Once Upon a Book Club Box (April YA Box With Spoilers)

I think I've made it more than obvious that I adore the Once Upon a Book Club Boxes.  I can't help but to be amazed at the amount of work they put into the details of their box and the utterly unique experience of opening gifts while you read that make you feel like you are holding a piece of the story.

What is Once Upon A Book Club?
Quick summery: You get a book (You can choose either the women's lit or YA version) and it comes with a handful of wrapped gifts with pages numbers on them.  When you get to that page there is a sticky note in the book telling you when to open your gifts, and that gift is an amazingly well curated item that feels like it was pulled strait from the story.

I also have to say that I'm quite impressed with the ability of Michelle and her team to find not only random items to pull from the book, but items that are surprisingly useful.  (Past boxes have included:  jewelry, purses, umbrellas, gloves, notebooks, scarves, socks, etc.)

I honestly can't recommend this box enough, I feel like the experience of it is so different from anything else and it's really quite magical.  ... but enough about my glowing, onto the actual unboxing of the April YA crate.

Aprils book was "The Hidden Memory of Objects" by Danielle Mages Amato
Published March 21st 2017 by Balzer + Braybr
Hard Cover, 336 pages
Goodreads Rating: 3.9 Stars

I included the Goodreads rating to show you that many people liked the book, though it wasn't really my cup of tea...

The Hidden Memory of Objects opens with high schooler Megan Brown trying to get through her older and beloved brother's funeral.  Megan overhears a detective questioning her father about the unusual circumstances surrounding her brothers passing and what Megan hears prompts her to launch her own investigation.

I thought the story itself was fine, I'd probably give it a three stars myself as I didn't feel like it was particularly life changing though the writing style, characters and plotting were all solid, if not amazing.  What did make it amazing was the Once Upon a Book Club treatment.  Lifting those bits of story from the pages and holding them in my hand made it incredible. Again I was blown away not only by the details of the objects related to the story, but also the usefulness of the pieces that where included.  All I can think is that amazing amounts of work must go into making this box possible and I love it all.

The first gift was a pair of scissors shaped like a bird.  THEY ARE EXACTLY WHAT THE CHARACTER HAD!  I don't know how these were even found but after reading the description of the characters trusty and very odd scissors it was amazing to be holding such a unique piece.

The second gift was a Button Necklace.  In the story the girl begins wearing a button from her brothers coat on a string around her neck, so it makes total sense with the book and it's a quirky but kind of fun piece of jewelry.

The third gift was a backpack, with a wallet inside it and a private investigator card inside the wallet. (Did I mention you often get rewarded for exploring the gifts a bit?  Opening them up and looking through them?)  I thought the card was a fun detail and the bag is really cute.

The fourth and final gift were a pair of fancy black gloves, great for winter, touch screen compatible, warm and soft.  (We had a cold weekend where I was outside a lot and I wore them everywhere. loved how warm and sleek they were)

Finally summary,  I felt a bit luke warm about the book, but the gifts and whole experience of opening them while reading blew me away yet again.  I loved this box, and I'm so happy they've added a YA version to their line up.

May's YA theme is Hurrican's & Heartache
May's Women's lit theme is Time Travel Romance

Each box is $34.99 + Shipping

Though you can use my code "NOVELPAIRING" for the next month for 10% off

And if you want to give me a highfive for sharing this you can use my referral code (no extra charge to you, just lets them know where you came from): onceuponabookclub.cratejoy.com/refer/Britt-GGFOYDZG