teghans_tomes's Reviews (84)

This book was a really good read! I found it while browsing the library shelves and I thought it looked interesting. I had no idea I was in for such a wild ride of love and magic. Midnight at the Houdini is an action-packed magical realism story with a healthy sprinkling of love. The book was well crafted, and the magic system was so unique that I constantly wanted to learn more about its inner workings. I would recommend this book to anyone who loves a story with twists, turns, magicians and love finding a way to almost mess up the mission multiple times. It was a really great read and I cannot believe I had not heard of it before! 

I was told to read this book by a friend. I am not a memoir person, and I am not a very big fan of love, and so I thought I was going to hate this book. Why did I decide to read it anyway? I have no idea. I am glad I did, however. Since I picked this book up, I have started to look at the world differently and view my experiences with a new lens. I no longer felt so alone as a 20-year-old girl who has never even been in a relationship. I learned that it's hard and that's not always great to hear, but that friendships are just as if not more important than romantic interests. This is a good book, full of good life lessons, some harder to swallow then others, but all necessary to learn. I enjoyed the reading experience, and thank my friend for recommending it to me. I know have hope for the future, where before lay the scary though that all of my friends will find love and I will end up renting a 1 bedroom and be sad, now I know I will be renting a 1 bedroom and be happy!

This was a good book. I never thought I would pick up any of Backman's books because I am not a lit-fic girlie, however, I was walking around the library and I just so happened to pick this book up and read the synopsis. It sounded interesting so I picked it up! I am definitely glad I did too, Backman executed a well-done interconnected story! Each character has some relevance to every other character's life and I think that perfectly represents life in a small town. Overall, I gave this book three stars because it was a good book, and the ending had me sobbing on the floor, but it was sort of just a book in my eyes. Backman did something new with Anxious People and it was enjoyable and refreshing, but it did not change the way I looked at the world. I would absolutely, however, recommend this book to everyone. I can absolutely see the appeal within the pages, they just did not captivate me as much as they will someone else.

I loved this book! It was hard to put down to do things like sleep or work. I adore how this story is packed full of all of my favorite elements of spy movies, but is not being performed by a middle-aged white dude, instead, it's a young black woman! Ross is such a strong character, but unlike the "strong fmc" that has been used over and over again, we get to see her crack, we learn her faults, Kayvion Lewis does not shy away from Ross's imperfections and I love it! This book is absolutely jam packed with pure awesomeness and I think everyone should pick it up! I cannot wait for the sequel to come out in November, to see where Ross goes, and how her new "partnership" unfolds.

I went into this book after reading the title and looking at the cover. I expected a summer romance between an American girl and an Italian man, and I was ready to hate it but love the process of hating it. I was blown away to find a magical realism element, and it really saved this book for me. I think if I went in knowing it was magical realism, I would have been disappointed because while it is a cool concept, the "magic system" was only vaguely explained and it was more of an excuse for the book existing, then to serve as a useful magic system. However, I did really enjoy the concept of said "system" and once I started to like that, I was able to pay a bit more attention to what the book was actually about: grief. I think the book does a wonderful job illustrating the different ways people grieve with the same loss, it was a good book. It wasn't entirely transformative for me, I did not walk away with a different view on the world, but it wasn't the trainwreck I was expecting. It was good! Do I recommend this book? Maybe, if you are feeling a book about grief and a bit of time travel, otherwise, it will not be the end of the world if you skip this one, the world will still spin, the sun will still rise and set, and bugs will continue to be gross.

I don't know what I can say about this book that has not already been said. It is an incredible graphic novel that is able to tell a story from the perspective of a child who grew up to fast but still holds on to a childlike whimsy, while simultaneously recounting facts of a horrible event in human history. I am always saying that graphic novels allow stories to be told that are really heavy but gives them an air of lightheartedness with cartoon characters and this book is no exception to that. I think a graphic novel is truly the only way this story should be told. It is able to tell hard hitting facts about the Islamic revolution but upholds that childish aspect to it with the, albeit black and white, cartoon-style drawings. My mouth has been left agap and I don't know if I will ever be able to close it again. If you have not yet read this book, go to a bookstore, or library or open up your Kindle and do it right now!

This book gave me everything, and I ate it up! This book deals so heavily in smashing the patriarchy, and not asking but TAKING equal rights. There are plenty of twists and turns, broken bones and hardened hearts, but through all, love and determination perseveres and persists. Xiran Jay Zhao perfectly weaves Chinese culture and mythology with sci-fi and has created this book that has be BEGGING for the next book to be in my hands years ago. I learned so much about myself and have come away with a new lense on the world that I didn't have before. This book has a bit of everything and even if sci-fi isn't your genre, you will devour this book like I did!

This book was incredible! I loved every second of my reading journey with this book. It took a few chapters to fully understand what was happening, but once I did, I could not put the book down. This book expertly weaves love into a story about time travel and a war into a story about love. No one element feels out of placed or forced. If you have ever been somewhere in a single moment, where you think to yourself "this is perfect" and you just have the most wonderful feeling, you know what it feels like to read this book. Every single person needs to read this books and grow as a person because of it. 

This was an adorable sequel! I enjoyed watching the characters get better established in their world and face new problems along the way. The new character, Alice, was interesting. Her struggle is not  shown but rather talked about so it was interesting to see how the author played with that and gave just enough detail to still be mysterious while simultaneously giving enough detail for the reader to have sympathy for Alice. 

I was supposed to read this book for a class, and while I love the concept, I just could not get into it. I skipped around a bit but I just do not like zombies and so it was hard for me to really care about the struggles of the interviewies. I do want to give this book another try at some point but that is not right now.