was participating in this readathon aimed to promote diversity and encourage people reading and sharing diverse books!

For the rules and other information, read my previous post because this post is already going to be super long without going into all of that!

I decided to go with the vertical line down the middle as part of challenge however, I made sure to fill up the rest of the squares as well with other diverse reads that I wanted to try and complete within December and if not, January.

During this month, I discovered some absolutely fabulous books that have enriched my life so much and I am so grateful to have read these gems! My reviews for them are short, however, if there is a specific book you might want me to do an in-depth review on, let me know in the comments!

To stay up to date with the books I am reading and to get my thoughts and ratings on them first, follow me on goodreads because I always keep that updated!

Let’s get started!

If I Was Your Girl by Meredith Russo

I had read this book for the transgender main character prompt and I really enjoyed it! Before having read this, I had heard about it often from friends and it had been included as part of Zoella’s book club picks!

I thought this had such an important, powerful message and it explored the difficulties with being transgender – the social and personal aspects associated – in a really beautiful and realistic way! The plot was quite interesting, which is rare in a contemporary and the characters were loveable! It had a cute romance too!

I learnt a lot from this book and I highly encourage you to also read this!

««««

The Sun Is Also A Star by Nicola Yoon

I love Nicola Yoon in case you didn’t know, after her first book, Everything Everything which is also diverse because it has a biracial main character! I read TSIAAS for the PoC with natural hair prompt!

I really loved this book because it had such an important message! The plot was intriguing and the characters were so real and loveable!

I have a full no spoiler book review on it on my blog which you can read for more details!

««««½

Tiny Pretty Things by Dhonielle Clayton and Sona Charaipotra

I read this book for the biracial main character prompt as one of the three main characters is biracial. Another one of the main characters is black, so it is quite diverse! Going into this book, I didn’t know very much about the story cause the description on Goodreads is quite vague. However I did quite enjoy this book! You could feel yourself getting sucked into the world of these ballerinas. There was mystery, suspense, romance and it was quite gripping till the end!

««««

  

The Song Of Achilles by Madeline Miller

I read this book for the science fiction/fantasy with a LGBTQI+ character prompt. I had heard such amazing things about this book and I was so happy to find I wasn’t let down! It was beautifully done and so accurate to the Illiad, which is what Miller got her inspiration from. The writing and romance was beautiful and I learnt so much about Greek mythology from this book! I didn’t know anything going into this so I was pleased to find I did enjoy.

There were some dull moments in the middle and I didn’t love the characters as much as I thought I would but I can see why they couldn’t be altered – because they weren’t really Miller’s, as she had borrowed them and wanted to stay as true to the mythological events as possible!

««««½

Of Fire And Stars by Audrey Colhurst

I read this book for the female/female prompt. Okay so let me just begin by saying…this was a DNF for me. I was a 100 pages in and dragging through it. It wasn’t exciting at all and everything just seemed so forced and awkward and clunky and I was doing my best to not cringe at times. I was really looking forward to this because it sounded amazing but I just couldn’t pull through.

««

The Forbidden Wish by Jessica Khoury

I read this book for the free space prompt! Can I just say how glorious this book was? It was everything I wanted and more. The romance was fantastic, the plot was fast paced, the world building was beautiful and the idea was unique! It is such a fantastic read and I cannot even tell you how much I enjoyed it!

««««½

Not If I See You First by Eric Lindstrom

I read this book for the disabled character prompt. I wasn’t expecting to enjoy this book because I had previously tried to read it before DNFing it but I gave it another try and it was so wonderful and perfect! The characters were so powerful and I learnt so much from the book! It was also so witty and light at times, having a bit of everything!

««««½

Salt To The Sea by Ruta Sepetys

This was my very last book for diversity December bingo and I read it for the prompt refugee main character. I had heard very positive things about this book before so I was very excited to get into it! While the first half could be a lot more interesting, the second half did not disappoint. I loved everything – the characters, the writing the plot. It was so heartbreaking and unflinching and it had me tearing up at the end. This is such a must read book!

So that is the end of my diversity December bingo wrap up! This was such an amazing month for me because I discovered such fantastic books, by such fantastic authors. This challenge really helped me discover other books and got me reading more diversely and thereby supporting diverse and own voices books!

I am going to be participating in the #diversitybingo2017 which is the same as the December challenge, only year long and with 36 squares, which you have to complete all of! The challenges are harder but I think it’ll be good to push myself out of my comfort zone and try books that I might not have gone for in the past!

Look forward to my holiday reading wrap up coming in the next few days that have the other books I read in December that were not part of this challenge!

Are you participating in any reading challenges this year? If so, please tell me which ones because I’m always looking to join these sorts of events!