Disclaimer: I received the finished book from the author. Thanks! All opinions are my own.

Book: Deadlock

Author: C.E. Clayton

Book Series: Ellinor Book 2

Rating: 4.5/5

Diversity: Non-Binary Characters, Bisexual coded MC

Recommended For...: science fiction, magic, technology

Publication Date: November 2, 2021

Genre: Sci-Fi

Recommended Age: 18+ (Language, Violence, Gore, Death, Drug and alcohol allusions, Terminal illness allusion, Romance, Sexual content, Religion, Grief)

Explanation of CWs: There is cursing in this book. There is lots of violence and some gore. There is death and the death of a spouse is mentioned, as well as grief. There are some allusions to drug and alcohol, as well as terminal illness. There is also some romance and sexual content. There is slight mentions of religion.

Publisher: Starfish Ink

Pages: 367

Synopsis: The plan was always to go to Amardeep, just not like this.

Ellinor Rask always planned to head for the Ashling’s island in order to hunt down those who had killed her husband, but now she’s going for something she didn’t expect: help. With Ellinor’s magic still beyond her reach, the only ones capable of removing her magical shackle are the sentient androids Ellinor has vowed to destroy. If only she can tolerate the Ashlings long enough to aid them in return, of course.

But getting the attention of those who could help proves difficult, and more dangerous than anticipated. Knowing whom to trust becomes a frantic dance as Ellinor and her friends traverse the toxic island in disguise, going from fight-club dance arenas to drug labs all in their search for assistance. Ellinor discovers, however, that hiding a dreeocht who is becoming more unstable by the second is increasingly deadly.

If hiding was all Ellinor had to worry about, she might have a chance at survival. But something waits beneath the glitter of Amardeep that Ellinor and her friends are not expecting . . . something they may be unprepared to face.

Review: For the most part I liked this sequel! I loved the addition of Fiss and I felt like this book was more cohesive than the first one. The plot seemed more streamlined and a little less chaotic. The book had great character development and world building. The book was also well plotted and overall I really liked it and felt it was a great continuation of the main story.

However, I did have some issues with the book. I felt like the book needed a recap in the beginning, which would help readers since the first book had quite a bit happen in it. The back to back action scenes gave me a bit of whiplash and it felt a bit daunting to have a lot of action scenes. I also felt that the book slowed down a bit midway.

Verdict: It was good!

Disclaimer: I received this e-book from the author. Thanks! All opinions are my own.

Book: Lost Boy

Author: Rawiri James

Book Series: Standalone

Rating: 1/5

Diversity: Italian American/Indigenous MC, POC characters (nothing was very concrete about their race), Jewish side character

Recommended For...: (note: I can’t recommend this for younger than 18 readers because of the way the material in this book is written) paranormal, mystery

Publication Date: October 4, 2019

Genre: YA Paranormal Mystery

Recommended Age: 18+ (Sex, Cheating, Sexual content, Language, Disordered eating TW, Parental Death, Bulimia TW, purging shown TW, Underage alcohol consumption, Grief, Pressuring Sex, Religion, Alcoholism, Abelist comments, Drug use, Racism mentioned, Homophobia mentioned, Child abuse mentioned, Emotional abuse, Violence, Gore, Romance, Rape of a minor mentioned)

Explanation of CWs: Sex, pressuring for sex, and sexual content is shown and mentioned, including the talk about pornography. There is romance and cheating in the book. There is a lot of curse words in the book. Disordered eating is shown, fatphobia is in the book, bulimia is mentioned, and there is purging and excessive working out shown. Parent death and grief are shown. Underage alcohol consumption and drug use is shown in the book. Religion is briefly mentioned. Alcoholism is shown. There are some abelist comments in the book, including the R word being said, and there is racism and homophobia mentioned in the book. Child abuse is mentioned in the book. There is emotional abuse shown in the book as well as violence and gore. There is rape of a minor mentioned in the last bit of the book.

Publisher: Indie Published

Pages: 310

Synopsis: Overdue assignments.
Overbearing parents.
Overactive hormones.

Being sixteen sure does suck sometimes.

Yet Mike DeVelli Jr. knows he is destined for greatness. His mother always told him so - at least, until the unfortunate day an overdose took her to an early grave. As grief befalls the DeVelli house, Mike's father retreats to the liquor bottle, while Mike throws himself obsessively into exercise. All this, while avoiding the pitying gazes of the students at school whom he always struggled to fit in with.

It's not all bad, though. He has his best friend Joey, a loyal and quick-witted kid who's raging libido brings its own troubles; and he has Nicole, his girlfriend of nearly two years. Sweet, strong Nicole. She knows Mike even better than he knows himself. Lately, he's been acting different. Distant, weird, with an arrogance even his newly-formed six-pack doesn't warrant. Nicole has noticed. And she's not the only one.

Mike catches the eye of popular It Girl, Priya, at school. Flirtation spills over and they agree to meet, but she fails to show, and Mike feels rejected yet again. Priya is soon reported missing and Mike becomes a lead suspect in her disappearance. As the town of Flatbush searches desperately for Priya, the investigation mounts, with many residents under the magnifying glass of Inspector Peter McCall and Officer Espinoza. The evidence continues to point in Mike's direction and with the help of Nicole and Joey, the three teenagers decide their only option is to uncover the identity of the real culprit.

Getting closer to the truth, he learns that his seemingly ordinary family tree has supernatural roots, and as he comes face to face with a hungry, eveil enemy, he discovers a power inside himself that will create a wave of change in the world.

Touching on themes of addiction, loss and racial identity, Lost Boy is an engaging coming-of-age story, an entertaining superhero origin tale, and a suspenseful mystery thriller, all in one.

Review: Oh boy, this was… a book. I feel bad for this because the book had a lot of promise, but it fell flat for me. The positives? The character development was good. However, that’s the only thing that I felt was good about the book unfortunately. The book has a lot of promise, but there’s a lot of work to do on this book to make it good. The POV of the book keeps switching and it’s very disorienting to the reader. One second we are following Mike and then we are following his girlfriend Nicole and then we’re following some random guy in a completely different place that’s unconnected to Mike and then we’re back, but following a teacher. It’s so weird and it would be good for a TV show manuscript, but not for a book. The writing got weirder in the book with the weird and random flashbacks that would happen and the random interjections of different characters doing different things than what the plot was calling for. The powers and supernatural themes in this book didn’t come into play until the middle of the book and there was no build up to it nor was there any conclusion to it. It just kind of happened and then didn’t. I was also sad to see a lack of world building and I was confused by how some of the characters were written. This is definitely a more mature young adult book, but it feels like Mike is being written more mature than what is the norm in YA. I am very pro-sex positive in YA books and it should be normalized, but there’s a level of care that happens when you write YA books with the intention of young children as young as 13 reading them. I also am concerned that while there are POC characters in this book, the book doesn’t describe these characters until very far into the book or just off-handedly about 70% through it. I felt very confused by the writing of this book.
I also want to talk about what felt like a lack of research on police procedures with juveniles from what I saw as a former Juvenile Clerk. This is not indicative to all states, but how the two I’ve worked in have handled juveniles and how their laws were. The main character mentions that he is a sophomore in high school, but then is not treated as a juvenile when arrested. When a child is arrested by the police they should NEVER be questioning them without the presence of a parent, legal guardian, or legal aid especially after they say they wanted to speak to their attorney. All communication stops there about the case at all and they are kept waiting until an attorney is present. Children are also not kept in general population when arrested. They are taken to a juvenile detention center or to a special segment of a jail/prison where none of the adults can talk or touch them. Juveniles are also placed into correctional uniforms when booked in as well, not left with their clothes and just without their shoelaces, that’s sometimes a mental institution that does that. Juveniles also see a Judge within 24 hours on business days and on Monday by noon on weekends. Juvenile Judges also usually go into a juvenile detention center on holidays to make sure that the kids don’t spend holidays in detention centers. Within 24 hours, the next day by noon, our MC should have been in front of a Judge. The way that Mike was treated during these passages really feel like he was being written as an adult rather than a kid.
Finally, I had tremendous issue with the way that the mother was wrote. She’s fat at 350 pounds, which is fine because I myself am 300 pounds, but she is described in the most fatphobic way that I’ve ever read in my life. She’s described as lazy and unable to move because of the weight she has. She dies from “overeating” as described by a character later. The author even goes on to describe how some characters were concerned at the mother’s funeral because they were concerned about how to lift a 350 pound woman in her casket. I will say that, reading this on a treadmill actively doing cardio as apart of a book challenge I’m voluntarily participating in, I felt very insulted by these words. Even if I misread the weight that the mother was, I would still feel insulted because this is NOT how you talk about fat characters in books. The book doesn’t stop with the mother when it comes to fat shaming however. The book constantly talks about the food that Mike is eating or won’t eat. A part of the book is about Mike’s eating disorder and I’ve read books that have talked about eating disorders before. However, the way that the food is described is incredibly insensitive and given how the POV is written it feels like the author is fat shaming and impressing disordered thinking about food on young readers.

Overall, I’m just very confused and hurt by this book. I had an idea of what would happen in this book, but it was completely different and badly executed. I think there’s some promise of this book, but it will take a lot of work to fix it.

Verdict: Not for me, but maybe for you? Definitely needs work though.

Disclaimer: I received this e-arc and finished copy from the publisher. Thanks! All opinions are my own.

Book: If This Gets Out

Author: Sophie Gonzales & Cale Dietrich

Book Series: Standalone

Rating: 4/5

Diversity: Gay MC, Bisexual anxiety MC, Asian side character, M/m romance

Recommended For...: young adult readers, contemporary, romance, LGBT+, boy bands, music books

Publication Date: December 7, 2021

Genre: YA Contemporary Romance

Recommended Age: 17+ (Language, Sex, Sexual content, Homophobia, Racism, Underage alcohol consumption, Romance, Sexualization, Emotional Abuse, Drug abuse, Drug usage, Violence, Gore)

Explanation of CWs: There is a lot of curse words in the book. There is some sex and sexual content shown in the book with some brief depictions. There is homophobia and racism shown in the book. There are a few scenes that show the kids underage drinking (not considering Europe because it’s legal at 18 over there and all are 18-19 at the time of the book). There is a lot of romance shown, it is friends to lovers. There is some sexualization of the boys shown. There is some emotional abuse shown. Drug abuse is shown as well as some brief mentions of drug usage. There is also one scene in which one of the boys gets injured and is shown bloody.

Publisher: Wednesday Books

Pages: 400

Synopsis: Eighteen-year-olds Ruben Montez and Zach Knight are two members of the boy-band Saturday, one of the biggest acts in America. Along with their bandmates, Angel Phan and Jon Braxton, the four are teen heartbreakers in front of the cameras and best friends backstage. But privately, cracks are starting to form: their once-easy rapport is straining under the pressures of fame, and Ruben confides in Zach that he’s feeling smothered by management’s pressure to stay in the closet.

On a whirlwind tour through Europe, with both an unrelenting schedule and minimal supervision, Ruben and Zach come to rely on each other more and more, and their already close friendship evolves into a romance. But when they decide they’re ready to tell their fans and live freely, Zach and Ruben start to truly realize that they will never have the support of their management. How can they hold tight to each other when the whole world seems to want to come between them?

Review: I really liked this one overall! I thought that this was a cool book that focused on two members of a boy band and a lot of the things that happened within the band made a lot of small references to other bands/singers like N’Sync, Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, and Taylor Swift. The character development was good, the world building was good, and I really liked how seamless the story flowed with two authors. If you’re a big gossiper or like books that revolve around the goings on of bands, then this will be the book for you!

However, I did think that there were some issues with the book. The beginning is a bit chaotic and it takes a bit to get into the book. The pacing was a bit off in a few places and it slowed way way down than what I thought it needed to. The book is already a little slow to begin with, which makes some of the middle part a little exhausting especially considering that the “will they get together” part only lasted less than 100 pages. I also thought that there were a bit too many plot points that were going on at once.

Verdict: It was good!

Disclaimer: I received this e-arc from the publisher. Thanks! All opinions are my own.

Book: You Can Go Your Own Way

Author: Eric Smith

Book Series: Standalone

Rating: 1/5

Recommended For...: young adult books, contemporary, romance

Publication Date: November 2, 2021

Genre: YA Contemporary Romance

Recommended Age: 14+ (Language, Vandalism, Sexual content, Dead parent, Grief, Sexism, Bullying, Underage consumption of alcohol)

Explanation of CWs: There are a few curse words said in this book. There is a vandalism scene in the beginning of the book. There are some sexual content and jokes told. Adam has a deceased father and it’s brought up a lot in the book, as well as his and Whitney’s grief. There is some sexism discussed. There is some underaged drinking. There is also a lot of bullying scenes.

Publisher: Inkyard Press

Pages: 336

Synopsis: Adam Stillwater is in over his head. At least, that’s what his best friend would say. And his mom. And the guy who runs the hardware store down the street. But this pinball arcade is the only piece of his dad that Adam has left, and he’s determined to protect it from Philadelphia’s newest tech mogul, who wants to turn it into another one of his cold, lifeless gaming cafés.

Whitney Mitchell doesn’t know how she got here. Her parents split up. She lost all her friends. Her boyfriend dumped her. And now she’s spending her senior year running social media for her dad’s chain of super successful gaming cafés—which mostly consists of trading insults with that decrepit old pinball arcade across town.

But when a huge snowstorm hits, Adam and Whitney suddenly find themselves trapped inside the arcade. Cut off from their families, their worlds, and their responsibilities, the tension between them seems to melt away, leaving something else in its place. But what happens when the storm stops?

Review: This was an ok book. The book had good character development for the most part and I liked the world building. I also liked the main plot of the story and I thought it was a good plot.

But, oh my, this book probably made me question myself as a reader. I’ve heard a lot of good about this book and I went in with high expectations and this book faltered on everything I thought. The beginning of the book is a complete mess and nothing was explained for awhile. The parents in this book do not talk like parents. They two main characters are horrible and I felt nothing for either of them. There’s not a descriptor for any character in this book, which left me confused as to how to paint these characters in my mind. There is a lot of elitist and sexism video game talk, Adam is a bit of a purist in his pinball talk and Whitney, who is an avid gamer supposedly even though she hardly does it throughout the book and is more micromanger, talks down about people who play games like Animal Crossing rather than Mass Effect. The Twitter conversations that the kids have between each other are NOT how kids or companies talk to each other on Twitter. The whole of the book focuses on one thing, but at the end you figure out it was all for nothing and it’s “fixed” with possibly the stupidest thing I’ve ever read. The ending of the book fixed nothing and a lot of plot holes are just left out. The whole of the book just made me extremely angry and I feel like I wasted a lot of time reading it, and while I understand that this is an arc and it was unfinished by the time I got it I do not feel any inclination to pick up a physical copy of this one.

Verdict: Not for me, but you can try it out.

Disclaimer: I received this e-arc from the publisher. Thanks! All opinions are my own.

Book: The Women of Pearl Island

Author: Polly Crosby

Book Series: Standalone

Rating: 3/5

Recommended For...: historical fiction, mystery

Publication Date: December 7, 2021

Genre: Historical Fiction

Recommended Age: 17+ (Animals Hurt, Animal Violence, Grief, Death, Romance)

Explanation of CWs: The book starts with a butterfly getting its wing repaired and it’s in pain. The book focuses a lot on grief and death. There is also some romance.

Publisher: Park Row

Pages: 352

Synopsis: Set on a secluded island off the British coast, The Women of Pearl Island is a moving and evocative story of family secrets, natural wonders and a mystery spanning decades.

When Tartelin answers an ad for a personal assistant, she doesn't know what to expect from her new employer, Marianne, an eccentric elderly woman. Marianne lives on a remote island that her family has owned for generations, and for decades her only companions have been butterflies and tightly held memories of her family.

But there are some memories Marianne would rather forget, such as when the island was commandeered by the British government during WWII. Now, if Marianne can trust Tartelin with her family's story, she might finally be able to face the long-buried secrets of her past that have kept her isolated for far too long.

Review: So I was intrigued with this book because of the butterflies, but I should really read the synopses better lol. I did like the story for the most part and I felt like the characters were well developed. The plot of the story kept me intrigued in finding out the ending and I also feel like the writing fits the book well.

However, I did not like the book a lot. The way the story was told was confusing for me and I was couldn’t connect to the characters. The writing is kind of flowery and I normally don’t like that. The world building was kind of everywhere as well and it was just not a book for me.

Verdict: Not for me, but maybe for you.

Disclaimer: I received this e-arc from the author. Thanks! All opinions are my own.

Book: The Winter Charlatan

Author: Victoria McCombs

Rating: 5/5

Recommended For...: middle grade readers, fantasy, magic, retellings, Sleeping Beauty

Publication Date: December 7, 2021

Genre: MG Fantasy

Recommended Age: 10+ (Romance, Slight Violence, Slight Gore)

Explanation of CWs: Very light romance with some kisses and the story doesn’t focus on it. There is also some very slight violence and gore.

Publisher: Indie Published

Pages: 336

Synopsis: A Queen raised in the shadows, and a Fraud Prince who needs her help.

The sole heir to the kingdom is destined to sleep for a hundred years. To hide this liability, the queen left her cursed daughter in the care of a trusted lord, while taking his son as her own. Rowan grew up hating the boy who had her crown and vowed to one day reclaim her place as queen.

But when a neighboring king threatens a war they won’t survive, Rowan must work with the fraud prince to save Elenvérs. She pledges herself as his spy in the enemy court and lives in the heart of danger. If she can’t save her kingdom before the curse hits, there may be nothing left to wake up to.

Review: For the most part I really liked this book! The character development and world building was well done and I loved all of the dialogue and all of the relationships. The writing was well done and I was able to read through this super quickly. The book had a lot of fun twists and turns and it was just a fun magical book.

The only issues I had with the book are that I felt the book was too fast paced for me and that I feel like I would have a better understanding of this world overall if I read the other books.

Verdict: It was good!

Disclaimer: I received this e-book and finished book from the publisher. Thanks! All opinions are my own.

Book: Killer Content

Author: Kiley Roache

Book Series: Standalone

Rating: 5/5

Diversity: Lesbian character, Bisexual character, F/f romance at the end

Recommended For...: young adult readers, mystery, murder mystery, thriller, tiktok, LGBT+

Publication Date: November 30, 2021

Genre: YA Mystery

Recommended Age: 15+ (Romance, Underage consumption of alcohol, Murder/Death, Gore, Sexual content, Language, Disordered eating, Suicide shown)

Explanation of CWs: There is some romance and sexual content mentioned and slightly shown. There is a lot of underaged drinking. The book revolves around a murder and death and there is gore shown. There are some curse words and some mentions of disordered eating. There is also a suicide shown in the book.

Publisher: Underlined

Pages: 317

Synopsis: Knives Out meets One of Us is Lying! In this paperback original thriller a group of famous TikTokers find themselves turning on each other when one member of the group turns up dead at their beachfront Malibu mansion.

35 million followers. One dead body.

The six teenagers who make up the Hype House seem to have it all. A beach front Malibu mansion, millions of TikTok followers, model good looks, and sponsorship deals up to $30,000 per post. Everything's pretty much a Gen-Z paradise. Except that one member of the house has just turned up dead in the infinity pool. And the rest of them are suspects.

When the group TikTok account starts posting cryptic messages about the murder, the police limit their investigation to the members of the house. Now old joke videos are filed as evidence and past rivalries start to look like motives.

As investigators dig into these influencers' lives beyond their glossy internet personalities, they discover all five had reasons their lives would've been easier with Sydney Reynolds dead. But only one of them killed her.

Underlined is a line of totally addictive romance, thriller, and horror paperback original titles coming to you fast and furious each month. Enjoy everything you want to read the way you want to read it.

Review: I didn’t think I’d love this book as much as I did but I was so so wrong! This was a fun murder mystery, but set in the modern world of TikTok and cell phones and influencers! I thought the book did so well with the multiple POVs and time skips. The book flowed so well and the characters were well developed. The world building was well done as well and the plot kept me going. I also failed to guess the killer… soooooo IT”S GOOD!

However, I did think that some of the events of the book were a bit exaggerated. The police investigation was severely botched, but that does happen. There is also a lack of truecrimetiktok in the book, which, if you were on TikTok during the Gabby Petito, you know that truecrimetiktok would have been all over that FYP.

Verdict: It was great!