rebeccasreadingrambles's Reviews (3.06k)

I truly love Ann Patchett's writing. Her characters are deep and raw and flawed and so human. They are so well presented and developed so that by the end I have a clear vision of who they are...even if they don't know have such a clear view of themselves.
I love love loved the characters and they made this book so good.
This book was such a beautiful and emotion description of deep grief from different point of views. The inside of Sabine's mind was an interesting place to be and I enjoyed learning about Percifal from her memories combined with his family's.
I will admit there wasn't much of a "point" to this story. It's more of just a portrait of grief and "real" people's lives and thoughts. I am starting to ramble, but it's hard to really review this book as I thought it was unique, but also in Ann Patchett's lovely style.

It pains me to give a Christie book such a low rating, but this is my least favorite of all so far. Not only was it the slowest moving story, but I also felt like nothing was actually accomplished or resolved. The story just went around in circles and then all of a sudden it was over. I'm still confused about much of the stuff that happened. I had a lot of trouble paying attention and had to go back and re-read many passages that I had zoned out of. Though T&T are not my favorite AC characters, this novel was by far the worst.

What a different and interesting book. I really enjoyed it and it turned out to be so different from what I thought it was going to be. An intensely mysterious and romantic story. So many twists and turns through the book, right as you seem to have a handle on the story. I loved the characters (Fermin especially) and how their lives are interwoven. Many times I would be reading an account of Julians live and be having a heard time teasing it from Daniel's own.

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It was amazing that all these character's lives were tied to and revolved around the love between Penelope and Julian. I loved how the effects were still being felt many years later in Julian's lifetime and probably in his son's as well.

If you are stuck at the beginning, keep reading, because it will slowly pull you in until you can't put it down. Enchanting!

Wow. Ok I know why it took me so long to start this but dang was it good. This book was nothing like the ACOTAR series and I love that! This seems so much more complex and so many different elements are in play. I LOVE Celeana and was captured by her character right away. All the other characters are amazing and I am totally team Chaol. There were so many different mysteries at play that I couldn’t decide what I was more interested in; the competition or the evils in the castle. For the most part I was totally gripped by the writing and the story telling. There was a little lull in the middle and I kind of wish we got to see more of the Tests.

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I LOVED the poison one and thought it would be fun to see more of those types. But anyway the last Duel with Cain was INSANE and made up for all of that. And when she fought the Ridderack had be sitting up and reading as fast as I could flip the pages. I KNEW Cain was the one controlling it and getting the powers. I’m glad Nehemia revealed herself to Celeana and I hope we see more of her. I do not trust this King and I hope she doesn’t either!! I’m still a little confused about the other realms and felt like a LOT of information was thrown at us in the end, but hopefully it gets clearer as the series goes.

I loved this book. I was feeling kind of like Shannon at the start of this book... I wanted to have tons of Christmas spirit, but I was struggling. Well this book helped fix that. Nothing says Christmas like lots of Santas and a nice murder right? I love the holiday spirit and how it was sprinkled in throughout the book. I wish this large mansion being turned into beautiful apartment was a true story, because it was a lovely idea. Shannon Hammer is easily one of my favorite amateur sleuths and it also helps that she is surrounded by an awesome cast. Though I did need more Mac in my life during this story! Some of the things seemed obvious

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such as Lauren being pregnant and the mother of the mystery baby and I just knew the solution Shannon was going to come too. It still brought tears to my eyes while reading it though.

And I had my suspicions about the murderer from about halfway, I was only kind of correct about that. I just love Lighthouse Cove and these stories and I cannot wait to read more!

Wow. So it took almost a year for me to finish this book. My husband and I decided to listen to the audiobook in the car, and so we only got it in bursts and an occasional long trip. I don't quite know how to review this EPIC TOME. But here are some highlights:

Things I loved:
How we got to see so much of the character's lives. How many unpredictable things happened and all the drama. I enjoyed the characters - Ken Follett can write some seriously DISTURBING AND EVIL characters. And even the ones you are rooting for are flawed, and sometimes made you roll you eyes or want to yell at them (some of the characters are extremely selfish_hemCarishem_ and/or just so dumb it makes you yell_hemGwenda_). I loved the setting and how I really know what life was like during this time in history (for better or worse). The detail was fantastic and really well written. I loved how we followed all the main characters throughout their entire lives.

Things I didn't love:
The unnecessarily long description of disturbing things (there is sickness, gruesome injuries and fights, rape, sex, you name it). There was a lot of cringing involved by my husband and I - sometimes we honestly would have to mentally tune out because it made us feel a little ill. This book is GRAPHIC and we just didn't see the need for some of it. Basically everything disturbing thing you can think of was in this book.

Enemies to lovers is one of my favorite romance troupes, so I was very excited to read about Kate and Anthony. I did enjoy this one a lot, but not quite as much as the first Bridgerton book. I think I just had to adjust to it focusing on one of the male characters, though we do get a lot of POV from Kate, so it wasn't a huge difference. I just felt the tone was a bit different. I loved seeing the Bridgertons again, and most of their family scenes had me cracking up. This big, competitive family has all the sass that I love. I also really loved Kate, her snark was immediately apparent when she teased her younger sister and she had so much love for her family, which I really admired. She had a lot of tragedy in her life, but she did an amazing job of keeping it from being her down.
Anthony took me a moment to warm up to. I think because he was a little pig-headed in his attitude at first. She has these secrets demons and fears and he was letting it cause him to treat women in a way that made me so mad. That he would choose someone he did not love to marry, and had plans to still sneak behind her back! It had my blood boiling. However, once Kate was able to break through and get him to reveal his true self, I did like him more. The intense emotions between them (going from annoyance, to hatred, to passion to love) was really enjoyable to read about and the ending was so sweet.
I am looking forward to more fun with the Bridgertons!

Wow. Oh wow. Did I love this book. It had me laughing out loud so much that my coworkers gave me funny looks. It also had me close to tears and my heart was squeezed with both sadness and overwhelming happiness. A book about with female president, her biracial family, and bisexual son who falls in love with the Prince of England? Throw in a hate to love romance and I was ALL IN. And I can honestly say that this book blew my expectations out of the water. I already want (ie: NEED) to read it again.

The character were so sassy and sarcastic and I absolutely loved it. The fact that both Henry and Alex had this amazing attitude and humor, but could also have such amazingly tender moments made them such loveable characters. I love how they used old letters in their emails to each other and this author did an amazing job of making these characters realistic, but also people to look up to.

The romance was hot and I loved all their romancing scenes, especially when their relationship was secret and new. I cannot imagine having to hide a relationship like this from friends and family, but to be such public figures and worried about what the whole world things - it is unimaginable. I just wanted to be their advocates and give them such big hugs. There were moments of heartbreak that were so visceral and that just shows how amazing the writing and storytelling were.

I could honestly gush about this book forever, but I just have to say GO READ IT. It will make your heart so very happy.