Fiona

Interesting science; would have liked less case study tales.

I noped out near the beginning when the author claimed IBS as an autoimmune disease. He also blindly accepts the concept of autoimmunity being widely causitive despite a lack of evidence for numerous diseases. I checked Mr. Richtel's biography and decided, in the future, I will refrain from reading immunology books from somebody without any background in medicine.

I got very excited by the idea of a writer's guide written by dear Mr. Vonnegut. But he died in 2007 and this is no such thing; it is written by someone who lacks the late Kurt's credibilty but who apparently felt attending his workshops entitled her to claim this book as part of his canon, putting his name as lead author. If you want an actual writing guide from the master, google, “vonnegut how to write with style” for his two page essay which was used as the underpinning structure for this 400 pages of unnecessary rambling.

Pity the reader who wastes money on this book.

Bardugo is a great writer and I enjoyed this immensely, even if I found it slightly too long for my current predilections. I don't know that I want to read a bunch of books set in this Grishaverse though so if she wanted to branch out into other genres, like historical fiction, that'd be swell.

Cute and charming.

DNF. There are these weird little info dumps that could so easily have been avoided. And the way new characters are introduced leaves me confused... shifting names, two characters at once, too much backstory, ugh. I was so stoked for this plot-wise but my hand itched to get out the blue pencil.

A very satisfying conclusion.

I was really excited to read a choose-your-own-adventure type book as I enjoyed them so much as a kid. This, however, was not the enjoyable read I was hoping for.

The choice to write in second person is never, in my experience, a good one. The end result is either preachy or distanced emotionally from the reader and this book is both. The tale presents readers with puzzles to be solved and also asks them to provide dialogue; the interactive nature is reflective of the supposed setting and not a bad technique, but from a narrative standpoint it does nothing helpful. Ultimately, the book is closer to an activity book than a readable one.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher for review.

Soooo long. Mr. McCullough gives me the impression that he's incapable of deciding which bits are important from a narrative standpoint.

There's a lot of very sound practical advice in here and I like the sense of control and can-do attitude the book fosters but some of the “missions” require a level of economic privilege that not every kid has. Overall, an informative and easy-to-understand read.

I received an ARC of this book from Candlewick Press free for review.

Definitely learned stuff from this book but its not an entertaining tome and is drier than Levitin's other works.

A very enjoyable read (good plot, solid pacing, believable characters) but I didn't enjoy this as much as Stone's other works. Its written in 3rd person (whereas her YA novels have all been 1st p.o.v.) and it felt strained to me.

The artwork is beautiful and the narrative is intriguing but the characters are really flat so I didn't actually care what happened.

This premise had so much promise but doesn't deliver because a) too much telling, not enough showing and b) preachiness. DNF.

The first 200 pages of this is great. After that it's mostly fodder for fans, I think, with the author recounting various “adventures in skepticism” which are vaguely snarky and smack of superiority.

Covers basic concepts adequately, slightly repetitive. Bibliography consists entirely of online sources, which irks me because urls change and info disappears.

Ms. Stone's ability to write dialogue blows me away.

A bit thin, both story-wise and characters, this book feels like it just scratches the surface. Being the first published book for both authors, I feel like neither has reached thier potential here (also co-writing is harder than you think its going to be).

A very enjoyable and formulaic beach read. I devoured this fairly quickly but suspect I will forget it rapidly as well.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher for review.

A bit depressing tho.

This is clearly an “issues” book but the plot isn't strong enough to make it interesting. The pacing in the second half of the book is glacial and I skimmed the last fifty pages because I cared so very little about what happened.

Mr. Giles' ability to write about deep issues like ingrained sexism in a nuanced way needs more development as of yet. Del's understanding of his own misogyny seems sudden, limited and not reflective of the real world, which irritated me.

I was totally on board with this book's premise but, almost from the beginning, it was a disappointment. Mostly due to the lame attempts at misdirection in an effort to create excitement in the narrative; the most egregious example being Olive's “disappearance” which was just her being in her tent. I suspect I would have enjoyed Olive MacLeod's book about her trip (which was titled Chiefs and Cities of Central Africa) much more than this awkward modern reimagining that tries to frame Olive as a lovesick puppy searching for her fiancee.

I received a free copy of this book for review from the publisher.

This is the most tedious political biography I have ever read. It was so uninteresting that about three-quarters of the way through, I started wondering (purely for narrative purposes and not due to any dislike for the man) if Brown might die in some tragic way before the end and make things more interesting. But no, the subject is still with us and might do all sorts of things worthy of note yet (although the writer has clearly written him off as too old.) Biographies are best written when the subject has shuffled off this mortal coil, obviously.

I received an ARC of this book free from the publisher for review.

Disappointing. Vowell tells us about travelling to various places while researching this book which seems like a lot of trouble given how little information she conveys about her purported subject.