This book has lots of strong points, exactly the sort I’ve come to expect  from Mary Robinette Kowal’s writing: easy, readable prose, a strong mixture of sci-fi STEM stuff and human experiences, some joyous quirkiness, and strong characterization. Unfortunately, I didn’t click with the main character at all. I definitely appreciated the disability rep that was exceptionally well done and relatable for me as a person with a chronically fucked-up spine. I loved Tesla’s doggo companion and the way the bond between a human and a service animal was presented. I need more service dogs in fiction! I even appreciated some of her wit and some of her thinking, but ultimately, idk. She’s the kind of person who, for me, very much falls under the Eat the Rich umbrella. Yes, she tries to acknowledge her privilege and to use it for good, sort of. She’s also quite content with throwing it around to get what she wants, to constantly feel the urge to talk to the manager, and to take her frustrations out on the small people who decide nothing. At least her husband points out her flaws to her in a loving and gentle way and she kind of listens? Though that speaks better about the husband than it does about her.

Frustrating main character aside, the mystery is fun, even if there are a couple of key points of it that rely too much on happenstance and, yes, money rather than deduction, or so I felt . The retrofuturistic setting with its mixture of high-tech and 1930s vibes is amazingly vivid and full of colorful personalities. I appreciated the inclusion of nonbinary folks and the way stating pronouns here is just a normal part of the culture. All the representation felt rather organic to me. There was some fun banter, too, and some awesome scenes with the MC and her husband being total newlyweds while also leaning into it to be sneaky and secretive under surveillance—I found those pretty fun. So all in all, a pretty good read, really. It’s just that my ever-growing aversion to the people on top of the capitalist food chain made it harder for me to engage.

This book feels very much Legends & Lattes-inspired, in the sense that it’s a “what happens after the final quest of the campaign“ type of story, and unlike L&L, it doesn’t bother filing off any serial numbers whatsoever. It’s impossible to have any doubt that this is a D&D story. We’ve got tieflings and bags of holding here, people. I sure hope the author has double-checked the legalities of it all before hitting publish.

Anyway, the tabletopness of it all aside, this is really a great cozy read. Where a more typical fantasy novel will give you a full book of adventures and maybe 10-20 pages of the ever after that comes when the battles are won and the quests are solved, this one does the opposite. The adventurous premise is contained to the first 15% or so, and then the rest of the book deals with what happens after you put the dangers aside, settle down in a comfortable seaside town, and buy a bookshop. 

The romantic storyline is handled much the same way. We get a glimpse of Ari and Finnean falling for each other and deciding to be together, but it’s all super condensed, and then we get right into the honeymoon phase. Which, I must admit, didn’t 100% work for me because for a good chunk of the story I wasn’t sure why I should care about these characters and their happiness, other than as a general “happy people good, even when fictional“ thing. But the author gave me some damn good reasons to be interested and invested further down the line. As the story progressed, it turned into an amazing portrayal of that relationship phase where the honeymoon slowly gives way to the everyday, and you discover that no matter how infatuated you are with each other still, you’re actually different people with different needs, different paces of healing, and maybe even non-identical goals. I loved seeing all the cracks, anxieties, and compromises as the characters stumbled through it.

All in all, despite some pacing- and prose-related clunkiness, it’s a lovely read that I’m going to recommend to fellow cozy fantasy addicts for sure!

Wow. Such an emotional rollercoaster, in the best possible way. I loved how the narrative swirled between the typical romance story beats and the parts of the character arcs that didn’t quite mesh with it. There was a point late in the story where I wasn’t certain a joint happy ever after was possible at all, rather than two separate hopefully happy endings that wouldn’t be possible if it wasn’t for the impact Logan and Matty had on each other—and I was actually prepared to be okay with it. And then the author genuinely and believably surprised me by going back to the genre conventions.

Both leads here are simply amazing, as far as characters go. I loved the depth Kacen Callender brought to each of them, and how while Logan is obviously the more troubled one, it’s always made clear that Matty has his own stuff to work through, too. There’s a lot of very earnest, very relatable discussion of trauma, and of being there for someone dealing with it, and how sometimes it takes over your life and you feel like you’re losing yourself in being someone else’s pillar, and how hurt people hurt people and that’s sometimes expected but never okay. It’s such a great portrayal of the rocky, messy road to healing, and it hurts in such a good way.

I also loved the parts focused on Hollywood and acting. Especially the acting: the actual art and craft of it is regularly explored, leaving me with no doubt that yes, these characters are actors, it’s a big part of their lives, it’s their job but also something that affects how they interact with the world and themselves. I also liked all the behind the scene politics around the fake dating scheme, as well as the parts with the fans discussing everything ones—there were some great insights on parasocial relationships here, and it was cool how the audiobook uses a bunch of different voice actors for these sections, exacerbating the impression of numerous other voices intruding on a very private story.

10/10, would get my heart broken and mended by this book again.

The more books by Talia Hibbert I read, the more I fall in love with her style. I mean, the banter! The characterization! The humor! Everything I’ve read by her so far has been so much fun, and this book is no exception. It may even be my favorite so far, even though it took time for me to buy the two leads as a couple because of the incompatibility in their needs and wants. They did win me over eventually, but honestly, at the beginning of the book it was really hard to believe Danika wasn’t aromantic. All the views she shared on relationships were like… pretty much the exact things I hear from my aro friends. 

And yes, in her case it was all because of the trauma coming from a string of relationships that didn’t work out because she wasn’t invested in the traditional romantic activities her partners expected. Makes sense, I guess. But as I type this, it’s still hard for me to not read her as an aromantic character, despite the opposite being affirmed in the book in her own words. There was just this vibe around what she wanted from a relationship, like she was interested more in a kind of… committed FWB scenario? Which is completely valid and something plenty of alloromantic people could get behind, I’m sure. It just took quite a lot of convincing for me to buy that this could be a good choice for someone like Zafir who places so much importance on feelings.

Speaking of Zafir, I absolutely love him. Seriously, best MMC I’ve seen recently! He’s got such a great balance of grumpiness and kindness going on, and I really relate to the reasons he’s so into romance novels, and his anxiety is portrayed so well. He’s this guy who genuinely wants to make the world a better place because he’s been hurt by it and doesn’t want others to suffer the same, and this is my favorite type of character to root for. I also really loved the small subplots woven around his storyline, pulling his work, family, and best friend into the story. Dani, of course, brought plenty to the table, as well, with those amazing couple of scenes with her sisters, and the witchiness vibe, and the academia, and her unique blend of confidence and vulnerability. Really, both are wonderful characters.

My one small complaint is pacing: it was absolutely wonderful for the first 75-80% or so, but then the final part was really, really rushed, and I feel like the third-act break-up could have been handled better or avoided at all. But ultimately, this was a super fun read, and I’m excited for the final book in the series.

If I had to describe this graphic novel in one sentence, I’d go with, “An exploration of a friendship falling apart.“ Like with any dissolving friendship, there’s a lot of stuff going into it: first love gone wrong, problems with parents, religious guilt, small town angst, money problems, peer pressure, teenage hierarchies, and a daring plot to get rich by selling illegal copies of hentai anime. That last one was the part of the blurb that intrigued me the most, but it’s the rest of it that made the book fly by.

I really loved the art—the style reminded me a bit of Tillie Walden’s works. The format was also cool, with the story essentially getting told through the POV of an unknown omniscient narrator with unbridled access to all the four girls’ innermost thoughts, constantly adding small comments about other characters and places in town. That format is a pretty cool factor adding to the story, constantly adding interesting juxtapositions for the main characters’ experiences.

Speaking of the main characters, all four girls are complex and fully realized characters with their own flaws, pain points, and dreams. It’s hard to agree with a lot of the choices they make, but easy to understand why they make them. Each of them is conflicted and messy in all the ways teens can be, and some parts of their intertwining stories really sent me back to my own teenage years.

This YA horror anthology is built out of stories that center queer POC characters. Also, they all take place on Halloween during a blue moon. This was supposed to be one of my spooky season reads, except I found the concept of it so cool that I couldn’t wait until fall. After all, any season can be spooky if you look at it right.

Most of the stories here had pretty cool premises and takes on the concept, but alas, only a few really stuck with me, most of them grouped together around the first half of the book. The earliest is Guested by Rebecca Kim Wells is one half weird secret society horror, one half thoughtful exploration of siblings estrangement. I really loved how unexpected the ending was—I really thought it was going in a slightly different direction. 

Rocky Road with Caramel Drizzle by Kosoko Jackson is probably my favorite out of the whole selection, mixing together demons and ouija boards and gay bashing aftermath and a really messy complicated friendship and small town politics. There’s enough here for a full-length novel, and I’d love to read that novel given the chance, but the short story absolutely packs a punch.

Next there’s The Three Phases of Ghost-Hunting by Alex Brown, a great palate cleanser after the heaviness of Rocky Road. It’s a perfect blend of campiness and friends-to-lovers sweetness, set on a mall haunted by a pirate’s  ghost and written with the kind of humor that had me snorting out loud every page or two. Despite being horror, this is really a very sweet story.

Another gem is Leyla Mendoza and the Last House on the Lane. I loved the style here, the second-person narration, the deep delve into the themes of figuring out gender, and trying to belong, and all that teenage awkwardness of feeling too different and not enough of whatever you think you should be. The way the horror tropes are tied to this narrative is beautiful and, I would say, extremely hopeful.

As for the other nine stories in the anthology, I can’t outright complain about any of them; like I’ve said, they all have great concepts and premises. It’s just that, other than maybe a stray line here or there, they didn’t really touch me much. But I do feel that even for just the four stories that did, the book was worth reading.

This wasn’t quite what I expected (the cover and the blurb led me to believe this was going to be mostly a road trip story, but that’s just one part of the book), but I really enjoyed this story, regardless. This is a pretty unique book focused on discovering your identity late in life, forging new bonds, and learning more about yourself and the world—because it’s never too late.

I found Clare, a professor who realizes in her forties that there’s a word for who she is and that word is asexual, to be a really pleasant protagonist. She has a subtle charm to her, a dry wit, and I really enjoyed seeing her embrace all the newfound knowledge and venture out of her shell. She did have a bit of “kids these days“ air about her when she interacted with the younger cast members, but she did always try to understand and broaden her horizons. I genuinely enjoyed following all of her relationships, from her longstanding friendship with Louise to the newly forged one with Janice. There were also a few really fun academia-focused scenes with all those faculty members who were quirky, frustrating, and interesting in their own right—loved those, and Clare’s views on her experiences in the field in general. 

At times, I did feel like the story teetered on the border between celebrating asexuality and low-key bashing  allosexual people for whom this side of life is important (and I’m saying this as a total ace).  I would have perhaps appreciated more inclusion of sex-positive ace representation, or maybe an allosexual aromantic character in the mix, just for more well-rounded representation. Outside of that, though, I feel like this is a great, important story with an interesting subject matter, great prose, and a quirky diverse cast.

On one hand, this book probably had no business being this long. On the other hand, I kind of loved a lot of these gradual, slow-paced developments. It read like a fanfic about original characters, the type of story that’s more of a character and relationships study with plot happening in the background to nudge the characters’ toward specific developments. The LI wouldn’t have reason to take the MC shopping if the MC’s house doesn’t mysteriously burn down first, you know what I mean?

The relationship itself is a super slow burn, too: it takes these guys the length of an average book to start affirming their mutual interest. Fine by me—I love me some slow burn, and it works with both of their backstories—but I feel like there’s a definite discrepancy between this and the book’s title and packaging. The cover, to me, suggests an earlier onset of the heat, so to speak.

While on the whole I didn’t mind the slowness, I was a bit annoyed by how long the misunderstandings dragged on. Blair, at least, tried to talk about the assumptions he’d made about Richard, giving the latter the opportunity to clear the air (the fact that the opportunity was ignored, well… that’s hardly on Blair). On the other hand, Richard just continued to agonize over and over about Blair not remembering stuff that… *he could have just told him*. This was honestly mildly ridiculous. I mean, there were some worldbuilding-related reasons for why he couldn’t, I suppose, but they were fuzzy and introduced too late.

That’s another thing that made this book read like a fanfic: the worldbuilding sparseness. “Here’s a small town full of supernaturals, abiding by rules that won’t be laid out, let’s go.“ It’s the kind of approach that works well when the story’s set in an existing setting—I sure don’t need a detailed rehashing of what Hogwarts or Sunnydale’s like. But with an original world, there’s only so long you can go entirely on vibes.

Overall, I can imagine some readers getting deterred by the slowness and the occasional repetitiveness, but I personally really enjoyed this deep focus on characters. I do wish the two POVs were a bit better balanced, and I definitely could have used more clarity with the worldbuilding. Also, the last 1/4 of the book was a bit of a mood whiplash as the author obviously rushed to tie up all the plot threads and the gradual developments turned into a rush instead.

Technically, this was a re-read, but also, I haven’t touched this novel since high school and until now I only ever read Jane Austen in translation, so it didn’t fully feel like one. For the most part, I had an excellent time with it. As far as enemies-to-lovers romances go, this one truly stands the test of time. There wasn’t a single dialogue scene I didn’t love, and the characters’ quips and observation often made me giggle. I loved the interactions within the Bennet family and, of course, the banter between Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy—and how the fun parts intermingled with the cutting commentary about the society of the time (a lot of it still very applicable to certain aspects of today’s life, I feel).

At the same time, there were a bunch of scenes that felt more like summaries, with lots of telling over showing, and those were kind of hard to get through at times. I expect these kind of thing when I read classics, though, and it always makes me ponder on all the reasons and ways storytelling in books has changed over the years. Which is genuinely a fun topic to think about, so I can’t really complain!

Also, something that utterly fascinated me about this book: there are so many characters, and all of them are not just completely unique and recognizable in their personalities, but also so intricately linked together and constantly influencing each other’s arcs! Such an absolutely genius example of a big cast.

This was a really difficult read for me, mostly because of the subject matter. The other did an excellent job conveying how it feels to be living in an abusive relationship: the visceral lack of safety, the walking on eggshells, the losing touch with what's real about your own self. This is a prime example of why memoirs as a genre fascinate me: I can't imagine how brave a person must be to write about these experiences so candidly. 

The narrative isn't quite linear, just like both the recovery from this sort of trauma and the trajectories of  getting into this sort of situations are never quite linear. The whole book reads almost as a collection of essays or journal entries, but they do form a complete story of a terrible, awful, no good relationship. There are a lot of metaphors and similes here, and the prose is flowery and lush; in some ways, all of that provides a kind of barrier between what's being described and the reader, but in other ways, it makes the subject matter hit harder.  

I don't expect to ever re-read this book, because getting exposed to some things once is perfectly enough, but I believe it will live rent-free in my head for a while. Especially the part about fantasizing about death because you forget just leaving is possible. Or the cockroaches in the clock. Or that poor snail. Or the phone that call that wasn't, after all, a break-up. Or, or, or.

And I've also written out a number of quotes, because damn, the prose here is so unfairly beautiful, with those perfectly placed words, and the rhythm, and the alliterations. I wish I was capable of crafting sentences like that.