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fullmetalfisting · 1 year ago

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Here’s my August 2023 wrap up! Reviews under the cut. Also, I truly don’t understand how I wound up reading so many vampire-themed books this month! I don’t find vampires particularly interesting, this was just how my holds on books from the library shook out.

From Blood and Ash by Jennifer M. Armentrout | Fantasy, New Adult, Romance

⭐⭐

Summary: Poppy is the Maiden, a high-ranking position of power meant to usher in a new era of prosperity after she completes the mysterious “Ascension.” But as the Ascension grows nearer, her doubts begin to multiply. Her own misgivings paired with civil unrest cause her to question everything she knows. Also, one of her bodyguards is dreamy.

Thoughts: The worldbuilding was subpar to bad and the characters were all unlikable. The big twist was interesting, but not worth the slog it was to get there. Maybe I’m being too harsh, but I don’t understand why there are so freaking many New Adult Fantasy Romance books out these days. Of course, I would love to stumble upon a new Six of Crows or The Cruel Prince. But the fact is, not every author is skilled enough to write the new Grishaverse. I know a lot of people loved this book, but it just wasn’t it for me.

The Trap by Catherine Ryan Howard | Thriller, Mystery, Crime, Suspense

⭐⭐⭐ and 1/2

Summary: Lucy’s sister, Nicki, has been missing ever since she walked out of a Dublin bar late one night without a word to her friends. Angela is the Irish equivalent of a police dispatcher for the Missing Persons Unit who longs to be a detective herself. An unnamed man drives through the Irish countryside as he enumerates his crimes to the woman in his backseat, his latest victim. When Angela makes an alarming discovery, she sets a series of events into motion that changes the hunt for the serial killer plaguing Ireland and might just crack the case.

Thoughts: This was exceptionally entertaining, though the beginning was a bit slow. The commentary of what it’s like to be a woman in a precarious situation was spot-on, though it didn’t add anything new to the conversation. What I really enjoyed about this book was that it didn’t feel ghoulish, as crime novels often do since True Crime became so popular.

Salt & Storm by Kendall Kulper | Young Adult, Witches, Historical Fiction, Mother and Daughter Relationships, Fantasy, Romance

⭐⭐⭐

Summary: Avery Roe is descended from a long line of witches, all of whom resided on Prince Island, Massachusetts, giving up something unimaginable in order to obtain their magic, which they then use to protect the whalers at sea. But Avery’s mother saw the price that had to be paid in order to become the island’s witch and chose, instead, to attempt to make a life in Victorian society. Avery struggles against her mother’s rules, longing to go to her grandmother and learn the spells she needs to become the next island’s witch. But when Avery has a prophetic dream that shows her she will be murdered, suddenly Avery’s struggles become urgent.

Thoughts: This book had extraordinary prose and fantastic descriptions. Kulper masterfully depicted a tense relationship between mother and daughter. However, the price that is so built up that must be paid in order to obtain one’s magic was anticlimactic. I was, “That’s all?”

Naramauke by Lily Sparks | Young Adult, Companion Novella, Horror, Romance, Contemporary

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Summary: Erik’s version of events from the novel Teen Killers Club by Lily Sparks.

Thoughts: This novella gave readers of the Teen Killers Club series (final installment out in October) a glimpse into the motivations of characters that we didn’t get to see from Signal’s perspective. Definitely hyped me up for Teen Killers at Large.

Dark Water Daughter by H.M. Long | Fantasy, Pirates, Romance, Magic

⭐⭐⭐

Summary: A swashbuckling fantasy set among pirates, tree spirits, and mages alike. Mary Firth is a Stormsinger: someone who can control the winds and weather with a song. She has kept her ability a secret all her life for her own safety, but when she is mistaken as a highwayman and brought to the noose, she has no choice but to sing herself out of the situation. Now, pirates and privateers are after her for her unique ability to sail ships wherever they need to go. But that’s not all they’re after.

Thoughts: While well-written and entertaining at times, I found myself at sea (pun not intended) for a lot of this. I think this type of story just wasn’t for me, and it isn’t going to be something I remember reading six months from now.

How to Bite Your Neighbor and Win a Wager by D.N. Bryn | M M Romance, Vampires, Contemporary, New Adult

⭐

Summary: Wes is a recent college graduate mourning the sudden disappearance of his beloved mother. Vincent is a starving, houseless vampire whose support system was yanked away from him when he was turned by accident during his freshman year of college. Together, they explore a milquetoast attraction to one another as Vincent experiences a veritable barrage of hate crimes while Wes stands insipidly by. Also, there are entire passages lifted from The Song of Achilles and reworded so it’s not technically plagiarism.

Thoughts: This was hot, wet garbage. It reads like fanfiction written by the cringiest theater kid you ever had the displeasure of meeting in high school. The dialogue reminds one of how young teenagers speak, not how adults interact with one another. Case in point: a side character asks Wes if Vincent makes him, “tingly in [his] pingly.” He proceeds to refer to his penis as his “pingly” for the rest of the novel. I can’t make this shit up. And while the plot was clearly too ambitious of a concept for the skill level of the author, I am still disappointed with the result of this whole pharmaceutical conspiracy.

Mister Magic by Kiersten White | Horror, Mystery, Supernatural, Contemporary

⭐⭐⭐

Summary: Everyone remembers their favorite childhood television show, Mister Magic. What no one can agree on is what Mister Magic looked like. Unlike most shows from the early 90s, it’s impossible to find recordings of the episodes, even in the furthest reaches of the internet. But in an era where nostalgia is extremely profitable, someone gets the idea to have a reunion of the cast of the show in the form of a podcast. Val is 38 and lives on a ranch in Idaho. She has no memories of her time before she and her father arrived at the ranch covered in fresh burn scars at the age of eight. But when three men show up to her father’s funeral, she feels like she’s met them before. And when they tell her that her mother is alive and they all share a past, she has no choice but to return to the place where Mister Magic was filmed in search of answers.

Thoughts: The opening of this book is stunning. It draws the reader in, playing on that weird Mandela Effect we all have about media from our own childhoods. However, as the story progresses, things become more and more surreal, to the point where I wasn’t sure I was following what exactly was going on. It was so abstract that I found myself getting frustrated and bored.

Rent to Be by Sonia Hartl | Romance, Contemporary, New Adult

⭐⭐⭐

NOTE: I read an ARC.

Summary: Isla Jane is an elder zoomer (not a millennial, as the book blurbs will have to believe) who was, like many of us post-college twentysomethings, one unforeseen expense away from financial disaster. That expense, for her, came in the form of a broken transmission, which caused her to miss rent payments, which caused her to get kicked out by her roommates. Thus kicks off Isla’s month-long struggle to keep her head above water while she sleeps under her desk at work, housesits, and crashes on her brother’s couch, all while her brother’s handsome best friend stands by, sometimes teasing her but most of the time supporting her.

Thoughts: Hartl discusses the economic woes all new adults face with startling accuracy (although I’m not sure why Isla didn’t go to a food rescue if she was so food-insecure). However, Isla’s introduction in the story is frankly a lot, and for a few chapters, I was siding with her roommates. I’ve had roommates of my own neglect to pay their share of rent and neglect to discuss it with me, and believe me, I was not happy when the landlord showed up wondering where his $500-odd dollars were. Despite the initial bad taste in my mouth, I did grow to like Isla and sympathize with her interpersonal problems with her parents: Boundaries matter. And I think Cade acted as a great foil in that regard. Just because someone had it worse than Isla, that doesn’t mean Isla isn’t allowed to be hurt by her parent’s thoughtlessness. Overall, a good portrayal of young millennial/elder zoomer financial struggles with a cute romance.

In Nightfall by Suzanne Young | Urban Fantasy, Horror, Contemporary, Young Adult, Vampires, Reimagining, Supernatural

⭐⭐

Summary: In this reimagining of the 1987 film The Lost Boys, a pair of siblings visit their father’s hometown in the wake of their parent’s divorce. While Marco immediately falls in love with the stunning and stunningly cool Minnow, our heroine, Theo, isn’t so enamored. Things get stranger and stranger as their visit progresses, until it’s clear that there’s something wrong with this town--and it’s gotten its claws into Marco.

Thoughts: This was maybe ten to fifteen chapters too long. The paperback is nearly 400 pages and if I’m being honest, a YA vampire thriller with no symbolism/philosophy to speak of has no business being so tedious and long. I had to force myself through certain parts. It had the potential to be really fun and creepy if an editor had gone through it with some hedge clippers. Instead, it was boring. Amazing cover though.

Tilly in Technicolor by Mazey Eddings | Romance, Young Adult, Contemporary, Mental Health, Travel, Humor

⭐⭐⭐

NOTE: I read an ARC.

Summary: Tilly just graduated high school by the skin of her teeth thanks to her ADHD making it impossible to focus in a traditional classroom setting. Oliver, also neurodivergent, runs a successful Instagram page utilizing Pantone’s colors to relate to the world around him and start a dialogue about color theory. Both have spots as summer interns for a startup nail polish company, where they traverse falling in love in a world that wasn’t made for your brain chemistry.

Thoughts: Despite its serious subject matter, I found Tilly in Technicolor to be both heartfelt and wildly funny. The dialogue was age-appropriate for a YA book without feeling like an adult was poorly imitating how kids talk, and the characters were all flawed from the jump without seeming unlikeable. I did, however, find myself rolling my eyes at the inevitable Final Act Breakup, though that was resolved in pretty short order.

The Last Girls Standing by Jennifer Dugan | Horror, LGBT, Mystery, Young Adult

⭐

Summary: Sloan and Cherry are the only two girls who survived a horrific mass-murder. Now, as Sloan is trying to recover her memories, she grows more and more certain that Cherry is gaslighting her about what really happened that night.

Thoughts: I was expecting a fun slasher book. What I got was two dysfunctional lesbians screaming at each for 75% of the book. I was like, Just break up already! You two are so toxic to one another! I was annoyed at how misleading the cover and blurbs on this book were.

Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas | Historical Fiction, Horror, Vampires, Vaqueros, Gothic, Romance

⭐⭐⭐

Summary: After a gruesome mauling by a gray, eyeless, humanoid monster, Néstor believes his childhood sweetheart, Nena, to be dead. In the wake of the attack, he flees the ranch he was raised on and spends the next nine years breaking horses by day and chasing Nena’s ghost away with copious amounts of alcohol and meaningless sex by night. But when he is called back to the ranch after the Texans declare war on Mexico, he discovers that Nena survived the attack, and she is furious that he left her without so much as a word. An accomplished healer, Nena accompanies her father’s battalion to war, where she and Néstor are separated from everyone else. Soon, she and Néstor learn that there is more to be scared of than just the Yanquís trying to take their land.

Thoughts: At first, I found this to be an excellent, immersive read that had me feeling Néstor’s grief and Nena’s anger. It transported me to mid-1800s Northern Mexico. As the story wore on, I found the interpersonal conflict to be deeply annoying. In his inner monologue, Néstor insists he loves Nena. Yet when the two fight, he hits below the belt, casting aspersions on her due to imagined slights and even blaming her for being complicit to the exploitation of the working class. Like, Dude. She’s an unmarried woman during the Victorian era and there are vampires attacking you. I’m all for bringing down capitalism but maybe some of your ire is a little misplaced. They both whine an exceeding amount throughout the story about their relationship.

Ashes in the Snow by Oriana Ramuno | Historical Fiction, World War II, Crime, Holocaust, Nazi Germany, Murder Mystery

⭐⭐⭐

Note: I read an ARC

Summary: The year is 1943 and Detective Hugo Fischer, accomplished criminologist, is sent to Auschwitz to investigate the mysterious death of a high-ranking SS officer. A young twin and current favorite of the infamous Josef Mengele, eight-year-old Gioele is the one who discovered the body. The boy strikes a deal with the detective: he will provide information if Hugo locates his parents.

Thoughts: This novel opens up with a punch to the face: Detective Hugo Fischer is standing on the train platform in front of Auschwitz, waiting to be escorted to the crime scene. From there, he watches as an SS officer rips a baby from her mother’s arms and stomps her to death. After witnessing such a thing, one would think that Hugo might not be shocked at the horror that awaits him inside the camp. Yet it seems as though every injustice shocks him anew. I’m like, Hugo, you just saw a man murder a baby in front of her mother and you’re shocked that the Nazis are performing human experimentation? Come on. But Hugo has, since the Nazi party seized power, kept his head down in order to survive, which is why he wears the swastika on his jacket and pretends his bad leg was the result of polio and not a degenerative disease. And while the book seemed to be leaning quite hard on Hannah Arendt’s idea of the banality of evil, there is no denying that what went on at Auschwitz was anything but banal. While it was an engrossing read, I found myself disliking all of the characters except Gioele, because I don’t believe the line of reasoning that plenty of Nazis were doing their jobs because execution was the only other option. We even learn that Hugo had job offers all over the world but chose to stay in Berlin. It was difficult sympathizing with a character who, when we meet him, witnessed the brutal murder of a baby girl without uttering so much as a word.

Eventide by Sarah Goodman | Historical Fiction, Young Adult, Fantasy, Horror, Magic

⭐⭐

Summary: When Verity and Lilah’s father is committed to an asylum after the death of their mother, the two sisters find themselves on an orphan train heading from New York City to the small town of Wheeler, Arkansas. When adorable, 11-year-old Lilah is adopted immediately and there are no offers made on taciturn, 17-year-old Verity, Verity must take on an indenture to stay close to her beloved sister. But Wheeler is an odd town with strange magic in its bones and not everyone is as they seem, especially the mild-mannered schoolteacher who adopted Lilah.

Thoughts: I really do not like the sort of story where something is obviously happening and everyone around the protagonist doesn’t believe them. At least Verity’s friends and the one social worker believed her. I suppose I found myself frustrated that Verity showed up to a town and had to pay for the sins of her parents. What a parent does shouldn’t be the child’s burden to bear and the ending wasn’t fair.

The Lady Rogue by Jenn Bennet | Young Adult, Historical Fiction, Adventure

⭐⭐⭐

Summary: Theodora Fox lives on the sidelines of her father’s Indiana Jones-esque treasure hunting career, staying behind at hotels with governesses and tutors as he and Huck Gallager--her ex-boyfriend and father’s apprentice of sorts--go on adventures. After Theo’s tutor absconds with all of her money, leaving Theo in a foreign city with no resources, the last person she wants to see is Huck Gallagher, who left in the middle of the night over a year ago without so much as a word. But when he tells her he believes her father to be in trouble, she has no choice but to set her feelings aside and team up with her former love to come to his rescue.

Thoughts: I really, really enjoyed the adventure side of this book. It was a fun romp through the Carpathian Mountains. The personal conflict between Huck and Theo, however, felt half-baked. It needed to be fleshed out a little more. And while the two seemed to agree that Fox (Theo’s father) was the root cause of their problems, that was never explored in any satisfying way. It felt like the author was rushing the ending rather than giving these characters catharsis after they’d been badly hurt by someone they both considered a parental figure.

With a Kiss We Die by L. R. Dorn | Mystery, Thriller, Suspense, Contemporary

⭐⭐⭐

Summary: Ryanna Raines is an investigative journalist and host of the hit true-crime podcast known as, “The Raines Report.” Before landing on a subject for her sixth season, she receives an intriguing message on her tip line from a 22-year-old theater student from USCB whose parents were found murdered in their San Diego home. He knows that the police are days away from charging both him and his 18-year-old girlfriend with murder and he wants Raines to fly to California and give the young students a chance to tell their side of the story and proclaim their innocence.

Thoughts: At first, I found this read to be deeply absorbing. I liked the podcast-y format (though I haven’t listened to a podcast in years, I can still appreciate the unique approach to storytelling). But as the story wore on, it became clear that there would be no big twists or interesting discoveries. It was anticlimactic and perhaps that was the point as the book was a fictional lens with which to look at the true crime genre. Still, I found myself unsatisfied with the lack of mystery in this alleged mystery novel.

Cackle by Rachel Harrison | Horror, Fantasy, Witches, Contemporary

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Summary: Annie Crane, suffering from a devastating breakup, has no choice but to move out of her expensive NYC apartment she shared with her now-ex and take a job teaching upstate. In the small, picturesque village of Rowan, Annie meets Sophie and begins a life-altering transformation.

Thoughts: This was honestly a really funny read. I’ve read another book by this author that was equally as funny, so I expected that. However, I thought the plot could stand to be a little more developed and I would have liked it to be a little darker.

Jackal by Erin E. Adams | Horror, Race, Contemporary, Thriller, Black Horror, Supernatural

⭐⭐⭐

Summary: Liz Rocher grew up in the Rust Belt town of Johnstown, PA. A black girl in an affluent, predominantly white community, she struggled to fit in with her classmates throughout her childhood, and when she left the small town for New York City, it was for good. When her best friend announces she’s getting married, though, Liz sucks it up and returns to her hometown in order to be a bridesmaid and to visit her best friend’s nine-year-old daughter (her goddaughter), Caroline, who herself is half black. At the wedding, though, Caroline goes missing. This starts Liz down a path of discovery: black girls go missing every June in this little, idyllic town.

Thoughts: While this was an engrossing read, I can’t help but feel like it would have been more effective as a screenplay/movie. And while the novel subverted plenty of tropes, it was still in the tired genre of “woman with a substance abuse problem returns to hometown and stumbles upon a murderer.”

My Roommate is a Vampire by Jenna Levine | Contemporary, Romance, Comedy, Vampires

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Summary: Chicago-based artist Cassie Greenberg is shocked to see a Craigslist apartment listed for only $200 a month. Financially desperate, she decides to meet her potential roommate, fully expecting to encounter a complete weirdo or worse. Well, her roommate is a weirdo: he’s wildly handsome, only comes out at night, never seems to cook or eat, and has a tenuous understanding of technology at best. When Cassie finds blood bags in the fridge, the pieces come together in her mind: her roommate is a vampire.

Thoughts: This was a super funny read. While I’d prefer the plot to be a little more developed, it was fun and campy and I laughed out loud more than once. Definitely didn’t take itself too seriously and I’d recommend it as a palate cleanser.

Together We Rot by Skyla Arndt | Young Adult, Fantasy, Romance, Mystery, Horror, Cults

⭐⭐

Summary: Wil and Elwood were best friends until her mom went missing last year. Then Wil finds herself being gaslighted by the local police and begins noticing all the deeply strange rituals of the local church. Worse, she’s sure she has seen members of the church wearing her mother’s jewelry. Elwood’s father is the preacher and leader of the strange church, and when Wil confronts Elwood, he chooses believing his family over believing her. That is, until he overhears his father speaking about human sacrifice to the local sheriff and realizes he must run for his life.

Thoughts: I thought the prose was overly-flowery and Elwood’s abrupt shift from steadfastly believing his family of being innocent to immediately believing them to be murderers was strange to say the least. He doesn’t even take the time to question what he overheard. He just runs away.

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