en-US Tue, 31 Dec 2024 06:17:54 -0800 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Review7143525875 Tue, 31 Dec 2024 06:17:54 -0800 /review/show/7143525875 Jamie gave 5 stars to Like Mother, Like Mother (Hardcover) by Susan Rieger
I’m feeling generous with the five stars here, as it might be 4.5, but this is one of those multigenerational family stories with tons of characters, lots of plot, really fine detail, and all the literary greatness you want out of the last book you read in a year.

I had a concern that there were too many expository paragraphs giving backstory in dialogue and then I realized that was the point for some of the characters. By the end of the novel, I didn’t even notice it anymore.

Each character is her own person (and note that while there are men, some of whom even get lots of shading and character, we really are focused on the women here). Each story is interesting in its own right.

Very much a book for fans of Pineapple Street, Lessons in Chemistry, or any Ann Patchett. Also, I immediately went to the library to get Rieger’s backlist title that I slept on years ago even though I gave it a few pages - she’s hooked me. ]]> Review7143518016 Tue, 31 Dec 2024 06:17:40 -0800 /review/show/7143518016 Jamie gave 1 star to Merry Ever After (Under the Mistletoe Collection, #2) by Tessa Bailey
It is so bad and has every single one of the Tessa Bailey tics that make you cringe in a full novel but in this one at least you get the joy of it being condensed into fifty really cringey uncomfortable pages. ]]> Review7143518016 Tue, 31 Dec 2024 06:15:51 -0800 /review/show/7143518016 Jamie gave 1 star to Merry Ever After (Under the Mistletoe Collection, #2) by Tessa Bailey
It is so bad and has every single one of the Tessa Bailey tics that make you cringe in a full novel but in this one at least you get the joy of it being condensed into fifty really cringey uncomfortable pages. ]]> Review7143509075 Tue, 31 Dec 2024 06:15:23 -0800 /review/show/7143509075 Jamie gave 3 stars to Cruel Winter with You (Under the Mistletoe Collection, #1) by Ali Hazelwood
These novellas are usually fun, and this one is pretty entertaining, but I’m always skeeved out by stories where people fall in love with someone they met in a nursery (also, Jamie being that articulate at age 2 about the infant she was meeting doesn’t track, even for a Hazelwood protagonist). Otherwise, cute froth. ]]> Review7143509075 Tue, 31 Dec 2024 06:13:31 -0800 /review/show/7143509075 Jamie gave 3 stars to Cruel Winter with You (Under the Mistletoe Collection, #1) by Ali Hazelwood
These novellas are usually fun, and this one is pretty entertaining, but I’m always skeeved out by stories where people fall in love with someone they met in a nursery (also, Jamie being that articulate at age 2 about the infant she was meeting doesn’t track, even for a Hazelwood protagonist). Otherwise, cute froth. ]]> Review7096481432 Wed, 18 Dec 2024 09:20:56 -0800 /review/show/7096481432 Jamie gave 4 stars to Pure Country (Central Texas, #2) by Kelly Fox
]]> Review7096467534 Wed, 18 Dec 2024 09:20:43 -0800 /review/show/7096467534 Jamie gave 4 stars to You Wanna Be on Top?: A Memoir of Makeovers, Manipulation, and Not Becoming America's Next Top Model (Hardcover) by Sarah Hartshorne
I really liked this a ton. I remember watching these early seasons of ANTM (I believe season 9 was the last one I watched, actually) so reading about the horrible conditions the young women were put under and the ways that the reality TV complex chewed up and spat out so many people in the early 2000s was fascinating (especially after reading Emily Nussbaum's terrific CUE THE SUN).

What's really great, though, is that it's not all terrible all the time - I mean, it's pretty terrible, but Hartshorne is able to show how exciting it all was too. It also helps that she's a genuinely good writer and is smart about what she's saying. Highly recommend. ]]> Review7096467534 Wed, 18 Dec 2024 09:15:43 -0800 /review/show/7096467534 Jamie gave 4 stars to You Wanna Be on Top?: A Memoir of Makeovers, Manipulation, and Not Becoming America's Next Top Model (Hardcover) by Sarah Hartshorne
I really liked this a ton. I remember watching these early seasons of ANTM (I believe season 9 was the last one I watched, actually) so reading about the horrible conditions the young women were put under and the ways that the reality TV complex chewed up and spat out so many people in the early 2000s was fascinating (especially after reading Emily Nussbaum's terrific CUE THE SUN).

What's really great, though, is that it's not all terrible all the time - I mean, it's pretty terrible, but Hartshorne is able to show how exciting it all was too. It also helps that she's a genuinely good writer and is smart about what she's saying. Highly recommend. ]]> Review7096445344 Wed, 18 Dec 2024 09:07:09 -0800 /review/show/7096445344 Jamie gave 4 stars to It's a Love Story (Paperback) by Annabel Monaghan
This slots firmly into third place on my favorite Annabel Monaghan books, and yet third place for Annabel Monaghan is still high up there indeed. I like the hook of the story and I know that she's building off Jennette McCurdy's memoir by having this child star try to make it in the world as an adult with all the trauma that the childhood fame brought her, the components of the book in LA just didn't sing for me as much.

But when we were on Long Island? YES PLEASE. You gotta love how Monaghan builds these families and these towns, and that was some lovely, lovely, LOVELY romantic tension build.

I will absolutely have no trouble with recommending this wholeheartedly, but it wasn't as quick to grab me. ]]> Review7096434636 Wed, 18 Dec 2024 09:05:00 -0800 /review/show/7096434636 Jamie gave 4 stars to This Is a Love Story (Hardcover) by Jessica Soffer
Marriage isn't easy and it isn't pretty, but Jane and Abe's marriage is extraordinary at its simple core. This story of a love that spans decades is told in fragments that build to a beautiful whole. This book left me gutted and heartbroken while so very very happy to have met these characters and the people around them.

I do worry that the book will be dealt a disservice by the title - because it sounds like a romance and people looking for that are going to be greatly disappointed but I fear people looking for a strong, character driven literary novel are not going to pick it up. ]]>