Tag: books

Book Reviews

Book Review: The Devil Makes Three by Tori Bovalino

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Happy Monday bookish people! How are you all feeling today? I hope you are all good. Today I am bringing you my book review for The Devil Makes Three by Tori Bovalino.

The Devil Makes Three

Blurb/Synopsis:

Tess Matheson only wants three things: time to practice her cello, for her sister to be happy, and for everyone else to leave her alone.

Instead, Tess finds herself working all summer at her boarding school library, shelving books and dealing with the intolerable patrons. The worst of them is Eliot Birch: snide, privileged, and constantly requesting forbidden grimoires. After a bargain with Eliot leads to the discovery of an ancient book in the library’s grimoire collection, the pair accidentally unleash a book-bound demon.

The demon will stop at nothing to stay free, manipulating ink to threaten those Tess loves and dismantling Eliot’s strange magic. Tess is plagued by terrible dreams of the devil and haunting memories of a boy who wears Eliot’s face. All she knows is to stay free, the demon needs her… and he’ll have her, dead or alive.

My Review:

In The Devil Makes Three we are following two main characters. The first is Tess Matheson, a music prodigy who has upended her own life to make sure her sister Nat gets the best chance she can. Tess works in the Library with a woman who I believe was her Aunt but I’m not 100% certain on that and while working in the Library she ends up meeting Elliott Birch, who is the second main character we follow.

Elliott and Tess start off on the wrong foot but they end up having to work together when they find a hidden passage under the library where a grimoire is hidden.

I can’t say a lot about this book without giving spoilers away but I can tell you that for the first half of the book I enjoyed getting to know the characters but I felt that Elliott was being used to further Tess’s character rather than defining him as a 3D character himself. This did get better in the second half of the book though and I liked that you could see the flaws in the characters.

The other main thought that I had on this book was that it was very creepy, much too creepy for me even though I read it through to the end, which is good because that is what the author intended so it is very well written but for me that creepiness was off-putting. I liked the characters and I liked the setting although it felt like a YA book to me and I am reading more adult books than YA now. I don’t think I will keep my copy of the book but I am glad I gave it a go.

Have you read this book? What did you think of it?

Rating:

Rating: 3 out of 5.
Monthly TBRs

July TBR!

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Happy Friday bookish people! How are you all today? I hope you are all doing well.

July is a busy, busy month for me so I am hoping that I will be able to get a lot of reading done. I am having an operation on the 15th which means that I will not be able to do much for at least a week or so other than read which sounds perfect to me. Then at the end of July I am going to Carlisle for the weekend and in the back of the car I will be able to read as well so hopefully I read some great books, fingers crossed for some five star reads!

What are you excited to read in July?

My July TBR:

Hunting Party by Lucy Foley

Book Lovers by Emily Henry

The Whispering Dark by Kelly Andrews

A Feather so Black by Lyra Selene

The Jeweled Moth by Katharine Woodfine

On top of this though I have a list of books I would like to read while recovering and travelling because I am optimistic that I will get lots of reading done in July:

  • The Murder Game by Tom Hindle
  • The King’s Mother by Annie Garthwaite
  • Seven Lively Suspects by Katy Watson
  • The Suspect by Rob Rinder
  • The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz
  • Divine Rivals by Rebecca Ross
  • The Five by Haille Rubenhold
  • Hex Appeal by Kate Johnson
Monthly Wrap Ups

June Wrap Up!

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you’re all having a good day today. It is nearly halfway through the year and June is coming to an end.

What a month it has been! I have spent most of my time buried under edits of my novel, I have been working on it almost non-stop this month and I have just sent off a query to an agent, so fingers crossed for that. Because of that the month has gone by very quickly, and I have got some reading done which has been nice, no stand out reads, they were all average and one DNF which was a surprise, I thought that book was going to be a five star.

How has your reading been this month? Did you read any books you would recommend?

My Wrap up:

  • Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo – I did not read this book this month
  • These Hollow Vows by Lexi Ryan – I was hoping to get around to this book this month but I didn’t, I had to prioritise books that will help with my PhD so most fantasy books aren’t getting read at the moment.
  • The Ballad of Never After by Stephanie Garber – Same as above, another fantasy book I did not get around to reading
  • Belladonna by Adalyn Grace – This is a book I am very excited to get around to reading but I didn’t read it this month.
  • Tempest of Tea – I did not read this book this month
  • The Unmaking of June Farrow by Adrienne Young – I did not read this
  • Uprooted by Naomi Novik – I started to read this book but I ended up DNF’ing it after 115 pages, it was dragging for me. I might pick it up again in the future and try and read it but not right now.
  • The Devil Makes Three by Tori Bovalino – I did read this book, it was good but very creepy – I will give more of my thoughts in my review coming in July
  • How to Survive Your Own Murder – I am currently readying this book, I should be finished and have started another book by the end of this month
  • Love on the Brain by Ali Hazelwood – currently I have not read this book but I should have a few days at the end of this month where I start this book

Outside of my TBR I also read the second in the Dog Sitter Detective series. So, overall I read three books (four if I get to Love on the Brain), and I DNF’d one book which is quite a productive reading month foe me. I can only hope July will be just as good or even better.

Book Reviews

What Would Jane Austen Do by Linda Corbett Book Review

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you’re all having a good day today!

Today I am bringing you my book review of What Would Jane Austen Do by Linda Corbett, have any of you read this book? If you have let me know I’d love to hear what you thought about it!

Blurb/Synopsis:

It’s a truth often acknowledged that when a Jane Austen fan girl ends up living next door to a cynical but handsome crime writer, romantic sparks will fly!When Maddy Shaw is told her Dear Jane column has been cancelled she has no choice but to look outside of London’s rental market. That is until she’s left an idyllic country home by the black sheep of the family, long-not-so-lost Cousin Nigel.

But of course there’s a stipulation… and not only is Maddy made chair of the committee for the annual village literary festival, she also has to put up with bestselling crime author –and romance sceptic – Cameron Massey as her new neighbour.

When Maddy challenges Cameron to write romantic fiction, which he claims is so easy to do, sparks fly both on and off the page…

My Review:

Okay, first of all I picked up this book because it mentions that he is a romance sceptic and he is a crime writer which I thought was going to be an interesting take on the romance plot. I struggle with the predictability of romance novels and admittedly this one was very predictable so it was a middle of the road read for me but I will give you some more of my thoughts.

I liked most of the plot, forced to live in a small town, the forced proximity, the bet between them all those kinds of things I enjoyed and it felt very cosy and focused a lot on developing the relationship between Maddy and Cameron but also Maddy and the people of the village she’s moved to which I liked because I have found before that some novels forget about friendships in favour of a romance. Some of the parts I didn’t like were: I would have liked more of the enemies before they became lovers if you know what I mean, they – this may be a slight spoiler – do hate each other at the beginning an this does continue but I would have lied this to go on for longer, maybe I’m just greedy like that. Also, and I am not sure this is a complaint because I am glad it wasn’t a miscommunication issue because I hate them, the tension in the relationship came from something that seemed very insignificant, like it had been put in there just because the author felt they needed something bad to happen and I didn’t like that much.

Overall, as far as romances go, this was an okay read. I enjoyed it but I don’t think it is a book I would be thinking about in a few months time. if you like romances though this is a solid book.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.
Book Reviews

Rivals of the Ripper Book Review

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you are all having a good day today!

Today I am bringing you my book review for Rivals of the Ripper: Unsolved Murders of Women in Late Victoria London, a non-fiction book that I bought and read recently.

Blurb/Synopsis:

Jack the Ripper is the quintessential Victorian serial killer, and the debate continues with regard to the number of his victims. But there is a profusion of unsolved murders of London women from late Victorian times, and this book presents 11 of the most gruesome and mysterious of them. Marvel at the convoluted Kingswood Mystery and the unsolved Cannon Street Murder of 1866; shudder at the Hoxton Horror and the Great Coram Street Murder of 1872; be puzzled by the West Ham Disappearances and by the unsolved railway murder of Elizabeth Camp in 1898. There are many books about the Whitechapel fiend, but this is the first one to detail the ghoulish handiwork of the Ripper’s rivals.

My Review:

Okay, so my thoughts are going to be short so here we go: I am not a big nonfiction reader, I struggle to get interested in it usually but that was not a problem with this book at all. I am fascinated with victorian crime, particularly Jack the Ripper as I know a lot of people are but this book was something I happened to find and I thought ooh, it is interesting because it tells of these stories of women who are never mentioned and yet their cases never got solved. I could see a lot of similarities between some of these murders and the Ripper as well which was also very interesting. I found some of these so intriguing that I looked them up to get further information too so if you like this period of history you will probably like this book. Also, one last thing I will mention is that in nonfiction usually you can sense the bias of the writer but I didn’t figure out the writers bias in any of the unsolved crimes which I felt made the reading experience much better.

Monthly TBRs

June TBR

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Happy Friday bookish people! I hope you’re all doing well. We are getting into the summer months, the warm weather and longer days make it the perfect time for enjoying escaping into the worlds in our books so today I am sharing with you my June TBR!

What are you all reading this month?

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo

These Hollow Vows by Lexi Ryan

Uprooted by Naomi Novik

The Ballad of Never After by Stephanie Garber

Belladonna by Adalyn Grace

How To Solve Your Own Murder by Kristin Perrin

Love on The Brain by Ali Hazelwood

Tempest of Tea by Hafsah Faizal

The Unmaking of June Farrow by Adrienne Young

The Devil Makes Three by Tori Bovalino

Monthly Wrap Ups

May Wrap Up!

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you are all doing well. What a month May has been. I have been almost completely locked into research mode with my PhD draft, it is getting there slowly but surely and in a way that us completely unlike me, the more I am writing it the more I am enjoying it. The worst part now is that I can see the end in sight and not only will I have to do my exam but then it will be time to start sending the novel off to agents which I didn’t think would scare me but it fills me with a mixture of excitement and dread. I have spent so long working on it, it has become very dear to me so sending it off for critiquing is terrifying!

Anyway, you’re not here to listen to me blab on about that, we are here to discuss the books I read, or did not read which is more like it.

The Trial by Robert Rinder

I am currently reading this book and loving it by the way, I am hoping to meet Rob Rinder at Crime Fest next week and I am very excited about that.

Helle and Death by Oskar Jensen

I have not read this. Unfortunately, I have to read this book for my PhD thesis and its gotten to be one of those situations where I know I have to read it so the more I think about reading it the less I want to which is unfair to the book and the author because it sounds good.

What Would Jane Austen Do by Linda Corbett

I did read this book, I thought okay you have been reading a lot of fantasy and msytery novels so you need to break it up with something a bit lighter so I decided to pick up this romance book, it has a crime writer in it as the love interest which create a nice dynamic – I will tell you more of my thoughts in a review coming soon!

Powerless by Lauren Roberts

I have not read this book but I am still very excited to get around to it soon.

I Hope You’re Listening by Tom Ryan

Again, like Helle and Death, I have to read this for my PhD and I stayed it a while ago but I couldn’t get into it so I put it down and I haven’t managed to get back to it yet.

Murder At The Dolphin Hotel by Helena Dixon

I did not get the chance to read this book yet.

Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson

I have heard such good things about this book and I wished I could have gotten to it this month but unfortunately I didn’t manage it.

So, I read two books this month which isn’t great but I have been enjoying the reading I have been doing which is a good thing. I actually didn’t start my first book until halfway through the month as I was finishing Kingdom of the Wicked so two books in 15 days is quite good for me.

How was your reading in the month of may? What was the best book you read?

Uncategorized

Book Tropes I Love and Hate

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Happy Friday bookish people! I hope you are all feeling well today. I keep seeing a lot on social media about which tropes people love and hate in books and it got me thinking, what ones do I like.

To start with I didn’t think I followed tropes like that… then I took a look at the books I loved and which ones I did not and I realised there is a pattern.

Tropes I Love:

  • ‘Unbreakable’ codes
  • Talking animals
  • enemies to lovers
  • isolated mystery locations
  • reluctant heroes

Tropes I Hate:

  • The chosen one
  • Militery
  • Love triangles
  • miscommunication
  • cliffhangers
  • amnesia

So, those are my lists but I’m curious, what tropes do you love and hate?

Book Reviews

Shatter Me by Taherah Mafi Book Review

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Happy Monday bookish people! I hope you are all having a good day today.

Today I am sharing my book review for Shatter Me by Taherah Mafi. I have had this book for years, and it was getting to the point where I was thinking this had to be the year I would either read it or it would be time to let it go. Then I got hold of the beautiful Illumicrate edition of the first book and so I decided FINALLY I would read it – and it was worth every moment.

Blurb/Synopsis:

I have a curse
I have a gift

I am a monster
I’m more than human

My touch is lethal
My touch is power

I am their weapon
I will fight back

Juliette hasn’t touched anyone in exactly 264 days.

The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette’s touch is fatal. As long as she doesn’t hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don’t fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong color.

The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war—and The Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she’s exactly what they need right now.

Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior.

My Review:

What a book this was! Shatter Me follows a girl called Juliette, when the book begins you find out she has been imprisoned for a long time and her parents gave her up basically, all because she has a power that she can’t control.

I honestly thought I wasn’t going to enjoy this book because it is a bit of a dystopian and that has never been my genre but I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. This book manages to get the best balance between action, friendship, loyalty, and keep the characters realistic. I liked that Juliette wasn’t created as some kind of superhero character, she had flaws and she had human emotions and I loved that. I really can’t say much about the plot without spoiling anything but I can say that this book did not go the way that I thought it would, you start to think you have everything figured out then you are immediately hit with a huge twist.

If you were on the fence about reading this book I would highly recommend it!

Uncategorized

Top 5 Stunning book Covers I Own

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Happy Friday bookish people! I hope you are all doing well. Today I am going to share with you some of the most beautiful covers of books that I own!

Stalking Jack The Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco

Barnes and Noble Edition of War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

Pride and Premeditation by Tirzah Price

Spellslinger by Sebastien de Castell

The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels by India Holton