Daijah

i really do love thrillers like this. if you like you with less action and more of a focus on psychological factors, i would highly recommend this book. i love the morality discussions this book had and i just thought it had such amazing but subtle commentary. there wasn't a plot and more following a character like a literary thriller, but it was just done so well 

would i say this book is good? absolutely not. did i devour the absolute toxicity? completely. this was very similar to from blood and ash which i personally really enjoyed so depending on how you feel about that book, will probably predict how you feel about this one 

i wanted to love this more than i did because i love the synopsis but i found the heroine absolutely insufferable. i enjoyed the tropes, especially this “masculine” pro football player who runs a bakery but he definitely had a lot of traits i didn't enjoy. they didn't have a ton of chemistry and for having such an interesting premise it wasn't super interesting. i still had a good time but it was unmemorable. 

i wish i loved this series more because christina c jones has some of the best writing, chemistry, and smut but i cannot stand the fantasy/magical elements within this series. i don't know why but it just doesn't click with me at all. i love everything else but that is such a main draw to this series so i cannot in good conscious, rate this book higher 

actual rating: 4.5/5 stars

read for the black romanticathon 2023: feel good read

i love the trope of someone becoming a parent or finding out they're a parent so i absolutely ate this up. i don't know if i enjoy this one more than the first but i loved everything about this and alexa martin's writing is just so excellent and witty. i can't wait to continue on in the series

i love the trope of someone becoming a parent or finding out they're a parent so i absolutely ate this up. i don't know if i enjoy this one more than the first but i loved everything about this and alexa martin's writing is just so excellent and witty. i can't wait to continue on in the series 

this was a super cute YA contemporary but i went in expecting this was a romance and it didn't have an HEA. i did actually really love the characters and i was going through what they were going through just a couple years ago so it was super relatable. i loved that this was from the perspective as a black man because for the most part this had very little trauma which is not a common thing you see from black YA books let alone those from the perspective of a man. i would highly recommend this for the age group it's for 

this was such a captivating thriller. i loved the twist and turns so much. the end reveal had me absolutely shocked and i loved the direction this went in. it was slightly repetitive but it wasn't a super big drawback 

i enjoyed greer and derick but i'm not a huge fan of jealous exs and this had two and some parts in the end seemed a little outlandish. it was cute and fun but i've enjoyed some of alexandria house's other work significantly more 

i don't think i really like narrators that are of an older age but this story defied that dislike for me because this book truly touched on so many of my personal fears. why i don't think this is horror necessarily, most people are scared of getting old, running out of time, and dying and this book really makes you confront those fears 

we love ocean horror 

jennifer hiller always creates dynamic, flawed characters that show all aspects of humanity but are people who you also root for. they are relatable but sometimes you feel like screaming at them through the page. that is definitely how i felt about our main character, paris throughout this book.

while we do have a main plot line that is beautifully crafter, there are multiple timelines being told that eventually all weave together and honestly those were my favorites. this is like if a classic domestic thriller combined with allegedly by tiffany d. jackson and the last housewife by ashley winstead which are two of my all time favorite thrillers.

the way the backstories of our characters were explored to show why they are they way they are today was honestly so fascinating and the dynamics between characters were also super interesting. this book was dark without crossing the line of being widely enjoyed. don't get me wrong i love a thriller or horror book that pushes the envelope when it comes to being dark and sinister but those aren't books i would often widely recommend because they are most likely too much for the average thriller reader. this on the other hand i think can be enjoyed by the average thriller lover and those who love to explore the darker aspects of life.

i was not surprised by the twist at the end and thought it was slightly predictable but there were a ton of other twists throughout the book that left my jaw wide open and the whole story just came together so beautifully, that the slight predictability did not take away from this book for me.

thank you to st. martin's press, jennifer hillier, and netgalley for an arc of this book in exchange for an honest review 

this truly is one of my favorite lighter contemporary romances i've read. vanessa and michael had so much chemistry and I love seeing the representation of characters in their 40s having a romance and even a divorcee.

the setup for how michael and vanessa met is so funny and cute but it also led to discussions of trauma and abuse which I thought was handled really well. Iialso loved how the cultures of both the characters were incorporated specifically, michael's.

i also LOVED the side characters in this specifically vanessa's friends because you can genuinely tell how much they cared about vanessa but they also were super funny and pushed vanessa out of her comfort zone when needed. michael also had a close friend that was memorable as well.

i really enjoyed laquette's writing and steam. the way she wrote their relationship had it jumping off the page and I had such an amazing time reading this book! i truly couldn't put it down

thank you to st. martin's press, laquette, and netgalley for an arc of this book in exchange for an honest review 

 i really love the murder mystery aspect of this book and leigh bardugo does an amazing job of worldbuilding and creating tension within this book. it truly does feel so dark and gritty and the atmosphere is amazing. at points it is slow but i adore the ending and i think it did help with setting the atmosphere

actual rating: 3.5/5 stars

i loved the end and the twists within this book and holly jackson always has great writing but i just don't think this is necessarily my type of thriller. i still appreciated the ride but it wasn't a fav like her other series.

i feel like this is a quiet horror but i absolutely love how this combined horror with a love story. i adored the writing style and i love water/ocean horror so of course i would love this one 

jennette mccurdy is an extremely talented writer and i love how this explored an abusive relationship that is not a dynamic that is usually explored. the audiobook was read by jennette and was absolutely amazing. overall is was a phenomenal memoir 

 i never really dnf books but this was putting me into a reading slump because of how little i cared about anything going on in this story. this shit was boring asf and nothing was going on. i have no desire to find out anything going on in this book tbh. i've been to paris and i love it there but besides the characters speaking french sometimes, this could have been placed in any major city and i wouldn't have blinked twice. 

i'm so happy that i'm building up a little collection or holiday/christmas romances i really enjoy. this is definitely not my fav in the series but i had a really good time with this and i didn't think that i would be into a country star but i lowkey ate that part up. 

a super cute grump sunshine holiday romance! i normally don't enjoy holiday romances but this one is a good one. the set up is great and i also loved the characters and super related to the heroine 

i love the it movies and the loser's club so much so going into this book i was wary because ik stephen overwrites and uses tons of racism and homophobia in his books which i still couldn't stand. i had a good time reading this book but i do think the movies are better for me personally with the timeline splitup and with the actual time periods and because i constantly am comparing this to the movies and thinking how the movies are better, i couldn't full enjoy this and i don't think that's the books fault but i still had a good time as i said it just wasn't my favorite book every because of those elements and i don't always click with stephen kings writing and characterization all the way 

i LOVED magnolia and bj so much. their romance and relationship is so realistic to me. truly did enjoy the characters and the writing immensely 

i literally love everything eric larocca writes. this has become one of my favs from them and it was just so freaking good. Even though some of the stories are only 10ish pages, they all back such a punch and i just am left awed every single time. 

read for cozy mystery reading vlog

i enjoyed the writing and the characters were sooooo charming and i adored them. i like how the mystery connected all together but the mystery in general could use some work. it was a bit choppy and was almost disjointed. the characters really are the saving grace of this story 

read for the swoon sisters' book club liveshow: november 2022

i was so excited for this book but no. age gap doesn't always bother me but when it isn't done well its fucking creepy like this book. it wasn't even the fact she was underaged necessarily or even that there was a power dynamic like coach and gymnast. the main thing that bothered me was how the hero treated the heroine. i don't even mind an asshole hero in a series because there's character development and i even love bully romances but this is a grown-ass man being rude to everybody, especially to the underaged girl he's having sex with who is his gymnast and he's cheating on his girlfriend with her. like it's just too many things at once. the reason this got an extra 0.5 of a star is because i loved the gymnastics aspect of this and it talked about the gymnastics moves and training a lot which doesn't happen a ton in sports romances.