katietotallybooked's Reviews (785)

This was one of my anticipated reads for 2020. And I enjoyed it!
Big Lies in a Small Town features dual timelines. It follows Morgan in 2018, who’s been released from prison early if she takes the opportunity to restore an old painting for a small North Carolina community. In 1940, we follow Anna who has one a competition to create a mural for that same community.
The mystery of the mural and the townspeople starts to unravel as Morgan begins her work.
This is a slow burning story that is written wonderfully. The writing actually reminded me a little bit of Kristin Hannah’s. The characters were well developed. The issues of race and the male/female dynamic is very reflective of the times. There’s even a tiny bit of romance in this book too that was unexpected based on the synopsis!
This book is about connection, history, and finding your truth. It is a wonderful read if you can handle the slow but steady pace.

The Subtweet by Vivek Shraya is an original and unique fictional portrayal of female artists navigating their way through the Canadian music industry.
I promise you will devour this book in one or two sittings because of its intriguing writing style and grappling storyline.
I was so hooked by the characters.
I’ve never read a book that has captured female friendship in this way before. Never.
It covers themes of representation and the whiteness of audiences. I think there is so much a reader can dissect after reading this book.
So read it, share it, and talk about it.
Check out my blog http://katietotallybooked.com for my full review.

This is an eloquent and enjoyable Canadian memoir about family, aging, and love. Joe, an eighty-year-old living with Parkinson’s disease, invites his daughter Alison on a week-long trip to Ireland in search of roots and genealogical discoveries.

The narrative of this book was delightful and comical to read. I truly appreciated how the author told her story. Plus I enjoyed being able to travel to Dublin for a few days while reading and be captivated by the setting of this memoir. Check out my full review on my blog.

The Tenth Circle by Jodi Picoult...oh how do I feel about this book?
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Honestly, I am a bit disappointed. It didn’t bring me enjoyment like the other books of hers I have read so far. This one is about a family who is going through an extremely tough time. (Trigger warnings for rape, sexual abuse, assault, and self-harm before I go on...)
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Trixie is a 14 years old girl and has been raped by her ex-boyfriend. Daniel, her father, works for Marvel writing comic books and has a violent and emotional past that he has run away from. Laura, her mother, is having an affair. This family is a mess. The story kind of is how the family comes to terms with what is happening to them and more tragic events ensue. ⠀⠀
It is a very heavy read. I couldn’t read a lot of this book at one time, which is why I felt like it dragged out too much. The format of writing isn’t ideal. There are only 7 or 8 chapters, so each chapter is so long with only a one line break between sections. This is where the author switches perspectives, so you have to be paying attention. There are comic inserts that I didn’t care for, so I just skipped over them. The ending was unsatisfactory to me.
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Really, I just didn’t have that enjoyable of a reading experience with this book. So my rating is the lowest ever for a Jodi Picoult so far.

The Imperfects by Amy Meyerson is about the Miller family. Helen is the family’s matriarch and grandmother to estranged adult siblings, Beck, Ashley, and Jake. Their mother, Deborah, hasn’t always been a parent worthy of recognition and accolades. But then the family is brought together when Helen suddenly passes away. Of course, the last time the family was together didn’t go so well. At the reading of the will, an invaluable inheritance is brought to light. This sets off a journey of discovery for the Millers to uncover truths about their family’s heritage. At the center of this journey is the Florentine diamond, a 37-carat yellow gemstone. And this diamond went missing from the Austrian Empire a century ago.
⠀⠀ This story is all about relationships. Meyerson demonstrates the complexity of sibling relationships extremely well. As well, there are many different romantic relationships interwoven into the story. The notion that sometimes we don’t know what questions to ask of others until it is too late is a recurring theme in the novel for all characters. I love how Meyerson started with a nugget of truth and creatively wrote an entire fictional novel around that truth. And personally, some of my favourite fiction novels are written that way.

Love Anthony was not the book I expected. I generally don’t refresh my memory about a book by reading the dust jacket or back cover blurb right before I read. So, of course, I didn’t do that with this book, even though it’s been on my reading list for years. This book is about two women, both living in Nantucket. Beth, a mother of three teenage daughters, is reeling from the discovery of her husband’s infidelity. Olivia has escaped to the island to grieve the death of her autistic son Anthony and the fallout of her marriage. Both women are on personal journeys that end up intersecting in the most surprising and miraculous ways. It’s my own fault that I was not prepared or expecting this story.

The character Beth is a writer and I generally don’t like books where there is fiction within fiction. In this case, Beth is writing a story and there are excerpts of her writing as chapters in Love Anthony. That’s a trope that is not for me.

However, the ending of this book was beautiful. I had tears in my eyes while reading the last few pages. There is a heartfelt message behind this story and it does an excellent job of bringing awareness and understanding about childhood autism to the reader. I loved the beach setting and I could picture the scenes so perfectly. Genova’s writing and her descriptive characters are what boosted my rating of this book so high when it was a storyline that I wasn’t so particularly fond of.

he Mother In Law by Sally Hepworth was a surprise 5-star. I was shocked that I enjoyed it as much as I did because I had heard mixed reviews about it. Again, I went into this book blind with no expectations because I didn’t re-read the synopsis beforehand. This enables me to enjoy the book for exactly what it is, and I loved this book!

This book is a suspenseful family drama. Hepworth’s writing is fast-paced and well-plotted. I appreciated the short chapters. This made it easier to navigate the multiple character perspectives and moving timelines of the story. The entire family of characters were enticing and interesting. I was drawn the most to Lucy as I could relate to her character the most. She’s a supportive wife, a caring mother, and she seeks affection and approval from her husband’s family without sacrificing her own morals and character. The story was twisty and suspenseful. I was kept guessing until the very last page.

Unfortunately, I was a bit bored by this audiobook. I only enjoyed the beginning and end, and I found the middle really dragged on. I think this was mostly because I was interested more in their deaths and the investigation. I wasn't curious so much about the history and career background of the Shermans. It does point fingers at detectives because of how the investigation was mishandled, which I found fascinating. It's still an open investigation but there a lot of unanswered questions about who could have been responsible. I appreciated the author's attempt at providing research and facts to readers. I just wish it was done so in a more interesting way. ⁣