12/25 - okay so I never reviewed this. But in short, I really enjoyed it. I thought the MC’s anxiety was well portrayed, the chemistry was great between the MCs, and it’s just a very sweet romance. But I’m writing this review now almost 4 months after finishing this book because I wanted to let people know that this book is my gold standard now for the “I’m so into you, I can’t stop responding to your messages” vibes. It actually makes me a little sad now when books don’t have that vibe.

This was sort of a middle of the road romance. It was an entertaining thing to listen to for a few hours, but I have no real feelings about this one way or the other.

Except interview epilogues. I hate interview epilogues. They always just feel like cheap ways to sum up what the MCs have been up to in the last five years, or whatever. Bah.

I had some problems with this book but I ended up really enjoying it. I mean, the narration is fantastic. This most certainly would have been 3 stars had I just read the book.

My problems really come down to the fact that twice in this book, MC1 has nothing but platonic feelings for MC2 and then QUITE SUDDENLY, realizes that the MC2 is hot and that MC1 is attracted to MC2. And this happens twice (with different main characters in the MC1 and MC2 slots). And I never quite bought it. Idk. I just didn’t.

My other problem was that there were several conversations where characters started repeating themselves. Like, okay, you just said this. Are you drunk on orgasms? Is that what’s going on here?

But otherwise, I did like this. I think just as a book this is a very middle of the road book - nothing particularly special about it, one way or the other. The characters where fine. The plot was fine. The narration is perfection.

Y’all. This is a wild book.

So, first thing I should say about this is that this book contains so much queer angst. And listen. That’s not a criticism. I feel for Katrina. It’s just a statement of fact. There’s a lot of transphobia and more general queerphobia (including slurs, and one instance of deadnaming) in this book, and Katrina is very traumatized by everything she has had to endure. So I just want anyone going into this book to be aware of that.

NOW LET US TALK ABOUT MY FAVORITE THING ABOUT THIS BOOK. It’s something of an incongruity that almost almost doesn’t work. This book - tonally speaking - is very serious. This book is feat of storytelling in how it takes characters that are sheer ridiculousness and manages to somehow not only fit and be important to the story, but also have great character arcs themselves.

So let’s discuss the characters, okay?
1. First, we have Katrina, a sad, scared trans violinist with no formal training.
2. Next, there’s Shizuka Satomi, a woman frequently referred to as the Queen of Hell, who is training violinists and then taking their souls. (Already, I’m sure you see a large chunk of the plot here.)
Sounds like fun, right? Well, buckle up, buttercup.
3. THEN we have Lan Tran, the matriarch of a FAMILY OF ALIENS who are on Earth SELLING DONUTS.

I honestly just want an entire book of the Tran family selling donuts on Earth by way of Becky Chambers. (Maybe I need to read Wayfarers #4 soon.)

There’s other bits that are ridiculous in their own way too, but I’m not going to spoil anything. What can I say? I had a great time with this. I half read the book and half listened to the audiobook (which is great, btw). The ending was wonderful. This book lays it on a little thick with the metaphors, but I’m a particularly dense human being and I probably would have missed it if it was subtler.

All in all, this was great. Highly enjoyed.

(They bought a donut shop and they’re SELLING DONUTS.)

CWs: transphobia, queerphobia, mentions of domestic and child abuse, slurs, off page rape, death threats, on page death of minor character (but no gore), deadnaming.

An incredible follow up to A Psalm for the Wild-Built. Like, I’m writing this three weeks after I read it and while I don’t remember as much about it, I can still talk about all the things I loved about it.

For starters, Dex and Mosscap. They both grow so much in this book. Thinking back to the first book, they have a lot of conversations about what it means to be human and to need things, but they really expand on those conversations and take it in directions the first book didn’t go. And they’re beautiful, lovely conversations that are inherently very relatable.

Secondly, the world building. I loved the world building. We find out little nuggets more about the world. In particular, pebs. The system of currency is a stroke of genius and every week I have found myself wishing that we could switch to pebs. (I’m sure that Becky Chambers didn’t invent the idea of a customer-based currency like pebs, but I’m still giving her credit here because this book deserves it.)

Thirdly, the side characters. There’s so many interesting people Dex and Mosscap meet. Leroy such a sweetheart and I love Dex’s family. And now I’ve forgotten the name of the person they meet in that town they get to that doesn’t like robots, but they were great too.

Lastly, Em Grosland does a fantastic job narrating this. I read the first book with my eyeballs but I’m so glad I listened to this one. He really adds so much to this book by how he tells it. There’s several parts where I laughed out loud because the narration was so spot on and perfect. If you have the option of listening to this book, DO IT.

Y’all. I love this series so freaking much.

Okay so. This book. Wow. Okay.

First, understand. This rating only has as many stars as it does due to the narrator Rebecca Lee. I doubt I could have finished this book without Lee telling me this story. It was perfect. Every character had a subtle yet distinctly different voice and I was never confused as to who was talking. On top of that, I just found Lee’s narration and voice easy to listen to and get sucked into the story with. Honestly, the best thing about this book.

This is a very sweet (cloyingly so at times), low angst, low drama book with a frankly ridiculous plot. All things I generally speaking really enjoy. There’s a few moments of homophobia and racism, but everything is dealt with really well and very promptly and the book goes back to being low angst/drama.

The characters are well built, the MCs each have a distinct voice. The side characters are great as well. I’m kind of intrigued as to if the author is going to continue with this group of characters because there’s some characters I would consider picking up a second book by this author for.

My problem with this book really lies with a few things. First, if anyone drags me around for weeks telling me that they’re getting married and enlists me to do all this shit for them just to turn around and say that no actually it’s all fake for a TV show and a check, you better be cutting me in or we are not friends any more. Kris and D’Vaughn have much nicer families and friends than I am to anyone.

Secondly, the chemistry between Kris and D’Vaughn is so… instant and makes up such a large part of how they feel about each other for so long, I had a hard time connecting to the characters or being invested in their relationship. I guess this is another way in which f/f (or really, any romance story with a female lead) differs from m/m for me.

And last… okay so, D’Vaughn’s level of overthinking things is honestly the most relatable thing about this book, but in her overthinking, she comes to conclusions that I just can’t follow the train of thought. Maybe you could say that about my train of thought too when I overthink things but I’m not the one trying to sell the ending epiphany of a character’s journey to self-realization. Because that last one bugs me the most. I honestly don’t understand how D’Vaughn got what she did out of the *cough* prompt in front of her.

But all those are relatively small problems that have more to do with me than actual problems of the book, so if those don’t bother you, go for this. And if you are looking at this, listen to the audiobook. Like I said, it was perfect.

CWs: sexual content. Brief blips of moments with racism and homophobia.

Thanks to NetGalley for an audiobook copy in exchange for an honest review.

Fantastic blend of fantasy and romance, of magic and … something tangentially related to a mystery anyway. Well paced (which can be hard when things get as tense as they do here) with just a touch of humor, and it all builds to a very good ending. The characters are great (even the side characters are really good. God knows the characterization of the cats is perfect), and there’s great chemistry between Whisper and Julian.

This is my first book by Tavia Lark and I really enjoyed it. Well written, and gosh what a ride. I’m super looking forward to the rest of this series.

Thanks to the author for a free copy of the ebook in exchange for an honest review.

CWs: I … honestly can’t think of any but for explicit sexual content, which I didn’t list as part of the CWs on several of the last books that had other CWs. Hmm.