The Dark Net by Benjamin Percy has a VERY intriguing prologue! This did a wonderful job of drawing me in and I was hooked for quite a while. Unfortunately, things started to go downhill for me around page 75. Even so, I did enjoy this read.


My thoughts:
This book is organized in varying perspectives, some of which we spend more time with than others. In this case, this format worked really well because it helped you to really understand what was going on. At the very beginning, I had to take notes to keep the characters straight. But after just a short time, I had them figured out.

The characters:
Hannah- a blind middle school student that gets a high tech device to help her see.

Cheryl- Hannah’s mom.

Lela- a reporter. Hannah's aunt. She is digging for a story about Undertown, Inc. but is about to get in way over her head.

Mike Juniper- runs a shelter called The Weary Traveler. He feels that his helping others is his atonement for an event that occurred in his childhood.

Cheston- rents out blade servers for users to host their sites privately. Works for Undertown, Inc.

Daniel- Lela’s intern. Computer and technology wiz.

Hemingway- Lela’s awesome dog.

I loved the plot of the book! I think this would make an incredible movie! Unfortunately, the writing style threw me off and affected my overall feeling toward this book.


Beware, the negatives:
Many of the similes were either a total stretch or didn’t make any sense at all. And there were so many of them. Don’t get me wrong, there were a few I enjoyed, but overall it was just too much. I didn’t mark any examples here because I didn’t want this element to decrease my enjoyment of the book. Unfortunately it happened so frequently that it was hard to look past.

The descriptive bits felt very over done on many occasions. There was also a quite bit of repetition and sections that seemed to ramble. Many sections dragged on and on for me, and that really bogged me down. I unfortunately found myself skimming quite a bit, especially toward the end.


My favorite passages:
There's too much noise into little solitude in the world. Everybody should shut the fuck up and get back to work.

A crow caws. She looks up to see five of them watching her, roosting on telephone wires, appearing against the gray sky like notes on an old piece of sheet music.

As much as she hates fiddling around with computers, she knows that online archives have given her words even greater permanence. They'll outlive her. That's her idea of the afterlife, immortality. She prays at an altar built from twenty-six letters.

He would earn his oxygen by helping others.

"It means there’s plenty of good in the world to offset all the ugliness. But you can’t just sit back and expect someone to take care of you. You’ve got to fight for it.”

There are only so many fights you can take on before you lose your will to make a fist.


My final thoughts:
Overall, I enjoyed this read. Unfortunately the pacing and writing style just wasn’t really for me. I found myself a bit lost at times because the explanation of things wasn’t clear, which made the story feel a bit jumpy. I gave it two stars.

I would still recommend this book to those that enjoy stories about technology and the paranormal, and for readers that don’t mind varying perspectives. And I would LOVE to see this turned into a movie!

If you love dragons or tacos, you need to give this book a read!

This is such a cute book! The storyline is short and sweet, and it has a lovely humorous tone. The illustrations are also adorable. I loved the expressions of all the characters.

I also really loved the authors blurbs at the end of the book! Such a clever idea that was perfectly executed!

Corduroy by Don Freeman was one of my favorite books as a child. I hadn't read it since I was five or six, so this re-read was definitely needed!

I just love this book so much! As it is a children's picture book, the storyline is very short and sweet. But even so, it's one that readers of all ages could enjoy!

The illustrations are also rather simple, but so lovely.

I thought it was so amazing to re-read this book and discover that I recognized each and every page. I had even memorized some of the dialogue!

Pigeon-Blood Red by Ed Duncan is a crime thriller that will suck you in and not let you go until the very last page. I absolutely loved every second of this book and would highly recommend it to others.

Full disclosure: I was given a free copy of this book by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This did not affect my rating in any way.

The writing style was fantastic! It's easy to read and very realistic. The action and suspense was so well done that I struggled to put it down! There are many cases where I absolutely could not have guessed what was coming next. On page 77, I actually said out loud "Wait what?!" And had to re-read that paragraph because I couldn't believe it.

The pacing and the plot were both excellent! I loved that while the main focus was on crime and suspense, there were also elements of love, marriage and second chances, which I am a total sucker for!

Needless to say, I was totally engrossed in this story!

I loved all of the characters, even the "bad" ones. I really enjoyed how we were introduced to all of them, and how their storylines met up with one another. I cannot wait to (hopefully) see some of them in book two!


My favorite passages:
The truth was that she could never be absolutely certain what was in Rico's mind. Yet, as a flower is drawn to the sun, she was drawn to him by a force she could neither explain nor control. Perhaps more importantly she knew that, in his own way, he was drawn to her as strongly as she was to him. Of that she was certain.

He wasn't a happy drunk and when he'd had too much, his frustration spilled out of him in an angry torrent of false bravado. More than once in one bar or another he narrowly escaped getting his head handed to him because of some stupid comment bathed in liquor.

... he realized too late how important a few words were.


My final thoughts:
I would definitely recommend picking this one up if you like crime thrillers! I loved every second of it. I'm so excited to get my hands on the other two books in this trilogy.

A Killer Harvest by Paul Cleave is an incredible crime thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat.

Once I picked this one up, I really struggled to put it down; I just couldn't wait to see what happened next! This is definitely going to be one of my favorite books of the year!

My thoughts:
This is going to be another rather short one, as I don't want to give too much away!

I thought the plot was so interesting! The storyline started with a bang and then slowed for a bit as we dove into character development. But then there's a point soon after where the action picks up and it doesn't let up until the very last page. Once I hit that point, I couldn't put the book down!

There were so many twists and turns that I absolutely did not see coming, along with many A-HA moments sprinkled in. Needless to say, I thought the suspense was incredible! I was almost constantly feeling anxious while reading and just had to keep going to find out what happened next.

The way this author drops important info into the story was incredible. For example, there was a quick scene in the beginning of the book that is referenced near the end.

The characters were all so lovely and wonderfully developed. Even the “bad” characters were incredibly intriguing! I loved the connection that was created between the "bad" guys and one of the characters from the beginning of the book.

As a reader, I felt protective over Joshua because he was such a lovely character. His thoughts and feelings were also so perfectly written that I found myself getting angry with his mom when he did, I felt nerves when he did.


My favorite passages:
... looking at his watch again, as if to make sure it hasn't been lying to him.

Today the lie is going to be massive. The man they are here to see is going to tell them he was on the other side of the planet visiting his sick mother in hospital. He was on a boat in the middle of the Pacific Ocean rescuing dolphins. He was orbiting the moon. He was anywhere except for the one place they know he had been…

Monday does what it does best- it arrives quicker than any other day. Joshua is sure the physics behind that is something neither Albert Einstein nor Stephen Hawking could get a handle on.

That’s the thing about the Scott Bullies of the world - they do what they want because they can, because they don’t care, because their empathy chip has been switched out with an asshole chip.


My final thoughts:
Definitely one of my favorite crime novels of all time! If you enjoy gritty and dark crime thrillers, you have to pick this one up!

If you are expecting the same fun, bubbly teenage witch played by Melissa Joan Hart, this graphic novel will disappoint you. The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Vol. 1 is very dark and gory. Of course I loved every second of it!

I really enjoyed the storyline. It was short but complex enough to be interesting throughout, complete with twists and turns that, even though they were a bit predictable, still kept me on the edge of my seat. I really enjoyed the darker take on this character.

The artwork was my definitely favorite element. It has a lovely retro horror vibe that I'm a total sucker for! The color palette was also very lovely and I really love the pop of bright color here and there for dramatics.

As for the characters, I really enjoyed Ambros! I was also very excited to see Salem, but a bit let down that he didn't play a major role. I'd love to see more of him! I found both Sabrina and Harvey to be a bit lacking. I do hope to see Sabrina's character develop more in volume two.

I would definitely recommend checking this one out if you enjoy darker graphic novels!

Feel Me Fall by James Morris is an absolutely incredible YA mystery/triller that is filled to the brim with suspense!

Warning: Once you pick this one up, you won't be able to put it down!

This was another book that I lost sleep over simply because I had forced myself to put the book down to go to sleep, and couldn't stop thinking about it.

Full disclosure: I was given a free copy of this book by the author in exchange for an honest review. This did not affect my rating in any way.

Oh my goodness. Where to start with this book?! I just want to shout, "IT IS INCREDIBLE" over and over again!!

To preserve the thrill of reading this for yourself, I will keep my review a bit brief.

So first of all, I have to say that I absolutely loved the way this book was organized! The timeline moves between current day and the past, but in the past we see various glimpses of the characters before the trip, on the plane, and in the jungle. There weren't always clear chapter or line breaks that indicated the switch between timelines, instead they flowed seamlessly from one to the next.

When this happens, I usually find myself drawn more toward one of the timelines over the others. But that simply wasn't the case here. Each timeline was interesting in its own way, and the way each bit helped us learn more about the characters was wonderful.

And the characters! They were all so well developed and complex! At the very beginning they all kind of blended together, as we just knew names. But once we spent more time with them, they all seemed so realistic.

Another of my favorite features of this book was the end of many chapters, when the author would add just one line that totally threw me off! I would be reading right along, thinking things are ending on a good note and then BAM! Twist!
For example:
I'm just being paranoid, I thought.
Turns out I wasn't paranoid enough.

The overall writing style and organization of the storyline was so prominent and clever! This is definitely an author that I need to keep an eye on!


Favorite passages:
I have tried so hard to forget, but memory is a stubborn thing. Memories linger no matter what I do. They're there all the time – and worse. Even my dreams aren't safe. I have vicious nightmares, and they're real – too real – and suddenly I'm back there. I can't will them away, I can't squeeze them away, and the more I try the more they burrow in my head. I want to cut open my skull and dig my fingers into my brain and just pull them out.

Entering the rain forest was like passing through a green curtain into a massive haunted room. It was as claustrophobic as I feared. We could only see a few feet in front of us, like a bank of fog, except it was trees and vines: trees that soared well into the sky, vines that grew at impossible angles and thick waxy leaves the blotted out the sun.

No, I didn't spit in her food. That's gross. But I did wipe her bun on the bottom of my shoe.

I walked away, feeling his eyes on me and I felt… connected somehow. As if I just met the missing piece of the puzzle that was me.

The rain pelted us, each drop a tiny bullet.

I always felt prom was one of those overrated high school conventions that people put too much importance on, like New Year's Eve parties with all the pressure to have the best time ever and were inevitably a disappointment. The best times came from the unexpected, the unplanned.

Hope it didn't come easy. It had to be continuously created and called upon or it would disappear as soon as something else took its place…


My final thoughts:
I REALLY enjoyed this book; it's the perfect blend of suspense and mystery! I would highly recommend to anyone that enjoys any of the following genres: adventure, survival, thriller, suspense, mystery.

The Talented Ribkins by Ladee Hubbard is a slow, but very intriguing story about a man on a mission, his niece (whom he just found out existed), and a long family history of "peculiarities".

I absolutely loved all of the characters in this book! Each and every one of them was so complex and I loved that we learned more and more about them as the story progressed.

The storyline itself was short and sweet, as it spanned the course of a week. As I was reading, I couldn't wait to see how the story ended.

I enjoyed the writing style quite a bit and only had one small irk (more on that later).

On numerous occasions, the reader is thrown right into flashbacks and memories without any indication. I usually don't like when authors do that, but this time it worked well! It was all so smooth.

The same was true for scene jumps. For example in one line Johnny was talking to Reg outside, and the next line he was back in the hotel room with Eloise. It was a bit jarring, but it worked! Of course there were also plenty of chapter breaks and section breaks that were clearly marked.

Beware, the negatives:
My only complaint about the writing was that it could be a bit repetitive. For example, both the man and the girl talked about not knowing one another various times.

Repetition was also a bit of a problem for me in the way that the memories and flashbacks were organized. Of course for many readers this would probably help tie things together, but because I read the book so quickly I didn't need a refresher.

Formatting wise, one thing that didn't make sense to me was the clearly marked breaks in a section where it didn't make sense. For example, a break included in the same scene.

All super tiny "negatives"!


Favorite passages:
If what Meredith said was there, then Eloise was gifted, unique. And Meredith was right: that was something a lot of folks in the family shared. Little sparks of something special that didn't seem to make much sense and had generally caused more confusion than anything else. Because not knowing what to do with these gifts, many of them spent years trying to understand them, trying to figure out where they belonged and who they were.

People judge you on what you show the world. Stop showing your ass.

No one's gift was easy, but for the person who had received it, it was a source of strength and strange comfort that was difficult to understand and even harder to explain.

Because as hard as he tried to map out every move, he knew that things didn't always work out the way he planned.

And sometimes the only way to follow someone's example is not to follow at all.
Sometimes you have to go out and set your own.

How is anybody going to recognize you, Eloise, if your scared to show people who you really are?

"Everything beautiful in this world is strange," the Hammer said. "If you think about that for a little bit you're going to find I'm telling the truth. You can't live your life worries about people being scared of you just for being who you are. Because what you are is beautiful. It's not your job to try and compensate other people's lack of vision. You've got enough to do just trying to be true to your own."

That's what families do for each other. The best they can.


My final thoughts:
Overall, I did enjoy this read quite it bit! It was a wonderfully slow book to throw in-between my fast-paced thrillers that I have been reading recently!

I would definitely recommend this to others that don't mind a slow story and love character-driven novels.

Weave a Murderous Web by Anne Rothmans-Hicks & Ken Hicks is a wonderful crime thriller that will keep you guessing right up until the very end! I really enjoyed this book and definitely look forward to reading another in the Jane Larson series.

Full disclosure: I was given a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This did not affect my rating in any way.

My thoughts:
I really liked that we dive right into the story and see Jane at her desk in her office. It is clear that the story is about to get a little crazy from there. But then in chapter two, the narrator literally says, "Before going any further, maybe I should explain the unusual route I had taken to my current post at..." and then the story slows down so the reader can learn more about her both as a character and how she grew her career. I loved this method because the action of the first chapter totally hooked me, but I was feeling a little weird not really knowing the character yet. This slow bit really helped give background and depth to the main character before jumping back into the original action.

I enjoyed the writing style! It was so easy to read, and the storyline flowed wonderfully. I really liked that the end of each chapter gives you a glimpse into what will happen next. Though this made it nearly impossible to put the book down after promising myself that I'd just read one more chapter then go to bed...

I also really loved the sense of humor that the authors put into their writing. There were so many passages that made me chuckle right out loud (see my favorite passages below for examples!).

The web in the title was so perfect as each characters storyline was so interwoven with the others! I absolutely loved that I couldn't see any of the connections coming until it was spelled out for me, and then it was all SO obvious! Of course I had my theories and such all along, but none were strong enough to make me feel like I had really figured everything out. Which is exactly what I love most about crime mysteries!


Beware, the (slight) negative:
The main character was incredibly egotistical, superficial, and shallow. As a persona, it all made total sense and the authors captured the character wonderfully. I didn't particularly like her, but she was an unlikable character that I could still be interested in. However, all of her negative comments about how "fat" or gross Bernie was versus how stunning the "fit" characters were was oh so tiring. I was very happy to see the negative comments decrease as the story went on because at one point I was about ready to scream if there had been one more fat comment.


My favorite passages:
The sound of a whale breaching the surface erupted from the phone.

Francine winced. You might think this resulted from a superstitious aversion to speaking ill of the dead. You would be wrong. Francine had an aversion to speaking ill of both the living and the dead.

The involvement of that bastion of male rectitude in this run-of-the-mill case raised Carmen's eyebrows. That isn't easy to do because they're painted directly on her skin and recent plastic surgery made her face as tight as a watermelon.

Although he was in his early fifties, he still wore his hair in the prep school style of his youth. Thus, when he spoke with emotion, it tended to fall down over his eyes, necessitating a flip of his head every few seconds to clear his vision. If truly riled, as he was now, he resembled a seal trying to balance an imaginary ball on his nose.

I have a thing about heights. I hate them. For people like me, a flight of stairs is not just one step after the other. It is a place that seems to bend and sway below my feet, ignoring the laws of physics that hold our universe together. My sense of balance fails me. I am certain that at any moment I will stand too straight and fall backwards to my death or to grave injury. Now, here in front of me was one of the steepest and narrowest staircases I had ever had the privilege of ascending.

My own voice was nearly lost in the cavernous space, where the twenty-foot ceilings and wooden paneling absorbed words like a very dry sponge.

Her slight sneer told us she didn't allow sugar-filled crap like that into her body. I took an extra big bite.

The sudden crack of knuckles on wood reverberated in the empty office and reminded me in an unwelcome way of how isolated this spot was from the ebb and flow of daily business.

Suddenly, the traffic eased at 64th Street and the driver took off like a spirit released from a dead body.

Fatigue was like a heavy cloak hung around my shoulders, and yet a certain restless energy possessed me, making sleep impossible.


My final thoughts:
I really enjoyed this book! I would highly recommend it for someone looking for a quick crime mystery with a slightly unlikable main character. :)