Tag: bookclub

Book Review | Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng

Posted April 16, 2025 by Haze in Book Reviews / 1 Comment

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng

Everyone in Shaker Heights was talking about it that summer: how Isabelle, the last of the Richardson children, had finally gone around the bend and burned the house down.

In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is meticulously planned – from the layout of the winding roads, to the colours of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules.

Enter Mia Warren – an enigmatic artist and single mother – who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenage daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than just tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother–daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past, and a disregard for the rules that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.

When old family friends attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town – and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia’s past. But her obsession will come at an unexpected and devastating cost . . .


For the Reading Challenge(s):
2025 52 Book Club Reading Challenge (Prompt #TBD)


The Reason

I watched the tv adaptation a few years ago and loved it and always meant to read the book eventually.

The Quotes

“Sometimes you need to scorch everything to the ground, and start over. After the burning the soil is richer, and new things can grow. People are like that, too. They start over. They find a way.”

“She had learned that when people were bent on doing something they believed was a good deed, it was usually impossible to dissuade them.”

“I’ll tell you a secret. A lot of times, parents are not the best at seeing their children clearly.”

“Where do we follow the rules, and where do we justify breaking them? Do our pasts determine what we deserve in the future? And is it ever possible to leave your past behind?”

The Narrator(s)

Jennifer Lim. It was absolutely perfect.

My Thoughts

I feel like a lot of my love for this book might have been carried over from my love for the tv adaptation. I remember a lot of key moments in the show and the vibrancy of the actors who play the characters and pictured some of the scenes as I was reading the book. This rarely happens with me but in this instance I think the show was just so good that it stayed with me, and dare I say, I think the show was better than the book. But not by much because the book was really good too.

Reading the book served to make the differences in class and privilege among the characters a lot more jarring to me. Their internal thought processes and justifications, their reasons for doing the things they did, made such a stark contrast when put into words in the book.

There have been some criticisms about the book trying to bias us towards certain characters that may or may not necessarily be right in their own actions, but I personally feel like that’s missing the point. It’s not about who’s right or wrong, all the characters did/have done questionable things, but rather, it’s about privilege. The ones who have money and privilege have more options, more connections, more ways to get themselves out of trouble, and more grace from public opinion. The poor don’t have the luxury of better options, nor grace from public opinion. They are maligned for “making bad choices” when “good choices” are just not available to them.

I love that this story highlights that, but I also think that people who have privilege may not recognize this aspect of the story because they don’t always recognize their own privilege. It’s written so subtly and masterfully, the characters are so complex and their thought processes feel so true to life, it’s just an amazing book and I loved it.

My Rating

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐/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?

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Sunday Post | Whelmed

Posted September 28, 2024 by Haze in Sunday Post, Weekly Book Memes / 13 Comments

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. 

Not Overwhelmed

I looked up the word “whelmed” just to make sure it meant what I thought it meant, and it doesn’t, but that’s fine because I’m actually quite whelmed. Not overwhelmed, but I am whelmed.

I have been tired most of last week and I thought I’d have some time to rest this weekend but today turned out quite eventful too – my irl bookclub had our meetup this morning, and then we went to grab lunch together so I got home hours later than I thought I would. But I had fun and I love hanging out with my bookclub so I’m not complaining!

Trying to keep this post short though, because I’m still whelmed and all I want to do is lie down on the couch and doom-scroll on my phone.

All the happy things:

  1. We had someone new join us for our book club meetup today!
  2. And then we all went for lunch after!
  3. One of my friends treated me to lunch. It was delicious and I’m so appreciative of wonderful people like her.
  4. Went for my regular checkup and the doctor says everything looks great!
  5. I leveled up in my Discord bookclub! It’s a role thing and gets you additional benefits in the server.
  6. I’m also getting points for the buddy reads I signed up for, which gets you additional benefits when you level up as well. It’s a lot of fun!

The Books

Books I read last week:

  1. Perfume by Patrick Süskind – It’s my irl bookclub BOTM and everybody finished it and enjoyed it! Even the newcomer! It’s weird but good, and I really enjoyed listening to it on audiobook.
  2. The Rom-Commers by Katherine Center – I’ve been enjoying Katherine Center’s books very much and I really liked this one too! It got me quite emotional, especially near the end.
  3. Expiration Dates by Rebecca Serle – I really like the premise of this book, and Julia Whelan narrates it so of course I was going to read it! The execution wasn’t as good as I hoped, but I still enjoyed reading it.
  4. Daddy-Long-Legs by Jean Webster – I just reread this book last month and here I am rereading it again! This time it was for a buddy read that I instigated, so I felt obliged to read it with everyone else, but it’s not like it was difficult for me to love it all over again! 😂
  5. The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins – This book is very well-written but I’m not sure how I feel about it. I loved almost everything about it but I’m struggling with the message. If you’ve read the book, I’d love to know what you think.

Book(s) I’m reading:

  1. The Wishing Game by Meg Shaffer – Currently on page 87 of 278. I like it so far! I’ve heard lots about it and I’ve been curious for a while so I hope it lives up to expectations.

Last Week on The Blog

This Week

I haven’t read very many books from my buddy reads TBR list last week because I needed some fun and light romance. I’m ready to jump back into them 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!

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Sunday Post | “I just want to be married again…”

Posted February 3, 2024 by Haze in Sunday Post, Weekly Book Memes / 32 Comments

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. 

“And I just want a million dollars…!”

Funny story, last week I posted about maybe starting an in-person book club. I was only kinda joking, but guess what?!

Yup, there’s a book club.

I asked around and ended up getting a handful of people who are interested, and that makes me so happy! It’s just getting started and our first meeting is going to be at the end of the month, so who knows what’s going to happen and if it will work out long term, but I really hope it does!

So I spent the first part of the week setting up a couple of platforms for our new bookclub, for book picks and voting on our first book, getting to know each other, and so on. I’m nervous and excited for our first meeting! It’s totally still open to new members, if you happen to live or know anyone who lives in Calgary! Just letting you all know it’s an open invitation!

As for everything else, I’m running behind and trying to catch up. I didn’t read a lot, but I managed to finish Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries, and I loved it! I’m still working on Stiletto, the second book in the Checquy Files series by Daniel O’Malley. I haven’t gotten much else done this week, unfortunately. The new month caught me by surprise, January went by so fast! How was January for you?

Last Week on The Blog

This Week

I’m sure I can finish Stiletto this week, and I have Children of Virtue and Vengeance by Tomi Adeyemi up next on audiobook. On e-book, I’ve got Death by Dumpling by Vivien Chien, and I’ve got Legends and Lattes as a physical copy from the library. I am looking forward to all of them!

How was your week? I hope you had a great week last week, and I hope you have a great one again this week!

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Sunday Post | Happiness Is…

Posted January 27, 2024 by Haze in Sunday Post, Weekly Book Memes / 28 Comments

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. 

Happiness Is…

We got to go to the zoo this week and see the Penguin Walk! I loved it! They were so adorable and I loved watching them walk! The big furry brown one is Augustus, and he was chirping so happily, omg! It’s lucky they cordoned off the space and had people controlling the crowd and protecting the penguins from me, because it was all I could do not to throw myself at them!

Happy!

I also went down to the Central Library this week because it’s been a while, and that’s another happy place for me! I wanted to browse books I might not have found on my own (like I don’t have enough books already anyway!), and I ended up with more books than I can carry, so I just took a couple and placed a hold for the rest.

I asked about book clubs because the library used to have a whole bunch of them listed in the programs guide, but apparently, they have no more book clubs now, ever since the pandemic. Which is really disappointing to hear.

Not so happy. =(

I’ve been looking for an in-person book club for a while but haven’t found one that would be right for me. Logistics is an issue for me so there are limited locations I can travel to, and there was a couple that seemed to be “dinner and book club” things, which would be too pricey for me. A book club at the library would’ve been perfect for me, but oh well. I’ll keep looking.

Or maybe I’ll start one! Does anyone live in Calgary, Canada, or knows someone who lives here and wants start a book club with me? Lol! (I’m only half-joking!)

As for reading, I’m also very happy because I managed to read three books that I’d been wanting to read for a while!

I finally finished The Rook by Daniel O’Malley, Thornhedge by T. Kingfisher, and by popular demand, The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster. I loved how many of you were telling me to read it and how much you loved it. Well, I read it! And I loved it! Thank you for your enthusiasm for the book! I’ve written a review if you wanna know what I thought!

Last Week on The Blog

This Week

I have started on Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries and I am loving it so far. I just got the second book in the Checquy series on audio today, and I’m excited to dive in as well! I’m happy I didn’t have to wait too long after finishing The Rook!

I am still planning to read The Dance of Anger. I know I said I’ll try to read it for last week, but I was caught up with other books and activities, and wasn’t in the right frame of mind. I’m still not ready to give up on it, but I’m not certain if I should give up on it for now and pick it up again a couple of weeks later. I’ll just play it by ear and see how I feel.

How was your week? I hope you had a great week last week, and I hope you have a great one again this week!

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