The Christmas Bookshop by Jenny Colgan

Owned book.

4/5 stars

Long time no review 😅

I wouldn't say that this is my normal sort of vibe at all but it caught my eye sometime and I thought it looked cute. I promptly forgot about it until a few days ago when I came down with a horrible cold and felt too foggy for anything on my TBR list and I was scanning my shelves and spotted this and thought Christmas? That'll do.

Carmen has just been made redundant after the shop she works in closes and there's nothing left in her town. Then her fancy lawyer sister, Sofia, in Edinburgh comes up with a solution. One of her clients owns a failing bookshop and Sofia begrudgingly admits that Carmen was good at her job, maybe she can help him turn things around.

Carmen and Sofia have never seen eye to eye and things are... Tense. Not helped by health-obsessed nanny Skylar - seriously sweets and TV and modern toys are good in moderation. Throw in a self-obsessed self-help book author and a professor of trees and things get complicated.

For a while I thought Carmen was going to make the wrong choice but everything worked out in the end. I wish the ending itself has been more fleshed out though. It seemed very abrupt and I wanted more of a coming together scene between the sisters.

Stef Out x

Daisy Darker by Alice Feeney

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

4/5 stars

Daisy Darker was never supposed to live long. Born with a broken heart that has almost killed her four times. The youngest of three sisters Rose and Lily clearly resent her. She's so much younger than them and her condition meant homeschooling of a sort for her and boarding school for them. Their parents are divorced, their mother finds them an inconvenience and their father loves his orchestra more. All are struggling financially.

That's where Grandma Beatrice comes in. A wealthy author with a sizable inheritance and a hunch that she's going to die soon. Beatrice calls the family to a get together at her seaside house. The tide comes in, the house is cut off and things start to get weird.

I read this in a single day, partly because I was waiting for someone but partly because it was mysterious and engaging and the suspense kept me reading.

My only big criticism is that some of the chapters were overly short and were split for no good reason.

Stef Out x

Full Disclosure by Camryn Garrett

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

5/5 stars

Simone is a normal teenager... Mostly. Her thoughts of boys and the development of future relationships are coloured by the fact that she is HIV positive and has been since birth. She's chill about it, mostly, and she looks after her health but it's not something she likes to be open about. The last time she tried, to a girl she had a crush on, it went badly and she felt that she had to leave her last school.

Now, things are looking up at her new school, she has two new best friends and a role as student director for the school's musical, Rent. Simone is passionate about musicals and Rent holds extra meaning personally since it's about the AIDS epidemic that killed friends of her two dads.

Through the musical Simone starts to bond with, and then fall for, Miles. But someone isn't happy about the blooming relationship and Simone starts to receive notes threatening to out her.

I did guess the culprit but I never would have guessed their reasoning and it added a much needed extra layer of depth. I loved Simone's friends and how casual their representation is! Lydia is bi and Asian, Claudia is asexual and a lesbian. Simone herself is Black (so is Miles) and bi questioning, not surprisingly prior experience has somewhat tainted that.

Overall I loved this, loved the characterisation especially Simone, the relationship she had with her dads was beautiful, they were so supportive!

Stef Out x

All the Stars and Teeth by Adalyn Grace

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

5/5 stars

Amora is the princess of the island kingdom of Visidia. She is also a practitioner of Soul Magic and training to be a High Animancer - Master of Souls. One final public demonstration will prove that she's fit to rule but then it all goes wrong and she's thrown in jail. Fearing execution she flees with mysterious pirate, Bastian. He'll help her if she will help him reclaim his stolen magic.

As they journey across the sea, along with an unexpected hitchhiker, Amora learns that her father, the King, kept her in the dark about the problems that the kingdom is having and now she feels that it's up to her to put things right.

I thought the world-building was simple yet effective, and the magic system was intriguing, but it was the overall storytelling that really got to me. The way we gradually got to know the characters and their motivations. I do feel like the romance side of things went a little too obvious when there was another choice that may have been more interesting... Overall I enjoyed it and I immediately borrowed the sequel from the library (4/5 stars: great overall but ending felt rushed and incomplete).

Stef Out x

All Of This Is True by Lygia Day Penaflor

Ebook originally provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

3/5 stars

So I originally started reading this in 2018 as a NetGalley eArc. I ended up marking it as Did Not Finish at 20%. At the time I struggled to connect to the characters and the formatting of the ebook wasn't working in those early stages (I presume this was fixed for official release?). I later found a paperback in a charity shop without realising it was the same book. Then this month it just so happens that it fit one of my reading prompts that I'm doing, the word "All". Even then I didn't connect that I'd previously attempted it until I went to Goodreads to mark it as "currently reading".

The way the book is laid out is unusual. We have video transcripts for the characters Miri and Penny, complete with a video graphic style header for the show "The Whole Truth". Then we have Soleil whose journal entries are being serialised in a newspaper. Lastly there are extracts from Fatima's new book, some scenes of which will cause deja vu.

The central plot point of this seems to be discussing this new book and the events that led to an attack on Jonah, the girls' friend. The kick off of everything is a book called The Undertow, written by local author Fatima Ro. Miri is a superfan who has a plan to get to know Fatima and become her friend. Her plan works but gradually everything changes. Not least of the changes is a secret that Jonah has been carrying with him that will turn them all upside down...

This was a very fast paced read and it drew me in but the characters aren't super likeable. Penny was the most "human" but there was a whiny quality to her and a lack of backbone to change her own situation, she was too much of a doormat. As soon as a certain event was mentioned in relation to a certain character I guessed the truth of what happened. It felt very naive of the other characters to assume what they did. It was fairly enjoyable but I won't reread, it's lost its mystery now.

Stef Out x

The Whole Truth by Cara Hunter

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

2/5 stars

To start with I disliked the chapterless style and Adam's diary entries lacked distinction. I could tell when they started due to the date/time stamp but the end transition could be better.

On to the story. We have two unconnected cases, one of a college professor accused of sexual assault by her male student. The other a murder of a woman that may or may not be connected to a historic rapist.

Apparently this is the 5th book in the series based around DI Adam Fawley and to be honest you need to read the others. There's a who's who cheat sheet at the beginning but I soon forgot and the parade of surnames was a little confusing, also there were discussions about relationships etc that lacked context. Not to mention the bio mention of Adam's young son taking his own life. The writing itself was good enough that I may check out the previous books and hope they come together a little tighter than this one.

The storylines were decent though the assault case became a little convoluted by the end and it was hard to work out what the actual truth was, especially with the epilogue. Also there was an unfortunate throwaway comment at the rape clinic where one of the cops wonders how often they need the clothes to change into (after their own have been taken for evidence) in an XXL which felt very heartless because as well as demeaning the few male victims - the exact plot point of this book - it also dismisses the idea that some of the female victims being larger bodied. Rape doesn't just affect the thin.

Anyway, as for the murder case and its related bits, there was no proper conclusion. Crucial evidence was discovered and then the book ended with no solid conclusion. No arrest, no setting free of the wrongly accused. Nothing. Very disappointing.

Stef Out x

Yellowface by R.F. Kuang

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

4/5 stars

I found this book very compelling and it drew me in but it's also one I personally found tricky to review.

June Hayward, a white woman, is a writer. As is her friend Athena Liu, a Chinese American. However while Athena's books have been bestsellers, June's book has struggled. But then Athena dies and June finds her latest unfinished books. June then inexplicably decides to steal it, finish it and publish it under the name Juniper Song. Her own full first and middle name that conveniently make her appear more ethnically ambiguous.

The book when released is an instant hit and the popularity inevitably leads to criticisms about the validity of a white woman writing about Chinese soldiers in the war. Subsequently the internet takes offence and tries to cancel her.

June wasn't particularly likeable but I guess she wasn't supposed to be. She tried to make too many excuses for her actions and as if once wasn't bad enough she then stole and took over a second piece of Athena's work!

I did enjoy reading this book and it made me think but I'm not sure of the overall point. Stealing is bad? Duh. Don't talk over the people that experienced something? Also seems clear, but neither of those feel like the whole story. *Shrug* Maybe I'm just being dense?

Stef Out x

Unscripted by Nicole Kronzer

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

4/5 stars

I really enjoyed this book. It had a lot to say and some important themes and the characters were brilliant.

Zelda, her brother and her brother's new boyfriend are attending an improvisational comedy camp for two weeks in the mountains. Zelda's excited but when they arrive she discovers that she's one of only 5 girls which doesn't fill her with hope. Hope that diminishes further when, though she's cast in the top Varsity team, she's constantly the butt of the joke and being cast in parts such as "prostitute".

The situation is worsened by a coach who in the room is constantly criticising her work and giving her contrary advice, but outside, in private, is giving her compliments and kissing her.

I really enjoyed the story's progression and Zelda's gradual realisation of how wrong things were. I just would have liked a little more ending. Maybe an epilogue of them coming back the following year and things being so much better.

Stef Out x

In the Lives of Puppets by TJ Klune

 

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

4/5 stars

Gio, the General Innovation Operative, is a humanoid android living in the middle of the forest in an expansive treehouse that he's self-built. He has a human son, Victor, whose existence has a mythical quality, he was apparently left with Gio by a couple in trouble. Then there are the robots that Victor has found in the Scrap Yards: Rambo, an anxious and excitable robot vacuum who is obsessed with vintage movie Top Hat; and Nurse Ratched, a medical robot with sociopathic tendencies and a fondness for drilling.

Life is good but then one day they discover another humanoid android in the Scrap Yards. It has residual power in its battery and they decide to take it home to repair and save. They succeed in awakening the robot and christen him Hap for Hysterically Angry Puppet. It soon transpires that Hap's original designation was something drastically different and his discovery is about to change everything and send them on a treacherous journey...

Once again TJ Klune shows us that he is the master of found family stories. Everyone is so well defined and quirky and fit together perfectly. I love Rambo and he had so many great moments! Victor was lovely in his worry for everyone and it's always nice to see asexual representation. He also gave me a lot of autistic vibes reading him and if he was I'm surprised that Nurse Ratched didn't have the necessary diagnostic capabilities.

I did feel that I had to knock off a star for world building and the ending. I just wanted more of both. The ending felt very abrupt and I wanted to know more about how it all became machines and what happened to the humans.

Stef Out x

The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

CW: murder, suicide, self-harm

I've seen this book around Instagram a fair bit lately and then I was scrolling through my Kindle when I spotted I had it (memory of the proverbial goldfish me) and thought now's a good time to read it.

For me while the story was intriguing I'm not sure if I really cared. Even with her diary entries Alicia didn't seem a very solid character. She didn't have any interests or personality. Theo was an arrogant dick and to be honest I'm not sure how much of his story was true and how much was manipulation. He was very controlling for a therapist and the way he went out searching for Alicia's family was pushing the boundaries a bit too much.

The twist was interesting but the ending on the whole felt a bit rushed and the timelines in the end were a bit muddled as to what happened when.

Stef Out x

The Sharp Edge of Silence by Cameron Kelly Rosenblum

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

Lycroft Phelps is an elite boarding school with very traditional values. "Turn a blind eye" and "boys will be boys" both ring true. Above all the boys rowing team rules the roost. They control the school and have created the Slycroft Club, a secret society with less than stellar ideals.

Charlotte is a dancer who is dating one of the rowers but she feels like Seb is holding back, and then she starts receiving mysterious notes about him. Max is a scholarship nerd, insecure about his height but then he's asked to join the rowing team as a cox. He enjoys it but all is soured once he learns the truth about Slycroft. Quinn, known as Q, is depressed and angry following a rape that can't be prosecuted. The three, along with some other friends, come together to start changing the "boys club" culture of Lycroft Phelps.

I really enjoyed the way this all came together and I liked the characters and how they developed and grew. I especially enjoyed Q's progression from alienating everyone to letting people in. I did feel like the ending was a bit rushed and it didn't seem like the situation of who was sending Charlotte the notes was properly resolved. Overall a great book that people should definitely read.

Stef Out x

The Search for Synergy by Brett Salter

Ebook provided by the author for review. Thank you.

Rome thinks he's a normal 14 year old boy but out of nowhere he starts to feel odd and his eyes keep tingling and then they produce fire?! Rome wants to ignore this weirdness but apparently someone has seen him. His classmate Julian.

Julian drags Rome to see Mr Jones, a modern day Merlin who reveals that Dragons used to exist and they could heart bond with knights but there was a fallout and there's also something called the Void which holds really bad creatures. Julian is from a long line of knights and Rome... Well he's a dragon. It appears that after this fallout they took on human forms and went into hiding.

I loved the ideas behind this novel but the execution was a little lacking in my opinion. The speech was very odd, quite formal and a little stilted, I never hear teenagers using "I am" instead of "I'm". Also there was no explanation as to why Julian and his father spoke in Olde English. The pacing was a little off as well, there were several large infodumps but no proper worldbuilding, we also don't really know a lot about the main characters themselves, likes, dislikes, family etc. This was a nice quick, easy read though and will appeal to a lot of people.

Stef Out x

No Big Deal by Bethany Rutter

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

4/5 stars

Emily is 17 years old and in her final year of school. University is looming and she feels stuck compared to her friends, especially in terms of relationships. As a self-described fat girl Emily is confident and fashionable and largely unbothered by her weight but with her mother constantly on a diet and picking at her about her weight, and a best friend returning from holiday having lost weight only to immediately get a boyfriend, she starts to lose faith in herself. But then she meets Joe. They connect over music and things seem to be going well but is everything as it seems?

This was a lovely, fast, easy read and I loved Emily! It is so rare to see fat characters in books and even rarer for them to not be obsessed with losing weight. For Emily that was her mum and it was sad to see how she let her obsession damage their relationship, though thankfully not irreparably.

I loved how Emily grew over the story and assured herself that she was worthy. The only thing is that Emily's friends could have been fleshed out a little more.

Stef Out x

This Can Never Not Be Real by Sera Milano

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

3/5 stars

I think that this is a book that will require a physical reread at some point. The formatting of who was saying what appeared to be a little mixed up in my eBook version, though I know you can't expect perfection in ARCs. I also don't know if I absorbed it as effectively as I could have.

It's a very unusual book. It's an as it happens narration of the experience of 5 teenagers (only 4 narrate the vast majority) as they try to survive a terrorist mass shooting event. They all attend the same school but none really interact normally yet are thrown together by fate.

I think claustrophobic is a good way to describe this book. Not just because of the hiding in small spaces but because 98% of the book was just this one event. I think I would have liked to have read more from the outside. Not from the terrorists themselves, I completely understand the author's decision on that front, no the police officers and the families on the outside, how did they find out, how did they feel? All we got were a couple of brief police reports that could have been expanded on.

I did like the writing style and would definitely read more by the author, I'd particularly love a sequel to see how the characters are sometime down the line.

Stef Out x

Breaking Down Her Walls by Erin Zak

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

4/5 stars

Julia Finch is running away as usual. But after taking a detour due to a blocked road her car ends up breaking down in a small town in the middle of nowhere. Despite Julia's somewhat hostile manner a chance conversation leads to a man named Ed offering to pay to get her car fixed in exchange for a job and a room on the ranch he helps manage. Julia is not an animal person and loathes the idea of being in debt to someone but no car means no getaway so she reluctantly says yes.

Ranch owner Elena is not happy about some city slicker working on her ranch but then she sees that Julia has an instinctive touch with the horses and allows her to stay. Elena is a very guarded person, her wife died in a car accident leaving her a single mum to now-teenage Cole, and then when she opened her heart to previous ranch hand Penn, she suddenly abandoned them.

The brilliant thing about this book is the title about "breaking down her walls" applies to both of them, Elena's been hurt before and Julia's chequered past in foster care makes her unwilling to open up and both have trust issues. This was beautiful and I loved the slow-burn development of their relationship. I did want more of the after and I wanted to know more about the side characters, they weren't as well developed.

Stef Out x

One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston

 

Ebook from the library.

5/5 stars

This was not really what I expected but I loved it anyway.

August has moved to New York in an attempt to get away from her mother's obsessive search for her missing brother which has clouded August's whole childhood. She's on her third college degree and fiercely minimalist with her possessions.

She is at first unsure about her new roommates, one claims to be psychic, one leaves strange art everywhere and the third is basically nocturnal with a dog who has become communal. Over time they become family, along with August's work crew at Billy's Pancake House and Annie, the drag queen across the hall. Along the way she meets Jane on her subway commute. Cool, mysterious and electrifying, Jane isn't who she appears to be...

The story with Jane was a bit startling at first for what I thought was a regular contemporary romance/whatever but the whole thing drew me in and was so well written!

To me this book is queer joy and I highly recommend it!

Stef Out x

Why Can't Life be Like Pizza? by Andy V. Roamer

Ebook provided by NetGalley for review. Thank you.

2/5 stars

CW: homophobic language, light racism

I was disappointed by this book. R.V. was not a particularly likeable character. One of two children of Lithuanian immigrant parents living in the US with his brother Ray (age unknown? Acts older but implied to be younger.) R.V. complained a lot but did nothing to fix anything. Apparently he's some kind of genius and brags about doing well in school and enjoying homework and reading difficult books. He also complained a lot about all the "Lith stuff" that his parents were involved in but I thought it was great that his parents are so in touch with their culture.

Also considering that he's pondering his own sexuality R.V.'s attitudes were quite homophobic. He was very dismissive about his teacher for being swishy, limp-wristed, femme and having a high voice. Said teacher is not even confirmed to be gay at this point. That comes later after a homophobia based attack which is then brushed off. No mention of reporting it or anything.

Overall I just found this book flat and boring. The diary style doesn't work particularly well, why would you explain stuff about your language and culture that you already know in your own diary? Also the ending was very abrupt, I guess to get people to read the sequel. Sorry but book one did not draw me in enough to warrant reading the second.

Stef Out x

New Year's Resolutions 2023

 I'm back with my New Year's Resolutions list for 2023!

1. Get a tattoo
2. Get a piercing
3. Watch 100 films
4. Complete my book resolutions
5. Learn to knit
6. Sew a garment
7. Learn to crochet
8. Write 20,000 words for NaNoWriMo
9. Write 10,000 works outside NaNoWriMo
10. Do a painting
11. Finish 2 embroideries
12. Go on an outing
13. Get a new job
14. Learn to drive
15. Get a new car
16. Decorate the hallway

Book resolutions:

1. Read 100 books
2. Read 2 auto/biographies
3. Read 2 other non-fiction
4. Complete 23 in 2023 challenge
5. Complete Alphabet challenge
6. Read 30 NetGalley books
7. Complete owed reviews
8. Review every book

I want to be more crafty and creative in 2023, I need to learn new skills and I need to make more things with my own hands! I also need to write more, to stretch my brain, I need to finish something!

As explained in my last post I need a new job, why is it so hard to find something that is compatible with my skill set, physicality and mental capacity? As for the car, we haven't had this one long but knowing our luck! LOL! But also it is still a little smaller than ideal, it's nice to dream anyway.

The hallway seems a bit random but it's actually not. It's been needing doing for a while but the council just redid the bathroom and toilet, they look nice on the surface but the paintwork needs an extra coat and their shower was pathetic so we bought a mixer tap shower and paid a plumber to fit it. They also took forever! We were quoted 10 working days, it was about 3-4 weeks in the end. People not showing up, only one person coming in a week etc. It was awful. Anyway now the bathroom has been done the hallway looks even shabbier, especially where they bashed at it bringing stuff in and out, so now it's desperate for redoing. The paint is cheap enough, the big cost is new flooring and we can't skip that because it's already patch-worked from where puppy Forest ripped some back up.

So that's the list. Obviously there are other non-list mini goals as always but whatever to them.

Stef Out x