colo's reviews
38 reviews

Beyond the Story: 10-Year Record of BTS by Myeongseok Kang, BTS

emotional hopeful reflective medium-paced

5.0

I love BTS a lot and a lot of the information wasn’t new but what was new were their “reflections” on the events. I could feel their hopefulness, frustrations, love, etc.. through the pages. 

Divine Rivals by Rebecca Ross

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious sad tense 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? It's complicated

5.0

I don’t have much to say honestly. I’m just sitting here, left in shock. Like I was not expecting that ending at all. Everything that could’ve gone wrong, went wrong! 

I loved this book so so much. I was half-way through the book and I knew it was going to be a solid 5-star read. The characters. The plot. The romance. The letters. OH THE LETTERS!

For All Time by Shanna Miles

adventurous emotional hopeful mysterious fast-paced

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

2.75

Not a great book but it wasn’t too terrible. It was… good enough. This isn’t a debut novel but there were parts in the book where the writing felt very juvenile. The premise of the book was really good and really interesting in theory but I’m not sure the author was able to execute it well. 

My favorite timeline was the 1924 timeline. My least favorite was definitely the one on Alpha 9. I skipped a majority of that timeline. I also really enjoyed the present timeline where she’s sick but the other worlds felt too jumbled out and not really written well. 

The book just felt repetitive to be honest because we’re reading about the same characters over and over again but they’re so… different? I don’t even know. In every life, they’re the exact same person so there wasn’t a lot, if any, character growth except towards the end where they have finally stopped time traveling and are actually living in the present. 

The book in general was just of confusing to me because like… was it real? Does magic really exist in this setting? Time traveling? Living many lives? Like what gives…? I just kind of wish this plot was fleshed out more because I was left with more questions than answers… I was totally confused towards the end where the airplane malfunctions and there’s a fire and they get brunt…? But they also stole a stone??? I was so fucking lost to be honest. I just didn’t think too much of it to be honest. 

I Must Betray You by Ruta Sepetys

dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

Ruta Sepetys is one my favorite authors. I love reading her books because I learn so much. Her books always lead me down a path where I have to know everything about the materials in the books because they’re based off real life events. 

This book was very fast paced as it did not allow you a moment to breath. It was just constant action and something new was happening with every page turn. 

I loved this book a lot and although a lot of characters were very unlikable, it was also very easy to feel empathetic. They were people in a terrible situation trying to survive and by trying to survive they had to do some unsavory stuff. 

I love how we were still getting new information till the very end. Learning Cristi’s mother was an informant and had been “selling out” her own family explained her behavior. Didn’t excuse it but it explained it. 

Cici’s story was just heartbreaking. Learning why she did what she did after learning of her death was just so… my heart felt heavy. 

Cristi and his friends, Liliana and Luca were so all very brave. They each had their faults but you really can’t hate them for it. 

Anyways, I loved this book so much and anyone who’s interested in historical fiction should definitely pick it up. 

Out of the Easy by Ruta Sepetys

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

I just love Ruta Sepetys so much. In my eyes, she can do no wrong. Like nothing. 

I loved reading this book. My heart was just constantly breaking for Josie and it broke even more when her mother broke into her room and just stole her entire life. In all that, I’m just glad she was able to find respectable friends in Willie, Cokie, Patrick, and Jesse. And even Charlotte, really. 

I just loved this book so much. It had been on my radar for so long and my library was finally able to get it on their shelves and I just snatched it up. 

Always Be My Duchess by Amalie Howard

4.0

It was cute, something I needed to get out of this awful reading slump. Despite their flaws, all the characters who weren’t meant to be likable were and the ones not meant to be likable weren’t. Charlotte was written as a cartoonish villain and it was kind of off-putting but oh well… 
I loved the epilogue and the pregnancy bit was cute because it was talked about before the epilogue. They both expressed wanting children so her being pregnant later was welcomed. 

A Lady's Formula for Love by Elizabeth Everett

mysterious sad 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? No

3.0

I don’t know. This book wasn’t good but it was bad either. It just was… To be honest, I could not tell you the plot of this book if you were to ask me, I couldn’t. Up until maybe the 30 pages is when I started to make sense of this whole thing with Winters and Phoebe but even then… I was still confused. Phoebe being the “villain” just didn’t make sense either. She wasn’t in the book enough for me to even consider her a big player… which I guess is her whole reasoning behind doing what she did… Hmm… the author kind of ate hold on lmaooo

I feel like the author had wanted to write a steamy romance but then decided she needed a plot afterwards.  The plot was very weak, I’ll tell you that. The book would’ve been a 5/5 if she had just written Violet and Arthur fucking in every chapter idk

The Girl Who Smiled Beads: A Story of War and What Comes After by Clemantine Wamariya

challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

5.0

Clemantine is a very unlikable person but who am I to judge, you know? I’m not the one who went through a genocide and had to migrate across seven African countries alongside her sister, her sister’s abusive husband, and play mother to her sister’s kids…. 

I always find writing reviews on real stories hard because how can you possibly critiques another person’s real life journey? What are you going to say? 

Of Cages and Crowns by Brianna Joy Crump

dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

2.0

I think the book started out really strong and somewhere in the middle, the author lost herself. Like, I genuinely believe she didn’t know how to further along the story so she just came up with the whole traitor bit and ran with it. Personally, I think the whole traitor bit made the book worse because it literally steered the entire book in a bad direction. Also, the whole Larkin bit was so… why? It’s a good plot twist but it also kind of undermines the whole powerful and extremely evil queen thing they had going on with Viera. Like you spent the whole book convincing us that she was the mastermind behind everything only to… strip it away from her..? The way she was killed off was so unserious to me 😭😭

Also not explaining Larkin’s abilities was a big disservice as well. Idk. The book felt lost from the middle point to the end.

The insta love was also not that great. I understand the circumstances though. A young girl who’s never had any type of romance in her life meets a handsome guy who seems totally smitten with her? It’s easy to fall in love in a situation like that. It’s really easy to fall in love with somehow who only has eyes for you and seems to think you’re the best thing since sliced bread. For Cohen, he was smitten with a beautiful girl who saved him years ago. The insta love made sense in their case but I don’t think it helped the plot in any way. 

I also think that the characters were flat. This book is so character driven but we don’t get to know the other characters outside the main 6-8 characters. I would’ve LOVED to see more of the other goddess touched girls. I would’ve LOVED IT! This entire plot (the Culling) only exists because of them so I was really disappointed when we didn’t get to see them more often. 

It was hard to choose a side though. I can see and understand everyone’s point of view.

Bittersweet by Sarah Ockler

challenging emotional hopeful lighthearted reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

I think Josh was the saving grace of this entire book tbh. He was a loser but like in the best way possible. He’s like the loser you date and will be obsessed with you (in a good way) and be all about you. Like we need more guys like him. Anyways. Hudson was annoying but also so relatable in the sense of knowing but not really knowing what she wants or where she belongs. I think this book is good for teenagers who are in high school and kind of need reassurance on that high school isn’t everything. It will end and I promise that you’ll have a great time after