Audrey
When I started this book, I wasn't entirely sure I would get super into it, but I ended up really enjoying it. Great flow and interesting story even if it was predictable and went too quickly in places. A good read!
This was a difficult book to put down! The pacing was fantastic, the plot unfolding bit by bit with every page. The vibe of the book was great too, a mix of whodunit, suspense, and a little bit of heist. Hope to read another thriller by Alex Witcher in the future!
This was an experimental read for me if there ever was one. Absolutely intriguing and wild, but also confusing. However, I believe that's the point.
Given how chaotic I found both the plot and the narration (told by the narrator with comments from the editor in the footnotes (both fictional, by the way)) insanely hard to follow, I'll leave descriptions up to the Goodreads summary. Perhaps this is something I would absorb more audibly rather than reading with my eyes. I would have trouble putting it all into words given I'm not quite sure what to mark as spoilers. It's quite intricate. There is also a website with a detailed FAQ on the book and characters which I think is a nice touch.
Ultimately, I'm not sure how I feel about all of this. It was interesting, that I can say with confidence. Whether or not I enjoyed it is still up for debate. It's stuck with me though, so I suppose that's what counts. My biggest issue was how unclear the chapters were marked. I'm somebody who has trouble stopping mid-chapter, so I read this faster than I might have not knowing where to put it down. That can be a good or bad thing depending on who's reading. For me, I think I would have taken in more with clear pauses so I could digest each section.
Readers super into mythology and detailed presentations will eat this up. I'm mostly left baffled, but I do like branching out of my comfort zone.
A huge thanks to the publisher for sending me a free copy of the book to read and review!
When I saw there was a novel featuring Princess Diana, I was so excited! However, it didn't take long to realize the title is a bit misleading. The book was more about Princess Charlotte than Diana. I did enjoy the connection and similarities between the two. It was also interesting reading about a royal family member I knew nothing about. In that respect I enjoyed it. It's just that the title had me thinking we'd see Diana later in life (or at least more about her in general). My other quip is that writing style felt more geared toward a YA audience than an adult, which is fine but that's personally something I like to be prepared for ahead of time.
I ended up enjoying Charlotte's side of the story more. My heart breaks for her, but I'm glad here her life was able to provide consolation to a young and anxious Diana as she set forth to her own life of royalty. The dynamic was very touching. I also liked the frankness of Diana's struggles and her confrontations with Charles. Mentions of Camilla were difficult, but I was glad the book ended on a positive note. Despite it not being what I expected, it was a nice read and it reawakened my interest in Princess Diana after several years.
Thank you to Harper Collins and Netgalley for providing this ARC copy in exchange for my honest review.
Lots of information here even though it's geared toward a teen/younger audience. Great pictures, too, though I've yet to look through them all because I listened to the book on audio (I typically borrow the digital version from the library as well for highlights, otherwise I wouldn't have realized). The book primarily focuses on a few individuals who took part in the Kinderstransport. Naturally, there is also a brief history of the rise of Hitler and the antisemitism of the Nazis that led to the mass evacuation of Jewish children. It's so sad to think about, but as the book emphasizes, it's important to keep these atrocious stories alive for future generations in hopes to prevent a repeat.
3.25 - This is an instance where I knew I was jumping into the second book of the series without reading the first (which was not yet published at the time I requested this one), so if I'm off the mark that's completely on me. That said, I didn't find myself completely lost while reading book two of the Girl Friday series which was helpful.
Viviana and Tommy are invited by a wealthy science man to a party at his home. While hobnobbing with New York's well-to-do, a body is found. Better yet? The party is snowed in. Having recently been promoted to Tommy's partner, this incident makes Viviana question if she truly has the capacity to be an investigator. The stakes are high and the setting is out of a movie.
What drew me to this series was the time period and setting. The 1950s were an interesting time in America in a city like New York and especially for women. I've read a mix of cozy mysteries set far prior and far later. I saw a lot of potential in Viviana. As for the plot? I struggled to get super into it. I don't think this is because I didn't have a lot of the backstory and build-up of the first book but there is that possibility. The characters were my favorite part of the story. I am curious to backtrack to the first book and get to know them properly. It's a cute premise. I'd check out future books.
Thanks to NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for providing me with a free ARC to read and review.
It's not often I enjoy a sequel more than the first book, but such was the case with Moonshine and Malice!
We're back with Q'Bita and the gang after the events of the first book. Soon enough, they find themselves entangled in another murder investigation. The culprit this time? Moonshine, of course! What made this book stand out to me more than the first is the intriguing cliffhanger at the end. I had to start the next installment right away.
I touched upon this in my review of the first book, but I have to praise the balance of mystery and a lighthearted tone. The characters are a joy to read, especially their conversations. J. Lee Mitchell manages to establish a good rapport all while keeping the book under 200 pages. A fun series to read!
(I read the English version — I could only find this edition)
A wonderful and inspirational collection of quotes by Fulton Sheen. This showed up by surprise in my mailbox at a good time, too. Thank you Dynamic Catholic!
What a lovely Christmas surprise this was! Picking up after Book 3, we follow Thea and her family at Christmastime... but it isn't all merriment for Thea.
After a year of excitement and danger, a quiet Christmas at Astermore feels a bit foreign. Thea misses her friends — a certain inspector in particular — and feels isolated being thrown back into her familial role. Uncertain of where her relationship with Leslie stands, she doesn't know how to ward off her family's not-so-subtle hints of marrying her off. Meanwhile, little Mercury has been sneaking out of the room. After one of his adventures, he brings Thea a key. A seasoned sleuth at this point, she sees this as a new mystery.
As always, I enjoyed visiting Thea's world. This one has a slightly different vibe than the other books with the absence of some key characters from the rest of the series, but it was interesting getting a glimpse of what Thea was like before they entered her life. There are some appearances from some of the minor characters from past installments which was also fun to see. I'll be on the edge of my seat until the next book!
A huge thanks to the author for sending me a free digital ARC of the book! I will also be purchasing a physical copy.
Beautiful and thought provoking poems paired with gorgeous photos. A lovely compilation.
Thank you NetGalley and Lyridae Books for this free review copy in exchange for my honest review.
This was something a bit new to me. I've read romance books and I've read dystopian books, but never the mix. What a treat to discover!
Set in a fictional European city and country, Wrong Place, Right Time is a story about family, loss, love, war, and faith. Anna and Boris find each other while facing hardships during turbulent times in their country. Boris particularly stands out to me, not the typical male protagonist you see in romances. He's a real, flawed, and struggling human being who comes into Anna's life in a less than ideal way. She, too, is dealing with the state of the country as well as her mother's well-being. When things get worse and it looks like war, Anna and Boris' relationship is tested.
For a book under 200 pages, the story is well fleshed out even though we don't get a whole lot of history about the country which was a bit disappointing. The writing was so good though that it didn't bother me too much. The characters are likable as well. I'm glad to see that Sevia is a series. I hope to learn more about this fictional place as the story continues. E.B. Roshan has created an enticing place that I want to learn more about.
A huge thanks to the author for sending me a free digital copy to read and review!
To the point, albeit, repetitive. I think I might have heard of Rodney Alcala in passing but realizing he'd made it onto The Dating Game in the middle of his crime spree was what got me to pick up the book. My heart goes out to his victims and their families. Unimaginable.
Though this book wasn't at all what I thought it was going to be, I was pleasantly surprised with the content I got instead.
Assuming this was a memoir (which it is at its core), I was initially disappointed that there was very little about Maria von Trapp and her family. There were mentions here and there, but ultimately, it was a spiritual book recounting her personal studies of the life of the Holy Family and how they correlated to events of their family's lives. Many questions were posed that I never considered and Maria von Trapp did her best to answer while also encouraging readers to do their own research and create their own conclusions. So while this turned out to be an unexpected read, it was one I ended up enjoying more than I might have had it been a traditional memoir focusing solely on the von Trapp family's story.
This was such an interesting read for me. It was unlike anything else I've read and a glimpse at a different culture than my own.
A retelling/reinterpretation of The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, the book follows Jawad as he wakes and discovers he's transformed into a monster. This transformation forces him to take a critical look at his life from a personal and social standpoint.
I've never read any of Franz Kafka's works so I can't offer any sort of comparison. I found Kafka in Tangier quite interesting, though I was moderately confused throughout it. It was a new concept for me, but given the book is under 100 pages, it wasn't intimidating to pick up. It was educational for me in a lot of ways. As a story, it didn't wind up being my thing in particular, but I'm glad to have given it a go.
A huge thanks to the author for sending me a free digital copy of the book to read and review!
The Circo del Herrero series continues in this sequel to The Automation. Longer and more in-depth than the prior book, The Pre-programming really goes for it in this one. Of course, we have some return characters as well.
As I mentioned in my review of the first book, I find the style of writing and the pace quite confusing so I'm having trouble formulating the plot into a tidy description. With footnotes and complex topics, I can't see myself being able to put it all into a tidy blurb. What I can say is that the initial intrigue I had in the first book waned with this one. It ended up becoming something more out of my comfort zone than I could enjoy.
The pace felt faster in this one which was overwhelming with the amount of information required to understand the setting. Like the first book, there are no clearly marked chapters. I'm not sure if the ebook is any different in this regard. There were also parts that I found offensive, ultimately leaving me unsettled by the end.
This series is very unique. Even though it's not a genre I see myself latching onto, I'm glad I gave it a go.
A huge thanks to the publisher for sending me a free copy of the book to read and review!
Food and cozy mysteries go so well together. As soon as I saw this series, I knew I needed to give it a go.
As the title suggests, cinnamon buns are the culprit in this book. But how and why, and who was behind them? When Liddy Lou is named the prime suspect, it's up to her granddaughter Q'Bita to solve the murder of Macie Dixon. She's not alone, however, having her boyfriend (who happens to be a sheriff) and friends by her side.
This book has a great bunch of characters, a twisty mystery, family drama, and of course food. Charming and quirky, it's a fun read. I also love seeing recipes in the back of a book like this! A great touch.
I've been wanting to learn more about the Japanese treatment in America during WWII so when this book popped up in an email I was sold. It's surprising to me that this part of the war is not more often discussed. It was a tragic time for Japanese Americans being taken prisoner simply because of their ancestry.
The book was short so it didn't go into any great depth, but the basic facts and timelines are there. It was difficult to read at times because the footnotes cut off sentences and sometimes those sentences never picked up again. This may just be due to it being a review copy and not an issue in the published version.
Thanks to BookSirens for providing me with this free review copy. I am leaving this review voluntarily.
The fact that I didn't eat up every word of this book was a major disappointment. 1984 and Animal Farm are among my all-time favorite books. I was ready for another mind-blowing reading experience. Instead, I was bored and desperately searching for a library copy of the exact essays in the audiobook so I could skip over a narration of recipes to see if there was anything I could salvage. This is a strange assortment of essays. Some belong together in a collection more than others. I found maybe two of them on par with the subject matters of the two novels I've read. Unfortunately, I no longer remember which they were which tells me they probably weren't as on par as I convinced myself to think at the time. I've never studied anything about Orwell himself. I knew a couple of facts but it was just a scratch on the surface. It was interesting to hear his thoughts and opinions on certain things, but I was gravely disappointed by the anti-Hindu and anti-Catholic sentiments (with negative allusions to other faiths) expressed in a couple of essays. Apparently, this is common knowledge as I discovered upon further research so I'm sure some people reading this are rolling their eyes. Had I known or realized, this isn't something I would have read. I find it disheartening to when people look down on anyone's religion and choose to avoid it whenever possible. All that said, there were a few positive takeaways. I'm disappointed that at the time of writing this my mind is still stuck on the negative and the downright boring (‘A Nice Cup of Tea', ‘British Cooking'...). If nothing else, it was a new perspective on the world during the times the essays were written.
A short collection of poems that flow together nicely. At only twenty-five pages, it makes a quick read.
Thanks to BookSirens for providing a free review copy. I am leaving this review voluntarily.
Though I didn't dislike this book, I wanted to like it more than I did. I read [b:Meet Me in Monaco 40651658 Meet Me in Monaco Hazel Gaynor https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1547148080l/40651658.SY75.jpg 61839194] by Hazel Gaynor and Heather Webb earlier this year and it was one of my favorite reads of 2022.Over the course of World War I, Evie Elliot exchanges letters with various relatives and friends, mainly Thomas (a family friend), Will (her brother), and her mother. The war unfolds play-by-play through these letters, and relationships strengthen in unimaginable ways. Typically, I enjoy reading letters between characters because it gives them such intimate voices to one another. I guess I also like some descriptions and action thrown into the mix. Had it just been two people back and forth I think it would have made a difference for me. I started losing track of the storylines between the minor characters due to there being so many to follow. Thankfully the characters were darling enough to keep me reading on.
An incredible story! A lot of action in a relatively short number of pages. I found myself feeling for all of the characters, though of course I was always rooting for David and could not justify Leibig and Petra's actions. I'm hoping to read more from G. Gruen in the future!
Thanks to BookSirens for this free advance review copy. I am leaving this review voluntarily.
A sweet, short compilation centering on friendship. Some overused lines and cliches are my biggest quip, but I ultimately feel with poetry it's the thought that counts. (And the cover is gorgeous!)
Thank you to NetGalley and Books to Hook Publishing for this free copy in exchange for my honest review.
A marvelous composition. This play is a great portrait of two 20th Century geniuses in their own right. I don't claim to know a whole lot about either Andy Warhol or Truman Capote, but I was unaware that the two were friends. It was interesting reading snippets of real-life conversations the two had together. My rating reflects my thoughts on the play itself. I didn't want to include the bonus content in my rating because I don't want to disregard what I found to be profound moments in the heart of it rather than my personal opinion on the extra portions, Some of it was just a bit much for me and a little bit difficult to follow with the redacted (and understandably so) names.
Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Super interesting and extremely thorough research. Bill Kimberlin's dedication is admirable, especially being exposed to some of the worst of humanity. I learned a lot, namely different methods of execution. The stories were personable despite the atrocities. My personal beliefs on the matter have not changed, however, I am glad to be better informed and to be aware that it's a broken system. Both sides of the argument get fair attention which I appreciate, although, the book focuses more on the inmates which is what made this such a fascinating read. Politics came more into the picture toward the end and felt like less about the people which changed the tone for me, but it seems like there is a possibility for more material in the future.