Category: Reviews

There’s something about this randomly picking up books from the library app that I really love, because I don’t think I would have ever gone to this section of a book store or looking through a library. It’s much easier to add random books to your holds and just read them when they become available after forgetting everything about why you added them in the first place.

The book follows Vera, the daughter of a convicted serial killer who has come home to her dying mother to settle things with the house once her mother finally passes. Her relationship with her mother is distant to say the least, but she also has to deal with a border, an artist and the son of the man who wrote an expose on her father’s crimes. But this old house holds secrets, as does Vera’s own past and the truth behind that final victim that got her father caught, and Vera soon finds that she is more attached to the house than she thought.

I really liked most of this book. There is a twist at the end that I think I would have liked a lot more if it had happened earlier so that it could be more thoroughly explored, because I do love a good “It wasn’t all in my head” reveal. I liked the supernatural element, but the vagueness of some of it was frustrating because I wanted to know more. It may be that as a horror story that was intentional, but I didn’t find it scary so it was a bit disappointing.

It is pretty slow at the start, including some elements that I thought would play into the story more like the people of the town wanting her gone. I think the pacing may have played into some missed opportunities to make the story feel more complete in the end. It does feel much more like a story that stops rather than ends, like there’s a lot of loose ends and like I am missing chapters that might wrap it up more fully. It doesn’t feel like it needs a sequel so much as a couple more chapters, or a five years later epilogue.

Overall, I did really enjoy the story. I just wanted a little more in the end to make it feel like it ended, even if it wasn’t over. This might be more of a genre mismatch for me, and I still had a lot of fun with the book.

I am finally getting some of my holds in! I’ve been working on a few new things I’ll talk about in a bit, so the books are a nice reminder that I was planning to read a lot more this year. That goal has not gone well, but time to try and pick it up again!

The story follows Ava who has been called into work at an Ikea knockoff store where her ex who she’s been avoiding, Jules, is also working a shift. When a little old lady slips into an alternate dimension, the pair of them are voluntold to go get her and are sent into the wormhole to find first the remains of the woman, followed by a replacement as they work through their relationship troubles.

This feels very much like Horrortor in a lot of ways, from the premise of it being an Ikea knockoff with alternate dimensions and horror elements. It has a much more action adventure angle to it, though, with much more exploration and much less being horribly scarred by the carnivorous furniture and hive mind employees of the alternate dimension.

A lot of the book was relationship stuff, though, and the two exes working through their relationship and why their recent breakup happened. And it never feels like they actually work out anything so much as they air out their grievances. I hoped that these issues would have some kind of parallel to the horror worlds they ended up in, but ultimately it felt very separate.

Overall, it’s not bad. I’m not a fan of relationship heavy stories and I thought it was a little heavy on that aspect, but I did like the way the story played out in the end. It’s also pretty short, so if you have an afternoon it’s worth checking out!

Libby is really the only thing that is keeping me reading these days, I swear. The random books that come in seem to know just when I need something, and this one came in right as I was taking some time off of work because, well, I need the time off. And I needed a pretty calm read.

The book follows two people: August and Emery. August in returning to the island after many years to bury his mother, but his return comes with the resurgence of all of the reasons he left. He was accused of murdering a friend in the midst of a fire and essentially run off the island, leaving Emery behind to continue living in a place that feels like it lives in stasis. But in the short time August is there to finish what he needs before leaving forever, the past comes back in strange ways and the truth of the mystery behind that death comes to light.

It’s a very calm and atmospheric read, and one that was really hard to place in terms of genre. While there’s implied magic in some of the characters, it’s never really clear until the end one way or another whether it is actually a thing in the world. And while there’s the feeling of it being a murder mystery or some idea of a gothic horror, nothing really stands out in terms of how the story was told or where it ended up to really understand what I should be expecting.

And really, the atmosphere was probably the best thing about the book. The characters never grow or change1 only reveal more information. There were no surprises until the end when you get the definitive answer about whether or not magic is real and ultimately it feels more like the story ends than concludes. It’s a bit disappointing in that there is no feeling that there’s any justice or finality to what happened, only that everyone walked away to never speak of it again.

Overall, it was mostly an okay read. It was what I needed for the time, something calm that didn’t ask too much in terms of complicated plots or characters. The perspective shifts threw me at first, but once I got used to it, it was a pretty chill book with a disappointing ending.

1. Which is expected in some genres, which is why the genre is throwing me [↩]

I’ve been having a rough time of things, so reading hasn’t been happening as much as I’d like. But I did get one of my holds in and got it finished before I had to turn it back in, so let’s see what I decided I wanted to check out several months ago.

The book follows Jess, a kid who comes from a book smuggling family who has the opportunity to get into the Library of Alexandria where he can better help his family smuggle books. While there, he uncovers more about what it takes to be a part of the library, and some of the darker aspects of how the library works to keep their secrets and prevent the public from access to the information within.

The world is one that took me a bit to understand. At first I thought it was meant to be a straight alternate history where the Library of Alexandria did not burn but had instead been privatized, but there’s a lot of subtle and not so subtle magical elements in it that threw me off. It’s revealed slowly and very matter of factually, where Jess is not entirely new to the world so a lot of information is presented much more as fact than something that is explained. Which, honestly, I really like and once I got it I was in.

The story gets a lot darker than I expected from this story about a bunch of kids in a school to pursue their ambitions to this much more political game that is being played with them as pawns. While Jess is bright and able to eventually recognize what’s happening, it’s clear that he’s not in a place to actually do anything about it. At least, not in this book.

Overall, I really enjoyed it. The pacing was quick and, once I got a better understanding of the world, I was in and I really enjoyed watching the story unfold. There’s a lot of interesting characters besides Jess and they all feel very well rounded, each with their own mysteries that I was excited to uncover. Definitely worth the read!