Lila Danisa

What a fast-paced story! It was so fast I felt many things just happened because the sake of them being there, not for the story to be good. Everything happened so fast from the very beginning of the book. Even the ending was happening so fast without the real details of explanations. I didn't like the rushing feeling I got from this book.

The premises were intriguingly good. The first half of the book was good too. Still fast paced but enjoyable and make sense in a way the story carried on. However, after 70% or something, when the real plot twist (?) appeared, the story became so rushing. The plot itself had really good potential but unfortunately the delivery was not it.

I usually didn't mind when the pace of the book I read was fast, however this book was not only fast paced but rushing too. Not only that, there were also many things happening at once. Especially around 70% to the end of the book. Everything happened so fast yet until 99% of the book, there was no real solution for both characters.

The time gaps were also my problem with this book. There were many important scenes happening but after that there were time gaps. For me, it was like important stuff just barely mentioned and solved was the main theme of this book.

The relationship between Gabriel (MMC) and Willow (FMC) was of course happening fast too. Fortunately I liked both Gabriel and Willow. They both had flaws but I understood why they acted like that. I just wish their relationship was delivered deeper because their story had so much potential.

Thank you to Amarie Collins and The Author Agency for the ARC.

Actual rating: 4,25 stars!

Wow, that was intense. I hated everyone in this volume except Erica. The small town people were so dumb. The Order of St. George Chapter Chicago aka The House of Slaughter was so mean. They sent someone to hunt Erica for f sake!!! So many going on in this volume and the ending was so heartbreaking. I hated it.

So in this book/volume we got the more in depth of Erica's history and more about The Order of St. George.

It was good and I understood more about Erica and why she did what she did(s) in the 3 previous books/volumes.

I also met young Aaron and it was a shame what would happen to him in this series. From the ending of this book, there are other series about The House of Slaughter. I might read it to know more about Aaron.

This book also showed Jessica, the one who recruited (?) Erica to be a hunter. I curious about her and though I already knew about her ending, because I spoiled myself by reading the reviews of volume 9 (the one I got the ARC of), I hope the other volume would explain more about how Jessica got her ending.

A good start to introduce the new series full of characters. I read this after I finished reading the first book so for me it got me more attached and invested in this series.

4,75 rounded-up to 5 stars!!!

Goddammit! That was amazingly good!! Almost perfect!!!

The tense! The sadness! The unfairness! I cried more than three times dammit!!

Like I said, almost perfect! The problem solver might unfair but it was for the best.

This book ended the Archer Peak case for Erica. I can't wait to read other adventures of her slaying the ones killing the children.

Actual rating: 4,25 stars!

The background story about who ordered Erica was getting clearer. Why Erica became Erica Slaughter also explained briefly in this book. The cliffhanger tho!!!

Dammit that was so good! Scary, dark, and tense!

I got ARC for volume 9, so I would binge this series. And I am so grateful that I could read this amazing book.

The story and the illustrations were so good! Perfect with the horror mysterious themes of this book.

There were still many questions about the something that killed the children and I am so ready to read the rest of the books from this series.

To be frankly honest, I never a fan of Peter Pan story. From the original to adaptation to anything related to Peter Pan, I usually chose not to pay to much attention. But I intrigued with this one because of the blurb. I wanted to know how Peter Pan would do when he indeed the last boy who don't want to grow up.

This book has dual timeline. Peter Pan's timeline in Neverland and Wendy's timeline in earth (London). At the beginning I was confused by these dual story and because I entirely forgot about Wendy. Fortunately, my brain caught up and my reading journey continued (kinda) smoothly.

Almost the entire book, except the very end, Peter Pan was the character I knew and disliked. He was childish and arrogant. Luckily the story brought out the redemption arc of him at the end of the story.

For Wendy's side of story, it was actually sad and deep meaning. It portrayed perfectly how adult being forced to 'adulting' and fill the expectations of other (entitled) adults. I loved how strong Wendy here. She stood up for herself beautifully.

The illustrations were good. Detailed and caught the right expressions of every characters. However, don't be like me who expect the illustration style within the story would be the same as the cover illustration because they are completely different style. I was kinda disappointed at first but along the way I agreed that the illustration style was fit the story better.

Thank you to Dan Panosian, BOOM! Studios, and NetGalley for the ARC.

Actual rating: 4,25 stars!

That was heartwarmingly good 🥹🫶🏻🥰

I indeed took my time reading this one because tbh the pacing was slow and after 20% something it was kinda dragging. I loved it when Titus still holed up in his room and was silently observing Mariah. But for me, after he finally had face-to-face interactions with Mariah, the story was kinda losing the grips. Mariah was apparently love-starved due to her pasts and Titus was also scarred by his own. I think that's why they were so difficult to talk about their feelings. I was so frustrated, especially around 75% or something, because of these two. They were already into each other but they didn't talk. Especially Mariah, gah! While Titus was not that far different from Mariah in terms of healthy communication, he was actually almost perfect. He was such a softy only for Mariah. I was kinda skeptical with how the author would handle Titus past trauma(s) but it(they) had been solved without drama.

Aside from the slow pacing and lack of communication between Titus and Mariah, I enjoyed this book. I especially can't wait to read other books in this series because while Titus and Mariah got their HEA, the mystery (?) plots haven't being solved yet and I believe it would carried out until the last book of this series. I also can't wait to see if I guess the upcoming couple right or not. Not the second book's couple because it's already obvious who they would be.

Thank you to Janice Whiteaker and Hambright PR for the ARC.

While the premises were promising, the story wasn't delivered well enough I am afraid.

The storyline was confusing. I usually don't mind with back-forward timeline, but in this book, those back-forward left many plot holes and made me so confused with the story. Worst of all, for me at least, was the ending. The ending was there but there was no explanations on how the ending ended like that.

I also found it difficult to like the characters. They were just there without any significant arc. Even Sango/Eben, the main character, had no redeeming qualities.

The illustrations were so good though. Full of details and helped the story a lot. The illustrations also gave the perfect vibe for the theme of this book.

Thank you to Shobo, Shof, BOOM! Studios, and NetGalley for the ARC.

P.S. Shout-out to Ms. Alya Kronsberg, the Marketing Manager of BOOM! Studios who so helpful to me getting another copy of this book even though it was my fault not to download the e-ARC on-time on NetGalley.

Ah this book is so good! Perfect for my 5 years old son to learn about private body parts and boundaries.

This book explained explicitly about which body parts that private and only belongs to you. Explicitly as in words used and illustrations. Since my son was way younger, I already taught him the name of body parts as their correct names. He knows that he has penis and I have vagina/vulva. He knows that boys/men's nipples can't breastfeed babies and the ones on girls/women can do it. Hence this book was perfecting what he already knew.

Boundaries also smoothly taught in this book. For me, the highlight of this book is that it's ok to verbally say you are not comfortable with hugs and/or being touch by someone (even doctors/medical personnel). Fortunately I also already applied this to my son because he himself is the type of kid who doesn't like being touched by someone he doesn't know well enough. Boundaries are very important for him even since he was way younger. Again, this book validated what he already knew and been practicing.

Another point plus for this book was the diversity and inclusiveness within the characters. There was even a character with hijab and my son was so happy about it since his ibu (mom, in Indonesian) is a hijabi. Well hello, I am his ibu and I am a (proud) hijabi. Representation matters.

Thank you to Krupa Bhojani Playforth MD, Callisto Publishing, Callisto Kids, and NetGalley for the ARC.

This book warmed my heart! Different ways to explain about kindness in beautifully poetic stories.

Though to be honest, I needed much longer time to understand the first two stories. I read this book twice so I fully understood before I read it to my 5 years old son. I didn't expect him to understand the beauty of this book because again he is only 5 years old. But we discussed each story and I truly believe he understood this book better than I was. My son grasped the values of the stories effortlessly. I think because he is a child. His heart and mind still pure so it's easily to understand kindness surrounding this book.

The illustrations were also beautiful and fit the theme of the book. The warmth of kindness from the stories was perfectly portrayed by the illustrations.

Thank you to Egor Klopenko and NetGalley for the ARC.

I don't know how to make it not cruel or rude, but this book was so weird.

First, the illustrations (I 99% sure) generated by AI. For me, that alone made the rating of this book less than 3 stars.

Second, the storyline was so bad and didn't make sense at all. How on earth you can get so close to eagles? I know everything can happen in fiction but even my 5 years old son wasn't convince by the lack of common sense in this book. He said it was impossible to see eagles so close in the wild.

Thirdly, I didn't find the good connection between eagle and its wisdom (barely) explained in this book. I think I caught the values (?) of the story but they had no correlation with the eagles in this book.

Lastly, the format of the book was horrible. I know this is ARC and usually formatting issues never bothered me much. However, this book formatting issues were another level. Even when I read it through NetGalley Shelf app, the format was still so bad.

Nevertheless, thank you to Denny Tranel, BooksGoSocial, and NetGalley for the ARC.

That was so good! Introducing neurodiversity through playing differences. For me, this is definitely different approach to know about autism. Books I personally read about autism usually showed autism through the ways a person thinks and behaves. However, in this book, the center is playing. Like any other kids, playing usually is their most enjoyable time of the day and when you have autism, it somehow shows on how you play. Surely this book is educational, yet easy to understand. The illustrations helped a lot too for me, because they were vibrant with colors and detailed.

I read this book for my 5 years old son. Though he doesn't get diagnosed officially, but he often said he did the same like the characters in the book when he plays. But since autism is a spectrum, one is different from the other.

Overall, we (my son and I) enjoyed this book a lot.

Thank you to Vanessa Guevara, Purple Diamond Press Inc, and NetGalley for the ARC.