caroline_mclaughlin's reviews
53 reviews

Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo

emotional hopeful informative inspiring 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? No

4.5

Tales from the Café by Toshikazu Kawaguchi

emotional hopeful reflective relaxing medium-paced

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

2.5

This book suffers from many of the same problems as the first, but I found this one to be even less heartfelt. I also found myself getting more and more annoyed by the repetitiveness of the prose and the over explaining done by narration in regards to both the rules and just simple actions/emotions. I’m so confused by the purpose of some of the rules, like the ghost woman, and what they really tend to add to the story overall. I think this book would be better as a TV show or even a video game, so maybe it’ll be worth checking out if it gets adapted.

Blitzed: Drugs in the Third Reich by Norman Ohler

informative slow-paced

2.75

I found this book incredibly slow. It is probably best for those who already have a lot of interest in WWII who appreciate the finer details, and not those like me who were looking for less specifics and more of an overarching look. For the audiobook, the narrator sounds a lot like Armie Hammer, which made this an odd experience. I would also not recommend listening while eating as, although descriptions aren’t graphic, they’re absolutely unpleasant at points. Overall it was interesting to hear what a loser Hitler was, but that’s about all the intrigue I found in this book.

Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi

emotional reflective relaxing sad medium-paced

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

2.75

This book was fine, but nothing that special. The prose was very basic and it was hard to tell if the language was so underwhelming just because of the writing or due to mistranslation. It also became very repetitive which is unfortunate for such a short book. I didn’t love the way women were portrayed and I’m pretty sure the portrayal of Alzheimer’s was also pretty odd. Overall, the book just felt very simple and wasn’t very engaging.

The Lives of Saints by Leigh Bardugo

informative medium-paced

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

2.75

While this isn’t a terrible book, it’s clearly only a companion to a series. Each story feels more like a summary, and I think I would’ve found it easier to get through and more enjoyable if the stories had been longer and more developed, or simply incorporated into a larger story. It also felt a little odd how similar to “real saint stories” some of these were, right down to quotes from historic Catholic saints. Overall, I just kinda found this tedious and underdeveloped. My favorite  story ended up being the saint of the book. I wish more of the pieces had been more like that!

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke by Eric LaRocca

dark funny tense fast-paced

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

2.5

I truly never dnf books because the unfinished book will always haunt me, but it got to the point where I felt like this book would haunt me if I did finish it. Somehow, however, I managed to push through. 

I had so many issues with this book. It is gruesome seemingly for the sake of being gruesome. Some of the quotes and passages are so beautifully written, but there are also so many choices the author made that I don’t understand. The character development happened so quickly, it felt incredibly unrealistic. Also, the characters were both so deranged it was often hard to even tell them apart. Overall, it was an odd short story with a good beginning, grotesque middle, and hilarious end.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child death, Gore, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Heartless by Marissa Meyer

dark tense slow-paced

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

2.75

It was nearly impossible to get into and through this book. However, I should mention I’ve never had a strong interest in the “Wonderland” universe, and this may have made the book less interesting to me. I found the world building to be odd and not well detailed, and the characters to be oddly one dimensional with strict interests like “baking” which felt overall pretty arbitrary. Though I like Meyer’s stories typically, and her romance always well done, I found this one fell short and dragged on, rather than adding anything interesting to the Alice in Wonderland story. 

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo

informative inspiring lighthearted medium-paced

4.0

I just love the way she personifies the items and one’s house. She’s clearly an expert, and this book was a great supplement to her Netflix show.

The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet by John Green

emotional informative inspiring lighthearted reflective medium-paced

3.25

I think I’m reading this book at the wrong time. Though the essays have a lot of interesting information and reflection, and they look at humanity in a gentle way that refuses to be too saccharine, the constant references to the pandemic and positioning of the present in 2020-2021 makes it hard to enjoy. Reading it in spring of 2022, when we are on the cusp of yet another variant, I don’t find myself close enough to the initial stages of the pandemic to want to bask in comforting thoughts about our persistence, nor distanced enough to be able to enjoy reflections on the pandemic. Give it ten years and this book will feel like a time capsule of this era, but at the moment, it feels more like a painful reminder.

My favorite essays were Auld Lang Syne and Harvey.

Vicious by V.E. Schwab

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0