Monthly Archives: November 2021

November 28, 2021 · 2:04 pm

The Tuscan Child by Rhys Bowen

The Tuscan Child by Rhys Bowen

The Tuscan Child is a gentle and beautiful book. It flips between the story of a father, a British airmen shot down near a small village in Tuscany in 1944, and the story of his daughter searching after his death in 1973 for clues to her father’s story. I loved how the book would switch to the past periodically to show what happened to her father since she could never learn the whole truth. I had my doubts that the author would be able to wrap it all up, but she did, and in a very lovely way. There were a few surprises along the way that added to my enjoyment. I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys World War II stories.

5 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 80
Pages Read in 2021: 26,116

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November 27, 2021 · 1:35 pm

Boy on Ice by John Branch

Boy on Ice by John Branch

When I was a kid my uncle took me to several hockey games (let’s go Caps!). The fights were always the highlight, a few seconds of major excitement. I never really thought about the role of the enforcer or what those fights could do to the players getting punched and injured over and over. Boy on Ice focuses on one enforcer, Derek Boogaard, who died from a drug overdose in 2011 at just 28 years old and was posthumously diagnosed with a severe case of CTE. The book is well researched, mainly because the Boogaard family was willing to provide lots of medical, phone, and ATM records and their memories of Derek for it. The tone is conversational and the book reads fast. Other than those hockey games with my uncle, I’ve never been into sports, but I found Boy on Ice to be very interesting and engaging. I recommend it to any sports fan.

5 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 79
Pages Read in 2021: 25,787

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November 26, 2021 · 8:50 am

Girl’s Guide to Witchcraft by Mindy Klasky

Girl’s Guide to Witchcraft by Mindy Klasky

I’m not sure exactly what this book was trying to be, but it failed pretty badly at them all. There were way too many compartmentalized storylines. I’ve read plenty of books with lots of storylines for seemingly unrelated characters that are spectacularly woven together. This one had lots of storylines for basically one character and, yet, they didn’t go together at all. The author would focus on one and then another but for the most part they weren’t related at all and one experience didn’t seem to affect her growth and development at all. It was like there were multiple individual short books cut up and pieced together. Basically, the author would focus on one storyline for a while and pretty much ignore that the others existed and then ignore that one to focus on another and so on. This made the book a bit disjointed. There were some good parts here and there, but mostly I just didn’t care about the characters and the main character and her inner dialogue was just annoying and juvenile (despite her being something like 29). It took a least a quarter of the book for me to get into it at all and even then I had trouble focusing and found my mind wandering and having to go back and reread what I had just read because it was so boring most of the time. There were a lot of grammar and usage mistakes which just contributed to my annoyance at the book. I will definitely not be continuing this series and don’t recommend reading Girl’s Guide to Witchcraft.

2 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 78
Pages Read in 2021: 25,402

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Filed under Fantasy, Reason: LitHub Bingo, Reason: We Be Book'N

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November 23, 2021 · 11:50 am

Always and Forever, Lara Jean by Jenny Han

Always and Forever, Lara Jean by Jenny Han

Always and Forever, Lara Jean is the third and final book of the To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before trilogy. It’s a lovely wrap-up to the story that started with some old love letters and a fake boyfriend. This one follows Lara Jean and Peter through their final year of high school. It’s cute and sweet, though quite a bit heavier and more emotional than the first two books in the series. I recommend it to anyone who enjoyed the first two books in the series.

5 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 77
Pages Read in 2021: 25,056

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Filed under Reason: I Like the Series, Reason: LitHub Bingo, Reason: We Be Book'N, Young Adult

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November 21, 2021 · 5:25 pm

The Magic of Christmas Tree Farm by Erin Green

The Magic of Christmas Tree Farm by Erin Green

This book reads fast in spite of the length. It rotates between three characters’ points of view. I found one of those characters to be very annoying. She left her husband and son at the beginning of the year, had lots of fun, and then at the end of the year decided she wanted her ex-husband back – after he finally started to move on. She was pretty obnoxious toward him and totally in denial that leaving her family negatively affected her son so I was kind of hoping he’d kick her to the curb. I didn’t dislike reading the sections from her point of view since I liked her ex-husband and son, but I was constantly rolling my eyes at her. All three characters’ lives end up intersecting and, like any good Hallmark Christmas movie (which this really was just in book form), the ending was totally perfect and happy. I recommend The Magic of Christmas Tree Farm to anyone who wants a happy little mind vacation.

4 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 75
Pages Read in 2021: 24,424

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Filed under Realistic Fiction, Reason: LitHub Bingo, Reason: We Be Book'N

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November 18, 2021 · 7:53 pm

Timebound by Rysa Walker

Timebound by Rysa Walker

Timebound made my brain hurt. There’s time travel involved and different timelines that may or may not all continue to exist and the need to go back in time to prevent people from having changed the world. Even though it made my brain hurt, it all still made sense (as much sense as time travel makes). The action is very steady and questions are answered at a good pace. The main storyline is wrapped up at the end of the book, but many other things remain open for subsequent books in the series. I recommend this book to people who enjoy sci-fi and historical fiction.

5 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 74
Pages Read in 2021: 23,971

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Filed under Historical Fiction, Reason: LitHub Bingo, Reason: We Be Book'N, Science Fiction, Young Adult

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November 14, 2021 · 3:33 pm

Adorkable by Cookie O’Gorman

Adorkable by Cookie O’Gorman

This book has a predictable best friends start fake dating which turns into real dating arc, but that’s all that’s predictable. The entire last half of the book it seemed like everything could be tied up into a happy ending at any time, but the author just kept throwing curveballs at the characters. The feelings were well-written and the characters were interesting. I very much cared what happened to all of them. The ending was perfect and just what I was hoping for. I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys cheesy light high school romance.

5 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 73
Pages Read in 2021: 23,595

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November 12, 2021 · 8:23 pm

A Solitude of Wolverines by Alice Henderson

A Solitude of Wolverines by Alice Henderson

A high school I went to had wolverines for their mascot. We used to make fun of that. Wolverines were little and pretty cute. That didn’t sound like the fighters the other high school had. Boy were we wrong! Now, thanks to this book, I know wolverines are vicious little critters and probably the fightingest fighters of all mascots in existence. And it’s barely about wolverines. Sometimes I found it hard to keep reading because of the suspense. I was downright scared on occasion (granted I don’t do scary things and situations well, but this was so well written I felt like I was in the scenes with Alex and I was so worried for her). I actually gasped aloud at a couple points because I seriously didn’t see some things coming. As soon as I finished I looked to see if the second book is out yet (it is) because I will definitely be reading it. I very highly recommend reading A Solitude of Wolverines to adults who enjoy thrillers heavy on suspense.

5 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 72
Pages Read in 2021: 23,261

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November 12, 2021 · 8:05 pm

Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding

Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding

Having not seen the movie or really hearing anything about it (I had a toddler and a newborn when it came out so was very busy) prior to reading Bridget Jones’s Diary, I had no idea what to expect from the book. What I found was incredibly predictable. Pretty much everything that happened was obvious, I just needed the details filled in as I read. I found Bridget to be incredibly annoying and insufferable, and a bit dumb. Nevertheless, it was an enjoyable mind vacation no matter how irritated I was at Bridget pretty much the entire time.

3 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 71
Pages Read in 2021: 22,909

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November 9, 2021 · 8:14 pm

Divergent by Veronica Roth

Divergent by Veronica Roth

Divergent is just as good on the third or fourth read. I do think the author is a little lazy filling out pages describing kissing repeatedly, often in the exact same way as a few pages before. Tris’s character development is excellent. The world is built very well. I highly recommend Divergent to anyone who enjoys reading dystopian books.

5 (out of 5) Stars
Books Read in 2021: 70
Pages Read in 2021: 22,585

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Filed under Dystopian, Reason: Bedtime Story for the Boys

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