January Minireviews // Part 2

House of Salt and Sorrows by Erin Craig – 3*

//published 2019//

I had really mixed feelings on this one.  I actually really loved it for the majority of the book, but the ending (a) got unexpectedly gruesome, way more down the horror spectrum than I was anticipating, and (b) the ending used a plot device that I somewhat consider cheating, especially since it didn’t really fully explain a lot of the mysteries.  I really liked the characters, especially the narrator, and the concept is done quite well, with a good creepy mystery going on, but then – it just kind of went a little sideways towards the end for me.  But a sequel is coming out the summer and I’ll probably read it, so there’s that haha

Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder – 5*

//published 1933//

Continuing the chapter-a-day readalong of the Little House books, our group picked up Farmer Boy next.  For some reason, I always read this one much later in the series when I was growing up, so it was especially interesting for me to read this one right after reading about Laura being the same age.  If I had to pick, I would probably pick Almanzo’s life – much more settled, and SO MUCH good food!!  I really loved reading about all the “how tos” around the farm, and seeing Almanzo learn lessons about life.  I wish that Laura had written another book about Almanzo so that we could learn more about how he got from a prosperous farm in New York to the little frontier town in the Dakotas!

Murder at the Mayfair Hotel by C.J. Archer – 3.5*

//published 2020//

My sister started this mystery series and thought it would be fun for us to read together.  We’re going quite slowly, but that’s better than not at all haha

This one is set just before the New Year of 1900.  Cleo is moving in with her uncle, aunt, and two (adult) cousins, who own a luxury hotel in London (the Mayfair, naturally).  Cleo has been estranged from them for her entire life due to the usual mother eloped with an “unsuitable” man, etc.  This does a great job of giving Cleo an in-between position – she isn’t a guest, but she’s still an outsider learning her way.  She’s always been poor, but now she has money and is expected to act “appropriately” for her class.  When the murder happens, she doesn’t have too many preconceived notions to interfere with her theories.  Some aspects of this story definitely stretched my credulity, but on the whole I liked Cleo herself and found this to be a decent historical mystery with a fun setting.

Living With Pattern by Rebecca Atwood – 4*

//published 2016//

A while back I read Living With Color by this author, and absolutely loved it.  Living With Pattern is actually her earlier book, which I found intriguing since Color seems like a more natural place to start than Pattern (to me).  While I did enjoy this one and found some useful information in it, I didn’t love it the way that I did Color.  I think, for me, “pattern” as a concept is harder to grasp than color.  Pattern involves color, texture, shapes, space, distance, texture, etc.  While this can work if you’re looking at, say, one piece of furniture, it’s hard for me when you’re looking at a room as a whole and trying to identify what patterns you see and how they are interacting with one another.  Honestly, I would love it if Atwood wrote more books breaking down Pattern into more specific subcategories, like she did with Color.  I would happily read a book about texture or furniture placement.  When I read her book about color, I made my husband read it, too, and we discussed SO much of it.  (Part of this, I’ll admit, is because he works with color for a living – he paints cars, which involves a great deal of matching and adjusting color, so he is already familiar with terms and concepts like saturation, vibrance, and hue.)  But I never felt that kind of connection with this book.  And while the book about color had me looking around my whole house and thinking about my spaces, this book left me feeling a little overwhelmed and without a lot of starting direction.  I do think part of this is that our house is very open, and not very big, so while we have distinct spaces without our home, you can see almost everything from any point in the house.  From where I am sitting at my computer in the corner I can see our pantry, the kitchen, a work area, a sitting area, and part of the lower room.  So it can be a tad overwhelming to try and thinking about how all these different spaces are interacting with one another.  Although I did find myself starting to count rectangles, as that seems to be our favorite shape around here!

All in all, Living With Pattern was still a worthwhile read, it just was a bit more academic and less practical than Living With Color was for me.

Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie – 4.5*

//published 1930//

This was a reread, of course, of an old favorite.  I absolutely love this mystery.  Partially because I adore Miss Marple, but partially because I love the narrator of this book.  The Vicar is such a likable, self-depreciating individual, and he really levels up the story.  No matter how many times I read this one, I always seem to forget who the murderer is, and even when I do remember, I’m still just caught up in admiration for Christie’s many red herrings.  While not my all-time favorite Christie, this is still an absolute classic.

Running Total: (I think I forgot this on my last post!) Books that I’ve read but haven’t reviewed yet: 74!!!  High/Low: 97/74

October Minireviews // Part 3

Despite being super busy at the orchard in October, I weirdly got in a lot of reading.  So here is another batch of reviews!!

Our House by Louise Candlish – 3.5*

//published 2018//

This one had such an engaging premise.  Bram and Fi are taking the “mature” course by following a modern co-parenting technique instead of a traditional divorce – they’ve kept their house and also rented a small apartment, and they take turns staying one place or the other, while their son is able to stay in his house all the time – the “bird’s nest” method.  Except one day Fi comes to her house after a few days not there to find total strangers moving in.  Bram is missing, and now no one seems to know what is going on.

This one kept me engaged and reading, but I wasn’t a huge fan of the ending, so it brought my overall enjoyment down a bit.  Still, a solid thriller with some fun twists.

The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd – 3.5*

//published 2022//

Sometimes I read a book and wish it were a lot better, and this was one of them.  The concept here is absolutely fabulous, but the inconsistency in the world/magic-building was just dreadful.  There were so many things that didn’t match up, so many people whose motivations were never remotely explained, and just – it was close to being this big win but ended up being flat, despite me wanting to love it, because I LOVE MAPS and the idea of magic maps was just completely intriguing to me.  I don’t have to have every single thing about a magical system explained to me line-by-line, but there needs to be consistency and in-world logic, and that was totally lacking in this book.  Still, I would be willing to give another of Shepherd’s books a try… probably.

Among the Shadows by L.M. Montgomery – 3*

This collection just wasn’t what I was expecting.  I was anticipating a book of ghosty stories, but instead these were all just sad.  Apparently the “darker side” is really just stories with sad endings and sad characters.  Lots of adultery, drunkenness, and death.  Some of the stories weren’t bad, but I didn’t love any of them.

Daddy’s Gone A-Hunting by Mary Higgins Clark – 3.5*

//published 2013//

I’m still working through the pile of Clark’s mysteries I’ve accumulated at random book sales.  However, I didn’t take notes on this one and can’t remember it very well, other than feeling rather meh towards it in the end, since it went into the giveaway pile!

Appointment With Death by Agatha Christie – 3.5*

//published 1938//

While I’m always going to enjoy a Christie mystery, this isn’t one of my favorites.  I just felt so bad for this whole family who has been abused their entire lives by their horrid mother!  It was hard for me to get past that.  The actual mystery is good as always, and I do love Poirot, but this one is just really sad.

September Minireviews // Part 2

The final batch of September reviews!!!

Venetia by Georgette Heyer – 3.5*

//published 1958//

The reasons I enjoy reading Heyer is because I love reading something relaxing and humorous with happy endings all around in the end.  While I did somewhat get that one with Venetia, there were also SO MANY TERRIBLE CHARACTERS in this one!  Poor Venetia!  The titular character herself was a delight, but she was genuinely beset with dreadful, obnoxious busybodies all around, constantly interfering with her life, tearing her down, and ruining everything!  I honestly felt stressed out for a lot of this book because of how badly Venetia was being treated.  So while I didn’t dislike this one, per se, it definitely wasn’t my new favorite.

Murder in the Mews by Agatha Christie – 4*

//published 1937//

A collection of four short stories, these were decent but not amazing.  Personally, I prefer Christie’s longer-form stories, which allow her time to develop side characters and red herrings.  However, these were quite readable and, as usual, I had absolutely no idea whodunit!

The Stand-In by Lily Chu – 4*

//published 2021//

I was surprised at how much I ended up enjoying this one.  It’s a goofy romcom, so it has moments were you have to stretch to buy it, but on the whole I just really liked the characters and enjoyed watching them grow.  I found Gracie to be so sweet and kind and just genuinely fell in love with her.  This is this author’s first romcom, but she has another one coming out this spring, and I’m quite looking forward to it.

NB: One of the things I liked was that this was a closed-door romance, yay!!

The Scarlet Pimpernel by Emmuska Orczy – 4*

//published 1905//

This was a reread, although it had been quite a few years since I had picked it up.  I thoroughly enjoyed it, and it’s started me on a journey to read all the Pimpernel books.  There’s a lot to enjoy here; it’s all quite dramatic with parts almost impossible to believe, but that adds to the allure of the Pimpernel.  My heart went out to poor Marguerite, whose happiness was destroyed by one poor choice, and I was totally rooting for her to conquer her enemies.  Personally, I think this story holds up great in the 100+ years since it was published, and I’ve been quite enjoying all the other Pimpernel tales I’ve read since.

The Mystery of the Six Clues by Vernon Howard – 3.5*

So it’s not unusual for me to pick up completely random books at yard sales and library discard sales and flea markets for really cheap just because I like the looks of them… and then never actually read them!!  I’ve owned this one for probably 20 years, so it seemed like it was a good time to finally read it!  Published in 1952, it’s actually rather interesting as an early concept of modern YA – a gang of teens getting up to teen shenanigans.  This isn’t a groundbreaking story, but it was perfectly enjoyable.

A Matter of Choice and Endings and Beginnings by Nora Roberts – 3.5*

//published 1984//

Well, I didn’t make any notes on these, the book descriptions only ring vague bells, and apparently I didn’t even mark them as “read” on Goodreads (that last one is honestly a bit weird haha) SO I don’t have much to say about the last two books I read in September!  Both of them are pretty typical 80s romances (both were published in 1984) and the 3.5* rating (and lack of memory of them) indicates that I found them to be regular but unexciting one-off reads.

January Minireviews – Part 2

Happy March, everyone!!! This week things are starting to smell like spring and I’m so excited!!!  In the meantime, here are some books I read back in January.

Sometimes I don’t feel like writing a full review for whatever reason, either because life is busy and I don’t have time, or because a book didn’t stir me enough.  Sometimes, it’s because a book was so good that I just don’t have anything to say beyond that I loved it!  Frequently, I’m just wayyy behind on reviews and am trying to catch up.  For whatever reason, these are books that only have a few paragraphs of thoughts from me.

Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi – 3*

//published 1883//

Do you ever read a book that just leaves you feeling !??!?!  That book was Pinocchio.  I never thought I’d say this, but Disney actually made this story more cohesive and actually somewhat make sense compared to the original!  Part of my problem with this one is that the sense of time was all wrong.  It seems like Pinocchio is only with his carpenter-father for like, a day, yet constantly references things his father taught him.  There were a lot of situations where I was confused about how long something had been going on.  It wasn’t a bad book, exactly, just choppy and confusing.  I did appreciate that Pinocchio’s attempts to be a “good boy” did cycle a lot – he would learn a lesson, be good for a while, and then slip-slide back into something he knew he shouldn’t be doing.  Been there, Pinocchio.  This was an interesting read, but did also make me wonder, once again, about why certain stories become classics while others fade away.

Dumb Witness by Agatha Christie – 4*

//published 1937//

This one was a reread for me (as most Christies are these days) and I really enjoyed it.  Poirot receives a letter from an elderly woman who, in a roundabout way, seems to be fearing for her life.  However, the letter is dated nearly two months earlier – and Poirot finds out that the woman is dead.  Seized with a sudden feeling that because this woman wrote to him, she’s technically his client and he owes it to her to investigate her (supposedly completely unsuspicious) death, Poirot and Hastings head off to the countryside to chat up the family.  As always, there are tons of red herrings and potential murderers, plus the usual everyday people holding back irrelevant information that makes them look bad.  Not my all-time favorite, but a very solid entry.

The Fire by Katherine Neville – 3.5*

//published 2008//

This follow-up to The Eight, published twenty years later, was not as strong as the original story.  Following the daughter of The Eight’s main character, there is a lot of running around but it just felt like this book’s main character, Xie, wasn’t really the main character.  Things happened TO her the entire time, but it never felt like she was in charge of what was going on.  Her best friend, Key, felt way more like the MC and I think the whole book would have been more interesting (and made more sense) if either Key was the MC, or Xie had some of the circumstances in her life that Key did, if that makes sense.  There was also this thing where I literally lost count of how many times characters realize that the room/conversation is bugged, to the point that I was confused about why they even attempted to have a conversation inside of any building or within 20 yards of any electrical device ever.  It was kind of ridiculous.  In The Eight the second story-strand set during the French Revolution enhanced and explained a great deal of what was going on in the modern-day story.  But in The Fire the historical part never really made sense to me and just felt like filler.  All in all, while there were some good elements here – and I really liked the ending – The Fire just didn’t jive like The Eight did.

The Year-Round Vegetable Gardener by Niki Jabbour – 3.5*

//published 2011//

In this nonfiction book published by favorite homesteading publishers, Storey Publishing, Jabbour explores ways to extend the gardening season beyond the frost dates.  A resident of Nova Scotia, Jabbour has added cold frames and a non-heated greenhouse to her personal garden, and also examines methods like cloches, row covers, etc. as ways to protect crops from the cold and lengthen the growing season.  There’s a lot of good information here, but no matter how you cut it, the main plants that are going to grow in the cold, even in cold frames, are plants like lettuce, spinach, carrots, etc., so in the end it seemed like a lot of work for not a lot of payback.  However, Jabbour also has a really great vegetable index in the back with notes on different varieties, varieties of various veggies that are more cold-tolerant, and planting/harvesting notes.  This comprises probably half the book and has some really great information.  All in all, not my favorite gardening book, but it is one that I’ve referenced a few times, and I’m still thinking about putting in a cold frame for some early season plants.

December Minireviews – Part 4

Oh look, more Christmas fluff from December!!!

Sometimes I don’t feel like writing a full review for whatever reason, either because life is busy and I don’t have time, or because a book didn’t stir me enough.  Sometimes, it’s because a book was so good that I just don’t have anything to say beyond that I loved it!  Frequently, I’m just wayyy behind on reviews and am trying to catch up.  For whatever reason, these are books that only have a few paragraphs of thoughts from me.

Hercule Poirot’s Christmas by Agatha Christie – 5*

//published 1938//

I’m sure I must have read this one in the distant past as it was vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t remember any of the details as to how it was going to come together.  When the grumpy, selfish, miserly, annoying patriarch of the family is murdered there is no lack of suspects from his own household – but he was killed in a locked room.  Absolutely loved the way everything came together in this one.

The Holiday Swap by Maggie Knox – 3.5*

//published 2021//

I’m a BOTM member but skip a lot of months. I decided to go ahead and get December’s book, though, because who doesn’t need another holiday read?  This was a fun concept.  Identical twins decide to switch lives for reasons that somewhat made sense within the context of the story haha  My main frustration with this one – one sister has broken up with her long-time boyfriend, but he isn’t getting the picture.  When that sister switches out, she asks her replacement sister (supposedly the more “go get ’em” one) to really emphasize to this guy that things are over – but instead she waffles and puts him off all the time instead of just saying really basic things like “I appreciate you bringing me this coffee, but we aren’t dating any more and you don’t get to decide if I want to talk to another dude or not” like oh my gosh.  Meanwhile, the big-city sister has been working on a tv show with an absolutely horrific jerk of a cohost.  I found it a bit unbelievable that in 2021 this guy would get away with overt bullying and harassment, like constantly touching her, rubbing her shoulders, putting his arm around her, commenting on her appearance, etc etc, or that she would actually have put up with that.  All in all, the story worked and I did enjoy it, but the passive attitude of both sisters about their situations really frustrated me a lot of the time.

Mistletoe at Moonglow by Deborah Gainer – 3*

//published 2015//

This one honestly just had me feeling super confused.  It starts as though the reader should already know the background of the location/characters, so it’s possible that there was another book or series before this one?? But who knows.  It takes place at this inn in a small Montana.  The inn is owned by an older lady whose name I can’t remember, and she has this crazy chick named Mist (yes, seriously) working for her.  The two women are prepping the inn for their Christmas guests.  The owner tells Mist about the upcoming guests, some of whom have stayed there before, and their various backgrounds, most of which have some tragedy involved.  Mist is this weird “mystical” character who always seems to magically know what everyone wants or needs, cooks elaborate dinners for the restaurant part of the hotel with seemingly no effort, and sort of floats around vaguely from place to place.  However, we’re reassured that she is NOT magic, she just listens to people, and hears their hearts, so in a weird way this book felt a little like it was gently scolding me, the reader, for not being as hospitable, calm, and mind-reader-y as Mist, because she’s just a regular person who manages to do all these things, so why don’t you, o reader??  Maybe I’m broken, but I honestly kept wondering if Mist was smoking weed or something, because she really had a chill, no worries surfer-dude vibe except with out “hey dude” jargon.  Nothing ever rattled he and she was always prosing on about basically vibing with the universe.  The guests arrive and stay in their perfect rooms that have weird little things in them that they exactly need because Mist didn’t read their minds before they got there but somehow still knew exactly, like, what kind of flower is their very favorite and what kind of chocolate they love, and then… literally nothing happens.  Everyone eats the perfect meals that Mist has prepared and comes together to celebrate Christmas, including opening the handmade gifts that Mist perfectly crafted for each of them that exactly speaks to their heart in just the way they need it to because it only takes Mist 24 hours or less to know all about a person’s soul (AND make them a gift!), so why can’t YOU, o reader, make perfect gifts for your loved ones that you have known all your life??  Everyone basically is like, “oh this place is so perfect and healing, all my tragic problems like my son dying and my husband leaving me and getting cancer have all just magically gone away thanks to Mist’s beautiful gifts and the way she’s shown us all the True Meaning of Christmas (TM)!”  I can see how some people found Mist to be this special, inspiring character, but her constant life philosophies, her “silent footsteps,“ and the way literally nothing flapped her at all just low-key annoyed me the entire book.

The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding by Agatha Christie – 4*

//published 1960//

Like I said, I wish these special editions were more focused on full novels instead of short story collections.  This collection was originally put together by Christie herself, but a couple of the stories were farmed out (by HarperCollins) into Midwinter Murder, which I had read earlier in the month.  The confusing part was that the versions weren’t exactly the same!  The two overlapping stories were the title mystery and one called something like “The Baghdad Chest.”  In the pudding tale, here it is much more fleshed out, with more background and other characters, while the Midwinter Murder version was shorter and not as interesting.  In the Midwinter Murder version of the Chest story, the story is told by Hastings.  In the Christmas Pudding edition, it’s told in the third person and Poirot spends a lot of time lamenting the fact that Hastings isn’t around because he would really enjoy the story!  The rest of the stories included were perfectly good short stories, but weren’t remotely Christmasy or wintery, so that was a bit of a letdown.  All in all, good stories, but it seems like Christie has written enough that HarperCollins should be able to make these lovely special editions without repeating themselves!

One More For Christmas by Sarah Morgan – 4*

//published 2020//

Another lovely tale from Sarah Morgan that focused more on the relationship between two adult daughters and their mother than it did on the romance (although the romance was fun, too).  I feel like our current society is prone to label everyone who doesn’t agree with you or who ever hurt your feelings as “toxic” and then write them off forever.  And while sometimes you do need to make the giant step of cutting someone off, so many times reconciliation and forgiveness are possible in so many cases.  Here, the two adult daughters have a lot of deep hurts from their mother, but when the mother has an accident and starts rethinking many of her life choices (although they seemed the best to her at the time) she desperately wants to reach out and reconnect with her estranged daughters.  Both daughters struggle with whether or not they should even let their mother try to come back into their lives, and how that should look.  All of this is handled well – it doesn’t become super dark and heavy, but doesn’t completely gloss over the difficulties of a relationship that has always been complicated.  I think that’s why I enjoy Morgan’s books – she isn’t afraid to tackle some harder family themes, but doesn’t allow them to drag the entire story down in a depressing spiral of hopelessness like so many stories (both women’s fiction and literary fiction… basically all those books that say A NOVEL on the front) do.  My only real issue with this one is that one of the daughters has a daughter of her own.  Growing up, the daughters were never allowed to believe in Santa, and the daughter is determined that her little one will always be able to believe in the “magic of Christmas” to the point that she is basically obsessive about her little girl believing in Santa and spends so much time agonizing and worrying about whether or not her mother will tell the little girl that Santa isn’t real.  It’s all this huge drama and just… I don’t think Santa = Christmas magic.  We never believed in Santa growing up (although our parents also told us we weren’t allowed to tell our friends he wasn’t real) – but Christmas was always incredibly magical in our household.  I didn’t like this concept that Santa was the be-all end-all for Christmas magic and Christmas would be RUINED if Santa wasn’t real.  Saying that all Christmas magic is pinned on a character who isn’t actually real, to me, implies that Christmas magic isn’t real, either, which just isn’t true.  But anyway, all in all I really did enjoy this one.  There was a splash of romance, a happily married couple, and a lot of really good discussions about family and forgiveness, all in a fun Christmas setting.

December Minireviews – Part 2

Can you tell that my life at work is slowing down??  How many days in a row is this??

Sometimes I don’t feel like writing a full review for whatever reason, either because life is busy and I don’t have time, or because a book didn’t stir me enough.  Sometimes, it’s because a book was so good that I just don’t have anything to say beyond that I loved it!  Frequently, I’m just wayyy behind on reviews and am trying to catch up.  For whatever reason, these are books that only have a few paragraphs of thoughts from me.

Christmas at Holiday House by RaeAnne Thayne – 4*

//published 2020//

Thayne has become another go-to romance author for me.  Her books are super low-angst and just have pleasant characters and reasonable situations.  In this one, Abby (a registered nurse) agrees to go stay with her friend’s grandma, who recently took a fall down the stairs.  Abby, a widow with a young son, is getting ready to move from one state to another and has several weeks off around the holidays, so it all works out.  Once she arrives at Holiday House, she finds out that the grandma was planning to have this huge Christmas tour fundraiser, and finds herself getting involved in decorating and organizing the event.  The synopsis makes it sound like the grandma’s grandson, Ethan, is kind of a jerk about the whole thing, but actually the level of concern he showed for his grandma made perfect sense – he’s just worried that she’s overdoing it to the determent of her health.  Nothing crazy in this one, but an enjoyable story with likable characters.

The Quiet Little Woman by Louisa May Alcott – 3.5*

This is actually a collection of three short stories, all of which were perfectly fine but trended towards Alcott’s moralistic side with some heavy-handed lessons.  However, they were all short, easy reads, and kind of an interesting look at the time they were published.

Cards on the Table by Agatha Christie – 4*

//published 1937//

This one isn’t remotely Christmasy, but it was December’s book for the Agatha Christie club.  Like most of Christie’s books, this one was a reread for me, but I thoroughly enjoyed it, although I did also have to look up the basics on playing bridge, because it’s a huge part of the plot.  In the beginning, Poirot meets a rich, self-indulgent fellow who, through the course of the evening, tells Poirot that he enjoys collecting rare things.  Some of his collections consist of information and knowledge rather than items, including, according to him, at least four people he knows who have successfully murdered someone.  This fellow gets the brainy idea that he will have a dinner party.  To it, he invites the four supposed murderers, along with four detective-types – Poirot, Colonel Race, Superintendent Battle, and Mrs. Oliver (writer of detective stories).  After dinner, two tables are made up for bridge.  The four suspects play in one room while the four others play in another.  Meanwhile, the host sits by the fire and enjoys himself.  But at the end of the night, he’s dead.  There was a lot of fun in this one, the obvious fact that one of these four people murdered him, the delving into everyone’s backstories to try and find out if they really had committed a murder in the past, the complicated connections between them.  Other than the fact that I kind of needed to know how to play bridge for some of the plot points to make sense, this was an excellent read.

Starry Night by Debbie Macomber – 3.5*

//published 2013//

Macomber is one of those authors whose books always sound like I’m going to enjoy them but then when I actually read them, they just don’t quite hit the spot.  Starry Night was one of those – not a bad story, exactly, but just a little too melodramatic.  It’s painfully obvious what the Big Drama is going to be later, to the point that I was dreading it so much that it was hard for me to enjoy the story.  The whole thing is the female MC wanting to interview the male MC, who’s this crazy recluse.  After they get to know each other, despite knowing that interviewing him could literally change the entire course of her career, the dude still refuses to let her publish an interview with him, to the point that it really felt like he was just being a jerk for no reason, which meant I didn’t really like him all that well.  This wasn’t a bad one-off read, but it did kind of cement to me the fact that Macomber just isn’t an author for me.

One Charmed Christmas by Sheila Roberts – 3.5*

//published 2020//

This one was a 100% mixed bag that I struggled to rate.  Catherine, an older widow, is disappointed because her adult children and their children have decided to go other places for the Christmas holidays.  This was the first part that immediately didn’t make sense – everyone literally acted like there were zero other options for a time to get together and celebrate Christmas.  Maybe it’s just because I grew up in a family with multiple Christmas get-togethers, but there are other options besides Christmas morning??  You could get together before they go out of town, after they get back from being out town, like literally any time??  It wasn’t like they all lived far away and couldn’t make the trip – they live in the same town, but are going to travel away for Christmas.  I was so confused!  Catherine is all sad and disappointed that she won’t be there when her grandchildren open their gifts… so why not open them some time when she is there?!?!!?  Catherine also spends a lot of time blaming herself because the Christmas before this one was the first one after her husband died, and he died right before Christmas, so basically last year’s Christmas was super depressing.  And instead of being like “oh wow I was going through literally the hardest time of my entire life so maybe my jerk-face kids should have been a little more understanding” she spends all this time going on about how she ruined their holiday and no wonder they don’t want to spend this one with her.  Oh my gosh.  ANYWAY so her best friend convinces her to go with her on a cruise through the Christmas villages somewhere in Europe, like Germany or somewhere, up some famous river, I don’t remember.  Catherine goes and so we also meet all these random people on the boat and all their little stories, most of which were perfectly fine, but there were other weird things.  Like the one girl is in her 20s and is a hypochondriac so she’s decided the best thing she can do is marry a doctor.  She meets this doctor old enough to be her dad on the cruise and decides she should marry him.  Okay… except then this literally perfect man (young, hot, kind, sweet, and freaking OWNS A CHOCOLATE COMPANY) really likes her and keeps trying to date her and she keeps blowing him off so she can keep flirting with the old guy??  I’m sorry, this felt 100% unrealistic and also kind of dumb.  In the end, I liked a lot of the characters and enjoyed the overall story, but there were also so many ???? moments that I kept almost DNFing it.  Not a terrible read, but definitely not one I want to revisit!

December Minireviews – Part 1

Okay, so I honestly thought about not reviewing the books I read in December, because, if I’m honest, these reviews are going to start to sound a little same-y.  I read a LOT of Christmas fluff last month!!!  But just for the sake of having a record of what I read, I think I’m going to go ahead and plunge in and hope there were enough random ones to be interesting!

Sometimes I don’t feel like writing a full review for whatever reason, either because life is busy and I don’t have time, or because a book didn’t stir me enough.  Sometimes, it’s because a book was so good that I just don’t have anything to say beyond that I loved it!  Frequently, I’m just wayyy behind on reviews and am trying to catch up.  For whatever reason, these are books that only have a few paragraphs of thoughts from me.

The Christmas Escape by Sarah Morgan – 4*

//published 2021//

I started strong with a Sarah Morgan book – I’ve really enjoyed all of her books that I’ve read so far, mainly because her married couples stay married and actually work through their problems like adults instead of storming off and having an affair with the attitude of a petulant child.  This book, like her others that I have read, also has a strong focus on the importance of friendship, family, and forgiveness – basically, even though these are kind of romance, they really just are about relationships in general and how we need to work to keep them strong.  With a journey to Lapland and an actual reindeer-sleigh ride, this one also checked off a lot of prompts for my million Christmas bingo cards!!

Midwinter Murder by Agatha Christie – 4*

This was a perfectly pleasant collection of Christie shorts, although the “midwinter” aspect was definitely a stretch for some of them.  And even though I absolutely love these special editions, I really do wish they would just focus on reprinting her full-length novels instead of randomly cobbling together shorts.  Still, reading these was like eating potato chips – they were so quick and fun that I just kept reading one more.

The Little Christmas Shop on Nutcracker Lane by Jaimie Admans – 4*

//published 2020//

If you enjoy absolutely saccharine Christmas stories with extremely long titles, you should definitely check out Admans.  I read Snowflakes at the Little Christmas Tree Farm last year and actually really enjoyed it, so I tried Nutcracker Lane this time around.  If you’re looking for in-depth character development, surprising plot twists, or a new take on the holiday season, this is NOT the book for you. But if you’re looking for some relaxing fluff and complete predictability, you’ll love this one.  My only real complaint was that it was so incredibly, painfully obvious who James actually was that it felt ridiculous that the MC couldn’t realize it.  Still, a perfectly enjoyable read with likable characters.

Christmas Angels by Nancy Naigle – 3.5*

//published 2019//

This one was excellent for the first 2/3 of the story, but then it went a bit off the rails.  The MC purchases a run-down inn that used to belong to her grandparents up in the mountains of North Carolina.  She moves there and begins renovations with the help of a hunky contractor who happens to be in town.  She has nothing but happy memories of spending time there as a child and is so excited about the entire project even though it’s going to be a lot of time and money.  All of this was great, but then she falls and injures her ankle and all of a sudden decides this is a “sign” that she’s supposed to give up on the entire project???  It felt completely out of left field that Liz would suddenly do a complete 180 and literally be ready to just sell the inn and move back to the coast.  This would have been a super fun story if it had just focused on the inn renovations and rediscovering all her grandparents’ Christmas traditions and decorations + romance with the hunky contractor, but the extra drama felt really shoehorned in, like the author was just trying to fill some pages.  I did enjoy it, but could have done without the weird section of Liz suddenly being a completely different character.

Forest of Souls by Lori Lee – 4*

//published 2020//

This was a completely not-Christmas book, as it was my December book for the traveling book club.  It really reminded me a lot of Poison Study when I was reading it, except a bit more violent and 100% devoid of any romance.  There was some great world-building, but seriously who includes an EIGHT-PAGE glossary but NO MAP?!?!?!  I REALLY needed a map!  The characters and plot were interesting, though, and I was really engaged in this one.  It’s the first of a trilogy that is set to wrap up this summer, so I may read all three of them later this year.

A Princess for Christmas by Jenny Holiday – 3.5*

//published 2020//

I had a hard time rating this one.  The story itself was perfectly fine with likable characters, but when I pick up a book that looks like a cherry little Christmas tale, I’m not mentally prepared to be bombarded with f-bombs on every page.  It felt like Holiday was trying wayyyyy to hard to make Leo the tough guy from the Bronx.  I get it, he’s tough.  So tough that he swears every-other word.  My gosh.  I do enjoy a good royalty read, so this one was fun that way, but the overall crudity meant I didn’t bother reading the sequel.

November Minireviews // Part 3

Final set of reviews for November!!  Woohoo!!

Sometimes I don’t feel like writing a full review for whatever reason, either because life is busy and I don’t have time, or because a book didn’t stir me enough.  Sometimes, it’s because a book was so good that I just don’t have anything to say beyond that I loved it!  Frequently, I’m just wayyy behind on reviews and am trying to catch up.  For whatever reason, these are books that only have a few paragraphs of thoughts from me.

The Shallow Waters of Romance by Charlotte Darcy – 3*

This was a free Kindle book I finally got around to reading.  Not sure why I didn’t read it was soon as I got it, considering it’s only 65 pages long.  That was also the main problem with this one – 65 pages just wasn’t enough to actually tell a story.  The bones were there and they were good, but overall it felt pointless because there is zero real character development or opportunity for anyone to do anything.

Doctor’s Boy by Karin Anckarsvard – 3.5*

This is another one that has been on my shelves for absolutely ever.  A children’s chapter book, I was utterly charmed by it at first – a delightful story about a young boy learning about poverty and the importance of helping those around us.  However, this book literally just stopped – to the point that I wondered if my book had been published with a missing final chapter??  I’m still confused by the way this book ended without any real conclusion, and still am wondering if something was lost in the translation from its original Swedish!

Murder in Mesopotamia by Agatha Christie – 3.5*

This was November’s Christie book for the Litsy group that is reading through her entire bibliography, and while perfectly enjoyable, it’s not one of my favorites.  It’s all a little melodramatic, and I always prefer Poirot to be there the entire time instead of showing up in the middle.  Still, even though I had read it before I couldn’t remember the conclusion, and quite enjoyed watching the story unravel.

The Singles Table by Sara Desai – 3.5*

After really enjoying the first two books in this series, The Marriage Game and The Dating Plan, I was a little let down by this one.  First off, there was virtually no crossover from the earlier characters, so I’m not even sure why this is considered to be a part of the series.  Secondly, it felt like there were way more sexy times in this one than the other two books.  Thirdly, I didn’t really like Zara and found her character development to be quite uneven – as was Jay’s.  It felt like both of them were going back and forth a lot about everything, and I wasn’t sure if I should really be rooting for them as a couple or not.  A fine little romance, but it lacked the charisma of the two earlier books.

October Minireviews – Part 1

Okay, believe it or not, I AM making progress on these reviews!!! My goal is to be caught up by the end of the year!!!!

Sometimes I don’t feel like writing a full review for whatever reason, either because life is busy and I don’t have time, or because a book didn’t stir me enough.  Sometimes, it’s because a book was so good that I just don’t have anything to say beyond that I loved it!  Frequently, I’m just wayyy behind on reviews and am trying to catch up.  For whatever reason, these are books that only have a few paragraphs of thoughts from me.

Aurora Burning by Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff – 4.5*

//published 2020//

I read the first book in this series at the end of September and rolled directly into this one, and it did NOT suffer from second-book syndrome.  SO.  GOOD.  This is what YA is supposed to be!  Fun and snarky, loads of adventure, engaging world-building, likable characters, personal growth, strong friendship, a splash of romance.  The bajillion POVs is slightly distracting and there are times where it feels like things are getting a little out of hand, but overall I just enjoyed this one so much.  The worst part – it ended on a cliffhanger and the third book didn’t come out until November!

The Ex Hex by Erin Stirling – 3.5*

//published 2021//

I’m a sometimes-BOTM member (I skip a LOT) but this one sounded fun so I went for it.  It was a nice one-time read, but I mailed it on to someone else when I was done with because I don’t see myself reading it again, although I probably could be persuaded to read a sequel.  It’s one of those books where you don’t worry about character development or think too hard about the world-building… just roll with what’s happening.  Overall it was a fun palette-cleanser after reading five 87th Precinct books, but it was just a little bit too far on the smutty/vulgar scale for me to really rate it any higher.  When I’m reading fluff, I don’t really want to be bombarded by f-bombs the entire time.  (As a side note, it’s not the actual sex scenes that bother me so much, because they’re easily bypassed, it’s when characters THINK about sex and TALK about sex and the whole thing just turns into SEX that it starts to really get aggravating.  This one wasn’t the worst I’ve come across in that way, but it still sometimes got old.)

The Jackal’s Head by Elizabeth Peters – 3.5*

//published 1968//

Peters isn’t a 100% win for me as she has definitely written some books that didn’t click with me, but in this one she returns to Egypt, where she should always set her books.  I only wish the Emersons could have made an appearance!  This story was virtually unbelievable, but it was still a great deal of fun.

The ABC Murders by Agatha Christie – 4*

//published 1936//

I actually remembered how this one came about, but I still enjoyed reading it because it’s fun to watch Christie lay the red herrings when you know which ones they are.  Plus, I got to read my beautiful special edition (HEART EYES).  I took a picture of the back cover as well because I quite liked the quote on it.

Cloaked in Red by Vivian Vande Velde – 3.5*

//published 2010//

The most entertaining part of this collection of Red Riding Hood retellings was Velde’s introduction where she explains how ridiculous the original story is.  Her actual retellings were mildly interesting but overall forgettable.

The Safest Lies by Megan Miranda – 3.5*

//published 2016//

This was one of those books that kept me reading while I was reading, but then I got done and I was like, “But what about…?????”  I also just never really connected with the characters, so a lot of the urgency was lost on me because I didn’t really care all that much about what happened to them.  This was a fun one-off read, especially if you like YA thrillers, but not one I’ll revisit.

Disclaimer by Renee Knight – 2.5*

//published 2015//

This is one that had been hanging around on my shelves for quite some time and I finally got around to it in October.  The premise sounds great.  A woman starts reading a book that’s on her bedside table – but then realizes that SHE is the main character.  Where did the book come from?  How did the author know about her life?  The only other person who knew about this situation is dead – RIGHT?  This sounds like it’s going to be a great thriller, and it was definitely compulsively readable (hence the 2.5* rating instead of like 1), but I didn’t feel like a single character in this story responded in a realistic way, meaning that no one felt like a real person.  The end of the book also just turned super preachy and also felt out of place.

I wrote a whole big long rant about this one but I’m just not feeling like publishing it.  There was a lot that annoyed me about this book, but I can see why so many people enjoyed it.  I personally find it difficult to root for a character who has lied to everyone in her life, including her husband, about really serious stuff, and then gets all offended that people don’t automatically assume that her behavior was impeccable during the situation she lied about.  But maybe that’s just me.

May Minireviews – Part 1

Well, I’m finally delving into May’s reviews, and since May does seem like more recent past than April, I at least feel like I’m making progress!!  May is traditionally a super busy month for me since I work at a greenhouse, which means there aren’t as many books to review as there are in most months…

Sometimes I don’t feel like writing a full review for whatever reason, either because life is busy and I don’t have time, or because a book didn’t stir me enough.  Sometimes, it’s because a book was so good that I just don’t have anything to say beyond that I loved it!  Frequently, I’m just wayyy behind on reviews and am trying to catch up.  For whatever reason, these are books that only have a few paragraphs of thoughts from me.

Happiness Hill by Grace Livingston Hill – 4*

//published 1932//

I read a lot of fluff in May, because that’s what I trend towards when I’m busy (or stressed or depressed or in a reading slump or just feel like it haha).  I actually own this one, so I know I’ve read it before, but I couldn’t remember the details – not that the details of a GLH book varies much from one book to the other, but still.  If you don’t like your romances to be clean, somewhat religious, a little saccharine, and quite predictable, don’t pick up GLH.  But I find that that’s frequently exactly what I want, and I quite enjoyed this one, with the traditional strong-moraled heroine, the goofy brother, the gentle-but-in-poor-health parents, and the lonely young hero who yearns for some family.  Basically, if you like GLH, you’ll like this one.

PS No, I’m not the heathen who used this book as a coaster at some point!

100 Years of Color by Katie Greenwood – 3*

//published 2015//

This nonfiction book had such an intriguing premise, but for me it just didn’t quite follow through.  Greenwood looks at each decade from 1900 through 2000, pulling advertising posters, artwork, and textiles, and discusses the colors that were popular during that decade and why… except she doesn’t really get to the “why” all that much.  Instead, each decade has a (very) short discussion page, then several images with no explanation as to why she particularly chose those or thought they were good examples of the decade.  There was so much potential here to really delve into popular colors and patterns but instead she barely skims the surface, making the book more or less unmemorable.  It was definitely a case of me wanting to like a book more than I did.

Carry On, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse – 5*

//published 1925//

I’m still working my way through all of Wodehouse’s works in published order.  The 1920s were a great decade for Wodehouse’s writing, as he invents the immortal duo of Jeeves and Bertie, and this book did not disappoint.  I’ve read all of the Bertie and Jeeves books in the past, but am never adverse to revisiting them.  This collection of loosely connected short stories included a couple of favorites, like a chapter from Jeeves’s point of view.  And who can resist a story titled, “The Rummy Affair of Old Biffy”??  Certainly not me!

Unicorn Famous by Dana Simpson – 4*

//published 2021//

This is the latest installment of the Phoebe & Her Unicorn comics, and just as much fun as the rest of the series.  While these can obviously be read in any order, they’ve been so much fun to read in publication order, as characters (and unicorn lore) do develop throughout the series.

Second First Impressions by Sally Thorne – 3*

//published 2021//

In my attempt to read newly published books by authors that I like as they get published, I reserved Second First Impressions at the library and was intrigued to read it after thoroughly enjoying The Hating Game.  However, this one just didn’t really hit the right notes for me.  While I did like the main character, Ruthie, she also frustrated me a lot.  The snarky best friend/coworker also really got on my nerves and I felt like she crossed the line and became condescending towards Ruthie, acting like Ruthie was just too sheltered and backwards to really know what she wanted from a relationship.  Like Ruthie would make a statement about what she wanted from life/a relationship and the snarky best friend was like, “Oh, no, that’s what losers would want!  THIS is what you REALLY want!”  I honestly found it a kind of offensive that Ruthie’s desire for a quiet, not-drama-filled life was dismissed as boring and pathetic.

I’m also personally a bit over having a character’s Tragic Back Story be because of a horrible “religious“ father. Can we please stop having background characters be “Christians“ just so you can talk about how hypocritical they are? Thanks.  I definitely felt like Ruthie could have had a terrible dad and a lot of the same issues without all the extra effort of emphasizing how “religious” her dad was.

Finally, while the two old ladies who lived at the retirement home were funny and sweet, their whole schtick of only hiring good looking young men so they could make them do embarrassing things until they cracked just felt, for lack of a better word, cringe.  I can’t even imagine how this aspect of the story would have gone over if it was two old men who hired young women so they could comment on how good they looked in various outfits and then send them off to do demeaning and difficult tasks just to see how long it would take them to quit.  I mean seriously.

So while this one was an okay read for me, I definitely didn’t love it.  It really lacked the chemistry, snark, and snap of The Hating Game, and read closer to women’s fiction than romcom for me.  The “humor” felt a little forced, like Thorne was writing a serious story but kept trying to make it into a romcom instead.

Three-Act Tragedy AKA Murder in Three Acts by Agatha Christie – 4*

//published 1934//

While this isn’t my favorite Poirot story, it was still quite good and, as usual, I had no idea what the solution was.  Hopefully no one ever needs me to solve their murder, because I can 100% promise that I won’t be able to do it!  One of my favorite parts of this book was the fun way Christie listed the cast of characters in the front.  The chapter/section headings also aligned with the parts of a play, carrying the theme throughout.