fernfuentes's reviews
341 reviews

Queen of Shadows by Sarah J. Maas

adventurous dark emotional 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? Yes

5.0

That’s what I’m talking about!!!! Oh man, Queen of Shadows was sooooooo good! This story is really becoming a crazy nail biter. I really truly loved how Maas handled the shift in dynamic between Aelin, Chaol, and Dorian. Such a dark contrast to how young adult triangles are usually handled. And I have finally found a love for Manon’s storyline in this book. I didn’t care much for her story in Heir of Fire, but now I’m all in. My biggest pet peeve with Maas right now is just her little writing quirks, like when she uses triple repetition to make a point. It doesn’t really heighten the moment; it just annoys me. She’ll say something like “Aelin climbed down, down, down into the pit” or something and I feel like it could sounded much more haunting and eloquent with a different set of word. But again, I loved this, and I believe this is my favorite entry yet in ToG!

Welcome to Night Vale by Jeffrey Cranor, Joseph Fink

adventurous emotional funny lighthearted mysterious 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? Yes

5.0

Welcome to Night Vale is my favorite podcasts of all time. Every once in a while I decide to start it over from the beginning, and every time I get to episode 76 - An Epilogue - I stop and read the novel, since that’s where it takes place. This is now my 4th time through the book; twice in print, twice on audio, and yep, it’s just as amazing as it was the first time. Even though the creators swear left and right that you don’t need to follow chronologically and that time is weird anyway, there’s definitely a canon to the series. I got to the point where this novel takes place so I decided to pick it back up and read it again. This story really is wonderfully strange. It follows a 19 year-old pawn shop owner who’s been 19 for as long as she can remember, a teenage boy who is going through changes, literal transformations in physical manifestation, and a man in a tan jacket with a deerskin suitcase whom nobody can remember the second they look away from him. Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor have a wonderfully strange mind. Definitely worth checking out!

The Assassin's Blade by Sarah J. Maas

adventurous dark emotional 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? Yes

5.0

Wow this was good! I’m a sucker for a good short story and these hit all the right spots. I really enjoyed getting the full back story on Celaena’s life before the mines. Personally, I’m happy with where in the series I chose to read these stories. It was a nice break from the main story, but it also added a different, sadder element already knowing the basics of how it ended. This was a good one, and I’m excited to get back into the main series!

Heir of Fire by Sarah J. Maas

adventurous slow-paced

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

3.0

Maybe it’s SJM burnout, but I just was not feeling this book. Everything felt so forced; the relationships, the situations characters were put in, it all felt like watching a kid smash Barbie dolls together. As always, the last few chapters had fantastic plot twists, so I enjoyed that. I really did not care for the Manon storyline, although it sort of grew on me towards the end? Overall, just wasn’t doing anything for me. Unfortunate, but it happens.

Crown of Midnight by Sarah J. Maas

adventurous dark emotional mysterious 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? Yes

5.0

Now we’re talking!! The plot moves forward, twists and turns all over the place, and most importantly, there were actual consequences!!! That made me sooooo happy. I genuinely enjoyed this one even more than the first book. I think the complicated relationships between the main characters is handled really well, and I just loved Mort so much. I’m so glad I waited until all the books were out to start reading them because I would be so upset if I couldn’t jump right into the next one!

Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas

adventurous dark mysterious 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? Yes

5.0

Holy mother of names, I don’t think I pronounced a single one correctly while reading ToG, but I sure did enjoy it! As we enter phase 2 of the SJMassverse, I think I enjoyed Throne of Glass more than I did ACOTAR. Yeah, it’s a bit of a slower paced story but I’m such a sucker for books about medieval style competitions (Hunger Games, The Quillan Games, Goblet of Fire, etc.) so this was really easy for my to enjoy. In ACOTAR Maas got on my nerves with the phrase “vulgar gesture” and this time it was the plural “rooms.” I get that Celaena had multiple rooms in her chambers but referring to it constantly as “she left her rooms” and “he entered her rooms” sounded ridiculous. Oh and really not a fan of the love triangle trope. My biggest grievance is that

Sarah once again resorts to a Deus Ex Machina to solve her main character’s problems. Boringggggg

. But overall it was great and I can’t wait to dive into the next book in the series.

Black Paradox by Junji Ito

dark mysterious fast-paced

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

4.0

Man, what do they put in the water in Japan?! I don’t know how Ito does it, but he comes up with some of the absolute strangest plots and this one did not disappoint! Absolutely fucked story 😂 4 strangers meet on an online forum dedicated to people who want to off themselves, and they decide to meet up and do it together 😂 that’s not even the weird part of this story. Absolute tip of the fedora to Junji Ito. One of the weirder ones for sure.

You May Not Have Much to Say…: …Say It Anyway by Craig Bidiman

dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

5.0

Yes, I’ve known Craig for years. Yes, he has slept on my bed before. So who’s going to believe that this is an unbiased review? Nobody? Oh well. I’ll push on, anyway. YMNHMTS is a powerful collection. Craig successfully tore my heart out with the opening essay, “I Feared My Father Weak” and from then on, continued to pound on it with a hammer until it was a small black pulp. The essays and stories are the real stars of this collection, but as a long time listener of another musician and Fragile Bird, I found a new light in these songs. When you strip away the accompanying music, and it’s just you and the words, it takes on a different, more naked feeling. Thank you for exposing yourself to me, Craig. I love you.

The Quiet Room by Terry Miles

adventurous dark tense fast-paced

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

4.0

Terry took a big risk with this one, going pretty far from what we’re used to with the Rabbits universe. It’s safe to say that I’m obsessed with the Rabbits universe and will defend it with bias every time. That being said, I can recognize that in an attempt to not rewrite the same story over again, there were a few too many elements from the original story that initially made me fall in love with the podcast and the first novel.

Without giving too much away, I wish there would’ve been more focus on the patterns instead of the somewhat trope-ish “I blacked out and now I don’t remember anything so will the person who was with me give me a half baked playback of what I was doing.”

The way it ended on that cliffhanger makes me believe that there will be a 3rd book coming, and while it would be awesome to see K. come back into the fold, I can’t say I missed them (TQR definitely leads me to believe K. was a female character) in this book. Emily and Rowan made great lead characters. I enjoyed having Alan Scarpio play a bigger role here since he’s one of my favorites from the podcast, but still I feel he felt a little flat. 

All in all it was the action and pace of the story that kept me going with this one. It’s kind of more a 3 star read, but I bumped it up to 4 because I just love the show so much and I want another book!

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

adventurous emotional funny sad fast-paced

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

5.0

“It isn’t a sadness, but a joy, that we don’t do the same things for the length of our lives.”

Every. Gamer. Needs. To. Read. This. Book!

For me, this is one of the greatest books I’ve read in years. It reminded me so much in all the best ways of A Little Life. It was beautiful, and heartbreaking, and hopeful, and all the other amazing things it could be. Gabrielle’s knowledge of game design and gaming culture is incredible. I felt so immersed in a world I was born too late for (as she mentions in the book), and if I’d read this book in high school in 2007, I guarantee I would’ve gone to college to become a game designer. I don’t know how she did it, but reading Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, all I could think about is how amazing these fictional games would be in real life. I want to play Solution, and EmilyBlaster, and Ichigo, and every other game that Zevin made feel so real.

Ultimately, this book, like every other book I’ve ever loved, broke my heart. It is full of hope and art and beauty, but it is beautifully painful as well. I’ll be thinking about Sam, Sadie, and especially Marx, whom I identified the most with, for many years to come.