booksare42's Reviews (608)

Thank you to The Write Reads for organizing and inviting me to participate in this blog tour. Thank you, Penguin, for providing me with a copy of this book through Net Galley and tour materials in exchange for an honest review.

I would say that words cannot describe how much I enjoyed this book, but since this is a review, I’m going to have to try to use my words. I am so glad that this book came into my life because it contained the perfect amount of magic and whimsy. I loved the characters and the setting, and I cannot wait to read the rest of the series.

The first thing I want to talk about is the characters. I loved how Lottie and Ellie are like day and night, and I liked how they balanced each other out. I liked how the characters fell into each other’s lives and how they could help each other. I loved watching their friendship grow, and I’m looking forward to seeing how it develops and if it develops into anything more later in the series. I also really liked Jamie, and I thought Lottie, Ellie, and Jamie made an excellent trio.

I absolutely adored the setting of this book. I generally enjoy books that take place at boarding schools, and Rosewood Hall is an exceptional boarding school. I loved how exclusive it is, and I love that you can tell that it’s full of secrets. I’m looking forward to learning more about the school and its secrets as I read the rest of the series. I also like the world-building in general in this book; I like the idea of a mystery princess that no one knows anything about. I like the idea of the secret world involved with protecting the princess.

I liked the mystery aspect of this book. I enjoyed trying to figure out who was behind the mysterious messages that Lottie was receiving. I also enjoyed the puzzles that Binah, one of the side characters, created for Lottie and Ellie to solve. I thought all of the puzzles and mysteries added lots of twists and turns to the story, making it very enjoyable.

One last thing I want to talk about is Lottie’s mother. Early on in the book, we learn that Lottie’s mother passed away years ago. Later on in the book, there’s a scene where Lottie is trying to hold herself together on the anniversary of her death, and I found this scene to be very relatable. As someone who lost their mother at a very young age, I’ve struggled with anniversaries and trying to keep myself together on that day. It was comforting, to a certain extent, to see that kind of grief on the page and to be able to relate to it.

Overall, I loved everything about this book. Lottie and Ellie are such wonderful characters, and I cannot wait to see what their next few years as Rosewood Hall brings them.

This was the February pick for the Middle-Grade Marvels Book Club, and words cannot describe how much I loved it.

Winterhouse follows Elizabeth Somers, an orphan who has been sent to stay at the mysterious Winterhouse Hotel for the winter holidays by her aunt and uncle. She doesn’t want to go, she can’t figure out why her aunt and uncle are sending her away, and she especially can’t figure out how they can afford this. Nonetheless, she reluctantly goes, and the Winterhouse Hotel is more than she could have ever imagined. It’s a place full of charm, mystery, a massive library, lots of activities, and many memorable people. Soon after arriving, she meets Norbridge Falls, the owner of the hotel, and Freddy, a boy around her age. While she’s there, she stumbles upon a mystery, and it’s up to her to break the curse, solve the mystery, and save the hotel.

This book was so much fun. What I liked most about it was all of the wordplay. Elizabeth and Freddy like word ladder puzzles and every chapter had a little word ladder at the beginning. The word puzzles and other riddles throughout the book brought me so much joy, and they made this book really stand out to me.

I also really liked the characters in this book. Elizabeth is a great main character, and I loved learning more about her. I loved her determination, cleverness, bookishness, and her entire personality in general. I loved Freddy and all of his inventions, and I also loved the friendship between him and Elizabeth. I thought Norbridge Falls was perfectly eccentric and that he made an excellent hotel owner. I also thought the villains in this book were quite creepy, and I enjoyed trying to figure out what their next move was going to be.

I also loved the setting of the Winterhouse Hotel in general. The hotel is massive, it’s full of different rooms that hold different secrets, and I loved exploring it with Elizabeth and Freddy. One of my favourite chapters in the book is when Elizabeth and Freddy plan a scavenger hunt for each other because I got to explore the hotel with them. I also loved the hotel’s history and learning about the Falls family.

I enjoyed the mystery in this book. I liked the clues; I thought they were clever. I enjoyed the wordplay that went with a lot of the clues. To a certain extent, some of the mystery was quite obvious, but I still found it fun to read about and solve with the characters. Some of the scenes near the end of the book kept me at the edge of my seat, and I wanted to keep reading to make sure that everything was going to be okay and to find out what would happen next.

Overall, I loved this book, and I cannot wait to read the second and third books in this trilogy. I want more Winterhouse in my life; I need to know what other secrets the hotel holds and how Elizabeth and Freddy are going to figure them out.

Thank you to Heather at Overview Media for inviting me to participate in this blog tour and providing me with a copy of this book and promotional materials for the tour in exchange for an honest review.

Just like The Meal of Fortune, Tinker Tailor Soldier Chef is one of those books where you want to read the blurb twice to make sure you read it correctly because it all seems just a little bit absurd. Fortunately, the blurb is correct, and the absurdity works well, making Tinker Tailor Soldier Chef a fun and memorable story.

This book switches between the perspective of three different characters, Anna from MI5, Dermot Jack, a celebrity agent, and DI Mark Henwell from the MET. Anna and Dermot are characters that the reader was introduced to in the first book in this series, but Henwell is new. I liked all three of these characters. I enjoyed reading more about Anna and Dermot, and I was glad to see what they had been up to since the previous book. Henwell was also a likeable enough character, and I could understand why he always seemed to be frustrated with his superiors. I also liked meeting the cast of side characters in this book, which added a lot to the story.

The plot of this book is absolutely ridiculous, which made this book fun to read. There’s someone in London killing off a bunch of celebrities, and MI5 thinks it might be part of a bigger terrorist plot. The three main characters, who frankly have no business even knowing each other, work together to see if they can crack the case before it’s too late. Unfortunately, I figured out who was behind the plot relatively early on, but I still enjoyed the action and shenanigans leading up to the final scene.

Overall, it was nice to read something fun and memorable. I also want to point out that if you haven’t read the first book in this series, you can totally read it without being confused or worrying about spoilers because anytime the crimes from the first book are mentioned, they’re met with a comment about how they’re classified.

Thank you to The Write Reads for organizing and inviting me to participate in this blog tour. Thank you for providing me with a copy of this book and tour materials in exchange for an honest review.

The Broken Heart of Arelium is the first book in an epic fantasy series full of amazing world-building, memorable characters, politics, betrayal, and action. Even though this isn’t my usual genre, it was easy enough to read, and I read the entire book in a day.

This book has lots of memorable, multi-dimensional characters. I liked getting to know more about them as I read on and watching them struggle with all of the challenges they were being faced with as the battle loomed and eventually raged on. I wish that we would have gotten more from Jelaïa though because I think she could be a much stronger character than she was.

I also liked the world-building in this book. I thought this book was a great introduction to the world that the author was creating for this series. I liked the scenes where Aldarin, one of The Knights of the Twelve, explained the world’s history to Reed, and I thought this was a good tool for explaining this fictional world. I also liked the politics and betrayal that were going on in this world; it made the book interesting because I was trying to figure out who was being genuine and who was being two-faced.

This book was too violent for my liking, but generally speaking, I try to avoid violence in books. This book features a lot of battles, wars, and bloodshed, and it was a lot to handle at some points for someone who doesn’t normally read books full of battles, war, and bloodshed.

Overall, even though this wasn’t my normal genre, it was still an enjoyable read. I don’t think I’ll read the rest of the series, but I think if you’re interested in epic fantasy, this book is definitely worth checking out.

Thank you to The Write Reads for organizing and inviting me to participate in this blog tour. Thank you to Farshore Books for providing me with a copy of this book through Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.

The Beast and the Bethany was one of my favourite reads of 2020, and I was so excited to get my hands on Revenge of the Beast to find out what beastly things the Beast cooked up in this book and to catch up with Bethany and Ebenezer Tweezer. I am happy to say that Revenge of the Beast has the same Lemony Snicket meets Roald Dahl charm as The Beast and the Bethany, and I thought it was absolutely fantastic.

Revenge of the Beast takes place a few weeks after The Beast and the Bethany. Bethany and Claudette are determined to help Ebenezer de-beast their lives by getting rid of all of the presents the Beast vomited up for him over the past five centuries. Bethany is also determined to change how the neighbourhood looks at her, and she is determined to Do Good, even if she’s not entirely sure how that works. But, of course, the Beast has other ideas and has some nefarious plans of his own.

My favourite thing about this book is how fun it was. I loved the flashbacks into Ebenezer’s past and his memories with the Beast. I also loved how fun some of the gifts that Ebenezer received from the Beast are; I specifically love the idea of a self-decorating Christmas tree. I also thought it was fun that the gifts had their own minds and started to act out against their new owners when Bethany gave them away to people in the neighbourhood.

Bethany is one of my favourite fictional characters, and I loved reading about her in this book. I loved how hard she tried to Do Good, and there were many moments where I wanted to give her a giant hug. I also loved Ebenezer in this book, and I enjoyed reading about them trying so hard to Do Good even though they had no idea what they were doing. I also loved how ghastly and terrible the Beast was in this book, and I cannot wait to see what it gets up to in the third book.

I loved all of the twists and turns in this book. I loved not knowing what the Beast was going to try to do next and being on the edge of my seat, wondering if Bethany and Ebenezer would figure things out before it was too late.

Overall, I thought this book was fantastic. It was fun, creepy, and full of twists and turns. The characters are fantastic, the Beast is ghastly and terrifying, and I cannot recommend this series enough.