I finished 15 minutes ago and I am still jaw-dropped like whaaa?! 5 stars! I need more of Rachel Autumm Deering in my life! I loved the way she built her characters up down to the dialect and how the characters acted. I grew up Southern Baptist with a preacher in my family so a lot of this rings close to home! Deering did a fantastic job in exploring PTSD post-war, drug addiction, and one man's re-entry into the real world. I loved the flirty romance between Kevin and Samantha and just loved this novella. That. Ending. Ugh!

Not overly impressed with this one. Most of the story was either unnecessary, redundant, or predictable. It seems that Flynn just threw this together quickly after the success of Gone Girl with an attempt to shock us once more... but if you know Flynn and her work, then you would have seen this ending coming a mile away. Meh... thankfully it was short and didn't take up too much time. I would not recommend this. I did, however, find a fantastic quote that I want to incorporate into things from now on: "Books may be temporary. But dicks are forever."

Widow’s Point is a unique horror story written by Richard Chizmar and Billy Chizmar. It chronicles a critically acclaimed supernatural author who wants to spend a weekend locked inside a lighthouse with quite a past. Residents of the nearby town would swear the Widow’s Point Lighthouse is cursed or haunted. Strange occurrences are associated with it: mysterious deaths, potential suicides, unexplained accidents, and disappearances. It has been almost thirty years since anyone has set foot inside the lighthouse before our protagonist begins his weekend locked inside. Sounds awesome, right? Well… spoiler alert: IT IS.

I think my favorite thing about this story is the way in which it is told. I think we have all seen a found footage film in our lifetime whether it be Blair Witch, Paranormal Activity, Cloverfield, REC, Quarantine, etc. I, for one, love found footage films and they don’t bother me in the least. But have any of us READ a found footage BOOK?? This concept is totally new to me and I am unable to recall reading anything like this before. Sure, I’ve read journal entries, newspaper clippings, interviews, etc., but I can’t pinpoint a book that was categorized as a found footage book. With Widow’s Point we have audio and video being described to us and the way Chizmar does it is so perfect. I FELT like I was really inside a found footage film and it heightened the terror for me.

Another perk in this book: some pretty creepy and awesome illustrations! Who isn’t a fan of that? With the illustrations as a bonus, we are really getting all of our senses teased and scared from this story in the best ways. I found myself going, “NOPE NOPE NOPE!” many times while reading as I would not be nearly as brave or fearless as our protagonist.

Widow’s Point is a haunting ghost story that will definitely scare you and excite you at the same time. It will remind you there are reasons to be afraid of the dark and that some things and places that are locked up and isolated from the rest of civilization should remain at rest and undisturbed. 5 stars to this one for me! As I hinted at earlier, I can definitely see this being made into a movie or show because of the way it flows (and I think I actually *did* hear that some film rights have been picked up).

3.5 to this one! I'm ready to figure out how it all ends and comes together with the next snd final installment of the trilogy!

4 stars!! STILL mulling this one over - full review to come!

The Chrysalis was a fun book to read! My initial interest in the book stemmed from reading the synopsis and seeing the tagline on the cover, DON'T GO IN THE BASEMENT. I had expected a lot more horror than I got, and even read a few reviews that considered this sci-fi and not horror at all. While I agree that it is not as MUCH horror as I wanted, it is still horror (horror light? horror adjacent?) and I do not really think it is sci-fi by any means.

I really enjoyed the protagonist's descent into madness based on the basement/what's in the basement. It was reminiscent of Jack Torrance from The Shining in some ways, and it made for an unpredictable character to read about!

If anything, I want to know more about the house, its past, the previous owners, the basement, the thing in the basement, etc. I don't feel like we got enough of that which could have helped with the element of horror.

Overall this was a great read and I give it 4 out of 5 stars! Thanks to the publisher for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review!

2.5 out of 5 stars. I was really hoping this was going to be better than it was and had already checked out the next one in the series (which I promptly returned along with this one). Just not for me. Too derivative and slow-going. I thought that maybe, just maybe, coming from Jason Segel it would either shock me or take me by surprise... but it left me feeling blah and bored. I guess he should just stick to acting in low-quality comedies (take away HIMYM and I really don't know what he even has going for himself).

Sadie by Courtney Summers is a book that will stick with me for some time. It's a YA thriller/mystery, but it has loads of subjects and triggers that range from YA to adult: drug abuse, murder, sexual abuse, pedophilia, rape, rural issues and poverty, etc. It is not just your run of the mill easy peasy YA book. It's pretty heavy.

But one of the things that helps make it lighter is the format in which the story is told. The chapters alternate between Sadie in the past and a podcast in the present. Yep - a PODCAST. In a book! I loved the idea and thought that Summers did an excellent job blending them both without going too meta and confusing us all.

My biggest complaint with the story is having to read Sadie's stutter the entire book. While on one hand it makes me feel more sympathetic towards her because she is juggling all of these emotions and things happening to her AS WELL as having a sever speech impediment. But on the other hand I was constantly annoyed at how it forced me to slow down my reading to read all h-her att- attempts at tr-trying to sp-sp-speak and stuff. I just could have managed perfectly fine without that ingredient in the story for it to work the way that it did.

I loved the ever-growing mystery with Sadie's journey (and then in turn OUR journey as we read along with the podcast). I am a huge lover of true crime mystery podcasts and cold cases and I think that Summers just did such a good job keeping us entertained and intrigued as if we were listening to a real life podcast.

I am going to give this one 4 out of 5 stars. I think I would have rated it higher had it not been for a) Sadie's constant stuttering and how that bothered me reading it for 300+ pages and b) the ending fell a little flat and was rushed after all that buildup and suspense. It kinda just happened and the next thing you know, the book is over! BUT those two elements did not take away from how great this book is and that it is extremely deserving of the 4 stars I am rating it. I encourage friends to read this if they like the kinds of things I have mentioned in this review.

Thanks to Netgalley, St Martins Press, and Wednesday Books for the advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I wasn't sure if I was going to enjoy this book or not because of knowing the story already so much because of the movie with Jim Carrey and the show on Netflix being almost verbatim to the books. However, I will say that I surprised myself because I quite enjoyed this book and definitely want to go ahead with the rest of the series! These are short books (probably all a little shy of 200 pages) and about a 3.5 hour narration on Libby/audiobook. And Tim Curry narrates these primarily with exception to a couple of characters (the kids, Justice, etc) and there are even some sound effects and music in the background. All in all it's a great "production" for an audiobook! 4 stars to book #1!

This is an interesting book and one that I am definitely not drawn to read naturally. But my mom has had a couple of medical issues lately and it got me thinking even more that she's got a LOT of $h*t in her house and when she dies, we will have to go through it all. The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning discusses döstädning, which is an act of decluttering and clearing out unnecessary belongings along the way instead of after a death and before it's a requirement. There are so many things we acquire for whatever reason: we bought it, it was a gift for a birthday/Christmas/house warming/etc, or whatever! This book is not at all about never collecting things - but to just understand what we have and why. Do we need 20 big dinner plates, bowls, etc when we only have room at a table for 4-6? Do we need clothes that hold 0 sentimental value that will never fit again? And all those encyclopedias.... do we need them now that we have phones and the internet and Google? These are just a few of the questions I have asked myself while reading this book. BUT I DO NEED ALL MY FUNKOS NO ONE GET IN MY WAY!!

3.5. out of 5 stars! I enjoyed this short, quick read! And some solid advice from this book: "Save your favorite dildo, but throw away the other fifteen!"