Publisher: Bloomsbury

Review Round Up | The Goose Girl, The Cottingley Secret, and Everything Must Go

Posted April 12, 2019 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments
Review Round Up | The Goose Girl, The Cottingley Secret, and Everything Must Go

In an effort to cut down on posts and burnout, my Review Roundups will feature 2-4 books I’ve read or listened to recently. Sometimes they’re newer releases and sometimes they’re all backlist titles. My ARC reviews usually get the solo treatment. Enjoy the mini reviews! When planning out my books for the retellings challenge this year, I knew I needed to attempt THE GOOSE GIRL. This is a classic fantasy novel that everyone seems to love. It reminded me a bit of ELLA ENCHANTED or STARDUST when it got started, with the princess/girl heading out on some kind of adventure/quest/etc. It honestly took me a little while to get into this and see what all the fuss was about, but it was worth it. I should also mention that I started with the audiobook, which has a full cast (!!) and was pretty adorable as a result. The latter half of the book was pretty fantastic, honestly. I’m glad I wasn’t fully aware of the original Brothers Grimm story, or else I wouldn’t have gasped as much as I did LOL. I didn’t see certain things coming and was honestly on the edge of my seat, deciding to finish the book off as an ebook instead of an audiobook. Ani was a great character to watch grow up and learn about life outside of being a princess. Her experience as a goose girl definitely shaped her into a more well-rounded person. I loved the bit of romance, even though it definitely wasn’t […]

Virginia Shreves: Now and Then

Posted September 12, 2018 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments
Virginia Shreves: Now and Then

I always wanted to read THE EARTH, MY BUTT, AND OTHER ROUND THINGS when I was younger, but was never sure what my mom would think if I tried to pick it out at the bookstore. I decided to give this “classic” a go when I saw the audiobook on Scribd. I later received the sequel, THE UNIVERSE IS EXPANDING (AND SO AM I) in the mail for review, so I decided to combine them here! I have a lot of feelings about this book. The first thing I feel like I need to mention is that obviously it was written in the early 2000s, so a lot of the words and references are outdated. I knew that going into it. The weird thing is that the sequel coming out isn’t like a “fifteen years later” kind of book. It takes place right after this ends. (More on that later.) Virginia was an extremely difficult narrator for me. She spent the vast majority of the book — I mean every single page — talking about her fatness and her (horrible) family reacting to her (horribly). I can feel for her on a lot of things, because I personally get it, but oh my god. It’s a very unhealthy and outdated (IMO) view of being a fat teen. She HAS to be sad and pathetic and unhappy with herself until she “gets healthier” in a very cliche way. I just don’t feel like there’s room for this portrayal of fat girls […]

Review Round Up | Not If I Save You First and A Court of Frost and Starlight

Posted May 18, 2018 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 4 Comments
Review Round Up | Not If I Save You First and A Court of Frost and Starlight

In an effort to cut down on posts and burnout, my Review Roundups will feature 2-4 books I’ve read or listened to recently. Sometimes they’re newer releases and sometimes they’re all backlist titles. My ARC reviews usually get the solo treatment. Enjoy the mini reviews! I’m a big fan of Ally Carter… clearly, if you look at all the reviews up at the top there. She writes some of the most fun and engaging “light mystery” kinds of books. I love all of them for different reasons. I was pretty excited to explore a standalone too! This was a first for her. The whole Alaskan survival thing didn’t exactly appeal to me but I can’t resist her stories, so I dove in soonafter it came out. I enjoyed Maddie and Logan, and the complexities of their relationship. I’m a huge fan of childhood-friends-to-more, especially if there’s hate-to-love involved. This checked off a lot of boxes for me in terms of tropes I love! There was a decent amount of build for their relationship and understanding where they both were coming from. I shipped them but not to OTP levels. The survival aspects were nicely done and not overkill, considering that I don’t love that genre/topic in general. The journey was really quick (the book itself is quite short and I listened to the audiobook, which was only around 6 hours). I think I would have liked a little more to the story? It was kind of simple, if that makes sense. I […]

Review Round Up | My Not So Perfect Life, Literally, ACOWAR, and Always & Forever, Lara Jean

Posted June 8, 2017 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 4 Comments
Review Round Up | My Not So Perfect Life, Literally, ACOWAR, and Always & Forever, Lara Jean

In an effort to cut down on posts and burnout, my Review Roundups will feature 2-4 reviews of already published books (either older/backlist or newer releases) that I’ve read or listened to recently. My ARC reviews usually get the solo treatment. Enjoy the mini reviews! Man, this was cute. Seriously… so good, guys. If you like early Kinsella like Can You Keep A Secret, Remember Me, and I’ve Got Your Number, give this one a shot. I read all of those – plus a few more – back in the day and had been craving her style again. This book did not disappoint. The story starts in London, where Katie/Cat is struggling to achieve the city life of her dreams. She’s soon let go from her job and returns home to her dad’s house in the country, where her stepmom and father have started a glamping business on their farm. She quickly settles back into life there and her scatter-brained ex-boss suddenly appears with her family on vacation. The book was pretty long and covered a lot more time than I expected, but it was nice to see all the different “phases” of her life to see how things progressed. I loved learning more about her boss, Demeter, who was not who she seemed. I loved Katie trying to find herself, fit in, and/or put her talents to good use on the farm’s business. I loved Alex. I loved her parents. I loved Steve. Seriously, everyone was fantastic. I really liked seeing secrets get […]

ARC Review: The Names They Gave Us

Posted May 3, 2017 / Book Reviews / 5 Comments
ARC Review: The Names They Gave Us

NOTE: This is one of my favorite reviews I’ve ever written. It’s very long and discusses so many things, like the book does, so TL;DR… I highly encourage you to read this story. Even if religious books or “cancer books” aren’t your thing, I would be shocked to hear you didn’t enjoy it. Initial Excitement Full disclosure: I don’t do well with books involving religion. I like reading books about various topics – especially about people who are not like me – but religious main characters are some I never click with. I’ve only read a few books involving main characters who are openly very religious and reference it, but they didn’t work. I knew I was going to read this book even though any summary involving the world “faith” (unless it’s about cults…) doesn’t make it on my TBR. I just can’t do them, but Emery Lord made me change my mind. I couldn’t not read a book by her. I was cautiously optimistic that she’d use her superb writing style to make me love a book about faith. Quick Summary … and, spoiler alert: she totally did. Lucy and her parents (her dad is a pastor and her mom has cancer) head to their church camp over each summer vacation. Because her mom’s cancer is back, she pushes Lucy out of her comfort zone and into a different camp on the other side of the lake. Its meant for healing and has kids dealing with various home or personal […]

Mini ARC Reviews: The Adjustment, Secrets of a Reluctant Princess, and At First Blush

Posted April 10, 2017 / Book Reviews / 2 Comments
Mini ARC Reviews: The Adjustment, Secrets of a Reluctant Princess, and At First Blush

Like I did last week, I’m rounding up three ARC reviews for today! Sooo many March and April titles to catch up on… good lord! There’s a bit of a mixed bag, enjoyment-wise. Some of them were really great while others were… not so great. I hope you enjoy these slightly smaller reviews 😉 S H O R T  &  S W E E T   A R C   R E V I E W S Honestly guys, I have no idea how Suzanne Young does it. She is totally the master for crafting an incredibly interesting series, where each book is just as good (sometimes better) than the last. I really can’t fathom it. I’m not ready to leave the world of THE PROGRAM yet and thank god there’s one more book! This story happens after the Program has come and “gone” from the world. (I recommend reading these in published order instead of chronological order because it keeps the suspense going!) There’s a new thing called the Adjustment, which allows for someone’s memories to be essentially implanted in another person. Tatum and her boyfriend Wes end up giving it a try. He comes back from the Program and doesn’t remember how much they loved each other before, so they start working with the Adjustment because he starts to get feelings for her again. Of course, there are plenty of problems and mysteries to work through. These books are a wild ride. I have to say that I did […]

Mini ARC Reviews: Letters to the Lost, Pretty Fierce, Zenn Diagram, and Done Dirt Cheap

Posted April 3, 2017 / Book Reviews / 9 Comments
Mini ARC Reviews: Letters to the Lost, Pretty Fierce, Zenn Diagram, and Done Dirt Cheap

Am I the only one with a million ARCs of books releasing this month?! (Even this week in particular!) I wanted to bring together a few reviews here because there are just too many to include. I read some of these a long time ago and a couple of them more recently, but I’m going to pat myself on the back for getting a good portion of them done before their release date. All of these ones were mostly enjoyable – a few more than others – so be sure to read on! 😉 S H O R T  &  S W E E T   A R C   R E V I E W S I enjoyed this one quite a bit. Declan and Juliet were definitely interesting characters who were going through a LOT of shit. The premise of writing letters to each other was really sweet; I love the whole “hidden identity” letter-writing/online-chatting trope. There’s always the torturous waiting game to see when one or both of them realize who the other person is. In this case, it was fairly complicated as they grew to know each other IRL too. Like I said, both had a lot going on. Juliet was dealing with the unexpected death of her mother from earlier that year. Declan was dealing with community service requirements and big family-related issues. He was always angry and closed off from literally everyone, and Juliet was fairly similar except she was sad instead of mad. It […]

Reviews: This Is Your Afterlife and The Burning Sky

Posted December 28, 2016 / Book Reviews / 2 Comments
Reviews: This Is Your Afterlife and The Burning Sky

I had no idea this book was less than 200 pages when I started reading, so that was actually a pleasant surprise! I was on a roll reading at the time and was damn happy to keep the reading going. I ended up finishing it up within two sittings on the same day. It was really fun and easy to read! When I added it to my Must Read in 2016 Challenge TBR, I think I completely forgot what the premise was and mixed it up with The Catastrophic History of You and Me (seriously look at the covers and you can see why I made this mistake!). So, needless to say, the book wasn’t what I expected when I started reading. This wasn’t a bad thing! I really enjoyed the premise. Reading about spirits, communicating with the dead, tarot cards, and seances was REALLY interesting. I don’t have a lot of experience with this outside of witch-related books. The characters were pretty fantastic in my opinion. I liked Keira a lot and Jimmy was excellent too. Dan was okay and the romance aspect was fine. I always root for best-friends-to-more and in this case it was ex-best-friends-to-more… so that’s fun! I could have totally read about them in a longer story and/or sequel. I am apparently getting much better at predicting whodunnit in YA mysteries. I knew who the killer was within the first half of the book. I did dampen my enjoyment a little bit because I was hoping […]

Throne of Glass Series – Part One

Posted September 5, 2016 / Book Reviews / 7 Comments
Throne of Glass Series – Part One

I’ve been saying for literal years that I needed to get going on this series. I kept promising everyone “by the end of the year!!” and it never happened. Something just clicked the other day when I needed a new audiobook, and I just pressed play on the first book without thinking. I had actually planned to read the novella bind-up first because people are very passionate about doing that, but I completely didn’t think of it at the time. In any case, I hopped into it right after finishing book one and before heading to book two. SO, here you’ll find my reviews for the first book, the novella bind-up, and the second book. (The order below is in the order I read them, but technically you could definitely read the novellas first!) I finally did it, guys! I can’t believe it. After reading and loving both ACOTAR and ACOMAF, I thought it really was time to get to Sarah J. Maas’s first series. I obviously had built it up a little in my head because it’s so many people’s favorite series ever. Luckily, I also knew that this is a series that gets better with each book (supposedly). My expectations were held in check a little because of that; I knew if I didn’t LOVE the first book I could still likely love later books. That’s kind of what happened here! I was a little bit underwhelmed at times because it felt like not much was happening. I know […]

ARC Reviews: Game On and Sweet Carolina Morning

Posted August 29, 2016 / Book Reviews / 3 Comments
ARC Reviews: Game On and Sweet Carolina Morning

Southern Summer(ish)time Series ARC August was perfect for catching up on some books I’d been putting off for basically no reason. I recently was approved for both of these on Netgalley. While they’re for different target audiences – one is YA and one is Adult – they’re both set in the south and bring some major warm weather vibes. They’re also both second in their each of their series, respectively, and I generally enjoyed their predecessors (although not 100% loved).I hate to say it, but I have mixed feelings on this one as well. I found my attention wavering a lot in the beginning of the book and I don’t think I paid enough attention to what was going on for some reason. I liked Bri and Eric well enough, but don’t feel like I really got to KNOW Bri as much as Eric. I feel like there were significantly more chapters from his point of view and I missed out on Bri’s perspective at times. I was missing some friendship feels I would have liked, but the family parts were fleshed out pretty nicely on both sides. My favorite trope involves childhood-best-friends-getting-together, PLUS there was a slow-burn romance involved here. It sounded like such a win-win on the romance side for me. I liked when they reminisced on their childhood together, but this was a bit too slow-burn for me. I guess they were both protecting their hearts but I wanted to just do this so badly: Super slow-burn aside, some of the […]