en-US Mon, 14 Apr 2025 10:18:22 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 156709253
Until she meets her new neighbor.

Hudson Daws, the handyman next door, lives on a farm with his parents and two adult children. He’s the opposite of everything she’s ever known. His happily chaotic life includes biker barbecues, an escape artist dog, and adorably menacing goats. He’s also got a sinfully sexy smile and a rumbling bass voice that makes her shiver. He inspires her.

From their first meeting, the two fall into an escalating cycle of favors, paybacks…and attraction, even though Willa’s trying to keep her distance.

They both have their own pasts to deal with. Now, they just have to figure out if they have a future.

A delectable rom-com about a widowed cookbook writer and a divorced handyman who find that it’s never too late for a fresh start.]]> 299 Cathy Yardley 1662517092 Jacqie 3
I liked both Willa and Hudson. Willa is working on ghost-writing a cookbook and I always like reading about food and cooking. Hudson lives with his family on their farm and they have goats, honey, berries, all sorts of yummy things. I'd call this a cozy romance. There's not too much tension, no real forced drama or conflict, these are adult people trying to make the best decisions that they can for themselves and their loved ones. It's a relaxing read, and I'll look for more of the same by this author.]]> 3.74 2024
author: Cathy Yardley
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/14
date added: 2025/04/14
shelves:
review:
I enjoyed this romance with 40 something protagonists. I'm more than over reading about 25 year old heroines and their romantic angst. It's nice to read about people who aren't a total mess and who can actually communicate.

I liked both Willa and Hudson. Willa is working on ghost-writing a cookbook and I always like reading about food and cooking. Hudson lives with his family on their farm and they have goats, honey, berries, all sorts of yummy things. I'd call this a cozy romance. There's not too much tension, no real forced drama or conflict, these are adult people trying to make the best decisions that they can for themselves and their loved ones. It's a relaxing read, and I'll look for more of the same by this author.
]]> 211004176 Follow the river Liss to the small town of Thistleford, on the edge of Faerie, and meet two sisters who cannot be separated, even in death.

“Oh what is stronger than a death? Two sisters singing with one breath.��

In the small town of Thistleford, on the edge of Faerie, dwells the mysterious Hawthorn family.

There, they tend and harvest the enchanted willows and honour an ancient compact to sing to them in thanks for their magic. None more devotedly than the family’s latest daughters, Esther and Ysabel, who cherish each other as much as they cherish the ancient trees.

But when Esther rejects a forceful suitor in favor of a lover from the land of Faerie, not only the sisters�� bond but also their lives will be at risk…]]> 133 Amal El-Mohtar 1250341086 Jacqie 3 netgalley
The story itself wasn't much. It's a basic retelling of a fairy tale that might be familiar to you. I didn't get anything original from it, although again, it was prettily told.

This book seems to be all about the vibes and atmosphere, not the plot. YMMV.]]> 4.20 2025
author: Amal El-Mohtar
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/14
date added: 2025/04/14
shelves: netgalley
review:
This book is beautifully written. I liked the idea of a slow transition from a more mundane world into a more magical one as the river flows. The author clearly loves to play with words. The idea of "grammar" as related to magic "grimoire", for example, was neat. But she didn't really do anything with her wordplay that mattered to the story.

The story itself wasn't much. It's a basic retelling of a fairy tale that might be familiar to you. I didn't get anything original from it, although again, it was prettily told.

This book seems to be all about the vibes and atmosphere, not the plot. YMMV.
]]> 123195812 In this follow-up to Kayode's "action-packed and spirited debut" Philip Taiwo returns to solve a missing-persons case, and in so doing, uncovers dark secrets the church has worked tirelessly to hide (Oyinkan Braithwaite, author of��My Sister, the Serial Killer).

A shadow has fallen over the megachurch in Ogun State, Nigeria: the beloved Bishop Dawodu has been arrested for the murder of his wife. Sade Dawodu has vanished without a trace and although no body has been found, the police have acted based on what they claim is damning evidence. Philip Taiwo, hot off the success of solving the Okriki Three case, is brought on to investigate. He quickly learns that Sade, young, impulsive, and outspoken, is no favorite of the congregants. She has also been known to disappear for long stretches of time. As Taiwo and his trusted associate, Chika plunge into the investigation, they unearth secrets that go beyond the missing persons case, ones that if leaked, threaten to shatter not only the Bishop, but the church itself. Taiwo quickly begins to feel like a hired gun, put up to the task with the express purpose to clear the bishop’s name rather than find the naked truth.

As Taiwo strives to crack the vast conspiracy he's up against, he’s tugged away by the demands of family life, and derailed by systemic challenges: in Nigeria, cash is king, there are no viable databases, and records are sparse. Through his eyes, we’re treated to religion’s cult-like grip, the ways in which the state is in bed with the church, and the difference between police corruption in Nigeria and America, where Philip has been living for over two decades. In turns high-octane, dark and political, but always emotionally stirring, this highly-anticipated follow-up to LIGHTSEEKERS has the bones of a classic mystery with a fresh, global tilt.]]> 384 Femi Kayode 0316536644 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.94 2021
author: Femi Kayode
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 211934965 All systems fail. All societies crumble. All worlds end.

In the authoritarian Federation, there is a plot to assassinate and replace the President, a man who has downloaded his mind to a succession of new bodies to maintain his grip on power. Meanwhile, on the fringes of a Western Europe that has renounced human governance in favor of ostensibly more efficient, objective, and peaceful AI Prime Ministers, an experimental artificial mind is malfunctioning, threatening to set off a chain of events that may spell the end of the Western world.

As the Federation and the West both start to crumble, Lilia, the brilliant scientist whose invention may be central to bringing down the seemingly immortal President, goes on the run, trying to break out from a near-impenetrable web of Federation surveillance. Her fate is bound up with a worldwide group of others fighting against the global status quo: Palmer, the man Lilia left behind in London, desperate to solve the mystery of her disappearance; Zoya, a veteran activist imprisoned in the taiga, whose book has inspired a revolutionary movement; Nikolai, the President’s personal physician, who has been forced into more and more harrowing decisions as he navigates the Federation’s palace politics; and Nurlan, the hapless parliamentary staffer whose attempt to save his Republic goes terribly awry. And then there is Krotov, head of the Federation’s security services, whose plots, agents, and assassins are everywhere.

Following the success of his debut novel, The Mountain in the Sea, Ray Nayler launches readers into a thrilling near-future world of geopolitical espionage. A cybernetic novel of political intrigue, Where the Axe is Buried combines the story of a near-impossible revolutionary operation with a blistering indictment of the many forms of authoritarianism that suffocate human freedom.]]> 336 Ray Nayler 0374615365 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.26 2025
author: Ray Nayler
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/02
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 46021762 A generation past, the western realms were embroiled in endless war. Then the Destroyer came. From the blood and ashes he left behind, a tenuous alliance rose between the barbarian riders of Parsathe and the walled kingdoms of the south. That alliance is all that stands against the return of an ancient evil—until the barbarian king and queen are slain in an act of bloody betrayal.

Though forbidden by the alliance council to kill the corrupt king responsible for his parents�� murders, Maddek vows to avenge them, even if it costs him the Parsathean crown. But when he learns it was the king’s daughter who lured his parents to their deaths, the barbarian warrior is determined to make her pay.

Yet the woman Maddek captures is not what he expected. Though the last in a line of legendary warrior-queens, Yvenne is small and weak, and the sharpest weapons she wields are her mind and her tongue. Even more surprising is the marriage she proposes to unite them in their goals and to claim their thrones—because her desire for vengeance against her father burns even hotter than his own…]]> 534 Milla Vane 0440000513 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.86 2020
author: Milla Vane
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 3985 639 Michael Chabon 0312282990 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.18 2000
author: Michael Chabon
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 15796700 477 Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Jacqie 0 to-read 4.32 2013
author: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 35624216 350 M.C.A. Hogarth Jacqie 0 4.38 2017
author: M.C.A. Hogarth
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at: 2025/03/28
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves:
review:

]]> 217262696 Discover how a love of books can foster community, understanding, and personal growth.

Bibliotherapy in The Bronx��by Emely Rumble, LCSW, is a groundbreaking exploration of the healing power of literature in the lives of marginalized communities. Drawing from her personal and professional experiences, Rumble masterfully intertwines storytelling with therapeutic insights to reveal how reading can be a potent tool for self-discovery, emotional transformation, and social change.

In this transformative work, Rumble offers readers an intimate glimpse into her journey as a psychotherapist in the Bronx, where she has spent over 14 years using books to help clients navigate complex emotions, heal from trauma, and find their voices. Through vivid anecdotes and real-world case studies, she demonstrates how literature can serve as a bridge between personal pain and collective healing.

Rich with practical tips, reflective exercises, and book recommendations,��Bibliotherapy in The Bronx��is a valuable resource for anyone interested in the power of words to change lives. Whether you're a therapist, educator, bibliophile, or simply someone seeking deeper understanding and growth, this book offers a compassionate, culturally affirming guide to the transformative potential of storytelling.

Rumble's work is a testament to the enduring power of books to heal, empower, and liberate. In a time when the world feels increasingly divided,��Bibliotherapy in The Bronx��reminds us that the stories we tell—and the stories we read—can unite us in our shared humanity.]]> 240 Emely Rumble 1955905878 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.62
author: Emely Rumble
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.62
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 123443274
"Salt and broom, make this room
Safe and tight, against the night."

Trunks packed with potions and cures, Jane Aire sets out on a crisp, clear morning in October to face the greatest challenge of her sheltered girls��-school existence. A shadow lies over Thornfield Hall and its reclusive master, Edward Rochester. And he’s hired her only as a last resort. Jane stumbles again and again as she tries to establish a rapport with her prickly new employer, but he becomes the least of her worries as a mysterious force seems to work against her. The threats mount around both Jane and Rochester—who’s becoming more intriguing and appealing to her by the day. Jane begins to fear her herb healing and protective charms may not be enough to save the man she’s growing to love from a threat darker and more dangerous than either of them imagined.]]> 282 Sharon Lynn Fisher 1662515685 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.12 2023
author: Sharon Lynn Fisher
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 143330475
BCCB Mississippi, 1930s. Magic simmering beneath the surface, kept in check by unjust laws and societal expectations. But for six extraordinary women, the roar of enchanted engines and the thrill of the forbidden broom race offer a chance to rewrite their destinies.

Meet Billie Mae, captain of the Night Storms racing team, and Loretta, her best friend and second-in-command. They’re determined to make enough money to move out west to a state that allows Black folks to legally use magic and take part in national races.

Cheng-Kwan �� doing her best to handle the delicate and dangerous double act of being the perfect “son�� to her parents, and being true to herself while racing.

Mattie and Emma -- Choctaw and Black -- the youngest of the group and trying to dodge government officials who want to send them and their newly-surfaced powers away to boarding school.

And Luella, in love with Billie Mae. Her powers were sealed away years ago after she fought back against the government. She’ll do anything to prevent the same fate for her cousins.

Brooms is a heart-pounding graphic novel soaring with magic, friendship, and rebellion. It's a Fast and the Furious with broomsticks instead of cars, a historical spotlight on struggles silenced by time, and a celebration of the indomitable spirit that dares to defy the odds. Buckle up, witches and dreamers, for this ride is about to take flight.

P R A I S E

“Draws on the fantastical to amplify and confront issues of both the past and the present. The result is a heartfelt, gripping, and resonant story about power—how the majority wields it, and how marginalized groups reclaim it.�� —Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books (starred) ��

“Fascinating�� Though readers will enjoy the dramatic racing scenes, this is truly a story about queer folk and people of color who have created a space where they can joyously and freely be themselves.�� —Booklist (starred) ��

“Pulse-pounding broom races and comforting domestic sequences�� An evocative Fast and the Furious–flavored graphic novel.�� —Publishers Weekly (starred)�� ��

“This is the queer, magical, broom-racing version of A League of Their Own that I didn’t know I was missing�� The representation in this graphic novel is so diverse and among the best I think I’ve ever seen. It’s clear that Walls and Duvall put equal parts passion and research into this beautiful story. If you don’t read it, you’re missing out.�� —Rachel Brittain, Book Riot

“A sweet, entertaining found-family story that weaves magic with historical injustice; recommended for teen graphic novel shelves. —School Library Journal��

“Six witches get caught up in the excitement and danger of illegal broom racing in an alternate historical Mississippi�� highlights the broadly diverse experiences of folks in the South�� highlighting the fact that there has always been and will always be room for queer folks in our communities.�� —Kirkus��

"[A] mix of exciting racing scenes, a story about overcoming the odds, and mesmerizing depictions of magic, plus some of the not-so-pretty parts of our country’s history, and it’s done in a way that is compassionate and uplifting." —GeekDad

��Brooms Is Your Next Favorite Fantastical LGBTQIA+ Sports Story�� —The Mary Sue

“Brings vivid characters (queer, broom-racing witches) to life in an equally vivid setting.�� —Gizmodo (io9)]]> 240 Jasmine Walls 1646143574 Jacqie 3
The story itself was... sort of simple. The author was meticulous in her represtation of race, gender identity and ability, so that was nice. But it seemed like she wanted her characters to be safe, even in a book set in a time when they would not have been safe. This came through to me as a feeling that I never really needed to worry about the characters because they were clearly going to be okay and to achieve their goals. They were all so self-actualized that they didn't need to do any character growth. It ended up feeling like a wish fulfillment story. It feels cozy, and that's nice but I was hoping for a little more tension in the story, which after all is ultimately about racing and the uncertainty of how those races will go.]]> 4.21 2023
author: Jasmine Walls
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/19
date added: 2025/03/19
shelves:
review:
I loved the art in this book. It's colorful and vibrant and a pleasure to explore.

The story itself was... sort of simple. The author was meticulous in her represtation of race, gender identity and ability, so that was nice. But it seemed like she wanted her characters to be safe, even in a book set in a time when they would not have been safe. This came through to me as a feeling that I never really needed to worry about the characters because they were clearly going to be okay and to achieve their goals. They were all so self-actualized that they didn't need to do any character growth. It ended up feeling like a wish fulfillment story. It feels cozy, and that's nice but I was hoping for a little more tension in the story, which after all is ultimately about racing and the uncertainty of how those races will go.
]]> 217387790 The epic conclusion to Moses Ose Utomi's critically acclaimed Forever Desert series, The Memory of the Ogisi shatters every truth, destroys every lie, and is a story of oppression no one shall ever forget.

Even deserts have a beginning. Even gardens have an end. Even water has a story.

One thousand years after Tutu and five hundred years after Osi the City of a Thousand Stories stands resolute on the edge of the Forever Desert. A teeming oasis, water flows into every mouth that thirsts and knowledge sprouts in every mind that hungers for it.

Ethike is an Ogisi, one of the City's many historians, who has devoted his life to studying a little-known figure named Osi. Unfortunately, the city has never approved any of his research papers and if he doesn’t find Osi’s story soon he will be stripped of his position.

Desperate to keep himself and his family from losing everything, Ethike ventures into the Forever Desert in search of the Lost Tomb of Osi. If he can find it, he will finally be able to prove his worth to the City’s elders and, more importantly, cement Osi’s role in history. But history is a tale told by those with power. What Ethike uncovers beneath the sand is far beyond anything he could have expected��.and it is extremely angry.

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.]]> 128 Moses Ose Utomi 1250849047 Jacqie 4 netgalley
As a side note, I've been trying to figure out what the author is trying to say with the words "ajungo", "aleke", "ogisi". These are Igbo words, I think, but a simple online search as to what they mean leads in so many different directions that I feel defeated. That's fitting for these books, I guess.

This is the only book to have more than one POV character. We both learn about an ogisi named Ethike, who lives in a city where most people can use implanted magic to look at the past to see what "really" happened and so who don't rely on their memories or other sources of information. Ogisi are scholars who read other sources and they are seen as odd by those who don't see the need to seek out other ways of knowing. This is painfully on target with today's information ecosystem and that sharp analogy is par for the course with this wonderful author.

Ethike is given a remit to go on a truthfinding mission to find out the true story of Osi, a minor character in the history of his people but one that Ethike suspects may lead to the actual truth of things.

Ethike does come across more of the truth but that information is embedded in a different culture with its own injustices and horrors, which eventually spill out into the greater world. A new and powerful character, one whose mission is to overturn and eliminate the unjust power systems of the world, comes to the foreground.

In this book, people still mutilate themselves to "keep themselves safe", have their mantras that they believe are the truth but that really serve to keep them in their places, and power still strives to keep power for itself. Innocence is a deadly flaw. Is there a place for softness in this world? It's hard to say and that makes me sad and worried for what might happen next in our own.]]> 4.67 2025
author: Moses Ose Utomi
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.67
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/19
date added: 2025/03/19
shelves: netgalley
review:
If this series is a meditation on the Attack on Titan story, then this book is about the beginning/end, 2000 years from now.

As a side note, I've been trying to figure out what the author is trying to say with the words "ajungo", "aleke", "ogisi". These are Igbo words, I think, but a simple online search as to what they mean leads in so many different directions that I feel defeated. That's fitting for these books, I guess.

This is the only book to have more than one POV character. We both learn about an ogisi named Ethike, who lives in a city where most people can use implanted magic to look at the past to see what "really" happened and so who don't rely on their memories or other sources of information. Ogisi are scholars who read other sources and they are seen as odd by those who don't see the need to seek out other ways of knowing. This is painfully on target with today's information ecosystem and that sharp analogy is par for the course with this wonderful author.

Ethike is given a remit to go on a truthfinding mission to find out the true story of Osi, a minor character in the history of his people but one that Ethike suspects may lead to the actual truth of things.

Ethike does come across more of the truth but that information is embedded in a different culture with its own injustices and horrors, which eventually spill out into the greater world. A new and powerful character, one whose mission is to overturn and eliminate the unjust power systems of the world, comes to the foreground.

In this book, people still mutilate themselves to "keep themselves safe", have their mantras that they believe are the truth but that really serve to keep them in their places, and power still strives to keep power for itself. Innocence is a deadly flaw. Is there a place for softness in this world? It's hard to say and that makes me sad and worried for what might happen next in our own.
]]> 139397033 Moses Ose Utomi returns to his Forever Desert series with The Truth of the Aleke, continuing his epic fable about truth, falsehood, and the shackles of history.

The Aleke is cruel. The Aleke is clever. The Aleke is coming.

500 years after the events of The Lies of the Ajungo, the City of Truth stands as is the last remaining free city of the Forever Desert. A bastion of freedom and peace, the city has successfully weathered the near-constant attacks from the Cult of Tutu, who have besieged it for three centuries, attempting to destroy its warriors and subjugate its people.

17-year-old Osi is a Junior Peacekeeper in the City. When the mysterious leader of the Cult, known only as the Aleke, commits a massacre in the capitol and steals the sacred God's Eyes, Osi steps forward to valiantly defend his home. For his bravery he is tasked with a tremendous responsibility—destroy the Cult of Tutu, bring back the God's Eyes, and discover the truth of the Aleke.]]> 103 Moses Ose Utomi 1250849055 Jacqie 4 netgalley
Osi is a young boy who admires the magically empowered Truthseekers of his city greatly. He becomes one through an accident and finds himself tasked to root out the deadly Cult of Tutu which recently launched an attack on his people.

You could probably read this series in any order because ultimately the story is cyclical. Tutu, the hero of Ajungo, lived 500 years ago and his story has tragically been taken and used by those in power to keep themselves in power. Osi has the best of intentions and pure belief in what he knows of his world. His innocence (or naivete) makes him a tool of those in power and places him in danger.

Osi wants to believe the best of those he encounters and in this story, that is a fatal flaw.

Instead of Tutu seeking the truth alone, Osi thinks that he already knows that truth. He also has companions to fight alongside with him. Those companions see far more than Osi does but they don't share what they know because he is a tool to them. Osi tries to find his way to the truth but has no way to get his bearings.

This book is a different sort of tragedy than the first book. The themes are still the same though- manufactured truth is wielded as a weapon to keep power for those who already possess it.]]> 4.10 2024
author: Moses Ose Utomi
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/19
date added: 2025/03/19
shelves: netgalley
review:
If Lies of the Ajungo described Paradis Island from the Attack on Titan story, Truth of the Aleke describes Marley.

Osi is a young boy who admires the magically empowered Truthseekers of his city greatly. He becomes one through an accident and finds himself tasked to root out the deadly Cult of Tutu which recently launched an attack on his people.

You could probably read this series in any order because ultimately the story is cyclical. Tutu, the hero of Ajungo, lived 500 years ago and his story has tragically been taken and used by those in power to keep themselves in power. Osi has the best of intentions and pure belief in what he knows of his world. His innocence (or naivete) makes him a tool of those in power and places him in danger.

Osi wants to believe the best of those he encounters and in this story, that is a fatal flaw.

Instead of Tutu seeking the truth alone, Osi thinks that he already knows that truth. He also has companions to fight alongside with him. Those companions see far more than Osi does but they don't share what they know because he is a tool to them. Osi tries to find his way to the truth but has no way to get his bearings.

This book is a different sort of tragedy than the first book. The themes are still the same though- manufactured truth is wielded as a weapon to keep power for those who already possess it.
]]> 60784306 Moses Ose Utomi's debut novella, The Lies of the Ajungo, follows one boy’s epic quest to bring water back to his city and save his mother’s life. Prepare to enter the Forever Desert.

A Library Journal Best Book of the Month!

They say there is no water in the City of Lies. They say there are no heroes in the City of Lies. They say there are no friends beyond the City of Lies. But would you believe what they say in the City of Lies?

In the City of Lies, they cut out your tongue when you turn thirteen, to appease the terrifying Ajungo Empire and make sure it continues sending water. Tutu will be thirteen in three days, but his parched mother won’t last that long. So Tutu goes to his oba and makes a deal: she provides water for his mother, and in exchange he will travel out into the desert and bring back water for the city. Thus begins Tutu’s quest for the salvation of his mother, his city, and himself.

The Lies of the Ajungo opens the curtains on a tremendous world, and begins the epic fable of the Forever Desert. With every word, Moses Ose Utomi weaves magic.]]> 87 Moses Ose Utomi 1250849063 Jacqie 5
I read somewhere that Utomi was inspired by the manga/anime Attack on Titan, and when I look at this whole series through that lens it helps me find the throughline. Lies of the Ajungo is a bit like Paradis. There is an isolated city surrounded by deadly danger with no information as to how to combat or overcome that danger. If you look at Tutu and see Eren you're not entirely wrong.

Tutu wants to save his mother, who is dying from dehydration. There is almost no water in the city. He is annointed a hero by the council and sent into the desert to find water or die trying (which is what they assume will happen).

These days it's pretty easy to decide that the government is not in fact there to help you but only to keep power in the hands of those who already possess it. A theme that goes through the entire trilogy is that axioms are what you make of them and are there to keep you from questioning the nature of your reality. That's certainly true here. In Utomi's world, people literally cut out their own tongues, deafen and blind themselves in order to "keep themselves safe" from an external evil. This is an angry series that does not promise a way out.

The writing in the story feels mythic. Things come in threes. Everything is portentious because the description is spare. This story is a strong warning but we are probably all too deaf to hear.]]> 4.20 2023
author: Moses Ose Utomi
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/19
date added: 2025/03/19
shelves:
review:
This is a novella that knows what it wants to do with its page count and succeeds admirably.

I read somewhere that Utomi was inspired by the manga/anime Attack on Titan, and when I look at this whole series through that lens it helps me find the throughline. Lies of the Ajungo is a bit like Paradis. There is an isolated city surrounded by deadly danger with no information as to how to combat or overcome that danger. If you look at Tutu and see Eren you're not entirely wrong.

Tutu wants to save his mother, who is dying from dehydration. There is almost no water in the city. He is annointed a hero by the council and sent into the desert to find water or die trying (which is what they assume will happen).

These days it's pretty easy to decide that the government is not in fact there to help you but only to keep power in the hands of those who already possess it. A theme that goes through the entire trilogy is that axioms are what you make of them and are there to keep you from questioning the nature of your reality. That's certainly true here. In Utomi's world, people literally cut out their own tongues, deafen and blind themselves in order to "keep themselves safe" from an external evil. This is an angry series that does not promise a way out.

The writing in the story feels mythic. Things come in threes. Everything is portentious because the description is spare. This story is a strong warning but we are probably all too deaf to hear.
]]> 215366525 Follow the bank of the Koitogawa river until you reach the beach. From there a path of white seashells will lead you to the Chibineko Kitchen. Step inside, they'll be expecting you.

Nagi Hayakawa is facing an impossible choice. Should she agree to marry her boyfriend, despite being ill and not knowing how many years she has left to live, or should she protect him from future heartbreak by refusing? Desperate for advice from the one person no longer there to give it - her mother who died years before - she reserves a table at the Chibineko Kitchen.

When she takes her first bite of the miso-marinated tofu and rice, prepared for her by the restaurant's young chef, Kai, the gulls outside fall silent and the air grows hazy.

Deliciously heart-warming, The Chibineko Kitchen is about savouring every moment.]]> Yuta Takahashi 1399817698 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.20 2020
author: Yuta Takahashi
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 212807260 Your table awaits at the Chibineko Kitchen, where a soul-nourishing meal in the company of the resident kitten will transport you back in time to reunite with departed loved ones—for fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold and The Midnight Library.

In a remote seaside town outside of Tokyo, Kotoko makes her way along a seashell path, lured by whispers of an enigmatic restaurant whose kagezen, or traditional meals offered in remembrance of loved ones, promise a reunion with the departed. When a gust of wind lifts off her hat, she sees running after it a young man who looks like her recently deceased brother. But it’s not her brother; it’s Kai, the restaurant’s young chef, who returns her hat and brings her to the tiny establishment, where he introduces her to Chibi, the resident kitten, and serves her steaming bowls of simmered fish, rice, and miso soup—the exact meal her brother used to cook for her. As she takes her first delicious bite, the gulls outside fall silent, the air grows hazy, and Kotoko begins a magical journey of last chances and new beginnings.]]> 192 Yuta Takahashi 0143138618 Jacqie 4 netgalley
This book didn't try to do too much. There were a total of four vignettes. The first was about a young woman who had lost her brother. This same young woman ends up being a through line in the book and she serves the last meal in the book, this time to the young man whose mother owned the restaurant and who had recently died.

There's also a meal served to a young boy who has regrets about how he treated a classmate and to an elderly man who wants to ask his departed wife a question.

This book also has tasty sounding food and actual recipes as well. I'll read more in the series.]]> 4.04 2020
author: Yuta Takahashi
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/18
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves: netgalley
review:
This is a great example of healing fiction, a book that you read to find comfort. Usually these book consist of a series of vignettes centered around a location, in this case the Chibineko Kitchen. This restaurant serves kagezen or remembrance meals. And it has a kitten. Sometimes, while the steam rises from the remembrance meal, a lost loved one might return for one last conversation.

This book didn't try to do too much. There were a total of four vignettes. The first was about a young woman who had lost her brother. This same young woman ends up being a through line in the book and she serves the last meal in the book, this time to the young man whose mother owned the restaurant and who had recently died.

There's also a meal served to a young boy who has regrets about how he treated a classmate and to an elderly man who wants to ask his departed wife a question.

This book also has tasty sounding food and actual recipes as well. I'll read more in the series.
]]> 199531914 A collection of the year’s best science fiction and fantasy short fiction selected by New York Times bestselling author of the Silo series Hugh Howey and series editor John Joseph Adams.

Hugh Howey, bestselling author of Wool and the Molly Fyde series, selects twenty pieces that represent the best examples of the form published the previous year and explores the ever-expanding and changing world of science fiction and fantasy today.

Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2024 contains the following stories.
FANTASY

The Ankle-Snatcher by Grady Hendrix
from Creature Feature (Amazon Original Stories)
Bari and the Resurrection Flower by Hana Lee
from Fantasy Magazine
The Blade and Bloodwright by Sloane Leong
from Lightspeed
Bruised-Eye Dusk by Jonathan Louis Duckworth
from Beneath Ceaseless Skies
Disassembling Light by Kel Coleman
from Beneath Ceaseless Skies
Eye & Tooth by Rebecca Roanhorse
from Out There Screaming edited by Jordan Peele & John Joseph Adams
How to Raise a Kraken in Your Bathtub by P. Djeli Clark
from Uncanny
If Someone You Love Has Become a Vurdalak by Sam J. Miller
from The Dark
John Hollowback and the Witch by Amal El-Mohtar
from The Book of Witches edited by Jonathan Strahan
Resurrection Highway by A.R. Capetta
from Sunday Morning Transport

SCIENCE FICTION

Calypso’s Guest by Andrew Sean Greer
from Amazon Original Stories
Emotional Resonance by V.M. Ayala
from Escape Pod
Falling Bodies by Rebecca Roanhorse
from The Far Reaches edited by John Joseph Adams (Amazon Original Stories)
Form 8774-D by Alex Irvine
from Reactor
The Four Last Things by Christopher Rowe
from Asimov’s
How It Unfolds by James S.A. Corey
from The Far Reaches edited by John Joseph Adams (Amazon Original Stories)
The Long Game by Ann Leckie
from The Far Reaches edited by John Joseph Adams (Amazon Original Stories)
Once Upon a Time at the Oakmont by P.A. Cornell
from Fantasy Magazine
Window Boy by Thomas Ha
from Clarkesworld
Zeta-Epsilon by Isabel J. Kim
from Clarkesworld]]> 384 Hugh Howey 0063315785 Jacqie 4 netgalley
I'm not going to rate the stories individually but I will shout out to the pieces by James A. Corey, Hana Lee, Christopher Rowe, V.M. Ayala, and P Djeli Clark as some of my favorites.]]> 3.90 2024
author: Hugh Howey
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/18
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves: netgalley
review:
This is always a really top anthology of the best short science fiction and fantasy of the year. Hugh Howey did a great job with the selections.

I'm not going to rate the stories individually but I will shout out to the pieces by James A. Corey, Hana Lee, Christopher Rowe, V.M. Ayala, and P Djeli Clark as some of my favorites.
]]> 1569540 224 Anthea Fraser Jacqie 3 netgalley writing so drastically toward the end of his career. I had a rough idea of why, and I bet you do too already, but the author did a decent job of throwing red herrings everywhere.

I'd call this a cozy mystery. Rona has a comfortable marriage with her artist and art instructor husband and she has a cozy home. She's got a dog that she walks through the lovely British countryside. She can go shopping on her High Street, have her husband cook her a tasty dinner when she gets home, and dig into her historical research.

This books is not that old but it really feels quaint. Rona's husband is parental and masterful with her at times although he is also genuinely protective. The sexual politics of the book feel like they come from a much older time. Cell phones barely make an appearance and often it's hard to feel exactly when the book is set. The pace of life feels slower, but that could just be because I'm American.

I don't know that I'll read more of this series because of the dated sexual dynamics but it wasn't a bad way to spend time.]]> 3.37 2003
author: Anthea Fraser
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.37
book published: 2003
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/18
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves: netgalley
review:
I liked the premise of this book. A biographer is hired by an author's widow to write a book about him and his work. Biographical research is an interesting way to go about getting clues for a mystery, and the author is dead already, so the mystery is really more about how and why he changed his style of
writing so drastically toward the end of his career. I had a rough idea of why, and I bet you do too already, but the author did a decent job of throwing red herrings everywhere.

I'd call this a cozy mystery. Rona has a comfortable marriage with her artist and art instructor husband and she has a cozy home. She's got a dog that she walks through the lovely British countryside. She can go shopping on her High Street, have her husband cook her a tasty dinner when she gets home, and dig into her historical research.

This books is not that old but it really feels quaint. Rona's husband is parental and masterful with her at times although he is also genuinely protective. The sexual politics of the book feel like they come from a much older time. Cell phones barely make an appearance and often it's hard to feel exactly when the book is set. The pace of life feels slower, but that could just be because I'm American.

I don't know that I'll read more of this series because of the dated sexual dynamics but it wasn't a bad way to spend time.
]]> 60093178 Award-winning author Malinda Lo returns to the Bay Area with another masterful coming-of-queer-age story, this time set against the backdrop of the first major Supreme Court decisions legalizing gay marriage. And almost sixty years after the end of Last Night at the Telegraph Club, Lo's new novel also offers a glimpse into Lily and Kath's lives since 1955.

Aria Tang West was looking forward to a summer on Martha's Vineyard with her best friends—one last round of sand and sun before college. But after a graduation party goes wrong, Aria's parents exile her to California to stay with her grandmother, artist Joan West. Aria expects boredom, but what she finds is Steph Nichols, her grandmother's gardener. Soon, Aria is second-guessing who she is and what she wants to be, and a summer that once seemed lost becomes unforgettable—for Aria, her family, and the working-class queer community Steph introduces her to. It's the kind of summer that changes a life forever.]]> 325 Malinda Lo 0525555285 Jacqie 4
This book is marketed as a loose sequel to "Last Night at the Telegraph Club" and it is a verrrry loose sequel. Some family members of the characters in that book figure in this one in a minor way and towards the end of this book there's some information on how the two main characters lived their lives.

Take this book on its own. Part of the book is about Aria, the main character, coming of age, realizing that she is queer, and coming out to some of the people she loves. Part of the book is a love letter to the San Francisco area. And part of it is a meditation on art and how it's created.

Aria has grown up on the east coast and a thoroughly unpleasant incident has led to her spending the summer after her high school graduation with her grandmother in northern California instead of on Martha's Vinyard with the rest of her friends. Aria is privileged, at loose ends, and sort of depressed. She meets her grandmother's gardener Steph and all sort of unexpected feelings turn up. Aria's never though of herself as queer but Steph is irresistable to her. Steph is also older and has a girlfriend. Aria becomes a loose part of their friend group and through these women is introduced to the queer culture of San Francisco. The author clearly loves this place and the feel of it is almost as good as being there.

Aria's grandmother is an artist. Steph is a musician. Aria has always considered herself drawn more to science (her grandfather was an astonomer and she was close with him) but she learns from her grandmother about how art is created. Her grandmother describes the ebb and flow of artistic inspiration, the time it takes to work through a concept, how she's been blocked in the past and how she's found ways to move forward despite that. Aria's mother is an opera singer and a very successful one and her father is a novelist, so Aria has been steeped in this way of thinking perhaps more than she realizes. She takes some steps toward trying to create art herself.

My least favorite part of this book was Aria's obsession with Steph and her lack of caring about Steph's current romantic situation. It happens, and it certainly happens when you're a teen, but... yeah, not great. I preferred just dwelling in the setting of the book.

A Scatter of Light refers to refraction and how it creates different colors, including the sunset. It's a way that science and art meet.]]> 3.83 2022
author: Malinda Lo
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/18
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves:
review:
I listened to this one and I'd recommend the narrator.

This book is marketed as a loose sequel to "Last Night at the Telegraph Club" and it is a verrrry loose sequel. Some family members of the characters in that book figure in this one in a minor way and towards the end of this book there's some information on how the two main characters lived their lives.

Take this book on its own. Part of the book is about Aria, the main character, coming of age, realizing that she is queer, and coming out to some of the people she loves. Part of the book is a love letter to the San Francisco area. And part of it is a meditation on art and how it's created.

Aria has grown up on the east coast and a thoroughly unpleasant incident has led to her spending the summer after her high school graduation with her grandmother in northern California instead of on Martha's Vinyard with the rest of her friends. Aria is privileged, at loose ends, and sort of depressed. She meets her grandmother's gardener Steph and all sort of unexpected feelings turn up. Aria's never though of herself as queer but Steph is irresistable to her. Steph is also older and has a girlfriend. Aria becomes a loose part of their friend group and through these women is introduced to the queer culture of San Francisco. The author clearly loves this place and the feel of it is almost as good as being there.

Aria's grandmother is an artist. Steph is a musician. Aria has always considered herself drawn more to science (her grandfather was an astonomer and she was close with him) but she learns from her grandmother about how art is created. Her grandmother describes the ebb and flow of artistic inspiration, the time it takes to work through a concept, how she's been blocked in the past and how she's found ways to move forward despite that. Aria's mother is an opera singer and a very successful one and her father is a novelist, so Aria has been steeped in this way of thinking perhaps more than she realizes. She takes some steps toward trying to create art herself.

My least favorite part of this book was Aria's obsession with Steph and her lack of caring about Steph's current romantic situation. It happens, and it certainly happens when you're a teen, but... yeah, not great. I preferred just dwelling in the setting of the book.

A Scatter of Light refers to refraction and how it creates different colors, including the sunset. It's a way that science and art meet.
]]> 205212830 When lies become truths and
two kingdoms�� head to a bloody war,
a man is exiled for his conscience

Refusing the queen’s order to gas a crowd of protesters, Minister Shea Ashcroft is banished to the border to oversee construction of the biggest defensive tower in history. However, the use of advanced technology taken from refugees makes the tower volatile and dangerous, becoming a threat to local interests. Shea has no choice but to fight the local hierarchy to ensure the construction succeeds—and to reclaim his own life.

Surviving an assassination attempt, Shea confronts his inner demons, encounters an ancient legend, and discovers a portal to a dead world—all the while struggling to stay true to his own principles and maintain his sanity. Fighting memories and hallucinations, he starts to question everything...

Sleeping Worlds Have No Memory is a thought-provoking meditation on the fragility of the human condition, our beliefs, the manipulation of propaganda for political gains, and our ability to distinguish the real from the unreal and willingness to accept convenient “truths.�� The novel is a compelling exploration of memory, its fragile nature, and its profound impact on our perception of identity, relationships, and facts themselves.

A unique blend of science fiction, fantasy and noir, with zeitgeist and prophetic qualities (the original novella anticipated the Russo-Ukrainian War), this is a must for fans of China Miéville’s Bas-Lag series, Ted Chiang’s Tower of Babylon, and Robert Silverberg’s Tower of Glass.]]> 300 Yaroslav Barsukov 1647101360 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.17 2024
author: Yaroslav Barsukov
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 199373354
In twelve luminous stories set across three centuries, The History of Sound examines the unexpected ways the past returns to us and how love and loss are entwined and transformed over generations. In Ben Shattuck's ingenious collection, each story has a companion story, which contains a revelation about the previous, paired story. Mysteries and murders are revealed, history is refracted, and deep emotional connections are woven through characters and families.

The haunting title story recalls the journey of two men who meet around a piano in a smoky, dim bar, only to spend a summer walking the Maine woods collecting folk songs in the shadow of the First World War, forever marked by the odyssey. Decades later, in another story, a woman discovers the wax cylinders recorded that fateful summer while cleaning out her new house in Maine. Shattuck’s inventive, exquisite stories transport readers from 1700s Nantucket to the contemporary woods of New Hampshire and beyond—into landscapes both enduring and unmistakably modern. Memories, artifacts, paintings, and journals resurface in surprising and poignant ways among evocative beaches, forests, and orchards, revealing the secrets, misunderstandings, and love that linger across centuries.

Written with breathtaking humanity and humor, The History of Sound is a love letter to New England, a radiant conversation between past and present, and a moving meditation on the abiding search for home.]]> 320 Ben Shattuck 059349038X Jacqie 0 to-read 4.36 2024
author: Ben Shattuck
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 199278965
Farley stands out among his Iñupiat neighbors in the Alaska village he calls home, both white and enormous, like the hungry polar bears that wander its streets. Jovial and a little hapless, he works as an investigator for a North Slope oil company, passing the long Arctic winters drinking whiskey with the village’s preacher and playing in the weekly poker game hosted by its matriarch and mayor.

When his young daughter visits from thousands of miles away in Portland—where she lives with her mother, who despises him—a shocking moment of violence leaves her dead and Farley injured. Crippled by his wounds and hamstrung with guilt over his inability to save her, he goes home to Oregon to try to make amends.

There he strikes up an unlikely friendship with a single mother and her daughter. With their help, he begins the slow process of healing—until the girl goes missing. Faced with the opportunity to do what he couldn’t do for his own daughter, Farley sets out on a brutal odyssey through Portland’s quirky and dangerous underworld, using his wits and his fists to try to save her life along with the shattered remains of his own.]]> 268 C.B. Bernard Jacqie 0 to-read 4.41
author: C.B. Bernard
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.41
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 216724329 In her first book, the popular From the Front Porch podcast host and independent bookstore owner challenges the idea that loud lives are the ones that matter most, reminding us that we don't have to leave the lives we have in order to have the lives of which we've always dreamed.

Can life be an adventure, even when it’s just . . . ordinary?

Annie Jones always assumed adulthood would mean a high-powered career; life in a big, bustling city; and travels to far-flung places she’d longed to see. But her reality turned out differently. As the years passed, Annie was still in the same small town running an independent bookstore —the kind of life Nora Ephron dreamed.

During that time, she hosted friends�� goodbye parties and mailed parting gifts; wrote recommendation letters and wished former shop staffers well. She stayed in her small town, despite her love of big cities; stayed in her marriage to the guy she met when she was 18; and she stayed at her bookstore while the world outside shifted steadily toward digital retailers. And she stayed loyal to a faith she sometimes didn’t recognize.

After ten years, Annie realized she might never leave. But instead of regret, she had an epiphany. She awakened to the gifts of a quiet life spent staying put.

In Ordinary Time, Annie challenges the idea that loud lives matter most. Rummaging through her small-town existence, she finds hidden gifts of humor and hope from a life lived quietly. Staying, can itself be a radical act. It takes courage to stay in the places we’ve always called home, Jones argues, as she paints a portrait of possibility far away from thriving metropolises and Monica Gellar-inspired apartments.

We’ve long been encouraged to follow our dreams, to pack up and move to new places and leave old lives—and past selves—behind. While there is beauty in these kinds of adventures, Ordinary Time helps us see ourselves right where we in the middle of messy, mundane lives, maybe not too far from where we grew up. We don’t have to leave to find what we yearn—we can choose to stay, celebrating and honoring our ordinary lives, which might turn out to be bigger and better than we ever imagined.��


]]> 240 Annie B. Jones 006341127X Jacqie 3 netgalley
I didn't know who Annie B. Jones was before trying out this book. I just knew what the blurb said: that she owns a small independent bookstore, that she is a "stayer", that she finds joy in a quiet life. I didn't know that she does a podcast that is widely loved and that this podcast helped her store through the pandemic. A lot of the chapters in this book feel like reworked podcast transcripts.

In this book, the author comes across as sunny, relentlessly nice, and definitely Christian (she devotes a whole section of the book to musings on the development of her faith). She doesn't get into the darknesses of her soul nor do her introspections cut very deep for me. I might have liked this book better 25 or 30 years ago, when I was younger than the author, instead of older than her as I am now. Her wisdom is more for folks who are still figuring out who they are and how to accept that. Not that I'm a finished product by any means, but Annie B. Jones feels a bit like a more rural version of Elizabeth Gilbert. She is also a woman who feels to me like she's privileged, isn't afraid to put it all out there privilege and all, and who has come to be an icon to women who would like to be like her. Instead of traveling the world to Eat Pray Love, Annie B. Jones was in the right place at the right time to buy a small independent bookstore.

I've worked in and managed a small independent bookstore and once upon a time thought I might buy the one I worked in too, so I'm very lucky in that way. What Jones says about bookstore work rings true to me. And clearly she's a genius at marketing because to keep a small town bookstore alive through COVID is no small feat so she deserves full credit for that.

And there are a lot of women who will relate to her life. Jones grew up in a small Southern town, tried moving elsewhere but ultimately ended up not very far from where she started. She is nourished by small town things: knowing your neighbors, sitting on the porch in a swing, walking a couple of blocks to get pizza, seeing fireflies in the summer. She knows that she's a "good girl" who internalized what her church taught her to the point that she picked a small Christian college instead of going to a bigger school and more secular student body. She met her husband during her first week of classes. Her trials include watching good employees leave, finding that not everyone likes her, internal struggles with the desire to explore instead of settling in.

I never had to figure out how to be a stayer. In a military family, you move repeatedly. You learn who you are independent of a constant social network or clasmates. You learn that you can change everything and remain yourself.

So in the end, this author seems perfectly pleasant and I'm happy for her success. A lot of people may find that she has insight that they can use. She didn't have wisdom for me and she seems a bit privileged and naive. ]]> 4.35
author: Annie B. Jones
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.35
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/12
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: netgalley
review:
2.5 stars rounded up.

I didn't know who Annie B. Jones was before trying out this book. I just knew what the blurb said: that she owns a small independent bookstore, that she is a "stayer", that she finds joy in a quiet life. I didn't know that she does a podcast that is widely loved and that this podcast helped her store through the pandemic. A lot of the chapters in this book feel like reworked podcast transcripts.

In this book, the author comes across as sunny, relentlessly nice, and definitely Christian (she devotes a whole section of the book to musings on the development of her faith). She doesn't get into the darknesses of her soul nor do her introspections cut very deep for me. I might have liked this book better 25 or 30 years ago, when I was younger than the author, instead of older than her as I am now. Her wisdom is more for folks who are still figuring out who they are and how to accept that. Not that I'm a finished product by any means, but Annie B. Jones feels a bit like a more rural version of Elizabeth Gilbert. She is also a woman who feels to me like she's privileged, isn't afraid to put it all out there privilege and all, and who has come to be an icon to women who would like to be like her. Instead of traveling the world to Eat Pray Love, Annie B. Jones was in the right place at the right time to buy a small independent bookstore.

I've worked in and managed a small independent bookstore and once upon a time thought I might buy the one I worked in too, so I'm very lucky in that way. What Jones says about bookstore work rings true to me. And clearly she's a genius at marketing because to keep a small town bookstore alive through COVID is no small feat so she deserves full credit for that.

And there are a lot of women who will relate to her life. Jones grew up in a small Southern town, tried moving elsewhere but ultimately ended up not very far from where she started. She is nourished by small town things: knowing your neighbors, sitting on the porch in a swing, walking a couple of blocks to get pizza, seeing fireflies in the summer. She knows that she's a "good girl" who internalized what her church taught her to the point that she picked a small Christian college instead of going to a bigger school and more secular student body. She met her husband during her first week of classes. Her trials include watching good employees leave, finding that not everyone likes her, internal struggles with the desire to explore instead of settling in.

I never had to figure out how to be a stayer. In a military family, you move repeatedly. You learn who you are independent of a constant social network or clasmates. You learn that you can change everything and remain yourself.

So in the end, this author seems perfectly pleasant and I'm happy for her success. A lot of people may find that she has insight that they can use. She didn't have wisdom for me and she seems a bit privileged and naive.
]]> 219833252 Award-winning, New York Times bestselling author S. A. Cosby returns with King of Ashes, a Godfather-inspired Southern crime epic and dazzling family drama.

When eldest son Roman Carruthers is summoned home after his father’s car accident, he finds his younger brother, Dante, in debt to dangerous criminals and his sister, Neveah, exhausted from holding the family—and the family business—together. Neveah and their father, who run the Carruthers Crematorium in the run-down central Virginia town of Jefferson Run, see death up close every day. But mortality draws even closer when it becomes clear that the crash that landed their father in a coma was no accident and Dante’s recklessness has placed them all in real danger.

Roman, a financial whiz with a head for numbers and a talent for making his clients rich, has some money to help buy his brother out of trouble. But in his work with wannabe tough guys, he’s forgotten that there are real gangsters out there. As his bargaining chips go up in smoke, Roman realizes that he has only one thing left to offer to save his himself, and his own particular set of skills.

Roman begins his work for the criminals while Neveah tries to uncover the long-ago mystery of what happened to their mother, who disappeared when they were teenagers. But Roman is far less of a pushover than the gangsters realize. He is willing to do anything to save his family. Anything.

Because everything burns.]]> 352 S.A. Cosby 1250832063 Jacqie 4 netgalley
He could also have titled this "The Fall of Roman". The main character, Roman Carruthers, has escaped the small dying rural Virginian town where he grew up and become a successful financial advisor to some of the rich and famous. When he learns that his father has been shot, he must return, the prodigal son. Roman's siblings, Neveah and Dante, have been struggling mightily with their own demons. Here's a note: both of Roman's siblings have names that have to do with Heaven and/or Hell and I'm sure this isn't by accident. This is the story of the Faustian bargain that Roman makes with evil men and how that bargain changes him forever.

The family business is a crematorium, which Neveah now must run almost entirely by herself with her father in a coma. Neveah has been beaten down by a past family tragedy (their mother disappeared when they were kids and the whole town thinks their father killed her). Her fingers have been so burned by contact with fire that she "can't feel anymore". Dante has chosen to numb himself with drugs, sex and foolishness and his bad choices are what drag Roman down. Roman wants to try to save Dante from his devil's bargain with the town's drug lords and offers his financial services and access to the crematorium to help the gang leaders' money grow in a desperate ploy to keep his brother and himself alive.

The gang quickly goes even darker than Roman thought they would so his "hands get dirty" and he's bound to them in complicity. If this had been my first book by Cosby, I don't know if I would have finished it or tried another of his novels. This book is incredibly grim and explores many different kinds of depravity. It's ultimately a character study of Roman and a chronicle of how one morally questionable decision leads to the next and then on to the next. It's a violent gothic look at the modern South.]]> 4.36 2025
author: S.A. Cosby
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/12
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: netgalley
review:
King of Ashes is S.A. Cosby's darkest book yet.

He could also have titled this "The Fall of Roman". The main character, Roman Carruthers, has escaped the small dying rural Virginian town where he grew up and become a successful financial advisor to some of the rich and famous. When he learns that his father has been shot, he must return, the prodigal son. Roman's siblings, Neveah and Dante, have been struggling mightily with their own demons. Here's a note: both of Roman's siblings have names that have to do with Heaven and/or Hell and I'm sure this isn't by accident. This is the story of the Faustian bargain that Roman makes with evil men and how that bargain changes him forever.

The family business is a crematorium, which Neveah now must run almost entirely by herself with her father in a coma. Neveah has been beaten down by a past family tragedy (their mother disappeared when they were kids and the whole town thinks their father killed her). Her fingers have been so burned by contact with fire that she "can't feel anymore". Dante has chosen to numb himself with drugs, sex and foolishness and his bad choices are what drag Roman down. Roman wants to try to save Dante from his devil's bargain with the town's drug lords and offers his financial services and access to the crematorium to help the gang leaders' money grow in a desperate ploy to keep his brother and himself alive.

The gang quickly goes even darker than Roman thought they would so his "hands get dirty" and he's bound to them in complicity. If this had been my first book by Cosby, I don't know if I would have finished it or tried another of his novels. This book is incredibly grim and explores many different kinds of depravity. It's ultimately a character study of Roman and a chronicle of how one morally questionable decision leads to the next and then on to the next. It's a violent gothic look at the modern South.
]]> 197448161 256 Edy Massih 0063280906 Jacqie 0 to-read, cookbooks 4.06
author: Edy Massih
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.06
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read, cookbooks
review:

]]> 65678550
Chicken Hill was where Moshe and Chona Ludlow lived when Chona ran the Heaven & Earth Grocery Store, which served the neighborhood's quirky collection of blacks and European immigrants, helped by her husband, Moshe, a Romanian-born theater owner who integrated the town's first dance hall. When the state came looking for a deaf black child, claiming that the boy needed to be institutionalized, Chicken Hill's residents—roused by Chona's kindess and the courage of a local black worker named Nate Timblin—banded together to keep the boy safe.

As the novel unfolds, it becomes clear how much the people of Chicken Hill have to struggle to survive at the margins of white Christian America and how damaging bigotry, hypocrisy, and deceit can be to a community. When the truth is revealed about the skeleton, the boy, and the part the town’s establishment played in both, McBride shows that it is love and community—heaven and earth—that ultimately sustain us.]]> 385 James McBride 0593422945 Jacqie 2 didnt-finish, netgalley 3.84 2023
author: James McBride
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2023
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2025/03/11
shelves: didnt-finish, netgalley
review:
This book covers an interesting bit of history about relationships between Jews and Blacks in the northeast in the early to mid-twentieth century. Unfortunately, I did not find the book itself as interesting as the subject matter promised to me. The characters didn't come alive for me and when I put the book down, I didn't feel like picking it back up.
]]> 200730938 From rural Mississippi in the Jim Crow era through the transformative 1970s, this sweeping novel tells the tale of a mother’s sacrifice, relentless ambition, and against-all-odds success. But the one dream she can’t stop chasing may cost her everything . . . Money is security. Always. Margo Dupree has lived by that rule since childhood, when her father’s death plunged her and her mother into poverty. Marriage brought only disillusionment and struggle. But it also gave Margo the determination to migrate north in search of a better life for herself and her young daughter, Lana. The north, however, isn’t the panacea she expected, and Margo finds herself contending with the all-too-familiar obstacles of racism and prejudice, not to mention the new stresses of urban living. But things change once she realizes that what was once her greatest shame is now her greatest asset—the skills she learned from her mother’s job as a cook. Using her tasty recipes, personality, and relentless hustle, Margo begins to build a successful restaurant chain. Yet despite her ever-more desperate efforts, she can't earn her heart’s deepest Lana’s forgiveness for her early absence. As Lana becomes a beautiful young woman with an increasingly mercenary temperament, Margo wonders if she knows her daughter at all—and if she can save her from the bitter and frighteningly dangerous mistakes that may shatter both of their worlds . . .]]> 320 Phyllis R. Dixon 149674313X Jacqie 4 netgalley
Margo (who chose her own new name to help reinvent herself) moved to Wisconsin to stay with extended family after her marriage in Mississippi went sour. Margo grew up with a single mother and married too young and also had a daughter too young. She sees Milwaukee as an opportunity to start over, to make money to bring her daughter Lana to live with her instead of Lana's father and as a way to escape the suffocating racism of the South. She becomes part of the great northern migration.

Margo finds a way to earn money. Getting Lana up to Milwaukee takes longer than she hoped. She gets married along the way (several times) fights with and makes up with her family, rolls with the punches of a changing neighborhood, and eventually adapts her own business to become ever more successful. This is all related in a day-to-day event sort of way, with bits of family or man drama finding its way in.

Margo has a huge blind spot when it comes to Lana. She feels guilty over not being with Lana through her early childhood and is far too permissive with her. Lana is also growing up in the 60's and 70's, a turbulent time in the USA and especially for civil rights.

I liked Margo despite her flaws and was interested in her tale. The story has a framing device that felt awkward to me, but I guess the author needed a way in to the life history part of the book. The writing is more workmanlike than inspired, but the voice feels real and true.]]> 4.00
author: Phyllis R. Dixon
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.00
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/11
date added: 2025/03/11
shelves: netgalley
review:
This is a book that traces the life of one woman but also illustrates the lives of many Black people in the mid twentieth century. It's a little soapy, a little bit of a family epic. It's written in a way that makes it feel like you're in a long conversation with someone who's had a very interesting life, with occasional foreshadowing along the lines of "if I'd known then..."

Margo (who chose her own new name to help reinvent herself) moved to Wisconsin to stay with extended family after her marriage in Mississippi went sour. Margo grew up with a single mother and married too young and also had a daughter too young. She sees Milwaukee as an opportunity to start over, to make money to bring her daughter Lana to live with her instead of Lana's father and as a way to escape the suffocating racism of the South. She becomes part of the great northern migration.

Margo finds a way to earn money. Getting Lana up to Milwaukee takes longer than she hoped. She gets married along the way (several times) fights with and makes up with her family, rolls with the punches of a changing neighborhood, and eventually adapts her own business to become ever more successful. This is all related in a day-to-day event sort of way, with bits of family or man drama finding its way in.

Margo has a huge blind spot when it comes to Lana. She feels guilty over not being with Lana through her early childhood and is far too permissive with her. Lana is also growing up in the 60's and 70's, a turbulent time in the USA and especially for civil rights.

I liked Margo despite her flaws and was interested in her tale. The story has a framing device that felt awkward to me, but I guess the author needed a way in to the life history part of the book. The writing is more workmanlike than inspired, but the voice feels real and true.
]]> 199246937
He’s on edge while she’s en pointe in this fake-dating sports romance from the author of the smash hit Collide.

Elias Westbrook, a newly drafted hockey player for the Toronto Thunder, is facing the challenges of fame and media scrutiny. With a growing fan base and too many expectations on his shoulders, he’s struggling to make his first career goal. The tabloids are reporting on his every move, including which woman he was last seen with, but all he wants to do is escape the spotlight.

Enter from stage left Sage Beaumont, an aspiring ballerina with dreams of joining the Aurora Ballet Theatre, but her lack of popularity online leaves her at a major disadvantage for securing the lead role. When Sage finds herself with the perfect opportunity to make her dreams come true by fake dating Elias, she takes her shot.

Soon enough, the flimsy fake-dating rules they set in place fall away in the face of their sizzling connection. But before things spiral out of control, Sage and Elias will have to decide if they’re willing to take the leap together or if they'll call it quits.]]> Bal Khabra Jacqie 0 to-read 3.86 2025
author: Bal Khabra
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/09
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 218664213 336 Liz Williams 1836390602 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.00
author: Liz Williams
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.00
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 211025449
Abe Winter and Ruth Warneke were never meant to be together—at least if you ask Ruth. Yet their catastrophic blind date in college evolved into a seventy-year marriage and a life on a farm on Bainbridge Island with their hens and beloved Labrador, Megs. Through the years, the Winters have fallen in and out of lockstep, and from their haunting losses and guarded secrets, a dependable partnership has been forged.

But when Ruth’s loose tooth turns out to be something much more malicious, the beautiful, reliable life they’ve created together comes to a crisis. As Ruth struggles with her crumbling independence, Abe must learn how to take care of her while their three living children question his ability to look after his wife. And once again, the couple has to reconfigure how to be there for each other.

In this bighearted and profound portrait of a marriage, Jonathan Evison explores seventy years of big moments in subtle ways, elegantly braiding the Winters�� turbulent history with their present-day battles, showing us how the oddly paired college kids became parents, fell apart and back together, andgrew into the Abe and Ruth of today. Endlessly heartwarming and moving, The Heart of Winter is a reminder that true love lives in small, everyday moments.]]> 368 Jonathan Evison 059347354X Jacqie 0 to-read 4.11 2025
author: Jonathan Evison
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 205973370
“How rare, this delicacy—this calm, sweet, desolated wisdom.”—Helen Garner

The Burrow follows members of the Lee family as they navigate grief and hope in their quiet Australian Jin, an emergency physician and father; Amy, a published author and mother; Lucie, their bookish and introverted ten-year-old; and Pauline, Amy’s mother who’s trying to make amends. Racked with grief for Ruby—Lucie’s baby sister who died in a shocking accident—the family adopts a rabbit in the hopes of bringing much-needed cheer to their home. At first, each family member benefits from the distraction of a new and needy creature, but when a violent home invasion breaks their fragile sense of peace, the family is forced to confront the terrible circumstances surrounding Ruby’s death.Atmospheric and tautly lyrical, Melanie Cheng’s slim novel brings together four distinct perspectives—and one wide-eyed rabbit—to reveal the enormity of loss, long-buried family secrets, and how to survive in a newfound world after the ultimate tragedy.]]> 200 Melanie Cheng 1959030868 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.00 2024
author: Melanie Cheng
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 52085140
The Year is 1883 and Emma M. Lion has returned to her London neighborhood of St. Crispian’s. But Emma’s plans for a charmed and studious life are sabotaged by her eccentric Cousin Archibald, her formidable Aunt Eugenia, and the slightly odd denizens of St. Crispian’s.

Emma M. Lion offers up her Unselected Journals, however self-incriminating they may be, which comprise a series of novella-length volumes. Armed with wit and a sideways amusement, Emma documents the curious realities of her life at Lapis Lazuli House.]]> 125 Beth Brower 0998063614 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.24 2019
author: Beth Brower
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 200189179
Born a vagabond, Tibb Ingleby has never had a roof of her own. But her mother has taught her that if you're not too bound by the Big Man's rules, there are many ways a woman can find shelter in this world. Now her mother is dead in a trick gone wrong and young Tibb is orphaned and alone.

As she wends her way across England's fields and forests, Tibb will discover there are people who will care for her, as well as those who mean her harm. And there are a great many others who are prepared to believe just about anything.

And so, when the opportunity presents itself to escape the shackles society has placed on them, Tibb and her new friends conjure an audacious plan: her greatest trickerie yet. But before they know it, their hoax takes on a life of its own, drawing crowds - and vengeful enemies - to their door...

A Little Trickerie is blazingly original, disarmingly funny and deeply moving. Portraying a side of Tudor England rarely seen, it's a tale of belief and superstition, kinship and courage, with a ragtag cast of characters and an unforgettable and distinctly unangelic heroine.]]> 371 Rosanna Pike 0241646065 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.18 2024
author: Rosanna Pike
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 51113 ]]> 211 Gail Tsukiyama 0312144075 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.15 1995
author: Gail Tsukiyama
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1995
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 27774641 Things really go to seed in the newest novel in the New York Times bestselling Book Retreat mysteries...
��
There is a hidden garden bordering the grounds of Jane Steward’s book-themed resort—a garden filled with beautiful but deadly plants such as mandrake and nightshade. Tucked away behind ivy-covered walls and accessible only through a single locked door, as described in the pages of Frances Hodges Burnett's classic novel, the garden is of special interest to Jane’s current group of guests, The Medieval Herbalists. But when one of them turns up dead, Jane must discover whether a member of the group has come to Storyton Hall to celebrate their passion for plant lore or to implement a particularly cruel means for murder.
��
With thousands of books at her disposal, Jane believes she has the proper materials to solve this deadly problem. If she’s wrong, however, she may lose something far more precious than the contents of Storyton’s secret library...]]> 276 Ellery Adams 0425265617 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.97 2017
author: Ellery Adams
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 215362027 A woman dives into her husband's memories to uncover a decades-old feud threatening reality itself in this staggering technothriller from the bestselling author of Ascension.

Maggie Webb has lived the last decade caring for elderly husband, Stanley, as memory loss gradually erases all the beautiful moments they created together. It's the loneliest she's ever felt in her life.

When a mysterious stranger named Hassan appears at her door, he reveals a shocking truth: Stanley isn't losing his memories. Someone is actively removing them to hide a long-buried secret from coming to light. If Maggie does what she's told, she can reverse it. She can get her husband back.

Led by Hassan and his technological marvels, Maggie breaks into her husband's mind, probing the depths of his past in an effort to save him. The deeper she dives, the more she unravels a mystery spanning continents and centuries, each layer more complex than the last.

But Hassan cannot be trusted. Not just memories are disappearing, but pieces of reality itself. If Maggie cannot find out what Stanley did all those years ago, and what Hassan is after now, she risks far more than her husband's life. The very course of human history hangs in the balance.]]> 384 Nicholas Binge 0593852168 Jacqie 0 to-read, book-club 4.18 2025
author: Nicholas Binge
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/07
shelves: to-read, book-club
review:

]]> 214151232 A highly anticipated, sweeping debut set in a unified Korea that tells the story of three estranged siblings—two human, one robot—as they collide against the backdrop of a murder investigation to settle old scores and make sense of their shattered childhood, perfect for fans of Klara and the Sun and We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves.

In a reunified Korea of the future, robots have been integrated into society as surrogates, servants, children, and even lovers. Though boundaries between bionic and organic frequently blur, these robots are decidedly second-class citizens. Jun and Morgan, two siblings estranged for many years, are haunted by the memory of their lost brother, Yoyo, who was warm, sensitive, and very nearly human.

Jun, a war veteran turned detective of the lowly Robot Crimes Unit in Seoul, becomes consumed by an investigation that reconnects him with his sister Morgan, now a prominent robot designer working for a top firm, who is, embarrassingly, dating one of her creations in secret.

On the other side of Seoul in a junkyard filled with abandoned robots, eleven-year-old Ruijie sifts through scraps looking for robotic parts that might support her failing body. When she discovers a robot boy named Yoyo among the piles of trash, an unlikely bond is formed since Yoyo is so lifelike, he’s unlike anything she’s seen before.

While Morgan prepares to launch the most advanced robot-boy of her career, Jun’s investigation sparks a journey through the underbelly of Seoul, unearthing deeper mysteries about the history of their country and their family. The three siblings must find their way back to each other to reckon with their pasts and the future ahead of them in this poignant and remarkable exploration of what it really means to be human.]]> 391 Silvia Park 1668021668 Jacqie 0 to-read, book-club 3.96 2025
author: Silvia Park
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/07
shelves: to-read, book-club
review:

]]> 123755284 29 Frank Tieri Jacqie 0 to-read 4.29
author: Frank Tieri
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.29
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 18806240 Bone Gap is the story of Roza, a beautiful girl who is taken from a quiet midwestern town and imprisoned by a mysterious man, and Finn, the only witness, who cannot forgive himself for being unable to identify her kidnapper. As we follow them through their melancholy pasts, their terrifying presents, their uncertain futures, acclaimed author Laura Ruby weaves a heartbreaking tale of love and loss, magic and mystery, regret and forgiveness—a story about how the face the world sees is never the sum of who we are.]]> 373 Laura Ruby 0062317636 Jacqie 3 skimmed
It's a paean to Americana. There is corn (that whispers, or shakes) there's a small town that functions as a sort of character itself as an amalgam of the inhabitants, there are barns and chickens and horses, there are diners to sit in with your sweetie. It leans into the feel of folklore.

But for me, the details didn't convince. Why was Finn called Moonface when it turns out he's the most gorgeous boy in town? Why don't any of the characters have thoughts like I do but only seem like they are thinking in quirky twists that come at reality sideways? Why doesn't the author know more about cooking when one of her characters knows so much about it? It felt like the author was squeezing everything she could out of her imagination but overthought it.

Why is this book so much about female victimization? Whether it be a misconstrual of a sexual situation and blaming the almost-victim, to kidnapping, to man after man after man who can't see a girl as anything other than a surface to reflect themselves in, it got exhausting. There were no pre-existing relationships between lovers in this book that were healthy, none. The book felt like it wanted to be light and dark at the same time and I never found my footing.

Finally, why is a woman mutilating herself to escape a kidnapper's affections seen as a win? Is that the best we can do?]]> 3.81 2015
author: Laura Ruby
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2015
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/05
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: skimmed
review:
This is very much a vibes book and I find that I don't do well with most vibes books.

It's a paean to Americana. There is corn (that whispers, or shakes) there's a small town that functions as a sort of character itself as an amalgam of the inhabitants, there are barns and chickens and horses, there are diners to sit in with your sweetie. It leans into the feel of folklore.

But for me, the details didn't convince. Why was Finn called Moonface when it turns out he's the most gorgeous boy in town? Why don't any of the characters have thoughts like I do but only seem like they are thinking in quirky twists that come at reality sideways? Why doesn't the author know more about cooking when one of her characters knows so much about it? It felt like the author was squeezing everything she could out of her imagination but overthought it.

Why is this book so much about female victimization? Whether it be a misconstrual of a sexual situation and blaming the almost-victim, to kidnapping, to man after man after man who can't see a girl as anything other than a surface to reflect themselves in, it got exhausting. There were no pre-existing relationships between lovers in this book that were healthy, none. The book felt like it wanted to be light and dark at the same time and I never found my footing.

Finally, why is a woman mutilating herself to escape a kidnapper's affections seen as a win? Is that the best we can do?
]]> 207567816 From the author of The Magician's Daughter comes The Scholar and the Last Faerie Door, a mythic, magical tale full of secret scholarship, faerie curses, and the deadliest spells of all—the ones that friends cast on each other.

All they needed to break the world was a door, and someone to open it.

Camford, 1920. Gilded and glittering, England's secret magical academy is no place for Clover, a commoner with neither connections nor magical blood. She tells herself she has fought her way there only to find a cure for her brother Matthew, one of the few survivors of a faerie attack on the battlefields of WWI which left the doors to faerie country sealed, the study of its magic banned, and its victims cursed.

But when Clover catches the eye of golden boy Alden Lennox-Fontaine and his friends, doors that were previously closed to her are flung wide open, and she soon finds herself enmeshed in the seductive world of the country's magical aristocrats. The summer she spends in Alden’s orbit leaves a fateful mark: months of joyous friendship and mutual study come crashing down when experiments go awry, and old secrets are unearthed.

Years later, when the faerie seals break, Clover knows it’s because of what they did. And she knows that she must seek the help of people she once called friends—and now doesn’t quite know what to call—if there’s any hope of saving the world as they know it.]]> 464 H.G. Parry 0316383902 Jacqie 3 netgalley, didnt-finish
I think it was because the characters felt more like types than people. Clover is the Very Smart Girl who is Poor but who will succeed anyway because she's just that good. She also can't fit in because of her social status. Until she meets: Alden Lennox-Fontaine, a blond wonderboy who's sort of the Gatsby of the group. He is effortlessly charming, feckless, but with a hollow inside that no one knows about. He is friends with Hero, my favorite character for the part of the book I read. Hero is the only other girl at Magic School. She's rich and classy but also perceptive and kind. She's a great friend and practically perfect. I think that something happens to her in the second part of the book that I would strongly dislike. Then there's Eddie. He's a bit neuroatypical and so is bullied until Hero and Alden rescue him. He's the overlooked one of the group with his own special genius.

These four create their own golden private world. And then nothing much happens for a very long time. There are hints and insinuations. There is the set up. Faerie doors can no longer be used because of the deadly consequences of opening one during the Great War. BUT: Clover's brother is no longer quite right because of that opened door and Clover thinks that she could heal him if only... Alden also has his own secret reasons for wanting to open a faerie door despite all good sense screaming otherwise. The secret that these two keep will probably split the friendship.

But I don't know that for sure. I read about half the book. And then I just didn't care enough to pick it up again. Alden is a weak hero, to be sure, and I didn't find Clover interesting even though she was Special and Smart. And I am given to understand that then there's a time jump and a great change coming toward these characters and I didn't care enough to find out what happened. I'll give this author another try but I wish this one had gone better for me.]]> 4.17 2024
author: H.G. Parry
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/05
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: netgalley, didnt-finish
review:
I am a sucker for a magic school novel, especially if it has a tight group of misfit friends. This book had all of that but for some reason it failed to keep my interest.

I think it was because the characters felt more like types than people. Clover is the Very Smart Girl who is Poor but who will succeed anyway because she's just that good. She also can't fit in because of her social status. Until she meets: Alden Lennox-Fontaine, a blond wonderboy who's sort of the Gatsby of the group. He is effortlessly charming, feckless, but with a hollow inside that no one knows about. He is friends with Hero, my favorite character for the part of the book I read. Hero is the only other girl at Magic School. She's rich and classy but also perceptive and kind. She's a great friend and practically perfect. I think that something happens to her in the second part of the book that I would strongly dislike. Then there's Eddie. He's a bit neuroatypical and so is bullied until Hero and Alden rescue him. He's the overlooked one of the group with his own special genius.

These four create their own golden private world. And then nothing much happens for a very long time. There are hints and insinuations. There is the set up. Faerie doors can no longer be used because of the deadly consequences of opening one during the Great War. BUT: Clover's brother is no longer quite right because of that opened door and Clover thinks that she could heal him if only... Alden also has his own secret reasons for wanting to open a faerie door despite all good sense screaming otherwise. The secret that these two keep will probably split the friendship.

But I don't know that for sure. I read about half the book. And then I just didn't care enough to pick it up again. Alden is a weak hero, to be sure, and I didn't find Clover interesting even though she was Special and Smart. And I am given to understand that then there's a time jump and a great change coming toward these characters and I didn't care enough to find out what happened. I'll give this author another try but I wish this one had gone better for me.
]]> 217388109 Status is hereditary, class is bestowed, trust must be earned.

When an arrogant prince (and his equally arrogant entourage) gets stuck in Orledder Halt as part of brutal political intrigue, competent and sunny deputy courier Elen―once a child slave meant to shield noblemen from the poisonous Pall―is assigned to guide him through the hills to reach his destination.

When she warns him not to enter the haunted Spires, the prince doesn’t heed her advice, and the man who emerges from the towers isn’t the same man who entered.

The journey that follows is fraught with danger. Can a group taught to ignore and despise the lower classes survive with a mere deputy courier as their guide?

The Witch Roads is the latest epic novel by fan favorite, Kate Elliott.]]> 448 Kate Elliott 1250338611 Jacqie 4 netgalley
We have a competent middle-aged woman main character. She loves her nephew, a young man who tells her that he doesn't know what he wants to do with his life but must declare for something soon. Most books would be from the boy's perspective and I do like his character but it is so refreshing to read this story from his mentor's POV! The world is meticulously constructed and built out by the author. No one is cartoonishly evil and no one is one dimensional (well, maybe one person). The world has a rich history and discovering more about that history feels like the way the series is going to go. There is deadly magic, there are supernatural creatures who tugged on my heart, there are ancient secrets. The world feels obviously Asian influenced to me, but I don't know what others will think, and it's also very much its own thing.

About the only thing that I didn't like was that it ends on a CLIFFHANGER. I do very much want to find out what happens next.]]> 4.29 2025
author: Kate Elliott
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/05
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: netgalley
review:
This is one of Kate Elliott's best, I think. Some of the things I loved:

We have a competent middle-aged woman main character. She loves her nephew, a young man who tells her that he doesn't know what he wants to do with his life but must declare for something soon. Most books would be from the boy's perspective and I do like his character but it is so refreshing to read this story from his mentor's POV! The world is meticulously constructed and built out by the author. No one is cartoonishly evil and no one is one dimensional (well, maybe one person). The world has a rich history and discovering more about that history feels like the way the series is going to go. There is deadly magic, there are supernatural creatures who tugged on my heart, there are ancient secrets. The world feels obviously Asian influenced to me, but I don't know what others will think, and it's also very much its own thing.

About the only thing that I didn't like was that it ends on a CLIFFHANGER. I do very much want to find out what happens next.
]]> 214152131 An imaginative retelling of the triumphs and sorrows of one of the most controversial and misunderstood women in Mexico’s history and mythology, perfect for fans of Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s Gods of Jade and Shadow and Zoraida Córdova’s The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina.

A real-life historical figure, the woman known as Malinalli, Malintzin, La Malinche, Doña Marina, and Malinalxochitl was the Nahua interpreter who helped Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés communicate with the native people of Mexico. When indigenous leaders observed her marching into their cities, they believed she was a goddess—blessed with the divine power to interpret the Spaniards�� intentions for their land. Later, historians and pop culture would deem her a traitor—the “Indian�� girl who helped sell Mexico’s future to an invader.

In this riveting, fantastical retelling, Malinalli is all of those things and more, but at heart, she’s a young girl, kidnapped into slavery by age twelve, and fighting to survive the devastation wrought by both the Spanish and Moctezuma’s greed and cruelty. Blessed with magical powers, and supported by a close-knit circle of priestesses, Mali vows to help defend her people’s legacy. In vivid, compelling prose, debut author Veronica Chapa spins an epic tale of magic, sisterhood, survival, and Mexican resilience. This is the first novel to reimagine and reinterpret Malinalli’s story with the empathy, humanity, and awe she’s always deserved.]]> 384 Veronica Chapa 1668009013 Jacqie 0 to-read, book-club 3.52 2025
author: Veronica Chapa
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.52
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: to-read, book-club
review:

]]> 212987930 From the bestselling author M. R. Carey comes an utterly unique and enchantingly dark epic fantasy fable like no other.

This is the tale of Once Was Willem, who - eleven hundred and some years after the death of Christ, in the kingdom that had but recently begun to call itself England - rose from the dead to defeat a great evil facing the humble village of Cosham.

Pennick for all its beauty was ever a place with a dark reputation. The forests of the Chase were said to be home to nixies and boggarts, and there was a common belief, passed down through many generations, that the castle housed an unquiet ghost of terrible and malign power. These rumours I can attest were all true; indeed they fell short of the truth by a long way . . .]]> 310 M.R. Carey 0316505129 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.10 2025
author: M.R. Carey
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 215197797
She’s not the only time traveler out there, though. A community of other travelers exists, with one main rule guiding them: don’t alter the past. This doesn’t stop Sloane from wishing she could fix that one night. Nor does it stop the mysterious woman who seems to be stalking her through time, trying to kill her.

As Sloane struggles to master her newfound abilities, as well as her complex relationship with her mysterious coworker Eric, something keeps pulling her back, over and over again, to that night everything went wrong. Sloane knows she shouldn’t do anything to change the past—but what if her future self has already made those choices for her?]]> 400 Aspen Andersen 0744311527 Jacqie 0 to-read, book-club 4.21
author: Aspen Andersen
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.21
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: to-read, book-club
review:

]]> 113949410
Terry begins life anew sheltered in his formidable grandparents�� home in a coastal town an hour’s drive from Copenhagen, Denmark’s capital. But within months of his arrival, the Second World War breaks out. Serving as the emotional prism through which that monumental struggle isrefracted, Terry’s older self recounts his precarious coming of age as an alien maroonedin a disconcerting new land throughout its long national nightmare �� an ordeal none of his peers was enduring back home safe in America.

Spared the savage treatment Nazi Germany dealt other countries it conquered, Denmark was allowed to remain nominally self-governing. Good fortune, though, did not allow the proud, peaceloving little kingdom to escape the toll the war took on its people’s collective soul. Fearful of openly resisting or secretly harassing the German occupation at risk of lethal reprisals, Denmark made a complicit pact with its tormentors to feed and equip their armed forces. As a result, the Danes suffered from self-hatred at home and contempt abroad as a land of shameless collaborators, bartering their country’s honor to survive the war unbloodied.

Hamlet’s Children by Richard Kluger is the story of a young American’s wrenching assimilation with his Danish relatives and their friends and of how he is pinioned in the same cruel vise with his adopted countrymen as they cunningly attempt to subvert the Germans�� iron grip on their kingdom. Paramount on this agenda of defiance was the Danes�� persistent effort to keep their Jewish neighbors out of the Nazis�� murderous hands. Vibrant with memorable characters and fraught with tension, this artfully crafted narrative, both heartbreaking and uplifting, is a testament to the human spirit in its bleakest hours.]]> 465 Richard Kluger 9781734531 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.91
author: Richard Kluger
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.91
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 58420880
Living with a great writer who is consumed by his work, and trying to find a place for her own spirit to thrive, she rails against the confines while desperate to find the truth in their relationship—and the truth of her own self.

This is a harrowing story, a portrait of the messy, painful, dark side of love lost, of betrayal and sadness and the sheer force of a woman’s anger. But it is also a story of resilience and strength, strewn with sharp insight, moments of joy and hope, the immutable ties of motherhood and the regenerative power of a room of one’s own.]]> 304 Helen Garner 1922458171 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.57
author: Helen Garner
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.57
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/04
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 222376689 KJ Parker's new novella is a darkly witty historical fantasy. A group of scholars are asked to do the impossible by a ruthless king. The cost of refusal being death, of course.

History isn't truth...it's propaganda.

Academics can be cocky. Atop their perches of authority high above the thrumming masses of the unquestioning world they can begin to think themselves gods. It is extremely rare for this authority to be tested. But a challenge from an idiotic, power-hungry king—that'll do it.

Our narrator is one of a dozen professors at the University of the Kingdom of Aelia. Early one morning, all of them are rounded up for an audience with their dictator, Gyges. You see, Gyges is new to the job—he only just invaded Aelia last year—and like any good tyrant, he's looking to expand his empire. But he doesn't think his public image can take the hit of (another) unjustified assault. No problem, he's come up with a plan—have the scholars construct an ancient city from scratch that justifies his right to the lands of the neighboring city-state.

Now these bookworms must put their heads together to do the impossible. They must make history. Because if they don't, they'll lose their heads all-together.

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.]]> 128 K.J. Parker 125083578X Jacqie 0 to-read 4.00
author: K.J. Parker
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.00
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 212320216 With Magic Comes Mayhem

For the Nameless Restaurant, once a discreet hole-in-the-wall meant for a cast of supernatural regulars, the increasing levels of background magic has brought with it that most dreadful of locusts - new customers.

The staff of the Nameless Restaurant are finding the influx of new customers - both mortal and magical - to be a challenge. They're reaching a breaking point and something has to give.

The only question is, will it be Mo Meng's rules on magic or the restaurant itself?

Thaumaturgic Tapas is the third standalone novella in the cozy cooking fantasy series Hidden Dishes.

The Hidden Dishes series is a cozy cooking fantasy perfect for fans of Travis Baldree's Legends & Lattes and Junpei Inuzuka's Restaurant to Another World. Written by bestselling author Tao Wong, his other series include the System Apocalypse, A Thousand Li, Climbing the Ranks, Hidden Wishes and Adventures on Brad series.]]> 140 Tao Wong 1778551963 Jacqie 3 4.05 2025
author: Tao Wong
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/26
date added: 2025/02/26
shelves: audiobook, didnt-finish, netgalley, not-right-now
review:
I like audiobooks that keep me either engrossed or relaxed when I'm driving. This was so soothing that it couldn't even hold my attention. I like cooking and hearing/reading descriptions of cooking but this failed to interest me. Maybe it was me this time, but I'm going to move on to something that is interesting enough to focus on.
]]> 211081101
The only route through a storm-ravaged world, the Bridge Kingdom enriches itself and deprives its rivals, including Lara's homeland. So when she’s sent as a bride under the guise of peace, Lara is prepared to do whatever it takes to fracture its impenetrable defenses. And the defenses of its king.

Yet as she infiltrates her new home and gains a deeper understanding of the war to possess the bridge, Lara begins to question whether she’s the hero or the villain. And as her feelings for Aren transform from frosty hostility to fierce passion, Lara must choose which kingdom she’ll save�� and which kingdom she’ll destroy.

Passionate and violent, The Bridge Kingdom is a seductive fantasy perfect for fans of From Blood and Ash and A Court of Thorns and Roses.]]> 448 Danielle L. Jensen 0593975189 Jacqie 2 didnt-finish
This was so, so YA. A deadly assassin/princess who is to marry/sleep with/kill the king of a rival kingdom because of her great patriotism. The king isn't exactly who she thought he would be- what a surprise. And maybe her father isn't as great as she thought either- how original. And she killed all her sisters to get her position to show her ruthlessness- but she didn't really, though! She really drugged them to save them from being killed by not being chosen. Could our icy heroine have a big heart after all? Never seen that before.

And I'm done.]]> 4.01 2018
author: Danielle L. Jensen
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2018
rating: 2
read at: 2025/02/26
date added: 2025/02/26
shelves: didnt-finish
review:
I read and enjoyed the author's "A Fate Inked in Blood" and thought I'd give one of her earlier series a try. I'm just going to stick with the Fate series.

This was so, so YA. A deadly assassin/princess who is to marry/sleep with/kill the king of a rival kingdom because of her great patriotism. The king isn't exactly who she thought he would be- what a surprise. And maybe her father isn't as great as she thought either- how original. And she killed all her sisters to get her position to show her ruthlessness- but she didn't really, though! She really drugged them to save them from being killed by not being chosen. Could our icy heroine have a big heart after all? Never seen that before.

And I'm done.
]]> 203956677 A thrilling collection of thirteen short stories that span the worlds of the New York Times bestselling author of the Scholomance Trilogy, including a sneak peek at the land where her next novel will be set.

From the dragon-filled Temeraire series and the gothic, magical halls of the Scholomance trilogy to the fairy tale worlds of Spinning Silver and Uprooted, this stunning collection takes us from fairy tale to fantasy, myth to history, and mystery to science fiction as we travel through Naomi Novik’s most beloved stories.

In Buried Deep, we move from ancient Greece and Rome, through the Middle Ages and the Black Death, and into the modern era. We meet Mark Antony, Sherlock Holmes, and Elizabeth Bennet, in ways we have never seen them before. We visit exotic fantasy cities and alien civilizations among the stars.

Though the stories are vastly different, there is a unifying theme: the act of finding and seizing one’s destiny, and the lengths one will go to achieve that—be it turning pirate, captaining a fighting dragon, or shifting from marriage to seek your destiny with a sword.

And in the two tales original to this collection, we first reenter the remade Scholomance in the wake of El’s revolution and see what life is like for the new crop of students. Then, we get a glimpse at the world of Novik’s upcoming series, a deserted land, populated only by silent and enigmatic architectural behemoths whose secrets are yet to be unlocked.]]> 430 Naomi Novik 0593600355 Jacqie 3 3.99 2024
author: Naomi Novik
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/26
date added: 2025/02/26
shelves: audiobook, didnt-finish, netgalley
review:
Naomi Novik is hit-and-miss with me and short stories are also hit-and-miss with me. Together, there weren't enough short stories that I was enjoying listening to that overcame my wish to move on. It was okay.
]]> 213243955 An unforgettable dark fairy tale that asks, Can love save us from ourselves?

Birdie’s keeping it together; of course she is. So she’s a little hungover sometimes, and she has to bring her daughter, Emaleen, to her job waiting tables at an Alaskan roadside lodge, but she’s getting by as a single mother in a tough town. Still, Birdie can remember happier times from her youth, when she was free in the wilds of nature.

Arthur Neilsen, a soft-spoken and scarred recluse who appears in town only at the change of seasons, brings Emaleen back to safety when she gets lost in the woods. Most people avoid him, but to Birdie he represents everything she’s ever longed for. She finds herself falling for Arthur and the land he knows so well. Against the warnings of those who care about them, Birdie and Emaleen move to his isolated cabin in the mountains on the far side of the Wolverine River.

It’s just the three of them in the vast black woods, far from roads, telephones, electricity, and outside contact, but Birdie believes she has come prepared. At first, it’s idyllic, but soon Birdie discovers that Arthur is something much more mysterious and dangerous than she could have imagined, and that like the Alaska wilderness, a fairy tale can be as dark as it is beautiful.]]> 306 Eowyn Ivey 0593231023 Jacqie 2 didnt-finish, netgalley
Right off the bat I didn't care for the mom character. She does things like leave her young child alone while she drinks all night, and then leave them alone again in the morning while she goes off fishing to take care of her hangover. Birdie seemed careless with herself and with her child.

Then I got POV chapter from said young child. I DON'T like reading these sorts of chapters. I wasn't patient enough to go further without skimming. Seems like mom keeps on getting herself and her child into dangerous situations and I didn't feel like getting further into it.]]> 3.70 2025
author: Eowyn Ivey
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2025
rating: 2
read at: 2025/02/26
date added: 2025/02/26
shelves: didnt-finish, netgalley
review:
I've liked Eowyn Ivey's previous books but this one didn't do it for me.

Right off the bat I didn't care for the mom character. She does things like leave her young child alone while she drinks all night, and then leave them alone again in the morning while she goes off fishing to take care of her hangover. Birdie seemed careless with herself and with her child.

Then I got POV chapter from said young child. I DON'T like reading these sorts of chapters. I wasn't patient enough to go further without skimming. Seems like mom keeps on getting herself and her child into dangerous situations and I didn't feel like getting further into it.
]]> 62919004 Tender and intense,��Honeybees and Distant Thunder is the unflinching story of love, courage and rivalry as three young people come to understand what it means to truly be a friend.

In a small coastal town just a stone's throw from Tokyo, a prestigious piano competition is underway. Over the course of two feverish weeks, three students will experience some of the most joyous—and painful—moments of their lives. Though they don't know it yet, each will profoundly and unpredictably change the others, for ever.

Aya was a child prodigy who abruptly gave up performing after the death of her mother, and is now trying for a comeback; Masaru, a childhood friend of Aya who came to the piano through her insistence that he learn to play, is now reunited with her after many years, and is equally invested in both his and her success; Akashi, who is older and married, works in a music store and is the “old man�� of the competitors, hoping for a final chance at success; and Jin, a sixteen-year-old prodigy, the free spirited son of a beekeeper who travels constantly, and has no formal training (and doesn’t even own a piano) yet whose mesmerizing insight into music has brought him to the attention of one of the world’s most celebrated pianists, the late Maestro Von Hoffman.

Each of them will break the rules, awe their fans and push themselves to the brink. But at what cost?

Beloved in Japan, Riku Onda��immerses us in the world of music—from piano masterpieces to the buzz of bees and the rumble of thunder—which��crescendos to a surprising ending in this��rich and vibrant novel.]]> 432 Riku Onda 163936403X Jacqie 0 to-read 3.85 2016
author: Riku Onda
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 213243921 A remote Scottish island hides shocking secrets in this page-turning debut mystery laced with dark folklore.

An island lost in time. A cryptic, pagan past. Some secrets should stay buried.

Eilean Eadar is a barren, windswept rock inhabited by a few hundred humans and sheep. Until now, the island was best known for the unsolved mystery of the three lighthouse keepers who vanished back in 1919. But when a young man is found dead at the base of the same lighthouse, two detective inspectors are sent from Glasgow to investigate.

Georgina ‘George�� Lennox is finally back from leave after a devastating accident and happy to be on the case with her partner, Richie Stewart. That is, until she meets the hostile islanders who seem determined to thwart their investigation, and their enigmatic, omnipresent priest who inserts himself into every interview. Then there’s Richie, who just wants to close the case and head home to his family. He doesn’t see that there is something off about the island and its tiny community. He hasn’t heard the wolves howling or seen the dark figures at their window at night. He’s too busy watching George as if waiting for her to break.

With the dark secrets of Eilean Eadar swirling around them, George and Richie must decide who to trust and what to believe as they spin closer to the terrible truth. Laced with Scottish legend, yet sharp and modern in voice, The Wolf Tree announces a spellbinding new voice in crime and mystery fiction.]]> 336 Laura McCluskey 0593852540 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.77 2025
author: Laura McCluskey
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 204325152 HAMMAJANG | adjective. Definition: In a disorderly or chaotic state; messed up. Chiefly in predicative use, esp. in all hammajang. Etymology: A borrowing from Hawaiian Pidgin. Source: Oxford English Dictionary.

Edie is done with crime. Eight years behind bars changes a person - costs them too much time with too many of the people who need them most.

And it's all Angel's fault. She sold Edie out in what should have been the greatest moment of their lives. Instead, Edie was shipped off to the icy prison planet spinning far below the soaring skybridges and neon catacombs of Kepler space station - of home - to spend the best part of a decade alone.

But then a chance for early parole appears out of nowhere and Edie steps into the pallid sunlight to find none other than Angel waiting - and she has an offer.

One last job. One last deal. One last target. The trillionaire tech god they failed to bring down last time. There's just one thing Edie needs to do - trust Angel again - which also happens to be the last thing Edie wants to do. What could possibly go all hammajang about this plan?

Ocean's 8 meets Blade Runner in this trail-blazing debut science fiction novel and swashbuckling love letter to Hawai'i about being forced to find a new home and striving to build a better one - unmissable for fans of Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir and Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo.]]> 372 Makana Yamamoto 139961679X Jacqie 4 netgalley
I'm not much for heist books. But I did enjoy the found family aspects of the Ocean's Eight crew that was put together. I'm a cis woman, but I found our main character Edie to be pretty sexy and just generally an interesting character. Edie's just out of prison (early) and finds that her friend Angel has facilitated this because Angel is "putting together a crew" and Edie is the best runner on Kepler station. This means that Edie knows the back ways and secret accesses throughout the station, which is necessary to plan an entrance and escape route.

Edie is passionate, impulsive, fiercely loyal, and great at improvisation. She's a great character. I didn't like Angel, her foil, nearly as much. Angel is icy, brittle, and mad at Edie a lot for arguing with her when Angel's betrayal is the reason that Edie doesn't trust her anymore. These two spark a lot. And even though I didn't like Angel, I've got to respect the author for creating two such distinct characters.

When Edie is down for a person (or her family) though, she'll do anything for them. Anything at all. Edie's love for her family and her frustration at not being able to take care of them better are a prime motivation for her. This trope can get tired for me, but the author made me believe it. Edie's family are Hawai'ian Japanese who moved to Kepler station some time ago for a better life, but that life has been elusive. Theirs is a typical immigrant story. I loved the pidgin used in characters' speech and the richness of Edie's heritage is something else I enjoyed about the book.

The heist itself I could take or leave. I didn't get a sense of edge-of-your-seat tension from the book, but maybe that's because I'm familiar enough with these sorts of stories to not get as tense about how it plays out any more. I'm not sure that the science fiction aspect was essential to much of the plot: safe-cracking is science fiction to me anyway, finding a secret escape route through the station could have been through the underpassages of any big city and the information they were planning to steal was stored in a weirdly low-tech way. But I didn't mind the trappings or the science fiction flavor.

This was a very strong debut and I'd definitely read more by this author. They've got the ability to make me care about their characters.]]> 3.57 2024
author: Makana Yamamoto
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/18
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: netgalley
review:
I read somewhere that the author's working title for this one was "Heist Lesbians" and that's exactly what this is!

I'm not much for heist books. But I did enjoy the found family aspects of the Ocean's Eight crew that was put together. I'm a cis woman, but I found our main character Edie to be pretty sexy and just generally an interesting character. Edie's just out of prison (early) and finds that her friend Angel has facilitated this because Angel is "putting together a crew" and Edie is the best runner on Kepler station. This means that Edie knows the back ways and secret accesses throughout the station, which is necessary to plan an entrance and escape route.

Edie is passionate, impulsive, fiercely loyal, and great at improvisation. She's a great character. I didn't like Angel, her foil, nearly as much. Angel is icy, brittle, and mad at Edie a lot for arguing with her when Angel's betrayal is the reason that Edie doesn't trust her anymore. These two spark a lot. And even though I didn't like Angel, I've got to respect the author for creating two such distinct characters.

When Edie is down for a person (or her family) though, she'll do anything for them. Anything at all. Edie's love for her family and her frustration at not being able to take care of them better are a prime motivation for her. This trope can get tired for me, but the author made me believe it. Edie's family are Hawai'ian Japanese who moved to Kepler station some time ago for a better life, but that life has been elusive. Theirs is a typical immigrant story. I loved the pidgin used in characters' speech and the richness of Edie's heritage is something else I enjoyed about the book.

The heist itself I could take or leave. I didn't get a sense of edge-of-your-seat tension from the book, but maybe that's because I'm familiar enough with these sorts of stories to not get as tense about how it plays out any more. I'm not sure that the science fiction aspect was essential to much of the plot: safe-cracking is science fiction to me anyway, finding a secret escape route through the station could have been through the underpassages of any big city and the information they were planning to steal was stored in a weirdly low-tech way. But I didn't mind the trappings or the science fiction flavor.

This was a very strong debut and I'd definitely read more by this author. They've got the ability to make me care about their characters.
]]> 62967342 In this spellbinding debut novel, two estranged half-sisters tasked with guarding their family's library of magical books must work together to unravel a deadly secret at the heart of their collection--a tale of familial loyalty and betrayal, and the pursuit of magic and power.

For generations, the Kalotay family has guarded a collection of ancient and rare books. Books that let a person walk through walls or manipulate the elements--books of magic that half-sisters Joanna and Esther have been raised to revere and protect.

All magic comes with a price, though, and for years the sisters have been separated. Esther has fled to a remote base in Antarctica to escape the fate that killed her own mother, and Joanna's isolated herself in their family home in Vermont, devoting her life to the study of these cherished volumes. But after their father dies suddenly while reading a book Joanna has never seen before, the sisters must reunite to preserve their family legacy. In the process, they'll uncover a world of magic far bigger and more dangerous than they ever imagined, and all the secrets their parents kept hidden; secrets that span centuries, continents, and even other libraries . . .

In the great tradition of Ninth House, The Magicians, and Practical Magic, this is a suspenseful and richly atmospheric novel that draws readers into a vast world filled with mystery and magic, romance, and intrigue--and marks the debut of an extraordinary new voice in speculative fiction.]]> 484 Emma Törzs 0063253488 Jacqie 3
Looking back on it later, I'm not quite as fond of it. The characters seemed to lose agency by the end of the book. Turns out that they were sort of the epilogue for a plot that had been mostly set in place before they were born. There were some fairly obvious twists that I could see coming. Fortunately, the book moves along fast enough that I didn't get too impatient with waiting for the things that I thought were going to happen.. to happen.

This feels like sort of a cross between literary fiction in the vein of Starless Sea and fantasy like A Thousand Doors of January. I read it from a fantasy frame and I think it's wanting in that area but if it's approached from a different angle it's easy to be more forgiving.]]> 4.20 2023
author: Emma Törzs
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/18
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves:
review:
I enjoyed this book while reading it. The writing flows nicely and I'm always a sucker for a book about books, especially magic books.

Looking back on it later, I'm not quite as fond of it. The characters seemed to lose agency by the end of the book. Turns out that they were sort of the epilogue for a plot that had been mostly set in place before they were born. There were some fairly obvious twists that I could see coming. Fortunately, the book moves along fast enough that I didn't get too impatient with waiting for the things that I thought were going to happen.. to happen.

This feels like sort of a cross between literary fiction in the vein of Starless Sea and fantasy like A Thousand Doors of January. I read it from a fantasy frame and I think it's wanting in that area but if it's approached from a different angle it's easy to be more forgiving.
]]> 208896760 In this atmospheric debut mystery, an out-of-work journalist and the homicide detective who broke her heart must cipher out a murder before the clock runs out, perfect for fans of Naomi Hirahara and Jane Pek.After the newspaper she works for folds and the freelance assignments no longer pay the bills, Maya Wong reluctantly returns to her native Hawaiʻi to ghostwrite controversial land developer Parker Hamilton's biography. But when the Hamilton patriarch is found dead under suspicious circumstances, Maya is unwittingly drawn into the investigation. Maya’s family and friends aren't happy about her work for Hamilton. And now, with her ex, Detective Koa Yamada on the case, she’s forced to contend with the very person she was determined to avoid.��All too soon, Maya is dodging assailants and digging for clues while juggling girls�� nights out with her old BFFs and weekly family dinners. Convinced the police are after the wrong man, Maya is determined to stop the killer before it’s too late.��Exploring timely issues in Hawaii, including locals getting priced out of paradise, The Ghost of Waikiki is an engrossing mystery in the vein of The Verifiers.]]> 288 Jennifer K. Morita 1639109390 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.86 2024
author: Jennifer K. Morita
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 181037562
December 1903: While Wilbur and Orville Wright’s flying machine is quite literally taking off in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina with its historic fifty-seven second flight, their sister Katharine is back home in Dayton, Ohio, running the bicycle shop, teaching Latin, and looking after the family. A Latin teacher and suffragette, Katharine is fiercely independent, intellectual, and the only Wright sibling to finish college. But at twenty-nine, she’s frustrated by the gender inequality in academia and is for a new challenge. She never suspects it will be sleuthing��

Returning home to Dayton, Wilbur and Orville accept an invitation to a friend’s party. Nervous about leaving their as-yet-unpatented flyer plans unattended, Wilbur decides to bring them to the festivities . . . where they are stolen right out from under his nose. As always, it’s Katharine’s job to problem solve—and in this case, crime-solve.

As she sets out to uncover the thief among their circle of friends, Katharine soon gets more than she bargained She finds her number one suspect dead with a letter opener lodged in his chest. It seems the patent is the least of her brothers�� worries. They have a far more earthbound concern—prison. Now Katharine will have to keep her feet on the ground and put all her skills to work to make sure Wilbur and Orville are free to fly another day.]]> 288 Amanda Flower 1496747666 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.85 2024
author: Amanda Flower
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 10161216 For fans of Jacqueline Winspear, Laurie R. King, and Anne Perry, Mr. Churchill’s Secretary captures the drama of an era of unprecedented challenge—and the greatness that rose to meet it.

London, 1940. Winston Churchill has just been sworn in, war rages across the Channel, and the threat of a Blitz looms larger by the day. But none of this deters Maggie Hope. She graduated at the top of her college class and possesses all the skills of the finest minds in British intelligence, but her gender qualifies her only to be the newest typist at No. 10 Downing Street. Her indefatigable spirit and remarkable gifts for codebreaking, though, rival those of even the highest men in government, and Maggie finds that working for the prime minister affords her a level of clearance she could never have imagined—and opportunities she will not let pass. In troubled, deadly times, with air-raid sirens sending multitudes underground, access to the War Rooms also exposes Maggie to the machinations of a menacing faction determined to do whatever it takes to change the course of history.

Ensnared in a web of spies, murder, and intrigue, Maggie must work quickly to balance her duty to King and Country with her chances for survival. And when she unravels a mystery that points toward her own family’s hidden secrets, she’ll discover that her quick wits are all that stand between an assassin’s murderous plan and Churchill himself.

In this daring debut, Susan Elia MacNeal blends meticulous research on the era, psychological insight into Winston Churchill, and the creation of a riveting main character,�� Maggie Hope, into a spectacularly crafted novel.]]> 384 Susan Elia MacNeal 0553593617 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.70 2012
author: Susan Elia MacNeal
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 212276037 Holy work sometimes requires unholy deeds.

Brother Diaz has been summoned to the Sacred City, where he is certain a commendation and grand holy assignment awaits him. But his new flock is made up of unrepentant murderers, practitioners of ghastly magic, and outright monsters, and the mission he is tasked with will require bloody measures from them all in order to achieve its righteous ends.

Elves lurk at our borders and hunger for our flesh, while greedy princes care for nothing but their own ambitions and comfort. With a hellish journey before him, it's a good thing Brother Diaz has the devils on his side.]]> 560 Joe Abercrombie 125088005X Jacqie 4 netgalley
This motley crew consist of: a vampire, a necromancer, an elf (elves are terrifying cannibals in this world), a truly terrifying Viking werewolf, and are led by a jack-of-all-trades and an immortal soldier. So we've got basically Frankenstein, Dracula, Wolf(wo)man, Zombie and The Invisible Man along with a human Swiss Army Knife.

Added to this team are a new priest (because the Church needs this team to have a spiritual handler) and a long lost princess who's grown up as Oliver Twist only a lot less nice. The job is to get her to this world's version of Constantinople, which is undergoing a succession struggle. Our long lost princess, in theory, has the best claim to the throne if she can only get there. Achieving this might solve the schism between the Church of the East and the Church of the West (if you remember your European medieval history).

Things go wrong. Oh, do they go wrong. The other prospective heirs to this throne are not interested in a new princess and have lots of horrible ways to try to stop her. There's double-crossing, there's spying and messages gone astray, there are horrible inhuman monsters to fight. This is why the Church keeps its own monsters.

Abercrombie tells us what's up right at the beginning of the book and the climax did not come as a surprise to me. I don't know if his heart was in all of the characters. For example, I never cared about our princess; I was far more interested in the monsters around her.

But he's mostly on point. A tragedy concerning a character I'd grown to really enjoy hit hard. Fight scenes were lots of fun. Great banter and raunchy jokes. I'm interested in the world he's built and it feels like he's left the door open for a sequel, which I'd gladly read.]]> 4.46 2025
author: Joe Abercrombie
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/13
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: netgalley
review:
This is sort of a fantasy version of the Suicide Squad. The Devils are a crew put together by the Church (in which all the most powerful people are female in this world), set aside for a day when normal methods to solve a problem will not do. Most people know that the Church has twelve chapels, but these folks are part of the secret thirteenth, Our Lady of Pragmatic Expediency.

This motley crew consist of: a vampire, a necromancer, an elf (elves are terrifying cannibals in this world), a truly terrifying Viking werewolf, and are led by a jack-of-all-trades and an immortal soldier. So we've got basically Frankenstein, Dracula, Wolf(wo)man, Zombie and The Invisible Man along with a human Swiss Army Knife.

Added to this team are a new priest (because the Church needs this team to have a spiritual handler) and a long lost princess who's grown up as Oliver Twist only a lot less nice. The job is to get her to this world's version of Constantinople, which is undergoing a succession struggle. Our long lost princess, in theory, has the best claim to the throne if she can only get there. Achieving this might solve the schism between the Church of the East and the Church of the West (if you remember your European medieval history).

Things go wrong. Oh, do they go wrong. The other prospective heirs to this throne are not interested in a new princess and have lots of horrible ways to try to stop her. There's double-crossing, there's spying and messages gone astray, there are horrible inhuman monsters to fight. This is why the Church keeps its own monsters.

Abercrombie tells us what's up right at the beginning of the book and the climax did not come as a surprise to me. I don't know if his heart was in all of the characters. For example, I never cared about our princess; I was far more interested in the monsters around her.

But he's mostly on point. A tragedy concerning a character I'd grown to really enjoy hit hard. Fight scenes were lots of fun. Great banter and raunchy jokes. I'm interested in the world he's built and it feels like he's left the door open for a sequel, which I'd gladly read.
]]> 218153843 From the internationally bestselling author of Tigana, All the Seas of the World, and A Brightness Long Ago comes a majestic new novel of love and war that brilliantly evokes the drama and turbulence of medieval France.

Thierry Villar is a well-known--even notorious-- tavern poet, familiar with the rogues and shadows of that world, but not at all with courts and power. He is an unlikely person, despite his quickness, to be caught up in the deadly contests of ambitious royals, assassins, and invading armies.

But he is indeed drawn into all these things on a savagely cold night in his beloved city of Orane. And so Thierry must use all the intelligence and charm he can muster as political struggles merge with a decades-long war to bring his country to the brink of destruction.

As he does, he meets his poetic equal in an aristocratic woman and is drawn to more than one unsettling person with a connection to the world beyond this one. He also crosses paths with an extraordinary young woman driven by voices within to try to heal the ailing king--and help his forces in war. A wide and varied set of people from all walks of life take their places in the rich tapestry of this story.

A new masterwork from the internationally bestselling author of All the Seas of the World, A Brightness Long Ago, and Tigana, Written on the Dark is an elegant tour de force about power and ambition playing out amid the intense human need for art and beauty, and memories to be left behind.]]> 320 Guy Gavriel Kay 0593953983 Jacqie 4 netgalley
Thierry, one of the main characters in this book, is a poet who's made a name for himself in the taverns. He is a hedonist who lives for today and tries not to think too hard about tomorrow. He drifts from place to place and bed to bed. However, he ends up being in the right place at the wrong time and is drawn into a power struggle between powerful nobles. The person who draws him in is a lawman who also realizes that he and Thierry both are not nearly as powerful as those whose crimes he has committed to investigate.

Thierry's gift for words and his boldness end up being assets for the investigation, if not for Thierry's prospects for living to a ripe old age. Death can happen suddenly and brutally, but Kay assures that the reader knows that death always matters.

Kay likes to write about a world just sideways from our own and if you know your history a lot of his characters are recognizable. In this book he writes variations on Joan of Arc and Christine de Pizan, among others.

I wouldn't say that this is the best of Kay's books. I couldn't thoroughly attach to Thierry, who thought a lot of himself as clever man and as a poet. But the melancholy, nostalgic tone of the book felt deep and true. If you like reading Kay you'll like this one.

]]> 4.48 2025
author: Guy Gavriel Kay
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.48
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/13
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: netgalley
review:
Kay's work seems to be dwelling more and more upon legacy these days. His themes also commonly include "small" people swept up in large events, the importance of art, and how power works upon ethics.

Thierry, one of the main characters in this book, is a poet who's made a name for himself in the taverns. He is a hedonist who lives for today and tries not to think too hard about tomorrow. He drifts from place to place and bed to bed. However, he ends up being in the right place at the wrong time and is drawn into a power struggle between powerful nobles. The person who draws him in is a lawman who also realizes that he and Thierry both are not nearly as powerful as those whose crimes he has committed to investigate.

Thierry's gift for words and his boldness end up being assets for the investigation, if not for Thierry's prospects for living to a ripe old age. Death can happen suddenly and brutally, but Kay assures that the reader knows that death always matters.

Kay likes to write about a world just sideways from our own and if you know your history a lot of his characters are recognizable. In this book he writes variations on Joan of Arc and Christine de Pizan, among others.

I wouldn't say that this is the best of Kay's books. I couldn't thoroughly attach to Thierry, who thought a lot of himself as clever man and as a poet. But the melancholy, nostalgic tone of the book felt deep and true. If you like reading Kay you'll like this one.


]]> 25241708 The biggest adventure in DC's history is here!
Join visionary writer Grant Morrison, today's most talented artists, and a cast of unforgettable heroes from 52 alternative Earths of the�� DC Multiverse!
Prepare to meet the Vampire League of Earth-43, the Justice Riders of Earth-18, Superdemon, Doc Fate, the super-sons of Superman and Batman, the rampaging Retaliators of Earth-8, the Atomic Knights of Justice, Dino-Cop, Sister Miracle, Lady Quark, and the latest, greatest Super Hero of Earth-Prime: You!
The Multiversity is more than a multipart comic-book series: it's a cosmos spanning, soul-shaking experience that puts You on the frontline in the battle for all creation against the demonic destroyers known as the Gentry!
Featuring artwork by Ivan Reis (Justice League), Frank Quitely (All-Star Superman), Cameron Stewart (Batgirl) and many others, The Multiversity
Collecting: The Multiversity 1-2, Guidebook, The Society of Super-Heroes, The Just, Pax Americana, Thunderworld, Mastermen, & Ultra Comics]]> 448 Grant Morrison 1401256821 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.78 2015
author: Grant Morrison
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 173754979 A brilliant reimagining of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn—both harrowing and satirical—told from the enslaved Jim's point of view

When Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he runs away until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck has faked his own death to escape his violent father. As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond.

Brimming with nuanced humor and lacerating observations that have made Everett a literary icon, this brilliant and tender novel radically illuminates Jim's agency, intelligence, and compassion as never before. James is destined to be a major publishing event and a cornerstone of twenty-first-century American literature.

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780385550369.]]> 303 Percival Everett Jacqie 0 to-read 4.47 2024
author: Percival Everett
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/06
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 204201791 A tightly woven blend of myth, magic, and the ties of a found family.

Ghosts that speak in smoke. Spirits with teeth like glass. A parasitic, soul-eating spirit worm has gone into a feeding frenzy, but all the Jong-ro Police Department’s violent crimes unit sees is a string of suicides. Except for Kim Han-gil, Seoul’s only spirit detective. He’s seen this before. He’ll do anything to stop another tragedy from happening, even if that means teaming up with Shin Yoonhae, the man Han-gil believes is responsible for the horrifying aftermath of his mother’s last exorcism.

In their debut novella, Sam Kyung Yoo weaves a tale of mystical proportions that's part crime-thriller, part urban fantasy.]]> 144 Sam Kyung Yoo 1953736289 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.12
author: Sam Kyung Yoo
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.12
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 202934228
In the city of Sirvassa, where petals are currency and flowers are magic, the Caretaker tends to the Garden of Delights. He imparts temporary magical abilities to the citizens of Sirvassa, while battling a curse of eternal old age. No Delight could uplift his curse, and so he must seek out a mythical figure. A god. When a Delight allows a young girl an ability to change reality, the Caretaker believes he’s at the end of his search. But soon a magical rot takes root in his Garden, and the Caretaker must join forces with the girl and stop it from spreading. Even as he battles a different rot that plagues Sirvassa, he learns that Delights are always a precursor to Sorrows.

FLAME TREE PRESS is the imprint of long-standing Independent Flame Tree Publishing, dedicated to full-length original fiction in the horror and suspense, science fiction, fantasy, and crime / mystery / thriller categories. The list brings together fantastic new authors and the more established; the award winners, and exciting, original voices.

Learn more about Flame Tree Press at www [dot] flametreepress [dot] com and connect on social media @flametreepress.]]> 384 Amal Singh 1787589080 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.31 2024
author: Amal Singh
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 214988412 Discover the enchanting new feelgood novel where five overlapping lives seek comfort from a magical hippo ride.

Nestling at the bottom of a five-storey apartment block in the community of Advance Hill is the children's playground, Hinode Park, where you will find a very special hippo ride. According to urban legend, if you touch it with the area of your body that needs comfort, you will see swift signs of recovery.

Meet a couple of the neighbours who use the hippo ride, from a highschool student to an eighty-year-old cleaning lady:
- Kanato lays his head on the hippo's back, hoping to recover the confidence he lost when he started at his scary new school;
- Saha, a new mother with no friends, strokes its mouth, in case she can bring back the words she spoke when she was an award-winning retail assistant.

Three more neighbours will come to the magical hippo for help, as they discover how to resolve emotional pain for themselves, if their heart is open and their minds are at peace, in this deeply moving celebration of kindness, community and understanding.]]> Michiko Aoyama 1529949777 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.50 2023
author: Michiko Aoyama
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 209628245 Welcome to Tenderness!

A quaint seaside town in Kitakyushu, Mojiko is full of hidden delights. And one unexpected treasure is the 24/7 convenience store, Tenderness.

At first glance, it’s a store like any other.

Sure, it’s a bit odd that the handsome manager has his own fan club. And perhaps the customers are somewhat eccentric. But there’s a warmth about Tenderness that draws you in.

The bright lights are always on. The employees know you by name. And the shelves are stacked with delicious treats, from strong hot coffee to sweet parfaits, egg sandos to ramen, crispy fried chicken to refreshing soba.

After a while, you get the feeling that whatever you need might just be waiting for you here��

Celebrating the joy of connection and community, The Convenience Store by the Sea is the heartwarming international bestseller from award-winning Japanese novelist Sonoko Machida.]]> 304 Sonoko Machida 1398722782 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.76 2020
author: Sonoko Machida
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 205363984
May 1938. The young novelist Aoyama Chizuko has sailed from her home in Nagasaki, Japan, and arrived in Taiwan. She’s been invited there by the Japanese government ruling the island, though she has no interest in their official banquets or imperialist agenda. Instead, Chizuko longs to experience real island life and to taste as much of its authentic cuisine as her famously monstrous appetite can bear.

Soon a Taiwanese woman―who is younger even than she is, and who shares the characters of her name―is hired as her interpreter and makes her dreams come true. The charming, erudite, meticulous Chizuru arranges Chizuko’s travels all over the Land of the South and also proves to be an exceptional cook. Over scenic train rides and braised pork rice, lively banter and winter melon tea, Chizuko grows infatuated with her companion and intent on drawing her closer. But something causes Chizuru to keep her distance. It’s only after a heartbreaking separation that Chizuko begins to grasp what the “something�� is.

Disguised as a translation of a rediscovered text by a Japanese writer, this novel was a sensation on its first publication in Mandarin Chinese in 2020 and won Taiwan’s highest literary honor, the Golden Tripod Award. Taiwan Travelogue unburies lost colonial histories and deftly reveals how power dynamics inflect our most intimate relationships.]]> 320 Yáng Shuāng-zǐ 1644453150 Jacqie 5
Apparently the author of this autofiction memoir sort of thing was asked by her government to write a travel series in Taiwan, which was a Japanese colony at the time (pre WWII). Our author and narrator was unsatisfied with the official translator that had been provided to her and came across a young woman more to her liking, who then became her translator and fixer. These two traveled around the island together.

Aoyama, our narrator, is food-oriented. She wants to try all the different versions of local and Japanese dishes, ferret out new ingredients, and she's not shy about getting her translator to plan lecture junkets specifically so she can try a new dish she's heard about. I like reading about food and it was interesting to me just how differently she perceived Taiwanese and Japanese food. She'd never had a pineapple or even knew what one looked like. She loved finding parallels between Taiwanese cooking techniques and the foods that she knew. Aoyama had a prodigious appetite and sometimes I couldn't take her seriously because she claimed to be such a glutton that a 250 pound man would have had difficulty packing away everything she devoured in one sitting.

Aoyama is also enthralled by her translator and insists that they are friends. Her translator demurs politely but this goes unnoticed by our author.

The trick that the author plays is to portray herself as clueless about her power as a colonial over her "friend". She writes of several uncomfortable conversations that make her seem oblivious as to the nature of this relationship but made me, the reader, uncomfortable. It's poignant because you can see that Aoyama wants to connect but her blindness to her own privilege makes that impossible. It's a very delicate thing to write. Eventually, things do come to a head.

There's a lot in the book that made me feel like these women might have had romantic feelings for each other, which adds more tragedy to the story. I did mostly like the author's character with all her flaws and the translator character was exquisite.

The author manages to make a travel series written from a colonizer's point of view interrogate that viewpoint and perhaps even allow the reader to empathize with the perspective of the colonized. It's quite the feat. The writing was amazing and I'll bet it would have been even better in the Japanese. This is a book that made me feel and think about the book for quite some time afterwards. Speaking of afterwards, there's one in the version I read that shed a bit more light on the translator's side of things.]]> 4.13 2020
author: Yáng Shuāng-zǐ
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/04
date added: 2025/02/04
shelves:
review:
I'm not sure if this is the correct translation on ŷ������ but I'll review the content of the book more than the translation.

Apparently the author of this autofiction memoir sort of thing was asked by her government to write a travel series in Taiwan, which was a Japanese colony at the time (pre WWII). Our author and narrator was unsatisfied with the official translator that had been provided to her and came across a young woman more to her liking, who then became her translator and fixer. These two traveled around the island together.

Aoyama, our narrator, is food-oriented. She wants to try all the different versions of local and Japanese dishes, ferret out new ingredients, and she's not shy about getting her translator to plan lecture junkets specifically so she can try a new dish she's heard about. I like reading about food and it was interesting to me just how differently she perceived Taiwanese and Japanese food. She'd never had a pineapple or even knew what one looked like. She loved finding parallels between Taiwanese cooking techniques and the foods that she knew. Aoyama had a prodigious appetite and sometimes I couldn't take her seriously because she claimed to be such a glutton that a 250 pound man would have had difficulty packing away everything she devoured in one sitting.

Aoyama is also enthralled by her translator and insists that they are friends. Her translator demurs politely but this goes unnoticed by our author.

The trick that the author plays is to portray herself as clueless about her power as a colonial over her "friend". She writes of several uncomfortable conversations that make her seem oblivious as to the nature of this relationship but made me, the reader, uncomfortable. It's poignant because you can see that Aoyama wants to connect but her blindness to her own privilege makes that impossible. It's a very delicate thing to write. Eventually, things do come to a head.

There's a lot in the book that made me feel like these women might have had romantic feelings for each other, which adds more tragedy to the story. I did mostly like the author's character with all her flaws and the translator character was exquisite.

The author manages to make a travel series written from a colonizer's point of view interrogate that viewpoint and perhaps even allow the reader to empathize with the perspective of the colonized. It's quite the feat. The writing was amazing and I'll bet it would have been even better in the Japanese. This is a book that made me feel and think about the book for quite some time afterwards. Speaking of afterwards, there's one in the version I read that shed a bit more light on the translator's side of things.
]]> 216052751 Four dissatisfied sixties-era housewives form a book club turned sisterhood that will hold fast amid the turmoil of a rapidly changing world and alter the course of each of their lives.

By early 1960s standards, Margaret Ryan, Viv Buschetti, and Bitsy Cobb, suburban housewives in a brand-new "planned community" in Northern Virginia, appear to have it all. The fact that "all" doesn't feel like enough leaves them feeling confused and guilty, certain the fault must lie with them. Things begin to change when they form a book club with Charlotte Gustafson--the eccentric and artsy "new neighbor" from Manhattan--and read Betty Friedan's just-released book, The Feminine Mystique.

Controversial and groundbreaking, the book struck a chord with an entire generation of women, helping them realize that they weren't alone in their dissatisfactions, or their longings, lifting their eyes to new horizons of possibility and achievement. Margaret, Charlotte, Bitsy, and Viv are among them. But is it really the book that alters the lives of these four very different women? Or is it the bond of sisterhood that helps them find courage to confront the past, navigate turmoil in a rapidly changing world, and see themselves in a new and limitless light?]]> 384 Marie Bostwick 1400344743 Jacqie 3 netgalley
All of the women end up re-examining their lives to some extent and make decisions that they might not have made if they didn't have each other as support. One goes back to work for a while. One writes a column in a women's magazine and eventually tries to go beyond the tripe that she's expected to write. Two get divorces and careers.

Only one of these women has what I'd consider to be a good marriage, although one ends up being reparable in what feels like a frankly unrealistic realization that the husband comes to.

I think what I liked about the book is that it's one of those books where everyone gets their version of a happy ending. This is meant to gently challenge traditional (patriarchal) assumptions with everything carved out so black and white that there's no doubt what you're supposed to think as the reader. This is no Feminine Mystique, Women's Room, or any of the other literature name-checked in the book. It's training wheels consciousness raising. I suppose the sad thing is that this is probably all that a lot of its readers might be ready for. We haven't really come all that long a way from the 1960's in terms of misogyny, even thought I'd like to think differently.

But if what you want to read about is developing friendships and things all working out okay with maybe a little bit of a message, this will do just fine.]]> 4.13 2025
author: Marie Bostwick
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/04
date added: 2025/02/04
shelves: netgalley
review:
This will definitely make the book club rounds. We've got four women (all with different color hair!) who are all married in the 1960's, who meet each other at a neighborhood mixer and decide to start a book club. The "Samantha" of the group suggests reading The Feminine Mystique and this starts some things off.

All of the women end up re-examining their lives to some extent and make decisions that they might not have made if they didn't have each other as support. One goes back to work for a while. One writes a column in a women's magazine and eventually tries to go beyond the tripe that she's expected to write. Two get divorces and careers.

Only one of these women has what I'd consider to be a good marriage, although one ends up being reparable in what feels like a frankly unrealistic realization that the husband comes to.

I think what I liked about the book is that it's one of those books where everyone gets their version of a happy ending. This is meant to gently challenge traditional (patriarchal) assumptions with everything carved out so black and white that there's no doubt what you're supposed to think as the reader. This is no Feminine Mystique, Women's Room, or any of the other literature name-checked in the book. It's training wheels consciousness raising. I suppose the sad thing is that this is probably all that a lot of its readers might be ready for. We haven't really come all that long a way from the 1960's in terms of misogyny, even thought I'd like to think differently.

But if what you want to read about is developing friendships and things all working out okay with maybe a little bit of a message, this will do just fine.
]]> 11834447
But when the travelers reach the ancestral home of Indigo Cloud, shrouded within the trunk of a mountain-sized tree, they discover a blight infecting its core. Nearby they find the remains of the invaders who may be responsible, as well as evidence of a devastating theft. This discovery sends Moon and the hunters of Indigo Cloud on a quest for the heartstone of the tree �� a quest that will lead them far away, across the Serpent Sea.]]> 340 Martha Wells 1597803324 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.06 2012
author: Martha Wells
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 9461562 ]]> 278 Martha Wells 1597802166 Jacqie 4
Moon doesn't really know who he is. He's never met anyone like him and has spent most of his life trying convince groundling groups that he's a groundling too. But eventually he always has to move on, often because the groundlings discover his winged form and think he's one of the deadly Fell.

Moon is discovered by a fellow Raksura who brings him to a benighted Court in an uncertain home. Moon gets quite the crash course in Raksura cultural norms and expectations. Deep down, he doesn't think he'll end up fitting here either and is ready to move on, but the Fell threaten the Court and he stays to help until the threat has passed.

I loved that I couldn't form any expectations while reading this book. I love anthropological fantasy and Wells has done a good job here. Her alien creatures manage to be both fantastic and relatable and I'm not sure how she did that.

It did make it hard for me to latch onto sometimes, because I couldn't really form a good mental picture of the scenes in the book. But I'm interested to read the next one.]]> 3.94 2011
author: Martha Wells
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/03
date added: 2025/02/03
shelves:
review:
This is one of the more imaginative fantasy books that I've read. The author has created a new world with alien species and no humans. Most of these people are groundlings, but the Raksura and their deadly enemies the Fell can shapeshift and many of them can shapeshift into winged beings.

Moon doesn't really know who he is. He's never met anyone like him and has spent most of his life trying convince groundling groups that he's a groundling too. But eventually he always has to move on, often because the groundlings discover his winged form and think he's one of the deadly Fell.

Moon is discovered by a fellow Raksura who brings him to a benighted Court in an uncertain home. Moon gets quite the crash course in Raksura cultural norms and expectations. Deep down, he doesn't think he'll end up fitting here either and is ready to move on, but the Fell threaten the Court and he stays to help until the threat has passed.

I loved that I couldn't form any expectations while reading this book. I love anthropological fantasy and Wells has done a good job here. Her alien creatures manage to be both fantastic and relatable and I'm not sure how she did that.

It did make it hard for me to latch onto sometimes, because I couldn't really form a good mental picture of the scenes in the book. But I'm interested to read the next one.
]]> 28765741
Their journey will be long, hard and fraught with danger. Allies will become enemies; enemies will become allies. And the Dark Lord will be waiting, always waiting��

Spiderlight is an exhilarating fantasy quest from Adrian Tchaikovsky, the author of Guns at Dawn and the Shadows of the Apt series.]]> 298 Adrian Tchaikovsky 0765388359 Jacqie 4
A classic adventuring party sets forth to fulfill a prophecy about toppling the Dark One from his throne. They know that they must take "the spider's path" and trying to fulfill the prophecy means that they end up with a giant spider who's been shapeshifted by their arrogant wizard into something very close to human form. The spider will be their guide. The spider himself is fulfilling the orders of his queen but doesn't expect to get out of this alive.

Naturally, the spider ends up being one of the most relatable characters in the book. All his human party members have their flaws, some are more likable than others and one at least is almost irredeemable. Through their inhuman party member, most of the rest of the crew find themselves musing on exactly what makes Good good and what makes the Dark so dark. Black and White thinking is easy. Us vs. Them means that there is always an enemy that it's okay to dehumanize and torment. This book asks if maybe we should get beyond Black vs. White since those who use the tool of othering a convenient enemy are often doing for reasons of their own that have nothing to do with any common good and have all to do with their own convenience.]]> 4.14 2016
author: Adrian Tchaikovsky
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/03
date added: 2025/02/03
shelves:
review:
Adrian Tchaikovsky likes bugs and he likes D&D. Here he combines both things into a quest fantasy that has you questioning who's really the most inhuman of the characters.

A classic adventuring party sets forth to fulfill a prophecy about toppling the Dark One from his throne. They know that they must take "the spider's path" and trying to fulfill the prophecy means that they end up with a giant spider who's been shapeshifted by their arrogant wizard into something very close to human form. The spider will be their guide. The spider himself is fulfilling the orders of his queen but doesn't expect to get out of this alive.

Naturally, the spider ends up being one of the most relatable characters in the book. All his human party members have their flaws, some are more likable than others and one at least is almost irredeemable. Through their inhuman party member, most of the rest of the crew find themselves musing on exactly what makes Good good and what makes the Dark so dark. Black and White thinking is easy. Us vs. Them means that there is always an enemy that it's okay to dehumanize and torment. This book asks if maybe we should get beyond Black vs. White since those who use the tool of othering a convenient enemy are often doing for reasons of their own that have nothing to do with any common good and have all to do with their own convenience.
]]> 62919847 A gripping, page-turning novel set in Jim Crow Florida that follows Robert Stephens Jr. as he’s sent to a segregated reform school that is a chamber of terrors where he sees the horrors of racism and injustice, for the living, and the dead.

Gracetown, Florida
June 1950

Twelve-year-old Robbie Stephens, Jr., is sentenced to six months at the Gracetown School for Boys, a reformatory, for kicking the son of the largest landowner in town in defense of his older sister, Gloria. So begins Robbie’s journey further into the terrors of the Jim Crow South and the very real horror of the school they call The Reformatory.

Robbie has a talent for seeing ghosts, or haints. But what was once a comfort to him after the loss of his mother has become a window to the truth of what happens at the reformatory. Boys forced to work to remediate their so-called crimes have gone missing, but the haints Robbie sees hint at worse things. Through his friends Redbone and Blue, Robbie is learning not just the rules but how to survive. Meanwhile, Gloria is rallying every family member and connection in Florida to find a way to get Robbie out before it’s too late.

The Reformatory is a haunting work of historical fiction written as only American Book Award–winning author Tananarive Due could, by piecing together the life of the relative her family never spoke of and bringing his tragedy and those of so many others at the infamous Dozier School for Boys to the light in this riveting novel.]]> 576 Tananarive Due 1982188340 Jacqie 5 netgalley
In this book, in 1960's Florida Robbie Stephens ends up in Gracetown after trying to defend his older sister Gloria from the unwelcome attentions of a white boy. Robbie and Gloria are Black and they are mostly on their own since their father, an important figure in the civil rights movement, has had to leave for the North after it became clear that Jim Crow was closing in on him. His two children remained behind and became vulnerable to the racists who see them as a lever to get their father back in the South where he can be dealt with.

The book has two main storylines. One is Gloria, trying her best to get Robbie out of Gracetown by hook or by crook. She becomes more and more disillusioned about the systemic means open to her and also more enlightened about how systemic racism will have its way by abusing the system that is meant for White people, not Black people. Gracetown takes (and abuses) both White and Black boys, the Jim Crow South makes sure that the mostly poor and uninfluential families of these boys never has any recourse for any outrages committed by the school.

Meanwhile, Robbie tries to learn the ropes and survive at Gracetown. This was the more compelling of the storylines for me. Robbie is only twelve. His ability to see the dead becomes more powerful at Dozier because there are a lot of unquiet dead at the school. However, the most dangerous presence at the school is the superindendant. Like so many institutions, Gracetown has become a haven for a sadistic predator.

Robbie becomes caught between his loyalties to the friends he makes at Gracetown, the spirits who want him to do something for them, and the superindendant himself. He's in an impossible situation.

Tananarive Due ratchets up the tension to a high degree. These children were constantly on dangerous ground. The adults of their community who cared for them were in constant danger as well. The racism and injustice built into the society of the Jim Crow South is illustrated clearly and so is the peril to any Black people living there.

As with so many horror stories, the true horror is us, just normal people. Humans can outdo angry spirits any day with regard to atrocity.]]> 4.44 2023
author: Tananarive Due
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/03
date added: 2025/02/03
shelves: netgalley
review:
If you've read or seen The Nickel Boys, you know about the Dozier School. It was a "reformatory school" in Florida that was the setting for countless atrocities and many child deaths that were pushed under the rug. Gracetown is a thinly disguised and fictionalized version of Dozier.

In this book, in 1960's Florida Robbie Stephens ends up in Gracetown after trying to defend his older sister Gloria from the unwelcome attentions of a white boy. Robbie and Gloria are Black and they are mostly on their own since their father, an important figure in the civil rights movement, has had to leave for the North after it became clear that Jim Crow was closing in on him. His two children remained behind and became vulnerable to the racists who see them as a lever to get their father back in the South where he can be dealt with.

The book has two main storylines. One is Gloria, trying her best to get Robbie out of Gracetown by hook or by crook. She becomes more and more disillusioned about the systemic means open to her and also more enlightened about how systemic racism will have its way by abusing the system that is meant for White people, not Black people. Gracetown takes (and abuses) both White and Black boys, the Jim Crow South makes sure that the mostly poor and uninfluential families of these boys never has any recourse for any outrages committed by the school.

Meanwhile, Robbie tries to learn the ropes and survive at Gracetown. This was the more compelling of the storylines for me. Robbie is only twelve. His ability to see the dead becomes more powerful at Dozier because there are a lot of unquiet dead at the school. However, the most dangerous presence at the school is the superindendant. Like so many institutions, Gracetown has become a haven for a sadistic predator.

Robbie becomes caught between his loyalties to the friends he makes at Gracetown, the spirits who want him to do something for them, and the superindendant himself. He's in an impossible situation.

Tananarive Due ratchets up the tension to a high degree. These children were constantly on dangerous ground. The adults of their community who cared for them were in constant danger as well. The racism and injustice built into the society of the Jim Crow South is illustrated clearly and so is the peril to any Black people living there.

As with so many horror stories, the true horror is us, just normal people. Humans can outdo angry spirits any day with regard to atrocity.
]]> 211004050 In this action-packed debut, time traveling archaeologist Rabbit Ward maneuvers through the past to recover a long-lost, precious menorah hiding out in ancient Rome.

Smithsonian archaeologist Rabbit Ward travels through time on sponsored expeditions to the past to secure precious artifacts moments before they are lost to history. Although exceptional at his job, Rabbit is not without faults. In a spectacular failure twenty years ago, he lost both the menorah of the second temple and his hot-headed mentee, Aaron. So, when new evidence reveals the menorah’s reappearance in 6th century Constantinople, Rabbit seizes the chance for redemption.

But from the moment he arrives in the past, things start to go wrong. Rabbit quickly finds out that his prime competition, an unlicensed and annoyingly appealing “stringer�� named Helen, is also in Constantinople hunting the menorah. And that’s only the beginning. The oppressed Jewish population of the city is primed for revolution, Constantinople’s leading gang seems to have it out for Rabbit personally, and someone local is interested enough in the menorah to kill for it.

As the past closes in on him and his previous failures compound, will Rabbit be able to recover the menorah before it's once again lost in time?

With new and old dangers alike hiding behind every corner, time might just be up for Rabbit’s redemption—and possibly his life.]]> 320 Andrew Ludington 1250349303 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.95 2025
author: Andrew Ludington
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 205015141 When a mysterious tower appears in the skies over England, thirteen strangers are pulled from their lives to stand before it as a countdown begins. Above the doorway is one word: ASCEND.

As a grieving teacher, a reclusive artist, and a narcissistic celebrity children’s author lead the others in trying to understand why they’ve been chosen and what the tower is, it soon becomes clear the only way out of this for everyone�� is up.

And so begins a race to the top, through sinking ships, haunted houses and other waking nightmares, as the group fights to hold onto its humanity, while the twisted horror of why they’re here grows ever more apparent �� and death stalks their every move.]]> 368 Dan Hanks 1915202949 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.67 2025
author: Dan Hanks
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 193548782 Why don't more 60-something-year-olds get to have fun magical adventures?

Delia Spark is caught in a maelstrom. Her former life as a London theatre director is on the brink of implosion amid a scandalous divorce, a tarnished reputation, and, for reasons she cannot fathom, things keep spontaneously combusting around her. Her sixties were supposed to be peaceful, but now even her grown daughter won't return her calls. Escape is the only option.

In the remote village of Myrtlewood, she seeks solace, not suspecting that in this quaint haven, far stranger adventures await than the urban chaos she left behind. Delia is oblivious to the undercurrent that her arrival stirs. Amid whispers of magic, she finds herself on the precipice of an extraordinary transformation.

As she grapples with these new realities, an ominous shadow lurks - a secret Order, steeped in ancient lore, is watching, plotting and scheming. Delia must confront her destiny. Will she surrender to the enchanting pull of Myrtlewood and the ancient prophecies of the elemental crones, or will she claw back her former life from her power-hungry ex?

Welcome to a world where the extraordinary is ordinary, where tranquillity is a veil for the mystical, and where time itself whispers secrets of old served with delicious cakes and cups of tea �� or coffee if you insist!]]> 304 Iris Beaglehole Jacqie 2 didnt-finish
I guess this could be considered cozy- there is a small town with shabby yet cozy pubs, a teahouse, a forest cottage. And lord knows older women could use more books where they are protagonists. And yet.

About 30% into the book, Delia, our main character, is hanging out in Myrtlewood. She's there because a couple of things have caught on fire when she's around, her daughter is in the area, and Delia needs to get away from London. Her philandering ex-husband has philandered one too many times. Delia has a foggy inkling that maybe she has something to do with things catching on fire but she really hasn't bought into that. She's surrounded by characters who know more than she does, but no one tells her anything. They just send her around to different places and people, none of whom will tell her anything either. These people all know that something very big and very dangerous will happen soon and Delia might be very important to it, but no one feels like putting Delia in the picture. Or putting the reader in the picture, either. This is a cardinal sin for me in entertainment- no being super cagey with information for no good reason!!!!

So, despite the priests in red robes occasionally coming at Delia with swords (she thinks nothing of this), despite the hints of foreboding, eventually I just didn't care anymore, about 30% in.]]> 4.09 2023
author: Iris Beaglehole
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2023
rating: 2
read at: 2025/01/30
date added: 2025/01/30
shelves: didnt-finish
review:
I listened to this as an audiobook which probably made me more patient with it. I liked the narrator. But eventually that could not overcome the book's fatal flaw, which was that nothing happened.

I guess this could be considered cozy- there is a small town with shabby yet cozy pubs, a teahouse, a forest cottage. And lord knows older women could use more books where they are protagonists. And yet.

About 30% into the book, Delia, our main character, is hanging out in Myrtlewood. She's there because a couple of things have caught on fire when she's around, her daughter is in the area, and Delia needs to get away from London. Her philandering ex-husband has philandered one too many times. Delia has a foggy inkling that maybe she has something to do with things catching on fire but she really hasn't bought into that. She's surrounded by characters who know more than she does, but no one tells her anything. They just send her around to different places and people, none of whom will tell her anything either. These people all know that something very big and very dangerous will happen soon and Delia might be very important to it, but no one feels like putting Delia in the picture. Or putting the reader in the picture, either. This is a cardinal sin for me in entertainment- no being super cagey with information for no good reason!!!!

So, despite the priests in red robes occasionally coming at Delia with swords (she thinks nothing of this), despite the hints of foreboding, eventually I just didn't care anymore, about 30% in.
]]> 208516656 If you knew your future, would you try to fight fate?

Aside from a delay, there will be no problems. The flight will be smooth, it will land safely. Everyone who gets on the plane will get off. But almost all of them will be forever changed.

Because on this ordinary, short, domestic flight, something extraordinary happens. People learn how and when they are going to die. For some, their death is far in the future—age 103!—and they laugh. But for six passengers, their predicted deaths are not far away at all.

How do they know this? There were ostensibly more interesting people on the flight (the bride and groom, the jittery, possibly famous woman, the giant Hemsworth-esque guy who looks like an off-duty superhero, the frazzled, gorgeous flight attendant) but none would become as famous as “The Death Lady.��

Not a single passenger or crew member will later recall noticing her board the plane. She wasn’t exceptionally old or young, rude or polite. She wasn’t drunk or nervous or pregnant. Her appearance and demeanor were unremarkable. But what she did on that flight was truly remarkable.

A few months later, one passenger dies exactly as she predicted. Then two more passengers die, again, as she said they would. Soon no one is thinking this is simply an entertaining story at a cocktail party.

If you were told you only had a certain amount of time left to live, would you do things differently? Would you try to dodge your destiny?

Liane Moriarty’s Here One Moment is a brilliantly constructed tale that looks at free will and destiny, grief and love, and the endless struggle to maintain certainty and control in an uncertain world. A modern-day Jane Austen who humorously skewers social mores while spinning a web of mystery, Moriarty asks profound questions in her newest I-can’t-wait-to-find-out-what-happens novel.]]> 512 Liane Moriarty 0593798600 Jacqie 4 netgalley
Even though we are in the lady's head for many of these chapters and get her entire life history eventually, we don't know why she did what she did until the end of the book. This could have been precious and annoying, but I was interested in a lot of the other stories along the way too.

Liane Moriarty has sort of a breezy comic tone that gently mock a lot of the characters but she also eventually seems to care about them and I eventually did too.

Really, this is a book about loss. What do you do when threatened with or confronted with loss? How do you feel? How do you prepare? How can you cope? It's really rather sad in parts. But that's life, isn't it? Everyone dies, everyone must face loss, everyone goes through this. The book feels very humanistic. It ended up packing a punch and making me think as well as entertaining me.]]> 3.99 2024
author: Liane Moriarty
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/30
date added: 2025/01/30
shelves: netgalley
review:
This book has short, punchy chapters that jump from one character to the next. These characters were all on a flight from Tasmania to Sydney when a "lady" ( no one thinks of her as a woman or any other appellation than "lady") stands up, points fingers at everyone on the plane, one at a time, while walking down the aisle, and says "I expect..." and then a method of death. Everyone gets a death prediction. Why did the lady do this? And was she right? And what would you do if you got one of those death predictions? These questions are what the book finally answers.

Even though we are in the lady's head for many of these chapters and get her entire life history eventually, we don't know why she did what she did until the end of the book. This could have been precious and annoying, but I was interested in a lot of the other stories along the way too.

Liane Moriarty has sort of a breezy comic tone that gently mock a lot of the characters but she also eventually seems to care about them and I eventually did too.

Really, this is a book about loss. What do you do when threatened with or confronted with loss? How do you feel? How do you prepare? How can you cope? It's really rather sad in parts. But that's life, isn't it? Everyone dies, everyone must face loss, everyone goes through this. The book feels very humanistic. It ended up packing a punch and making me think as well as entertaining me.
]]> 56932146 From one of the most imaginative writers of her generation comes an extraordinary vision of the future��

Ven was once a holy man, a keeper of ancient archives. It was his duty to interpret archaic texts, sorting useful knowledge from the heretical ideas of the Burning Age—a time of excess and climate disaster. For in Ven's world, such material must be closely guarded so that the ills that led to that cataclysmic era can never be repeated.

But when the revolutionary Brotherhood approaches Ven, pressuring him to translate stolen writings that threaten everything he once held dear, his life will be turned upside down. Torn between friendship and faith, Ven must decide how far he's willing to go to save this new world—and how much he is willing to lose.

Notes from the Burning Age is the remarkable new novel from the award-winning Claire North that puts dystopian fiction in a whole new light.]]> 401 Claire North 0316498858 Jacqie 2 didnt-finish, netgalley
Next, we move on to a more urban environment with a guy being tortured in a bar. The feel is Eastern Europe post-apocalypse but now we're in the city instead of the forest. Despite this guy being threatened with torture, I didn't really care too much about what happened to him either.

So it could just be me being coldhearted about all these characters, or it could be the book not making it easy for me to get attached. I'm willing to admit it could be me, but I have no desire to go back to the book.]]> 3.69 2021
author: Claire North
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2021
rating: 2
read at: 2025/01/30
date added: 2025/01/30
shelves: didnt-finish, netgalley
review:
I bounced off this pretty early. It seems to be set in a post-apocalypse pastoral society. The first part of the book is about a forest fire in which a (possibly) magical (possibly) forest guardian perishes. In addition, a young girl dies. It seems that this girl is a motivating factor for some of the main characters in the book when they grow up and she doesn't. However, to me the only trait she showed was a spoiled inability to listen to anybody so I really did not care when she burned to death.

Next, we move on to a more urban environment with a guy being tortured in a bar. The feel is Eastern Europe post-apocalypse but now we're in the city instead of the forest. Despite this guy being threatened with torture, I didn't really care too much about what happened to him either.

So it could just be me being coldhearted about all these characters, or it could be the book not making it easy for me to get attached. I'm willing to admit it could be me, but I have no desire to go back to the book.
]]> 199343573 A woman journeys into a submerged world of gods and myth to save her home in this powerful historical fantasy that shines a light on the drowned Black towns of the American South.

“Our home began, as all things do, with a wish.��

Jane Edwards hasn’t spoken since she was eleven years old, when armed riders expelled her family from their hometown along with every other Black resident. Now, twelve years later, she’s found a haven in the all-Black town of Awenasa. But the construction of a dam promises to wash her home under the waters of the new lake.

Jane will do anything to save the community that sheltered her. So, when a man with uncanny abilities arrives in town asking strange questions, she wonders if he might be the key. But as the stranger hints at gods and ancestral magic, Jane is captivated by a bigger mystery. She knows this man. Only the last time she saw him, he was dead. His body laid to rest in a rushing river.

Who is the stranger and what is he really doing in Awenasa? To find those answers, Jane will journey into a sunken world, a land of capricious gods and unsung myths, of salvation and dreams made real. But the flood waters are rising. To gain the miracle she desires, Jane will have to find her voice again and finally face the trauma of the past.

For more from Leslye Penelope, check out The Monsters We Defy.]]> 398 Leslye Penelope 0316378224 Jacqie 4 netgalley
There's a map of Awenasa and Jane spends a lot of time moving through the town. I felt like the physical locations in the book became very clear to me. The feel of the free Black town, the relief its dwellers had of having a home and sanctuary, and yet the tenuousness of this safety, the complicated feelings about the setting were part of the interesting aspect of the book for me.

Awenasa is slated to be drowned by a new dam. Feds are coming to town to make offers to its inhabitants. They can either take something and leave or stay and be pressured, frightened and abused into leaving. The offers aren't fair but they are the only thing on the table. Jane, an inquisitive person, is noticing some very strange things happening.

There's a slow burn romance that I was there for. At the beginning there didn't seem to be a speculative element but as the book went on the fantastic became part of the story. It's kind of sad that the only way to help the characters was through magic that their historic counterparts never had. I liked the way that the magic was portrayed despite that.

This book impressed me enough that I'd definitely read more by this author. I'm glad I picked it up!]]> 3.99 2024
author: Leslye Penelope
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/28
date added: 2025/01/28
shelves: netgalley
review:
This book had a lot of pleasant surprises for me. While I could predict some things about the plot, a lot of time I had no idea what was coming. Jane was a great heroine. The author clearly portrayed the heinous racism in the Jim Crow reconstructed South and yet the setting had a lot of joy in it too.

There's a map of Awenasa and Jane spends a lot of time moving through the town. I felt like the physical locations in the book became very clear to me. The feel of the free Black town, the relief its dwellers had of having a home and sanctuary, and yet the tenuousness of this safety, the complicated feelings about the setting were part of the interesting aspect of the book for me.

Awenasa is slated to be drowned by a new dam. Feds are coming to town to make offers to its inhabitants. They can either take something and leave or stay and be pressured, frightened and abused into leaving. The offers aren't fair but they are the only thing on the table. Jane, an inquisitive person, is noticing some very strange things happening.

There's a slow burn romance that I was there for. At the beginning there didn't seem to be a speculative element but as the book went on the fantastic became part of the story. It's kind of sad that the only way to help the characters was through magic that their historic counterparts never had. I liked the way that the magic was portrayed despite that.

This book impressed me enough that I'd definitely read more by this author. I'm glad I picked it up!
]]> 75668288 The heart is a battlefield.

All Talasyn has ever known is the Hurricane Wars. Growing up an orphan in a nation under siege by the ruthless Night Emperor, Talasyn has found her family among the soldiers who fight for freedom. But she is hiding a deadly secret: light magic courses through her veins, a blazing power believed to have been wiped out years ago that can cut through the Night Empire's shadows.

Prince Alaric, the emperor's only son and heir, has been forged into a weapon by his father. Tasked with obliterating any threats to the Night Empire's rule with the strength of his armies and mighty Shadow magic, Alaric has never been bested. That is until he sees Talasyn burning brightly on the battlefield with the magic that killed his grandfather, turned his father into a monster, and ignited the Hurricane Wars. In a clash of light and dark, their powers merge and create a force the likes of which has never been seen.

Talasyn and Alaric both know this war can only end with them. But a greater threat is coming, and the strange new magic they can create together could be the only way to overcome it. Thrust into an uneasy alliance, they will confront the secrets at the heart of the war and find, in each other, a searing passion--one that could save their world...or destroy it.

An exquisite fantasy brimming with unforgettable characters, sizzling enemies-to-lovers romance, and richly drawn worlds, The Hurricane Wars marks the breathtaking debut of an extraordinary new writer.]]> 472 Thea Guanzon 0063277271 Jacqie 3 skimmed
I got almost halfway through it when I came to the end of my patience and started skimming. I have to say that neither main character seemed anything like either Rey or Kylo Ren. Our female MC was sassy and mad about everything all the time. She was super special although she'd grown up in the poor parts of the city and was just trying to survive. She somehow became a great soldier, although I was never really convinced of that. Her extra special bloodline meant that she became a pivotal point in the story, especially because she had extra special magic powers to go with the bloodline- special powers that people no longer knew existed, that gave her ties to the special secret nation that could save everyone.

Our Kylo stand-in is pale with jet black hair. He's all logic (Kylo, that can't be you!) and repressed honor.

There is a forced marriage. Both of these two have tried seriously to kill each other but secretly think the other one is really hot and can't stop thinking about it. They Can Never Be Together of course.

The setting was very vividly and visually drawn with lots of descriptions of color and costume. I like all that stuff, so was probably more patient with the book because of it. I also liked the way the magic system came together, even if it's the same elemental system we've seen so many times before. It works, and that's why it's a classic. Eventually the standard plot and shallow characters couldn't overcome the pretty setting and I skimmed up to the end.]]> 3.65 2023
author: Thea Guanzon
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2025/01/28
date added: 2025/01/28
shelves: skimmed
review:
I probably knew better than to get this book- it's romantasy and it's respecced fanfic of Reylo, but the new edition had such pretty sprayed edges in my favorite colors that I couldn't resist.

I got almost halfway through it when I came to the end of my patience and started skimming. I have to say that neither main character seemed anything like either Rey or Kylo Ren. Our female MC was sassy and mad about everything all the time. She was super special although she'd grown up in the poor parts of the city and was just trying to survive. She somehow became a great soldier, although I was never really convinced of that. Her extra special bloodline meant that she became a pivotal point in the story, especially because she had extra special magic powers to go with the bloodline- special powers that people no longer knew existed, that gave her ties to the special secret nation that could save everyone.

Our Kylo stand-in is pale with jet black hair. He's all logic (Kylo, that can't be you!) and repressed honor.

There is a forced marriage. Both of these two have tried seriously to kill each other but secretly think the other one is really hot and can't stop thinking about it. They Can Never Be Together of course.

The setting was very vividly and visually drawn with lots of descriptions of color and costume. I like all that stuff, so was probably more patient with the book because of it. I also liked the way the magic system came together, even if it's the same elemental system we've seen so many times before. It works, and that's why it's a classic. Eventually the standard plot and shallow characters couldn't overcome the pretty setting and I skimmed up to the end.
]]> 223830940 From beloved James Beard Award–winning and��New York Times bestselling author��Dorie Greenspan—a vibrantly illustrated collection of recipes for simple yet most-memorable cakes

Over the years, Dorie has created thousands of excellent recipes. And out of all of them, the ones she always comes back to are the simplest cakes. Some may have a dusting of powdered sugar or a drizzle of icing, but most of them are straight-from-the-oven cakes that are great as-is. They’re cakes that you probably already have all the ingredients for in your pantry. They’re the kinds of cakes you can whip up, put out and know that anyone with a hankering can come by and cut a sliver or a hunk. Any time.

With evocative writing, expert advice, and gorgeous illustrations by Nancy Pappas, Dorie’s Anytime Cakes celebrates the simple—but still exciting and special—with more than 100 recipes for easy-to-make, easy-to-love cakes.

There are recipes for all kinds of cakes, including loaves and rounds, muffins, crumbles, and Bundts—even savory cakes—plus frostings, fillings, and other

BFF Brownie CakeMorning, Noon, and Night Thanksgiving CakeCafuné Corn CakeSimplest, Plainest, Most Old-Fashion—Also Best Tasting—Marble CakeButtermilk Plum CakeFaux-caccia SquaresMiso-Cheddar Scone CakeFeta, Sumac, and Za’atar LoafThe Devil’s Chocolate CakeYou’ll also find “Playing Around�� suggestions throughout—Dorie’s inspirations for making each recipe to your own taste and right for all occasions. Flavor your sugar with citrus or tea for a special touch, spice your cake up with hot honey, or transform your plain cake into an impressive, layered party cake. Just like Dorie, you’ll return to baking these favorite cakes again and again.��]]> Dorie Greenspan 0063346974 Jacqie 0 to-read, cookbooks 0.0
author: Dorie Greenspan
name: Jacqie
average rating: 0.0
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/28
shelves: to-read, cookbooks
review:

]]> 425029 Presumed Innocent brings to life our worst nightmare: that of an ordinary citizen facing conviction for the most terrible of all crimes. It's the stunning portrayal of one man's all-too-human, all-consuming fatal attraction for a passionate woman who is not his wife, and the story of how his obsession puts everything he loves and values on trial—including his own life. It's a book that lays bare a shocking world of betrayal and murder, as well as the hidden depths of the human heart. And it will hold you and haunt you ... long after you have reached its shattering conclusion.]]> 421 Scott Turow 0446350982 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.10 1987
author: Scott Turow
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1987
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 33859098
Following the death of their matriarch, the lives of Chye Hoon’s family turned upside down. Now that the British have fled and the Japanese have conquered, their once-benign world changes overnight.

Amid the turmoil, Chye Hoon’s daughter-in-law, Mei Foong, must fend for her family as her husband, Weng Yu, becomes increasingly embittered. Challenged in ways she never could have imagined and forced into hiding, Mei Foong finds a deep reservoir of resilience she did not know she had and soon draws the attentions of another man.

Is Mei Foong’s resolve enough to save herself, her marriage, and her family? Only when peace returns to Malaya will she learn the full price she must pay for survival.]]> 322 Selina Siak Chin Yoke 1542095751 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.13 2017
author: Selina Siak Chin Yoke
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 32053976
Amidst the smells of chillies and garlic frying, Chye Hoon begins to appreciate the richness of her traditions, eventually marrying Wong Peng Choon, a Chinese man. Together, they have ten children. At last, she can pass on the stories she has heard—magical tales of men from the sea—and her warrior’s courage, along with her wonderful kueh (cakes).

But the cultural shift towards the West has begun. Chye Hoon finds herself afraid of losing the heritage she so prizes as her children move more and more into the modernising Western world.]]> 466 Selina Siak Chin Yoke 1503994341 Jacqie 5
These books are both coming of age stories, but this one is so much better written and has characters that are nuanced instead of black and white paper cut-outs like the other book has.

I very much enjoyed reading this story (loosely based on the author's own family from what I understand) of a Chinese Malaysian woman and how she made sure that she and her family survived. Malaysia is a country with many different ethnic groups and Chinese Malaysians call themselves Nyonyas. This unique identity was a touchstone for Chye Hoon, the main character. We read how she grows up, how she marries (with a lot of interesting information about Peranakan Chinese marriage customs), how her intelligent and ambitious husband takes them from the bustling colonial town of Penang to the tin mining outpost of Ipoh.

Chye Hoon was a strong woman who helped her ten (!) children become successful adults by starting her own business making Kueh, Malaysian sweets, that she then sold from door to door. She figured out buying trends, brought in innovations like delivering on bicycles, conceived the concept of the reward card! All the while, her large family and her best friend's family rode the tides of change and modernization. The British became more important and then less important as the Japanese began to gain influence. It became okay for girls to attend school. Children leave for the bigger cities and more sophistication. Indoor plumbing arrives!

The book was a bit of a slow start for me but I quickly became engrossed in the lives of these people. Chye Hoon wasn't perfect, there were several times that I could see the problems that arose from her values and decisions before she could, but that makes for a more interesting character than a paragon anyway. The author skillfully wove all the stories of the many different characters together and I cared what happened to all of them.

It looks like this might turn into a series and I am here for it. I hope that the author gets the recognition that she deserves! This book ended right around the time that Japan came into the country in earnest. It was a very difficult time and I want to see how the author treats it.]]> 4.22 2016
author: Selina Siak Chin Yoke
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at: 2025/01/27
date added: 2025/01/27
shelves:
review:
In preparation for a trip to Asia, I read "The Storm We Made" and this book. I've got to say that it's a shame that "The Storm We Made" is getting so much attention when this book is so much better.

These books are both coming of age stories, but this one is so much better written and has characters that are nuanced instead of black and white paper cut-outs like the other book has.

I very much enjoyed reading this story (loosely based on the author's own family from what I understand) of a Chinese Malaysian woman and how she made sure that she and her family survived. Malaysia is a country with many different ethnic groups and Chinese Malaysians call themselves Nyonyas. This unique identity was a touchstone for Chye Hoon, the main character. We read how she grows up, how she marries (with a lot of interesting information about Peranakan Chinese marriage customs), how her intelligent and ambitious husband takes them from the bustling colonial town of Penang to the tin mining outpost of Ipoh.

Chye Hoon was a strong woman who helped her ten (!) children become successful adults by starting her own business making Kueh, Malaysian sweets, that she then sold from door to door. She figured out buying trends, brought in innovations like delivering on bicycles, conceived the concept of the reward card! All the while, her large family and her best friend's family rode the tides of change and modernization. The British became more important and then less important as the Japanese began to gain influence. It became okay for girls to attend school. Children leave for the bigger cities and more sophistication. Indoor plumbing arrives!

The book was a bit of a slow start for me but I quickly became engrossed in the lives of these people. Chye Hoon wasn't perfect, there were several times that I could see the problems that arose from her values and decisions before she could, but that makes for a more interesting character than a paragon anyway. The author skillfully wove all the stories of the many different characters together and I cared what happened to all of them.

It looks like this might turn into a series and I am here for it. I hope that the author gets the recognition that she deserves! This book ended right around the time that Japan came into the country in earnest. It was a very difficult time and I want to see how the author treats it.
]]> 201845532 Nice Victorian ladies don’t run off to find legendary lost cities.

One trifling little arrest shouldn’t have cost Ellie Mallory her job, but it’s only the latest in a line of injustices facing any educated woman with archaeological ambitions.

When Ellie stumbles across the map to a mysterious ancient city, she knows she’s holding her chance to revolutionize Pre-Colombian history. There’s just one teensy complication. A ruthless villain wants it, and Ellie is all that stands in his way.

To race him to the ruins—and avoid being violently disposed of—she needs the help of maverick surveyor Adam Bates, a snake-wrangling rogue who can’t seem to keep his dratted shirt on.

But there’s more than Ellie’s scholarly reputation (and life) on the line. Her enemies aren’t just looters. They’re after an arcane secret rumored to lie in the heart of the ruins, a mythical artifact with a power that could shake the world.

Between stealing trousers, plummeting over waterfalls, and trying not to fall in love with her machete-wielding partner, will Ellie be able to stop the oracle of a lost empire from falling into the wrong hands?

Empire of Shadows is the first book in Jacquelyn Benson’s smart, swashbuckling Raiders of the Arcana series. Read it now and dive into a rip-roaring historical fantasy adventure perfect for fans of Romancing the Stone and The Mummy.]]> 478 Jacquelyn Benson 1959050125 Jacqie 2 didnt-finish, netgalley
Maybe in a different mood I've have been more accommodating of the frothiness- I certainly have been in the past. But the writing was just a little bit overstated and the tiniest bit too clunky. I'll look elsewhere for frothy Victorian problematic fun.]]> 4.22 2024
author: Jacquelyn Benson
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2024
rating: 2
read at: 2025/01/27
date added: 2025/01/27
shelves: didnt-finish, netgalley
review:
I do like the occasional Victorian mystery, especially if there's a rollicking adventure and a bit of sexual tension. This one just fell into some tropy ruts that I got bored with quickly. Our heroine is so sassy and of course an early feminist. The priest in the intro was of course self centered, totally oblivious as to the reality of those he's sent to convert and the most unpleasant sort of religious person.

Maybe in a different mood I've have been more accommodating of the frothiness- I certainly have been in the past. But the writing was just a little bit overstated and the tiniest bit too clunky. I'll look elsewhere for frothy Victorian problematic fun.
]]> 199531653 A glittering, bold, darkly funny novel about two sisters—one in New York, one in Singapore—who are bound by an ancient secret.

Sisterhood is difficult for Su and Emerald. Su leads a sheltered, moneyed life as the picture-perfect wife of a conservative politician in Singapore. Emerald is a nihilistic sugar baby in New York, living from whim to whim as she freely uses her beauty and charms to make ends meet. But they share a secret; once they were snakes, basking under a full moon in Tang Dynasty China.

A thousand years later, their mysterious history is the only thing still binding them together. When Emerald experiences a violent encounter in Central Park and Su boards the next flight to New York, the two reach a tenuous reconciliation for the first time in decades. Su convinces Emerald to move to Singapore so she can keep an eye on her—but she soon begins to worry that Emerald’s irrepressible behavior will out them both, in a sparkling, affluent city where everything runs like clockwork and any deviation from the norm is automatically suspect.

Razor-sharp, hilarious, and raw in emotion, Sister Snake explores chosen family, queerness, passing, and the struggle against conformity. Reimagining the Chinese folktale “The Legend of the White Snake,�� this is a novel about being seen for who you are—and, ultimately, how to live free.��]]> 272 Amanda Lee Koe 006335506X Jacqie 2 didnt-finish, netgalley 3.79 2024
author: Amanda Lee Koe
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2024
rating: 2
read at: 2025/01/27
date added: 2025/01/27
shelves: didnt-finish, netgalley
review:
This one wasn't for me. It's quite preoccupied with designer brands, sexual politics, and isn't quite as edgy as it thinks it is. At least not what I read. The two sisters feel like polar opposites and the relationship between them that's established at the beginning of the story feels like it's long gone. We have the sexy vampiric sister and the uptight good girl sister. I just didn't care after reading 15%.
]]> 206005312
My name’s Ernest Cunningham. I used to be a fan of reading Golden Age murder mysteries, until I found myself with a haphazard career getting stuck in the middle of real-life ones. I’d hoped, this Christmas, that any self-respecting murderer would kick their feet up and take it easy over the holidays. I was wrong.

So here I am, backstage at the show of world-famous magician Rylan Blaze, whose benefactor has just been murdered. My suspects are all professional tricksters: masters of the art of misdirection.

THE MAGICIAN

THE ASSISTANT

THE EXECUTIVE

THE HYPNOTIST

THE IDENTICAL TWIN

THE COUNSELLOR

THE TECH

My clues are even more abstract: A suspect covered in blood, without a memory of how it got there. A murder committed without setting foot inside the room where it happens. And an advent calendar. Because, you know, it’s Christmas.

If I can see through the illusions, I know I can solve it.

After all, a good murder is just like a magic trick, isn’t it?]]> 175 Benjamin Stevenson 0063412861 Jacqie 2
From what I can tell, the idea for this series is that the main character uses murder mystery genre tropes to solve mysteries himself. This novella is intended to be sort of a "Christmas special", which means that all the series favorites need to make an appearance of some sort but the greater plot of the series won't really be affected. There have to be some sort of holiday allusions or decorations, puns are very much in play, but there can be no speculative elements.

So this mostly takes place in the Blue Mountains outside of Sydney, an escape from summertime holiday heat. I never got a huge sense of place, unfortunately. The main character's ex-wife's fiance is dead, definitely murdered, and she's in jail because she can't remember what happened. There's a magician and his motley crew who become the main suspects.

This felt like a tv episode, complete with an overdramatic and rather silly way of doing the big reveal. Nothing wrong with the writing, just nothing appealed to me to take this series any further.]]> 3.70 2024
author: Benjamin Stevenson
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2024
rating: 2
read at: 2025/01/27
date added: 2025/01/27
shelves:
review:
I read this book over Christmas vacation. I was curious about this series and figured that a novella would be a quick way to find out if I'd like to read more. I have decided against it.

From what I can tell, the idea for this series is that the main character uses murder mystery genre tropes to solve mysteries himself. This novella is intended to be sort of a "Christmas special", which means that all the series favorites need to make an appearance of some sort but the greater plot of the series won't really be affected. There have to be some sort of holiday allusions or decorations, puns are very much in play, but there can be no speculative elements.

So this mostly takes place in the Blue Mountains outside of Sydney, an escape from summertime holiday heat. I never got a huge sense of place, unfortunately. The main character's ex-wife's fiance is dead, definitely murdered, and she's in jail because she can't remember what happened. There's a magician and his motley crew who become the main suspects.

This felt like a tv episode, complete with an overdramatic and rather silly way of doing the big reveal. Nothing wrong with the writing, just nothing appealed to me to take this series any further.
]]> 102615935 Robert Jackson Bennett Jacqie 0 to-read 5.00
author: Robert Jackson Bennett
name: Jacqie
average rating: 5.00
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 211953352 To find a missing young woman, the new tribal marshal must also find herself. At rock bottom following her daughter’s murder, ex-Chicago detective Carrie Starr has nowhere to go but back to her roots. Starr’s father never talked much about the reservation that raised him, but they need a new tribal marshal as much as Starr needs a place to call home. In the last decade, too many young women have disappeared from the rez. Some dead, others just�� gone. Now, local college student Chenoa Cloud is missing, and Starr falls into an investigation that leaves her drowning in memories of her daughter—the girl she failed to save. Starr feels lost in this place she thought would welcome her. And when she catches a glimpse of a figure from her father’s stories, with the body of a woman and the antlers of a deer, Starr can’t shake the feeling that the fearsome spirit is watching her, following her. What she doesn’t know is whether Deer Woman is here to guide her or to seek vengeance for the lost daughters that Starr can never bring home.]]> 336 Laurie L. Dove 0593816102 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.56 2025
author: Laurie L. Dove
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 219520759 Set in the world of New York Times bestseller Seraphina, a boy on the run from a dragon �� among other dangers �� seeks refuge in a haunted abbey in this wholly original YA ghost story about what haunts us, and what connects us.

A few things to know about the town of St. Muckle' It's too out-of-the-way to interest greedy lords, and too damp and muddy for marauding dragons to burn. And anyone, from a humble serf to a runaway nun, may earn their freedom by living for a year and a day within the town walls. Seven years ago, Charl and his mother fled to St. Muckle's and made it their safe-haven, building a new life in this so-called Peasant's Paradise. But when Charl sees something impossible �� a ghost �� soon the embers of his past are threatening to engulf his��world in flames. A tragic accident is quickly followed by murder, a deadly plague, and a mercenary dragon.��

Charl manages to escape to an abandoned abbey outside of town, but finds no safety within those ruined walls. A treacherous nun, a chorus of murdered girls, and the fearsome Battle Bishop await, ready to ensnare him in a complex web of history, magic, and fate. For some things should never be forgotten, however much they haunt us, and Charl will need all his wisdom and resiliency if he is to fight for the world he knows . . . and the people he calls home.

Discover more critically acclaimed fantasy from Rachel Hartman!

Seraphina
Shadow Scale
Tess of the Road
In the Serpent's Wake]]> 400 Rachel Hartman 0593813723 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.56 2025
author: Rachel Hartman
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.56
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 60725960
Rachel and Jaime: their story isn’t simple. It might not even be their story.

Augustus Fate, a once-lauded novelist and now renowned recluse, is struggling with his latest creation. But when Jaime and Rachel stumble into his remote cottage, he spies opportunity, imprisoning them inside his novel-in-progress. Now, the fledgling couple must try to find their way back home through a labyrinthine network of novels.

And as they move from Victorian Oxford to a utopian Manchester, a harsh Russian winter to an AI-dominated near-future, so too does the narrative of their relationship change time and again.

Together, they must figure out if this relationship of so many presents can have any future at all.

The Watermark is a heart-stopping exploration of the narratives we cling to in the course of a life, and the tendency of the world to unravel them. Kaleidoscopic and wildly imaginative, it how can we truly be ourselves, when Fate is pulling the strings?]]> 544 Sam Mills 1783789654 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.55 2025
author: Sam Mills
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.55
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 180633984 June Hur, bestselling author of The Red Palace, crafts a devastating and pulse-pounding tale that will feel all-too-relevant in today’s world, based on a true story from Korean history.

Hope is dangerous. Love is deadly.

1506, Joseon. The people suffer under the cruel reign of the tyrant King Yeonsan, powerless to stop him from commandeering their land for his recreational use, banning and burning books, and kidnapping and horrifically abusing women and girls as his personal playthings.

Seventeen-year-old Iseul has lived a sheltered, privileged life despite the kingdom’s turmoil. When her older sister, Suyeon, becomes the king’s latest prey, Iseul leaves the relative safety of her village, traveling through forbidden territory to reach the capital in hopes of stealing her sister back. But she soon discovers the king’s power is absolute, and to challenge his rule is to court certain death.

Prince Daehyun has lived his whole life in the terrifying shadow of his despicable half-brother, the king. Forced to watch King Yeonsan flaunt his predation through executions and rampant abuse of the common folk, Daehyun aches to find a way to dethrone his half-brother once and for all. When staging a coup, failure is fatal, and he’ll need help to pull it off—but there’s no way to know who he can trust.

When Iseul's and Daehyun's fates collide, their contempt for each other is transcended only by their mutual hate for the king. Armed with Iseul’s family connections and Daehyun’s royal access, they reluctantly join forces to launch the riskiest gamble the kingdom has ever

Save her sister. Free the people. Destroy a tyrant.

Also by June
The Silence of Bones
The Forest of Stolen Girls
The Red Palace]]> 364 June Hur 1250858100 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.97 2024
author: June Hur
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/23
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 207003910 Nel sud-ovest del Giappone, in una pozza di mare condivisa da due province, Kagawa e Okayama, nuota un'isoletta unica al mondo: Teshima. Sulla punta orientale dell'isola, sorge un minuscolo edificio in cui sono catalogate le pulsazioni del cuore di decine di migliaia di persone, alcune vive altre già ombre, provenienti dai luoghi più disparati del pianeta. Si chiama Shinzō-on no Ākaibu, l'Archivio dei Battiti del Cuore.

Alle porte di Tōkyō, in una cittadina lambita dall'oceano e circondata dalle montagne, sorge la casa dove Shūichi ha trascorso l'infanzia e dove ha appena fatto ritorno. Shūichi è un noto illustratore, ha quarant'anni e una cicatrice in mezzo al petto. È ossessionato dal proprio cuore che si ausculta ogni sera e dalle memorie confuse che ha del passato. Sua madre, per proteggerlo dai dispiaceri, ne ha manipolato i ricordi d'infanzia: di tutti i suoi piccoli drammi gli ha sempre raccontato una versione migliore. Ma se non si ha la certezza di aver sofferto in passato e di avercela fatta, da dove si ricava il coraggio di tentare ancora? È allora che Shūichi si accorge di un misterioso bambino che si aggira intorno alla casa.

Questa strana presenza fa nascere in Shūichi molte domande: chi e quel bambino che lo osserva e perché ha scelto la sua casa? E soprattutto: come si pesca un pesce-bambino? Shūichi scopre che il pesce-bambino si chiama Kenta, ha otto anni e vive prodigiose avventure nella solitudine più assoluta. Ma il pesce-bambino che
è Kenta e il disegnatore surfista che è Shūichi, stringono giorno dopo giorno una straordinaria amicizia e quell'incontro cambierà per sempre la loro vita. Li porterà in un luogo che batte al ritmo del cuore, pronunciato in tutte le lingue del mondo. È Teshima, un'isoletta remota nel sud-ovest del Giappone, dove sorge l'Archivio dei Battiti del Cuore.

Dopo Quel che affidiamo al vento, Laura Imai Messina torna a un luogo incredibile eppure reale del Giappone. E, nel viaggio in cui ci conduce, ci permette di avvicinarci a un modo diverso di concepire la vita e i suoi smarrimenti. Ma soprattutto ci dona una delle chiavi essenziali per interpretare il presente: quella per ritrovare la felicita perduta.]]> 400 Laura Imai Messina 141977249X Jacqie 0 to-read 4.00 2022
author: Laura Imai Messina
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 201901 Always Coming Home is a major work of the imagination from one of America's most respected writers. More than five years in creation, it is a novel unlike any other.

A rich and complex interweaving of story and fable, poem, artwork, and music, it totally immerses the reader in the culture of the Kesh, a peaceful people of the far future who inhabit a place called the Valley on the Northern Pacific Coast. The author makes the inhabitants of the valley as familiar, as immediate, as wholly human as our own friends or family.

Spiraling outward from the dramatic life story of a woman called Stone Telling, Le Guin's Always Coming Home interweaves wry wit, deep insight and extraordinary compassion into a compelling unity of vision.]]> 525 Ursula K. Le Guin 0520227352 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.05 1985
author: Ursula K. Le Guin
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1985
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 198296982
They are the lifeblood of human-occupied space, transporting an unimaginable volume - and value - of goods from City, the greatest human orbital, all the way to Tradepoint at the other, to trade for xenoglas with an unknowable alien species.

And now, out in the darkness of space, something is targeting them.

Nbaro and her friends are close to locating their enemy, in this gripping sequel to the award-nominated Artifact Space, but they are running out of time - and their allies are running out of patience . . .

Written by one of the most exciting new voices in SF, this space thriller will keep readers on the edge of their seats.]]> 510 Miles Cameron Jacqie 4 4.48 2024
author: Miles Cameron
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.48
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/11/12
date added: 2025/01/14
shelves:
review:

]]> 217563834
Assassin, executioner, shapeshifter, and dutiful son of the undying Queen of the land called only the Forest, Mairran is haunted by the voice of an Immortal long lost, who runs with him as a wolf in his dreams. More used to being the instrument of death than an arbiter of justice, he is dispatched by his mother to find the killer of an earl whose life was offered in an unsanctioned sacrifice to the Forest.

In an earlier age, the outlaw Lannesk swears an oath to follow the Grey Hunter and the Wild King, ancient guardians of the Forest, in a war against the invading dragon-kin and their sorcerer-priests, who seek to wake the great dragon long ago bound in sleep beneath the Lake. Past and present tangle around troubled assassin and mute outlaw, as a conspiracy of fell magic threatens the land and its people.

Evocative of a darker, grimmer McKillip, The Wolf and the Wild King is a brooding, lyrical new work from a master of epic fantasy.

***

“K.V. Johansen’s THE WOLF AND THE WILD KING is a lyrically rendered tale of intrigue and war enriched by two compelling central characters in a world that is both mythic and fully realised. A darkly beautiful book crafted in some of the finest prose it’s been my pleasure to read. Can’t wait for the sequel.�� ~ Anthony Ryan, author of The Traitor

“A wonderful and timeless epic fantasy -- a book with wisdom, beauty and claws.�� ~ Tom Lloyd, author of Stranger of Tempest

“With beautiful prose reminiscent of Patricia McKillip, Johansen paints a bleak and devastating picture of a cold world where humans, fey, and near-fey struggle for control of an unforgiving land. The magical system is deep and well thought out, haunting and resonant. The dual plotlines of the main protagonists braid together into an intriguing narrative that leads to an explosive conclusion. The Wolf and the Wild King will fulfill your desires for epic dark fantasy that is original and fascinating. I can’t wait for the second book in the duology!�� ~ Jo Graham, author of Black Ships and The Emperor’s Agent]]> 397 K.V. Johansen 1637890958 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.67 2024
author: K.V. Johansen
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 204529385 The story of four women who set out to uncover the secret origins of an intricate, magical city—and to change its fate.

Istehar Sha'an, whose unique powers allow her to communicate with trees and books, has led her community of refugee forest people to a remarkable place. In the archipelago-city of Moonstone, the Sha'an people find themselves in an extraordinary, multicultural metropolis that houses the the world's all-encompassing repository of wisdom. But in their search for a new home, the refugees soon garner the suspicion of Moonstone's locals, who forbid their magical practices. And when a hostile prince makes a bid to inherit the city's rule from his father, Istehar and her people realize they may be faced with exile—or worse. Meanwhile, Istehar has married three wives of Moonstone—a brave warrior librarian, a subtle-minded former concubine, and a tenacious apothecary who has spent years trying to solve her parents' murder. Driven by magical intuition and guided by a mysterious book, Istehar and her wives embark on a journey that will transform not only their lives, but the city of Moonstone itself.]]> 409 Jill Hammer 1961814153 Jacqie 0 to-read 4.07 2024
author: Jill Hammer
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 207299482 Looking for your one shot to rise to the "top of the pots" in the cutthroat world of interstellar cuisine? Look no further--you might have what it takes to be an Interstellar MegaChef!

Stepping off a long-haul star freighter from Earth, Saras Kaveri has one bag of clothes, her little flying robot Kili... and an invitation to compete in the galaxy's most watched, most prestigious cooking show. Interstellar MegaChef is the showcase of the planet Primus's austere, carefully synthesised cuisine. No one from Earth--where they're so incredibly primitive they still cook with fire--has ever graced its flowmetal cookstations before, or smiled awkwardly for its buzzing drone-cams. Until now.

Corporate prodigy Serenity Ko, inventor of the smash-hit sim SoundSpace, has just got messily drunk at a floating bar, narrowly escaped an angry mob and been put on two weeks' mandatory leave to rest and get her work-life balance back. Perfect time to start a new project! And she's got just the idea: a sim for food. Now she just needs someone to teach her how to cook.

A chance meeting in the back of a flying cab has Saras and Serenity Ko working together on a new technology that could change the future of food--and both their lives--forever...]]> 453 Lavanya Lakshminarayan 1837862338 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.58 2024
author: Lavanya Lakshminarayan
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.58
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 8538883 In a novel as warm and embracing as a family kitchen, Barbara O’Neal explores the poignant, sometimes complex relationships between mothers and daughters—and the healing magic of homemade bread.
��
Professional baker Ramona Gallagher is a master of an art that has sustained her through the most turbulent times, including a baby at fifteen and an endless family feud. But now Ramona’s bakery threatens to crumble around her. Literally. She’s one water-heater disaster away from losing her grandmother’s rambling Victorian and everything she’s worked so hard to build.

When Ramona’s soldier son-in-law is wounded in Afghanistan, her daughter, Sophia, races overseas to be at his side, leaving Ramona as the only suitable guardian for Sophia’s thirteen-year-old stepdaughter, Katie. Heartbroken, Katie feels that she’s being dumped again—this time on the doorstep of a woman out of practice with mothering.

Ramona relies upon a special set of tools—patience, persistence, and the reliability of a good recipe—when rebellious Katie arrives. And as she relives her own history of difficult choices, Ramona shares her love of baking with the troubled girl. Slowly, Katie begins to find self-acceptance and a place to call home. And when a man from her past returns to offer a second chance at love, Ramona discovers that even the best recipe tastes better when you add time, care, and a few secret ingredients of your own.]]> 416 Barbara O'Neal 0553386778 Jacqie 0 to-read 3.92 2010
author: Barbara O'Neal
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2010
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/10
shelves: to-read
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Five hundred cycles ago, the Watcher closed the gates between the world of Lieus and its moons to end a war. Since then magic has been hidden, relegated to childhood tales. On the outer moon of Tebein, any human showing magically aligned traits would sentence their entire community to death at the hands of the native awldrin overlords.

For awldrin are immortal and their memories long.

Even peace is transient, and on Lieus, invasive monsters are encroaching on Caldera, leaving Darin and his bonded moonhound to face nightmares made real. As the creatures spread their wings, Suriin’s father is injured, and she must delve deep into the secrets of the Black Palace to try and save him.

Elissa’s magic could not have bloomed a a worse time on Tebein, as the awldrin are roused, and now she must run to save everyone she loves.

Far more than the fate of their loved ones is at stake, but will any of them see it in time?]]> 492 J.E. Hannaford Jacqie 0 to-read 4.05 2023
author: J.E. Hannaford
name: Jacqie
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/09
shelves: to-read
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]]> 211079130 Raised in Appalachia, native daughter Ashleigh Shanti, a queer Black woman and acclaimed chef, knows Southern Black cooking means more than we’ve come to believe. While hot buttered cast-iron-pan cornbread and crunchy, juicy, lard-fried chicken have their roles to play, they are far from the entire story.

The key to understanding how Black influence has defined foodways and cultures in the South is to explore its microregions, each with its own distinct flora and fauna, dialects, traditions, and dishes. In Our South, Ashleigh takes you through the five regions closest to her heart, beginning with a glimpse of mountain life in the Backcountry through recipes like Fish Camp Hush Puppies and quail spiked with black pepper. A swing over to the coastal Lowcountry fills your plate with smoky grilled oysters and benne seed–topped crab toasts. Seasonal produce shines in the Midlands, where bountiful stone fruits enrich dishes from shortcakes to salads. Lowlands nods to the diversity of food cultures that meet in the region, where Ashleigh grew up eating noodle dishes like Virginia yock alongside Southern classics like Brunswick stew. The book culminates in Homeland, with foods that share what it’s like to cook—and live—as a Black Southern chef now.

Long before competing on Top Chef and earning a coveted James Beard Award Rising Star Chef nomination for her cooking at Asheville, North Carolina’s Benne on Eagle, Ashleigh shelled boiled peanuts and coveted the jars of pickles in her great-aunt Hattie Mae’s larder. In high school, she pored over food and travel magazines and marveled at how her mother never failed to put a hot meal on the table, whether instant grits or slowly cooked celebration dishes. After spending a gap year in Nairobi and graduating from culinary school, Ashleigh entered the restaurant world, bartending, catering, teaching, and staging. She rekindled her connection to the cuisine of her roots before opening her own restaurant, Good Hot Fish, named for a phrase her ancestors would shout to draw in customers.

Ashleigh’s culinary journey culminates in Our South, where each dish speaks deeply to its origins, revealing the true story of Black food in the region and the many pleasures of the South you can savor at home, wherever that may be.]]> 320 Ashleigh Shanti 1454949120 Jacqie 0 to-read, cookbooks 3.88
author: Ashleigh Shanti
name: Jacqie
average rating: 3.88
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/09
shelves: to-read, cookbooks
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