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FEB - If You Have a Garden and a Library...

...you have everything. Right?!

“Read a book with a plant or flower on the cover.��

Comment below with the name of the book you read this month and what you thought of it.

I'll be reading What My Bones Know by Stephanie Foo. I used an Audible credit on this last year and haven't gotten around to it yet so this challenge is the perfect way to finally get to it. I'm also trying to read more non-fiction/memoirs this year. What My Bones Know: A Memoir of Healing from Complex Trauma

The vanishing half for February

I read The Vines by Shelley Nolden. It was very creepy and atmospheric. It is the story of North Brother Island in the East River where people with contagious illnesses were kept for years. This is the story of a family of doctors who "treated" patients there. Be sure to look at pictures of the abandoned island as it is now to add to the creepiness.

I'm reading Hidden Pictures ... which has trees on the cover ... close enough!

Planning on reading The Darkest Secrets by Heather Wynter. Have had it for a couple years as an ebook, just haven’t gotten around to it yet.

I'm reading The Cloisters by Katy Hays for this one. My husband got me it for Christmas and I've been trying to find a time to read it. Funny enough, I barely have books that have plants or flowers on the cover so as soon as I saw that this one did, I knew it was the one.

I'm reading The Villa by Rachel Hawkins.

This was actually a rather odd book and had lots of twists and turns that I didn't always see coming. I did enjoy the dual timeline stories as they wove together past and present. I particularly liked the snippets of news articles, blog posts, and podcasts that were included and feel they brought more to the story by helping to flesh out the history of the house.

I didn't particularly care for Chess' character thought. I found her pushy, prideful, and egotistical. She struck me as someone who made it big and let it go to her head thinking she was now above all the others. Treating your best friend like crap isn't cool for any reason IMO.

I gave this book 4/5 stars and would recommend it for anyone who enjoys thrillers. I definitely want to read more books by this author.

CHALLENGE COMPLETE! I read Book 9 of Helene Tursten’s Inspector Huss series. As always, I enjoyed the pace of the story, the continuation of the personal lives of these now familiar characters, the buildup to the reveal, & the unusual way in which this story ended. I am writing from my iPad so I cannot add my usual book cover. However, the cover contains the white flower so prominent throughout the story and thus completes the requirements of this month’s challenge.

That Dark Infinity - Kate Pentecost
My review: 4 stars
This book fell closer to 5 stars for me. It has a very entertaining & unique storyline, with characters that are interesting & believable. Keeping in mind that it’s definitely in the YA category - the only thing keeping this from a 5 star rating is that the book felt a bit condensed, especially the ending - I feel like the trials could have been fleshed out a bit more. Having said that, I was perilously close to hating this book entirely because of the way it ended, but the HEA I wanted was achieved quite nicely in the epilogue.
/book/show/5...

I read The Night Garden by Lisa Van Allen. I really enjoyed it. It's about a girl who runs her family farm. The farm has been in her family for generations, there is also a garden maze that her mom started. The farm also draws "boarders" in the summer, women searching for answers from the maze who also work on the farm for room and board in the old, rundown barn. The maze is considered magical, in the sense that if you walk through it you could receive answers to your questions. The girl's dad is still alive and has left the farm to live on another part of their land, away from everyone. The girl is hiding a secret, that only her and her dad know about. The book drew me in and kept me wanting more!

I read The Family Upstairs and really enjoyed it.

Motif book #2
Damsel - Elana K. Arnold
My review: 5 stars
This. Was. AMAZING. This is exactly the type of YA writing that I love - mature, gritty, and the author has wonderful style. On the surface, Emory seems like the quintessential fairytale prince, but it isn’t long before he starts showing readers his true nature. Ama, however, is both ethereal & entrancing right from the start, and continues to be so throughout. I honestly couldn’t have wished a more suitable ending for both characters��.but especially especially for Emory.

I read On dancing hill, a book about a family farm, and a wife who goes on vacation for a week. It was a bit slow and not as much feel good as I'd hoped, but it got better towards the end.

The Bookstore Sisters. it was short, and I felt had the potential to be a great novel, but instead started slowly and then rushed to a finish.

I read By the Book by Jasmine Guillory for both GXO Reading Challenges. It has flowers on the cover for the motif challenge and it fits the keyword prompt with Book in the title!

I read A Dark and Stormy Tea which featured a big bouquet of red roses on the cover! (The red roses were part of the story too....it wasn't just the cover art!) It was a fun read - a very solid mystery series book. I haven't read any of the other books in the series, but would definitely pick up another one. And the recipes at the end were fun too!

I also just finished It Starts with Us which has daffodils on the cover. It's the third book of Colleen Hoover's I've read and I always enjoy her stories. So I'm really glad I got to read that one for this month's monthly motif challenge!

I plan on reading The Dragon's Promise, which is the second in the Six Crimson Cranes series. Since I'm doing this challenge out of order (aka not chronologically), I probably won't get around to it for a couple months, but I'm happy to post here with my plan :)

Finished
I read The Ghosts Of Rose Hill by R.M. Romero
It was a bit of mystery, a bit of romance, and a lot of ghosts.
A quick read/listen story about a 16 yr old girl who visits Prague for the summer and finds an abandoned graveyard and some ghosts to go along with it.

Just finished The Cactus by Sarah Haywood. This motif also helped my other reading challenge of TBR Club Picks . It wasn’t rated very high on ŷ������, maybe because I’m older , i actually liked reading about an unconventional relationship.

Challenge Complete: “Read a book with a plant or flower on the cover.��

The History of Bees by Maja Lunde

/review/show...

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Inadvertently, I read a few books for this one this month. I planned on reading Long Time Coming by Edie Claire on my kindle for this. Then, when I was looking at the covers again of the 2nd and 3rd books of the The Kingdom Of The Wicked series, I realized that those also have flowers on the covers. So that series (especially the 2nd and 3rd books) were spicy spicy and made me think maybe I shouldn't enjoy a book so much about someone doing the nasty with the devil rofl. The book on my kindle, Long Time Coming, was what I call easy reading... no being anxious on what may be coming up or super crazy plot twists. overall, all books this month were enjoyable.

Challenge Complete.

I read Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather. There's a couple of green bushes/cactus? on the cover. I'm trying to sprinkle a few more classics into my reading challenges this year. I enjoyed this book. It has rather a slow and steady pace which made the book somewhat calming to read. The author did a great job in capturing the time period. I found it surprisingly even handed with its treatment of the Native American and Mexican races and culture considering it was written in 1927.

Squeezed in a 3rd motif book!
Ever Cursed - Corey Ann Haydu
My review: 5 stars
Migraine strikes again! Suffice it to say, this was perfectly sublime. My favourite read this month I think.
/book/show/5...

Little late, but finally started mine: Belladonna by Adalyn Grace. Been wanting to read this one for a while and it seems to be living up to the hype.

Challenge complete! (Finally!)
Book: The Darkest Secrets by Heather Wynter
Not a bad book, but a long way from my top pics. At least one more off my towering TBR pile!
My review here: /review/show...

A bit behind on posting (not reading!), but completed challenge by reading Honeysuckle Season by Mary Ellen Taylor. I'm not a huge fan of two timelines back and forth, but otherwise this was a good book.

New to this group. These books read in February have flowers, fruits or plants such as forests on the cover:
--- tear jerker, unputdownable--gave it 5 stars.
--was too slow and dragged and was not an enjoyable read --- gave it 2 stars
-- a whodonit police detective novel--- gave it 4 stars.
-- an entertaining romcom. Gave it 4 stars
-- full of suspense and the best book from this author in my opinion, gave it 5 stars
- was looking forward to the final book of this trilogy and it did not disappoint but was not the best as her other trilogies--gave it 4 stars.
-Interesting true account of those gone missing in the wild --lost interest and gave it 3 stars.
- an average mystery thriller in the wild of Colorado---gave it 3 stars
-- Too slow for me, after The Husband and What Alice Forgot, her other novels have been a disappointment. Gave it 3 stars.
--- Another average mystery thriller. ---gave it 3 stars.

Challenge complete!
I read Maame by Jessica George. This is an excellent read, but even better as an audiobook as the narrator really made the story come to life. If you liked Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams, you'll love this.

The summer we lost her by Tish Cohen

The library book by Susan Orlean

My mistake in my last posting. The book I read was Freida by Sébastien Peres