Review | A Misfortune of Lake Monsters by Nicole M. Wolverton

September 22, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

When legends bite back…

Lemon Ziegler wants to escape rural Devil’s Elbow, Pennsylvania to attend college―but that’s impossible now that she’s expected to impersonate the town’s lake monster for the rest of her life. Her family has been secretly keeping the tradition of Old Lucy, the famed (and very fake) monster of Lake Lokakoma, alive for generations, all to keep the tourists coming. Without Lemon, the town dies, and she can’t disappoint her grandparents . . . or tell her best friends about any of it. That includes Troy Ramirez, who has been covertly in love with Lemon for years, afraid to ruin their friendship by confessing his feelings.

When a very real, and very hungry monster is discovered in the lake, secrets must fall by the wayside. Determined to stop the monster, Lemon and her best friends are the only thing standing between Devil’s Elbow and the monster out for blood.

This book was a wild ride. On the surface it seemed like a fun lake monster story, following a trio of teenagers – Lemon, Troy and Darrin – in a town where the claim to fame (and tourism) is a lake monster akin to Nessie or Champ. I really enjoyed that we get a dual POV between Lemon (our main character who has to shoulder a lot of family responsibility) and Troy (one of her best friends who is in love with her). Just when I thought I knew where this story was going it got a lot more twisty and out there. Lemon herself deals with a lot of resentment towards the responsibilities she has to shoulder as well as pressure from her family that results in her feeling like she has to give up all of her aspirations. There are definitely characters I had instant dislike for, her grandfather for example, who had a his way or the highway kind of thinking, but even he had a lot of character growth in the story. Overall this was a thoroughly enjoyable story that had a lot more depth than I expected when it came to the characters.

Happy reading!

Blog Tour | The Ghost Cat by Alex Howard | Review

August 30, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

For fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold and How to Stop Time, a charming novel by TikTok sensation Alex Howard that follows a cat through his nine lives in Edinburgh, moving through the ever-changing city and its inhabitants over centuries.

Early morning, 1902. In a gloomy Edinburgh tenement, Eilidh the charlady tips coal into a fire grate and sets it alight. Overhearing, a cat ambles over to curl up against the welcome heat.

This is to be the cat’s last day on earth. But he is going to return… as The Ghost Cat, a spirit-feline destined to live out his ghostly existence according to the medieval proverb of “The Cat with Nine Lives” – For Three He Plays, For Three He Strays, For Three He Stays.

Follow The Ghost Cat as he witnesses the changes of the next two centuries as he purrs, shuffles and sniffs his way through the fashion, politics and technological advances of the modern era alongside the ever-changing inhabitants of an Edinburgh tenement.

As we follow our new spirit-feline friend, this unique story unearths some startling revelations about the mystery of existence and the human condition and provides a feel-good read full of charm for any fan of history, humour and fur-ridden fun.

Buy Links | HarperCollins | Bookshop | Barnes and Noble | Amazon

I was initially drawn to this book because it’s being compared to Before the Coffee Gets Cold and while I can see why that comparison is being made, I will say that the books have completely different feelings to them. They can definitely be compared in that they feature a number of connected vignettes being Grimalkin’s 9 lives. I found this book to be utterly charming and cozy as Grimalkin makes his way through his lives while being a ghost cat. Though we could have used more detail and depth to each life, they were filled with intriguing personalities that I would have loved to see more of. It’s understandable as everything is told through Grimalkin’s eyes and voice, but the different humans he encounters could have built out with more depth.

Happy reading!

Review | Lavender Clouds by Bex Ollerton

July 29, 2024July 29, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

Lavender Clouds is a collection of autobiographical comics about mental health, neurodiversity and feelings!

Lavender Clouds is a collection of short comics centered on anxiety, depression, neurodivergence and more. I can honestly say it was refreshing that during a lot of this book I was feeling reassured that I’m not the only one who feels the things described in the comics, but also it was quite a shock that everything fit so well. If you deal with any of the issues listed, or anything adjacent to them then this collection will likely speak to you. The comics perfectly capture some of the struggles of anxiety and other conditions and so much of the internal dialogue or struggle. It’s great to be seen and I’m so glad to see more books coming out talking about things like anxiety and neurodivergence.

Happy reading!

Review | Asking for a Friend by Kara H.L. Chen

July 28, 2024July 28, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

This charming YA rom-com follows a strong-willed, ambitious teen as she teams up with her childhood frenemy to start a dating-advice column, perfect for fans of Emma Lord and Gloria Chao.

Juliana Zhao is absolutely certain of a few things:

1. She is the world’s foremost expert on love.

2. She is going to win the nationally renowned Asian Americans in Business Competition.

When Juliana is unceremoniously dropped by her partner and she’s forced to pair with her nonconformist and annoying frenemy, Garrett Tsai, everything seems less clear. Their joint dating advice column must be good enough to win and secure bragging rights within her small Taiwanese American community, where her family’s reputation has been in the pits since her older sister was disowned a few years prior. Juliana always thought prestige mattered above all else. But as she argues with Garrett over how to best solve everyone else’s love problems and faces failure for the first time, she starts to see fractures in this privileged, sheltered worldview. With the competition heating up, Juliana must reckon with the sacrifices she’s made to be a perfect daughter—and whether winning is something she even wants anymore.

I did not expect this story to go as deep as it did, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. There’s a lot of exploration not only in the enemies to lovers dynamic, but also there’s a deep dive into family dynamics and relationships and how those can shape a person. I really felt for Juliana as she went through her journey in this book, not only navigating her relationships, but also her internal struggles, grief and more. What I thought was going to be a lighter read definitely much more than that. I really enjoyed Juliana as a character and her counter in Garrett is great throughout the story. All in all it was a really great read and had far more depth and heart than I had initially thought it would.

Happy reading!

Review | Cryptids, Creatures & Critters by Rachel Quinney

July 25, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

From Mothman to the Mongolian Death Worm, Shellycoat to Simurgh, Nessie to even Ningyo, this charming and creative collection of cryptids will fascinate readers for years to come.

Cryptids, Creatures & A Manual of Monsters and Mythos from Around the World features 90 different creatures from around the world, each with their own researched description and full-color illustrations. The book is divided into three cryptids, folklore, and mythology. It features popular cryptid favorites, such as Mothman and the Flatwoods Monster, and some lesser-known cryptids, such as the Enfield Horror and the Montauk Monster. For folklore, there are kelpies, selkies, cat sidhes, and grimalkins, along with the dobarchu and the vampiric pumpkin! In mythology, you’ll find Medusa, sphinx, Pegasus, and the bukavac!

The book is fun for newcomers to cryptozoology, folklore, and mythology but is also fun for those who are well read about the creatures in the book. While written by Rachel Quinney and mainly illustrated by her, there are twelve guest artists featured within the book, too.

As a lover of all things folklore/mythology/legend, I was excited to see a book specifically featuring creatures like cryptids. This was a really fun collection with a lot of background information for each entity featured, plus vibrant art to illustrate how each creature is believed to look (in some cases a few different ways). I did wish that there was more because I know there were some parts of the world/cultures that were not touched on, but understand that only so much could be featured in this book. I would love to see more in a similar vein from this author as the writing style flowed well and was succinct while also full of great information.

Happy reading!

Review | The Kamogawa Food Detectives by Hisashi Kashiwai

July 11, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

The Kamogawa Food Detectives is the first book in the bestselling, mouth-watering Japanese series for fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold.

What’s the one dish you’d do anything to taste just one more time?

Down a quiet backstreet in Kyoto exists a very special restaurant. Run by Koishi Kamogawa and her father Nagare, the Kamogawa Diner serves up deliciously extravagant meals. But that’s not the main reason customers stop by . . .

The father-daughter duo are ‘food detectives’. Through ingenious investigations, they are able to recreate dishes from a person’s treasured memories – dishes that may well hold the keys to their forgotten past and future happiness. The restaurant of lost recipes provides a link to vanished moments, creating a present full of possibility.

A bestseller in Japan, The Kamogawa Food Detectives is a celebration of good company and the power of a delicious meal.

Seeing books marketed at comparable to Before the Coffee Gets Cold immediately draws my interest, so when I saw this one I had to pick it up. In this one we follow a father and daughter who run a restaurant, which they make almost impossible to find except for those that really want to locate them in order to locate dishes from their past. It’s very slice of life with a lot of emotions and reminiscing as each person experiences the dish and memories that they were yearning for. The book is made up of connected vignette like stories, similarly to Before the Coffee Gets Cold, but there’s not magic/supernatural aspect to it. I look forward to the following books in the series getting published in English as I want to see what customers find them as well as the relationship between father and daughter.

Happy reading!

Review | A Great Big Visual Hug by Andrés J. Colmenares

July 3, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

Like a warm embrace in comic strip form, the cute, cuddly, and clever illustrations by Andrés Colmenares bring joy to millions of readers across the globe. A Great Big Visual Hug collects many of his most popular comics, along with dozens of never-before-seen images that are both heartwarming and hilarious.

Featuring cheerful characters like sloths, broccoli, snakes, cacti, pigs, and the cutest possible version of just about any animal or object you can imagine, Andrés Colmenares’ comics are wholesome, amusing, clever, and often hilarious. This book collects the greatest hits from his popular series and feature dozens of new comics. A Great Big Visual Hug is great for all ages and an excellent birthday, gift, or self-care purchase.

This was an absolutely adorable collection of mostly single page comics. For the most part they are quick and uplifting vignettes, featuring animals, celestial bodies and more. The art style is super cute and colorful, suiting the subject matter perfectly. This is perfect to burn through all in one session, or pick it up from time to time and read a few pages when you need a smile.

Happy reading!

Review | The Realm of the Dog by Paul Luikart

July 1, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

Paul Luikart’s The Realm of the Dog is a collection of stories. Masterfully written portraits of life; the mundane, the dangerous, the stark light of revelation, the dead and dying, hatred, love, and laughter. Each story offers a glimpse into the American Condition. Some gazing into the abyss, others adrift, forgotten, down and out in the underbelly of America, lost souls searching for a glimmer of redemption in a world gone mad. ”The Realm of the Dog” is an unflinching exploration of the chaos, beauty, and despair of everyday life, a relentless examination of humanity in all its flawed glory. The prose crackles with electricity, capturing the frenetic energy of a world on the brink. It dares you to dive headfirst into the maelstrom, to laugh in the face of despair, and to find beauty in the wreckage.

Goodreads | Amazon

I always enjoy anything in the realm of an anthology or collection of short fiction, even though they can sometimes be hit or miss, they are almost always enjoyable. I really enjoyed that this collection had a wide range of lengths and subject matter. A lot of them felt like vignettes and were very free form in a lot of ways. There is an evolution or progression as you read through the stories, some of the subject matter devolving in a way, like a descent. It is definitely a journey, which was something that I really found interesting and was fully immersed in.

Happy reading!

Review | Grace Notes by Naomi Shihab Nye

June 11, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

With themes of family, love, kindness, empathy, grief, growing up, and resilience, these one hundred never-before-published poems by the beloved poet, speaker, and teacher Naomi Shihab Nye will resonate with a wide audience.

National Book Award Finalist and former Young People’s Poet Laureate Naomi Shihab Nye’s Grace Poems about Families celebrates family and community. This rich collection of one hundred never-before-published poems is also the poet’s most personal work to date. With poems about her own childhood and school years, her parents and grandparents, and the people who have touched and shaped her life in so many ways, this is an emotional and sparkling collection to savor, share, and read again and again.

I absolutely loved this collection of poems, it’s full of poems discussing family, growing up, grief and more. The poems span the spectrum of emotions and have an ease of rhythm that makes them flow naturally. There are poems for anyone and everyone in this collection, and it’s something you could easily read in one setting while still taking them in, but you can also read them over time and sit with them to really absorb the emotions and impact of the poems.

Happy reading!

Review | One Killer Problem by Justine Pucella Winans

June 8, 2024 DeAnneLeave a comment

A darkly funny and thoroughly queer mystery thriller with a touch of camp, for fans of Kara Thomas and Kit Frick by way of Only Murders in the Building.

When Gianna “Gigi” Ricci lands in detention again, she doesn’t expect the glorified study hall to be her alibi.

But when she and her friends receive a mysterious email directing them to her favorite teacher, Mr. Ford’s room, they find him lying in a pool of blood. But calling the math teacher’s death an accident doesn’t add up, and Gigi needs all the help she can get to find the truth. Luckily, she’s friends with her high school’s “mystery club,” and so with her best friend, Sean, and longtime crush, Mari, Gigi sets out to solve a murder.

But it turns out, murderers are extremely unwilling to be caught, and the deeper Gigi gets in this mystery, the more dangerous things become. Between fending off a murderer, continual flare-ups of her IBS, and her archnemesis turning flirtatious . . . making it out of junior year is going to be one killer problem.

With a wry, hilarious voice and a main character who is the walking definition of a disaster bi, this book is an ode to cozy mysteries, queer found families, and fighting for the people you love, no matter what.

I was definitely in the mood for something funny and this definitely fit the mood. It is very much in the YA sphere, so if you’re feeling like you aren’t in the mood or into YA it may be too much on that edge for you, but I thoroughly enjoyed this little murder mystery laced with humor as well as real and relatable characters and issues. I found this to be a fast read, easily paced and the humor just kept is going, making it so fun and enjoyable.

Happy reading!