While catching up with reviews, I am surprised that this is still in queue; I feel like I wrote and posted it already. But from my notes and memory, I will let you know that while Colleen Hoover and It Ends with Us is gracing the window dressing of bookstores across America, I was not…
I read a lot of literary stuff, but as I get older I also read a bit of fluff. When I am on vacation, I reach for at least one fluffy book, and Emily Henry has become a staple for those moments (though she only has four adult, romance books at this time, so I’ll…
I’m sure to catch it for this review, but I was not at all impressed or even very entertained by the Percy Jackson & the Olympians book series. In the original five books that put the otherwise-teacher and -father Rick Riordan on the map, his famous Percy Jackson goes from age twelve to age fifteen…
As with many of the other books I’ve read lately, I am divided in my opinion about Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine (2017) by Gail Honeyman. It has been a popular book and its Goodreads rating is at 4.25—which is very impressive—but I both liked it and didn’t like it. Eleanor is engaging, one hundred…
A Monster Calls (2011) by Patrick Ness is a sad, somewhat difficult YA book that borders on a novella and, in the end, is rewarding. It is also magical, but avoids the obnoxiousness of overly-fable-y books to drive home some very real points about coming of age, death, and guilt, while the backstory about this…
I Speak Boy by Jessica Brody (2021) is a solid read for middle grades readers, especially if they are interested in a little romance. With a fun premise and modern lessons, there are plenty of twists and turns and memorable characters in this loose retelling if Jane Austen’s Emma. Emmy is obsessed—and not in a…
I have decided that from now on, I am going to give a brief synopsis of my review right off the bat, then a synopsis of the book. Only then will I take forever telling you about it. Good idea? To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (2014) by Jenny Han is YA to the…
You might already know, but I have been venturing lately into the territory of ARCs—advance reader copies. This means that sometimes publishers or publicists approach me about reading a book and reviewing it before it has been published. In the past, my response was a no, 100% of the time. Recently I read ARCs of…
I have meant to read some Jules Verne for many years, because his books are classics (though they were intended more for boys, originally). In the latter half of the 1800s, Verne wrote prolifically on his Voyages Extraordinaires series (he was French) and those fifty-four novels (and novellas) include Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea,…
I have often considered reading ARCs—advance reader copies—to review, but I have stayed away from this in the past because 1) I have two self-published books and reviewing other self-published books felt like a conflict of interest and 2) I really don’t want to be honest about a bad book from an emerging author. I…
Yeah, I did it. I read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Why is this remarkable (as in, worth remarking on)? Firstly, I hate zombies and don’t tolerate much gore. Secondly, this is not writing of the snootiest caliber, which you may have noticed I have tried to embrace to an extent—as long as it’s notable…
The Messy Lives of Book People by Phaedra Patrick is, yes, one of those books that appeals to readers by using a title and premise that are them, relatable. “Book people” is in the title. And it’s about, well, book people. Liv Green is about to be an empty nester. She married and had kids…
I’m pretty mad at the Fitzwilliam Darcy, Gentleman trilogy. The main reason? It is a point-for-point retelling of Pride and Prejudice. Why on earth did Pamela Aidan write it as a trilogy? Did she think she knew better than the queen, Jane Austen? There is absolutely no reason why she took three books to say…
(This is like the longest book review I’ve ever written. If you want the short of it, you could just read the first and last sections.) Finding information about Maggie Stiefvater is not as straight-forward as I would have expected in this day and age of digital TMI. But she seems to keep a pretty…
And another book that I added to my TBR because it came up under “NDE”s but has nothing to do with NDEs. Not its fault. It ended up being Printz-award-winning YA, so I can learn from this reading experience while writing YA myself. I could also have just enjoyed it. But did I? We Are…
I’m going to commit to you that this is the last Pride and Prejudice retelling review I will do for a little while. I have been reading a few other things, but they are mostly series (which I finish before I do the review) and nonfiction (which takes me much longer than fiction). But I…
Kinda yikes. Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors by Sonali Dev was a confusing read, for me. Sure I was actually confused sometimes (I’ll get to that in a sec), but what I mean is that I both enjoyed it and disliked it simultaneously, all the way through. Much like the relationship between Elizabeth Bennet and…
I was going to bunch some of these Pride and Prejudice retellings that I am plowing through lately together, but decided that was silly. I have the usual amount of stuff to say about each one, so here we go. First, I read and reviewed Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice recently and it coincided with…
Here’s the thing: in the spirit of no spoilers, I fear the marketing and reviews of The Loneliest Girl in the Universe by Lauren James are so cautious that they don’t adequately warn a reader what they are getting into. This is not a romance. This is not a light-hearted coming-of-age story. The blips out…
The genius of Jane Austen aside, I have to admit that this story held very few surprises for me. Thanks to movies, cultural allusions, and adaptations, I read this book feeling very much like I had read it already. Several times. And yet… There is a reason Austen’s six novels (she died too early!) are…
the starving artist 