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purplepenning

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Yes

I don't usually do horror or horror-adjacent and I literally just finished reading it on a dark and stormy night when I still have a touch of fever, so I need a beat before crafting a real review. It's undoubtedly fascinating, though! And the writing is lush but not overly so. 

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emotional hopeful lighthearted medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes

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adventurous challenging emotional mysterious tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Yes

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted reflective medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No

I enjoy the single mom, writer's life perspective and the self-referential meta-Hallmark-movie-ness of it all but I was expecting a little more depth to that aspect. Something a little more subversive. There are a couple of tropes here I don't enjoy and pacing that didn't quite work for me. An enjoyable, fast, meta-Hallmark-movie read with a few amusing and relatable lines and scenes.

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emotional hopeful reflective slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Hubert Bird is a dapper, elderly widower who was born and raised in Jamaica before immigrating to the U.K. as a young adult in 1958. When we meet him, he has shut himself off from the world, spinning stories of a vibrant life of retirement to satisfy his daughter Rose's expectations during their weekly phone calls. Cracks start to form in his isolation when he gets a friendly, chatty, persistent new neighbor and when he discovers that Rose will soon be visiting from Australia. As Hubert attempts to create the life he has been pretending to live, we see moments from his past that have led to the life he's living now — and that may empower the life he wants and needs.

An unexpectedly touching, well-crafted story of isolation, connection, love, and friendship. Perfect for fans of A Man Called Ove, The Secret Life of Albert Entwistle, The Reading List, and other stories of curmudgeonly elders opening their hearts and finding their communities. 

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emotional lighthearted mysterious medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No

A lot of fun for Austen fans! Not only do we get Wickham's comeuppance, but it happens in a super-sequel where characters from Austen's books are gathered together at a house party hosted by Emma and Mr. Knightly! In addition to our favorite established couples (Elizabeth and Darcy, Marianne and Colonel Brandon, Fanny and Edmund, Anne and Captain Wentworth), a few delightfully original characters of marrying age are introduced — Elizabeth and Darcy's eldest son, Catherine and Henry Tilney's daughter, and Jane and Frank Churchill's daughter. As the only two members of the house party to have an alibi and no motive, Jonathan Darcy and Juliet Tilney set aside propriety for investigative camaraderie. But neither propriety nor camaraderie are easy in a house where everyone is protecting secrets and someone is an actual murderer. 

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emotional hopeful reflective tense fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Yes

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challenging informative reflective medium-paced

There are a lot of excellent "antiracist" reads out right now but if I had the power to grant my friends, family, and colleagues access to and genuine understanding of one, and only one, this would be my pick. 

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Author Sangu Mandanna set out to write a "warm, cozy, romantic story about magic and family. A story that was, above all things, about love and human connection." She did just exactly that.

Pick this one up if you're looking for a unique, funny, heartwarming comfort read with witches galore (a studious young orphan, a murderously protective younger orphan, a high-spirited youngest orphan, lonely practitioners, an imperious elder), a mysterious absentee benefactor, a sweet housekeeper, an impish retired actor, a steady gardener, a golden-coated golden-hearted retriever, a floating koi pond, a sexy scowling growling librarian, and magic sprinkled like stardust throughout a found-family story. 

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emotional reflective slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No

Epic family drama is not usually the sort of story I'm drawn to, but I do like a good sibling tale and I enjoy sampling the work of great writers who don't write in my preferred styles and genres. Tom Hanks narrating a sibling story by Ann Patchett seemed like the perfect opportunity. And it was! I read a few chapters throughout  — enough to know that Hanks's narration probably added a full star of enjoyment to my rating. It's not a fast read either way, but what felt too slow in my hands became a fascinating and skillful unfolding in his. 

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