The Saturday Review - 7 September 2019

This week I'm tackling the next few books I read over the summer... what have you read lately bookdragons?

The Witches of BlackBrook
by Tish Thawer

Publisher: Amber Leaf Publishing

Release Date: June 23, 2015

Genre: Paranormal, Witches, Fiction

Blurb

Through space and time, sisters entwined. Lost then found, souls remain bound.

Three sisters escape the Salem witch trials when the eldest casts a spell that hurtles their souls forward through time. After centuries separated, fate has finally reunited them in the present day.

One the healer, one the teacher, and one the deceiver.

Will their reunion return their full powers, or end their souls journey forever?

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 I first saw this book on bookstagram so the cover was what first drew my interest enough to look it up on Amazon.

Summary/Tagline: n/a
Characters: 🌟🌟🌟.5 I liked the characters overall, but at times they felt a little flat. I would have liked more development into the side characters motivation and their personality. 

Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟 Again, there isn't as much fleshing out as I would like. It's a small town and you get that homey vibe but you don't really learn much about the town except for the few places the main character goes to: home, work, and another character's house then to her hometown in Massachusetts (which felt like the most developed setting of all).

Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 The plot wasn't bad. It was easy to follow, taking you between the main character's past and present and showing you hints into the other character's thoughts and feelings. It was a quick read. Not the best book I've ever read, but not the worst either. Will I read book two? Probably. I'll definitely give the series more time to woo me into falling in love.

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 3.63 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟 🌟🌟

3.63 of 5 Stars!

Wildcard

by Marie Lu

Published by: G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers

On: September 18, 2018

Genre: Young Adult, Sci-Fi, Fantasy

Blurb:

Emika Chen barely made it out of the Warcross Championships alive. Now that she knows the truth behind Hideo's new NeuroLink algorithm, she can no longer trust the one person she's always looked up to, who she once thought was on her side.

Determined to put a stop to Hideo's grim plans, Emika and the Phoenix Riders band together, only to find a new threat lurking on the neon-lit streets of Tokyo. Someone's put a bounty on Emika's head, and her sole chance for survival lies with Zero and the Blackcoats, his ruthless crew. But Emika soon learns that Zero isn't all that he seems--and his protection comes at a price.

Caught in a web of betrayal, with the future of free will at risk, just how far will Emika go to take down the man she loves?

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 I love the dark cover of Wildcard in contrast with the white cover of Warcross. They compliment each other well on the shelf. 

Summary/Tagline: 🌟🌟🌟 "It's time for a rematch." - This made me think the bulk of the plot would be Emika vs. Hideo so I was a bit surprised with the way the plot turned.

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 I love how Emika and Hideo grow in this novel. We see Hideo go from the grieving brother who created Warcross to a monster who thinks he's saving the world, a lovestruck man who wonders if Emika is right to the cold exterior he shows the world and back again. Emika meanwhile struggles to learn how to accept help from others, to lean on and depend on them. Her teammates are back in this one and as awesome as they were in Warcross, but this time helping Emika out on a whole new front. And then there are the enigmatic Zero and his crew. Are they friend or foe? What do they really want?
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 From the inside of Warcross to the tech-savvy city of Tokyo and the dark underbelly of the Warcross blackmarket Lu has once again drawn readers into a mesmerizing world that they wish they could experience first hand while also cautioning that with every benefit of a tech-centered world, comes an even more costly downside.

Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟.5 I think I loved this one more than Warcross. It delves deeper into Sasuke's disappearance and what became of him which tugged at my heart. And for Emika, what started out as a job to find a hacker has thrown her into a more dangerous game of cat and mouse than she's ever endured before, uncovering secrets and making her wonder who she can trust and what people will do to have absolute control. 

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 4.3 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟🌟

4.3 of 5 Stars!

The Afterlife of Holly Chase 

by Cynthia Hand

Published by: HarperTeen

On: October 24, 2017

Genre: Young Adult, Holiday, Retelling, Fantasy, Paranormal

Blurb:

On Christmas Eve five years ago, Holly was visited by three ghosts who showed her how selfish and spoiled she'd become. They tried to convince her to mend her ways.

She didn't.

And then she died.

Now she's stuck working for the top-secret company Project Scrooge--as the latest Ghost of Christmas Past.

Every year, they save another miserly grouch. Every year, Holly stays frozen at seventeen while her family and friends go on living without her. So far, Holly's afterlife has been miserable.

But this year, everything is about to change. . . .

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 The Afterlife of Holly Chase has a simple, elegant cover that I really loved. It's not so in your face paranormal or christmasy as you would expect from the blurb.

Summary/Tagline: 🌟🌟🌟 “Every Scrooge Deserves a Second Chance"  - This promises the premise of almost every Christmas Carol retelling ever until you read the blurb.

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟 All hail the annoying mean girl who hasn't quite learned her lesson, add in an assistant that is annoyingly perky, a bunch of Christmas loving coworkers, and a bad boy who isn't bad at all and you have the characters in Holly Chase. As a protagonist, Holly is a bit of a self-pitying downer with an attitude problem.
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟 New York City, a secret organization, Christmas-time. 

Story: 🌟🌟🌟 This book wasn't too bad, but it was predictable and a bit annoying to read at times due to Holly's personality. 

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟 3.2 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟

3.2 of 5 Stars!

A Simple Favor

by Darcey Bell

Published by: Harper

On: March 21, 2017

Genre: Fiction, Thriller

Blurb:

She’s your best friend.
She knows all your secrets.
That’s why she’s so dangerous.
A single mother's life is turned upside down when her best friend vanishes in this chilling debut thriller in the vein of Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train.

It starts with a simple favor—an ordinary kindness mothers do for one another. When her best friend, Emily, asks Stephanie to pick up her son Nicky after school, she happily says yes. Nicky and her son, Miles, are classmates and best friends, and the five-year-olds love being together—just like she and Emily. A widow and stay-at-home mommy blogger living in woodsy suburban Connecticut, Stephanie was lonely until she met Emily, a sophisticated PR executive whose job in Manhattan demands so much of her time.

But Emily doesn’t come back. She doesn’t answer calls or return texts. Stephanie knows something is terribly wrong—Emily would never leave Nicky, no matter what the police say. Terrified, she reaches out to her blog readers for help. She also reaches out to Emily’s husband, the handsome, reticent Sean, offering emotional support. It’s the least she can do for her best friend. Then, she and Sean receive shocking news. Emily is dead. The nightmare of her disappearance is over.

Or is it? Because soon, Stephanie will begin to see that nothing—not friendship, love, or even an ordinary favor—is as simple as it seems.

A Simple Favor is a remarkable tale of psychological suspense—a clever and twisting free-fall of a ride filled with betrayals and reversals, twists and turns, secrets and revelations, love and loyalty, murder and revenge. Darcey Bell masterfully ratchets up the tension in a taut, unsettling, and completely absorbing story that holds you in its grip until the final page.

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 I have the movie tie-in cover of this book (of course) and I love the retro 1950s vibe to it. 

Summary/Tagline: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 "She’s your best friend. She knows all your secrets. That’s why she’s so dangerous." - Ooh, I love the sound of this!

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 The first rule going into this book... trust no one. Both Stephanie and Emily are mothers that on the outside have enviable lives - Steph is the perfect mother, Emily has it all - perfect husband, adorable son, fantastic job in the fashion industry - but both have dark secrets simmering under the surface. Let the games begin.
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 The worldbuilding is less about a setting or a location in this book, but the feeling. An idyllic Connecticut town perfect for raising a family yet close enough to commute into NYC, an old cabin in Michigan, a decaying manor hiding the secrets of the past. 
Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Step right up for unreliable narrators with twisted secrets, murder, lust, and fraud. This book will make you ask "WTF?" as you stay up late into the night binging to reach a crazy twist and an unbelievable end. 

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 4.4 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟🌟

4.4 of 5 Stars!

Imposters

by Scott Westerfeld

Published by: Scholastic Press

On: September 11, 2018

Genre: Young Adult, Sci-fi, Dystopian

Blurb:

The spellbinding, New York Times bestselling series-starter, now $4.99 for a limited time only.

Frey and Rafi are inseparable . . . two edges of the same knife. But Frey's very existence is a secret.

Frey is Rafi's twin sister-and her body double. Their powerful father has many enemies, and the world has grown dangerous as the old order falls apart. So while Rafi was raised to be the perfect daughter, Frey has been taught to kill. Her only purpose is to protect her sister, to sacrifice herself for Rafi if she must.

When her father sends Frey in Rafi's place as collateral in a precarious deal, she becomes the perfect impostor -- as poised and charming as her sister. But Col, the son of a rival leader, is getting close enough to spot the killer inside her. As the deal starts to crumble, Frey must decide if she can trust him with the truth . . . and if she can risk becoming her own person.

With Impostors, master storyteller Scott Westerfeld returns with a new series set in a world full of twists and turns, rebellion and intrigue, where any wrong step could be Frey's last.

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 Luckily for me I held out on starting this series long enough to grab the paperback that will match the cover of Shatter City. Unfortunately the $4.99 sticker is not a sticker and cannot be removed. :(

Summary/Tagline: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 "Everything She Tells You Is A Lie." - I do like the sound of that, it makes me want to find out more.

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟.5 I loved Frey, she's such a bada$$. Then there's Rafi, who we don't see as much of but you can tell she's a little unhinged which is bound to have consequences down the line. Their father is a monster, there's no doubt about that and you wish someone, anyone would take him out. Then there's Col, who at times I loved and others found annoying. Insert the secondary characters to make the story awesome and viola!
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 This was my first book by Scott Westerfeld. I haven't read the series that this series is a spinoff of. But even so, it was easy to understand the world that Frey, Rafi, and Col live in, the differences in their cities and the rest of the cities in the world, from the vibrant, inviting Victoria to the cold technological city Frey and Rafi grew up in to the neutral city of Paz and the refuge of the caldera.  
Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 I usually don't like dystopian novels but I devoured this book, intrigued by the story of twins who couldn't be more different and Frey's desire to embrace her own identity in a world on the verge of war.  

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 4.5 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

4.5 of 5 Stars!

House of Salt and Sorrows

by Erin A. Craig

Published by: Delacorte

On: August 6, 2019

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Retelling

Blurb:

In a manor by the sea, twelve sisters are cursed.
Annaleigh lives a sheltered life at Highmoor, a manor by the sea, with her sisters, their father, and stepmother. Once they were twelve, but loneliness fills the grand halls now that four of the girls' lives have been cut short. Each death was more tragic than the last—the plague, a plummeting fall, a drowning, a slippery plunge—and there are whispers throughout the surrounding villages that the family is cursed by the gods.

Disturbed by a series of ghostly visions, Annaleigh becomes increasingly suspicious that the deaths were no accidents. Her sisters have been sneaking out every night to attend glittering balls, dancing until dawn in silk gowns and shimmering slippers, and Annaleigh isn't sure whether to try to stop them or to join their forbidden trysts. Because who—or what—are they really dancing with?

When Annaleigh's involvement with a mysterious stranger who has secrets of his own intensifies, it's a race to unravel the darkness that has fallen over her family—before it claims her next.

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 This cover is so pretty! Definitely a cover buy for me!

Summary/Tagline: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 "In a manor by the sea, twelve sisters are cursed." - Your first clue that this is a Twelve Dancing Princesses retelling

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 I loved Annaleigh and her sisters, though they are all so different. Their stepmother, Morella seems like this sweet thing that just wants their father wrapped around her finger but you can tell as you're reading that there is a dark undercurrent in their somewhere. And the girls' poor father - first losing his wife then four of his daughters in quick succession. Can't a man catch a break without being manipulated by his new wife?
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 The worldbuilding is fantastic in this book, dark and atmospheric. A manor by the sea that everyone believes is cursed, a unique set of gods that the characters believe in and the rituals that accompany them, the clothing, and everything is so well plotted the reader will feel transported. 
Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 I wasn't sure what to expect going into this book but I was completely blown away. 

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 4.6 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

4.6 of 5 Stars!

The Saturday Review - 31 August 2019

The Saturday Review is back! I know, I need to keep up better with this but my reviews keep piling up instead. What have you been reading lately bookdragons?

These Witches Don't Burn

by Isabel Sterling

Publisher: Razorbill

Release Date: May 28, 2019

Genre: Young adult, Paranormal, Witches, LGBTQ+

Blurb

Hannah's a witch, but not the kind you're thinking of. She's the real deal, an Elemental with the power to control fire, earth, water, and air. But even though she lives in Salem, Massachusetts, her magic is a secret she has to keep to herself. If she's ever caught using it in front of a Reg (read: non-witch), she could lose it. For good. So, Hannah spends most of her time avoiding her ex-girlfriend (and fellow Elemental Witch) Veronica, hanging out with her best friend, and working at the Fly by Night Cauldron selling candles and crystals to tourists, goths, and local Wiccans.

But dealing with her ex is the least of Hannah's concerns when a terrifying blood ritual interrupts the end-of-school-year bonfire. Evidence of dark magic begins to appear all over Salem, and Hannah's sure it's the work of a deadly Blood Witch. The issue is, her coven is less than convinced, forcing Hannah to team up with the last person she wants to see: Veronica.

While the pair attempt to smoke out the Blood Witch at a house party, Hannah meets Morgan, a cute new ballerina in town. But trying to date amid a supernatural crisis is easier said than done, and Hannah will have to test the limits of her power if she's going to save her coven and get the girl, especially when the attacks on Salem's witches become deadlier by the day.

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 I really like the tarot card style theme of the cover. It looks like you placed objects on a purple table cloth and turned it into a book cover. I really like the simplicity.

Summary/Tagline: n/a
Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 One of the things that drew me to this book was the LGBTQ+ rep during Pride month and I think the author executed it perfectly. The emphasis of the story isn't on the main character being a lesbian, just that she's a witch who also happens to be a lesbian. Hannah's struggles with her feelings for her ex-girlfriend and her crush on the new girl are relatable to all readers. Overall, the characters are all well developed with distinct personalities.

Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 I felt like I had stepped onto the streets of Salem while reading this book. It's always been my dream to visit there during the fall and this book really encompassed the small, eclectic town vibe I get from looking at brochures and photos.

Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 Again, the theme of this story is not on the character finding out she's a lesbian, its about witches and family pressure, moving on from your exes and starting something new with someone new all while dealing with a witch hunter bent on the deaths of the local witch population. I thought the story was well balanced overall, but I did have to take a star away because I figured out who the witch hunter was about halfway through the book. 

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 4.75 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟 🌟🌟🌟

4.75 of 5 Stars!

Like A Love Story

by Abdi Nazemian

Published by: Balzar + Bray

On: June 4, 2019

Genre: Young Adult, "Historical Fiction," Contemporary, LGBTQ+, Romance

Blurb:

It's 1989 in New York City, and for three teens, the world is changing.

Reza is an Iranian boy who has just moved to the city with his mother to live with his stepfather and stepbrother. He's terrified that someone will guess the truth he can barely acknowledge about himself. Reza knows he's gay, but all he knows of gay life are the media's images of men dying of AIDS.

Judy is an aspiring fashion designer who worships her uncle Stephen, a gay man with AIDS who devotes his time to activism as a member of ACT UP. Judy has never imagined finding romance...until she falls for Reza and they start dating.

Art is Judy's best friend, their school's only out and proud teen. He'll never be who his conservative parents want him to be, so he rebels by documenting the AIDS crisis through his photographs.

As Reza and Art grow closer, Reza struggles to find a way out of his deception that won't break Judy's heart--and destroy the most meaningful friendship he's ever known.

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 The cover is the initial thing that drew me to this book. It's gorgeous, it's colorful, and it's the kind of cover that if you saw it on a shelf at the bookstore you'd stop and take a closer look.

Summary/Tagline: N/A

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 Do I think each of the three main characters are well-developed, unique voices, and that their struggles were clearly displayed on the page? Yes, yes I do. Unfortunately I just couldn't connect with any of them. Reza was probably the most likable of the three, but his paranoia about getting AIDS just because he had thoughts about other boys was a little melodramatic for me to read. I know that perhaps during the time period people thought they could get the disease from the smallest thing but I just found the paranoia annoying.
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 Again, the worldbuilding is well conveyed. You feel as if you have stepped back into the 1980s. Unfortunately for me there were just so many references that I couldn't understand being a 90s baby that I couldn't enjoy the setting and worldbuilding more.

Story: 🌟🌟 I could rate this book higher, but I just couldn't connect with any of it. I went in wanting to get a YA take on the AIDS craze of the 1980s and while it did go into the fears each character had or the connection to people that had the disease, I could have done entirely without the romance between Reza and Art. This book will give you the feels and will tear at your heart, but if you weren't a teenager+ in the 80s you'll miss a lot of the references.

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟 3.75 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟

3.75 of 5 Stars!

Bird Box 

by Josh Malerman

Published by: Ecco

On: March 12, 2019

Genre: Fiction, Horror, Thriller, Apocalyptic, Post-Apocalyptic

Blurb:

Now a Netflix film starring Sandra Bullock, Sarah Paulson, Rosa Salazar and John Malkovich!

Written with the narrative tension of The Road and the exquisite terror of classic Stephen King, Bird Box is a propulsive, edge-of-your-seat horror thriller, set in an apocalyptic near-future world—a masterpiece of suspense from the brilliantly imaginative Josh Malerman.

Something is out there . . .
Something terrifying that must not be seen. One glimpse and a person is driven to deadly violence. No one knows what it is or where it came from.

Five years after it began, a handful of scattered survivors remain, including Malorie and her two young children. Living in an abandoned house near the river, she has dreamed of fleeing to a place where they might be safe. Now, that the boy and girl are four, it is time to go. But the journey ahead will be terrifying: twenty miles downriver in a rowboat—blindfolded—with nothing to rely on but her wits and the children’s trained ears. One wrong choice and they will die. And something is following them. But is it man, animal, or monster?

Engulfed in darkness, surrounded by sounds both familiar and frightening, Malorie embarks on a harrowing odyssey—a trip that takes her into an unseen world and back into the past, to the companions who once saved her. Under the guidance of the stalwart Tom, a motely group of strangers banded together against the unseen terror, creating order from the chaos. But when supplies ran low, they were forced to venture outside—and confront the ultimate question: in a world gone mad, who can really be trusted?

Interweaving past and present, Josh Malerman’s breathtaking debut is a horrific and gripping snapshot of a world unraveled that will have you racing to the final page.

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Yes, I had to have the media tie-in edition of Bird Box. I'm one of those people. Don't judge me. 🤣

Summary/Tagline: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 “Something is out there..."  - I like it! It definitely gives you an eerie vibe of what's inside.

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 As a main character, Mallorie is definitely a survivor who has become strong because she had no other choice. But she lacks heart. She's so cold toward "Boy" and "Girl" - especially Girl - that you feel sorry for the children. The rest of the characters are a diverse cast of characters who have such differing personalities that you know they would have never crossed path if not for their need for survival. 
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Imagine a world in which sight in the outside world can drive you mad. Where survivors will hide behind covered windows and blindfolds. Where those driven crazy do terrible things to themselves and to others. It's this terrifying world that Malerman brings you in Bird Box. It's frightening, it's unexplainable, it's a living nightmare.

Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 This book is as good as it is frightening. There's a scene when Tom goes looking for supplies and seeing eye dogs where he comes across a dead person who gauged their own eye out and plucked it into a bowl that is grotesquely but fantastically described that really got to me. And even though I saw the movie first, this book still took turns that gave me chills. 

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 4.6 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

4.6 of 5 Stars!

Paranoid

by Lisa Jackson

Published by: Kensington

On: June 25, 2019

Genre: Fiction, Thriller

Blurb:

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Jackson comes a new novel of nerve-jangling suspense as a woman haunted by guilt realizes that nothing can be trusted—not even her own memory …

There are people in Edgewater, Oregon, who think that twenty years ago, Rachel Gaston got away with murder.

Rachel still has no idea how a foolish teenaged game turned deadly—or who replaced her soft pellet air gun with a real weapon. When a figure leapt out at her from the darkness, she fired without thinking. Too late, she recognized her half-brother, Luke, and saw blood blooming around his chest.

Despite counseling, Rachel’s horrifying dreams about that night continue. Her anxiety contributed to her divorce from Detective Cade Ryder, though he blames himself too. But as Rachel’s high school reunion nears, she feels her imagination playing tricks, convincing her that objects in her house have moved. That there’s a hint of unfamiliar cologne in the air. That someone is tailing her car. Watching her home.

She’s right to be scared. And as connections surface between a new string of murders and Luke’s death, Rachel realizes there’s no escaping the past, and the truth may be darker than her worst fears …

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 This cover is dark, and somewhat simplistic. A decaying set of stairs, faded typography of the title, and an overall creepy vibe.

Summary/Tagline: n/a 

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 Rachel is a character haunted by a past event that has forever changed her life, her ex-husband Cade is a detective who hates himself for giving into the affair that torpedoed his marriage to Rachel. On top of that, Cade's father is married to one of Rachel's high school friends, a girl whose son is the child of Rachel's late half-brother who died all those years ago. Oh what a tangled web we weave.
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 The beginning of this book reminded me of the setting of Nancy Holder and Debbie Viguie's The Rules. I really enjoyed that book so I was hooked on the beginning of this book. Then we move forward twenty years and Rachel is still living in the same small Oregon town. You definitely get the small town feel and the small town mindset, gossip and grudges.
Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 I liked this book, but after reading so many of Lisa Jackson's books you start to realize they all have similar themes; especially when it comes to dark family secrets and bombshell revelations. 

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 4 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟🌟

4 of 5 Stars!

Finale

by Stephanie Garber

Published by: Flatiron Books

On: May 7, 2019

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy

Blurb:

A love worth fighting for. A dream worth dying for. An ending worth waiting for.

It’s been two months since the Fates were freed from a deck of cards, two months since Legend claimed the throne for his own, and two months since Tella discovered the boy she fell in love with doesn’t really exist.

With lives, empires, and hearts hanging in the balance, Tella must decide if she’s going to trust Legend or a former enemy. After uncovering a secret that upends her life, Scarlett will need to do the impossible. And Legend has a choice to make that will forever change and define him.

Caraval is over, but perhaps the greatest game of all has begun. There are no spectators this time—only those who will win, and those who will lose everything.

Welcome, welcome to Finale. All games must come to an end…

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 All of the covers of the books in this trilogy are eye-catching. This one and Legendary are definitely tied for my favorites.

Summary/Tagline: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 "A love worth fighting for. A dream worth dying for. An ending worth waiting for." - Such a perfect way to sum up this book.

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟.5 I really think Scarlet and Tella grow so much in this final book and I liked having chapters in both their perspectives. Julian was charming as always and I loved seeing more of Jacks (I only wish he would have his own spin off). The only character I wanted more of was Legend. It feels like we mostly encounter him in Tella's dreams.
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 As always, this book has fantastical worldbuilding where the strange and impossible become possible realities on the page. I love the clothing, the locations, and the Fates. 
Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 I loved Legendary, liked Caraval, but Finale is my favorite of the three. It was a great way for the trilogy to end, the only thing I was missing was the fantastical Caraval games played out in the previous two books. 

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 4.9 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

4.9 of 5 Stars!

Making Up

by Helena Hunting

Published by: St. Martin's Press

On: July 16, 2019

Genre: Contemporary, Romance

Blurb:

A new standalone, laugh-out-loud romantic comedy by New York Times bestselling author Helena Hunting.

Cosy Felton is great at her job—she knows just how to handle the awkwardness that comes with working at an adult toy store. So when the hottest guy she’s ever seen walks into the shop looking completely overwhelmed, she’s more than happy to turn on the charm and help him purchase all of the items on his list.

Griffin Mills is using his business trip in Las Vegas as a chance to escape the broken pieces of his life in New York City. The last thing he wants is to be put in charge of buying gag gifts for his friend’s bachelor party. Despite being totally out of his element, and mortified by the whole experience, Griffin is pleasantly surprised when he finds himself attracted to the sales girl that helped him.

As skeptical as Cosy may be of Griffin’s motivations, there’s something about him that intrigues her. But sometimes what happens in Vegas doesn’t always stay in Vegas and when real life gets in the way, all bets are off. Filled with hilariously awkward situations and enough sexual chemistry to power Sin City, Making Up is the next standalone in the Shacking Up world.

Review:

Cover: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Ah yes, give me all the sexy man candy!! 😍😍😍

Summary/Tagline: n/a

Characters: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 I really loved Cosy and Griffin. Griffin definitely fits into the sexy, mogul, billionaire trope and Cosy is this cool, sassy girl who is used to holding everything together. Together the pages scorch with their chemistry. And I also loved Cosy's sister! Is there any chance she will get her own book or novella someday? She so deserves to find love!
Worldbuilding: 🌟🌟🌟.5 The clearest image we get in this book is of the adult store Cosy works in when she and Griffin initially meet. The rest of the book doesn't stand out too much with the fancy set-ups Griffin puts together for Cosy, the diner that Cosy loves, the Grand Canyon, and Cosy's apartment being all pretty standard.
Story: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 This book is so funny and sexy I couldn't get enough of it!

Overall: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 4.4 of 5 Stars!

My Rating:

🌟🌟🌟🌟

4.4 of 5 Stars!