stephsbooktalk's Reviews (915)

Mini Book Review:
I am not sure why I struggled with this book but it took me almost 2 weeks to complete. 
Instalove is a hit or miss trope for me. I know this is a novella so we didn't have much time to develop Nora and Bowie's relationship but it came on so quick. I wish Nora and Bowie had more resolution to why she pulled away - it kind of happened and then she called him to recite lines and we moved on. 

I love the diversity that Reynolds writes with and I love how she is not afraid to put sex in romances. Off the top of my head I am fairly certain that this is the first book that had toys in the bedroom. I love how Bowie was such a cinnamon roll in the outside world but when he was alone with Nora he became such a horndog.  

I also liked that we got some early appearances from Leighton and Killian who are the stars of the second novella. 

Just because this book it didn't work for me at this time doesn't mean you shouldn't read it! 
If you love a plus size FMC, bisexual short king, steamy romance set in California. 

I am looking forward to Reynold's next book & continue to support her! 

Audiobook Review: I won't make this super long as there's so much that I could cover in this review.

Britney Spears has been my queen since 1998 and little 11 year old me was such in awe of this woman who seemed so much older than me and was just so cool. She was EVERYTHING. And even going into my later teen years, into my 20s and 30s, she still was everything. I was well deep into the pop culture of Britney and would watch or read ANYTHING she was involved in. Hell I even cut my hair short after seeing the Lucky video! I wanted it short and so straight just so I could be like her.

It is easy to point fingers at who led to the demise of Britney Spears when in truth we all failed her.
What happened to Britney Spears should NEVER have happened to her but somehow it did. And honestly the biggest people who failed her was her family. They saw her talent, saw her drive and took advantage of what she could potential provide for them and ran with it. Those in her life whether that was her parents or management or record label, just kept wanting more and more and more from her and it is no wonder why she spiraled. I think pop singers now saw what Britney and Christina and all those who came before them and learned those boundaries.

Justin Timberlake.
Look it's no surprise to those who know me personally that I have loved Justin just as long as I have loved Britney and my love runs deep. And real fans will know he is a shitty person and made a lot of bad decisions (even in his current marriage) but was he the cause of the downfall of Britney? I do not think so. He was such a small blip in the bigger picture of her life and fame. I am constantly amazed how people are still hung up on end of this relationship 20+ years later. I am not condoning his behavior as it was definitely disappointing using their breakup or their relationship as a way to make headlines even years and years after it had ended. And Britney doesn't hold anything against him so why should we?

This book was really short and I wish we got more insight into those early years from MMC and into peak Baby One More Time and Oops I Did It Again. But I also know how the memories fade and with all that she has gone through remembering those early times may be hard to elaborate on. I am very interesting to see where Britney goes from here as she recently mentioned there is a second book that will be coming out?

I would have loved Britney to have read the audiobook but Michelle Williams did an excellent job as articulating her story. She had such a beautiful tone and richness which made listening comforting especially because of the content she was saying.

I want the absolute best for Britney & she deserves all the happiness in the world.

**I will not be rating Non Fiction books as it is based on real events and real experiences.**

Mini Audiobook Review: I did auto for this but I also received a complimentary copy of the book from Blackstone Publishing.

This book has 4 point of views and I was thankful that the audio did have 4 different narrators to voice each view. I was very into this book until the last quarter of it. I am not sure if because of what I was doing while I was listening but I just felt lost and wasn't sure what was happening?

I do wish that in present day the girls were a little older as how they presented themselves and it just seemed like they were way more mature than the actual age (I'm fairly certain they are 18/19 years old).

Even with not liking the last bit, I still really enjoyed and kept wanting to listen to it! The girls really stuck together when they needed to and they wanted to figure out what happened to this person who was so influential to them as tweens.

This was a debut and I thought the author did pretty well for her first book. I will definitely give her next book a try.

Thank you so much to the author for the complimentary copy of the book!

"I'll have it black, like my soul during the holidays."

I thought this novella was such a great way to jump into the holiday season. I have a love/hate relationship with novellas as I love that we get a completed story within a short amount or pages but what is missing with novellas is getting that full development of characters and growth from start to finish. I think especially with romances it is hard to imagine at least with this trope, the enemies to lovers building and then being resolved so quick.

I did like that instead of having a grumpy/sunshine trope, we had a grumpy/grumpy which I thought was a fun twist. I just didn't feel as connected to them as a couple. I wanted to so bad!

"I have big feelings for you."

I am definitely going to seek out the author's other work as I love the representation that the author writes about. I love seeing my body size represented and continues to prove that fat girls deserves love too!

If you are looking for a quick, holiday novella with spice & dual POV and takes place in a small town give this a read!

Swoon: 5/10
Karaoke: Sadly no

I definitely went into this book blind. I knew it was about a serial killer but that was really about it.

I am not a True Crime consumer at all. I know the names of some of the bigger cases and the basic facts about the murderer. In this case, I did not realize this was about Ted Bundy until the very end when the author thanked a Ted Bundy survivor in her acknowledgements and I googled the name mentioned. And from there I was able to see some of the comparisons of what was done in the book to what happened in real life.

I like that the author focused the book on the victims but I really wanted this to be completely fictional. Where there is some fictionalization there were still parts seemed to be taken from real life. Once again because I didn't realize this was based off Bundy's cases, I was waiting for a big twist of some sort to happen that linked Ruth's story to Pamela's story. I wish it either was completely fictional or more non fiction and not the blur of the two.

I paired this with the audio and I was a fan of Sutton Foster after watching Younger and I thought she was a great Pamela. She made her sound so mature beyond her years during the college years.

I thought the pacing of the book was pretty well. The beginning half and the last half were addicting while the middle was necessary but just not as memorable as much as the rest of the book was.

This was a bookclub selection and we all really enjoyed it and shared similar feelings towards it.

These two quotes really stood out for me:
"But all it did was make me realize that there wasn't so big a difference between the man who'd brutalized Denise and half the men I passed every day on the street."

"Some nights I lay in bed sleepless and full of apathy, realizing that The Defendant could have gone anywhere in the country, done this to any other group of women, and the defense could likely raise reasonable doubt by pointing a finger at the Roger who already resided among them. Rogers were everywhere, reasonable-doubt scapegoats waiting in the wings for a case like this."

Thank you so much to Berkley Romance for an advance copy of this!
Thank you so much to PRH Audiio for the complimentary audio! 

I have been such a fan of Rosie Danan since reading The Roommate last year. I knew she would be an autobuy/autoread author after that.

"You're about to soak through the pants I just gave you."

This book was different compared to not only to her other books but other contemporary romances out there (that I am aware of). This book gives us not only romance and a mystery all set in a Scottish setting.  You have two characters whose occupations are such an extension of them and Clark doesn't believe in what Riley does as a curse breaker. The tension didn't come right away which I appreciated by Danan because we got that heat fairly quickly as their relationship began as a one night stand.

But one of my issues was that enemy tension, it just didn't feel real? They came off a little dramatic and it felt like they were enemies for the sake of being enemies so we could have a trope. I did like the banter and the sex ritual as Danan excels in her spicy scenes.

I also was very happy to see that there was no 3rd act break up!!! I am so used to romances having this that this was refreshing. But instead we got a very tender heart to heart moment between Riley and her mother which I thought was so beautiful!
 
"What happened?"
"I fell in love."

I paired this with the audio and really enjoyed both narrators! Shane East did an excellent job as Clark - wheww. Riley was done by a new name to me Saskia Maarleveld who really brought her passion for curse breaking to life. 

I appreciated Danan doing something different in a romance. Seeing her speak about this book I can totally see how her love of historical romances (and the movie "The Mummy") influenced this. 

Not my favorite as my heart is still belongs to her debut but it is still a solid romance.

Swoon Meter: 6/10
Karaoke: Sadly no

Thank you so much to Penguin Teen & Razorbill for an advance copy of this! 
Thank you to PRH for the complimentary audio! 

One plane. 
12 contestants. 
An overnight flight to Europe. 
How many will survive the flight? 

The premise of this book drew me in. This was not the first book I read recently where teens were put together in one environment to play a game. I really enjoyed this and was sucked into the who dun it. 

I like that this took students from all over and they were forced to trust one another and to work together in order to make it through this flight. There were a lot of characters in this and many times I thought I knew who was the villian (of course I was proven wrong each time). Somehow despite having all these characters we were able to get to know them all and figure out what kind of personality they had. There were moments where you could tell it was a YA book (Emily with her boy crush tendencies) but even still I really enjoyed it. 

I thought the pacing of this book was well done but I just imagine being on that flight it felt like it was taking forever. I do not frequent planes often but I was trying so hard to figure out the setup of the plane they were on.  Planes with offices and a dining area?! 

I paired this with the audio and I thought the narrator Bailey Carr did a great job bringing the youthfulness to Emily and the other teens.  Adding the audio made it super bingeable and made me want to keep reading. 

If you are into force proximity, locked room with a cast of characters and a game thrown in - check this out! 

Mini Audiobook Review: I initially had no desire to read this book. Honestly the cover didn’t draw me in nor did the title and I had not read any of Ann’s work previously (nothing against her just haven’t had a chance to). BUT once it hit the bookstagram world and a podcast I listen to made it it’s book of the month, my interest was piqued. And THEN when I saw what the premise was about, and that Meryl Streep did the narration – I was sold!

It took me a bit to get into the format via audio as it dipped in and out of timelines without much distinguishing it until you hear what is happening. Having the text or reading from the physical would have been helpful. I feel like I enjoyed the 2nd halfway more than the first half when the story really ramped up. Honestly the children in this were slightly annoying. I kept forgetting they were grown children as sometimes when they spoke I felt like it came off very childish? This did take place during covid times but covid was not really mentioned except for them being together on the farm.

After I finished listening I went back to listen to the podcast episode that deep dived into it and it really was a nice follow up after completing it - check out Bad on Paper’s episode Sept 27 episode.

As expected, Meryl did a wonderful job at narration, and I thought she was the perfect choice given what we learned about the FMC Lara. I listened at a 1.5 speed and was able to complete it rather quickly.

Mini Audiobook Review: Keeping this short as there are so many reviews out there and you either will want to read this or you don't. 

 

I am not a fantasy reader. I have struggled so much conceptualizing what is happening. 

I paired the audio with the text (always had it by my side while listening). 

And even though my brain couldn't always figure out what was happening, I still enjoyed it. 

 

I definitely enjoyed the romance aspect of it; my favorite chapters were 47 & 48 (the throne iykyk). 

I never knew that I would fall for such a bad boy (he is such a protective mush towards Violet). I have so many quotes and pages tabbed because my hopeless romantic heart couldn't take it. 

 

Looking forward to seeing what happens next with the characters! 

 

Swoon: 10/10 

Karaoke: Sadly no 

Mini Audiobook Review:
“Why sit on Santa’s lap when you can sit on his face?”

This is the 2nd book in the duo’s Christmas Notch series and was one of my most anticipate reads for the 4th quarter. There were things I liked about this book compared to the first book in the series just like there were things I liked in the debut more than this.

I think my biggest issue was the immature of the FMC Winnie. I really felt in the 2nd half of the book she was very whiney and annoying? I had even texted a friend to make sure it wasn’t just me (she agreed). The trope in the 2nd half of the book didn’t even bother me, I just didn’t like how Winnie treated Kallum.

I thought the audio went by quick and that the narrators did a great job with the characters.
I definitely will be continuing the series because I have enjoyed each of these enough to want to continue.

Swoon Meter: 6/10
Karaoke: No