I read and adored Salt & Stone by Victoria Scott when it first came out, years ago. As soon as someone described it to me as Pokemon meets Hunger Games, I was sunk. And it was a good thing I was – that book and its sequel are the most delightful, engaging, fun dystopian romps I’ve read in a long time, and I never fail to recommend them to anyone. So when I saw Jinxed and read the summary, I had to…
This might possibly be the hardest review I’ve ever written. While I am known for my irreverent, cynical reviews, this book has taken my heart in its little fist and crushed it – not in an angry way, but like how you are so excited to attend a concert that you crush the ticket in your palm as you wait in line for it to be scanned at the entrance to the venue. This book – this beautiful, beautiful…
It’s October! Time for cooler weather, jack o’lanterns, witches, black cats, ghost stories, crunchy leaves … and did I mention cooler weather? I’m saying it a little bit louder just in case Georgia might hear me saying that and get the memo. Looking at you, temperatures in the 80s for the next week. I didn’t read nearly as much in September as I thought I would. I don’t think this is by any fault of my own, per se – more like…
It’s Halloween! If you tell me Halloween is in 30 days, you are sadly mistaken. Halloween, dear children, is a state of mind that begins on October 1st and runs for 31 marvelous days, and I shan’t hear you say anything different. If you aren’t familiar with Blogoween, it’s a month-long blog event run by Sam and Clo, hosted by several amazing bloggerinos, where there is a month of prompts specifically about the joys of Halloween and Fall! There are…
“Decades of dead girls. Poor girls and rich girls. Black and brown and white girls. All of them Sawkill girls.” If I could describe what I read this summer in a single phrase, it would probably be: “A lot of books about sassy, catty teenage girls trapped in the woods.” I’ve spent a lot of time in the woods with clusters of these ladies, and so when I went to pick up Sawkill Girls, I was not expecting anything…
Today’s Top Ten Tuesday (as always, hosted by the inimitable Jana over at That Artsy Reader Girl) is simple enough: what are the top ten books in your Fall TBR pile? First things first: Fall starts Friday and I am living for it. That’s the most important thing in this entire entry, let’s be real. Because I live in Georgia where the climate is whackadoodle every day of the year, I consider Fall to be August-October, and Winter to be November-January –…
I read a lot of books about gun violence. Not because I am big into the second amendment or my firearm rights – on the contrary, I am very much an anti-gun person. But with gun violence ever on the rise in America, I feel it’s very important to carefully let our teenagers, our young adults and new adults alike, understand what society is doing, what some of this fighting really is all about. Ellen Hopkins is known for her…
Today’s Top Ten Tuesday (as always, hosted by the inimitable Jana over at That Artsy Reader Girl) is all about one of America’s most beloved pastimes: television. “Patricia, what the Hell? This is a book blog, am I in the right place?” Yes, my child. But as Jana pointed out, September is the return of Fall (aka: the good) TV, and what better time to talk about it than to discuss the shows you binge when you don’t have your nose…
August is over, and there is less than a month until Autumn! If you can’t tell, I just really hate the summer. Honestly, September through December is the best third of the year and you cannot possibly convince me otherwise – cooler weather, beautiful scenery, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, excuses to snuggle, crock pot meals and hot drinks. What’s not to love? Nothing. Summertime means … bug bites, heat rash, sweat, high power bills, kids everywhere, your car trying to burn you when…
I am a long-time lover of domestic thrillers, as evidenced by the fact that my blog consists of either middle grade/YA book reviews, or overly complicated, twisted thrillers about husbands and wives gone horribly wrong. So when I saw the adult offering for August’s Once Upon a Book Club box, I jumped on it – who doesn’t love a good ol’ yarn about a missing husband? And what’s even better, the wife who’s trying to puzzle it all out is a…