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Welcome to the Sunday Post, a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @ Caffeinated Reviewer to share weekly news and updates on what we’ve been up to on our blog, with our books, and book-related happenings.
Snow and More Snow
It’s March already, but it’s been snowing and snowing and snowing for the last few days! Whyyyyy??? I had a couple of appointments that turned into virtual ones instead because I did not want to go out in this weather. I’m a wimp. But also, I have a cold.
I’ve been sneezing all day, every day, for three days now and it is not fun. My sneezes are loud and powerful, it’s like a full body blast every time I sneeze, so my whole body aches and it feels like I’ve been running marathons and lifting weights. Not fun! I don’t even run marathons or lift weights when I’m healthy!
I wasn’t even able to lay in bed sick to read books. I only finished a single, tiny book last week. It was a good book though, so there’s that!
Book(s) I read last week:
I read the first book in The Murderbot Diaries, All Systems Red by Martha Wells on audiobook. It was only a 3-hour audiobook, so it went quickly, but I really enjoyed it and I’m excited for more! I haven’t written a review because I haven’t felt up to it yet, but I will as soon as I feel better!
I am also still in the middle of The Count of Monte Cristo for the readalong. I have it on audio and I’m just listening casually whenever I need to (for chores and sleeping). I love that it’s a huge book and 47 hours on audio, so I have lots to listen to and don’t have to scramble to find a new audiobook.
The book I’m actively reading right now is A River Enchanted by Rebecca Ross, and I’m 61% in and loving it. It’s been on my TBR for a long time and I’m finally reading it due to some pressur-…uh, I mean, encouragement from my friends, and I’m probably going directly to the next book in the duology right after.
I thought I would be able to finish it last week, but the beginning of the week was busy for me, and then later with all the sneezing and being so physically tired, I’ve just been falling asleep every time I try to read.
I definitely want to finish A River Enchanted and A Fire Endless this week, if nothing else. I’m still feeling too sick and tired to aim for more. I’d be happy with these two!
How was your week? I hope you had a great week last week, and I hope you have a great one again this week!
Welcome to the Monthly Wrap Up hosted by Nicole @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction to share our monthly wrap-up posts that summarizes our month in books, our favorite books of the month, what we did on our blogs, and anything noteworthy we want to share.
February 2024 Wrap Up
I had a pretty good reading month. I read 19 books, which is a lot more than my usual, but 11 of them were novellas/middle-grade/graphic novels so I got through them fast. I’m also very happy that I managed to read/cross-out several of my February TBR intentions, although I’m a bit disappointed because the two books I dnf’d were meant to count towards my Diversity Reading Challenge goal, and obviously they can’t count anymore. I also had a couple of books on the list meant to count towards my Nonfiction Reading Challenge, but I didn’t get to those either.
Fortunately, I did manage to read other books that counted towards those goals, so I’m not too disappointed! Here’s my February TBR list to recap, and then below are the books I actually read for February.
My February 2024 TBR Intentions
Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt
Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree
Stiletto by Daniel O’Malley
Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherworlds by Heather Fawcett
The Fox Wife by Yangsze Choo
The Dance of Anger by Harriet Lerner
The Way Forward by Yung Pueblo
Children of Virtue and Vengence by Tomi Adeyemi (DNF)
Death by Dumpling by Vivien Chien (DNF)
Books Read in February 2024
All My Friends Are Dead by Avery Monsen and Jory John
I cannot decide on one because I loved them both so much, so I’ll have to make it a tie and award the title to both Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree, and The Storyteller by Dave Grohl.
On The Blog
I didn’t write a lot of posts this month on the blog, other than book reviews (linked above) and Top Ten Tuesday posts.
I’ll do this every month as a sort of sticky-note to help remind me of the books I want to get to sooner rather than later. I don’t expect to stick to the list exactly, but it’s a great reminder for when I get distracted by new and shiny books!
The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell (it’s my bookclub’s BOTM)
Fairy Tale by Stephen King (I’ve read it, but there’s a readalong happening in March!)
A River Enchanted by Rebecca Ross (I’ve already started it)
A Fire Endless by Rebecca Ross (because it’s the sequel)
The Fox Wife by Yangsze Choo (I’ve been anticipating it the most and I just got the book from the library!)
Bookshops & Bonedust by Travis Baldree (because I loved Legends & Lattes)
Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherworlds by Heather Fawcett (because I loved Encyclopedia of Faeries)
Hmm… It looks like this list is more reactionary based on urgency, timing, and excitement, but that’s okay for now. I’ll do better after I finish the ones I’m excited about!
How was your month in February? What were your most memorable moments? I hope you have a wonderful March with lots of great books!
Welcome to Top Ten Tuesday, a weekly bookish meme hosted by Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl that features a different bookish topic every week.
Today’s topic is Covers/Titles with Things Found In Nature
Most of these are books I’ve read, but there are a couple that I haven’t yet read – The Priory of the Orange Tree, and The Fox Wife. All the ones I’ve read are books I’ve loved, and I have high expectations for the two I haven’t read.
Top Ten Covers/Titles with Things Found In Nature
Thornhedge by T. Kingfisher – This is probably the most recent book I’ve read out of this list. I love T. Kingfisher and I love fairytale retellings, this one is a retelling of the Sleeping Beauty story.
The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon – I have not read this one. I have been wanting to, but the size of it is daunting! One of these days, though!
Grass by Sheri S. Tepper – This is one of my all-time favorite sci-fi stories. It’s been a while since I read it, so it’s probably time for a reread, but I remember being fascinated by the alien world, alien beings, and the incredible world-building.
Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo – A heist story, a group of people with different skills brought together, found family. How could I not love this?
The Darkest Part of the Forest by Holly Black – Holly Black is one of my favorite authors. Her stories are so good, so simple, and yet so rich. This book is about the fae, the changeling, but told from a different POV.
The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway – Some have said that this book is boring because it’s only about a man fishing, but for me, it’s thrilling because I used to go fishing with my father when I was young, and there’s nothing like the thrill of having a fish caught on the hook but not yet landed. This book describes that feeling so vividly and I love that it was able to put into words what I never could.
The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman – Neil Gaiman is another one of my favorite authors and I would read anything he writes. I read this book for the second time a couple of years ago, and it was so much better the second time around. It was much scarier, and more horrifying, and so wonderful.
The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel – This is an old book I haven’t revisited in a while. There have been some new books in the series since, but I haven’t read them. It’s probably time to reread from the beginning. All I can say is that I loved the story, and the wonderment of discovering things along with the characters.
The Fox Wife by Yangsze Choo – This is the newest book on this list, and that’s the only reason I haven’t read it. It was just released two weeks ago, and I’m impatiently waiting until I can read it! I’ve loved the author’s two other books, and I expect to love this one too!
Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi – This book is set during WW2, and it’s one of the most heartbreaking books I’ve read. I probably read it around 20 years ago and I’ve forgotten most of the details, but that feeling of heartache still lingers even after all these years.
Have you read any of these books? What did you think of them? Would you read any of these books?
Benny is so nice they feel compelled to destroy him, but he has a friend who should scare the hell out of them.
Benny Catspaw’s perpetually sunny disposition is tested when he loses his job, his reputation, his fiancée, and his favorite chair. He’s not paranoid. Someone is out to get him. He just doesn’t know who or why. Then Benny receives an inheritance from an uncle he’s never heard of: a giant crate and a video message. All will be well in time.
How strange—though it’s a blessing, his uncle promises. Stranger yet is what’s inside the crate. He’s a seven-foot-tall self-described “bad weather friend” named Spike whose mission is to help people who are just too good for this world. Spike will take care of it. He’ll find Benny’s enemies. He’ll deal with them. This might be satisfying if Spike wasn’t such a menacing presence with terrifying techniques of intimidation.
In the company of Spike and a fascinated young waitress-cum-PI-in-training named Harper, Benny plunges into a perilous high-speed adventure, the likes of which never would have crossed the mind of a decent guy like him.
I haven’t read a lot of Dean Koontz, but I’ve liked the ones I’ve read, and I thought the premise of this book was interesting.
The Quotes
“Many of your friends will be fair-weather friends, Benjamin, but I will be there in bad weather, in worse weather, in any weather.”
“Fantasies can become realities. There’s no reason that craggles couldn’t be as real as trains and cranes and girls named Jane. That is a conclusion to which the discoveries in physics over the past century lead us if we have the imagination and courage to think through the evidence.”
“Charismatic people were born with charisma; it wasn’t something that could be learned or ordered from Amazon.”
The Characters
Benny Catspaw is the protagonist, Spike is the bad weather friend, and Harper is the love interest. I loved all of them in the context of this book, but I have to be objective and also admit that they seem more like caricatures than real people. In fact, even the side characters all seem like caricatures. It doesn’t take away from the story though, it’s just what it is, and it works for the story.
My Thoughts
I expected a somewhat sinister horror story, but this is basically a fairy tale and I still loved it. I’m quite amused because not long ago Stephen King, known for horror, wrote Fairy Tale, and now Dean Koontz, also known for horror, has written a fairy tale as well. I’m not complaining because I love Stephen King and everything he writes no matter the genre, and I haven’t read a lot of Dean Koontz so I’m totally open to whatever story he wants to throw at me.
To be fair, if we’re comparing Stephen King’s Fairy Tale to Dean Koontz’s The Bad Weather Friend, Stephen King definitely did it better. Fairy Tale has got more depth and substance, and The Bad Weather Friend stays very much on the surface. As I said before, the characters seem like caricatures, the story feels very black and white, each quest/adventure is neatly wrapped up, and there’s even that Disney princess instalove element.
My Feels
I enjoyed it for what it is and I even like the caricaturistic quality of the characters in the context of the story. It was wholesome and heartwarming, and there were lots of funny moments that made me laughed, but it’s not a book I’ll come back to or think about very much. Still an enjoyable read.
My Rating
3/5 stars.
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
Having entertained the idea for years, and even offered a few questionable opportunities (“It’s a piece of cake! Just do 4 hours of interviews, find someone else to write it, put your face on the cover, and voila!”) I have decided to write these stories just as I have always done, in my own hand. The joy that I have felt from chronicling these tales is not unlike listening back to a song that I’ve recorded and can’t wait to share with the world, or reading a primitive journal entry from a stained notebook, or even hearing my voice bounce between the Kiss posters on my wall as a child.
This certainly doesn’t mean that I’m quitting my day job, but it does give me a place to shed a little light on what it’s like to be a kid from Springfield, Virginia, walking through life while living out the crazy dreams I had as young musician. From hitting the road with Scream at 18 years old, to my time in Nirvana and the Foo Fighters, jamming with Iggy Pop or playing at the Academy Awards or dancing with AC/DC and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, drumming for Tom Petty or meeting Sir Paul McCartney at Royal Albert Hall, bedtime stories with Joan Jett or a chance meeting with Little Richard, to flying halfway around the world for one epic night with my daughters…the list goes on. I look forward to focusing the lens through which I see these memories a little sharper for you with much excitement.
I’m a fan of Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters, and I’ve been wanting to read this for a while. I don’t read a lot of memoirs and biographies in general so it takes me a while to pick them up, but one of my reading goals this year is to read more nonfiction, and the audiobook became available to me at just the right time.
The Quotes
“Life is just too damn short to let someone else’s opinion steer the wheel.”
“But with friends, you design your own relationship, which in turn designs your grief, which can be felt even deeper when they are gone. Those can be roots that are much harder to pull.”
“I love my children as I was loved as a child, and I pray that they will do the same when their time comes. Some cycles are meant to be broken. Some are meant to be reinforced.”
“Courage is a defining factor in the life of any artist. The courage to bare your innermost feelings, to reveal your true voice, or to stand in front of an audience and lay it out there for the world to see. The emotional vulnerability that is often necessary to summon a great song can also work against you when sharing your song for the world to hear. This is the paralyzing conflict of any sensitive artist. A feeling I’ve experienced with every lyric I’ve sung to someone other than myself. Will they like it? Am I good enough? It is the courage to be yourself that bridges those opposing emotions, and when it does, magic can happen.”
The Narrator
Dave Grohl himself. I loved it. I loved listening to the book directly from his voice, to hear him tell me his stories about his life and his musical journey. It was perfect!
My Thoughts
Dave Grohl isn’t just an amazing musician, he is an amazing writer and storyteller. I’ve been a casual fan of his and of Foo Fighters, but while I liked his music and what little I know of his public persona, there is a lot I never knew about him and I’m glad he decided to tell his story in this book. The stories he tells in this book made me laugh, made me cry, filled me with awe and amazement, inspired me, and made me a bigger fan.
My Feels
What I love most about this book are the stories Dave Grohl tells about his connection to the people in his life. His relationships with people who are important to him; his mother, his family, his friends, and band mates. The way he connects with his fans, and other celebrities whom he is a fan of. He is such a down-to-earth person, even with all that fame and stardom from a relatively young age. Listening to him narrate the book, you feel like you are having a conversation with a close friend, and he is a person whom I’d truly love to be close friends with.
My Rating
5/5 stars. I loved listening to the book so much and I was sad when it was over. I almost wanted to start over just to hear it all over again. I’ve told my husband (who’s also a fan of Dave Grohl) little anecdotes while I was reading so he has put a hold on the book as well. Who knows? I might reread when he does!
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
Welcome to the Sunday Post, a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @ Caffeinated Reviewer to share weekly news and updates on what we’ve been up to on our blog, with our books, and book-related happenings.
The First Book Club Meeting
We had our first book club meeting this weekend! It was so much fun; we talked about our book of the month – Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt, it was just okay for most of us – and also got to know each other a little bit.
It’s still funny to me that not even a month ago I was joking about wanting a book club and then it happened. I have to call back the “I want a million dollars” joke, because it’s not really a joke, I do want a million dollars! Please, thank you, Universe!
Other than that, last week was pretty uneventful. I was a little low energy and not feeling my best, and I found myself falling asleep while reading a couple of times. I took a lot of naps!
Books I read last week:
I wasn’t really satisfied with the first two books I read last week. The Bookshop on the Corner started off fine but I ended up not really liking the story and characters. And Remarkably Bright Creatures was a bit of a disappointment because I thought it was going to be more octopus-centric than it was. One of my book club members said that she felt like the author could’ve omitted the octopus’ POV entirely from the story and it wouldn’t have changed the story, and I agree.
Dave Grohl’s The Storyteller made me very happy though! I listened to it on audio with Dave himself narrating, and it was wonderful to listen to his stories about his life, his family, his musical journey. I just finished it last night so I haven’t written a review yet, but the gist is that I love it, and I love him, and I feel so inspired!
My husband is a musician and a fan of the Foo Fighters, so I kept telling him little anecdotes from the book, and he got interested and put a hold on the audiobook to listen for himself, which made me so happy! I’ve been trying for the longest time to get my husband to read more and discuss books with me, and apparently, all I had to do was read books about music and musicians! I’m making a list and taking recommendations, so if you’ve got a good one, let me know!
I’m currently in the middle of The Bad Weather Friend by Dean Koontz. And I’ve just started the first Murderbot Diaries on audio. I’m also still rereading The Count of Monte Cristo for the readalong, and I promised a friend that I’d start reading the Elements of Cadence series by Rebecca Ross this week.
How was your week? I hope you had a great week last week, and I hope you have a great one again this week!
Remarkably Bright Creatures, an exploration of friendship, reckoning, and hope, tracing a widow’s unlikely connection with a giant Pacific octopus.
After Tova Sullivan’s husband died, she began working the night shift at the Sowell Bay Aquarium, mopping floors and tidying up. Keeping busy has always helped her cope, which she’s been doing since her eighteen-year-old son, Erik, mysteriously vanished on a boat in Puget Sound over thirty years ago.
Tova becomes acquainted with curmudgeonly Marcellus, a giant Pacific octopus living at the aquarium. Marcellus knows more than anyone can imagine but wouldn’t dream of lifting one of his eight arms for his human captors–until he forms a remarkable friendship with Tova.
Ever the detective, Marcellus deduces what happened the night Tova’s son disappeared. And now Marcellus must use every trick his old invertebrate body can muster to unearth the truth for her before it’s too late.
Shelby Van Pelt’s debut novel is a gentle reminder that sometimes taking a hard look at the past can help uncover a future that once felt impossible.
I’ve heard wonderful things about it and I was intrigued by the premise. It also ended up being the first book chosen for my in-person bookclub.
The Quotes
“Why can humans not use their millions of words to simply tell one another what they desire?”
“Secrets are everywhere. Some humans are crammed full of them. How do they not explode? It seems to be a hallmark of the human species: abysmal communication skills.”
“You can’t fix someone who is determined to stay broken.”
The Characters
Marcellus the octopus! I like that we get his POV, and I really like his personality too. Tova was also a main character and I liked her fine, and Cameron too, but sometimes he got on my nerves. I love the Knit-Wits; I love that they have their own idiosyncrasies but they genuinely care about Tova. Ethan was a real character too, even though he liked to gossip.
My Thoughts
I enjoyed the story, but it’s not exactly what I expected, and I do have some issues with it. I wanted more from Marcellus and I thought it would be more Marcellus-centric, but it felt like he was just a side character in Cameron’s and Tova’s stories. I enjoyed their stories too, but I’m just disappointed it wasn’t about Marcellus.
Spoiler
I also got really frustrated and honestly, I’m in disbelief that it took so long for Tova and Cameron to figure it out. The whole thing, with all the little bit of hints and speculation, and yet still not reaching the conclusion, is a bit convoluted and unrealistic for me. Marcellus ended with saying humans can occasionally be remarkably bright creatures, and I was like, really? Tova and Cameron?
My Feels
I do love that this is literally a found family story, but it didn’t give me the feels, to be quite honest. It’s a decent story, and I like that there was warmth between the characters, but there wasn’t enough. I love Marcellus, but even the relationship between Marcellus and Tova wasn’t enough. I’m disappointed.
My Rating
3/5 stars. I had high hopes for this book because it was so highly recommended, but I’m disappointed with the prolonged runaround and the lack of focus on the octopus and I feel just meh about it in the end.
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
Nina Redmond is a literary matchmaker. Pairing a reader with that perfect book is her passion… and also her job. Or at least it was. Until yesterday, she was a librarian in the hectic city. But now the job she loved is no more.
Determined to make a new life for herself, Nina moves to a sleepy village many miles away. There she buys a van and transforms it into a bookmobile—a mobile bookshop that she drives from neighborhood to neighborhood, changing one life after another with the power of storytelling.
From helping her grumpy landlord deliver a lamb, to sharing picnics with a charming train conductor who serenades her with poetry, Nina discovers there’s plenty of adventure, magic, and soul in a place that’s beginning to feel like home… a place where she just might be able to write her own happy ending.
It’s a bookish book, it was available, and I was in between books.
The Quotes
“Just do something. You might make a mistake, then you can fix it. But if you do nothing, you can’t fix anything. And your life might turn out full of regrets.”
“Because every day with a book is slightly better than one without, and I wish you nothing but the happiest of days.”
“There was a universe inside every human being every bit as big as the universe outside them.”
The Narrator
Lucy Price-Lewis. I really liked her as a narrator. I did have trouble understanding the accents, but that’s mostly on me.
My Thoughts
I enjoyed it very much at first, even though it’s just a little bit cheesy. But I started to get really annoyed with Nina (and other characters) at the second half of the book.
Spoiler
I really didn’t like that she was so forgiving towards Marek after finding out he had a romantic partner who’s the mother of his child. I also don’t like that Marek is somehow still portrayed as a sympathetic character. Nina can be naive, but I think this is a little over-the-top. The fact that she continued talking to him even after that, I just don’t like it.
I also really didn’t like the way she handled that whole thing with the two siblings and their sick mother. That whole scene with Ainslee being unhappy about Nina getting involved, and then all of a sudden being okay with it didn’t ring true to me. And her sick mother’s interactions with Nina also felt weird and unrealistic.
And there was the part where Lennox had a sick animal he was rushing to get to the vet, but then he came back to drive Nina home first, I was in disbelief.
I could’ve overlooked one or two issues, but there were too many and I couldn’t enjoy the book anymore. I’m sorry I don’t have more to say about the book that isn’t spoilered. I guess I don’t really have a lot of nice things to say, and that makes me feel really bad, but it is what it is!
My Rating
3/5 stars. Because I don’t think it’s badly written. I just didn’t like the story or the characters.
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
Welcome to Top Ten Tuesday, a weekly bookish meme hosted by Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl that features a different bookish topic every week.
Today’s topic is Bookish Superpowers I Wish I Had
I had a lot of fun coming up with ideas for this topic and asked some of my bookish friends this question for fun. I ended up liking some of their answers more than my own, so I’ve stolen their ideas and added them here!
Top Ten Bookish Superpowers I Wish I Had
My own ideas:
Books on my library waitlist always come at exactly the right time, staggered, and not all at once!
Invincibility to FOMO
Books I want to buy always just happen to be on sale when I want to buy them
Ability to stop time while I savor reading
Ability to remember every single detail of books I read – unless I want to reread, in which case, I forget everything except the fact I loved it, and get surprised all over again!
Automatically forget any accidental spoilers so books never get ruined for me
Ideas I stole:
Ability to read in every language
Always picking up the exact books with the exact tropes you want in the moment
Ability to know if you’ll like a book once you pick it up, so you don’t waste your time on books you wouldn’t like
The artistic prowess for bookbinding and fore-edge painting so all my books look unique and beautiful!
Oh, how I wish some of these were real and actual superpowers I could have! What bookish superpowers would you wish for?
Welcome to the Sunday Post, a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @ Caffeinated Reviewer to share weekly news and updates on what we’ve been up to on our blog, with our books, and book-related happenings.
All the Legends, All the Lattes
I had a great reading week! I finished six books and they were all really good! Granted half of them were novellas and graphic novels, but still.
In particular, I finally read Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree, and omg, it totally lived up to the hype for me. I finished it in one sitting on Tuesday, neglected everything else I was supposed to do, and I don’t even regret it. I loved it so much and I cannot wait to read the prequel!
Books I read this week:
I’ve written reviews for most of them, and if you’re interested in what I thought about them, you can check them out! I’m not planning to write reviews for the Debbie Tung books, but I do want to mention them here and express how much I loved them and how relatable they are. It’s like she sees into my soul!
Other than reading and burying my head in books this week, I didn’t really do much else. But again, I don’t regret anything!
I’m reading Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt this week. Our book club is having its first meeting this weekend and this is our first book of the month! Yay!
I’m also reading The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan on audio, and rereading The Count of Monte Cristo. There’s a readalong happening for The Count of Monte Cristo and it’s one of my all-time favorite books so I couldn’t resist joining in!
I’m not sure if I should keep up the pretense of reading The Dance of Anger by Harriet Lerner. I still really want to, but I’m just not. How do I make myself read it?
How was your week? I hope you had a great week last week, and I hope you have a great one again this week!
