andat's Reviews (467)

I think I’d like to revisit this one but right before a current change of power in the US was the wrong time and mindset. 

OMG! WE GET TO SEE THE OTHER SCHOOL!

Oh. Oh it’s… No. Cora, please don’t. 

A different adventure for the Wayward Children awaits and it might cost them their doors forever. We pick up again with Cora still being haunted by the Drowned Gods and looking for anything and everything to banish them from her nightmares. That brings us and her to Whitethorn Institute. Everything Eleanor’s home is, Whitethorn is not. Cora has to navigate a very different kind of existence here, including closing herself off to the Trenches forever. There’s something darker and stranger at the Institute than anyone realizes. Cora and friends will have to make a choice. I won’t spoil the main plot line, but it’s easy to see parallels in her story to current events here in the US. It’s a bittersweet read with the barest of hopes hanging on to the end. I can only hope that our doors appear for us soon, too. 

In this installment of the Wayward Children series Seanan McGuire introduces a brand new character, Regan and a brand new world. After receiving life-changing news about why she’s different from her peers, Regan finds a door along a creek near her house. She steps through and finds…well, I won’t spoil it for you. A beautiful story about found family, belonging, and acceptance of something not unlike destiny. Regan is a reluctant hero that changes two worlds, her found one and her own. 

When I started this I was fully expecting this book to suffer the fate of dragging along the plot. You can tell its primary objective is to move things in place; sometimes too fast, and sometimes spending a little too slow and long on Mal and Alina’s communication issues. But you can also see the breadcrumbs she drops for the later duologies that make reading this series out of order a bittersweet experience. 

In many ways this book is an obvious sophomore, outside of one particular trait Bardugo has honed into mastery. She does a fantastic job of lulling you into complacency, and then hits you over the head until you’re reading with your jaw hanging open. Which is 100% what she did in the last freaking 30 pages of Siege and Storm. I’ll leave you with this…

And Genya, sweet Genya. The horror that was done to you, my heart is broken. 

“He left me in the dark.”

Regardless of how you came by this book, it will not be what you think it is. Whatever you think it will be, you’d be wrong. And that’s what makes it magic.

Despite the title it’s not a murder mystery that takes center stage in this book. Stuart Turton paints such a vivid world, you’re almost halfway through the book before you realize that you don’t even really care about the murder. Every thing is happening at once and backwards, and it’s wonderful. It does have a murder. It has sci-fi. It has a dystopian future. And to be honest, all of those take a backseat to the real focal point of the novel. Which I won’t reveal as a spoiler. If you’re comfortable reaching outside of a typical genre, then I’d highly recommend this book. Especially the afterword. 

Phenomenal. Weird. Thought-provoking. And most of all, beautiful. 

Look, I’m going to be honest here. This series is the Disney princess stories you didn’t know you needed. I am shocked these books haven’t been picked up for a show or movie yet. Marissa Meyer weaves a complex narrative that brings together all the different roles these main characters play effortlessly. Cress was a single day reading of 550 pages and I do not regret a single thing. I can’t believe I didn’t know about this series until just recently. It’s phenomenal and you should absolutely start reading it! (And always have the next book ready to go, Meyer loves a good cliffhanger!)

Let me tell you, I could not have picked a better book to read in January 2025. You got female rage? Read this book. You don’t have female rage, read this book, and you will. Christina Henry weaves a masterful story through three women and their very different experiences. I won’t spoil anyone with hints, or breadcrumbs here, but let me tell you it is a phenomenal single-sitting read. And if anyone wants to say that it’s too far out to be real, that it’s a caricature of what living in today’s world as a woman is like…I have only one response for you. Prove it.

I loved the first book so much, I was disappointed this one didn’t snag my interest in the same way. I may try to come back and try again later. I hate to write it off completely. 

This just did not grab me. I was struggling to get through to 18 pages and I could not find myself caring what happened next. 

I picked this up having zero ideas on the storyline or world that it was written in. I wanted to go in blind and give myself a blank slate that wasn’t leaning on how much I loved Priory of the Orange Tree. I was surprised when I saw it was set in the future, London, AND had a group of clairvoyants as the main characters. Sign. Me. Up. Now, just as her other work required some time to world-build, this one does too. And it’s slightly confusing, however there’s a handy chart at the beginning that I found myself referring back to frequently. I think a lot of readers were sidelined with the world-building, assuming that a future-state of London wouldn’t require it. But it absolutely does and it is necessary to understand the structures by which this society functions. I found myself wrapped up in new world order doing whatever they could to rid society of “unnaturals”. It was startlingly to see the  extreme measures they were willing to engage it to achieve it. I won’t go into detail on the plot devices given the high spoiler possibilities, though. The detail given to world and the characters operating within it is unmatched. I’m convinced Samantha Shannon sold her soul to write these incredible stories. And for a first novel, too. Well… hot damn, it was worth it. I can’t wait to get the next book!