Under The Book Cover: dead silence

Book Tag Thursday: Bedtime Book Tag

anne heltzel 12:00:00 PM

Hi hello and welcome to my first Book Tag Thursday! I’m not one hundred percent sure who started this, but I found it from Rachel at Life of a Female Bibliophile so be sure to drop by her blog and check out her post this week. Today, I’ll be doing the Bedtime Book Tag, created by Kelly from Barely Reading! I thought this was a funny and appropriate tag to do since I really enjoy writing my blog posts in bed on my iPad before I go to sleep. Let’s get started!

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1. What book kept you up all night reading?

While I did absolutely devour the Eluding Destiny series by Charlie Nottingham, for some reason I read New Normal in one sitting before going to sleep. Something about it just hooked me and my brain said I had to finish it before I could go to sleep, so I did. This entire series is wonderful and worth staying up all night to read so if you haven’t read it yet, I definitely recommend it!

2. What book made you scared to go to sleep?

I distinctly remember getting so spooked by Dead Silence by S.A. Barnes that I hid under my blankets and scrunched my feet up so the monsters under my bed couldn’t get me. This was such a good book and it really did make me scared to sleep because of how well-written it is. If you’re looking for a horror book set in space, I highly recommend this one!

3. What book almost put you to sleep?

Motherthing by Ainslie Hogarth. This was a book I was so excited to read because of the insane synopsis of a woman trying to save her and her husband from the vengeful ghost of her mother-in-law. As someone who struggles with their relationship with their own mother-in-law, this sounded perfect. Unfortunately, I just did not enjoy it as much as I hoped I would. There were parts that I could have sworn were written just for me, but most of it was just a struggle to read. But I have seen so many positive reviews for this so clearly while it wasn’t for me, a lot of otherpeople enjoyed this and I’m so happy that it found its audience with other readers!

4. What book has you tossing and turning in anticipation of its release?

I’m so excited for Assistant to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer that it’s not even funny. I’ve been following her TikTok for a long time and I’ve seen this go from short skits to a full fledged book and I could not be happier for Hannah! I already know I’m going to love it and I can’t wait to read this!

5. What book has your dream girlfriend/ boyfriend?

I am unashamedly a simp for both Delilah and Claire from Delilah Green Doesn’t Care by Ashley Herring Blake. I love them both so much and can definitely say that they are dreamy as can be. Delilah has the bad girl aesthetic and she’s a photographer and Claire has the single mom bookstore owner thing going on and I respectfully simp for them both.

6. What book world would be your worst nightmare to live in?

Just Like Mother by Anne Heltzel immediately came to mind. This is a world where the Mother cult exists and its members believe one thing: women are meant to be pregnant and bring a little girl into the world because “a girl would be such a blessing.” And if you don’t want to have children? Well, that’s not what they want to hear because what else is a woman supposed to do with her life? And Mother forbid you give birth to a boy. The most terrifying part of this? There are actually people out there who believe the things that are said in this book and there’s a very real possibility that a cult like this could form (or already exist) in our world. Now that’s what I call horror.

7. What book cover reminds you of nighttime?

The House Across the Lake by Riley Sager always gives me creepy nighttime vibes when I see it. I have read it and I think I’m in the minority of people that really liked it, and I think it’s both a great book to read at night and also a really eerie book cover that definitely makes me think of nighttime.

8. What book has a nightmarish cliffhanger?

Charlie Nottingham is an amazing writer, one of my all-time favorites. Charlie Nottingham is also so good at cliffhanger endings that literally make me scream. Raven’s Reckoning has a cliffhanger that made me stop, drop my iPad, pick it back up, and read it again and then promptly lose my entire mind. The Raven’s Cry series is fantastic and if you like paranormal book series with some great spice (and a healthy polyamorous relationship dynamic), this is definitely the book series for you.

9. What book have you actually dreamed about?

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab. I talk about this book more than any other and I'm sure it’s exhausting, but it's such an important book to me. I've had dreams about this book numerous times and I will probably continue to have dreams about it forever. Especially since I’m going to the Addie tour in April!

10. What book monster would you not want to find under your bed?

Pennywise from It by Stephen King. I’ll be the first to admit it, I’m normally a loud and proud monster lover. Like, even the most ridiculous monsters could respectfully get it. But not this monster. And I honestly don’t think I need to go super in depth as to why, right? I’m not down with a monster that wants to scare me by changing into whatever I’m most terrified of so it can feed off of my fear. Like, you do you but I’m scared of clowns so this is a hard pass.

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And that does it for the Bedtime Book Tag! I’m so excited to add this post prompt to my weekly rotation because there are so many book tags out there which allows for a wide variety of books and answers to appear each week. I think starting off with this one was a good choice because it was a nice and easy 10 questions and I had a lot of fun talking about each of the books I mentioned. Have you done this tag before? Are there any books I talked about that you’ve read or are interested in picking up? Did you participate in Book Tag Thursday this week? Let me know in the comments below and be sure to link me your post so I can go check it out! Thanks for stopping by and I’ll see you in the next chapter!

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Best Books of 2022!

ashley poston 10:00:00 PM

Hi hello and welcome to my first post of 2023! This is not only my first blog post of the year but a celebration of my 9th year of blogging! I cannot believe that it has been almost a decade since I've been a part of the book blogging community. I've had some ups and downs throughout the years but I have never lost my love of blogging about books. I hope that 2023 is much easier on me so that I can continue to blog and share even more amazing posts with the community. Thank you so much if you've ever commented, read, shared, or anything in between. I can't wait to see what this year has in store and I hope you'll stick around to see! Now, for today's post, I'll be sharing the best books that I read in 2022. I read 92 books (which is incredible for me) but I'll be talking about my top 10 favorites. Let's get started!
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Just as a side note before I begin, these aren't in any particular order until the top 3!

10. I Am Not Your Final Girl by Claire C. Holland

From Claire C. Holland, a timely collection of poetry that follows the final girl of slasher cinema - the girl who survives until the end - on a journey of retribution and reclamation. From the white picket fences of 1970s Haddonfield to the apocalyptic end of the world, Holland confronts the role of women in relation to subjects including feminism, violence, motherhood, sexuality, and assault in the world of Trump and the MeToo movement. Each poem centers on a fictional character from horror cinema, and explores the many ways in which women find empowerment through their own perceived monstrousness.

9. Only a Monster by Vanessa Len

It should have been the perfect summer. Sent to stay with her late mother’s eccentric family in London, sixteen-year-old Joan is determined to enjoy herself. She loves her nerdy job at the historic Holland House, and when her super cute co-worker Nick asks her on a date, it feels like everything is falling into place. But she soon learns the truth. Her family aren’t just eccentric: they’re monsters, with terrifying, hidden powers. And Nick isn’t just a cute boy: he’s a legendary monster slayer, who will do anything to bring them down. As she battles Nick, Joan is forced to work with the beautiful and ruthless Aaron Oliver, heir to a monster family that hates her own. She’ll have to embrace her own monstrousness if she is to save herself, and her family. Because in this story, she is not the hero.

8. He Who Haunts Me by Kenna Bellrae

Bexley Laughtery lives a very unassuming life in Old Oaks, where secrets fast become dangerous. Unease grows as women are found murdered. Trails run cold for Detective Bishop as he is cuffed with bureaucracy trying to piece the city back together. While some believe they know the party responsible, every new answer leads to further questions. Bexley and other students keep a watchful eye as they participate in fraternity games and social politics. When she finds herself in the camera’s flash, Bexley soon discovers everything comes at a price when the monster they're looking for lurks closer than she could ever imagine. The game is survival. Things get complicated when romance, friendship, and loyalty get involved – and they aren’t playing fair.

7. Small Spaces by Katherine Arden

After suffering a tragic loss, eleven-year-old Ollie who only finds solace in books discovers a chilling ghost story about a girl named Beth, the two brothers who loved her, and a peculiar deal made with "the smiling man"--a sinister specter who grants your most tightly held wish, but only for the ultimate price. Captivated by the tale, Ollie begins to wonder if the smiling man might be real when she stumbles upon the graves of the very people she's been reading about on a school trip to a nearby farm. Then, later, when her school bus breaks down on the ride home, the strange bus driver tells Ollie and her classmates: "Best get moving. At nightfall they'll come for the rest of you." Nightfall is, indeed, fast descending when Ollie's previously broken digital wristwatch begins a startling countdown and delivers a terrifying message: RUN. Only Ollie and two of her classmates heed these warnings. As the trio head out into the woods--bordered by a field of scarecrows that seem to be watching them--the bus driver has just one final piece of advice for Ollie and her friends: "Avoid large places. Keep to small."

6. Dead Silence by S.A. Barnes

Claire Kovalik is days away from being unemployed—made obsolete—when her beacon repair crew picks up a strange distress signal. With nothing to lose and no desire to return to Earth, Claire and her team decide to investigate. What they find at the other end of the signal is a shock: the Aurora, a famous luxury space-liner that vanished on its maiden tour of the solar system more than twenty years ago. A salvage claim like this could set Claire and her crew up for life. But a quick trip through the Aurora reveals something isn’t right. Whispers in the dark. Flickers of movement. Words scrawled in blood. Claire must fight to hold onto her sanity and find out what really happened on the Aurora, before she and her crew meet the same ghastly fate.

5. Delilah Green Doesn't Care by Ashley Herring Blake

Delilah Green swore she would never go back to Bright Falls—nothing is there for her but memories of a lonely childhood where she was little more than a burden to her cold and distant stepfamily. Her life is in New York, with her photography career finally gaining steam and her bed never empty. Sure, it’s a different woman every night, but that’s just fine with her. When Delilah’s estranged stepsister, Astrid, pressures her into photographing her wedding with a guilt trip and a five-figure check, Delilah finds herself back in the godforsaken town that she used to call home. She plans to breeze in and out, but then she sees Claire Sutherland, one of Astrid’s stuck-up besties, and decides that maybe there’s some fun (and a little retribution) to be had in Bright Falls, after all. Having raised her eleven-year-old daughter mostly on her own while dealing with her unreliable ex and running a bookstore, Claire Sutherland depends upon a life without surprises. And Delilah Green is an unwelcome surprise…at first. Though they’ve known each other for years, they don’t really know each other—so Claire is unsettled when Delilah figures out exactly what buttons to push. When they’re forced together during a gauntlet of wedding preparations—including a plot to save Astrid from her horrible fiancé—Claire isn’t sure she has the strength to resist Delilah’s charms. Even worse, she’s starting to think she doesn’t want to.

4. Funeral Girl by Emma K. Ohland

Sixteen-year-old Georgia Richter feels conflicted about the funeral home her parents run--especially because she has the ability to summon ghosts. With one touch of any body that passes through Richter Funeral Home, she can awaken the spirit of the departed. With one more touch, she makes the spirit disappear, to a fate that remains mysterious to Georgia. To cope with her deep anxiety about death, she does her best to fulfill the final wishes of the deceased whose ghosts she briefly revives. Then her classmate Milo's body arrives at Richter--and his spirit wants help with unfinished business, forcing Georgia to reckon with her relationship to grief and mortality.

And now, let's talk about my top 3 books of 2022!

3. The Dead Romantics by Ashley Poston

Florence Day is the ghostwriter for one of the most prolific romance authors in the industry, and she has a problem—after a terrible breakup, she no longer believes in love. It’s as good as dead. When her new editor, a too-handsome mountain of a man, won’t give her an extension on her book deadline, Florence prepares to kiss her career goodbye. But then she gets a phone call she never wanted to receive, and she must return home for the first time in a decade to help her family bury her beloved father. For ten years, she’s run from the town that never understood her, and even though she misses the sound of a warm Southern night and her eccentric, loving family and their funeral parlor, she can’t bring herself to stay. Even with her father gone, it feels like nothing in this town has changed. And she hates it. Until she finds a ghost standing at the funeral parlor’s front door, just as broad and infuriatingly handsome as ever, and he’s just as confused about why he’s there as she is. Romance is most certainly dead . . . but so is her new editor, and his unfinished business will have her second-guessing everything she’s ever known about love stories.

When I picked this book up, I assumed it would just be a cute romance, maybe with some ghosts or something. What I didn't expect was that I would find one of my new all-time favorite books and one of my favorite books of the year. When I say that I loved this book, I mean it with my whole heart. It was exactly what I thought it would be, which is a cute romance. But it tackled things like loss and finding who you are and what your voice is, as well. The Dead Romantics was an absolutely beautiful book and it actually made me cry several times! I can't even remember the last time I cried over a book, but this one got me. There were so many quotes/lines in here that felt like they were written just for me to read, and I'd love to share some of them.

"Love was putting up with someone for fifty years so you'd have someone to bury you when you died."

"Love was a high for a moment that left you hollow when it left, and you spent the rest of your life chasing that feeling."

"There's a certain smell to death."

"I'd always written how grief was hollow. How it was a vast cavern of nothing. But I was wrong. Grief was the exact opposite. It was full and heavy and drowning because it wasn't the absence of everything you lost- it was the culmination of it all, your love, your happiness, your bittersweets, wound tight like a knotted ball of yarn."

"Because loneliness was the kind of ghost that haunted you long after you were dead. It stood over your plot in the cemetery where a lone name sat carved in marble. It sat with your urn. It was the wind that carried your ashes when no one claimed your body."

"There were no happily ever afters between an undertaker's daughter and her ghost."

"I hoped that when they eased Dad into the ground, the dirt would part for the thunder. I hoped the sound would rattle his bones still, make them dance, like they did mine. I hoped that. when the wind was high, blown from some far-off shore, I could hear him singing in the storm, as loud and high and alive as all the dead I'd ever heard singing."

"Love wasn't a whisper in the quiet night. It was a yelp into the void, screaming that you were here."

"She told me that you don't ever lose the sadness, but you learn to love it because it becomes a part of you, and bit by bit, it fades. And, eventually, you'll pick yourself back up and you'll find that you're okay. That you're going to be okay. And eventually, it'll be true."

"Ghost stories never had happy endings."

"Because ghost stories were just love stories about here and then and now and when, about pockets of happiness and moments that resonated in places long after their era. They were stories that taught you that love was never a matter of time, but a matter of timing."

2. Every book by Charlie Nottingham

Laila's a bubbly waitress at a small-town diner. Jeremy's a rogue supernatural hunter with a dark past. When they meet, sparks don't just fly but catch aflame. Her sunshine merges with his dark sky, and it's as though the rest of the world disappears. But he can't rope a human girl into his dangerous life. No matter how much he wants her, no matter how much she wants him, he can't risk her life. Except... Maybe she isn't the defenseless little flower he thought she was.

Okay, okay, hear me out. I know this should be one book, but this is my list. I came across a TikTok from an author earlier in 2022 who was searching for ARC reviewers, and she mentioned Charlie Nottingham was also looking for reviewers. I got approved to read an ARC of Spades by Charlie and instantly fell in love with her writing and world-building! So of course, like any sane person, I started my journey of reading every previous book that she had published. I also got an ARC of Raven's Cry, which is set in the same world as all of her other books, and devoured it immediately. I read through her entire backlog of books and am happy to say that I have found a new favorite author. I just fell so in love with her writing and the world she has built and these books mean the absolute world to me in so many ways. I have a ton of quotes saved from all of these books (seriously, there are so many books) so I won't share a ton, but maybe these will allow you to see a glimpse of why these books are so amazing.

"But that’s how every pivotal moment starts out. Just another day. You never know when your entire world is about to change."

"To grow, to be strong, we have to survive the storms. We hate the rain as it falls, but without it, everything that grows will wilt."

"It’s funny how when something awful happens, people view us as the result of something awful instead of the powerful, badass survivor the awful forced us to become. They act like we’re something to be pitied and cared for. But we don’t want pity. We don’t want thoughts or prayers. We don’t want to hear people say, “I’m sorry you had to go through that.” We want people to say, “I’m glad you lived to tell the tale.” And then to shut their god damned mouths."

"You’re a writer, you have to write. Passions give us purpose and if you’re forgetting what that is, put the pen to paper and you’ll remember. Even if you think you don’t want to, once you start, you know you won’t want to stop."

"You wish you were as strong as me. You wish you had a fraction of the strength women have. That’s why you degrade us down to a single organ."

"Love is like a gaseous compound in the empty wonders of outer space. It can’t be limited to one small box because it expands endlessly in every direction. There’s always infinite room for it to grow. It doesn’t in any way lessen the love that’s already taking up space. That love simply morphs together to create something larger, complex, and even more beautiful."

"It occurred to me that trauma isn’t just the moment that it occurs, it’s damage to the way your mind works every day for the rest of your life afterwards."

"Experiencing trauma does not excuse inflicting the same on others."

"But love is not always simple. Love can be complicated. Love can cause wars. Love can save nations. Love is at the root of all things—good and evil. Sometimes it’s a sweet tale. Sometimes it’s one of heartbreak. Sometimes it is one of intricacy. It has no bounds. It has no rules. There are standard ideas of what we expect love to be, but it is different for everyone who feels it."

1. Sundial by Catriona Ward

All Rob wanted was a normal life. She almost got it, too: a husband, two kids, a nice house in the suburbs. But Rob fears for her oldest daughter, Callie, who collects tiny bones and whispers to imaginary friends. Rob sees a darkness in Callie, one that reminds her too much of the family she left behind. She decides to take Callie back to her childhood home, to Sundial, deep in the Mojave Desert. And there she will have to make a terrible choice. Callie is worried about her mother. Rob has begun to look at her strangely and speaks of past secrets. And Callie fears that only one of them will leave Sundial alive. The mother and daughter embark on a dark, desert journey to the past in the hopes of redeeming their future.

This may or may not be a surprise but Sundial is my favorite book of 2022. I was initially hooked by the cover (I mean, how could you not be, it's stunning) and the synopsis definitely had me interested. And then I read it. And I struggled. And by the time I finished, I was in tears because I knew I had just read something special. I don't experience the feeling that I had once I finished reading Sundial very often, so I knew that this was the book that would end up being not only my favorite read of the year but a new all-time favorite. What's crazy is I initially gave this a 4-star rating because I struggled at the start. This is easily a 5-star read, if only because I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since I read the final word. The writing was some of the most beautiful and effective writing that I've read in quite some time, and some of my favorite quotes I've ever read have come out of this book. Sundial is not for the faint of heart as it deals with some intense topics such as animal abuse/torture/death, loss of pregnancy, and abuse, but it's also an incredibly beautiful book. As soon as I finished, I told my mom that she had to read it when it came out because, beneath the carefully built layers that make up this book, this is a story about a mother reconnecting with her daughter. It's brutal, horrifying, and bloody at times. But it's also heartbreaking, memorable, and strangely hopeful.

"I don't know what it's like for other people but love and nausea are often indistinguishable to me."

"Living is enough. It is so intense and painful."

"It's cold inside the MRI machine. Narrow, cold and full of noise like ghosts knocking on your coffin."

"It's possible to feel the horror of something and to accept it all at the same time. How else could we cope with being alive?"

" Everyone has one story that explains them completely. I thought I knew what mine was. I was wrong- I am in it, here and now. This will be the choice that defines me. The decision tree unfolds before my eyes, the terrible fruit at the end of each branch."

"Everything comes around the dial in the end."
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And that's it for my top 10 books of 2022! I know this post is a little late, but I'm really happy to finally get to share these with you. Having read almost 100 books in 2022 was such a wonderful experience and narrowing it down to only 10 was definitely a challenge, but these books are some of my all-time favorites now and I feel so lucky to have been able to experience them. I'd love to know what some of your top books of 2022 were so leave me a comment below and share a few! Did you read any on this list and if so, what did you think of them?

Before I go, I just wanted to thank you once again. Doing this for nine years has been such a treat and I am so grateful for any and all support that I've had from the amazing book community. I hope to be able to continue doing this for ten more years and I can't wait to see what 2023 has in store.

Thanks for stopping by and I'll see you in the next chapter!

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February Wrap Up!

catriona ward 8:00:00 PM

Hi hello and welcome to my (slightly late) February wrap-up! I'm really excited to share all of the wonderful books that I read this month and to also (hopefully) bring back my monthly wrap-ups. It's something that I always enjoyed doing and I love to see what other people have read, so here are some of the books that I read in the month of February. As always, books will be linked to their Goodreads pages just in case you'd like to check them out and something new I'm doing is including a mini-review with each book I read! I hope to be doing full reviews of these books in the future but for now, my mini-reviews will be a good placeholder. If I do have a full review for any of these books, it will be linked! Also, the information for the first book I read will be blacked out and I will be including an explanation as to why. Please consider taking a moment to read my explanation and know that I will no longer be supporting the author in any way. With that being said, let's get started!
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Title: Claimed by Cupid
Author: Dana Isaly

Pages: 63

Genre: Romance

Release Date: 04 February 2022

From Goodreads: "Date a Silver Fox? Check. Share your New Year’s kiss with said Fox? Check. Have a Big O during Valentine’s Day dinner? Check. Wait…what was that last one? Holly is quickly falling for Nick, and she can’t wait to spend their first Valentine's Day together. And, boy, does this Silver Fox have a surprise up his sleeve. A very public surprise. But this isn’t just about lust anymore, and Nick is tired of taking things slowly. Cupid’s arrow is pointed directly at Holly. This holiday, Nick is claiming her as his own."

Mini-Review: I read this book early on in the month, before becoming aware of the issues surrounding the author. I want to state that I do not plan to support this author going forward and will continue to do my research on the ongoing situation in order to educate myself further. I fully support and believe survivors of abuse and also heavily disagree with plagiarism. The only reason I am keeping this in my wrap-up is to share links to the situation so that others are able to educate themselves and make their own decisions as to what to do moving forward. Here are the links: Patreon post 1 from vo.EROS, Patreon post 2 from vo.EROS, Patreon post 3 from vo.EROS, Final Patreon post from vo.EROS , vo.EROS TikTok account with multiple videos on the situation. Please do your research and make your own decisions and always remember to be kind to one another. Thank you for reading.

Title: Kingdom of the Wicked
Author: Kerri Maniscalco
Pages: 372
Genre: YA Fantasy
Release Date: 27 October 2020

From Goodreads: "Emilia and her twin sister Vittoria are streghe - witches who live secretly among humans, avoiding notice and persecution. One night, Vittoria misses dinner service at the family's renowned Sicilian restaurant. Emilia soon finds the body of her beloved twin...desecrated beyond belief. Devastated, Emilia sets out to find her sister's killer and to seek vengeance at any cost—even if it means using dark magic that's been long forbidden. Then Emilia meets Wrath, one of the Wicked—princes of Hell she has been warned against in tales since she was a child. Wrath claims to be on Emilia's side, tasked by his master with solving the series of women's murders on the island. But when it comes to the Wicked, nothing is as it seems."

Mini-Review: I'll start by saying I didn't read the synopsis of this book so I went into it literally blind. It wasn't what I was expecting at all but, to be honest, I wasn't sure what I was expecting. I had seen this all over BookTok and it has always had positive reviews so I decided, sure, why not read it finally? But I did end up enjoying it more than I thought I would! I wasn't super crazy obsessed about it but I finished the book with a smile on my face and I definitely plan to pick up the rest of the books in the series.

Title: Dead Silence

Author: S.A. Barnes

Pages: 352

Genre: Horror/Sci-fi

Release Date: 08 February 2022

From Goodreads: " Claire Kovalik is days away from being unemployed—made obsolete—when her beacon repair crew picks up a strange distress signal. With nothing to lose and no desire to return to Earth, Claire and her team decide to investigate. What they find at the other end of the signal is a shock: the Aurora, a famous luxury space-liner that vanished on its maiden tour of the solar system more than twenty years ago. A salvage claim like this could set Claire and her crew up for life. But a quick trip through the Aurora reveals something isn’t right. Whispers in the dark. Flickers of movement. Words scrawled in blood. Claire must fight to hold onto her sanity and find out what really happened on the Aurora, before she and her crew meet the same ghastly fate."

Mini-Review: I loved this, plain and simple. This was a fantastic sci-fi horror book that gave me both the spooks and the serotonin that I was hoping for! I have a full review here if you want to read my more in-depth thoughts on this book but to keep it quick, this was an easy five-star read for me and I will absolutely be picking up anything that S.A. Barnes writes in the future.

Title: Sundial

Author: Catriona Ward

Pages: 304

Genre: Horror/Sci-fi

Release Date: 01 March 2022

From Goodreads: "All Rob wanted was a normal life. She almost got it, too: a husband, two kids, a nice house in the suburbs. But Rob fears for her oldest daughter, Callie, who collects tiny bones and whispers to imaginary friends. Rob sees a darkness in Callie, one that reminds her too much of the family she left behind. She decides to take Callie back to her childhood home, to Sundial, deep in the Mojave Desert. And there she will have to make a terrible choice. Callie is worried about her mother. Rob has begun to look at her strangely and speaks of past secrets. And Callie fears that only one of them will leave Sundial alive. The mother and daughter embark on a dark, desert journey to the past in the hopes of redeeming their future."

Mini-Review: This is hands down one of my new favorite books. I did struggle through it a bit, but I've chalked that up to reading it at night before bed and being unable to fully grasp everything that was happening. Once I actually sat down and read it while awake, I flew through it and ended up bawling as I finished the book. It was so intense and gripping and I found myself so emotionally overcome while reading the end that I was crying and felt like my heart had been ripped from my chest. This was eerie and emotional and twisted in so many ways (please check trigger warnings!) and I absolutely loved every bit of it. I was lucky enough to be on the blog tour for Sundial so if you're interested in seeing my full review, check it out here!

Title: Angels of Ashes & Ivory

Author: Raye Wagner

Pages: 478

Genre: YA Fantasy

Release Date: 03 February 2022

From Goodreads: "Angels sharpening their blades. A mortal world plagued by demons. And one young woman torn between them. As an orphan in Midri, Sanaa wants only one thing: Freedom outside the walls of Vice District. When she’s caught by the dreaded poachers and sold at auction, she’ll do anything to escape her fate. Anything.

Rynk has battled his way to the top of the angel hierarchy, but he longs for his fated mate. Instead, the Council sends him to Midri to recover a lost token of the Celestials—the sacred relic he lost as a child. Rynk must seize this one chance for redemption if he ever hopes of finding her—his Beloved. In the demon-infested world of Midri, Rynk stumbles across a young woman on death’s door. With a single touch, three things become crystal clear to the blind warrior:

1. She is his Beloved.

2. She’s human.

3. She rejects their fated bond.

With demons closing in, Sanaa and Rynk are running out of time. If they don’t overcome the bruises of their pasts, thousands will die. Because it’s not just their hearts at risk— Sanaa’s entire world will be destroyed if the two can’t find a way to accomplish the impossible. Before the angels burn Midri to ash."

Mini-Review: I was so excited to see that Raye Wagner was writing another book and when the opportunity to read an ARC arose, I jumped on it ready to fly through it! At 478 pages, this book is no joke, and I had such a good time reading Sanaa and Rynk's story. It gave me so many feelings and I eventually found myself rapidly turning the pages to see what would happen next. There is so much character development and the plot was really interesting to follow. By the end, I was crying because it was over and I wasn't ready to leave these characters. Raye Wagner never disappoints and I can definitely say that she has come back stronger than ever! If you're interested, check out my full review here!

Title: Electric Idol

Author: Katee Robert

Pages: 375

Genre: Adult Romance

Release Date: 18 January 2022

From Goodreads: "In the ultra-modern city of Olympus, there's always a price to pay. Psyche knew she'd have to face Aphrodite's ire eventually, but she never expected her literal heart to be at stake...or for Aphrodite's gorgeous son to be the one ordered to strike the killing blow. Eros has no problem shedding blood. But when it comes time to take out his latest target, he can't do it. Confused by his reaction to Psyche, he does the only thing he can think of to keep her safe: he marries her. Psyche vows to make Eros's life a living hell until they find a way out of this mess. But as lines blur and loyalties shift, she realizes he might take her heart after all...and she's not sure she can survive the loss."

Mini-Review: Neon Gods was one of my favorite books I read last year so it was no surprise that I was absolutely going to read Electric Idol and love it. And love it I did! I think the thing that I appreciated most was the plus-sized representation that we got with this book. Psyche is a fat girl and she's not ashamed of that, it's just who she is. Despite the criticisms that she receives being in Olympus, which has drastically different beauty standards than what she falls into, she's not bothered by it and is actually quite confident in herself. She knows she's beautiful and her confidence in herself hit me in so many different ways because it made me realize that I don't have to fit the "normal" beauty standard to be confident in myself and the way I look. I can be beautiful as a fat girl, and I have Psyche to look up to when I'm feeling down about myself. And now that I've rambled about that aspect, I'll quickly say that once again Katee Robert has written a book that has a terrific plot, wonderfully spicy moments, and a romance that was super cute to watch develop over the course of the book. She is an auto-buy author for me and I cannot wait for Wicked Beauty and to get more of Helen's character!

Title: The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

Author: V.E. Schwab

Pages: 444

Genre: Fantasy/ Historical Fiction

Release Date: 06 October 2020

From Goodreads: "France, 1714: in a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets. Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world. But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name."

Mini-Review: This was a re-read for me after reading it when it was released back in 2020 and it was still as amazing as I remember it being. I somehow never wrote a proper review for it but I will absolutely be fixing that! Of course, to no surprise, this is still one of my all-time favorite books and this re-read confirmed that for me. It was beautiful and I cried possibly even more than I did the first time. I actually got another copy of this just to annotate and marked all of my favorite things throughout the book. It was scary at first but I had so much fun making this book my own! This was still 7 (get it, because Addie has 7 freckles?) glowing stars for me and I can't wait to read it again.
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And that's it for my February wrap-up! I had a pretty great reading month and I'm really excited for March and all of the books that I hope to read. Again, I would like to encourage anyone that is unaware of the situation with the first author I read from this month to please do your research and decide for yourself how you plan to move forward. And with that, thanks for stopping by and I'll see you in the next chapter!

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Dead Silence by S.A. Barnes Blog Tour!

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Buzzfeed Unsolved Book Tag!

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Hi hello and welcome to the Buzzfeed Unsolved book tag! I was inspired by tons of people talking about how Valentine's Day should just be a second Halloween and figured why not do a spooky tag to celebrate that? This book tag was originally created by Sarah from The YA Room so be sure and go show her video some love! I will confess that while I haven't seen every episode of Buzzfeed Unsolved, I do love the show and I am so excited to do this tag today. Let's get spooky!
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Shaniac: A book you don't think is deserving of the hype

I might get some hate for this but From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout. I tried picking this book up not too terribly long ago and just could not get into it. Maybe it is deserving of the hype (there is a ton of it everywhere) but I just couldn’t see it when I was attempting to start reading. I don’t know what it was but I just couldn’t see why people were obsessed with this book when I struggled to read one chapter. I’ll probably give it another shot at some point but for now, it’s not for me.

Boogara: A book that chilled you to the core

Dead Silence by S.A. Barnes! This is a book I just finished recently and I was quite literally in bed curling my feet up just in case a ghost tried to reach out and pull my feet. It really spooked me and I haven't been spooked by a book in such a long time! The atmosphere was creepy as heck and it was just an all-around wonderfully scary book that I would absolutely recommend.

Shitfish: A book you're not sure where you stand on

I immediately thought of Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo. I read this a while back and when I finished, I was confused as to how I felt. There has been so much love and hype for this book/series (there's even a TV show on Netflix based on the world) so I wanted to pick it up and see what everyone liked about it so much. When I was done, I was just...meh. I didn't absolutely love it but I also didn't hate it. I feel like I'm on the outside looking in when it comes to the love this book has because it just didn't click to me. It wasn't a bad book, I think I did enjoy my time with it, but I never felt compelled to continue the series. What's hilarious is that I gave the book 4 stars apparently and said I couldn't wait to read the next book so now I'm just unsure where I stand!

Hey there demons. It's me, ya boy: A book that kept you up at night

Claimed by Cupid by Dana Isaly. I read this in one sitting after being reminded that it was out (thank you TikTok) and I loved it so much. I also read the first book, Dipped in Holly, in one sitting and, to no surprise, also loved it. Dana Isaly is one of my go-to authors and I've almost read all of the books she's released and have yet to be disappointed. Highly recommend it, but only if you're over the age of 18 because it gets spicy.

(WHEEZE): A book that made you laugh out loud

Dead Inside by Chandler Morrison. Probably not what you were expecting if you’re familiar with this book, but it genuinely did make me laugh out loud. There were parts that were actually funny but I think I mainly laughed because of how absolutely insane this book was. It was so good and right up my alley of messed up books but this is definitely not a book for everyone. Please check content warnings before reading this and make sure you’re prepared for a new level of messed up

Mothman: A hyped fave

A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas. I'm sure you know all about the series and especially ACOMAF by now, but it's hyped for a reason and loved for a reason. I actually have a whole Twitter thread about my experience reading this book and it was a wild ride that I loved every second of. My husband also read part of Chapter 55 out loud and I got it on video which was probably the highlight of my reading experience! But yes, ACOMAF means a lot to me and I’m so glad that I finally understand why the book and the series overall are so hyped up and loved.

Holy Water: A book you'd protect with your life

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab. No one is surprised that I’m mentioning this, right? I read this during recovery from my cancer treatments and it impacted my life in the best way possible. I’m reading it again and am actually annotating a physical copy (my 12th or 13th copy of this book) which has been an amazing experience! It’s such an important book to me and it’s absolutely one I would protect with my life.

Demons: A book you're too scared to read

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. I’m not scared to read it because of the content or because I think it’ll actually scare me; I’m typically hard to actually scare when it comes to books! I’m more so scared to read it because of how big it is. She’s a thick one and definitely something I plan to read a physical copy of (I bought it years ago and just haven’t picked it up yet) but it’s honestly super intimidating! I’ve heard really good things about it so I know I’ll enjoy my time with it, but dang it if I’m not nervous at how long it will take me to actually get through that book.

But for now, this mystery will remain...unsolved: A book you needed more from/didn't want to end

Showing some more love to Dana Isaly here with Games We Play! It’s a short novella and if you like Corpse Husband, you’ll like this. I have dived headfirst into smutty books over my absence and this one is one of my favorites. I really enjoyed this novella and I was happy with how it wrapped up, but of course I wanted more of these two characters when I was finished reading because it was just that enjoyable for me. Please be sure to check content warnings if you do end up picking this one up!

Buzzfeed Unsolved Postmortem: A book you still have questions about

Victorious by V.E. Schwab. It’s not out and heck I’m pretty sure she isn’t even working on it yet, but I have so many questions and no answers and it’s both stressful and exciting. I would wait a hundred years for another book in my favorite series but I really do have so many things I want to know about this book! I can’t wait for when it finally does come out and I can come back and tell past me that we finally got to read this. I know it’s going to be perfect.

Hot Daga: A trashy fave

I don’t like to think of books as “trashy” because I’ve always thought trashy equals bad. Thankfully, I understand now that that’s not always the case, but it still tends to carry a negative connotation for me. But a “trashy” romance book I’m obsessed with would have to be Scream For Us by Molly Doyle. It’s definitely another book to check the content warnings for but if you’re into the things that the book contains then you’ll like this one a lot. I read this in one sitting and whew it was wild!

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And that does it for the Buzzfeed Unsolved book tag! This was so much fun to do and I loved getting spooky in February. Any excuse to talk about or do something involving scary things is an absolute win for me! I’d love to know what your answers to these questions are so let me know down in the comments what a few of your answers would be for these questions. Bonus question: what is your favorite episode of Buzzfeed Unsolved? I’m particularly fond of the Goatman’s Bridge episode, myself. Thanks for stopping by and I’ll see you in the next chapter!