

Sep 5, 2024
Review of Burn by Peter Heller
I love Peter Heller's books, and Burn offers a wonderfully complicated friendship, meaningful connections to nature, momentous secrets,...


Jul 30, 2024
Review of In Memoriam by Alice Winn
Alice Winn's account of the unrelenting slog of World War I and the beautiful young men set against each other in the trenches serves as...


May 30, 2024
Review of Love, Lists and Fancy Ships by Sarah Grunder Ruiz
Sarah Grunder Ruiz serves up an irresistible rom-com with great banter and with interesting and difficult, complex issues of loss, grief,...


May 22, 2024
Review of The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley
This captivating story involves time travel, but it's primarily about deep human connections, complete with fantastic, funny banter;...


Jan 17, 2024
Review of Lone Women by Victor LaValle
LaValle mixes a Western setting with strong feminist messages, magical realism, haunting elements, and the terrifying, freeing truth in...


Jan 16, 2024
Review of A Power Unbound (Last Binding #3) by Freya Marske
Marske's quirky, funny, richly imagined magical world, complex character-building, relationship exploration, and storytelling continues...


Oct 25, 2023
Review of Starling House by Alix E. Harrow
Starling House is another wonderful, dark, twisty story from Alix E. Harrow, with imperfect characters, a noble, messy quest, layers of...


Oct 24, 2023
Review of American Girl by Wendy Walker
This is another whodunit winner from Wendy Walker: a character-driven mystery with a neurodivergent main protagonist, small-town...


Oct 18, 2023
Review of October in the Earth by Olivia Hawker
Hawker's newest historical fiction gives a wonderfully evocative peek into a gritty period, as her main protagonist escapes a bad...


Oct 3, 2023
Review of A Winter in New York by Josie Silver
Despite the many outlandish details of Iris's situation and ongoing secrets, I was taken with the sweet family relationships and the...


Jul 26, 2023
Review of Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo
In the second installment in Leigh Bardugo's Alex Stern series, Alex is as brave, scowling, and unapologetic as ever--and Darlington will...


Jul 11, 2023
Review of The Rachel Incident by Caroline O'Donoghue
Caroline O'Donoghue's coming-of-age story celebrates friendship, young love, and life-changing decisions and missteps that shape the...


Jun 1, 2023
Review of The Celebrants by Steven Rowley
Rowley brings humor to this heartwarming--but never cloying--exploration of friendship, connection, messy relationships, heartbreak, and...


May 18, 2023
Review of Meet Me at the Lake by Carley Fortune
Summertime is the backdrop to Fortune's Meet Me at the Lake, light fiction with an anchor in deeper issues, some steamy scenes,...


May 3, 2023
Review of Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Q. Sutanto
Sutanto's Vera Wong is playful, brusque, bossy, and connects an unlikely cast of characters, all murder suspects, into a heartwarming...


Feb 22, 2023
Review of We All Want Impossible Things by Catherine Newman
Newman offers a heartbreaking and heartwarming tribute to friendship that centers around witty dialogue, unconventional arrangements,...


Feb 7, 2023
Review of Solito: A Memoir by Javier Zamora
Zamora's memoir of his grueling journey from El Salvador to the United States without family at age nine keeps the reader within each...


Jan 25, 2023
Review of Other Birds by Sarah Addison Allen
Addison Allen's magical realism story is set on an island off the coast of South Carolina and offers lots of heart, interactive ghosts,...


Jan 19, 2023
Review of A Play for the End of the World by Jai Chakrabarti
Chakrabarti offers characters with complex struggles, hopes, and haunting memories who work to form deep, heartwarming connections in...


Jan 18, 2023
Review of As Good As Dead (A Good Girl's Guide to Murder #3) by Holly Jackson
Jackson doesn't skimp on heart-pounding pacing, captivating character development, and dark turns in this third book in her young adult...