Tag Archives: reading

Current Libro.fm Deal

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Hey all, wanted to clue you in to a currently active audiobook deal with libro.fm. If you are not currently a member, they are offering 20% off any single audiobook right now with code “THANKYOU20.” Members still get their usual 30%, including on top of sales prices, but this does not stack. If you’ve been thinking of trying the service out, now would be a great time.

I also know a lot of anti-racism books are on backorder right now, so this is a great way grab a title immediately while still supporting an indie bookstore. I know I have picked up Me and White Supremacy by Layla F. Saad, White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo, and How to be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi within the last week. I still intend to grab So You Want to Talk about Race by Ijeoma Oluo and Eloquent Rage by  Brittney Cooper. I also think Hood Feminism by Mikki Kendall, which I have previously reviewed, is an important title in these conversations.

Libro.fm sale books- May

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Here we go again–more libro.fm sale titles! Yet again, there are some great ones! All sales support indie bookstores.

Books I’ve Read:


American War by Omar El Akkad
Bachelor Nation by Amy Kaufman
Brazen and the Beast by Sarah MacLean
Daughter of Smoke & Bone by Laini Taylor
Get a Life, Chloe Brown by Talia Hibbert
Marrying Winterborne by Lisa Kleypas
Stranger than Fanfiction by Chris Colfer
The Cruel Prince by Holly Black
The Devouring Gray by Christine Lynn Herman
The Prince of Broadway by Joanna Shupe
This Savage Song by Victoria Schwab
Virals by Kathy Reichs
We Are Okay by Nina LaCour

Books I’ve been Meaning to Read:

Be More Chill by Ned Vizzini (This is the last Vizzini, so I’m not sure when I will read this because it still makes me very sad. But good news especially for fans of the musical!)
Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan
The Beholder by Anna Bright
The Tiger at Midnight by Swati Teerdhala
Tidelands by Philippa Gregory

Bookish Blathering- 1

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Happy Friday!

I’m breaking the review run to just chat reading lives for a moment. I hope to find a more natural balance as I go, but 1) it’s kind of dependent on my work schedule 2) it’s kind of dependent on what feels most organic to my reading life. But, hey, I wanna chat books with people. So let’s chat!

How has your reading life been impacted by social distancing?

What are some of your favorite 2020 releases so far?

What are some of the 2020 rereleases yet to come are you most excited about?

Find bookish lists from me and buy books at: https://bookshop.org/shop/mdemanatee (This is an affiliated link, and I do receive a commission of sales but all featured books and opinions remain my own)

Pet

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Pet

by Akwaeke Emezi

5/5 stars (**updated from original 4/5 stars rating)

Listen to me, little girl, it said. You want many things, you are full of want, carved out of it, made from it, yes. But the truth does not care about what you want; the truth is what it is.

There are no monsters in Lucille. The angels got rid of them years ago. But then Jam accidentally brings a creature from her mother’s painting to life, and it says it is there to hunt a monster, a monster not just in Lucille, but in Jam’s best friend’s home.

Sometimes you read a book that makes you want to go out and get your teaching license so you can teach it. This is one of those books. I can see this being taught in a Socratic seminar.

I love the characters of this book. The family. The friendship. There is such community here, and there is the understanding that these people all mean well. They aren’t ignoring a monster out of bad intentions. Rather, they truly believe the monsters have been conquered. And its the danger of this that’s at the root of this. How even the best intentions can be warped, but how we can adjust and grow.

I also love that Jam loves the library. That it’s seen as a welcoming place to find answers. That we research montages of a sort, even as Jam and her best friend, Redemption, searching to discover what monsters even are is tension-filled. As a reader, it’s easy to expect the worst of human kind.

This explores so many big ideas. What does it mean to be a monster? What does it mean if we tell ourselves all the monsters are gone? This is a compact book, capable of being binged in a sitting, that contains big ideas. For that reason, I do think it would be perfect in a classroom. I also think it wold be great for kids that are looking to explore some of these questions of good and evil. It shows evil for evil, but it also explores the little choices a person makes and how it can impact those we love.

Also of note, Jam is a transgender protagonist, but it’s just treated as a matter of course. She is accepted by all her family and friends. The narrative occasionally mentions that she’s able to feel her hormone implant in a different way when it gets cold. It’s just utterly lovely that even in a book about a utopia having to contend with there still being human evil, this is just a fact.

There are times were the narrative can feel like it wanders in the realm of the didactic, but it doesn’t feel preachy. It just feels a part of the style.

But don’t just take it from me. The cover features a whole bunch of accolades at this point. Its has been recommended by the likes of Notzake Shange. I’ve had a library copy sitting in my ottoman for months (listen, the library is closed I’m not hoarding I can’t take them back) and I regret not picking it up sooner.

Buy now on Bookshop.org (I may receive a commission from purchases via this link.)
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Undercover Bromance

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UndercoverBromance

by Lyssa Kay Adams

3/5 stars

History was built by thousands of women who thought they were just housewives or just secretaries or just seamstresses until the day they got fed up and decided to fight back.

Mack is trying to prove to the book club that he doesn’t just know how to woo a woman– he can be in a relationship. This, unfortunately, leads to a thousand dollar cupcake in his date’s lap, him without a girlfriend, and Liv without a job. Liv won’t miss working for a big ego and a short temper, but once she knows of the harassment going on behind closed doors, she can’t just walk away.  Liv and Mack soon team up to take her former boss down, even if Liv can’t stand the sigh of Mack half the time at first.

I loved the concept of the Bromance Book Club, and while I enjoyed the plot, I was still hoping for a little more. When it comes down to it, it’s main tropes just weren’t my main tropes. Undercover Bromance hit my tropes, and I haven’t even read romantic suspense in a long while.

This had many tropes I enjoy, especially the banter (and Mack calling Liv out if she’s being judgmental). It did also have plot points I don’t typically enjoy as much–such as a secret or lack lack of communication being the big conflict around the climax. I get that Live has trust issues, but the thing she makes a big deal about Mack keeping from her also feels like something that would definitely be hard to share. Still, this is used to highlight some ultimately really dang good communication. And, I’ve had to accept that communication isn’t always that good in relationships.

There was a continuity blip in the novel that did take me out of the moment. Toward the climax Liv meets with her friend Alexis in Alexis’ office in the bakery, and it is described as being as small as a closet. Unless I am misremembering, they also met in the same office earlier in the novel. It was just weird to have it described again like we’d never been there, and for it to be smaller. There were also a couple of dropped articles, which seems nitpicky, but it’s also a trade paperback price.

The friendships in here were as stellar as the first. The book club is great, and I enjoyed the bits with the Russian immensely (more the chickens than the farting). I always enjoy the moment of the book club storming in in someone’s low point and talking some sense. But this also dug deeper into the friendship between Liv and Alexis and how sometimes friendships can be just as hurt by a lack of communication or harsh words, and they are worth fighting for as well.

Honestly, the taking down of a serial predator her, with the ripped from the headlines villain, is just as much a fantasy as the romance. It’s hard for women to come forward, and Adams does try to explore that. But, a lot does come easy here. And the ending does not match with investigative reporting that goes in to these kinds of takedowns, heck, there are still things being unearthed from Ronan Farrow’s reporting. Still, there is something comforting in the idea the bad guy could be caught. For a nonfiction angle, also check out Catch and Kill by Ronan Farrow and She Said by Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey (I may receive a commission from purchases via links). I can”t speak to how this plot line may impact survivors. I would go in carefully if you think this may be hard for you, especially as our main character Liv goes in with good intentions but does make a lot of mistakes. This book does a lot of things with good intentions. Some readers will not think it succeeds in those intentions, and I think it’s okay to know your boundaries as a reader.

Buy now on bookshop.org (I may receive a commission from purchases via this link)
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The Down Days

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TheDownDays

by Ilze Hugo

3/5 stars

“This had always been a city shaped by germs. These streets were birthed by disease. And one day, it would be destroyed by it. But not yet.”

Sans, a peddler of stolen ponytails, sees his whole life going belly up after a fling with a mysterious woman and the disappearance of one of his runners. Tomorrow’s brother has been kidnapped, and she hires Faith to help her find him. Oh and the whole city is plagued by a mysterious laughing illness that is deadly enough to inspire those who patrol for the sick and whole new industries for a new world. The stories of Sans, Tomorrow, and Faith weave in and out of each other, along with other characters, including a sin eater, a doctor turned junkie, a man named Mickey Mouse who can get you any data you want, nuns that will share your head (and sell the hair to Sans), and a mysterious librarian. In a quarantined city in South Africa that is coming apart at the seams, not even reality can be trusted.

The world of this novel was not supposed to hit this close to home. And yet. We have a story about a pandemic–here a disease that shows itself in uncontrollable laughing. People go about their business in masks. Comedy clubs are run underground. There are daily med checks. It’s hard to know how I would have responded to this book at any other moment. There is enough of a supernatural bend to help it feel like an escape. There are also things like lines about people drinking bleach that resonate more than I’m sure they were ever meant to.

It did take a bit for the narrative threads to make sense with all the different points of view and plot lines. While the world of the book may feel closer to home than we’d like, it’s still a completely new world to have to ground ourselves in. The rules have to be established. Add on to that points of view that often change, and it took me a second for me to feel confident in who we were with and where we were. But, once they all cemented themselves, the way these stories wove in and out of each other was skillfully done.

The supernatural-esque elements started to show up just when the narrative was starting to drag a bit for me. The seeds were laid throughout, but the entertaining of the supernatural ideas did not happen right away. I loved the idea of the dead not really being dead, and I do wish it had been explored a bit more. Because it was introduced so late, the resolution of this could feel a little rushed to me.

This definitely had a unique, quirky voice. At times it felt like this tone could be the focus more than the plot. Still, Hugo painted some distinct images (I’ll be having nightmares about cockroach walls thank you). All of these characters had developed backstories that gave them specific wants and needs in this world, but the voice could keep them at a distance for me as a reader.

As a bit of a coincidence, this novel also features a sin eater as a character. I had never heard of this before this year and have now read two books within a month or so that feature sin eaters (Sin Eater by Megan Campisi).

Buy now on Bookshop.org (I may receive a commission from purchases via this link)
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Wicked Fox

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WickedFox

by Kat Cho

4/5 stars

Stopping bad people doesn’t make me a good one

Miyoung has just moved back to Seoul with her mother and is preparing to start a new school. There’s just one problem: she’s secretly a gumbo, a nine-tailed fox that needs the energy of men to survive, and now one of her new classmates knows her secret. Jihoon was content playing video games and delivering food for his grandmother. Now, he’s pulled in to Miyoung’s orbit, attempting to protect her from bullies even as she tries to push him away. But Miyoung has problems bigger than getting bean paste thrown on her at school. Her fox bead has been exposed, and, if it gets in to the wrong hands, it can be used to control her. Soon Miyoung and Jihoon are pulled in to a supernatural power struggle, even as they form a friendship–and maybe more.

I haven’t really watched much K-drama, but seeing this book often compared to the genre, I may have to start. There were a couple of CW-worthy dramatic reveals, but, overall, the book stayed grounded in its characters motivations and wants. And Cho laid the groundwork for even the most extreme of the twists. I do wish certain beats of the ending felt a little less rushed. There were revelations that made sense, but felt like they still held something back. It’s possible we’ll get more exploration of these in the sequel.

(Sidenote: I will say the “cop investigating wild animal attacks in the woods” subplot did give me some heavy Twilight/teen drama flashbacks.)

This presented a supernatural world I’d love to know more about (if anyone has recommendations for Korean myth and lore let me know!) I also enjoyed that Cho gave us a fun, fast-paced, and dramatic supernatural story, while also complicating good versus evil. It’s often said that villains are the heroes of their own story. That is evident here (even if it may feel a tad melodramatic for a character or two as the stakes raise and we don’t get to spend as much time with those characters). Cho very much works from a place of what these characters’ objectives are, and these objectives are rooted in something very real for them.

Speaking of the characters and their objectives, I really enjoyed the Jihoon was just a normal guy. So often romantic leads are set up to be these extreme, brooding souls, and don’t don’t get me wrong I like that too, but there was something refreshing in Jihoon. He had his problems, like his abandonment issues that impacted how he viewed situations, but they were firmly rooted in his backstory. He tried to work from a good place, and as a reader I could see him trying to work from a good place. I also just enjoyed the mental pictures of him making restaurant deliveries on a scooter that could break down at any moment.

Oddly, it was the friendship I was drawn to here as much as the romance. The romantic chemistry could feel a little rushed but for these two extremely lonely souls looking for connection, it went beyond that. I think for both Miyoung and Jihoon it was about finding someone that saw them and they could cling to, even though Jihoon already had some pretty stellar friends. I additionally loved the friendships and interactions with the secondary characters. I anticipate, and hope, that we’ll get to see more of them in the sequel.

Buy now on Bookshop.org (I may receive a commission from purchases via this link)
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Fix Her Up

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FixHerUp

by Tessa Bailey

2/5 stars

Georgette broke away from the family renovation business in favor of her entertainment company, focusing mainly on children’s birthday parties. Between being the baby and being an actual clown part of the week, her family doesn’t take her seriously and Georgette is tired of it. When a injury ends her childhood crush Travis’s baseball career and has him working for her family’s company, Georgette

Georgette’s wants as a character supposedly revolved around getting her family to take her seriously and prove she was an adult. This was something I was totally behind, especially after the sad brunch scene. However, I never saw evidence of Georgette’s really taking charge of her life in a tangible, active way. Also, the choice to have her as a clown felt like it was trying to be ironic/make a point, but it just never really made sense.

The pacing on this felt slightly off too. I was expecting much more fake dating, but it took us a while to get there, and then that aspect was never fully explored. I was expecting more exploration of Travis’ career. Of Georgette’s. Of the family. There was a lot that just felt not fully explored here, while we spent time on weird things. Lots of decent ideas that just never felt fulfilled.

The chemistry in this was off for me. Georgette kind of busts her way in to Travis’s life and gives him a lot of help and emotional energy. He is not particularly emotionally intelligent and takes a while to catch on to anything close to feelings. And the only draw for Georgette seems to be her childhood crush (and she did like watching him play ball). I’m all for staying loyal to childhood friends, but the chemistry just never felt on equal footing. Especially as Travis was possessive in a weird way. The dynamic of the relationship just didn’t work for me, and I didn’t find the sex scenes sexy.

Still, if you like childhood crush romances, this may be your jam. I’ve had other friends who really enjoyed!

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