Shannon
After reading my first Pratchett book, Going Postal, I received lots of suggestions and had a list of books I was considering to read further into Discworld. I ended up reading the next book starring Moist because I thought I'd like to continue his story. Now I feel like I'm ready to go back further and learn more about the city and Wizard University.
Format: Audiobook and eBook
I listened to the audiobook for this whole book, and it's a fun sci-fi that's a contrast to most of my other books. It's just weird and imaginitive, and there's no romance at all. I particularly enjoyed the audiobook narrated by [a: Wil Wheaton 37075 Wil Wheaton https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1356706649p2/37075.jpg] for an easy, enjoyable listen. I finished this one while driving home from an event. This is my second book by [a: John Scalzi 4763 John Scalzi https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1724435824p2/4763.jpg]. I liked [b: Starter Villain 61885029 Starter Villain John Scalzi https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1683564155l/61885029.SY75.jpg 97563902] a bit more, but this one is fun too.
Christmas Shopaholic was a super funny Christmas themed book, but also had some touching storylines. I really identified with the struggle to help another mom who is going through a hard time.
Becky's adventures were as outlandish and funny as ever, but not so unbelievable that it made me doubt her ability to pull it off in the end.
I relayed quite a few of the funny bits to my husband, and he laughed out loud too. Christmas Shopaholic really seems to have recaptured the charm of the earlier books. All of the characters felt like old friends I was catching up with after a long time.
Christmas Shopaholic came out in 2019, but for some reason I didn't read it until this year. I don't know why, but I just wasn't in the mood for it. I feel a little silly for not reading Christmas Shopaholic sooner, but I'm glad I read it this year. Looking back at my reviews for the previous two Shopaholic books, I definitely thought that was the end of the series, and I wasn't looking for a continuation. I was definitely wrong! Christmas Shopaholic was a delight and a wonderful book for getting in the holiday mood.
Seasonal Vibe: Christmastime Travel Location: England I loved this book. The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year had a balanced mix of mystery and romance. Some romance would be happening and then suddenly something would happen to get you back to the mystery, and vice versa. I loved the characters, and the vibe was perfect. It was Mystery+Romance+ Christmastime in snowy England. It was a joyful reading experience. It wasn't all “fluff”, though, because it did deal with difficult character backstories and bad things that had happened in the past. Of course, there was crime to solve, but also a character who's been gaslit. I liked Ally Carter's YA books; my favorites are her Heist Society books. The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year had a similar feel to Heist Society, but adult. I went to a fantastic Ally Carter signing event shortly after this book was released, but I'd waited to read it because it's a Christmas book.
Rewitched was a perfect October book. It literally took place in October, and had a wonderful combination of cozy magic with darker mysterious elements. There was a small amount of romance as well, but most of it was about personal development, family, and friendship.
Seasonal Vibe: Fall (October specifically)
Travel Location: London
Historical Time: It doesn't specify this, but I feel like this book takes place in the 1990's because pagers are mentioned.
I saw the Rewitched special edition on the Waterstones website and was so taken with the cover and adorable cat on the edges. I preordered it along with the upcoming Percy Jackson book. This edition of Rewitched is so adorable, and it was fun to track my reading progress by how far into the edge cat I was. (I'm past the ears! Now I'm at the tail!)
Rewitched Features
Witches
A Bookstore
A Cat
Lots of coffee
A Magical Mystery
Family Secrets
Best Friends
London in the Fall
A bit of romance
After re-reading Howl's Moving Castle, which I turned out not to have remembered practically at all, I decided to read the sequel. I had not read it previously, possibly because it did not seem to be much of a direct sequel. I decided to read it, and Howl and Sophie do eventually appear.
I loved the new characters and different type of fairytale world. It reminded me a bit of The Horse and His Boy in the Chronicles of Narnia, where the book starts out with a character in a very different place, but it does give some information on your main characters from the previous books eventually.
Seasonal Vibe: Summer! Takes place on June 20
This Night is Ours was a wonderful book about understanding yourself with friendship, some romance, and art. The characters and relationships feel very authentic. The book takes place all in 24 hours, on the Summer Solstice. It's a wonderful book I happily recommend for teens and up.
Reading this book was like hanging out with a group of friends and exploring New York with them for the summer. Seasonal Vibe: Summer Starts with a high school graduation and takes place during the summer after graduation. Travel Location: New York City There is a romance, but mostly this is a story about a group of friends figuring out what they love and what they want to do next. There's also a really nice theme about books and writing, with the main two characters having bonded over a beloved(fictional) children's fantasy series as kids. This is realistic YA fiction that touches on how people can use fantasy stories to navigate the real world and their relationships. There was also a theme about coding and app development that I was surprised to discover. I started reading The Getaway List on the perfect day for me. I had just been to my youngest daughter's preschool graduation and it was the last day of school for my older two kids, with my oldest daughter singing in the choir at the promotion for her middle school's 8th graders. It had a perfect vibe for the end of the school year and looking forward to summer, and was a nice easy read for my tired mom brain.
My daughter's sixth grade class was reading Holes by Louis Sachar. I decided to read it too since I had never read the book, but liked the movie. This is a really wonderful book. It touches on so many important themes in really accessible ways. It's easy to read, but still compelling. I love the way everything works together in each character's backstory for a really satisfying connection. My daughter, who is usually an all-fantasy reader, really liked it too. It occured to me that this book might be considered magical realism. It's mostly realistic fiction, with interspersed historical fiction, but the element of the “curse” could be a bit of magical realism.
The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery is one of those backlist classic books I've meant to read for years. I've loved the Anne of Green Gables book series since I was a young girl, but I haven't read many of her other books. I read this mostly from an actual paperback book.
I think The Blue Castle is as good a classic romance as a Jane Austen book, though it takes place about a hundred years later. It's one of the few adult novels that L.M. Montgomery wrote.
This book has social commentary, humor, tears, romance, and a wonderfully written cast of characters. Plus cats! This is a cat-friendly book. The chapters are short. There are 45 chapters in this book that's about 250 pages long. If you're looking for short chapters, this book has them.
“Fear is the original sin,” wrote John Foster. “Almost all the evil in the world has its origin in the fact that some one is afraid of something. It is a cold, slimy serpent coiling about you. It is horrible to live with fear; and it is of all things degrading.”
I thought that the rose bush Valancy “attacked” at the beginning of the book would be blooming at the end, and it was.
I cried big tears at Cissy Gay's story of her baby's death, then for her own death a few pages later.
The only problem with this romance is that Barney Snaith is perhaps the worst name for a romantic lead I've ever heard.
I'm interested in how much detail is on the page compared to what we're supposed to understand is going on off-page. In my experience, intimacy is rarely mentioned in a book like this. A “respectable” book published in 1926.
To “make love” means romantic speech or “sweet nothings” and seems to have no “bedroom” implications. I've read this in “older” books before, but it was especially noticeable here that this was still accurate. On the drive home after they get married, Valancy says she doesn't “want him to make love” to her, and suggests that she just wants him to talk to her like usual.
But I wanted you to talk. I don't want you to make love to me, but I want you to act like an ordinary human being.
Then as soon as they get to the island, they have their first kiss. I think we are to understand from this first kiss, that they have an intimate physical relationship.
Barney lifted Valancy out of the canoe and swung her to a lichen-covered rock under a young pine-tree. His arms were about her and suddenly his lips were on hers. Valancy found herself shivering with the rapture of her first kiss. “Welcome home, dear,” Barney was saying.
And a bit later, this line.
And that little kissable dent just between your collar bones.
That sounds quite intimate to me. Interestingly, none of the “marriage of convenience” style tropes such as sleeping apart happened. That's not where the romance is. A sweet and wonderful relationship is described for them, from companionship to implied physical intimacy. The conflict comes from the unknowns in his past as well as her assumed quickly approaching death.
All this, and still Valancy does not believe he loves her. She truly thinks he's just been pitying and humoring her. This is frustrating to the reader but is not unbelievable given her emotionally abusive upbringing.
Thankfully, they sort it all out in the end.
The hypocrisy of her family! Ugh!
My Contrary Mary was a delightful expansion of the Lady Janies series to include Mary. The book is wonderfully funny with its combination of historical fact, fiction, and humorous commentary. I particularly enjoyed the “future predictions” that were actually movies. The characters were likable, and I enjoy how the arranged marriages actually contain people who like each other.
I highly recommend My Contrary Mary, along with all of the Lady Janies series. I look forward to the next Mary as well!
I truly love Rainbow Rowell's New Year's Eve themed short story, Midnights, and already have it in two other volumes of her short stories. This year, I was delighted to enjoy the story in this adorably small paperback, which also has unique illustrations that are not in the other volumes. I also enjoyed Kindred Spirits, a story about camping out to see Star Wars Episode VII in 2015. I'm now somehow nostalgic for 2015.
I decided to start reading this book when I saw someone on Twitter describing it as the ultimate slump buster. I thought that sounded like just what I needed!
This book was so fun and funny. I loved the narrator's voice and tone of the book. The alternate history mixed with fantasy was very engaging.
I was also struck with the realization that I didn't know anything about this period of British history. I had never heard of Jane Grey, and while I had heard the name Tudor, I didn't really know what it was.
SpoilerThough, one of my favorite bits was the suggestion that G was really Shakespeare. I noticed that pretty quickly.
I was intrigued when I saw Every Duke Has His Day by Suzanne Enoch described as Bringing Up Baby, in the style of Jane Austen. I love Bringing Up Baby, which is a 1938 movie starring Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, and a Leopard. I grew up watching it, incorporated the song from the movie(I Can't Give You Anything But Love) into my wedding ceremony, and had a framed Bringing Up Baby poster in my living room. I also like Jane Austen books.
In Every Duke Has His Day, an eccentric, scientifically minded Duke is watching his aunt's pet poodle. He's taking the poodle for a walk when a young woman's near-identical poodle runs at them, knocking the duke and his poodle into a stream. They accidentally switch dogs, dogs are stolen, and adventure and romance proceed from there. The story takes place during the summer in London during the “Season”.
It was a bit slow to get into, but once I did, I really enjoyed it. The dialogue and banter were funny and engaging. It had multiple points of view, giving the reader a full picture of what was going on. There was also a Gaston-level villain, and a bonus commoner romance for a bit of upstairs/downstairs action. Good “swooniness”. Happily Ever After for everyone except the villain, even the pets. It had a 101 Dalmatians vibe too. It didn't really have a Bringing Up Baby plot, though it had screwball comedy elements.
I couldn't put it down and had to finish it before I could go to bed.
This is a “sweet” or “clean” romance with no “spicy” scenes.
Despite having read lots of classics throughout my youth, this may actually be the first contemporarily written “regency romance” that I've read. I actually had to look up British nobility rankings, because I wasn't sure about the difference between, say, a marquis and a viscount. I'm glad I looked it up instead of just wondering if I had it right the whole time.
Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's press for the e-ARC in exchange for my honest review.
The Tea Dragon Society was so cute! I struggle a bit with graphic novels because I'm not very visual and have to actively remember to look at the pictures, but I really enjoyed this one. This was the sweetest concept and such a cozy story. I love the idea of tea dragons! I showed them to my daughter, and we agree that we both want one.