Lila Danisa

Well, where do I need to start? First, I am 99% sure the illustrations in this book were AI. I hated AI illustrations. There are millions of real-person illustrators in this world but this author chose to use AI. I against AI in books, especially picture books targeted for kids. There are already so many AI videos, don't bring AI into books.

The story was so bad. It was messy and had no focus. Sure, the mysterious creature is the main character, but after that the story went all over the place. Since I strongly believed the illustrations were AI, I automatically assumed the story maybe has AI involvement in it. I hope I am wrong.

I intended to read this book to my son but with my speculation of AI illustrations and the mess of the story, better I keep this book for myself.

Nevertheless, thank you to Alex Podoprigora, BooksGoSocial, and NetGalley for the ARC.

ps. Please feel free to prove me wrong about the AI illustrations accusation I made above and I am also open for discussion regarding that matter.

My son has already passed the age to read this book since he is about to be 5 years old. However, I wish I have more high-contrast books like this one when he was a baby. Now, I used this book as digital coloring book for him. I let him coloring this book digitally so his screen time was not totally spending by watching videos or playing games. He had so much fun with this book and that what mattered the most.

Thank you to Janna Steagall, Familius, and NetGalley for the ARC.

If definition of slow day is going to the beach and collecting sea creatures, it's not slow day I knew of 😅 Minus 1 star because for me there is nothing about slow days in this book. However, we (my son and I) still enjoyed this book much. I especially loved the illustrations so much. They were in high quality of sharpness and so colorfully vibrant. The illustration in this book is one of my favorites for children's books.

The story of Kya and her grandmother went to beach and Nana (the grandma) started to throwing trivia about sea creatures was freshly educational. Many trivial things I didn't even know about. So, it was not just knowledgeable for my son, but also for me.

The words using in this book were mostly simple enough and I didn't need to simplify it to my son.

The problem raised after I read this book to my son was he wanted to go to the beach and the beach here where we currently lived (West Sumatra, Indonesia) is completely different with the beach in the book 😅

Thank you to D.S. Getson, BooksGoSocial, and NetGalley for the ARC.

This book was indeed calming my son. Perfect bedtime story book. The illustrations were so good and detailed. My son (and me!) loved the illustrations so much. The simple and lyrical words were suitable for calming theme of the book. To be honest, my son always picked this book for his bedtime story up until the day I wrote this review. And I think he would continue picking this book for a long time until he somehow find other book(s).

Thank you to Karen Brough, BooksGoSocial, and NetGalley for the ARC.

That was so heartwarming 🥹🥹🥹

A story about the animals lived in the old barn and needed to move out of it since human wanted to build something new (and useful). The togetherness among the animals was so heartwarming to read. Their optimism was also top notch. I loved it so much.

I read this book to my (soon to be) 5 years old son and he also loved it. He loved the simplicity of the story. He also loved how different animals could be friends and had different "work" to make the old barn their house.

We (me and my son) also enjoyed the simple information about each animal mentioned in this book so much. It broaden our knowledge.

Thank you to Cheryl Lock, BooksGoSocial, and NetGalley for the ARC.

That was so cute!!!

Big Wolf being such as a soft hearted wolf because of a cute bunny. Right in my alley!

I read this for my (soon to be) 5 years old son and he enjoyed the book. Both the story and the illustrations. The words used in this book was so simply and easily understand for him. Same like me, my son loved it so much when Big Wolf didn't eat the cute bunny for the dinner. He was so afraid Big Wolf would eat the cute bunny.

After I finished reading this book to my son, he fortunately could get the message from the story which according to him is we need to be nice and the rewards followed would be so much nicer. I am so proud of him, barely 5 years old and could easily pick a message from the book I read for him 🥹

Thank you to Larysa Maliush, NorthSouth Books, and NetGalley for the ARC.

That was so much fun!

My son loved the story and the illustrations. The story was adventurous and so heartwarming with friendship between sea creatures. The illustrations were good, colorful, and resemble so much with the real ones.

Though my son was questioning the storyline where Peter The Pelican discovered Kevin The Crab trapped inside the shipwreck. He said shipwreck was on the sea floor and pelican can't swim deep in the water. Well well well... My (soon to be) 5 years old son already used his logic 😅 What I could say to him was everything can happen in fiction world. I said maybe Peter The Pelican heard Kevin The Crab screaming for help and Kevin himself told Peter that he had been trapped. Fortunately my son satisfied with my answer and let the plot hole the way it was.

Thank you to George J. Linsenmeyer, Atmosphere Press, and NetGalley for the ARC.

Actual rating: 3,5 stars

The illustrations were vibrant, colorful, and full of details. But the placement of them was all over the place and confusing. It might have purpose for the little games of guessing for the readers but since I read this book to my (soon to be) 5 years old son, he got confused and I needed to show him which illustrations belong to descriptions I just read to him. We needed time to fully enjoy the book.

Though there are answer keys (?) showed the right illustrations with the right explanations on the last pages of the book, for me it felt like repeating the context of the book.

Thank you to Manon Bucciarelli, Cider Mill Press, Applesauce Press, and NetGalley for the ARC.

4,5 rounded-up to 5 stars because this book way better in motivational approaches than any self help books I have ever read. Maybe because this book targets are children, kids, and middle-graders. The simple and fun (?) words made it easier to understand and to be applied in daily life.

Though I got this book for my son (5 years old in the end of the month), I couldn't read all chapters to him because they were not suitable for him yet. I definitely would read this book in long run following his age maturity.

After we read some chapters, we wrote journals about ourselves with the guidelines this book gave. We had so much fun doing those journaling activities.

The illustrations were so good and diverse. My son loved it so much when there was kid with hijab in the illustration because I am also a hijabi. He felt included and that was what mattered.

Thank you to Eric Braun, Teacher Created Materials, Free Spirit Publishing, and NetGalley for the ARC.

What a heartwarming and reflective book ❤️

I read this for my (soon to be) 5 years old son and I think I enjoyed this book more than him. Maybe because he is still so young and doesn't understand the anxiety caused by this cruel world yet. He mostly liked the story of the girl(woman?) that loved animals and nature so much. He loved the colorful illustrations too.

For me, this book reached another level of self-love. This book easily told me to create my own happiness and stop worrying about other things. It was definitely meaningful and deep for me.

Thank you to Diane Arkenstone, DPG Worldwide, and NetGalley for the ARC.

I understood and really got into the story the first half of the book, but after that my brain worked kinda hard to understand the story. By the end of the book, I stayed still like 15 minutes to recall and make sense of the story. Fortunately I could understand the story and the plots even though there are still parts I barely understand 😅

It had been a long time for me reading this kind of comic and I needed time to get used to it. The first half of the book, the illustrations were good and helped me to get used to the pace of reading comic. But after the first half, I think the illustrations got messy and all over the place. Maybe that was also why the second half of the book got me confused. Both the story and the illustrations were confusing for my (mom)brain.

I didn't like any of the main characters in this book. I only liked Nate and Stan Lee as cameo. Though The Traveler had characters growth, it didn't help me to like him. Julia, meh, I disliked her even more.

The writing filled with dry humors which I found annoyingly funny. For me, those dry humors made the serious and hard to understand storyline easily to read.

After all I had a fun reading experience with this book and made me want to read other comic books.

Thank you to Stan Lee, Mark Waid, Tom Peyer, Chad Hardin, BOOM! Studios, and NetGalley for the ARC.

Book three of Steele Brothers series and like other two previous books, this book was so hot! These Steele Brothers could do so much with their mouths 👄👅🫦 Though in terms of story, plot, and characters, this book was so much behind than the previous books. The story and the plot were light. But I wish there were more details in Lincoln and Willa's pasts on why their friendship turned into bickering and nonstop arguing. I waited until the end of book and it was not there. The brother's best friend plot also came out flat for me.

Though Lincoln said many times that it had always been Willa, his playboy behavior showed otherwise. I hated it even more that the reason he had been in celibate (if you want to called it that) was because he lost a bet and needed to uninstall his dating apps. Like duh!

Willa too didn't grasp my attention much. She was so strong yes, but her push-and-pull actions toward Lincoln were too dragging.

Despite those bumps, I enjoyed the story. Especially when Laurel was mentioned. She was definitely scene stealer for me.

The ending was intriguing me with the hints of the last brother in The Steeles available, Declan. The FMC is going to be Penelope and I can't wait for it.

Thank you to Brighton Walsh for the ARC.

3,5 stars rounded-up to 4 stars because Ms. McKenzie Nabi (Book Publicity Coordinator) of Atmosphere Press was so helpful when the book I got from NetGalley had formatting issues. Because of her, I can read this book. Hence, a deserved rounded-up.

This book talks about Maddy who loved science, especially moon (crescent moon to be specific), and called it The FingerNail Moon. She then had adventurous journey with mentioned moon. It was imaginary awesome. My son loved the idea of hanging on crescent moon and traveling around. Through this book, my son gained a love towards moon because before he hated moon so much. He associated moon with bedtime and he hates bedtime (to this day!). Thankfully, throughout this book and Maddy's story with her fingernail moon, my son hate feeling towards moon reduced and completely gone now (as I read this review).

However, my son and I had the same idea about the illustrations. We didn't like the illustrations much. It missed the details of the story. It was colorful enough but didn't portray the story well.

For me, the story itself was actually all over the place and kinda hard to understand. I needed to read the books like 3 times before I read it to my son. I also needed to simplify the words and the story so my son (soon to be 5 years old) could fully understand.

Yet, despite the bumps, my son and I had a fun time reading this book. This book brought back the obsession of space, galaxy, and planets to my son. We spend so much time going through a rabbit hole of moon phases, galaxies, and planets thanks to this book.

Thank you to Darrell Spencer, Greg McKenzie, Sarah Gledhill, McKenzie Nabi, Atmosphere Press, and NetGalley for the ARC.