Category: Book Reviews

Recent Reads | Love and Other Conspiracies and Hemlock House

Posted November 8, 2024 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments

I saw this book getting some love on Goodreads and decided to request it on a whim from the library. I really haven’t read a lot of romance this year and was hoping to find a win… and boy did this deliver! I absolutely loved this romance – A+, no notes. Hallie is in need of a breakthrough show for her job at Skroll (basically like Buzzfeed I guess but heavy on video content) when she finds a random conspiracy show on TV and falls for the guest of the episode, Hayden. She learns of his successful podcast and immediately thinks he has something special. The two of them begin a show where he discusses conspiracy theories and hunts cryptids. She’s the skeptic and he’s the believer, and their banter on the show quickly turns into something more. I absolutely loved the tension and chemistry in this book. Hayden honestly set the bar high for other romance heroes. He was thoughtful, caring, and sweet at every single turn. Hallie had a horrible previous relationship with her ex that still works at Skroll, so there was a lot of heaviness and gaslighting in this book. It was hard to read and I prefer my romances super fluffy, but the swooniess of everything else overpowered it. I was rooting for Hallie so hard. I knew pretty early on that this was going to be a five-star read and it maintained that level of excellence throughout the entire story. It will certainly go […]

Recent Reads | Worst Case Scenario and The God of the Woods

Posted October 14, 2024 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments

I’ve been absolutely loving TJ Newman’s books lately – I know I haven’t looked that hard, but I don’t think a lot of authors are writing thrillers like these! (If you have recs, let me know!) They’re basically disaster thrillers where an airplane causes some kind of havoc – her first book was about a hijacked plane crashing, the second book had a plane sinking underwater and needing rescue, and this one is about a plane crashing into a freakin nuclear power plant. The setup, as a result, was a bit different – the plane has already crashed and the team at the power plant / in the small town have to rally together to figure out how to save everyone. There were definitely similar elements to her first two books, like going back and forth between different people involved, but not really a past/present situation. Everything is happening real time in this one. I didn’t expect to finish this book as quickly as I did and ended up kind of sobbing at the end of it! I think each of Newman’s books have gotten stronger (especially with characters and emotional punch) as they’ve come out. I feel like the ending was a little abrupt but otherwise this was super addicting. I cannot fathom the amount of research that must go in to all of her books… She has all of this stuff about nuclear power plants and underwater welding and crazy things that go beyond her normal flight attendant […]

Recent Reads | The Examiner and The Unwedding

Posted October 3, 2024 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments

Janice Hallett has very quickly become an auto-buy author for me. I’m now officially caught up on all her books (sad!) because I completed her backlist before diving into her new release, THE EXAMINER. Hallett always writes in mixed media or epistolary format so you spend a lot of the initial pages wondering where all of these emails or texts or audio notes will take you. THE EXAMINER is much of the same, except for a little bit longer… It takes a while to figure out what the mystery actually is. The premise is a bunch of students are taking a Masters course in art at a college and something goes haywire, or someone goes missing, or someone dies. You don’t really know right away as the messages are just the students getting to know each other and eventually having disagreements. The story evolves into a lot of wild revelations. I’ve always thought some of Hallett’s premises are a bit far-fetched (primarily the TWYFORD CODE in some ways as well as ALPERTON ANGELS). That hasn’t affected my enjoyment of these books though, as one of them was five stars. I will admit that the EXAMINER was a bit too wild for me. It didn’t feel realistic that all of this would actually happen. I’m not saying all of my books need to be super realistic (ex: I read cozy mysteries or books like FINLAY DONOVAN where the amateur sleuth figures complex mysteries out) but with each reveal and twist, I […]

Recent Reads | I Need You to Read This and Such Charming Liars

Posted September 13, 2024 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments

I was one of the people who loved THE GOLDEN SPOON but I totally understand why people didn’t. That book was exactly what I wanted and expected it to be – basically a cozy mystery taking place at GBBO. I wasn’t expecting high-stakes thrills. Because of that, I went into I NEED YOU TO READ THIS with the same expectation. I think, for that reason, I enjoyed this more than others (though not as much as her adult debut). Her mysteries are not fully cozy but they’re not fast-paced thrillers either. I think this one took a while to get grooving – the main character was going through a lot but it wasn’t necessarily a thriller. Yes, she wanted to figure out what happened to the previous Dear Constance but there weren’t scary moments necessarily. I got halfway through the book and didn’t feel like anything happened. I thought some of the “twists” were incredibly obvious while others would have been, in my opinion, impossible to figure out (and not in a good way). I always hear people talk about “fair play mysteries” where you as the reader have all the information you need to solve the crime or mystery within the pages. No random boogeyman can come out and be the culprit. While I *do* think this technically counts as a fair play mystery, one of the elements came out of nowhere and it didn’t feel fair in a way. I won’t spoil it. The ending or whodunnit wasn’t […]

Recent Reads | Death at Morning House and Just Playing House

Posted August 28, 2024 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments

Much like the INHERITANCE GAMES series by Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Maureen Johnson’s TRULY DEVIOUS books are some of my favorite ones to read – I can’t explain why or how these series are so cozy to me but the writing style, unique character voices, and fun mysteries have a lot to do with it. I’ve said over and over again that Johnson could write a hundred TRULY DEVIOUS books starring Stevie Bell and I would read them like they’re Nancy Drew mysteries. There’s something indescribable about her writing style that will keep me coming back over and over again, even as I stray away from young adult fiction. When I heard (during her last book’s tour stop at RJ Julia) that she was pausing the TD series to bring a new standalone mystery set on a creepy island, I was still pretty excited. This book ended up having very similar vibes to TD but with juuuust a bit less magic for me. I think the story could have honestly fit into the series and starred Stevie – that’s how similar it felt at times. Truthfully, I think that I missed Stevie and that’s the main reason I wish it was a TD book; this main character was kind of annoying. Marlowe is very stuck on the girl she left behind in her hometown when she leaves for the summer so it’s hard to get invested in any other romance potentials on the island or even if we SHOULD ship her with […]

Recent Reads | The Grandest Game and A Novel Love Story

Posted August 19, 2024 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 2 Comments

Jennifer Lynn Barnes is one of my auto-buy authors and really has been since 2015 with her criminally underrated THE FIXER series. It’s been banger after banger. This book was pretty much no exception to that! THE INHERITANCE GAMES series is the one that has stuck with me the most out of all of her books and series, I’d say… I love that she keeps adding to the world! The previous installment was a bit of a bridge book between the original series (with Avery as the main character), featuring some of the Hawthorne brothers. It definitely felt like a bridge and was a little hard to get into, so I was hopeful this “fresh start” series would be better. It certainly was! Avery, with her billions of dollars, developed an annual game to give away her money in the spirit of the way SHE got it… games and tricks and riddles and puzzles. This story is the second annual game and brings the POVs of characters like Rohan, Lyla, and Gigi to the table (along with other players in the game like Knox, Brady, and Odette). I’ll admit this did take me a while to get into, much like the previous book, but I think it’s because it’s a new story and I was on the fence about the characters. Once I got into it though… it was hard to put down! That’s what I count on JLA for. The story itself was fun and chockfull of different puzzles […]

Recent Reads | The Chamber and The Love of My Afterlife

Posted August 8, 2024 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments

Omg lol. I was hoping to finish this in July since apparently it was my worst reading month (ratings-wise) and it would have been nice to keep the bad vibes out of August… but I kept falling asleep on the last day of July when trying to finish this book! THE LAST ONE was one of my favorite thrillers last year. I know a ton of people had mixed ratings based on the infuriating ending but I kinda loved it. The book was so addicting; nothing could stop me from turning pages. I was so excited to see how his style would translate to this book and I have very few words to describe how disappointed I was. This book was as boring as his previous book was enthralling/addicting. I could literally sum up this entire plot in three sentences (which I immediately did for my husband). The same thing happens over and over for 80% of the book, no exaggeration. The divers tell stories from their time in the military or about their diving careers for more than 3/4 of the book while people die off. There is no suspense or intrigue, just repetitive events and conversations I did not care about. It was not claustrophobic or creepy like I was promised; I could barely picture what it looked like despite diagrams and a glossary! I don’t know what didn’t click for me but I basically pictured a small bunk area with a table. I know it was small […]

Recent Reads | Fangirl Down and The Lost Story

Posted August 2, 2024 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments

I wanted to conduct an experiment to see if Tessa Bailey could be ~for me~ although I’ve always suspected she wouldn’t be. I read a holiday novella by her and thought it was okay but when this golf-based romance was released, I thought this would be the perfect test for me. I love watching the sport and maybe it would resonate. This was tough to get into from the beginning if I’m being honest. I thought her writing style in general was pretty good and easy to read, but the dialogue and setup had too much cringe for me to overcome. I’d like to start by saying this guy was definitely a jackass the FMC was perfectly fine. I do not like possessive and jealous men; it just comes across as not trusting and I do not enjoy it. I want my husband or boyfriend to treat me like an equal, capable of making my own decisions, and not assuming any guy giving me attention would be able to steal me away. I fully know there are more alpha male type MMCs out there and this just goes to show I would hate to read those books if this bland ass dude bothered me. He said “champagne is for women” and I’d like to kill him, thanks. Their dialogue was super cringe-worthy and he was obsessed with her waaaay too early to be cute or reasonable. He even says in the final few chapters that they barely know each other […]

Recent Reads | The Unmaking of June Farrow and The Finder’s Keepers Library

Posted July 22, 2024 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments

This book intrigued me from the start but I honestly wasn’t sure what to expect. It doesn’t help that almost everyone gave it five-stars! I was truly expecting to be blown away lol. I think my expectations got the best of me and I really expected MORE from the elements that I knew the book contained: time travel, mystery spanning generations, romance, and general magical realism. I don’t know how to even review this, especially after sitting with it for a few days. The story follows June Farrow, the last in line of the Farrow women, after her grandmother passes away. They all have some kind of “illness” that makes them hallucinate doors and other things. June begins to investigate what’s happening to hear and steps through a door that appears. Cue the time travel science that was hard to follow but I just ignored it while pretending I understood. I realized that there’s a good chance literary mysteries are not for me – it made the book only somewhat intriguing and also quite boring, pulling the weaker elements from both genres together. I wanted more twists and intensity like I’d get in a mystery while also seeing some strong character development and romance. All of the elements of this story felt surface-level. I heard people describe this as a fever dream and discuss how much they loved the characters and didn’t want to leave them behind, which totally baffled me. I felt zero connection to any of the characters […]

Summerween Reviews | Every Time I Go On Vacation, Someone Dies and Summers End

Posted July 18, 2024 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

Summerween is a readathon hosted by GabbyReads that runs in early July each year. This year’s readathon was hosted July 5th through 11th with the following prompts: read a book in the dark, read a thriller or horror book, read a book with a night sky on the cover, read a book with 5 words in the title, and read a book set during the summer. For more information click HERE. Okay, this was really fun for me! I can absolutely see this as a polarizing book and the low-ish rating doesn’t surprise me. I think you have to be in the mood for something a little different, where the narrator breaks the third wall and involves the reader in the story. There are a couple of other reasons people don’t love this one but I’ll get into that shortly. This book follows Eleanor, bestselling author of the Vacation Mysteries series, as she travels on a “book tour” kind of giveaway event in Italy. Along for the ride are a few other authors (including her ex), the man who inspired her first book, her sister (slash person who manages her entire life), and some fans who won a giveaway to join them. Connor, the hero-turned-nemesis, thinks someone is trying to kill him and the group spends the book trying to figure out who’s doing it, if he’s the real target, and more. I haven’t yet read EVERYONE IN MY FAMILY HAS KILLED SOMEONE but from what I understand about the narrative style, […]