Lights Out Lucy - Elicia Hyder

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Lucy Cooper isn't looking for love when she finds it--or slams into it, rather--during rush hour traffic. But her heart, like her car, is a total loss the moment West Adler steps out of his truck to inspect the damage.

West truly is the perfect guy: handsome, funny, rich. The benefactor of not one, but two children's hospitals. And he's the main sponsor of the Music City Rollers, Nashville's championship roller derby team.

When Lucy discovers the Rollers are actively recruiting "Fresh Meat," she puts her life on the line to catch West Adler's attention. But will accident-prone Lucy skate off with the heart of Nashville's Most Eligible Bachelor? Or will she get herself killed in a sport that promises, "It's not a matter of if you'll get hurt--but of how bad and when."

Alright, I'm going to get one thing out of the way before we get into what I loved about this book. Coaches for skaters new to roller derby should not treat their new girls the way they did in this book. Holy shit, no. Just no. Is roller derby badass, yes. Are skaters tough, obviously. But is it ok to be total assholes to each other? Fuck no. New girl coaches should be nice and supportive and patient, and if you start at a league with coaches who yell at you, call you bitches, and generally behave like some of the coaches in this book...find another league to skate with. That's a red flag. Now that we've got that PSA out of the way, moving on!

I enjoyed the balance in this book between work, dude interactions, and roller derby practices. It drives me crazy when books present characters as working in whatever field, being crazy busy or successful, and then proceed to not ever have that character go to work. In this case, the book starts off with Lucy heading to work, where she is doing well but stressed about her boss...and then throughout the book we see her work, kick ass, and navigate her relationship with her intimidating boss. Say what, women can have careers and hobbies and romantic relationships? I love it!

I also enjoyed the relationships between all the fresh meat skaters. Lucy and Olivia were wonderful, as I knew they would be from early on, but then seeing the two of them bond with some of the other new skaters from practice was lovely. The community you join and the friends you make are far and away the best part of being involved in roller derby for me, so seeing that emulated in the book was heart-warming. Also, shout out to Zoey, the toughest skater in this book, fresh meat or otherwise!

Finally, the relationship arc between dreamy West Adler and Lucy was overall adorable and, at times, laugh out loud hilarious. I legitimately stopped a few times while reading to send my husband quotes that had me cracking up. Watching their relationship develop after their...can you call it a "meet cute" if it's a car accident?...was heart-warming, and it felt a little like seeing a friend fall in-like with someone and then watching it become more. Warmed my icy little heart. If you like solid friendships and sweet love connections, this book might be for you. If you want all of that combined with roller skates and a kickass sport, what are you waiting for? Read it.

Empress of All Seasons - Emiko Jean

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Each generation, a competition is held to find the next empress of Honoku. The rules are simple. Survive the palace’s enchanted seasonal rooms. Conquer Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall. Marry the prince. All are eligible to compete—all except yōkai, supernatural monsters and spirits whom the human emperor is determined to enslave and destroy. 

Mari has spent a lifetime training to become empress. Winning should be easy. And it would be, if she weren't hiding a dangerous secret. Mari is a yōkai with the ability to transform into a terrifying monster. If discovered, her life will be forfeit. As she struggles to keep her true identity hidden, Mari’s fate collides with that of Taro, the prince who has no desire to inherit the imperial throne, and Akira, a half-human, half-yōkai outcast."

Mari is an animal wife, a yōkai who has been sent to the palace to compete for the chance to marry the prince. 

Akira is a half-human, half yōkai who calls himself the Son of Nightmares. Akira and Mari have been friends for years, and while she may not love him, he is in love with her. Terrified at the thought of her risking her life at the palace, Akira tries to convince her to run away with him--when she turns him down, he decides instead to follow her, learn what he can about fighting, and try to win her heart.

Taro, the cold prince, lives a secluded, lonely life. His father, the emperor, is heartless and unfeeling, and Taro finds peace only in his workshop, where he creates mechanical creatures to keep him company. He keeps himself closed off, close with no one, until he unexpectedly runs into Mari and finally finds someone he might be able to open up to.

The lives of these three characters will intertwine in unexpected ways as Mari battles her way through the seasonal rooms, falling in love with Taro along the way, as Taro falls in love in return and struggles to decide who he can trust, and as Akira makes connections with the yōkai resistance and learns how to be a warrior. Snippets of tales about the Gods who created the yōkai and the humans are interwoven with the story, and these stories enrich the narrative by offering insight into what the Gods have in store.

Overall, while I found the story intriguing and enjoyable, there was a lot going on, and the pacing and transitions were clunky at times. Also, I didn't love the ending--lots of hasty wrapping up, when I would have loved to see more detail. Complaints aside, this is a solid read, and I especially think that anyone interested in Japanese folklore will enjoy it.

When Dimple Met Rishi - Sandhya Menon

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Dimple Shah has it all figured out. With graduation behind her, she’s more than ready for a break from her family, from Mamma’s inexplicable obsession with her finding the “Ideal Indian Husband.” Ugh. Dimple knows they must respect her principles on some level, though. If they truly believed she needed a husband right now, they wouldn’t have paid for her to attend a summer program for aspiring web developers…right?

Rishi Patel is a hopeless romantic. So when his parents tell him that his future wife will be attending the same summer program as him—wherein he’ll have to woo her—he’s totally on board. Because as silly as it sounds to most people in his life, Rishi wants to be arranged, believes in the power of tradition, stability, and being a part of something much bigger than himself.

The Shahs and Patels didn’t mean to start turning the wheels on this “suggested arrangement” so early in their children’s lives, but when they noticed them both gravitate toward the same summer program, they figured, Why not?

Dimple and Rishi may think they have each other figured out. But when opposites clash, love works hard to prove itself in the most unexpected ways."

Rishi and Dimple meet at Insomniacon, a summer program dedicated to coding and app development. The catch--Rishi is there specifically to meet Dimple, since their parents have arranged their marriage, but Dimple has no idea Rishi even exists. As you can imagine, their relationship gets off to a rocky start. Fortunately, it improves from there, but the pair are so different, is a real, successful relationship even possible for them?

I was pretty split on this book, and ultimately I think it's only meh. I liked Dimple, Rishi, and especially enjoyed reading about Rishi's brother, but most of the characters were pretty one-note, stereotypical, and not terribly well-developed. I loved the premise of a teenage girl being interested in coding and pursuing her career over romance, but the execution fell flat for me, especially since virtually the entire book is her being starry-eyed over Rishi. If you're going to tell me someone has no interest in a romantic relationship, you can't have her bowled over by some dude she barely knows with almost no build-up.

More than anything, the book was just too long. I was into it at the beginning, but after Dimple starts enjoying Rishi's company a few days into Insomniacon, nothing really happens. It's just chapter after chapter featuring more of the same until you get to the end of the book and suddenly things get exciting again and are hastily wrapped up. I wish there had been more character development, more time devoted to Dimple actually working on her app and developing her coding skills, and a little less time devoted to how their hearts beat harder when Dimple and Rishi looked at each other. I wouldn't discourage someone from reading this, but there are definitely more compelling stories out there.

The Reader - Traci Chee

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Once there was, and one day there will be. This is the beginning of every story.

Sefia lives her life on the run. After her father is viciously murdered, she flees to the forest with her aunt Nin, the only person left she can trust. They survive in the wilderness together, hunting and stealing what they need, forever looking over their shoulders for new threats. But when Nin is kidnapped, Sefia is suddenly on her own, with no way to know who’s taken Nin or where she is. Her only clue is a strange rectangular object that once belonged to her father left behind, something she comes to realize is a book.

Though reading is unheard of in Sefia’s world, she slowly learns, unearthing the book’s closely guarded secrets, which may be the key to Nin’s disappearance and discovering what really happened the day her father was killed. With no time to lose, and the unexpected help of swashbuckling pirates and an enigmatic stranger, Sefia sets out on a dangerous journey to rescue her aunt, using the book as her guide. In the end, she discovers what the book had been trying to tell her all along: Nothing is as it seems, and the end of her story is only the beginning."

If it hasn't already become clear, I'm a sucker for pretty book covers. I mean, realistically, who isn't? That's the point of a cover, to make you want to read the book! This cover...ohh boy, it made me want to read this book. Look at it. Feast your eyes. It's gorgeous.

Then read the words, "This is a book. You are the reader. Look closer. There's magic here."

I couldn't not be tingling with anticipation after that. I wanted to love everything about this book. It's such an intriguing concept, after all. In a world where books are not allowed and no one (or mostly no one) even knows how to read, Sefia is on her own, on the run from the unknown assassins who murdered her father and kidnapped her aunt Nin, protecting a mysterious rectangular object...The Book. She rescues a young man from a group of men who kidnap boys to brutalize them and force them to battle others in fighting rings, and the two of them team up to discover who is behind the kidnapping of her aunt and uncover the man they have been told is behind these horrific fighting rings. What's not to love about this premise?

As it turns out, the fact that this is all laid out by about page 65, and then nothing much new happens until roughly 350 pages later. It wasn't bad...there was enough to keep me reading, even if I wasn't dying to pick up this book over some of the others I'm working on. There was some excitement and intrigue, and I really enjoyed some of the characters. I just wish things had moved a little more quickly. The pacing of the book felt off, and the transitions between Sefia's story and her reading of The Book weren't always the smoothest. 

That being said, Chee did manage to reel me back in. Just when I was getting to a point near the end of the book where I had decided if it didn't grab me soon, I wasn't going to be reading the next book, I got to a chapter titled, appropriately, "answers." Those answers weren't much, but they were enough to convince me to give The Speaker a chance. I'm hoping now that most of the world-building is done and characters have been established, the pace of the next book will keep me more engaged. If not...at least there are plenty other books in the sea. Or something.

Leah on the Offbeat - Becky Albertalli

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Leah Burke—girl-band drummer, master of deadpan, and Simon Spier’s best friend from the award-winning Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda—takes center stage in this novel of first love and senior-year angst.

When it comes to drumming, Leah Burke is usually on beat—but real life isn’t always so rhythmic. An anomaly in her friend group, she’s the only child of a young, single mom, and her life is decidedly less privileged. She loves to draw but is too self-conscious to show it. And even though her mom knows she’s bisexual, she hasn’t mustered the courage to tell her friends—not even her openly gay BFF, Simon.

So Leah really doesn’t know what to do when her rock-solid friend group starts to fracture in unexpected ways. With prom and college on the horizon, tensions are running high. It’s hard for Leah to strike the right note while the people she loves are fighting—especially when she realizes she might love one of them more than she ever intended."

Leah Burke is my filthy-mouthed high school BFF soul mate. I started this book after I came home from work a couple days ago and finished it before I went in for work the next day. It was hard to put down, and honestly I would have finished it faster, except I kept stopping to text my sister my favorite Leah one-liners. This book is hilarious. 

Those of you who weren't fans of Leah in Simon Vs. may not dig this one, but if you were down with her in the first book and want more of their world, pick this up. It had its flaws--mainly, for me, dragging out the drama between Leah and Abby too long and then hastily wrapping all the conflict in an epilogue--but hot damn, it will hook you and keep you giggling. It's a good read.

Sky in the Deep - Adrienne Young

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Raised to be a warrior, seventeen-year-old Eelyn fights alongside her Aska clansmen in an ancient rivalry against the Riki clan. Her life is brutal but simple: fight and survive. Until the day she sees the impossible on the battlefield — her brother, fighting with the enemy — the brother she watched die five years ago.

Faced with her brother's betrayal, she must survive the winter in the mountains with the Riki, in a village where every neighbor is an enemy, every battle scar possibly one she delivered. But when the Riki village is raided by a ruthless clan thought to be a legend, Eelyn is even more desperate to get back to her beloved family.

She is given no choice but to trust Fiske, her brother’s friend, who sees her as a threat. They must do the impossible: unite the clans to fight together, or risk being slaughtered one by one. Driven by a love for her clan and her growing love for Fiske, Eelyn must confront her own definition of loyalty and family while daring to put her faith in the people she’s spent her life hating."

I read this too fast to take notes! Gahhhh!

The synopsis from the cover gives you a pretty good idea of what to expect. Eelyn is fighting in a battle against the Riki clan, and one of the Riki gets the best of her. He's about to kill her when her brother, who died years ago, materializes out of nowhere and stops him. After the battle, her father convinces her that it was his spirit, sent by Sigr to protect her. She's almost sold on the idea...until the Aska go to battle a second time against the Riki and she sees him again. This time she follows Iri, and she ends up being taken captive by his warrior brother. 

As winter sets in, she finds herself a slave to the Riki family who took her brother in after he fell to what she presumed to be his death. At first Eelyn is angry. She can't understand why her brother betrayed his clan by staying with the Riki instead of returning home to the Aska, and she wants to hate Fiske, his mother, and his younger brother for taking Iri away from her. The more time she spends with them, however, the more she begins to realize that rival clan or no, the Riki are a lot like her own people--looking out for their own, caring for each other, keeping their clan safe. When the unthinkable happens and the Riki are raided by the ruthless Herja, Eelyn knows what needs to be done. The Riki and Aska must put aside their blood feud if they have any hope of surviving the Herja...but will she be able to convince the clans to work together?

This book is full of action, emotion, and heart. Eelyn, Fiske, and the others were fantastic characters, the plot was riveting, and I couldn't put it down. If you're a fan of fierce female warriors, Viking battle scenes, and the like you'll be a fan of this book.

Dumplin' - Julie Murphy

My rating: ⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Self-proclaimed fat girl Willowdean Dickson (dubbed “Dumplin’” by her former beauty queen mom) has always been at home in her own skin. Her thoughts on having the ultimate bikini body? Put a bikini on your body. With her all-American beauty best friend, Ellen, by her side, things have always worked…until Will takes a job at Harpy’s, the local fast-food joint. There she meets Private School Bo, a hot former jock. Will isn’t surprised to find herself attracted to Bo. But she is surprised when he seems to like her back.

Instead of finding new heights of self-assurance in her relationship with Bo, Will starts to doubt herself. So she sets out to take back her confidence by doing the most horrifying thing she can imagine: entering the Miss Clover City beauty pageant—along with several other unlikely candidates—to show the world that she deserves to be up there as much as any twiggy girl does. Along the way, she’ll shock the hell out of Clover City—and maybe herself most of all.

With starry Texas nights, red candy suckers, Dolly Parton songs, and a wildly unforgettable heroine—Dumplin’ is guaranteed to steal your heart."

So...goods not as advertised. For starters, Will is not at home in her body. She's insecure, hyper-conscious of her size, and has constant terrible self talk. Forget "her thoughts on having the ultimate bikini body? Put a bikini on your body." Not only does she go swimming early on in the book feeling super self-conscious about her swimsuit, but she spends the entire book telling herself she shouldn't do things and doesn't deserve things because of her size. What's more, she's crappy to people who don't deserve it because of her own self-worth issues. Ellen is her best friend, and Bo is clearly a great guy who is into her, so why is she such a dick to them? Because they have the misfortune of being conventionally attractive? That's the only conclusion I can draw. Finally, she judges everyone. People who are fatter than her, people who are thinner than her, people with bad teeth, people who are conventionally attractive, people who aren't...she hates herself so much that she consoles herself by tearing everyone else down in her head while reassuring herself that she's better than the bullies at school who do it out loud. 

Is this a body-positive book? Really? This is the best we can do? 

The saving grace for this book were the supporting characters. If it weren't for Bo, Millie, Amanda, and Hannah, I would have DNFed. The TL:DR for this book could be "self-proclaimed fat girl Willowdean Dickson hates herself and everyone around her and spends an entire book doing nothing but pitying herself and treating everyone around her like shit."

Midnight at the Electric - Jodi Lynn Anderson

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Divided by time. Ignited by a spark.

Kansas, 2065. Adri has secured a slot as a Colonist—one of the lucky few handpicked to live on Mars. But weeks before launch, she discovers the journal of a girl who lived in her house over a hundred years ago, and is immediately drawn into the mystery surrounding her fate. While Adri knows she must focus on the mission ahead, she becomes captivated by a life that’s been lost in time…and how it might be inextricably tied to her own. 

Oklahoma, 1934. Amidst the fear and uncertainty of the Dust Bowl, Catherine fantasizes about her family’s farmhand, and longs for the immortality promised by a professor at a traveling show called the Electric. But as her family’s situation becomes more dire—and the suffocating dust threatens her sister’s life—Catherine must find the courage to sacrifice everything she loves in order to save the one person she loves most. 

England, 1919. In the recovery following the First World War, Lenore struggles with her grief for her brother, a fallen British soldier, and plans to sail to America in pursuit of a childhood friend. But even if she makes it that far, will her friend be the person she remembers, and the one who can bring her back to herself? 

While their stories spans thousands of miles and multiple generations, Lenore, Catherine, and Adri’s fates are entwined."

Like the description says, this book follows three different timelines. Adri is staying with a distant cousin on her farm while she waits to leave for Mars, and while there she finds a postcard written by a woman named Lenore. Curious, she starts searching for more information about this mysterious Lenore, and she eventually discovers letters written by Lenore and Catherine in time past. The three timelines weave together, each woman facing different challenges but also tied together by common threads. 

Adri, always unable to connect with other people, finds herself unable to let go of Lenore and Catherine's stories. Who were these mysterious women? How were they connected to her family? And most importantly...what happened to them? As the date of her launch to Mars draws closer, she finds herself more and more desperate for answers. Will she learn what happened to the women in those letters? Or go to Mars always wondering what tied the three of them together?