this was so fun!! it didnt quite live up to the teases on social media, but i really enjoyed it. helen (countess in her own right) is one of my fav heroines ever! the whole cast of characters is great. i just wish it would have been a little longer, so jack could apologize more and helen could explain more. i also wanted more about jack’s past and a greater sense of resolve from his whole “all women are cheaters” philosophy 

isla hit different this time. so good. 

only had to read 2 chapters of it for class

omg omg omg this was awesome. these characters are wonderfully written and well-developed. like seriously amazing character work. they feel so real that they practically jump off of the page, and i know that they will stay with me for a long time

i did not think that this could live up to sarah maclean’s hype but OMG. the story, the characters, the writing, the spice…PERFECTION 

a good overview of madison’s life, but parts of it certainly could have been more sensitive 

Unfortunately, I did not enjoy this. I like Grant, though. Obviously, Chernow is one of the most famous historians of all time, so my hopes were high, but it was just not my favorite. First of all, 2017 was too late to be calling people "blacks" and "Indians". If a group of people do not want to be called something, it is the most respectful course of action to NOT CALL THEM THAT. I also did not like how he spoke about women. He was not outwardly misogynistic, but his general tone just made me a little upset. It seemed like he dismissed Mary Lincoln as a stereotypical crazy female and stereotyped Julia Grant as a caricature of a nineteenth-century woman. Like the last two books I've read, it was also too long. It was sometimes repetitive and sometimes gave far too much information. Like yes, Grant was an alcoholic, but he did not need to mention every single time that Grant ever drank alcohol in his entire life. This book is supposed to be complimentary, but to me, it just dismisses Grant's failures instead of debunking them and kind of makes Grant look like an idiot. One thing that it made me think about was the nature of intelligence. Grant was often faulted for his gullibility and regarded as a simpleton (he even has the lowest estimated IQ out of all of the presidents), but his work in the military is widely considered genius. Contradictory views surrounding his intelligence are something that I think Chernow should have explored more, but he neglected to do so. The writing itself uses a lot of superlatives, like "best," "worst," "most," etc. This is just bad history, in my opinion. Chernow does not get to say who the "most racist" figure is; that cannot be definitively proven. I often use hyperbole in my daily life, but in history, it should be avoided. Finally, the Jimmy Carter audiobook was read by a black man because of its use of the n-word when quoting people. This book also uses that word, and a white man reads it. I am no expert on usage, but I'm not sure how I feel about that.

i didn’t love how much flack carter got for being a “playboy”. like it feels unfair to stereotype all of the women he slept with, saying that all of them wanted more than just one night, but women can like one night stands too!! and carter was never duplicitous with the women he was with. the writing was okay but not the best, and i liked how it was mostly pretty low-angst. in the end, it made me happy

i wasn’t completely vibing w this at first, but once thronos left his slut-shaming era, i got really into the characters together