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adventurous
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
This book blew me away. I was expecting to like it but not love it. But this novel is genuinely amazing and beautifully put together. It takes on the classic Cinderella story from the perspective of the "ugly stepsisters" this time after the dust has settled and Cinderella is now living in the palace. This novel examines how society reinforces the roles of the ugly and the beautiful, the worthy and the worthless, over and over again. Until we start to really believe it. The ugly stepsister will always be the ugly stepsister, because that is how the story is written. Or is it? Maybe a little work from Chance and opportunity can change your life.
Definitely will read again. You should, as well.
Definitely will read again. You should, as well.
The Neuroscientist Who Lost Her Mind: My Tale of Madness and Recovery
Elaine McArdle, Barbara K. Lipska
I...am not sure how to feel about this. On one hand, I was really interested in how completely "madness" can change a person, all from damage to one--or several--parts of the brain, and on top of that recovering from madness. On the other, I couldn't help but be reminded of how privileged Dr. Lipska is. Her ease of access to healthcare, whether experimentative or not, I am always reminded of how treatment of this magnitude is completely out of the range of possibility for a vast number of American citizens. I'm not saying she's responsible for all of this--that's a product of American policy, greed, accessibility and all that jazz. What really irked me was that the author didn't seem to realize how privileged she was. She may have mentioned in passing that what was given to her, as far as treatment, is virtually impossible for a lot of people, but she never examined that. I'm conflicted though, it's quite possible that it's not fair for me to assume that she's not aware of those facts, but it made me a little frustrated with her story.
8/7/2019: kind of forgot that I read this. Don't really remember why I thought it was bad...time for a re-read?
Let me start by prefacing: I have read almost every single book Penny Reid has put out and all of the Winston Brothers series that has so far been released. I have seen these characters grow right in front of my eyes. This is to say that I have a special place in my heart for Billy and Claire/Scarlet. I literally stayed up until midnight waiting for the ebook to be delivered, just so that I could start reading as soon as possible. If you have read the series, whether that be all five books or just a few, the contents of Beard With Me are not a surprise. In fact, I commend Reid on her ability to make old information, just as impactful and painful. And boy, I think I cried for a solid fifty percent of this book. But that’s okay, because I grinned and laughed with the characters for the other fifty percent.
“I wasn’t mature for my age, I was old for my age. And I supposed the same could be said for Billy.
In this way, we had a lot in common.” -Scarlet, Beard With Me
Trauma is a pretty big theme in this novel. It could be because I already knew what would happen in the end, but it’s almost like the entire novel has this depressive weight over the characters head. Like they were waiting for the other shoe to drop. I think one of the reasons Scarlet and Billy’s story is so tragic is because I know this doesn’t end in an HEA. They had so much on their shoulders at such a young age, you may want to shake your head and say go tell someone, talk to Scarlet, do SOMETHING, but it’s hard to imagine anyone having to make the decisions that were put in their lap.
Reading the backstory of Billy and Scarlet gave them color and personality. It’s really hard for me to think of them outside of the other books. But I will, nonetheless, try my best not to compare these characters to postBwM. I will say, however, that their character progression from beginning to end feels well-planned, and natural.
I felt like the world building was especially fantastic in this book. It had continuity with the other books. I would say my only qualm on this novel is the pace of the ending. It would be inaccurate to say that it felt rushed. However, a lot happens in just the last quarter of the novel. I could see how someone could get confused, and I wonder if pacing could have been just a little slower.
At any rate, I really enjoyed reading Beard with Me. Reid was correct in saying that this is not a romance. It certainly had a different feel than the other Winston novels. Though it is an intense story, I would say it is very rereadable. In fact, I plan to reread it right now.
November can’t come soon enough.
“I wasn’t mature for my age, I was old for my age. And I supposed the same could be said for Billy.
In this way, we had a lot in common.” -Scarlet, Beard With Me
Trauma is a pretty big theme in this novel. It could be because I already knew what would happen in the end, but it’s almost like the entire novel has this depressive weight over the characters head. Like they were waiting for the other shoe to drop. I think one of the reasons Scarlet and Billy’s story is so tragic is because I know this doesn’t end in an HEA. They had so much on their shoulders at such a young age, you may want to shake your head and say go tell someone, talk to Scarlet, do SOMETHING, but it’s hard to imagine anyone having to make the decisions that were put in their lap.
Reading the backstory of Billy and Scarlet gave them color and personality. It’s really hard for me to think of them outside of the other books. But I will, nonetheless, try my best not to compare these characters to postBwM. I will say, however, that their character progression from beginning to end feels well-planned, and natural.
I felt like the world building was especially fantastic in this book. It had continuity with the other books. I would say my only qualm on this novel is the pace of the ending. It would be inaccurate to say that it felt rushed. However, a lot happens in just the last quarter of the novel. I could see how someone could get confused, and I wonder if pacing could have been just a little slower.
At any rate, I really enjoyed reading Beard with Me. Reid was correct in saying that this is not a romance. It certainly had a different feel than the other Winston novels. Though it is an intense story, I would say it is very rereadable. In fact, I plan to reread it right now.
November can’t come soon enough.
**ARC provided in exchange for an honest review**
When I first picked up this book, I’m not quite sure what I expected but this for sure wasn’t it. To Be Your Girl is a new adult romance novel about Haley and how she comes to fall in love with her love interest, Cade. The two characters have immediate chemistry and through the course of the book have to overcome many obstacles. Some of those included abandonment and interference from other people. I would consider it an erotic novel (for some reason I wasn’t expecting that, even though I know sexual exploration is a pretty big trope in NA literature. I’m not counting this against the novel though). As you can tell by its star rating, I am not a fan of this novel. However, before we get into the cringe worthy and downright problematic, let’s talk about the good.
The Good
I liked that we had a pretty clear sense of who Haley is right from the beginning. We know her family dynamic and the emergence of her relationship with Cade felt natural. I felt like her feelings about photography and her father were well-written and felt very organic.
The Bad
every non-major character felt frivolous to the story. The author regularly included new characters, and gave us context on who likes who and what their dynamic are, only for that same person to never show up again. Every friend of Haley’s really felt like her talking piece. For instance, her friend Court. We don’t really learn anything about her except for the fact that she’s very attractive and nice and the whole package. She’s the perfect friend and the perfect woman with the best advice for Haley. But when does Haley reciprocate that? I felt that way for many of Kennedy’s characters. They just weren’t fleshed out enough, and were irrelevant to the story.
Haley is very misogynistic and hypocritical towards women. If Haley views another woman as “competition,” they’re almost always portrayed as slutty, even after she turns around and does the same things she’s so disgusted by! It’s incredibly frustrating to read and I hate when authors reduce female-to-female interaction to exclusively cattiness and microaggressions.
The characters didn’t follow linear growth. Basically, it never felt like the characters grew or learned from their mistakes. It felt very abrupt, with each character just reacting to the situation, instead of reacting the way I would expect that character to react in that situation. It made them feel wishy-washy, like they didn’t know what they wanted. This in turn, made their declarations of love and their outbursts seem insincere.
There was more that frustrated me. However, I am not going to spend more time explaining my thoughts. It’s mostly just variations of the same points I previously stated. I haven’t read Rae Kennedy’s other works so maybe this is just an outlier, but I think this book just wasn’t my cup of tea. Maybe I will like her other works more.
I don’t usually like giving one star reviews, just because it feels so mean spirited, and as a writer myself, I know how much criticism can crush you. Hopefully, this will be helpful, though.
**ARC provided by Netgalley and corresponding publisher in exchange for an honest review**
All opinions are entirely my own.
When I first picked up this book, I’m not quite sure what I expected but this for sure wasn’t it. To Be Your Girl is a new adult romance novel about Haley and how she comes to fall in love with her love interest, Cade. The two characters have immediate chemistry and through the course of the book have to overcome many obstacles. Some of those included abandonment and interference from other people. I would consider it an erotic novel (for some reason I wasn’t expecting that, even though I know sexual exploration is a pretty big trope in NA literature. I’m not counting this against the novel though). As you can tell by its star rating, I am not a fan of this novel. However, before we get into the cringe worthy and downright problematic, let’s talk about the good.
The Good
I liked that we had a pretty clear sense of who Haley is right from the beginning. We know her family dynamic and the emergence of her relationship with Cade felt natural. I felt like her feelings about photography and her father were well-written and felt very organic.
The Bad
every non-major character felt frivolous to the story. The author regularly included new characters, and gave us context on who likes who and what their dynamic are, only for that same person to never show up again. Every friend of Haley’s really felt like her talking piece. For instance, her friend Court. We don’t really learn anything about her except for the fact that she’s very attractive and nice and the whole package. She’s the perfect friend and the perfect woman with the best advice for Haley. But when does Haley reciprocate that? I felt that way for many of Kennedy’s characters. They just weren’t fleshed out enough, and were irrelevant to the story.
Haley is very misogynistic and hypocritical towards women. If Haley views another woman as “competition,” they’re almost always portrayed as slutty, even after she turns around and does the same things she’s so disgusted by! It’s incredibly frustrating to read and I hate when authors reduce female-to-female interaction to exclusively cattiness and microaggressions.
The characters didn’t follow linear growth. Basically, it never felt like the characters grew or learned from their mistakes. It felt very abrupt, with each character just reacting to the situation, instead of reacting the way I would expect that character to react in that situation. It made them feel wishy-washy, like they didn’t know what they wanted. This in turn, made their declarations of love and their outbursts seem insincere.
There was more that frustrated me. However, I am not going to spend more time explaining my thoughts. It’s mostly just variations of the same points I previously stated. I haven’t read Rae Kennedy’s other works so maybe this is just an outlier, but I think this book just wasn’t my cup of tea. Maybe I will like her other works more.
I don’t usually like giving one star reviews, just because it feels so mean spirited, and as a writer myself, I know how much criticism can crush you. Hopefully, this will be helpful, though.
**ARC provided by Netgalley and corresponding publisher in exchange for an honest review**
All opinions are entirely my own.
*ARC PROVIDED IN EXCHANGE FOR AN HONEST REVIEW*
It has been a minute! But I’m back and ready to share my thoughts!
From the very first page, Weight Expectations had me laughing. And not just a silent chuckle, but actually full-on-laugh-that-you’re-trying-to-keep-quiet-because-other-people-are-in-this-car. I am happy to report that this book’s hilarity does not stop after the first twenty or so pages. Rian’s humor was relatable and I think that’s what made me like her.
This is going to sound super weird, but I actually really appreciate that Carlos was a bit of a horndog in the beginning of the story. I felt like it made his redemption feel more real, like he actually did need to be redeemed for something. It’s something. that Rian and Carlos have to work through and I appreciated that.
There are only two things, that had me a little confused.
1) Her sister was an absolute boar. Now, I understand she’s supposed to be a bit of a bridezilla but her sister never said anything to Rian unless it was to criticize her about her weight. She was such a bi-otch it aactually made me think, “how could they possibly be friends before Laney lost weight??” Like I could not understand HOW someone like that could be friends with Rian because that kind of prejudice has a way of creeping forward. Maybe their relationship was just to surface level who knows?
2) I’m good with insta-love plots, but when Carlos is realizing he likes Rian it was a little too insta-love to be believable. Which actually hurts my former point about him being redeemed. He definitely had a reason to be a better person, but how did he get to the spot where we actually believe it? I think it just needs a little brushing up.
10/02/2019:,And so, we enter the pennyverse...
Review to come.
It has been a minute! But I’m back and ready to share my thoughts!
From the very first page, Weight Expectations had me laughing. And not just a silent chuckle, but actually full-on-laugh-that-you’re-trying-to-keep-quiet-because-other-people-are-in-this-car. I am happy to report that this book’s hilarity does not stop after the first twenty or so pages. Rian’s humor was relatable and I think that’s what made me like her.
This is going to sound super weird, but I actually really appreciate that Carlos was a bit of a horndog in the beginning of the story. I felt like it made his redemption feel more real, like he actually did need to be redeemed for something. It’s something. that Rian and Carlos have to work through and I appreciated that.
There are only two things, that had me a little confused.
1) Her sister was an absolute boar. Now, I understand she’s supposed to be a bit of a bridezilla but her sister never said anything to Rian unless it was to criticize her about her weight. She was such a bi-otch it aactually made me think, “how could they possibly be friends before Laney lost weight??” Like I could not understand HOW someone like that could be friends with Rian because that kind of prejudice has a way of creeping forward. Maybe their relationship was just to surface level who knows?
2) I’m good with insta-love plots, but when Carlos is realizing he likes Rian it was a little too insta-love to be believable. Which actually hurts my former point about him being redeemed. He definitely had a reason to be a better person, but how did he get to the spot where we actually believe it? I think it just needs a little brushing up.
10/02/2019:,And so, we enter the pennyverse...
Review to come.
*Given in exchange for honest Review by Netgalley & Publisher
Lemon Lavender is Not Fine is a coming-of-age novel about a girl whose name is, to her annoyance, Lemon Lavender. This story, even from the beginning of the page I felt invested in Lemon Lavender. The author does a really good job of character development, and you could definitely see a change from the begging Lavender to the ending Lavender. The story will break your heart at points, as the main character has to deal with bullying (both in school, and online). I found myself at times being very frustrated with Lemon and the decisions she made. But I can't say some of her decisions weren't predictable (at least, in terms of Lemon's state of mind at that point) or even warranted.
I would say where it could use some work is her relationship with Graham. I didn't really get to know him that much, and I thought their relationship was cute at the beginning. However, it's hard to root for Lemon/Graham end game, when you don't know what one half is thinking. Some of his decisions made me frustrated, maybe even outright mad at him. But, I don't know, he was there at the end so that counts I guess?
There were also parts of the story that seemed unrealistic, especially in terms of the school and how they handled the situation. Their reasoning didn't seem to make sense in terms of what was happening and what would be apparent to the school at that time. They seemed biased towards some people but there really is no explanation for why that bias exists. Plus, their whole "freedom of speech, we can't do anything blah blah blah" was just really unrealistic to me. What they posted was NOT freedom of speech, it was blatant bullying, especially when you have the second person denying all of their accusations. That's slander.
Overall, I would give this book a 3.5/5.
Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with this book in exchange for an honest review
Lemon Lavender is Not Fine is a coming-of-age novel about a girl whose name is, to her annoyance, Lemon Lavender. This story, even from the beginning of the page I felt invested in Lemon Lavender. The author does a really good job of character development, and you could definitely see a change from the begging Lavender to the ending Lavender. The story will break your heart at points, as the main character has to deal with bullying (both in school, and online). I found myself at times being very frustrated with Lemon and the decisions she made. But I can't say some of her decisions weren't predictable (at least, in terms of Lemon's state of mind at that point) or even warranted.
I would say where it could use some work is her relationship with Graham. I didn't really get to know him that much, and I thought their relationship was cute at the beginning. However, it's hard to root for Lemon/Graham end game, when you don't know what one half is thinking. Some of his decisions made me frustrated, maybe even outright mad at him. But, I don't know, he was there at the end so that counts I guess?
There were also parts of the story that seemed unrealistic, especially in terms of the school and how they handled the situation. Their reasoning didn't seem to make sense in terms of what was happening and what would be apparent to the school at that time. They seemed biased towards some people but there really is no explanation for why that bias exists. Plus, their whole "freedom of speech, we can't do anything blah blah blah" was just really unrealistic to me. What they posted was NOT freedom of speech, it was blatant bullying, especially when you have the second person denying all of their accusations. That's slander.
Overall, I would give this book a 3.5/5.
Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with this book in exchange for an honest review
Hello! I would just like to say that it’s been a while since I’ve actually read this because as soon as I received it, I gobbled it down in about 30 minutes. That being said, Let’s get into it.
Sticking to the Script is a romcom by Stella Weaver. If you’re a fan of the Pennyverse, the familiar faces may be enough to keep you engaged, but I truly believe even if you are a first time reader, the characters are so well written, that you will have no trouble getting into it. I really really liked this book. I felt like I really knew and understood by the end of their book, and their HEA felt natural.
I loved how Steven could get DKM to relax. It was endearing to watch their romance bloom.
I also like that the author took the time to address bi-phobia and how it was affecting DKM’s family and personal life. It made these characters stand out even more.
All in all, I loved the story and would recommend it!
Thank you to Smartypants Romance for providing me with an e-ARC in exchange for my honest review.
Sticking to the Script is a romcom by Stella Weaver. If you’re a fan of the Pennyverse, the familiar faces may be enough to keep you engaged, but I truly believe even if you are a first time reader, the characters are so well written, that you will have no trouble getting into it. I really really liked this book. I felt like I really knew and understood by the end of their book, and their HEA felt natural.
I loved how Steven could get DKM to relax. It was endearing to watch their romance bloom.
I also like that the author took the time to address bi-phobia and how it was affecting DKM’s family and personal life. It made these characters stand out even more.
All in all, I loved the story and would recommend it!
Thank you to Smartypants Romance for providing me with an e-ARC in exchange for my honest review.