The moment of Read Harder truth

Vacation reading mode, activated! I didn't have quite as much reading downtime as I usually end up with on this trip, but I still did pretty well. First off, I finished The Grimoire of Grave Fates, which while interesting in concept and studded with authors I adore fell a little flat for me. I think on the surface "a mystery, but make it an anthology" is cool, but when the story is told across eighteen different chapters featuring eighteen different (mostly disconnected) characters, it ends up being disjointed. If it had been like...four or five characters and you revisited characters, I think it would have come together a little tighter, but I also just think seamlessly weaving a whodunnit with so many moving parts is a tall ask.

I also finished Persepolis, which is SO SO GOOD. It has been on my TBR for a very long time, and I can't believe I waited this long to read it. I know woefully little about Iran, and while I've been trying to follow more people from the Middle East to get a better/more accurate picture of what goes on there, that doesn't do much to catch me up on the complicated history of the region. This was a glimpse into some of that history, and Marjane's writing and artwork captures so much emotion and nuance in what she lived through. Incredible.

Finally, I whittled away at Oathbound. I'm still nowhere near finished, but I've made it into the 200s, so I'm inching ever closer. It does seem like maybe it's picking up a little bit, but I'm a little stunned that I'm about 230 pages in and still so little has happened. The plot is moving at a glacial pace.

Up next? First of all, I'm finally KEEPING NOTES! During July, I'll keep working away at Oathbound, unless I decide to admit defeat. It picked up a bit, so I'm hopeful. My other plan for next month was to pay a visit to the library to check out Perfectly Parvin (prompt #10, read a romance book that doesn't have an illustrated cover, in case you forgot like I had), The Dreadful Tale of Prosper Redding by Alexandra Bracken (prompt #11, read a work of weird horror), and The Third Gilmore Girl by Kelly Bishop (prompt #7, read a book about a piece of media that you love). I did that. And then? Then I finished Perfectly Parvin, which was excellent and also heartbreakingly timely because it was written shortly after the "Muslim ban" during the orange dicktator's first term and I started reading it just days after his dumb ass decided why not ignore laws and decency and bomb Iran for no fucking reason. So...if we could actually get our shit together and create a better world for kids like Parvin, that would be amazing. 

On a brighter note, I haven't started The Dreadful Tale of Prosper Redding yet, but I started The Third Gilmore Girl and am loving learning more about Kelly Bishop, who is kind of a badass. I've still got a day in June, maybe I'll finish her memoir before July and roll for some additional July books while I work on reading Prosper Redding's dreadful tale.

The Academy - T.Z. Layton

Initial Draw: ☆☆☆☆
Character Development: ☆☆☆☆
Plot/Writing Style: ☆☆☆☆
Overall: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Born and raised in a small town, twelve-year-old Leo K. Doyle has never seen the ocean or stepped foot on a plane. But Leo is a star soccer player with big dreams in life. Rock-star, Olympic gold, dragon-slaying dreams. While Leo longs to make the pros one day, he has no idea how to achieve this goal - until a professional scout pays a chance visit to one of Leo's games and extends an invitation to try out for the London Dragons youth squad, known as The Academy. 

Leo is stunned. The London Dragons isn't just any old soccer team. It's a world-famous English Premier League team. Soon Leo is off to a whole new country, embarking on the greatest adventure of his life. The downside? Only eleven players can make the team. Eleven out of two hundred of the very best twelve-year-old players on the planet. 

Along with the grueling competition, Leo must also face a bully intent on torpedoing his summer, a roomie who doesn't know how to have fun, a terrifying camp director, and, most of all, Leo's own lack of formal training and the fear he'll never succeed. By the end of the summer, Leo will become a much better player and forever changed by his experience. But will he be good enough to make the Academy?"

📚📚📚 

Let me tell you, between my love for Ted Lasso and my students' love for The Most Beautiful Game, I have such a soft spot for books about soccer. This one has a little bit of a Blue Lock vibe (manga about a mysterious and slightly shady soccer "camp" designed to produce a world-class striker in which any eliminated players are no longer allowed to play soccer), but more wholesome and less mysterious. While I wish Leo's backstory had been developed a bit more, I found him so heartwarming and loveable, and I was rooting for him the whole book.

There was a pretty big cast of side characters, which made it hard to really develop them, but a handful of them were given distinct enough characteristics that I still felt like I got a sense of their personalities. In spite of it not being possible to give each of them the development they deserved, I found the camaraderie between Leo and his fellow Iguanas, including Coach Samantha, very endearing. They came off as sort of an "underdog" team, since the other teams were assigned some of the top players in camp, and watching them grow as a team made the former coach in me happy.

Soccer-wise, it's always tough to write sports action in a book, but I thought Layton did a pretty solid job. I am not SUPER familiar with soccer, but I've pieced together a bit, and that was enough to get a picture of what was going on. I thought the matches, scrimmages, and drills were pretty well written and entertaining, and I was impressed with the balance struck between almost-impossible heroic sports moments and realistic "damn, I fucked that up" plays. The entire book, I kept thinking I knew what was coming only to be taken by surprise, which was a very pleasant surprise, since I started the book thinking I knew exactly how it would all play out. That's on me for getting cocky, I guess.

Anyway, pretty solid book. There are at least two more, and I'm looking forward to getting into them!

June Mystery Read

𝅘𝅥𝅮It's the first of the moooooonth...𝅘𝅥𝅮

And that means it's time for a new mystery read! Truly, what does it say about me that even if I looked at my TBR shelf to try and guess which books I have wrapped and waiting for me, I would have ZERO idea of which books are missing? (That I don't have a great memory. It says nothing about the amount of books waiting for me to read them.)

We're getting off topic. The important thing right now is what June's mystery book is! And it's a good one - One of the Good Ones, in fact.

I know this is probably going to be very sad, and "I'm looking forward to reading it" really feels weird to say, given that it's a book about two siblings trying to find a way to honor their sister after she dies under mysterious circumstances at a social justice rally. I think it will be a good book, though.

Puzz Buds, Part Deux

Welcome back to the puzzle corner! Today's completed puzzle is very aptly called "Paris Windows," manufactured by Ceaco. 

As far as pictures go, this one was pretty fun! Still a little bit of watercolor style to it, but to less of an extreme than our previous puzzle. The pieces were much more uniquely shaped ("unique, random shaped pieces" per the box!), which keeps things fun and a little spicey. The only minor complaint I had was that the pieces didn't stay together quite as well as I would like. We started out trying to use a puzzle mat in case we needed to move the puzzle at some point, but we had to bail on that because the pieces didn't want to stay together on the felt. They did a little better on our tabletop, but even then...could have been a bit better there. All in all, though, I found this to be an enjoyable puzzle, just enough of a challenge without being headache-inducing. I'm giving this one a 4.5/5. Good times were had exploring the streets and windows of Paris.

May update in June

Well, shit, I got my weeks all mixed up, posted late last week, and then forgot that the last week of the month is my Read Harder update. Or maybe I blocked it out, because update? What update? I've been working on books for the committees I joined for work, the book for my book club was chonkier than normal, and so I have barely done any reading for this at all. Haven't started Persepolis. Finished a few chapters of Oathbound, but honestly, I'm struggling with it. The other books were solid, but this one is moving at a glacial pace. I'm gonna keep chipping away, but I don't know how far I'll get.

I'm out of school now, at least, so hopefully I'll get my butt in gear and finish some books. Persepolis, obviously. The Grimoire of Grave Fates and Perfectly Parvin are the next two on my list...I've got a vacation coming up next week, so that's the perfect chance to knock some reading out. If only I had planned ahead and bought copies. It makes me nervous bringing library books on vacation, so I guess I'll be checking out the ebooks to read instead. Congratulations, everyone who has ever told me "you know e-readers are a thing, right?" when they find out how many physical books I bring on vacation. You finally get your way. (Except my library apparently doesn't have the digital version of Perfectly Parvin. Womp. I'll figure something out.)

Strangeworlds Travel Agency - L.D. Lapinski

Initial Draw: ☆☆☆
Character Development: ☆☆
Plot/Writing Style: ☆☆
Overall: ⭐⭐

From the cover:

"When twelve-year-old Flick Hudson accidentally ends up in the Strangeworlds Travel Agency, she uncovers a fantastic secret: there are hundreds of other worlds just steps away from ours. All you have to do to visit them is just jump into the right suitcase. Then Flick gets the invitation of a lifetime: join Strangeworlds' magical travel society and explore other worlds.

But, unbeknownst to Flick, the world at the very center of it all, a city called Five Lights, is in danger. Buildings and even streets are mysteriously disappearing. Once Flick realizes what's happening, she must race against time, traveling through uncharted worlds, seeking a way to fix Five Lights before it collapses into nothingness - and takes our world with it."

📚📚📚

Sooooooo the thing about this book. While there's nothing outright objectionable about it, that little synopsis from the cover? That's literally the entire book. As in (sorry, spoilers) the discovery that parts of Five Lights are disappearing and that Flick and the Head Custodian of Strangeworlds need to travel through other worlds to figure out how to fix it IS the end of the book. Respectfully, I don't think that's how synopses on the cover are supposed to work. And honestly, that isn't how it should have played out. 

What I wish had happened: the synopsis takes us maybe a quarter of the way through the book, at which point the adventure really kicks off and we follow Flick through adventure after adventure as she pieces together what's going wrong in Five Lights. Instead, the book starts with Flick discovering Strangeworlds, then has a whole bunch of slow-paced filler with hints at bigger things that never really get answered or added to, and then bam, Five Lights, the end. Boring. And I don't even really fault Lapinski for it, because it's not like the writing itself is bad! No, no. I blame whomever edited this. What is an editor for, if not to be like hey, maybe cut this, rearrange these pieces, pick up the pace a bit...

Or, I don't know, maybe the plan was to spread this book out so it could be spun into a book two (and a 2.5, a 3, and apparently a 3.5). 🤔 I'm not saying this SHOULDN'T have been a series, but the way it was handled makes me scratch my head. There most definitely wasn't enough in this first book to entice me into going back for more, and I'm a completionist, so that says something. Disappointing, because the premise is interesting, but this gets a "you should pass on it" from me.

The House Swap - Yvette Clark

Initial Draw: ☆☆☆
Character Development: ☆☆☆
Plot/Writing Style: ☆☆☆
Overall: ⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Allie is a middle child living in a sleepy English village who dreams of being a spy. Sage, an only child from Los Angeles, is more interested in her crystal collection than cracking codes. Though they have nothing in common, their worlds collide when their parents agree to a house swap - Allie's family will spend their vacation at Sage's house in sunny California while Sage and her mom will stay at Allie's cottage in England.

When the girls meet, it doesn't take super-spy skills to see that Sage is worried about the tension between her parents. Determined to fix things, the girls hatch a complicated plan. But while Allie is pulling the strings in Sage's family, she's struggling to feel heard in her own, with her obnoxious older brother and annoying younger sister taking up all her parents' time. It just may take a trip halfway around the world for Sage and Allie to find their place at home."

📚📚📚 

Good god, it's been two months since I wrote an actual review of a book. Well, here I go! The House Swap, a.k.a. The Holiday but make it middle grade. This book...was fine. Nothing terribly bad to complain about, but nothing especially engaging to gush about either. It was pretty slow-paced, probably as a result of the driving action being so milquetoast, thus not giving much to drive toward. Allie was fine, Sage was fine, the other siblings and friends were fine (although including bitchy neighbor Chloe and the whole bit with Sage's missing diary probably could have been left out and the story would have been better for it). The parents were...truly baffling. As many parents can be, I suppose. Overall, I give this a solid C+. If you're looking for something to read and don't have any other options, spend an afternoon on this. Otherwise, you could probably skip it. 

Travel the world through puzzles!

A friend has got us on a real puzzle kick, so since we've been so into them and been doing so many different puzzles, I figured hey, why not review some of them? It probably says something about me that my first thought when enjoying any kind of hobby or media, my immediate instinct is to share my thoughts about it with my friends on the internet, but I'm not going to dig into what exactly that is. Instead, let's look at our first puzzle!

Cities Around the World - Galison

This puzzle was designed by Michael Storrings (and is actually the SECOND puzzle that started this whole saga, but the first, Cats in the City, was a nightmare so I decided to let that one fade into memory). I really enjoyed the picture, and while the watercolor style makes things a little more challenging, aside from the building in the bottom left corner I didn't think anything was too nightmarish. The pieces stick to two standard shapes, which alternate, making it a little easier to put together. And as a bonus, the pieces stay together really well! We probably could have picked up the whole puzzle when it was finished without much of it coming apart. As someone who does a lot of puzzles with little kids, I love a puzzle that stays together. Overall, I'd say 4/5 stars. Approaching perfection, the watercolor just isn't our jam. I would try other Galison puzzles, though!

May Mystery Read

It's been a streak of somewhat heavier/longer books for my mystery reads for the last few, and May's is a bit lighter...or maybe it's just that it's a middle grade book, so it feels easier to fly through? Whichever it is, the book is Strangeworlds Travel Agency by L.D. Lapinski. 

This is an Owlcrate Jr book from back in the day, which became one of the many middle grade books waiting to be read and possibly added to my school library that I made my way through at a glacial pace. Congratulations, book, it's finally your time! I wonder if I can finish it before school lets out.

Reading so very hard in April

Briarheart wasn't bad, but I found it pretty meh. It had the potential to be exciting, but the style of storytelling felt almost clinical to me, and while the buildup and mystery of what was going on had me hooked, the ultimate payoff was a little bit of a letdown. Glad I read it, at least, so now it's off my list. I also started Oathbound and picked up Persepolis from the library, and I read the second book I had chosen for promp #24, a book of ghost stories, some of which were truly creepy. Good for me, reading TWO books for two prompts instead of reading books for other prompts!

I haven't gotten any better at keeping notes on my plans, either. I'm going to level with you, I joined a few committees for our state book awards, because my students LOVE voting for this award every year, and it's possible that in my enthusiasm for something I know my kids enjoy I bit off more than I could chew. So unusual for me, overextending myself? Not something I'm known for! 

Anyway, I swear I went back and tried to untangle everything with my last Read Harder post, but now I can't find those notes, and on the PDF that I use for tracking which books I choose, I have one listed for January but for a challenge that I'm not sure I'm actually doing yet? So...I don't know, I'm just muddling my way through. Look, with any luck I'll finish Persepolis in May and make decent progress on Oathbound (truly such a long book), and then school will be out and I can try to really straighten myself out. Until then, I'm out here building the plane as a fly it. It'll be fine.

Ahhhh, time isn't real

I really thought I had posted last week, but truly the last few weeks have run together. I can tell it's nearing the end of the school year because I am VERY tired. Could also be the lingering effects of being sick over spring break, but no...that's impossible.

Anyway, missed a post, it happens. I finished my mystery read for this month, and WHEW it was good. BUT. The whole time I thought it was a standalone, and then at the very end...I don't think it is. Or maybe it is and they wanted to leave you with an "and then..." Hold for research.

......

......

Nope, confirmed, it's the first book in a series. The age-old curse of fantasy, even realistic fantasy, everything has to be a series. Yet another book for me to decide if I read the sequel. Le sigh. I'm glad it was an enjoyable book, at least, and honestly even though it's part of a series I do feel like it was satisfying even as a standalone.

Now, related to reviews, if you can count this as a review, an announcement!

My household has recently gotten into puzzles, and I think we're going to post some puzzle reviews for funsies. So hey, if you like puzzles...keep an eye out for those.

Monthly Mystery Read - April

Before we get into which book I unwrapped for April, I'm gonna take a moment to say that if you have a big backlog of TBR books on your shelf and can't summon the motivation to dive into it...this is such a great way to get yourself reading them. Not only are you tricking your brain into being excited about a book you've probably owned for years, but who doesn't love unwrapping presents?! I might start wrapping other already-owned things for later use. Shirt I haven't worn in a while? That's a gift for future me now. Pair of shoes I forgot I owned? Merry Christmas in July to me! You get the picture.

Anyway, March's book was pretty solid, although I discovered that it's a duology. 🤦 So now I have to decide if it was solid enough that I read the second book. I mean...I do want to. If my library had it on audiobook, I would already be listening to it. So I guess more accurately I should say I need to find the energy to read the second book, because energy is in low supply at the moment. I'll get there.

For now though, we're not talking about Illusionary, sequel to Incendiary! We're talking about April's mystery book, a.k.a. The Buried and the Bound.

A little haunting, a little spooky, a little mysterious...I'm already almost a quarter of the way through, and I'm very intrigued so far. I'm also crossing my fingers that this is a standalone, because please, authors. Please. There are so many great books waiting to be read, they can't all be series books, I'll run out of tiiiiime!

March Read Harder, or "I'm Trying My Best"

Yeah, it has been a rough start to the year. Not just with reading, like generally with life. It happens. I'm trying. Did I get back on track over spring break? Nope! I did get sick though, so that was fun. I do feel like I'm finally starting to straighten things out, though and that's not nothing. I finally finished The Crossroads, sequel to The Only Road, and it was beautiful and sad and hopeful. I also read (one of? Surprising no one, not only have I not been reading my challenge books, I haven't been keeping great notes of my plans) my choices for challenge #24, The Storyteller. It's magical realism, and it was very strange and fascinating and cool. 

So hey, four prompts complete, all told not too shabby! It could certainly be worse. I haven't requested Persepolis from the library for challenge #14 yet (frustrating, because I went to TWO libraries today and could probably have found it at one of them if I had thought about it), but I've got the audiobook for Briarheart so I've got that going for myself. And my pick for challenge #1, Read a 2025 release by a BIPOC author, has arrived. Oathbound, last book in the Legendborn series! 650 pages, whaaaaat? Who doesn't love a hefty tome like that? I'll chip away at that, though, listen to my audiobook, and next time I make a trip to the library I'll grab Persepolis. Baby steps, baby.

Each Tiny Spark - Pablo Cartaya

Initial Draw: ☆☆☆
Character Development: ☆☆
Plot/Writing Style: ☆☆
Overall: ⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Emilia Torres has a wandering mind. It's hard for her to follow along at school, and sometimes she forgets to do what her mom or abuela asks. But she remembers what matters: a time when her family was whole and home made sense. Emilia expects that her life will get back to normal when Dad returns from deployment. Instead, it unravels.

Dad shuts himself in the garage to work on an old car. Emilia peeks in on him daily, mesmerized by his welder. One day, Dad calls Emilia over. Then, he teaches her how to weld. And over time, flickers of her old dad reappear.

But as Emilia finds a way to repair the relationship with her father at home, her community ruptures, with some of her classmates - like her best friend, Gus - at the center of the conflict."

📚📚📚 

Sigh. I feel like this was much-lauded, but I found it to be very lackluster. The plot was pretty aimless, and while I thought there were nice moments, overall it didn't really go anywhere. Not to mention, the synopsis is pretty misleading. Take, for example: "Emilia peeks in on him daily, mesmerized by his welder. One day, Dad calls Emilia over. Then, he teaches her how to weld. And over time, flickers of her old dad reappear." 

Yeah, she watches her dad weld from far away through Gus's camera once and then welds with him twice, both times with disastrous conversation, and then it really doesn't come up again. This is pretty much how the whole story goes - threads picked up, immediately dropped, sometimes forgotten about, others picked back up way later. I'd say the only consistent storyline was the homework assignment from her social studies teacher, and even that I found very puzzling. Her teacher? Clearly a great one. The assignment? Made no sense to me.

Maybe I could have moved past inconsistent plot if the characters were solid, but sheesh, they were all like caricatures. Clarissa, introduced at the beginning of the book as one of Emilia's best friends, is obnoxious (but also clearly positioned as an antagonist, so that's kind of to be expected). But even Emilia, her family, and Gus are pretty stereotyped. There was no nuance or real development, and there were a lot of inconsistencies. Just...meh all around. I had high hopes, and this did not deliver. 

Monthly Mystery Read - March

It's March, and that means it's time for a new mystery read. (Pretend we aren't already a third of the way into March. Life is hard right now.) March's mystery book is another tome - Incendiary by Zoraida Cordova. 

I think this was an Owlcrate subscription book, so I had to look up the synopsis because it's been a while since I got it: 

"Renata Convida was kidnapped as a child by the King's Justice, her Moria power to steal memories exploited by the king and his guard. Renata is now one of the Whispers, rebel spies working against the Crown and helping other Moria escape the kingdom. When the commander of her unit, Dez, is taken captive, Renata is forced to return to the palace, undercover, to complete their top secret mission. But returning to the palace unlocks long suppressed memories, and as Renata becomes more embedded in royal politics, she uncovers a secret from her past that could change the fate of the kingdom and end the war that has cost her everything."

Intriguing, for sure! I'm looking forward to diving into this! 

MapMaker - Lisa Moore Ramee

Initial Draw: ☆☆☆☆
Character Development: ☆☆☆☆☆
Plot/Writing Style: ☆☆☆☆☆
Overall: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"When Walt and his family relocate to Blackbird Bay, Walt thinks it's the most boring place on earth. While his twin sister, Van, likes to spend her time skateboarding, Walt prefers to hide out in his room and work on his beloved map world, Djaruba. But shortly after their arrival, Walt discovers something extraordinary: He has the ability to make maps come to life.

Suddenly his new hometown doesn't seem so boring after all. And when a magical heirloom leaves Walt, his new friend Dylan, and Van stranded in t he fantastical world that Walt created, he'll need to harness his new power to get them home.

But things are changing. People have gone missing, and it's clear that a malevolent rival to the kingdom - a fellow mapmaker - has nefarious plans for Walt. If he's not stopped soon, Djaruba could become nothing but a shadow of itself or, worse, gone forever. And if a mapmaker can destroy one world, could Earth be next?"

📚📚📚 

On the one hand, this book is shorter than many of the middle grade books I've considered adding to my library, which is refreshing - stop writing 400-500 page books for kids, y'all, tighten that shit up. On the other, I wish there had been a little more development of certain things? That's not to say the book needed to be LONGER, necessarily, but I think perhaps some of the "Blackbird Bay isn't my HOME, having a twin sister who's taller than me SUCKS, my parents don't UNDERSTAND ME" angst could have been trimmed to allow space for other things. I am assuming there will be a second book at some point, so perhaps there will be more world building in book two.

Still, it's an interesting concept for a story, and I really enjoyed the characters. Solid story for map kids everywhere.

February Read Harder update...if you can call it that

Look, this will be a short update. Did I read the other books I planned to from January? No.

Did I read my February books? No.

Did I even request February books from the library or purchase them from my bookstore of choice? Also no.

I'm going to hold off on choosing new challenge books for now so I don't overwhelm myself in books I should be reading. Maybe I'll catch up during spring break.

Lore - Alexandra Bracken

Initial Draw: ☆☆☆☆
Character Development: ☆☆☆☆☆
Plot/Writing Style: ☆☆☆☆☆
Overall: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Every seven years, the Agon begins. As punishment for a past rebellion, nine Greek gods are forced to walk the earth as mortals. They are hunted by the descendants of ancient bloodlines, all eager to kill a god and seize their divine power and immortality.

Long ago, Lore Perseous fled that brutal world, turning her back on the hunt's promises of eternal glory after her family was murdered by a rival line. For years she's pushed away any thought of revenge against the man - now a god - responsible for their deaths.

Yet as the next hunt dawns over New York City, two participants seek her out: Castor, a childhood friend Lore believed to be dead, and Athena, one of the last of the original gods, now gravely wounded.

The goddess offers Lore an alliance against their mutual enemy and a way to leave the Agon behind forever. But Lore's decision to rejoin the hunt, binding her fate to Athena's, will come at a deadly cost - and it may not be enough to stop the rise of a new god with the power to bring humanity to its knees."

📚📚📚

 Dude...the plot twists in this book. I knew it would be good, and I'll tell you what, it did not disappoint. It isn't often that a twist throws me for a loop, but Lore left me reeling MULTIPLE times. It helps that there's like...deep deep lore (ha...pun not intended) that the reader is learning as they progress through the story, so sometimes it felt like I was just barely keeping my head above water with all of that, but MAN. Truly got me so good, in the most satisfying ways. Truly, reading this felt like swinging along a series of ropes or something, trying not to drop, and as soon as you thought you were in a rhythm and had a grasp on things, it was like NOPE! So masterfully done.

I want to talk details, but I don't know how to without potentially spoiling things, so I'll just say the characters - top notch. The plot develops at a great pace, with more detail revealed at intervals where you're juuuuuust starting to get frustrated, and then ope, here's another little kernel for you, my desperate reader, I hope you enjoy! 

I think my one wish after finishing this is that there had been a little more actual God lore included, not just the house lore, but honestly, this book was SO long, I truly don't know if that would have been feasible. And I think if it came down to more details about the pantheon and maybe making this a duology or less and keeping it a standalone book, I would come down on the side of standalone book. There are so few standalone fantasy books with solidly developed worlds, I really loved that. Plus even though we didn't get a lot of pantheon lore, what we got...was good. So hey, maybe I have no wishes. This was a great book!

The Only Road by Alexandra Diaz and musings on empathy

 This isn't even a review, I don't know what it is...but I finished reading The Only Road last night, and I don't know if a book has ever made me so emotional. It took me a while to finish because I had to take so many breaks to process those emotions, and I think more people should read books like this. It's a prime example of what freedom to read folks talk about when they praise the way reading exposes people to other viewpoints and helps (kids especially) learn and develop empathy. It puts you in the shoes of someone you may not otherwise understand in a way that just...frankly tore my heart out.

That said, I was thinking about some people in my life that I wish would read a book like this, and I realized that truthfully, even if they did I don't think it would make them feel any type of way. I don't think it would make them take a look at their attitudes about immigration, particularly people who come into the United States "illegally" (no one is illegal on stolen land, abolish ICE, our legal immigration system is a joke and seeking asylum is a fucking human right), and I think many of them are so dug in to their hateful rhetoric that they would manage to find a way to blame people in positions like the characters in The Only Road for the situation they were in.

And that just makes me sad and confused. I genuinely don't understand how people can hold such hatred in their hearts and be so closeminded and cruel and then just...walk around like normal. How do you exist like that? How do you justify it? It baffles me.

I don't know. This isn't a book review, and it's mostly me having a rambly existential crisis, I guess. It's just weighing on my mind, and I figured why not put it out there. I wish more people were willing to commit the sin of empathy.

Monthly Mystery Read

Shortly before the 2024 holidays, a meme started going around where as a "gift" someone was given 12 wrapped books from their TBR shelves, each labeled for one month of the year. Two of my sisters and I decided to do that for each other, and so far it's a lot of fun looking forward to unwrapping my new book on the first of the month to discover what it is. My January book was #VeryFatVeryBrave by Nicole Byer, which was SO good. It's also pretty short and is a photography book, so has lots of (incredible) pictures, which meant that I finished on January 1st and have been impatiently waiting for my next book reveal for the rest of the year that has been January.

And at last, yesterday was the day.

At long last, the February book reveal! And the February book is...

Drumroll, please...

🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁

Yessssssssss, I'm so excited! I've read a time travel duology by Alexandra Bracken and really enjoyed it. This one is modern day Greek mythology, which like...what's not to love? I'm definitely looking forward to it - will report back when I finish!

January challenge update - a.k.a. "I thought I wrote this already"

If you were to throw yourself a 13-13-13 birthday party, what would you plan? Because yesterday was my 13-13-13 birthday, and I find the idea of a 13-themed birthday party so much more fun than a 40th birthday bash. 40? So cliche. 13-13-13...who does that? (Probably no one, because it's weird. And I accept that.)

Speaking of births and days...how about that Read Harder challenge, huh? You'll never believe it, but I fuckin forgot that I came up with the roll the dice thing to choose challenges.😬 Sooooo yeah, I read two books for challenge #2, reread a childhood favorite book - Beauty by Robin McKinley and The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare. Love them both so much, even though I find it silly as hell that the main "conflict" to Beauty when you boil it down is her not being pretty. Anyhow, after I remembered that I was rolling dice to choose which challenges to do, I started working on my challenge #5 books and challenge #24 books. Have I finished them? No. But I still have five more days in January, so there's time. So far, I like them, but man, in the current climate, The Only Road is making me cry even more than it normally would.

Pending completion of my January books in the next five days, for February I'll be completing challenge #6 and challenge #14. For #6, read a standalone fantasy book, I'll be reading Briarheart by Mercedes Lackey. My unofficial goal for this year was to choose books I could add to my school library for as many challenges as possible, but sooooo many middle grade fantasy books are part of a series, I got tired of looking for an intriguing standalone. Briarheart has been on my list for a minute, so it'll be good to finally read it! For challenge #14, read a comic in translation, I'll be reading Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi, translated from French. I also kiiiiind of want to read Persephone by Loic Locatelli-Kournwsky, also translated from French, so I guess we'll see how my reading goes.

Castle of the Cursed vs. The Immortal Dark

Remember back in the roaring tenties, aka the 2010s, when two movies would come out and it was like...I mean, these are two versions of the same movie, did one studio pass and then steal the idea while another studio picked up the original? You know what I'm talking about, right? Mirror Mirror and Snow White and the Huntsman - retellings, but still, same year? No Strings Attached, featuring Natalie Portman and famed rapist-apologist Ashton Kutcher, and Friends with Benefits, featuring dumpster fires Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake? (Per the IMDB trivia, NSA actually tried to title their movie FWB when their original title was rejected and couldn't because...you know, a movie with that exact title and the same plot was coming out a handful of months later...)

Anyhow, I guess this is a thing, they're called Twin Films, movies with similar plots coming out at similar times, which usually would get flagged but every once in a while slips through the cracks. This happens with books too, obviously, and while I always really enjoy reading a book and being like heyyyy I've read something similar to this before, this time I happened to read both books at exactly the same time, and it was a really interesting experience for me so I figured hey, why not blog about it. And here we are.

For starters, personally? These book covers are different variations on the same theme. Similar vibes.

Also, there's an orphaned main character who has lost the last of their known family due to mysterious and probably nefarious circumstances. Both, mostly unwillingly, take a journey to live at a place they find distasteful with an aunt they don't know and don't trust, where both end up allied (tenuously?) with a vampire. Both have lost their native tongue and attempt to relearn it. Both discover their families have complex, mysterious, and dark legacies. Both protagonists are dealing with mental health stuff, with PTSD in the forefront of that stuff.

There's more, but to be honest I thought I had finished this review days ago and foolishly didn't make any notes, so a lot of the more nuanced stuff I'm having trouble remembering and a lot of the less nuanced stuff is spoilers. So I'll just say, interesting experience reading two books that are so similar in overarching plot yet so different in storytelling style. If a person could only read one and asked me for a recommendation, I would say go with Castle of the Cursed if you like things that are mysterious, slightly creepy, but also relatively straightforward when it comes to worldbuilding. Go with The Immortal Dark if you like much more complex, lore-heavy stuff where the book is as much about building the world as it is about advancing the plot. 

What the Woods Took - Courtney Gould

Initial Draw: ☆☆☆☆
Character Development: ☆☆☆☆☆
Plot/Writing Style: ☆☆☆☆☆
Overall: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Devin Green wakes in the middle of the night to find two men in her bedroom. No stranger to a fight, she calls to her foster parents for help, but it soon becomes clear this is a planned abduction - one everyone but Devin signed up for. She's shoved in a van and driven deep into the Idaho woods, where she's dropped off with a cohort of equally confused teens. Finally, two camp counselors inform them that they've all been enrolled in an experimental therapy program. If the campers can learn to change their self-destructive ways - and survive a fifty-day hike through the wilderness - they'll come out the other side as better versions of themselves. Or so the counselors say.

Devin is immediately determined to escape. She's also determined to ignore Sheridan, the cruel-mouthed, lavender-haired bully who mocks every group exercise. But there's something strange about these woods - inhuman faces appearing between the trees, visions of people who shouldn't be there flashing in the leaves - and when the campers wake up to find both counselors missing, therapy becomes the least of their problems. Stranded and left to fend for themselves, the teens quickly realize they'll have to trust each other if they want to survive. But what lies in the woods may not be as dangerous as what the campers are hiding from each other - and if the monsters have their way, no one will leave the woods alive."

 📚📚📚

I've commented many times on here about how I'm not a horror person, but after reading a spate of horror and horror-adjacent books recently (thanks, I guess, Owlcrate), I might have to revise that to say that I'm interested in horror, but only a very specific sliver of the genre. I don't even know what that sliver is, though. Maybe more thriller than horror? Psychological? Whatever subgenre it is, this falls into it. I could not put it down, ended up finishing it in about a day.

For starters, the whole premise of a bunch of teens sent to an ill-fated (aren't they all) wilderness "therapy" retreat hooked me immediately. I used to know someone who worked for one (🤮) and I knew someone who, uh...benefited isn't the word...from being sent to the same one. As far as I heard, neither of them experienced anything supernatural on their retreats, but even hearing about them back then I found the whole concept off-putting. This really cemented that impression.

I mean, for starters, who sends a group of "troubled" teens out into the wilderness for fifty days with adults as outnumbered as these two ill-equipped counselors were? You have five teens, at least one of which was sent there for her "violent outbursts" (are my sarcastic air quotes doing enough work here? I'm not sure), and only two early-20s counselors? Excuse me while I laugh my ass off. I truly don't think Ethan could have held his own against a group of sixth graders, let alone whole-ass teens, so that was an interesting choice. One "counselor" and one "wilderness guide" is in no universe adequate - and perhaps that's one of the many reasons why these retreats fell so out of favor (although they absolutely still fucking exist, I drive past the HQ for one every day on my way to and from work).

Anyway, yeah, premise, strong. Character development? So solid. Starting off, everyone is pretty heavily stereotyping each other, but it's clear from the jump that there's so much we aren't seeing below the surface, and I loved the way those deeper parts of each character came out as things progressed. It was done so naturally, it never felt forced, and the way the characters bonded as more was revealed about them felt very real. I thought it was so well done, letting things unfold together the way they did.

And finally, the inhuman faces appearing in the woods...MY GOD. Psychological warfare, seriously. Things that make the reader question reality is such a tricky line to tow (toe? Fuck, I don't know.). I'm sure some people love being so thoroughly gaslit by the media they're consuming that they have no idea what's up and what's down anymore, but that's not my thing. I do enjoy not being sure what's real and what isn't, but it often goes way too far for me to enjoy. This book?

Truly, just the right amount of questioning reality for me without putting me off of the story. It was enough to keep me on the edge of my seat and make it impossible to put the book down because I had to get to the bottom of things, but not enough for me to give up and decide I didn't care what was happening because it was all too obfuscated. If I didn't keep my nails cut super short for climbing, I would have been biting them off through at least the last half of the book. Masterfully written.

2024 Readcap

Yeah, I've used that portmanteau before, I know. It's stupid, but I like it.

Outside of Read Harder, I really only had a few reading goals. The first, which isn't really a hard and fast thing, was to read at least 100 books. Final count? 111. How very Bilbo of me.

First book of the year, The Mirrorwood by Deva Fagan. Last book, For She is Wrath by Emily Varga. I didn't review For She is Wrath, but it's a reimagining of The Count of Monte Cristo, in a Pakistan-inspired world, and it was pretty good! I also reread seventeen books - bet you can guess a few, and I'm rereading one of them again now - and I DNFed two books, which is a huge victory for me.

My last reading goal was to prioritize reading the books I bought this year and be more intentional with which books I purchased. I think I did pretty well with being intentional - most of the books I bought were for Read Harder, my book club, or were from my monthly book subscription boxes. This year, I'm going to try to use the library more for Read Harder challenges, or pick books from my TBR backlog. And speaking of my TBR backlog, it did not grow this year because I finished ALL the books I bought in 2024! So proud of myself.

Now, what should my 2025 goals be? I've got a monthly mystery read from my TBR shelf thanks to my sister, so I'll be reading those (knocked January's out on the 1st - #SoFat #SoBrave by Nicole Byer, SO good!), and my sister and I are also making Very Hungry Caterpillar scarves with different colors for each genre we read. Those aren't really goals, they're more...fun book-related things...so, what else should I throw into the mix? Read 112 books? Reread 25 books? Read one non-fiction book a month?

The world is my oyster.