Ever book I’ve had the pleasure of reading has been unique and perfectly enchanting. Schumacher delivers a fun novel that doesn’t shy away from very real, relatable, and tragic situations.
In The Renaissance of Gwen Hathaway we meet Madeline, yeah, not Gwen, Madeline. Maddie is still reeling from the loss of her mother. She and her father have continued to do the Ren Faire route which has been certainly different, her mother’s absence almost feels phsyical. Maddie does talk to a therapist to work through her grief; but whether or not she’s coping is probably debatable. Especially when you learn about her journal of noticings.
Maddie is determined to pay attention to all the small details of the important people in her life. How many breakfasts do her and her father have together. How many phone calls do her and her best friend Fatima have a week? Does she do her nightly routine correctly? Most importantly, she cannot, CAN NOT, add more people to care about and notice about. Her brain just doesn’t have the capacity, it’s exhausting enough with just these two people to be concerned with.
And then Maddie runs into Art. A bard at the renaissance faire who walks a fine line between friendly and annoying. Art also refuses to call her Maddie, instead calling her Gwen. And Art doesn’t really care that Maddie insists they aren’t friends. He’s determined that Maddie will have a summer full of fun and random experiences with him.
The unfolding of this relationship is a joy to watch. Schumacher doesn’t make light of Maddie’s grief, nor her OR Art’s body image struggles. She manages to stick with the feel-good, YA-romance feelings while giving validation to other very real feelings young adults experience regularly.
And all of it is set inside a renaissance faire… what more could you ask for?
You’ve probably seen this cover in your e-reader ads, all over goodreads and on numerous bestseller lists:
This book has won so many accolades and it (and Ms. Zevin) have earned them all.
I’m kicking myself for missing the ARC deadline on this one. I cannot believe I waited so long to read this. But as I’m catching up on my Netgalley Shelf, I’m also making my way into my backlog and trying to catch back up!
The artwork on the cover of this book becomes relevant as the story goes on and main characters Sam and Sadie create their video games – it makes the cover more beautiful when you’re aware of the meaning and inspiration plus it brings the game imagery to life.
I love an alternating POV and hearing the inner thoughts of multiple characters in a story; its a way to get to know the characters even better as the story moves along. Sam is a young man whose been through some struggles – a serious car accident hospitalized Sam at a young age and that is where he first met Sadie.
Sadie’s sister Alice has cancer. This means she’s often in the hospital while Alice goes through treatments. And one day she’s wandering around look for the break room when she stumbles across a boy her age playing Mario. The start of a fast friendship the two bond over video games.
But something happens that fractures their young friendship and they don’t speak for a long while. It isn’t until they’re in college and they happen to cross paths in a subway station that their story really begins.
Set in the 1990s it was fascinating to read about programming and gaming in ways I certainly had no knowledge or experience with. As Sam and Sadie grow so does the gaming industry.
I enjoyed the story and the characters – Zevin has a true gift with words, I was totally immersed in the story. Throw in some twists and tragedies that I never saw coming and I was left crying as I flipped the pages of this novel.
You don’t have to be a gamer or techy to enjoy this book – you just have to be a human who has relationships.
Emma Lord continues to bring imaginative and relatable new stories and characters to her books. One of my favorite aspects of Lord’s writing is that romantic relationships are an element of the plot but not the point of the book. The main characters demonstrate personal growth and self-discovery in a way that feels celebrated and encouraged. I think this is an especially important focus for the age group her books are directed toward. I love seeing strong female characters come into their own, accept their flaws, and love themselves. It seems like Lord’s protagonists come to love themselves without expecting perfection.
In Begin Again, Andie is starting out fresh. She’s had a small set back when she didn’t get in to her first choice college for fall semester, but after a semester of buckling down at the community college, she’s been accepted as a transfer student and is ready to make her mark at Blue Ridge State.
It’s not just that it’s Andie’s dream school. It’s BEEN her dream school since she can remember. Her parents both went to this school, they met here, they had magic here, both in their relationship and in how the college made it’s mark on their lives. That and her mom died when Andie was young so it feels like this is the best way for her to connect to her mom when she can’t be there. She may be putting a bit of pressure on herself.
Andie meets a core group of friends almost immediately – she has a knack for bringing people together. And as the semester goes on she juggles a long-distance boyfriend, a group of new friends, classes, and what her friends have affectionately dubbed her “fix-it” problem. Because there isn’t a problem that Andie doesn’t want to help someone solve, she will bend over backward to help someone out and sometimes at the detriment to herself.
This only skims the surface of the depth of the novel and Andie’s start to college – romantic relationships, friendships, relationships between children and parents, grief, manipulation, all of these challenges are met and tackled throughout the story. I really enjoyed getting to know all the players in this novel and can’t wait to see what great piece Emma Lord puts out next.
I’m pretty convinced I’ll read anything this talented author writes. I look forward to her new releases eagerly and am consistently left feeling rewarded after finishing one of her books.
I don’t know if any other reader and reviewers out there get bogged down by the TBR but sometimes it feels almost too deep to come out of!
For me, there is nothing worse than an overdue task list and the fact that I have around 10 or so books that didn’t get reviewed on time looms heavy on my mind.
But it’s 2023 and whether or not your into new years resolutions, it’s still the start of something new.
Writing and reading has always felt like a huge part of myself. So I find happiness here in early reads and reviews and summarizing a book. So I may as well try to re-commit to this blog and a little more happiness for this year.
The second book of the year for me is Georgie, All Along by Kate Clayborn.
Kate Clayborn is an author I adore. Her books just bring you in like a warm hug. Books such as Georgie, All Along just leave you with a happy feeling after you've shut the book for a final time. It's not to say she shies away from tough subject matter, but rather finds ways to focus on love and light and self-growth at the same time.
In Georgie, All Along our female protagonist, Georgie, is kind of floundering. She's back to her small town from LA where she had served as a personal assistant to the big wigs in Hollywood. Her last boss having just decided to take a step back and reevaluate her life, while good for her, has left Georgie scrambling to figure out what she wants to do, what she wants from life, where she wants to be. All the big questions that we are bombarded with from the time we're five (what do YOU want to be when you grow up?) like we should have the answers figured out and never veer from that straight and narrow path.
But what if you don't know? What if it doesn't seem like a clear path? Coming home and being around some of the people who made her feel less than as a young adult, isn't exactly something she's looking forward too, but being with her best friend right before she delivers her first baby and housesitting for the parents she loves doesn't seem like too bad a place to crash land while she figures things out.
What she doesn't expect is to run into Levi Fanning, a man labeled as TROUBLE when they were growing. That image doesn't quite fit with the quiet and stoic man she meets when she's back in town.
Our male protagonist, Levi, is also trying to figure things out. He's constantly working to be better and more stable than the young man he once was. While he may think he's got it figured out and is living his best life, he's letting his past rule him and Georgie may just be the person to help him see that clearly.
This read left me feeling cozy and happy with the ending, proud of the characters and how they grew and the truths they uncovered about themselves. It's easy to see yourself in at least one of the characters Clayborn creates in this space.
Before I was wrapped up in Georgie, All Along, I was finishing up my mother-daughter book club’s January pick: Love and Other Words by Christina Lauren.
My sister has been raving about this duo’s writing all year. During December I was in the mood to read something festive, but not cheesy – insert In a Holidaze by Christina Lauren. Such a cute read, fast-paced, easy to read, leaves you feeling good.
After finishing that book, I was eager to get my hands on Love and Other Words. This was so much more than cute and feel-good. The way these writing partners were able to make you FEEL the feelings was almost overwhelming. Told in alternating timelines between past and present, I could FEEL young and the first crush, first love, big overwhelming, anxiety-inducing feelings. The feeling of “this is too much.” The way you almost wanted to hide from those big feelings because even if they also felt good, they felt scary too.
This book dealt with the death of parents and grief. I wanted to mention that as a trigger warning, but I also think it might be a relatable and comforting read if its something you’ve gone through yourself.
Book club meets this Friday and I’m so excited to discuss this one!
Another heartachingly beautiful book by Ashley Schumacher.
If I’m being honest, I’m still haunted by Ashley Schumacher’s debut novel “Amelia Unabridged.” This author must make the pages weep as she writes. The emotion and depth that flows out her pen (or perhaps keys on the keyboard) is amazing.
Schumacher captures the big feelings and valid emotions that young adults experience whether through “first loves” or friendships, growing up, grief, anxiety. Often, the way teens feel is downplayed and dismissed. Ms. Schumacher gives a loud and clear voice to them. After all, weren’t we all that age once? It’s easy to forget how it feels to be young the further away it gets from us.
Full Flight is a story about a young girl who keeps up her appearances. She’s bubbly, she’s driven, she’s the girl she is expected to be for all. Her friends, her parents, her teachers. What they see is what they get, but for Anna, underneath the expectations is a hidden part of herself that she struggles with. While Anna excels at hiding her “shadows” from her friends and family, one boy unexpectedly sees through it all: Weston Ryan.
An unexpected team is formed between Anna and Weston when she desperately asks for help on the duet piece for marching band. In fact, she’s actually already promised the band instructor that she’d get help from Weston. So, she’s relieved when she puts Weston on the spot and he agrees. Weston is a musical genius, no one would deny that but he’s a bit of a loner. And people in small towns don’t tend to like people who don’t fit into tidy boxes. Her parents warn her against getting involved with him, her friends clearly disapprove, and yet, Anna and Weston have an instant chemistry and connection that Anna doesn’t want to walk away from.
And then tragedy comes.
Schumacher has a way of writing a story where the format itself speaks volumes. I knew what was coming, and yet I still wasn’t ready for it. A beautiful story, a beautiful demonstration of emotion and feeling, and beautiful characters who made me feel a sense of hope and wonder.
It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything past a review on Goodreads, but it felt like as good a time as any to fire up the ole blog again.
If you grew up watching The Parent Trap this book is for you.
Better Together by Christine Riccio is a modern-day take on Freaky Friday meets The Parent Trap meets Dysfunctional family. I loved the sisters, Siri and Jamie. Their personalities are almost polar opposites but both are hilarious and charming characters to get to know. Siri and Jamie run into each other after more than a decade of disconnect. And I mean they literally run in to each other in the shower room at the Colorado mental wellness retreat they’re both attending.
Here’s some things to know: Siri is 18 and is reeling after the realization that her back injury has ended her ballet career. Not just put it on hold, no, her future as a ballerina is completely out of the question. That’s been her trajectory since about age 4 so she’s trying to figure out her next move and what the heck her entire future will be like now that everything she’s worked for is over. Her mother is there but barely, she works constantly and Siri felt like the one thing that held them together was their connection through dance, which she’s effectively severed.
Jamie is 20 and she’s floundering. She’s an emerging comedian and actor but just recently experienced a horrific failure during a 10-minute standup set where she wrapped things up by vomiting all over the stage. She’s mortified. She’s been kicked out of her apartment and forced back into her childhood home where her father has made her sign a contract, yes an actual print document contract, of steps she will complete to get her life back together. One of the conditions was a wellness retreat in Colorado, so away she goes.
Where Siri is full of emotion Jamie is aloof and flighty. They make the perfect pair and after their tumultuous reintroduction they come up with a plan to switch places. Each sister has a mess to work through with each of their estranged parents and it all comes to a head when they make the switch back in Las Vegas.
Oh and also there is actual glittery magic involved in the swap too.
I loved every second of this book. It was fast-paced switching between narrators frequently with short chapters and engaging characters. The girls are flawed. Their parents are definitely flawed. And instead of pretending like this will some how magically work out in the end without conflict, there is conflict aplenty. And with the conflict there is a normal, mature, and healthy relationship with therapy. Therapy is for everyone, friends. I love how Riccio manages to normalize it in this novel – something I hope to continue seeing more and more of in today’s literature.
If you’ve ever thought you DIDN’T need a story about modern Anne of Green Gables… think again, because you are wrong.
This book was an absolute treat. Starler completely captured Anne’s voice and attitude – I think she was spot-on with her assessment of Anne’s values and opinions in 2020. I couldn’t be happier – it’s the perfect romance mixed with a beloved character. I could wax on poetically about this, if I could think of a more dramatic analogy, I would share it in true Anne fashion.
Anne is a young woman in NYC. She’s about to enter her final year of her graduate program at Redmond College when lo-and-behold her archenemy, Gilbert Blythe, shows up in her city, in her school, IN HER PROGRAM. This after 6 years of radio silence. Anne knows she needs to keep her guard up and keep Gil at arm’s length because she’s still the only one not fooled by his dimpled grin.
Except, it turns out she may have been wrong about him. Gil isn’t as irritating and infuriating as Anne remembers. In fact, he’s kind of funny, and begrudgingly, she’s always known he’s smart. Their paths are intertwined when her senior thesis advisor insists that they complete the senior project together as he just doesn’t have time to add on another separate graduate student.
The romantic chemistry between these two is just heart-pounding. It’s silly-grin-while-reading-your-book good and I am still tickled over it.
If you loved Anne of Green Gables (and don’t mind a little open-door romance), this book is for you.
What better way to kick off the Halloween season (it IS it’s own season, is it not?) than reading a creepy, paranormal suspense YA book?
The Dead and the Dark had me hooked right away. We have alternating point of views from both main characters: Logan Ortiz-Woodley and Ashley Barton. Logan has just been uprooted from her family’s latest “home” to hunker down in Snakebite, Oregon. Snakebite is a place she had never heard of until her dad Brandon relocated there 6 months ago to scout locations for their ghost-hunter television series. Lo and behold when she finds out this is where both her dads, Brandon and Alejo, grew up. Suddenly the family she thought she knew seems shrouded in secrets and lies. Add this to the growing distance between her and her dad Brandon and Logan is just plain unhappy. It hurts to feel totally out of sync with the only family you have. And now she’s been plopped down into a homophobic clique-y little town that she hates.
And the town hates her and her dads right back. In fact, they are fairly convinced that the missing teen who disappeared one week after Brandon came to town is connected to Brandon. So Logan has very little choice but to team up with the town golden child, Ashley Barton, to solve this mystery of the missing teen and clear her dads names.
What ensues is an eerie hunt to find a killer. To make it more chilling a third narrator adds their voice to the story: the Dark. An evil entity that has taken possession of a body and is helping them kill. It’s heart-pounding to here the perspective of the Dark and it’s host, especially as it finds the victims.
I started this book on October 4th and finished it by midnight on the 5th. Once I started I couldn’t stop. Not to mention, I had to have the conclusion before I could sleep, I knew I’d have nightmares otherwise!
Perfect way to kick off October –
This cover is so intricate and gorgeous – I grabbed the image link from Goodreads to share since my copy is an eARC.
This book gave me such a feel-good feeling! Not that it didn’t deal with serious topics like drug addiction, relationships, and racism. The most impactful aspect of this book was discovering and loving yourself and the impact your family can have on your self-worth.
Mary Jane is a young teen from a prim and proper family in the 1970s. Her days are extremely predictable. She’s basically her mother’s assistant, helping with dinner and housework, and learning how to be a good housewife all the while. This summer though she’s gotten a summer job – a nanny for a local family with a five-year-old little girl named Izzy. Just walking into the Cones’ house for the first time is a culture shock for Mary Jane. The house is chaos embodied. She can’t figure out who is in charge here. Mrs. Cone doesn’t make dinner, she’s not even easy to find when it’s time for a meal – who feeds Izzy? Dr. Cone is just as absent-minded but most of the day he is working out in his garage-turned-office as a psychiatrist.
Mary Jane starts to bring some order and organization to the Cone house but learns that being messy isn’t such a big sin. This summer Dr. Cone has cleared his whole schedule to host a rock star and his movie star wife while the rocker tries to get sober. When Mary Jane walks up the day they arrive she is star struck as she realizes the movie star wife is none other than one of her favorite singers and actresses – Sheba! From there Mary Jane’s summer is a dream come true as she finally feels acceptance and love in a way she never has before.
This book is full of a young girl coming into adulthood and facing hard truths about her own family, prejudice, and the reality of addiction. I was just as enamored as Mary Jane herself with this story. I love the growth that Mary Jane has and the way she helps the Cones, Jimmy, and Sheba just as much as they help her. This was a really great coming-of-age story that was a true pleasure to read.
Some books just check off all the right boxes and The Passing Playbook certainly delivered.
It’s relatable. People are people. Puberty is puberty. I am certainly not alleging that some people do not have a harder time in life and in adolescence but we can all relate to the awkwardness of learning about ourselves, our bodies, our minds. At 32, I’m still learning about myself, and frankly, I hope I never stop.
Spencer is finally feeling like himself. He’s starting a new school this year where no one knows him as anyone other than Spencer and that feels good. Except he wants to try out for the soccer team and his parents’ aren’t quite behind that decision. So what choice does he have but to go behind their backs and try out anyway.
Honestly a lot of tumultuous things happen in this book, but it doesn’t come through as overly dramatic. Luckily Spencer has a phenomenal support system so he gets through it and comes out stronger and meets a lot of amazing people along the way.
I was able to learn more through reading this book, about tolerance versus acceptance, about life for trans people and their families, about the hope we see in the younger generations and the generations that will come after them.
It’s so important that we have books that reflect main characters that EVERYONE can see themselves in. I’m glad that Spencer can be that for so many young people now.
Librarian Wannabe 