Eat. Dance. Fight.
This is the life of the girls who compete in the Isle’s elite, all-female fighting sport of Bowing. But it isn’t really Dirt’s life anymore. At sixteen, she is old and has retired from competition. Instead, she spends her days coaching the younger sisters of the Mud Fam and dreading her fast-approaching birthday, when she’ll have to leave her sisters to fulfill whatever destiny the Gods choose for her.
Dirt’s young sisters are coming along nicely, and the Mud Fam is sure to win the upcoming South God Bow tournament, which is the tiny Fam needs the new recruits that come with victory. Then an attack from a powerful rival leaves the Mud without their top Bower, and Dirt is the only one who can compete in the tournament. But Dirt is old, out of shape, and afraid. She has never wanted to be a leader. Victory seems impossible—yet defeat would mean the end of her beloved Fam. And no way is Dirt going to let that happen.]]>
author: Moses Ose Utomi
name: Elena
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/07
shelves: to-read
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2019: Under cover of darkness, Kate flees London for ramshackle Weyward Cottage, inherited from a great aunt she barely remembers. With its tumbling ivy and overgrown garden, the cottage is worlds away from the abusive partner who tormented Kate. But she begins to suspect that her great aunt had a secret. One that lurks in the bones of the cottage, hidden ever since the witch-hunts of the 17th century.
1619: Altha is awaiting trial for the murder of a local farmer who was stampeded to death by his herd. As a girl, Altha’s mother taught her their magic, a kind not rooted in spell casting but in a deep knowledge of the natural world. But unusual women have always been deemed dangerous, and as the evidence for witchcraft is set out against Altha, she knows it will take all of her powers to maintain her freedom.
1942: As World War II rages, Violet is trapped in her family's grand, crumbling estate. Straitjacketed by societal convention, she longs for the robust education her brother receives––and for her mother, long deceased, who was rumored to have gone mad before her death. The only traces Violet has of her are a locket bearing the initial W and the word weyward scratched into the baseboard of her bedroom.
Weaving together the stories of three extraordinary women across five centuries, Emilia Hart's Weyward is an enthralling novel of female resilience and the transformative power of the natural world.]]>
author: Emilia Hart
name: Elena
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/07
shelves: currently-reading
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I'm just a girl. And it turns out, I'm Hercules.
I'm struggling to survive in a Titan infested world where Spartans, immortals from twelve royal families who have god-like powers and obscene wealth, rule over all. A shy-stammering foster child with nothing, I keep my head down, cover my scars, and focus on excelling in school. At least, I try to. Then it happens.
My blood test reveals I'm part of the powerful elite. I'm one of them. A Spartan.
Forced to attend the Spartan War Academy, I undergo the most harrowing test of all time to see if I have what it takes to be an immortal. There's just a few problems. Achilles and Patro are my scary mentors. Kharon, the ferryman of death, and Augustus, the son of war, are my terrifying professors. Also, I'm pretty sure either someone's stalking me everywhere I go, or my sanity's slipping––I have a bad feeling both are true.
I'm surrounded by Villains and they're smothering me with their hate, obsession, and dark possessiveness. Too bad for them, they have no clue just who they're messing with.
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author: Jasmine Mas
name: Elena
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/07
shelves: dnf
review:
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When Lupita learns Mami has cancer, she is terrified by the possibility of losing her mother, the anchor of her close-knit family. Suddenly, being a high school student, starring in a play, and dealing with friends who don't always understand, become less important than doing whatever she can to save Mami's life.
While her father cares for Mami at an out-of-town clinic, Lupita takes charge of her seven younger siblings. As Lupita struggles to keep the family afloat, she takes refuge in the shade of a mesquite tree, where she escapes the chaos at home to write. Forced to face her limitations in the midst of overwhelming changes and losses, Lupita rediscovers her voice and finds healing in the power of words.
Told with honest emotion in evocative free verse, Lupita's journey toward hope is captured in moments that are alternately warm and poignant. Under the Mesquite is an empowering story about testing family bonds and the strength of a young woman navigating pain and hardship with surprising resilience.]]>
author: Guadalupe Garcia McCall
name: Elena
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read
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Fifteen-year-old Marisol is the daughter of a soucouyant. Every new moon, she sheds her skin like the many women before her, shifting into a fireball witch who must fly into the night and slowly sip from the lives of others to sustain her own. But Brooklyn is no place for fireball witches with all its bright lights, shut windows, and bolt-locked doors.… While Marisol hoped they would leave their old traditions behind when they emigrated from the islands, she knows this will never happen while she remains ensnared by the one person who keeps her chained to her magical past—her mother.
Seventeen-year-old Genevieve is the daughter of a college professor and a newly minted older half sister of twins. Her worsening skin condition and the babies’ constant wailing keep her up at night, when she stares at the dark sky with a deep longing to inhale it all. She hopes to quench the hunger that gnaws at her, one that seems to reach for some memory of her estranged mother. When a new nanny arrives to help with the twins, a family secret connecting her to Marisol is revealed, and Gen begins to find answers to questions she hasn’t even thought to ask.
But the girls soon discover that the very skin keeping their flames locked beneath the surface may be more explosive to the relationships around them than any ancient magic.]]>
author: Ibi Zoboi
name: Elena
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/06
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She’ll go on her own terms.
Lily is less than thrilled about her arrival to the Afterlife, but what awaits her is more fantastical than she ever could have imagined. Deities wait in line at the coffee shop. Fae flit between realms. Souls find ways to make death a beginning.
As Lily explores everything the Afterlife has to offer, she finds herself drawn to a place most people would rather avoid at all Hell.
What she discovers there subverts everything she’s ever learned, and Lily realizes the demons working at the gate to guide souls need help—badly. Armed with years of customer service experience and pent-up sarcasm, Lily carves out a place for herself among the demons, confronting, sassing, and aiding the spectrum of humanity to redefine justice and redemption.
A chance meeting with Bel, a demon general with a distractingly sexy voice, sparks an immediate and deeply healing friendship. However, the undeniable heat between them simmers, and it’s only a matter of time before it combusts.
Meanwhile, something stirs beyond the boundaries of their world, threatening to destroy everything they’ve ever known and everything that could be… unless they fight like Hell to stop it.]]>
author: Jaysea Lynn
name: Elena
average rating: 4.86
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/05
shelves: currently-reading
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Beverly Underwood and her arch enemy, Lula Dean, live in the tiny town of Troy, Georgia, where they were born and raised. Now Beverly is on the school board, and Lula has become a local celebrity by embarking on mission to rid the public libraries of all inappropriate books—none of which she’s actually read. To replace the “pornographic” books she’s challenged at the local public library, Lula starts her own lending library in front of her home: a cute wooden hutch with glass doors and neat rows of the worthy literature that she’s sure the town’s readers need.
But Beverly’s daughter Lindsay sneaks in by night and secretly fills Lula Dean’s little free library with banned books wrapped in “wholesome” dust jackets. The Girl’s Guide to the Revolution is wrapped in the cover of The Southern Belle’s Guide to Etiquette. A jacket that belongs to Our Confederate Heroes ends up on Beloved. One by one, neighbors who borrow books from Lula Dean’s library find their lives changed in unexpected ways. Finally, one of Lula Dean’s enemies discovers the library and decides to turn the tables on her, just as Lula and Beverly are running against each other to replace the town’s disgraced mayor.
That’s when all the townspeople who’ve been borrowing from Lula’s library begin to reveal themselves. It’s a diverse and surprising bunch—including the local postman, the prom queen, housewives, a farmer, and the former DA—all of whom have been changed by what they’ve read. When Lindsay is forced to own up to what she’s done, the showdown that’s been brewing between Beverly and Lula will roil the whole town...and change it forever.]]>
author: Kirsten Miller
name: Elena
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/05
date added: 2025/04/05
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In Dearborn, a father teaches his son how to cheat the IRS and hide their cash earnings inside of frozen chickens. Tensions heighten within a close-knit group of couples when a mysterious man begins to frequent the local gym pool, dressed in Speedos printed with nostalgic images of Lebanon. And a failed stage actor attempts to drive a young Lebanese man with ambitions of becoming a Hollywood action hero to LA, but Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have other plans.
By turns wildly funny, incisive, and deeply moving, Dearborn introduces readers to an arresting new voice in contemporary fiction and invites us all to consider what it means to be part of a place and community, and how it is that we help one another survive.]]>
author: Ghassan Zeineddine
name: Elena
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/04
shelves: to-read
review:
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Shubeik Lubeik--a fairytale rhyme meaning "Your Wish is My Command" in Arabic--is the story of three characters navigating a world where wishes are literally for sale; mired in bureaucracy and the familiar prejudices of our world, the more expensive the wish, the more powerful and therefore the more likely to work as intended. The novel's three distinct parts tell the story of three first class wishes as used by Aziza, Nour, and Shokry, each grappling with the challenge inherent in trying to make your most deeply held desire come true.
Deena's mix of calligraphy and contemporary styles, brings to life a vibrant Cairene neighborhood, and a cast of characters whose struggles and triumphs are deeply resonant. Shubeik Lubeik heralds the arrival of a huge new talent and a brave, literary, political, and feminist new voice in comics.]]>
author: Deena Mohamed
name: Elena
average rating: 4.49
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/04
shelves: to-read
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Casablanca’s deterioration is not the only chaos in Zeina’s world but, unlike her husband who won’t speak to her, her best friend who is sliding towards self-destruction, and her cousin who is stealing Zeina’s life story for content, the restaurant is something she can fix. And Zeina, lonely and adrift, needs something she can fix.
Taking leave from her prestigious chef position, Zeina throws herself into caring for her ailing father, immersing herself in the familiar foods and flavours of her childhood, trying to save both him and his restaurant. But working in the kitchen – and her childhood home – brings memories, secrets, and unexpected ambitions simmering to the surface. When it comes time to make hard decisions, Zeina will have to accept that growing up is an ongoing process – one that never gets any easier.]]>
author: Amal Awad
name: Elena
average rating: 3.41
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/04
shelves: to-read
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author: Peyo .
name: Elena
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/04
date added: 2025/04/04
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Nor do they have tails.
But they are most assuredly dead.
Nebula and Alex Award winner P. Djèlí Clark introduces a brand-new world and a fantastical city full of gods and assassins.
Eveen the Eviscerator is skilled, discreet, professional, and here for your most pressing needs in the ancient city of Tal Abisi. Her guild is strong, her blades are sharp, and her rules are simple. Those sworn to the Matron of Assassins―resurrected, deadly, wiped of their memories―have only three unbreakable vows.
First, the contract must be just. That’s above Eveen’s pay grade.
Second, even the most powerful assassin may only kill the contracted. Eveen’s a professional. She’s never missed her mark.
The third and the simplest: once you accept a job, you must carry it out. And if you stray? A ?nal death would be a mercy. When the Festival of the Clockwork King turns the city upside down, Eveen’s newest mission brings her face-to-face with a past she isn’t supposed to remember and a vow she can’t forget.]]>
author: P. Djèlí Clark
name: Elena
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/04
date added: 2025/04/04
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Behind the scenes, Laurie’s life is frequently chaotic, an often pleasurable buffet of bad decisions at which she frequently overstays her welcome. Acerbic and wryly self-deprecating, Laurie attempts to carve her own space as a woman in this world that is by turns toxic and intoxicating. Laurie seeks to try it all—from a seedy Atlantic City strip club to the Park Hyatt Tokyo, from a hippie vegetarian co-op to the legendary El Bulli—while balancing her consuming work with her sometimes ambivalent relationship to marriage and motherhood.
As the food world careens toward an overdue reckoning and Laurie’s mentors face their own high-profile descents, she is confronted with the questions of where she belongs and how to hold on to the parts of her life’s work that she truly values: care and feeding.]]>
author: Laurie Woolever
name: Elena
average rating: 3.59
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/03
shelves: to-read
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Alice Scott is an eternal optimist still dreaming of her big writing break. Hayden Anderson is a Pulitzer-prize winning human thundercloud. And they’re both on balmy Little Crescent Island for the same reason: To write the biography of a woman no one has seen in years--or at least to meet with the octogenarian who claims to be the Margaret Ives. Tragic heiress, former tabloid princess, and daughter of one of the most storied (and scandalous) families of the 20th Century.
When Margaret invites them both for a one-month trial period, after which she’ll choose the person who’ll tell her story, there are three things keeping Alice’s head in the game.
One: Alice genuinely likes people, which means people usually like Alice—and she has a whole month to win the legendary woman over.
Two: She’s ready for this job and the chance to impress her perennially unimpressed family with a Serious Publication
Three: Hayden Anderson, who should have no reason to be concerned about losing this book, is glowering at her in a shaken-to-the core way that suggests he sees her as competition.
But the problem is, Margaret is only giving each of them pieces of her story. Pieces they can’t swap to put together because of an ironclad NDA and an inconvenient yearning pulsing between them every time they’re in the same room.
And it’s becoming abundantly clear that their story—just like the tale Margaret’s spinning—could be a mystery, tragedy, or love ballad…depending on who’s telling it.]]>
author: Emily Henry
name: Elena
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/02
shelves: to-read
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The indigenous people of Hawai?i are known as kanaka maoli, “true people.” In the third century, they sailed over 2,000 miles across untraveled seas, traveling from the Marquesas to the most remote island chain in the world. According to legend, however, the true kanaka maoli were already there. They were two to three feet tall, squat and strong, good and kind, and bothered no one without cause—they were the Menehune. When the Hawaiians came, the menehune chieftains feared the changes they brought. So, on the night of a full moon, they called all men and their firstborn sons and ordered them to leave Hawai’i. Some refused and, instead, hid behind to remain with their families. In the early 1800s, Kauai chief Kaumauali?i took a census of his people—and 65 of his 2,000 subjects were all that remained of the original people of Hawai’i.?
?
Flash forward to sixteen-year-old Emma is out running errands when she comes across a boy from Hilo living in the woods, saying things that do not make sense. It’s here, in these woods, that Emma has memories of finding a space between “the worlds” as a child. She soon realizes this boy has accessed the place she?lost, as well as the people, the Menehune. She helps him hide?until whatever spell has been cast over him is broken. Together, Emma and the Hilo boy have to figure out what the Menehune want before it’s too late to save the only home any of them have known. ?]]>
author: Nikki Van De Car
name: Elena
average rating: 4.75
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/02
shelves: to-read
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Welcome to Bletchley Park… with dragons.
London, 1923. Dragons soar through the skies and protests erupt on the streets, but Vivian Featherswallow isn’t worried. She’s going to follow the rules, get an internship studying dragon languages, and make sure her little sister never has to risk growing up Third Class. By midnight, Viv has started a civil war.
With her parents arrested and her sister missing, all the safety Viv has worked for is collapsing around her. So when a lifeline is offered in the form of a mysterious ‘job’, she grabs it. Arriving at Bletchley Park, Viv discovers that she has been recruited as a codebreaker helping the war effort – if she succeeds, she and her family can all go home again. If she doesn’t, they’ll all die.
At first Viv believes that her challenge, of discovering the secrets of a hidden dragon language, is doable. But the more she learns, the more she realises that the bubble she’s grown up in isn’t as safe as she thought, and eventually Viv must What war is she really fighting?
An epic, sweeping fantasy with an incredible Dark Academia setting, a clandestine, slow-burn enemies-to-lovers romance, and an unputdownable story, filled with twists and turns, betrayals and secret identities, A Language of Dragons is the unmissable debut of 2025, from an extraordinary new voice.]]>
author: S.F. Williamson
name: Elena
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/01
date added: 2025/04/01
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It’s the early 1800s, and Clover travels the impoverished borderlands of the Unified States with her father, a physician. See to the body before you, he teaches her, but Clover can’t help becoming distracted by bigger things, including the coming war between the US and France, ignited by a failed Louisiana Purchase, and the terrifying vermin, cobbled together from dead animals and spare parts, who patrol the woods. Most of all, she is consumed with interest for Oddities, ordinary objects with extraordinary abilities, such as a Teapot that makes endless amounts of tea and an Ice Hook that freezes everything it touches. Clover’s father has always disapproved of Oddities, but when he is murdered, Clover embarks on a perilous mission to protect the one secret Oddity he left behind. And as she uncovers the truth about her parents and her past, Clover emerges as a powerful agent of history. Here is an action-filled American fantasy of alternate history to rival the great British fantasies in ideas and scope.]]>
author: Eli Brown
name: Elena
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/01
shelves: to-read
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Located in a nameless desert somewhere in the great American Southwest, Night Vale is a small town where ghosts, angels, aliens, and government conspiracies are all commonplace parts of everyday life. It is here that the lives of two women, with two mysteries, will converge.
Nineteen-year-old Night Vale pawn shop owner Jackie Fierro is given a paper marked "King City" by a mysterious man in a tan jacket holding a deer skin suitcase. Everything about him and his paper unsettles her, especially the fact that she can't seem to get the paper to leave her hand, and that no one who meets this man can remember anything about him. Jackie is determined to uncover the mystery of King City and the man in the tan jacket before she herself unravels.
Night Vale PTA treasurer Diane Crayton's son, Josh, is moody and also a shape shifter. And lately Diane's started to see her son's father everywhere she goes, looking the same as the day he left years earlier, when they were both teenagers. Josh, looking different every time Diane sees him, shows a stronger and stronger interest in his estranged father, leading to a disaster Diane can see coming, even as she is helpless to prevent it.
Diane's search to reconnect with her son and Jackie's search for her former routine life collide as they find themselves coming back to two words: "King City". It is King City that holds the key to both of their mysteries, and their futures...if they can ever find it.]]>
author: Joseph Fink
name: Elena
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2015
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: dnf
review:
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![青のフラッグ 8 [Ao no Flag 8]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1591036038l/53575465._SX50_.jpg)
author: Kaito
name: Elena
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/28
date added: 2025/03/28
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![青のフラッグ 7 [Ao no Flag 7]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1578957190l/50438054._SX50_.jpg)
author: Kaito
name: Elena
average rating: 4.43
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/28
date added: 2025/03/28
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![青のフラッグ 6 [Ao no Flag 6]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1556218420l/45303124._SX50_.jpg)
author: Kaito
name: Elena
average rating: 4.53
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/28
date added: 2025/03/28
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From trips on private jets and encounters with world leaders to shocking accounts of misogyny and double standards behind the scenes, this searing memoir exposes both the personal and the political fallout when unfettered power and a rotten company culture take hold. In a gripping and often absurd narrative where a few people carelessly hold the world in their hands, this eye-opening memoir reveals what really goes on among the global elite.
Sarah Wynn-Williams tells the wrenching but fun story of Facebook, mapping its rise from stumbling encounters with juntas to Mark Zuckerberg’s reaction when he learned of Facebook’s role in Trump’s election. She experiences the challenges and humiliations of working motherhood within a pressure cooker of a workplace, all while Sheryl Sandberg urges her and others to “lean in.”
Careless People is a deeply personal account of why and how things have gone so horribly wrong in the past decade—told in a sharp, candid, and utterly disarming voice. A deep, unflinching look at the role that social media has assumed in our lives, Careless People reveals the truth about the leaders of Facebook: how the more power they grasp, the less responsible they become and the consequences this has for all of us.]]>
author: Sarah Wynn-Williams
name: Elena
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: currently-reading
review:
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When Rin aced the Keju—the Empire-wide test to find the most talented youth to learn at the Academies—it was a shock to everyone: to the test officials, who couldn’t believe a war orphan from Rooster Province could pass without cheating; to Rin’s guardians, who believed they’d finally be able to marry her off and further their criminal enterprise; and to Rin herself, who realized she was finally free of the servitude and despair that had made up her daily existence. That she got into Sinegard—the most elite military school in Nikan—was even more surprising.
But surprises aren’t always good.
Because being a dark-skinned peasant girl from the south is not an easy thing at Sinegard. Targeted from the outset by rival classmates for her color, poverty, and gender, Rin discovers she possesses a lethal, unearthly power—an aptitude for the nearly-mythical art of shamanism. Exploring the depths of her gift with the help of a seemingly insane teacher and psychoactive substances, Rin learns that gods long thought dead are very much alive—and that mastering control over those powers could mean more than just surviving school.
For while the Nikara Empire is at peace, the Federation of Mugen still lurks across a narrow sea. The militarily advanced Federation occupied Nikan for decades after the First Poppy War, and only barely lost the continent in the Second. And while most of the people are complacent to go about their lives, a few are aware that a Third Poppy War is just a spark away . . .
Rin’s shamanic powers may be the only way to save her people. But as she finds out more about the god that has chosen her, the vengeful Phoenix, she fears that winning the war may cost her humanity . . . and that it may already be too late.]]>
author: R.F. Kuang
name: Elena
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/28
date added: 2025/03/28
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With no other options, Rin joins forces with the powerful Dragon Warlord, who has a plan to conquer Nikan, unseat the Empress, and create a new Republic. Rin throws herself into his war. After all, making war is all she knows how to do.
But the Empress is a more powerful foe than she appears, and the Dragon Warlord’s motivations are not as democratic as they seem. The more Rin learns, the more she fears her love for Nikan will drive her away from every ally and lead her to rely more and more on the Phoenix’s deadly power. Because there is nothing she won’t sacrifice for her country and her vengeance.
The sequel to R.F. Kuang’s acclaimed debut THE POPPY WAR, THE DRAGON REPUBLIC combines the history of 20th-century China with a gripping world of gods and monsters, to devastating effect.]]>
author: R.F. Kuang
name: Elena
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/28
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: altbr
review:
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It’s 1985 and ten-year-old Gabrielle?is excited to be moving from Haiti to America. Unfortunately, her parents?won’t be able to join her yet and she’ll be living in a place called Brooklyn, New York, with relatives she has never met. She promises her parents that she will behave, but life proves to be difficult in the United States, from learning the language to?always feeling like she doesn’t fit in to?being bullied. So when a witch offers?her a chance to speak English perfectly and be “American,” she makes the deal. But soon she realizes how much she has given up by?trying to fit in and, along with her two new friends (one of them a talking rat), takes on the witch in an epic battle to try to reverse the spell.?
Gabrielle is a funny and engaging heroine you won’t soon forget in this sweet and lyrical novel that’s perfect for fans of Hurricane Child and Front Desk.]]>
author: Marie Arnold
name: Elena
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/27
shelves: to-read
review:
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![青のフラッグ 5 [Ao no Flag 5]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1538662347l/42177369._SX50_.jpg)
author: Kaito
name: Elena
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/27
date added: 2025/03/27
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Grocery Shopping with My Mother originated as social media posts about these visits and evolved into a breathtaking collection of thirty-two new poems, crafted like an album, plus four bonus tracks celebrating a great love of wordplay. Culturally rooted in the literary traditions of Ntozake Shange and Allen Ginsberg, Powell’s poems honor the likes of V (formerly Eve Ensler), bell hooks, and Sidney Poitier.
Grocery Shopping with My Mother dives into the complexities of relationships and contemporary themes with honesty and vulnerability. Creatively and spiritually inspired by Stevie Wonder’s Songs in the Key of Life, Powell’s poems shift in form and style, from praise chants to reverential meditations to, most importantly, innovative hope.]]>
author: Kevin Powell
name: Elena
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: to-read
review:
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I can't understand why – out of the four hockey players I'm sharing a house with this semester – Finn Howard's the one who catches my eye.
The guy never smiles. He doesn't say much and disapproves plenty.
But, something about him feels familiar. Something about him feels safe.
I'm not falling for Finn, I'm just curious. Could I make him smile? It wouldn't hurt to try. I love a good challenge. And who knows, maybe it'll distract me from pining over a guy I meet online.
Finn
I don't get nervous unless I'm on the ice. So why does my chest feel tight whenever Naomi Lewis looks in my direction?
She's witty, kind, and happy. How is someone that happy all the time?
If her sunny disposition isn't enough to distract me, the fact that her voice sounds exactly like the streamer I anonymously moderate for will.
If Naomi is her, she's in for a huge disappointment. I'm not the guy she thinks I am...not anymore, at least. And for that reason alone, I should stay away from her. I should stop trying to get closer. I should stop wanting her because she fell for someone else. Someone I will never be again.]]>
author: Deanna Grey
name: Elena
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: to-read
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![青のフラッグ 4 [Ao no Flag 4]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1529158257l/40540795._SX50_.jpg)
author: Kaito
name: Elena
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/25
date added: 2025/03/25
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Somadina and her twin brother, Jayaike, are practically the same person: they finish each other's sentences and make each other whole. When the twins come of age, their magical gifts begin to develop, but while Jayaike's powers enchant, Somadina's cause fear to ripple through her town.
Always an outsider, Somadina now faces blatant--and dangerous--hostility. And things go from bad to worse when her brother—the one person she trusted—vanishes. Somadina knows that no matter the dangers, she must track him down. Even if it means entering the Sacred Forest. Even if it means grueling, otherworldly travel she may not survive. Even if it means finding the hidden places where those closest to the spirit world don't dare to go. Does Somadina have the strength --within both her body and her soul -- for the trying journey ahead?
National Book Award finalist Akwaeke Emezi masterfully weaves a tale of family, identity, and the power of the past, in a world where the extraordinary is ordinary.]]>
author: Akwaeke Emezi
name: Elena
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/25
shelves: to-read, arc
review:
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"I'm going to call you Danny. What are you going to name me?"
"Angelo."
Danny is spending his sixteenth summer in Rome. As his mother spends the day at work in a mysterious museum, he wanders the ancient sites and streets. Soon after his arrival, he encounters a shadow... who becomes a voice... who becomes a boy his age. Angelo.
Soon Danny and Angelo are spending as much time as they can together, piecing together stories of the city while only gradually letting their own histories be shared. Attraction leads to affection, and affection leads to both an intimate closeness and a profound fear of what happens next. Danny has never really had a home, or known the love of another boy. Angelo seems to have more experience... but he also has secrets just out of Danny’s reach.
Run Away With Me is a stunning creation, weaving words and illustration to tell the story of a transformative love over the course of one Roman summer.]]>
author: Brian Selznick
name: Elena
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/25
shelves: to-read, tbrhl
review:
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Lilian Estrada seemingly has it all: an ob-gyn star on the rise, a master at balancing work with whirlwind romances and part of a family of fiercely loyal and exceptional women, all bound together by an extraordinary secret. The Estrada women each possess a unique power, and Lily shines with the rare gift to manipulate memories. Yet not even her mystical abilities can shield her from a harrowing event at the hospital, one that sends her powers—and her confidence—spiraling out of control.
Seeking solace, Lily retreats to her family's ancestral home in Mexico, only to find herself face-to-face with a ghost from her past—Sam, the first love she never forgot. Nearly a decade since she last saw him, Sam is hardly the boy she once knew, and as old flames spark to life, Lily must navigate the mysteries of their shared history and the depths of her own heart if she hopes to control her unpredictable magic.]]>
author: J.C. Cervantes
name: Elena
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/25
shelves: to-read
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Brianna Rogers has been told a time (or six) she needs to stop jumping into things head first. But when the principal rescinds his approval for a library upgrade, deciding to spend the money on a football field instead, she sees red. Literally. Brianna throws her hat in the ring and joins a team of teachers who will spend their summer in a Mars simulation. As the sister of an astronaut, this should be easy, right? What she didn’t count on was the last-minute addition to the team—Roman: science teacher, son of the principal, and too handsome for his own good.
Roman and Brianna have been hot and cold all year, and living in close quarters intensifies their animosity and attraction. Brianna is sure he’s been sent by his father to sabotage them, foiling their chance at prize money that will cover all of the school’s actual needs. But each day, Roman proves himself to be a dedicated teammate—and Brianna finds herself falling harder and harder. While it’s clear the feeling is mutual, she can’t shake the sense that he’s hiding something. As the simulation nears its end, Brianna realizes she may have to make an impossible choice, between the school she’s dedicated herself to, and the man who has won his way into her heart.]]>
author: Etta Easton
name: Elena
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/25
shelves: to-read
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Yael Clauneck is the only scion of an obscenely wealthy banking family with its fingers in every pie in the realm. They’re on the precipice of a predetermined life when they flee their own graduation party, galloping away in search of…well, they’re not sure, but maybe the chance to feel like life can still be a grand adventure.
Margot Greenwillow—talented plant witch, tea lover, and greenhouse owner—has never felt further from adventure in her life. She’s been desperately trying to keep what remains of her family's magic remedies business afloat. So when her childhood friend and former crush, Yael, rides back into her life, she’s shocked. But perhaps this could be a good thing. After all, Margot could use an assistant in the greenhouses.
Yael has no experience or, honestly, practical skills, but they’re delighted to accept. They can lay low for a while, flirting with Margot while they figure out what to do next. Meanwhile, Margot has plans of her own—but plans are notoriously unreliable things, unlikely to survive a swiftly blooming mutual attraction, not to mention the machinations of parents determined to get their heir back . . . no matter the cost.]]>
author: Jamie Pacton
name: Elena
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/25
shelves: to-read
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Diego Benevides works hard. His single mother encourages him to stay focused on school, on getting into college, on getting out of their crumbling neighborhood. That’s why she gave him her car.
Diego’s best friend, Lawson, needs a ride—because Lawson is dealing. As long as Diego’s not carrying, not selling, it’s cool. It’s just weed.
But when Lawson starts carrying powder and pills and worse, their friendship is tested and their lives are threatened. As the lines between dealer and driver blur, everything Diego has worked for is jeopardized, and he faces a deadly reckoning with the choices he and his best friend have made.
Award-winning memoirist and poet Rex Ogle’s searing first novel-in-verse is an unforgettable story of the power and price of loyalty.]]>
author: Rex Ogle
name: Elena
average rating: 4.51
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/25
shelves: to-read
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Since the Orisha War that rained thousands of deities down on the streets of Lagos, David Mogo, demigod, scours Eko’s dank underbelly for a living wage as a freelance Godhunter. Despite pulling his biggest feat yet by capturing a high god for a renowned Eko wizard, David knows his job’s bad luck. He’s proved right when the wizard conjures a legion of Taboos—feral godling-child hybrids—to seize Lagos for himself. To fix his mistake and keep Lagos standing, David teams up with his foster wizard, the high god’s twin sister and a speech-impaired Muslim teenage girl to defeat the wizard.]]>
author: Suyi Davies Okungbowa
name: Elena
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/25
shelves: to-read
review:
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![青のフラッグ 3 [Ao no Flag 3]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1513657900l/37573473._SX50_.jpg)
author: Kaito
name: Elena
average rating: 4.43
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/24
date added: 2025/03/24
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![青のフラッグ 2 [Ao no Flag 2]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1501293779l/35847241._SX50_.jpg)
author: Kaito
name: Elena
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/24
date added: 2025/03/24
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Love is already hard enough, but it becomes an unnavigable maze for unassuming high school student Taichi Ichinose and his shy classmate Futaba Kuze when they begin to fall for each other after their same-sex best friends have already fallen for them.
For some reason, Taichi Ichinose just can’t stand Futaba Kuze. But at the start of his third year in high school, he finds himself in the same homeroom as her, along with his childhood friend Toma Mita, a star athlete. But one day, Futaba opens up to Taichi and admits she has a crush on Toma. She then asks for his help in confessing to him! There’s just one problem—Toma seems to already have a secret crush on someone else.]]>
author: Kaito
name: Elena
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/23
date added: 2025/03/23
shelves:
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Raised in South Carolina and New York, Woodson always felt halfway home in each place. In vivid poems, she shares what it was like to grow up as an African American in the 1960s and 1970s, living with the remnants of Jim Crow and her growing awareness of the Civil Rights movement. Touching and powerful, each poem is both accessible and emotionally charged, each line a glimpse into a child’s soul as she searches for her place in the world. Woodson’s eloquent poetry also reflects the joy of finding her voice through writing stories, despite the fact that she struggled with reading as a child. Her love of stories inspired her and stayed with her, creating the first sparks of the gifted writer she was to become.]]>
author: Jacqueline Woodson
name: Elena
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/22
date added: 2025/03/22
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Middle school student Izuku Midoriya wants to be a hero more than anything, but he hasn’t got an ounce of power in him. With no chance of ever getting into the prestigious U.A. High School for budding heroes, his life is looking more and more like a dead end. Then an encounter with All Might, the greatest hero of them all, gives him a chance to change his destiny…]]>
author: Kohei Horikoshi
name: Elena
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/22
date added: 2025/03/22
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Sixteen-year-old dock boy Will is on the run, pursued by the men who killed his mother. When an old servant tells him of his destiny to fight beside the Stewards, Will is ushered into a world of magic, where he must train to play a vital role in the oncoming battle against the Dark.
As London is threatened by the Dark King’s return, the reborn heroes and villains of a long-forgotten war begin to draw battle lines. But as the young descendants of Light and Dark step into their destined roles, old allegiances, old enmities and old flames are awakened. Will must stand with the last heroes of the Light to prevent the fate that destroyed their world from returning to destroy his own.]]>
author: C.S. Pacat
name: Elena
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves: to-read
review:
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It is freezing in the churchyard, even before the dead arrive.
Every year, Blue Sargent stands next to her clairvoyant mother as the soon-to-be dead walk past. Blue herself never sees them—not until this year, when a boy emerges from the dark and speaks directly to her.
His name is Gansey, and Blue soon discovers that he is a rich student at Aglionby, the local private school. Blue has a policy of staying away from Aglionby boys. Known as Raven Boys, they can only mean trouble.
But Blue is drawn to Gansey, in a way she can’t entirely explain. He has it all—family money, good looks, devoted friends—but he’s looking for much more than that. He is on a quest that has encompassed three other Raven Boys: Adam, the scholarship student who resents all the privilege around him; Ronan, the fierce soul who ranges from anger to despair; and Noah, the taciturn watcher of the four, who notices many things but says very little.
For as long as she can remember, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love to die. She never thought this would be a problem. But now, as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she’s not so sure anymore.]]>
author: Maggie Stiefvater
name: Elena
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/21
shelves: to-read
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As the day dawns on the fiftieth annual Hunger Games, fear grips the districts of Panem. This year, in honor of the Quarter Quell, twice as many tributes will be taken from their homes.
Back in District 12, Haymitch Abernathy is trying not to think too hard about his chances. All he cares about is making it through the day and being with the girl he loves.
When Haymitch’s name is called, he can feel all his dreams break. He’s torn from his family and his love, shuttled to the Capitol with the three other District 12 tributes: a young friend who’s nearly a sister to him, a compulsive oddsmaker, and the most stuck-up girl in town. As the Games begin, Haymitch understands he’s been set up to fail. But there’s something in him that wants to fight . . . and have that fight reverberate far beyond the deadly arena.]]>
author: Suzanne Collins
name: Elena
average rating: 4.67
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/20
date added: 2025/03/20
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"Smart, swift, sure-footed and fleet-winged, The Book of Gothel launches its magic from a most reliable source: the troubled heart. Mary McMyne is a magician."—Gregory Maguire, NYT bestselling author of Wicked
Germany, 1156. Shunned by her village for her unusual fainting spells and black eyes, young Haelewise's only solace lies in her mother's stories of witches, magic wolf-skins, and ancient mist-cloaked towers. When her mother dies, she sets off through the woods for the mysterious tower of fable: Gothel. There, Haelewise discovers a haven, a safe refuge for women like her and for those who have lost their way in the harsh world of men. A place where magic lives and where the fairy tales of her mother's stories have more truth than she'd ever imagined.
Praise for The Book of Gothel:
"A sprawling epic, full of magic, love, and heartbreak." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"A luscious origin story."—Booklist (starred review)]]>
author: Mary McMyne
name: Elena
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/20
shelves: tbrhl, challenge-2025, currently-reading
review:
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A buoyant, mouth-watering oasis of a novel, Kate & Frida is a love letter to bookshops and booksellers, to the way stories shape how we perceive ourselves, to the passion we bring to life in our twenties, and to the last precious years before the internet changed everything.
Twenty-something Frida Rodriguez comes to Paris in 1991, relishing the city’s butter-soaked cuisine and seeking her future as a war correspondent. But when she writes to a bookshop in Seattle, she receives more than just the book she requests. A friendship begins that will redefine the person she thought she wanted to become.?
Seattle bookseller Kate Fair is transformed by Frida’s free spirit, spurred to kiss her handsome coworker, to believe in herself as a writer, and to find beauty even in loss.?Through the most tumultuous years of their young lives—personally and globally—Kate and Frida’s friendship sustains and nourishes them as they show each other how to overcome self-doubt and the necessity of embracing joy even through our darkest hours.]]>
author: Kim Fay
name: Elena
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/20
shelves: to-read
review:
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author: Amy Lin
name: Elena
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/20
date added: 2025/03/20
shelves:
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Ever since she turned sixteen, Nimmi has wanted to see her mother. Though she has a loving but overprotective father and a budding relationship, she yearns to travel to Sri Lanka to confront the mother who refused to leave the island during a war, not even for Nimmi’s sake. Her father is going back for the first time as a reporter on assignment, but he refuses to take her, deeming Sri Lanka too dangerous.
But then Nimmi's mother appears to her in a dream, asking her to come find her, and Nimmi knows she must go. Her father is livid when he sees her at baggage claim, but by then it’s too late, and he reluctantly agrees to help Nimmi make contact with her mother. In Sri Lanka, Nimmi tags along with her father and his guide, past checkpoints and armed soldiers and increasing hints of the war that rages there.
However, the day after Christmas, disaster strikes and a tsunami ravages the island. Stranded amid the devastation and destruction, can Nimmi reunite with her mother? Through her journey, Nimmi might just learn that the person she most needed to find was herself.]]>
author: S.J. Sindu
name: Elena
average rating: 4.35
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/20
shelves: to-read
review:
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In 2267, Earth has just begun to recover from worldwide ecological disasters. Minh is part of the generation that first moved back up to the surface of the Earth from the underground hells, to reclaim humanity's ancestral habitat. She's spent her entire life restoring river ecosystems, but lately the kind of long-term restoration projects Minh works on have been stalled due to the invention of time travel. When she gets the opportunity take a team to 2000 BC to survey the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, she jumps at the chance to uncover the secrets of the shadowy think tank that controls time travel technology.]]>
author: Kelly Robson
name: Elena
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/20
shelves: to-read
review:
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Danica Pierce has one great love in her life: work. As one of the top divorce lawyers in Austin, Danica lets her caseload keep her warm at night and has no problem being married to her job, not when love only ends in hurt. When the biggest case of her career gives her a shot at making partner, it seems like nothing could possibly stand in her way...except for her infuriating secret: she's sleeping with the enemy.
Ezra Hart is known for charming his way in and out of a courtroom. In the matter of winning Danica Pierce's heart, however, he's been far less successful. With her verdict to keep things purely physical with no chance of appeal, Ezra struggles to show Danica he's more than the insufferable playboy she's pegged him to be--especially since they find themselves on opposing sides of Danica's most important case to date.
While Dani and Ezra battle it out in the courtroom, the real trial is the one happening between them. When Dani realizes that everything she knows of Ezra might be hearsay--and that she's not the only one with emotional baggage--she must choose between her fear of trusting again and the feelings blossoming between her and the man she thought was her worst enemy.]]>
author: Lana Ferguson
name: Elena
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/19
shelves: to-read
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Poppy never dreamed she would find the love she’s found with Prince Casteel. She wants to revel in her happiness but first they must free his brother and find hers. It’s a dangerous mission and one with far-reaching consequences neither dreamed of. Because Poppy is the Chosen, the Blessed. The true ruler of Atlantia. She carries the blood of the King of Gods within her. By right the crown and the kingdom are hers.
The enemy and the warrior…
Poppy has only ever wanted to control her own life, not the lives of others, but now she must choose to either forsake her birthright or seize the gilded crown and become the Queen of Flesh and Fire. But as the kingdoms’ dark sins and blood-drenched secrets finally unravel, a long-forgotten power rises to pose a genuine threat. And they will stop at nothing to ensure that the crown never sits upon Poppy’s head.
A lover and heartmate…
But the greatest threat to them and to Atlantia is what awaits in the far west, where the Queen of Blood and Ash has her own plans, ones she has waited hundreds of years to carry out. Poppy and Casteel must consider the impossible—travel to the Lands of the Gods and wake the King himself. And as shocking secrets and the harshest betrayals come to light, and enemies emerge to threaten everything Poppy and Casteel have fought for, they will discover just how far they are willing to go for their people—and each other.
And now she will become Queen.]]>
author: Jennifer L. Armentrout
name: Elena
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/18
date added: 2025/03/18
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Where there’s a will, there’s a war.
Thayer Wren, the brilliant CEO of Wrenfare Magitech and so-called father of modern technology, is dead. Any one of his three telepathically and electrokinetically gifted children would be a plausible inheritor to the Wrenfare throne.
Or at least, so they like to think.
Meredith, textbook accomplished eldest daughter and the head of her own groundbreaking biotech company, has recently cured mental illness. You're welcome! If only her father's fortune wasn't her last hope for keeping her journalist ex-boyfriend from exposing what she really is: a total fraud.
Arthur, second-youngest congressman in history, fights the good fight every day of his life. And yet, his wife might be leaving him, and he's losing his re-election campaign. But his dead father’s approval in the form of a seat on the Wrenfare throne might just turn his sinking ship around.
Eilidh, once the world's most famous ballerina, has spent the last five years as a run-of-the-mill marketing executive at her father’s company after a life-altering injury put an end to her prodigious career. She might be lacking in accolades compared to her siblings, but if her father left her everything, it would finally validate her worth—by confirming she'd been his favorite all along.
On the pipeline of gifted kid to clinically depressed adult, nobody wins—but which Wren will come out on top?]]>
author: Olivie Blake
name: Elena
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves: to-read
review:
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Young Hiram Walker was born into bondage. When his mother was sold away, Hiram was robbed of all memory of her—but was gifted with a mysterious power. Years later, when Hiram almost drowns in a river, that same power saves his life. This brush with death births an urgency in Hiram and a daring scheme: to escape from the only home he’s ever known.
So begins an unexpected journey that takes Hiram from the corrupt grandeur of Virginia’s proud plantations to desperate guerrilla cells in the wilderness, from the coffin of the Deep South to dangerously idealistic movements in the North. Even as he’s enlisted in the underground war between slavers and the enslaved, Hiram’s resolve to rescue the family he left behind endures.
This is the dramatic story of an atrocity inflicted on generations of women, men, and children—the violent and capricious separation of families—and the war they waged to simply make lives with the people they loved. Written by one of today’s most exciting thinkers and writers, The Water Dancer is a propulsive, transcendent work that restores the humanity of those from whom everything was stolen.]]>
author: Ta-Nehisi Coates
name: Elena
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves: to-read
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It's all about blood.
The blood spilled between the Republic of Mareen and the armies of the Blood Emperor long ago. The blood gifts of Mareen's deadliest enemies. The blood that runs through the elite War Houses of Mareen, the rulers of the Tribunal dedicated to keeping the republic alive.
The blood of the former Legatus, Verne Amari, murdered.
For his granddaughter, Ikenna, the only thing steady in her life was the man who had saved Mareen. The man who had trained her in secret, not just in martial skills, but in harnessing the blood gift that coursed through her.
Who trained her to keep that a secret.
But now there are too many secrets, and with her grandfather assassinated, Ikenna knows two things: that only someone on the Tribunal could have ordered his death, and that only a Praetorian Guard could have carried out that order.
Bent on revenge as much as discovering the truth, Ikenna pledges herself to the Praetorian Trials--a brutal initiation that only a quarter of the aspirants survive. She subjects herself to the racism directed against her half-Khanaian heritage and the misogyny of a society that cherishes progeny over prodigy, all while hiding a power that--if found out--would subject her to execution...or worse. Ikenna is willing to risk it all because she needs to find out who murdered her grandfather...and then she needs to kill them.
Mareen has been at peace for a long time...
Ikenna joining the Praetorians is about to change all that.
Magic and technology converge in the first part of this stunning debut duology, where loyalty to oneself--and one's blood--is more important than anything.]]>
author: N.E. Davenport
name: Elena
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/17
shelves: to-read
review:
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After an imminent yet unnamed danger forces people across Colorado to leave their homes, a group of kids including an aspiring filmmaker and a budding journalist find themselves in the same evacuation camp. As they cope with the aftermath of having their world upended, they grow curious about the mysterious threat.
And as they begin to investigate, they start to discover that there’s less truth and more cover-up to what they’re being told. Can they get to the root of the conspiracy, expose the bad actors, and bring an end to the upheaval before it’s too late?]]>
author: Megan E. Freeman
name: Elena
average rating: 4.10
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/17
date added: 2025/03/17
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Come, claim your wings.
Lift your life above the earth,
return to the land of your father’s birth.
What exactly is it to be Black in America?
Well, for some, it’s learning how to morph the hatred placed by others into love for oneself; for others, it’s unearthing the strength it takes to continue to hold one’s swagger when multitudinous factors work to make Black lives crumble. For some, it’s gathering around the kitchen table as Grandma tells the story of Anansi the spider, while for others it's grinning from ear to ear while eating auntie’s spectacular 7Up cake.
Black experiences and traditions are complex, striking, and vast—they stretch longer than the Nile and are four times as deep—and carry more than just unimaginable pain—there is also joy.
Featuring an all-star group of thirty-seven powerful poetic voices, including such luminaries as Kwame Alexander, James Baldwin, Ibi Zoboi, Audre Lorde, Nikki Giovanni, and Gwendolyn Brooks, this riveting anthology depicts the diversity of the Black experience by fostering a conversation about race, faith, heritage, and resilience between fresh poets and the literary ancestors that came before them.
Edited by Taylor Byas, Erica Martin, and Coretta Scott King New Talent Award winner Amber McBride, Poemhood will simultaneously highlight the duality and nuance at the crux of so many Black experiences with poetry being the psalm constantly playing.]]>
author: Amber McBride
name: Elena
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/16
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves:
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I've always been good at following rules.?Until she came.?My name is Tyler Anselm Bell. I'm twenty-nine years old. Six months ago, I broke my vow of celibacy on the altar of my own church, and God help me, I would do it again.?I am a priest and this is my confession.
Priest is a standalone, full-length novel with an HEA. ?For mature audiences only]]>
author: Sierra Simone
name: Elena
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/15
date added: 2025/03/15
shelves:
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Eli Francis is stuck. Stuck in an assistant position at?the online magazine Vent?when he should be a writer. Stuck with a boss who dangles a promotion but would rather he just fetch the coffee. Stuck working alongside the ex who has had no trouble moving up at work…or moving on.
When Eli’s roommates push him to date so he can get over his ex once and for all, they set him up with Peter Park. Tall, handsome, and unbelievably awkward. The date is a complete disaster, and further proof to Eli that love isn’t for him. But when his boss overhears Eli recounting the catastrophic night, he suggests teaching Peter to be a better boyfriend through a series of simulated dates so he can write an article about it.
But Eli has other ideas…Eli plays along, pretending to write the article, while secretly interviewing Peter about growing up queer in the South and coming-of-age dating wise in adulthood. Eli hopes writing this sort of piece will?finally get him the promotion he deserves. And in exchange, he will teach Peter how to be a better boyfriend.
But the more time Eli spends with Peter, the closer they become, and the lines between what’s real and what’s fake begin to blur. Before long Eli is forced to face his greatest fears to become the writer he wants to be and secure the love he’s always needed.?]]>
author: Mason Deaver
name: Elena
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/15
shelves: to-read
review:
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In a place and time unknown, two elderly sisters live in a walled garden, secluded from the outside world. Evelyn and Lily have only ever known each other. What was before the garden, they have forgotten; what lies beyond it, they do not know. Each day is spent in languid service to their home: tending the bees, planting the crops, and dutifully following the instructions of the almanac written by their mother.
So when a nameless boy is found hiding in the boarded house at the center of their isolated grounds, their once-solitary lives are irrevocably disrupted. Who is he? Where did he come from? And most importantly, what does he want?
As suspicions gather and allegiances falter, Evelyn and Lily are forced to confront the dark truths about themselves, the garden, and the world as they’ve known it.]]>
author: Nick Newman
name: Elena
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/15
shelves: to-read
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Cassi loves spending time with her grandfather. His games, songs, and stories have always brought her endless joy. This visit with him, though, is different: Grandpa seems to be losing track of things, including everything from the stories they’re sharing to who Cassi herself is. So when he goes missing after wandering off from his own backyard, Cassi knows she has to figure out where he’s gone.
What she discovers is a world filled with memories, none of them her own. As she leaps from one memory to the next, she knows she’s getting closer and closer to finding her grandfather—but only if she can make sure he doesn’t slip away forever.]]>
author: Dean Stuart
name: Elena
average rating: 3.90
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/15
shelves: to-read
review:
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Spirit Keeper Eric isn’t prepared for this. He was just there to do his job and bring a soul into the Afterlife. Little did he expect to run into a too-familiar face from his past in the land of the living…
In this great expanse where what’s lost is found, fate, memories, and love intertwine as Kyra and Eric embark on a daring rescue mission to save a little boy from Death’s clutches. Afterlife: The Boy Next Realm is an epic Southeast Asian-inspired young adult fantasy graphic novel about one girl’s sacrifice as she fights to save what she loves.]]>
author: Gina Chew
name: Elena
average rating: 3.46
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/15
shelves: to-read
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IN THE YEAR 2044, reality is an ugly place. The only time teenage Wade Watts really feels alive is when he's jacked into the virtual utopia known as the OASIS. Wade's devoted his life to studying the puzzles hidden within this world's digital confines, puzzles that are based on their creator's obsession with the pop culture of decades past and that promise massive power and fortune to whoever can unlock them.
But when Wade stumbles upon the first clue, he finds himself beset by players willing to kill to take this ultimate prize. The race is on, and if Wade's going to survive, he'll have to win—and confront the real world he's always been so desperate to escape.]]>
author: Ernest Cline
name: Elena
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2011
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/13
date added: 2025/03/13
shelves:
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Father Isaias Flores may not have much, but he has his faith—and his dear friend Hector to keep him anchored when he is mired in self-doubt. But when Hector’s daughter, Violet, comes to Isaias with concerns that her father is acting strangely, Isaias’s doubts only increase, now with no one to keep him steadfast. For Hector seems to be possessed by something darker than even the traumas of the past, and Violet has nowhere else to turn to save her only family.
This is a problem that may require divine intervention—the rites of exorcism.
Unsure of his place in the church, doubting his gifts from God, and struggling to make sense of his feelings for the man he had thought was only a friend, Isaias isn’t sure if he is strong enough to save anyone’s soul from damnation.
For what can one man do against the torments of Hell?]]>
author: Tyler Battaglia
name: Elena
average rating: 4.46
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/13
shelves: to-read
review:
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Let us fly now to the empire of Orrun, where after twenty-four years of peace, Bersun the Brusque must end his reign. In the dizzying heat of mid-summer, seven contenders compete to replace him. They are exceptional warriors, thinkers, strategists—the best of the best.
Then one of them is murdered.
It falls to Neema Kraa, the emperor’s brilliant, idiosyncratic High Scholar, to find the killer before the trials end. To do so, she must untangle a web of deadly secrets that stretches back generations, all while competing against six warriors with their own dark histories and fierce ambitions. Neema believes she is alone. But we are here to help; all she has to do is let us in.
If she succeeds, she will win the throne. If she fails, death awaits her. But we won’t let that happen.
We are the Raven, and we are magnificent.]]>
author: Antonia Hodgson
name: Elena
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/13
shelves: to-read
review:
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Vacation Checklist: ?
Pack swim trunks.?
Apply sunscreen.?
Survive the apocalypse?
Professional underachiever Dan Foster is finally taking a vacation. Sure, his life has been average at best, and yeah, he’s never quite lived up to his potential. But after a few Miller Lites in paradise with his girlfriend, Mara, things are starting to look up.
Then the sun explodes.
With the island resort suddenly plunged into darkness (he really should’ve sprung for the travel insurance), Dan’s holiday goes from bad to worse when elite guests stage a coup and commandeer supplies. As temperatures drop and class tensions rise, revolution begins to brew on the island, and Dan accidentally becomes a beacon of hope for the surviving vacationers. But when one six-person plane is discovered that could get them back to the mainland, Dan realizes he has a choice to make.
Does he escape the island with Mara? Or does he stay and fight to become the most unlikely hero of the end of the world?
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author: M.J. Wassmer
name: Elena
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/11
shelves: dnf
review:
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On one side of the world, Aleya Ana-Ulai is desperate for a chance. Her family have written her off as a mistake, but she's determined to prove every last one of them wrong.
On the other, Kirby of Wall's End is searching for redemption. An ancient curse tore her life apart, but to fix it, she'll have to leave everything behind.
Fate sets them both on the path to Nivela, a city once poised to conquer the world with the power of a thousand stolen gods. Now the gates are closed and the old magic slumbers. Dead — or waiting for a spark to light it anew…
A character-driven science-fantasy road trip book with sword fights and a slowburn romance, Idolfire delves into the vastness of history and the terrifying power of organized faith.]]>
author: Grace Curtis
name: Elena
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/11
shelves: to-read
review:
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It's the early 1990s, and in the Irish village of Crossmore, Lucy feels out of place. Despite her fierce friendships, she's always felt this way, and the conventional path of marriage and motherhood doesn't appeal to her at all. Not even with handsome and doting Martin, her closest childhood friend.
Lucy begins to make sense of herself during a long hot summer, when a spark with her school friend Susannah escalates to an all-consuming infatuation, and, very quickly, to a desperate and devastating love.
Fearful of rejection from her small and conservative community, Lucy begins living a double life, hiding the most honest parts of herself in stolen moments with Susannah.
But with the end of school and the opportunity to leave Crossmore looming, Lucy must choose between two places, two people and two futures, each as terrifying as the other. But only one can offer her real happiness.
Sunburn is an astute and tender portrayal of first love, adolescent anxiety and the realities of growing up in a small town where tradition holds people tightly in its grasp.]]>
author: Chloe Michelle Howarth
name: Elena
average rating: 4.33
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/10
shelves: to-read
review:
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Let’s get one thing straight: this is a love story.
These days, Said Hossain spends most of his time away at boarding school. But when his favorite hometown librarian Ms. Barnes dies, he must return home to New Crosshaven for her funeral and for the summer. Too bad being home makes it a lot harder to avoid facing his ex-best friend, Tiwa Olatunji, or facing the daunting task of telling his Bangladeshi parents that he would rather be an artist than a doctor.
Tiwa doesn’t understand what made Said start ignoring her, but it’s probably that fancy boarding school of his. Though he’s unexpectedly staying through the summer, she’s determined to take a page from him and pretend he doesn’t exist. Besides, she has more than enough going on, between grieving her broken family and helping her mother throw the upcoming Eid celebration at the Islamic Center—a place that means so much to Tiwa.
But when the Islamic Center accidentally catches fire, it turns out the mayor plans to demolish the center entirely. Things are still tense between the ex-friends but Tiwa needs Said’s help if there’s any hope of changing the mayor’s mind, and Said needs a project to submit to art school (unbeknownst to anyone). Will all their efforts be enough to save the Islamic Center, save Eid, and maybe save their relationship?]]>
author: Faridah ?bíké-?yímídé
name: Elena
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/09
date added: 2025/03/09
shelves:
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author: Rex Ogle
name: Elena
average rating: 4.58
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:
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This debut romantasy perfect for fans of Sarah J. Maas and Rebecca Yarros delivers sizzling romance, cutthroat competition, a lush fantasy world, and an unforgettable heroine.
Blessed by the gods, Mona Arnett has the unique ability to divine soulmates, but she refuses to seek out her own—until she learns the king is dying without an heir, threatening the royal line and the world’s access to magic. Tasked with naming his future queen, Mona discovers the king’s soulmate is . . . her.
A royal match is the last thing Mona wants—especially when she starts falling for the king’s closest advisor—so she lies, cheats, and contends with scheming gods to hide the truth. But when this high-stakes game of thrones leads to murder, survival and the fate of the kingdom will depend on her finding the courage to face her destiny.
Delightful wit, spellbinding prose, and a flawed, funny protagonist you'll love from page one make this debut fantasy a must-read.]]>
author: Amanda M. Helander
name: Elena
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:
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author: Roshani Chokshi
name: Elena
average rating: 0.0
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:
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Romance is the last thing on Charlie’s mind.
On his first day at Valentine Academy for Boys, Charlie’s carefully crafted plan to hide his identity as the school’s only trans student is set in motion. Only to be immediately destroyed. Charlie has been assigned the worst roommate in the world (possibly the universe): Jasper Grimes, the boy who broke Charlie’s heart the year before he transitioned.
Except, Jasper doesn’t recognize Charlie.
Who knows how long until Jasper realizes the truth? Charlie has one shot at freedom and a dorm room all to himself, but only if he helps Jasper write love letters on behalf of their fellow students first. No problem. Charlie can help Jasper with some silly letters.
Long nights spent discussing deep romantic feelings with Jasper? Surely, no unintended consequences will arise…]]>
author: Page Powars
name: Elena
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:
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Sage Byrd has lived in the coastal town of Spunes, Oregon (not to be confused with Forks, Washington) her entire life. She's learned to love her small world, with the misfit animals on her hobby farm, and her friendships with the town’s inhabitants. But when her 5-year relationship ends and her ex, town-golden-boy Ian, suddenly gets engaged, Sage needs a win―something that will convince everyone to stop pitying her all the time, and to put Ian in his place. The Festival of Spunes, the town’s annual summer competition, would be the perfect opportunity. She just needs a partner.
Fisher Lange was a hotshot chef in New York City until the loss of his sister left him numb, grieving, and responsible for his teenage niece Indy. When Fisher loses his Michelin star along with his love of cooking, his boss sends him and Indy to Spunes on a much-needed summer sabbatical to consult on a restaurant opening. But when clashes with the townspeople threaten his last chance to redeem himself and a kiss with his new neighbor Sage leads to dating rumors, a strategic alliance might just be the best way to turn things around.
A deal is struck. Sage will improve Fisher’s image in the eyes of the town and remove the roadblocks he is facing with the restaurant, and Fisher will be Sage’s partner for the competition. But as their pact quickly turns into steamy rendezvous, emotional wounds begin to heal, and the pair tries to savor every moment, they start to realize that summer is racing by much faster than they would like...
Filled with spicy summer fun, small-town charm, and Big Feelings, this highly anticipated romcom is Tarah DeWitt’s best yet.]]>
author: Tarah DeWitt
name: Elena
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/07
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves:
review:
A small town romance between a disgraced Michelin Star chef and the town’s kindhearted golden girl. Each feels overshadowed by their pasts, so they decide to work together to break free from them. If they happen to develop feelings along the way. . . well, a summer fling sounds fun. Contains found family, hot single guardians, cute animals, delicious food, and fervent desire.
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Musical lover Riley has big aspirations to become a director on Broadway. Crucial to this plan is to bring back her high school’s spring musical, but when Riley takes her mom’s car without permission, she's grounded and stuck with the worst punishment: spending her after-school hours working at her dad’s game shop.
Riley can't waste her time working when she has a musical to save, so she convinces Nathan—a nerdy teen employee—to cover her shifts and, in exchange, she’ll flirt with him to make his gamer-girl crush jealous.
But Riley didn’t realize that meant joining Nathan's Dungeons & Dragons game…or that role playing would be so fun. Soon, Riley starts to think that flirting with Nathan doesn't require as much acting as she would've thought...]]>
author: Kristy Boyce
name: Elena
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/07
shelves: to-read
review:
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Lor has endured twelve long years of torment under the Aurora King’s rule. Her only desire is to escape and pay him back for every moment of misery she's endured.
When a surprise release finds her in the hands of the rival Sun King, Lor is thrust into the spotlight as she competes against nine other Tributes for the role of queen. If she wins his heart, she'll earn her freedom and finally get her revenge.
But Lor doesn't belong in the Sun Queen Trials. Not only does she not understand why she was freed, she isn’t a citizen of the Sun King’s court. The other Tributes resent her presence and will stop at nothing to ensure Lor is removed from the competition, permanently.
Now Lor must win, because if she loses, she dies. Or worse, she'll be returned to the evil—and now vengeful—Aurora King.]]>
author: Nisha J. Tuli
name: Elena
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/07
shelves: to-read
review:
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This time, they'll get it right.
Wren and Ellis Byrd fell in love as kids, had their son Sam when they were only teenagers, and built a life together in the coastal town of Spunes, Oregon. They were made for one another…until they fell apart.
Now divorced and in their 30s, Wren runs the bakery in town, while Ellis works as a firefighter. They live separate lives, though they are hardly off each other’s minds.
When Sam gets accepted into college and the pair help him move in together, Ellis convinces Wren to take an extended road trip back to Spunes with him to see if they can give their relationship one last chance. Amid the gorgeous scenery of the California coastline, dreamy destinations, and a great deal of long-yearned-for proximity, Wren starts to think it just might be possible. But the two still have to contend with their tumultuous past in order to move forward. And when spoken words fail, sometimes the written word must bridge the gap.
Will they make the most of what’s left of forever? Or will they let each other go for good?
Brimming with big feelings and packed with steam, Left of Forever is bestseller Tarah DeWitt at the top of her game.]]>
author: Tarah DeWitt
name: Elena
average rating: 4.62
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/06
shelves: to-read
review:
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1826. The sun is setting on the golden age of piracy, and the legendary Dragon Fleet, the scourge of the South China Sea, is no more. Its ruthless leader, a woman known only as the Head of the Dragon, is now only a story, like the ones Xiang has grown up with all her life. She desperately wants to prove her worth, especially to her mother, a shrewd businesswoman who never seems to have enough time for Xiang. Her father is also only a story, dead at sea before Xiang was born. Her single memento of him is a pendant she always wears, a simple but plain piece of gold jewelry.
But the pendant's true nature is revealed when a mysterious girl named Anh steals it, only to return it to Xiang in exchange for her help in decoding the tiny map scroll hidden inside. The revelation that Xiang's father sailed with the Dragon Fleet and tucked away this secret changes everything. Rumor has it that the legendary Head of the Dragon had one last treasure—the plunder of a thousand ports—that for decades has only been a myth, a fool's journey.
Xiang is convinced this map could lead to the fabled treasure. Captivated with the thrill of adventure, she joins Anh and her motley crew off in pursuit of the island. But the girls soon find that the sea—and especially those who sail it—are far more dangerous than the legends led them to believe.]]>
author: C.B. Lee
name: Elena
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/06
shelves: dnf
review:
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Olivetti gets a rare glimpse of action from Ernest’s mom, Beatrice--his used-to-be most frequent visitor—only for her to drop him off at Heartland Pawn Shop and leave him helplessly behind. When Olivetti learns Beatrice has mysteriously gone missing afterward, he believes he can help find her. He breaks the only rule of the “typewriterly code” and types back to Ernest, divulging Beatrice’s memories stored inside him.
Their search takes them across San Francisco—chasing clues, maybe committing a few misdemeanors. As Olivetti spills out the past, Ernest is forced to face what he and his family have been running from, The Everything That Happened. Only by working together will they find Beatrice, belonging, and the parts of themselves they’ve lost.]]>
author: Allie Millington
name: Elena
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/05
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves:
review:
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Conor has the same dream every night, ever since his mother first fell ill, ever since she started the treatments that don't quite seem to be working. But tonight is different. Tonight, when he wakes, there's a visitor at his window. It's ancient, elemental, a force of nature. And it wants the most dangerous thing of all from Conor. It wants the truth.
Patrick Ness takes the final idea of the late, award-winning writer Siobhan Dowd and weaves an extraordinary and heartbreaking tale of mischief, healing and above all, the courage it takes to survive.]]>
author: Patrick Ness
name: Elena
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: to-read
review:
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After growing up together on the luxurious SS Lark, Neeta Pandey and Emery Botwright are ready to start their lives. Emery wants to follow in his father’s footsteps and sail the Lark forever, while Neeta yearns to travel the world. But neither will have any future at all if the Lark’s new owner, Mr. Honeycutt, has his way.
Mr. Honeycutt . . . The first-class passengers adore him, while he makes the ship a nightmare for the crew. Twisted by unnatural appetites, the rich are actually transforming into something less than human, and their insatiable demands soon push the staff toward a—quite literal— burnout.
Something otherworldly is undeniably aboard the SS Lark, something horribly hungry. But it’s not Wick Farley: vampire, secret agent, and paranormal investigator. Alone and at sea, with only Neeta and Emery to help him, he must uncover the truth about Mr. Honeycutt. And fast—before a ravenous craving for power consumes them all.
Taylor Robin’s debut graphic novel is a thrilling supernatural adventure told in crackling, vibrant colors.]]>
author: Taylor Robin
name: Elena
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: to-read
review:
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Set in the author’s own teenage years, Raised By Ghosts begins in 1991 with semi autobiographical Briana in middle school. Classes are a bummer, but lunches are worse; either spent alone, or being teased. Traditionally a good student, Briana is not doing well in her academics, but keeps it a secret. Her parents (divorced) are a mess, and largely absent. She spends a lot of time by herself. By high school, she makes friends, and those connections are her only source of happiness as they help each other navigate adolescence. But life at home with each parent remains fraught. When her relationships at school begin to falter, she has no one to turn to, forcing Briana to grapple with her sense of self-worth, her longing for belonging, and her desire for authenticity in her relationships.
Raised By Ghosts is a powerful, affecting graphic novel for young adult readers. The story is told by shifting between Briana’s first-person class notes and diary entries. In her understated yet masterful approach to comics storytelling, Loewinsohn eschews dramatic confrontations and overt sentimentality, preferring instead to underscore the idea that sometimes acceptance and love can be communicated through quiet, everyday moments and close family bonds.]]>
author: Briana Loewinsohn
name: Elena
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: to-read
review:
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Raised in a politically divided family, Matilda wondered if she could be as courageous as her older sister who fought for suffrage. Joining the radical protest movement came with plenty of risk. Women were routinely scorned, harassed, arrested—and worse. And taking a stand for her rights could tear her family apart.
Told in powerful verse, One Step Forward follows Matilda's coming-of-age journey as she takes her first step into action. Amid the backdrop of World War I, Matilda’s story vividly highlights the extreme mental, physical, and emotional battles faced by the protestors leading up to the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment. It also reveals the bravery, hard work, and spirit of the women who paved the way for future generations to use their voices and votes.]]>
author: Marcie Flinchum Atkins
name: Elena
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/04
shelves: dnf
review:
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You know that one person you just can’t forget? Not the one that got away, but the one you had, until suddenly you didn’t?
Maki’s first love was her high school classmate, a girl named Midori. But Midori broke up with Maki at graduation, saying they were now "too old to be fooling around dating girls." Ten years later, Maki still can’t get Midori off her mind, and when the two women reconnect after a chance encounter, Maki realizes that, while her feelings haven’t changed, Midori has long moved on—in fact, she's engaged. Yet the more Maki hears Midori talk about her soon-to-be-husband, the more red flags she notices. And Midori has another secret, one she hasn’t yet shared with Maki. Will it be the last blow to Maki’s hopes that their romance might be rekindled? Or will it be the push that sets them on a new path—one they’ll travel together?]]>
author: Battan
name: Elena
average rating: 3.92
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/04
date added: 2025/03/04
shelves:
review:
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That thought pops into my head whenever I pull up my favorite social media app, but alas, every time I scroll, I learn something new about myself, and another one is born. And yes, I know I’m responsible for what the algorithm shows me, but I’m trying to ignore that fact.
Lately, my feed has been dominated by masked men. I’ve favorited videos with them dressed in full cosplay, decked out in futuristic military apparel, and wrapped up like ghouls.
But more than anything else, my FYP is filled with shirtless men wearing ghost masks. Bonus points if they’re heavily tattooed, wielding a knife, or covered in fake blood. At night, I dream about being chased by them, of them catching me and doing deliciously dark things to my more than willing body.
I never could have guessed that by sending one drunken text, those dreams would become my new reality.
Lights Out is a fast-paced dark romance with a morally grey male lead. Some themes and scenes may be disturbing to readers. Please check the TWs at the beginning of the book. ]]>
author: Navessa Allen
name: Elena
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/04
date added: 2025/03/04
shelves:
review:
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A god will return
When the earth and sky converge
Under the black sun
In the holy city of Tova, the winter solstice is usually a time for celebration and renewal, but this year it coincides with a solar eclipse, a rare celestial event proscribed by the Sun Priest as an unbalancing of the world.
Meanwhile, a ship launches from a distant city bound for Tova and set to arrive on the solstice. The captain of the ship, Xiala, is a disgraced Teek whose song can calm the waters around her as easily as it can warp a man’s mind. Her ship carries one passenger. Described as harmless, the passenger, Serapio, is a young man, blind, scarred, and cloaked in destiny. As Xiala well knows, when a man is described as harmless, he usually ends up being a villain.]]>
author: Rebecca Roanhorse
name: Elena
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves: to-read, tbrhl, challenge-2025
review:
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Meet Ove. He's a curmudgeon, the kind of man who points at people he dislikes as if they were burglars caught outside his bedroom window. He has staunch principles, strict routines, and a short fuse. People call him the bitter neighbor from hell, but must Ove be bitter just because he doesn't walk around with a smile plastered to his face all the time?
Behind the cranky exterior there is a story and a sadness. So when one November morning a chatty young couple with two chatty young daughters move in next door and accidentally flatten Ove's mailbox, it is the lead-in to a comical and heartwarming tale of unkempt cats, unexpected friendship, and the ancient art of backing up a U-Haul. All of which will change one cranky old man and a local residents' association to their very foundations.]]>
author: Fredrik Backman
name: Elena
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2012
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/02
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves:
review:
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Kris is a Shadester and a new mother to a baby born with a second shadow of her own. Grieving the loss of her wife and thoroughly unprepared for the reality of raising a child alone, Kris teeters on the edge of collapse, fumbling in a daze of alcohol, shame, and self-loathing. Yet as the kid grows, Kris finds her footing, raising a child whose irrepressible spark cannot be dampened by the harsh realities of the world.
With a first-person register reminiscent of the fierce self-disclosure of Sheila Heti and the poetic precision of Ocean Vuong, I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself is a bold debut novel that examines the long shadow of grief, the hard work of parenting, and the power of queer resistance.]]>
author: Marisa Crane
name: Elena
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/01
shelves: to-read
review:
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Take a well-fed nine-year-old with a big family and a fancy education. Fold in 2 revolutions, 2 civil wars, and one wholesale extermination. Subtract a reliable source of food, life savings, and family members, until all are gone. Shave down childhood dreams for approximately two decades, until only subsistence remains.
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In Slow Noodles, Chantha Nguon recounts her life as a Cambodia refugee who lost everything and everyone—her house, her country, her parents, her siblings, her friends—everything but the memories of her mother’s kitchen, the tastes and aromas of the foods her mother made before the dictator Pol Pot tore her country apart in the 1970s, killing millions of her compatriots. Nguon’s irrepressible spirit and determination come through in this emotional and poignant?but also lyrical and magical memoir that includes over 20 recipes for Khmer dishes like chicken lime soup, banh sung noodles, p?té de foie, curries, spring rolls, and stir-fries. For Nguon, recreating these dishes becomes an act of resistance, of reclaiming her place in the world, of upholding the values the Khmer Rouge sought to destroy, and of honoring the memory of her beloved mother.
From her idyllic early years in Battambang to hiding as a young girl in Phnom Penh as the country purges ethnic Vietnamese like Nguon and her family, from her escape to Saigon to the deaths of mother and sister there, from the poverty and devastation she experiences in a war-ravaged Vietnam to her decision to flee the country. We follow Chantha on a harrowing river crossing into Thailand—part of the exodus that gave rise to the name “boat people”—and her decades in a refugee camp there, until finally, denied passage to the West, she returns to a forever changed Cambodia. Nguon survives by cooking in a brothel, serving drinks in a nightclub, making and selling street food, becoming a suture-nurse treating refugees abused by Thai authorities, and weaving silk. Through it all, Nguon?relies on her mother’s “slow noodles” approach to healing and to cooking, one that prioritizes time and care over expediency.?Haunting and evocative, Slow Noodles is a testament to the power of culinary heritage to spark the rebirth of a young woman’s hopes for a beautiful life.??]]>
author: Chantha Nguon
name: Elena
average rating: 4.33
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/01
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In a world where everyone takes wonders like magic spells and dragons for granted, Coco is a girl with a simple dream: She wants to be a witch. But everybody knows magicians are born, not made, and Coco was not born with a gift for magic. Resigned to her un-magical life, Coco is about to give up on her dream to become a witch…until the day she meets Qifrey, a mysterious, traveling magician. After secretly seeing Qifrey perform magic in a way she’s never seen before, Coco soon learns what everybody “knows” might not be the truth, and discovers that her magical dream may not be as far away as it may seem…]]>
author: Kamome Shirahama
name: Elena
average rating: 4.45
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/01
date added: 2025/03/01
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Welcome to the Grand Abeona Hotel: home of the finest food, the sweetest service, and the very best views the galaxy has to offer. All year round it moves from planet to planet, system to system, pampering guests across the furthest reaches of the milky way. The last word in sub-orbital luxury—and an absolute magnet for intrigue. Intrigues such as: Why are there love poems in the lobby inbox? How many Imperial spies are currently on board? What is the true purpose of the Problem Solver's conference? And perhaps most pertinently—who is driving the ship?
Each guest has a secret, every member of staff a universe unto themselves. At the center of these interweaving lives and interlocking mysteries stands Carl, one time stowaway, longtime manager, devoted caretaker to the hotel. It's the love of his life and the only place he's ever called home. But as forces beyond Carl's comprehension converge on the Abeona, he has to face one final question: when is it time to let go?]]>
author: Grace Curtis
name: Elena
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/01
shelves: to-read
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author: Nakaba Harufuji
name: Elena
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/28
date added: 2025/02/28
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One year, Xan accidentally feeds a baby moonlight instead of starlight, filling the ordinary child with extraordinary magic. Xan decides she must raise this enmagicked girl, whom she calls Luna, as her own. To keep young Luna safe from her own unwieldy power, Xan locks her magic deep inside her. When Luna approaches her thirteenth birthday, her magic begins to emerge on schedule--but Xan is far away. Meanwhile, a?young man from the Protectorate is determined to free his people by killing the witch. Soon, it is up to Luna to protect those who have protected her--even if it means the end of the loving, safe world she’s always known.]]>
author: Kelly Barnhill
name: Elena
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2016
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/28
date added: 2025/02/28
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- Dyrk Ashton, Bestselling author of the Paternus series
Holt Cook was never meant to be a dragon rider. He has always served the Order Hall of the Crag dutifully, keeping their kitchen pots clean.
Until he discovers a dark secret: dragons do not tolerate weakness among their kin, killing the young they deem flawed. Moved by pity, Holt defies the Order, rescues a doomed egg and vows to protect the blind dragon within.
But the Scourge is rising. Undead hordes roam the land, spreading the blight and leaving destruction in their wake. The dragon riders are being slaughtered and betrayal lurks in the shadows.
Holt has one chance to survive. He must cultivate the mysterious power of his dragon's magical core. A unique energy which may tip the balance in the battles to come, and prove to the world that a servant is worthy after all.
"Ascendant is a delightful dragon-rider yarn in the tradition of Pern, Pit Dragon, Eragon, and Temeraire. It plucks at the strings of nostalgia in the best possible way, and picking it up feels like returning to old, beloved haunts."
- John Bierce, Bestselling author of the Mage Errant series]]>
author: Michael R. Miller
name: Elena
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/27
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... until she accepts a substitute teaching position in the charmingly witchy village of Old Middleton. Her first dream in twenty-five years ought to be enchanting, but her wonder quickly turns to shock when she realizes that it’s not a dream at all, but an entirely different sort of magic. Catapulted into the fairy tale kingdom of Between through an ancient portal, Sasha’s astonishment is swiftly upgraded to panic when she accidentally performs a supposedly impossible feat and is declared the True Queen of Between … and betrothed to its infuriatingly handsome sorcerer-king.
Lorn, Shadow King of Between, is desperate to break free from Between’s clutches. Magically tethered to the ramshackle kingdom, he wages a daily battle to save his disreputable subjects from rampaging magical creatures, sinkholes, and catastrophes of the distressingly lethal variety. To avoid an early grave, he needs an escape plan, not a wife...until he learns that this magicless mortal holds the key to his freedom.
Unwilling to leave her world to accept the crown—or the husband—Sasha must race against the clock to disentangle herself from this fairy tale. But her empty throne leaves a dangerous rift between their worlds. As dark forces descend upon Old Middleton, the two must make a choice: work together or unleash fairytale chaos upon their realms.
Between is the spellbinding first novel in The Chronicles of Between fantasy series. Filled with feisty, fairytale-savvy heroines, swoon-worthy sorcerers, slow burn romance, morose minotaurs, and bawdy witches it’s a laugh-out-loud fairy tale romp.]]>
author: L.L. Starling
name: Elena
average rating: 4.31
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/27
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Kirsten Raymonde will never forget the night Arthur Leander, the famous Hollywood actor, had a heart attack on stage during a production of King Lear. That was the night when a devastating flu pandemic arrived in the city, and within weeks, civilization as we know it came to an end.
Twenty years later, Kirsten moves between the settlements of the altered world with a small troupe of actors and musicians. They call themselves The Traveling Symphony, and they have dedicated themselves to keeping the remnants of art and humanity alive. But when they arrive in St. Deborah by the Water, they encounter a violent prophet who will threaten the tiny band’s existence. And as the story takes off, moving back and forth in time, and vividly depicting life before and after the pandemic, the strange twist of fate that connects them all will be revealed.]]>
author: Emily St. John Mandel
name: Elena
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/27
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A bloody war between demons and the Vatican has waged for more than a century, with two elite soldiers now at its center: Selene Alleva, a high-ranking exorcist running from a dark family legacy, and orphan Jules Lacroix, recruited by the Vatican and unrivalled on the battlefield.
When their paths cross over a series of unprecedented demon attacks, the distrust–and unwelcome attraction–they have for each other is immediate. But to get to the bottom of the breaches they strike an uneasy alliance to avoid suspicion. With Jules posing as Selene’s estranged fiance, they head to the Vatican in search of answers. But even as Selene questions who her most dangerous enemy is, Jules has begun to suspect that it’s him.
Now Jules’ very existence challenges every truth Selene thought she knew, and suggests a terrible conspiracy at the heart of the Vatican. Unable to ignore their growing feelings, the two must make an impossible choice between love and duty.
They say love conquers all – but can it win in a war between demons and exorcists? Or will it tear them apart…]]>
author: Sophie Clark
name: Elena
average rating: 3.60
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/27
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At the height of the Civil Rights movement, Lydia Abarca was a Black prima ballerina with a major international dance company—the Dance Theatre of Harlem, a troupe of women and men who became each other’s chosen family. She was the first Black ballerina on the cover of Dance magazine, an Essence cover star; she was cast in The Wiz and in a Bob Fosse production on Broadway. She performed in some of ballet’s most iconic works with other trailblazing ballerinas, including the young women who became her closest friends—founding Dance Theatre of Harlem members Gayle McKinney-Griffith and Sheila Rohan, as well as first-generation dancers Karlya Shelton and Marcia Sells.
These Swans of Harlem performed for the Queen of England, Mick Jagger, and Stevie Wonder, on the same bill as Josephine Baker, at the White House, and beyond. But decades later there was almost no record of their groundbreaking history to be found. Out of a sisterhood that had grown even deeper with the years, these Swans joined forces again—to share their story with the world.
Captivating, rich in vivid detail and character, and steeped in the glamour and grit of professional ballet, The Swans of Harlem is a riveting account of five extraordinarily accomplished women, a celebration of both their historic careers and the sustaining, grounding power of female friendship, and a window into the robust history of Black ballet, hidden for too long.]]>
author: Karen Valby
name: Elena
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/27
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The story that I thought
was my life
didn’t start on the day
I was born
Amal Shahid has always been an artist and a poet. But even in a diverse art school, he’s seen as disruptive and unmotivated by a biased system. Then one fateful night, an altercation in a gentrifying neighborhood escalates into tragedy. “Boys just being boys” turns out to be true only when those boys are white.
The story that I think
will be my life
starts today
Suddenly, at just sixteen years old, Amal’s bright future is upended: he is convicted of a crime he didn’t commit and sent to prison. Despair and rage almost sink him until he turns to the refuge of his words, his art. This never should have been his story. But can he change it?
With spellbinding lyricism, award-winning author Ibi Zoboi and prison reform activist Yusef Salaam tell a moving and deeply profound story about how one boy is able to maintain his humanity and fight for the truth, in a system designed to strip him of both.]]>
author: Ibi Zoboi
name: Elena
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/27
date added: 2025/02/27
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“She is a friend of my mind. She gather me, man. The pieces I am, she gather them and give them back to me in all the right order.”—Toni Morrison
For Glory Edim, that "friend of my mind" is books. Edim, who grew up in Virginia to Nigerian immigrant parents, started the popular Well-Read Black Girl book club at age thirty, but her love of books stretches far to public libraries alongside her little brothers after elementary school while her mother was working; to high school librairies where she discovered books she wasn't being taught in class; to dorm rooms and airplanes and subway rides—and, eventually, to a community of half a million other readers.
When Edim's father moved back to Nigeria while she was still a child, she and her brothers were left with a single mother and little money, often finding a safe space at their local library. Books were where Edim found community, and as she grew older, she discovered the Black writers whose words would forever change her: Nikki Giovanni through children's poetry cassettes; Maya Angelou through a critical high school English teacher; Toni Morrison while attending Morrison's alma mater, Howard University; Audre Lorde on a flight to Nigeria. In prose full of both joy and heartbreak, Edim recounts how these writers and so many others helped her to value to find her own voice when her mother lost hers, to trust her feelings when her father remarried, to create bonds with other Black women and uplift their own stories.
Gather Me is a glowing testament to the power of representation and the lasting impact of literature to gather our disparate parts and put them back together.]]>
author: Glory Edim
name: Elena
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/26
shelves: to-read
review:
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Serena Paris is orphaned, pack-less, and one of a kind. Coming forward as the first Human-Were hybrid was supposed to heal a centuries-long rift between species. Instead, it made her a target, prey to the ruthless political machinations between Weres, Vampyres, and Humans. With her enemies closing in on her, she has only one option left—if he’ll have her.
As Alpha of the Northwest pack, Koen Alexander commands obedience. His authority is so absolute, only a fool would threaten his mate. It doesn’t matter if Serena doesn’t reciprocate his feelings, nothing will stop him from keeping her safe.
But power-hungry Vampyres and Weres are not the only threats chasing Serena. Sooner or later, her past is bound to catch up with her—and Koen might be the only thing standing between her and total annihilation…]]>
author: Ali Hazelwood
name: Elena
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/26
shelves: to-read
review:
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