Icon Tag: ARC Review

ARC Review: History Is All You Left Me

Posted January 9, 2017 / Book Reviews / 8 Comments
ARC Review: History Is All You Left Me

I’m not totally sure where to begin with this review, but let me just say – Adam Silvera is now on my list. (That sounds bad, but I obviously mean must-read-all-this-author’s-books list.) HISTORY IS ALL YOU LEFT ME is the first book I’ve read by him, but I’ll definitely be going back and reading his debut sometime soon. Do yourself a favor and do the same, if you haven’t read him yet. I’m already predicting I’m going to love that one too. The synopsis honestly wasn’t super appealing to me, compared to the books I usually read, but I decided to try it out for some reason. I’m obviously glad I did. Griffin has OCD (something I was kind of nervous to read about) and recovering from the sudden death of his ex-boyfriend/best friend (something I also don’t do as well with). I like reading books where characters are moving on from grief, but those books generally take place months later when the person has had to some time to cope. This book completely exceeded my expectations. Literally within the first paragraph, I loved his writing style. I don’t know why but there’s just something about it that clicked with me instantly. The rest of the book was very much the same – such an engaging style that’s easy and enjoyable to read. Griffin was an interesting character. His OCD was actually quite interesting to read about and wasn’t overwhelming *there* to make it feel like a book exclusively about […]

ARC Review: This Adventure Ends

Posted September 26, 2016 / Book Reviews / 11 Comments
ARC Review: This Adventure Ends

Initial Excitement After loving FIRST & THEN to absolute pieces back when I read it, I was so eager to read THIS ADVENTURE ENDS. I loved Emma Mills’ style of storytelling and super charming, yet flawed, main character(s). I was so excited to end up with an advanced copy of this one and I’m surprised I waited until the end of August to finally read it. Summary in a Second Sloane and her family move to her childhood vacation town in Florida after living in NY. Her father is a famous author and he needs to get his writing mojo back, so the family opts for a change of scenery. Sloane quickly falls in with a pair of twins, Vera and Gabe, and their friends Aubrey, Remy, and Frank. When Vera/Gabe lose sight of a painting their deceased mother left them, Remy and Sloane make it their goal to track it down. This is a story about friendship, love, family, and fandom! Storytelling & Setting The whole premise behind this story was so intriguing. It had elements of my favorite tropes, like road trips, slow burn romance, friends-to-more romance, fandom/writing/reading, and strong, sassy main characters. I loved following Sloane on her journey with Remy to track down the painting while watching her friendships strengthen with the various people in the group. She was also a fantastic singer, so there were some elements of “will I be singing for the rest of my life and/or college career?” that were fun to […]

ARC Review: The Long Game

Posted July 13, 2016 / Book Reviews / 5 Comments
ARC Review: The Long Game

You guys. I just can’t with this book. I was completely smitten with the first one and was SO EAGER to get my hands on the next. I was counting my lucky stars when I ended up with a copy from ALA Midwinter because I planned to read it ASAP after finishing the first one. However, in typical Lauren fashion, I ended up waiting until a few days before its release. I totally shouldn’t have waited because some of the previous book’s plot was a bit muddy in my head. Either way, it didn’t take long for me to settle back into this world. I absolutely loved Tess in this book. I didn’t think it would be possible, but the stakes were even higher. The twists were even twistier. The characters were even asdfghjkl-ier. Sorry, no words there. Just feels. So fucking many feelings about everyone and everything. In the first book, there was literally zero romance. The author hinted at two romantic prospects in general but there really wasn’t even any tension to suggest that necessarily. I won’t spoil anything for this one. Just keep in mind what I said. I love books where you think everything has settled after the main climax, and then the author manages to toss in a few more curveballs. Totally happened here. I read very few mystery/thrillers because not many work for me. Add in politics and I’m even less sure I’ll like it. This duo seriously has me adding political dramas to my […]

Blog Tour | Review: Mystic Summer

Posted June 15, 2016 / Book Reviews / 11 Comments
Blog Tour | Review: Mystic Summer

It is my absolute favorite thing to read books that take place in towns or cities I’ve been to before. What’s even better? When it’s a location I know very well and is in my home state! I adore Mystic and haven’t been there in way too long. This book absolutely inspired me to get in the car some weekend soon and take a trip down there. It’s only an hour-ish from where I live and is full of fun things to do. So, needless to say, the setting for this book was pretty wonderful. The author did a fantastic job of setting the scene for people who may have never been there. I’m positive that all readers want to visit Mystic after reading this. Aside from the setting, this book was incredibly enjoyable. Maggie, the main character, starts spending time in her hometown of Mystic when her summer vacation starts. She was a teacher in a Boston prep school but finds out that she may lose her job due to budget cuts. She’s in the midst of helping her best friend plan a wedding, figuring out where she’ll live when her friend moves out, and determining some next steps with her actor boyfriend. When she comes home, she discovers her ex-boyfriend from high school has also returned to Mystic…with a lot going on that she didn’t expect. The two spend time together and you can imagine the rest! I enjoyed Maggie’s personality a lot and loved being inside her head. […]

Blog Tour | Review: Run

Posted June 14, 2016 / Book Reviews / 10 Comments
Blog Tour | Review: Run

MORE LINKS: Indiebound | iBooks | The Book Depository I am super impressed by this book, friends! I have been known to be a bigggg Kody Keplinger fangirl so I was absolutely excited to be a part of this blog tour. She just writes the best stories: usually a nice mix of fluffy and serious, with great strong leads and friendships. This book definitely had all of those things, but it struck me as very different from her other books right off the bat. I wasn’t sure at first, honestly, if that was a good thing or a bad thing. I love her backlist titles so much – would a “different” book by her work for me? The answer is definitely. Let’s chat about how great this book is. Her other books may have slightly higher ratings than this one but that’s completely my personal preference. This book is probably her best book – the most well-written, at the very least. She’s grown quite a bit as a writer and I love that she told this story. It’s about two friends, Agnes and Bo, who essentially run away from home. Bo has a messed up family life and Agnes is blind; the two make an unlikely pair but their friendship has grown to be something strong. Bo doesn’t treat Agnes like she’s fragile because she’s blind, but still helps her when she needs it. They just had such a sweet, caring friendship! There wasn’t much romance at all and I generally […]

ARC Review: Out on Good Behavior

Posted June 10, 2016 / Book Reviews / 2 Comments
ARC Review: Out on Good Behavior

I am too sad that this series is over. New Adult can be truly hit or miss for me. I find that I’m not a fan of a lot of drama and angst between the couples. I’m prettttty much here for the college-aged-setting and sexytimes. I really love Dahlia’s books in general, but she pretty much slays at NA. She has a great mix of the hot stuff, the relationship development, and most importantly – FRIENDSHIP. The saddest thing about this series is that I don’t have the ability to hang out with Lizzie, Cait, and Frankie anymore. I love them so much. Between the dirty jokes and the fact that they’re always there for each other, they are legit #squadgoals. I’m going to miss them. The previous two books had a lot of family feels and issues brought in, but this one had almost zero. It’s really not a big deal and I didn’t notice that much when I was reading… but it’s odd in hindsight. Samara had the issue of her parents and telling them she’s gay but that wasn’t at the forefront. We heard a little about Frankie’s parents but no interaction with them at all. The relationship between Sam and Frankie was really sweet. Frankie is known in the previous two books for doing whatever she wants with whoever she wants, so it was clear she’d need some character development for her to be monogamous. She didn’t change herself for a girl though – she made […]

ARC Review: Queen of Hearts

Posted April 21, 2016 / Book Reviews / 7 Comments
ARC Review: Queen of Hearts

This was overall an interesting retelling set in Wonderland, from the perspective of the soon-to-be Queen of Hearts, Dinah. Something happens very early in the book that still feels like a spoiler (it’s not said in the synopsis), so I won’t mention it… although it’s central to the rest of the plot. Anyways, I have mostly mixed feelings about this one? It’s kind of hard to explain this story… mostly because not much happens. I was about 60% of the way through and was able to explain the entire plot to my boyfriend within three sentences. Part of this is because it’s very info-dump-y in the beginning. There were little conversations where side characters would be explaining something to Dinah even though she already knew these random facts about Wonderland. I know these existed to cleverly explain things to the reader, but it felt SO forced. It really just read like an info-dump about the world. A lot of the early chapters involved this so the book had not a lot of action for a loooong time. Along those same lines, the pacing felt weird. The story seems to happen over the course of a year. The first scene happens, then the next chapter is six months later. Then another scene happens, and it jumps ahead a month or two. I don’t know why this was necessary because I feel like everything could have just happened in a more natural timeline? I saw Khanh’s review where she says the book feels like […]

ARC Review: Two Summers

Posted April 15, 2016 / Book Reviews / 7 Comments
ARC Review: Two Summers

I really enjoyed this one. It wasn’t exactly what I was expecting in a lot of ways, but it was a super fun and summery read. I love parallel life books SO much. Just waiting to see what happens at the end is my favorite part. You always wonder – will the two lives/paths/choices leave them to a different result? Will their life end up the same in the end? Every book has this question and I’ll admit, I haven’t read many that led to two very different outcomes. No spoilers here though. I definitely didn’t LOVE this as much as I hoped. It sounded right up my alley and I’ve enjoyed Aimee Friedman’s books in the past, so it was nice to be with her writing again. The premise is that Summer is planning to go to Paris to see her dad for the summer. She’s having second thoughts and then her phone rings with an unknown number the moment before she steps on the plane. Her life splits into two different directions – what happens when she answers, and what happens when she doesn’t. Like most parallel life books, the story alternates between the two choices and how her summer turns out. Summer in Paris vs. Summer in New York Instead of switching between the two parallel storylines every other chapter – like most books do – this one has longer “parts” so you only switch between the two a handful of times. In some ways, I liked […]