Zell

Especially in the beginning, this book felt a little choppy and cliche in parts. However, throughout the book, Saenz writes with the same deep love for his characters, charm, and realism seen in the first book about Dante and Aristotle. I loved watching Ari grow, mature, and deal with hardships. The characters are so loveable. But the ending felt a bit rushed.

This book thoroughly presents the reasons for white male superiority complexes in our society, and provides a solid explanation of how women and BIPOC are affected by these white men. I thought this was an extremely important look at the history of our country, and learned a lot from it.

This book was absolutely heartbreaking, raw, and honest. I've been in this situation, and it sounds like Craft has too, and this felt like a really accurate representation. The voices of all the women were so powerful, and the emphasis on secrets and communication breakdown was well executed. I also can appreciate the choice to not use Jeff's perspective in the book.

This was a disappointing rambling collection of “kids these days”, “back in my day”, and anti-PC rhetoric. I was hoping for more of a memoir on how the US contributes to anxiety, but this wasn't that. I felt Maslow's hierarchy was misrepresented here, and Lancaster did nothing to discuss her anxiety in any meaningful way.

This book delves into the intricacies of grooming, guilt, and the narratives we have to tell ourselves in order to survive our pasts in a deeply personal and realistic way. It felt like it dragged on a bit, but was otherwise a very strong story with a great statement on healing, denial, and grief.

This book had some good parts and some less good parts - I thought the rich boy/poor girl trope was a little too extreme, and Isabel seems selfish throughout the book. I also thought the thing with Billy was a little unnecessary for the plot. However, Castro is a technically great writer, and I liked the side characters. I would give this 3 stars, but too many Trumpsters have come in here and been annoying about one page in this book, so I feel like I need to balance it out.

This book was hard hitting and full of action, as well as great emotional moments. It is a pretty dark book, due to Nena's past, but I thought it was handled well and realistically. The action is well paced and there is enough of it to make the book interesting without being gratuitous. A great book overall, and I can't wait for the next one in the series to come out.

I loved the way this book was mostly realistic for the first 2/3s, but has enough of a hint of magical realism that when it becomes the main plot of the story, it doesn't feel like as abrupt a change as it might otherwise have been. The characters here are all so fantastic, and I loved Iph and Orr's distinct voices, as well as the different ways they relate to their shared experiences.

This book had a LOT of characters and I felt that sometimes it was hard to tell who was narrating, and the voices were often pretty similar. Besides that, and the dialect being a challenge, I thought this was a hard-hitting and realistic portrayal of addiction, and an important read.

This is the sweetest, most lovely little book. The illustrations are fantastic and simple and full of so much life, and the sentiments are a tiny bit cliche, but in a way that feels warm and loving and charming. I can't say enough good things about this book

It's interesting, looking at how polarizing this book is. So many people really didn't enjoy it, and I guess it may not be for everyone, but I really thought this was an exceptionally good read. I just recently read Hunger, Gay's memoir, and found this book full of the same blunt honesty, strong summarization, and social commentary that that book contained. I think Gay is a fantastic author and look forward to reading more from her.

This book was wonderfully atmospheric - the distinction between Cly's world and Jamie's, and the overlaps, came with super interesting shifts in style, tone, and character voice. The characters were distinct and I thought the use of parental characters throughout was so interesting as well. I almost feel like this should have been two stand-alone novellas - although the hotels are a shared aspect, I found myself reading the worlds as two totally separate stories. Overall a tense, disturbing, and wholly engrossing read.

These stories were vibrant, gritty, heartbreaking, and EXCEPTIONALLY well written. Washington writes such diverse voices with such a wonderful familiarity. This depiction of growing up queer and non-white in Texas was a hit, and I was extremely impressed by the writing here.

Fantastic commentary, feels as applicable in 2022 as it was in the 60s when these were written. So glad I picked this up - Collins' stories were vibrant, many-layered, and offered such interesting snapshots into the lives of her characters. I highly recommend this collection.

I thought this was a very interesting tale of these two families and their continued connections through the years. Emotionally charged and realistic characters - they all felt well developed. However, I felt that the pacing was off. I would have appreciated some parts to move faster, while others felt like they weren't given enough attention.

I try to make sure 50% or more of the books I read come from diverse authors, and this has given me SO many new fantastic additions to my TBR. I really appreciate this compilation that has something for everyone.

This book was horrifying and also made no sense. What the actual heck did I just read? I have no idea what to make of this, I feel sick and have SO MANY QUESTIONS. It was all so unnecessary and nonsensical and disgusting.

Barry's particular style of writing - laden with description, detailing events play-by-play, and full of poignant statements on the human condition - makes this an incredibly vibrant read that draws you in and doesn't let go. I love the lack of quotation marks and how it blurs the lines between dialogue and description, and the insight into the characters gained through flashbacks.

The straightforward, no nonsense narration of this book really resonated with me. I thought the narrator was relatable and honest, and enjoyed the lack of commentary (which usually frustrates me) on her eating disorder, relationship with her mother, and hatred of her body. I found it honest and refreshing. I also LOVED the depictions of all of the Korean food, it sounded fantastic and the detail there was wonderful.

I really enjoyed this look at all the ways folx out there are doing (or not doing) gender and sex, and thought that it showed a lot of unique voices and stories. I really enjoyed the social commentary and also the unabashed uniqueness of all the collaborators on this anthology.

I found Lizet's story interesting, but the supporting characters (especially her family) felt underdeveloped and disappointing. I liked the message here, but felt like the story could have focused more on Lizet's successes and struggles rather than the stuff going on around her, a lot of which seemed to go in circles.

This could have been a really interesting graphically focused book, or a history and cultural lesson based on text. It tried to be both, and ended up feeling tedious in parts. Some of the maps were very interesting, others missed the mark for me.

I picked this book up from the library on a whim, and I don't think I'm the target audience for it. It seemed a decent enough book- I found the romance a little rushed, and felt that Noah wasn't a character so much as a plot device, since the “present day” story happens while he is away. This story was sweet but slow paced. I really liked Dalton, was ambivalent about Evi and Eamon.

This book was extremely compelling to read, and deals with complex political issues while also being a retelling of an extremely old play. I really enjoyed the characters and found them complex, well-rounded, and sympathetic.

Many of these poems were just okay, and I thought there was some overuse of metaphors that gets tiresome. But the poems that were commentary on identity, race, etc, were OUTSTANDING. Four stars just based on those.