maddy707's reviews
110 reviews

A Thousand Broken Pieces by Tillie Cole

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dark emotional hopeful sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

4.5

This book was incredibly emotional. I teared up at like 95% of the chapters. This book explores grief in such a wide and hard hitting way. I loved learning about the different ways grief is viewed in different cultures. The main characters emotions come through so strongly and is easily the best part of the book. 
 
The only thing I had issue was how all-consumed the two main characters were with each other. I just personally don’t like that in romance because I feel like a bit of their personalities and journeys were lost and they both just didn’t exist outside of each other. But this is remedied by the end. 
 
I love how they handled Cael’s journey but they could’ve focused on Savannah more. Her journey felt sidelined at times to make room for Cael’s. 
 
You shouldn’t read this book looking for a romance. You should read this book for its amazing exploration of grief. 
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Light from Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki

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dark reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

I appreciated the LGBTQ+ and Asian representation in this book, but outside of that there wasn’t much I liked. 

The writing style of this book was just not for me. It felt very disjointed. The character’s thoughts and feelings were all over the place and we jumped from P.O.V to P.O.V every few paragraphs. This made things very difficult to follow and understand.

I am just not the right reader for this book.

But I really want a donut right now.

 
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Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter

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funny fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

This book was an entertaining highschool movie. I could picture the whole thing perfectly in my head. It had those laugh out loud movie moments and I was entertained throughout.

I loved Wes as the main love interest. He was funny and charming and had great chemistry with Liz. Liz on the other hand was a little flat for me. The pacing of her character development was very rushed at the end. I also didn’t like that she lied to her best friend about everything for basically no reason. I get that she was scared to open up to her, but at the same time she didn’t need to lie about everything, like going to a party. She probably has the worst communication skills of any teenager I've ever seen. 

The whole “fake dating” plotline was a little convoluted because they weren’t really dating at all. A more accurate description would be “fake talking-stage”. It sort of feels like they called it fake dating so they could use that in advertising the book. Also this isn’t an “enemies to lovers” more of a “rivals to friends to lovers”.

However, I was really entertained by this book and had a good time reading it. 3 stars for Wes and .75 for a cute relationship, banter and chemistry. 

Btw what the heck kind of name is Mr. Fitzpervert. 
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The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century by Ian Mortimer

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slow-paced

1.0

Boring. History books are not for me. 
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Forging Divinity by Andrew Rowe

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medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.25

The audio performance for this book was great. The book itself though was quite info-dumpy. Part of me can understand that as this is the first book in an entire universe and I understand that things need to be established and lore needs to be explained. It just felt like 50% of the book was the characters explaining the world and asking themselves questions about how it worked. I did find the main characters enjoyable.

I particularly liked Taelien and look forward to seeing how his relationship with Lydia develops. Lydia was also a character I enjoyed and I am glad she lived. I loved seeing such a competent FMC without the cringeness that can sometimes come with it. 

The middle of this book was a little confusing, but in the end it made sense. The author could have made some aspects a bit clearer. As with most high fantasy worlds, there were a whole lot of names of different places, races and people and I didn’t really understand all of them. It wasn’t until about halfway through that I actually began to understand the different races and religions. Even then it is still a bit confusing. 

Even though I listened to this on audio, there were a lot of repeated phrases, particularly, “quirked a brow.” I swear I heard this said at least 50 times. Does the author not know any other ways of describing interest/confusion? And I swear the author never uses another word besides “said” when the characters speak. I think the author's writing style could definitely be better, but it wasn’t horrible.

My favourite part of this book was the chapter 8 fight scene. It was spectacular, I was actually at the edge of my seat while listening to it. It’s one of the best fight scenes I've read/listened to in a book. 

Overall I found this good an enjoyable listen and look forward to listening to the next book and seeing how the world and the characters grow. 
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The Miracle Morning: The Not-So-Obvious Secret Guaranteed to Transform Your Life: Before 8AM by Hal Elrod

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1.0

Self-help books are not for me. Boring. Maybe had 2 points I resonated with. 
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The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

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emotional sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I understand the insane hype about this book.

This was magnificent. From the very beginning it captivated me. The story was alluring and the character of Evelyn was compelling. I absolutely loved seeing all aspects of her life. The author did a fantastic job of making Evelyn complex and we see that in the decisions she made throughout her life. 

The story was paced excellently and the writing style was simple and had some very profound moments. Knowing very little about the story going into it, I was surprised at where it went. 

Overall this was excellent. Amazingly written and deeply emotional. I cried. I will forever cry over this story. 
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The Sorcerer of the North by John Flanagan

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adventurous fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

I enjoyed this one. I’m not a massive fan of the 5 year time skip as I feel like there should’ve been another book of Will being an apprentice before becoming a fully-fledged Ranger. However, I did get used to it. The author does a good job of making a tonal distinction between young Will and adult Will while still feeling like the same character.

I love the inclusion of the dog. She is just so cute. Adding a dog makes every book better.

This book moved along at a brisk pace and kept my attention well. I like that we got to see some development of Alyss and Will’s relationship and I enjoyed her being in the story. I understand why Halt wasn’t including much in this book, but I missed him. However, a duel storyline probably would’ve taken away from the main storyline. 

This book feels like part 1 to the story and I am looking forward to part 2. 
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The Battle for Skandia by John Flanagan

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adventurous fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Finally Halt and Will have been reunited! I do wish this book focused a little more on that point. But this was still an enjoyable instalment in the series. 
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The Maid by Nita Prose

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mysterious sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

 
I am conflicted about this book. Although there were aspects I enjoyed, those aspects also come with things I didn’t enjoy.

For the most part I liked the main character. Though the random quotes/catchphrases I found cringeworthy. The autism aspects of the character are pretty stereotypical but also don’t make much sense. On one page you have her struggling to understand emotions and facial expressions. On the next you have her perfectly understanding people's behaviour. It’s inconsistent. 

This book is written in a first person perspective which I wasn’t a fan of at first but I eventually got used to it. FPP will always read like fan fiction to me in the beginning. 

At the end of the book there is this really great scene showing us the moment that Gran died. It’s incredibly emotional… and then it’s ruined by the main character essentially murdering Gran upon her request. Why couldn’t she just go in her sleep and stop breathing normally. Why did she have to make the main character do that? Additionally, while I understand Gran was very important to Molly, the constant mentions of her death and the grief that Molly feels is so overdone. It feels like every single page Molly is talking about her Gran’s death. Like we get it, she’s dead and you are sad about it, anything else? 

The writing of Detective Stark is so unprofessional and not at all how a detective would act. It’s like this was her first case ever. Every single time she spoke it irked me so bad. Not sure if the author intended for me to be so annoyed by her. 

The part at the end where it is revealed that Molly knew who the killer was all along makes no sense and almost completely ruined the book for me. Molly has no reason to cover for the killer outside of not liking Mr Black. About 50% of this book would have been resolved much quicker if Molly just told the police that. There are no clues given to the reader at all that Molly knew who the killer was. It’s like the author threw it in there at the last minute. It honestly makes 0 sense at all. It’s so out of character.

The actual crime itself makes no sense. Why did nobody check the security cameras? Why is Molly arrested when there isn’t actually any substantial evidence towards her being the killer. Why isn’t there more investigation into Mr. Black’s day and his ex-wife. It just makes no sense at all. 

 
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