literaryjunarin's reviews
496 reviews

The Third Love by Hiromi Kawakami

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 19%.
The narrator is 35 years old but has a voice of a 10yr old girl.
Lies We Sing to the Sea by Sarah Underwood

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2.0

Gorgeous prose but too long winded. I just waited for it to end. And turns out, the author did not actually finish reading The Odyssey. Then why did she write this? Cause it's the hype these days? What a major turn off.
Medusa by Nataly Gruender

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sad medium-paced

5.0

“Mothers should not expect their children to be exactly like their parents. Rather, they should fear raising a child who is exactly like them, for there will be no room for that child to grow.”

Compared to Stone Blind by Natalie Haynes, this story is much more personal.  This book covers Medusa's life from her childhood up to her sure demise.

Though there are sweet and touching moments, this is also heartbreaking. Medusa really was just an innocent maiden caught up in the gods' pettiness. She did not deserve what Athena did to her. She was not a monster the mortals deemed her to be. 

I cried so badly at the end. 
The Bromance Book Club by Lyssa Kay Adams

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3.0

“Book club isn’t just about books.” Malcolm nodded solemnly. “It’s a brotherhood, man.”

Well, it's kinda wholesome reading about men who use regency romance novels to navigate their relationship troubles. It's just that Thea isn't exactly a likeable character. She did not make me feel like supporting her. She was mainly the cause of miscommunications, a trope which I already particularly dislike and this didn't help her case at all. 

But the men strategizing was such a nice comic relief. Them discovering Pinterest was the most fun part. 
A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 14%.
Too confusing to follow through
Edenville by Sam Rebelein

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3.0

Batshit crazy. The body horror is indeed horror. Slurping eyeball goo horror. Tongue eating tongue horror. The world was well-built and interesting especially the borrowing of skin thing but this book is difficult to follow in audiobook format. I know that the characters' voices are distinct if I dont get confuse with which voice is whose (even in audiobook) but on this one, I just wait for names to be called to know who was speaking. 
A Study in Drowning by Ava Reid

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3.0

“I was a woman when it was convenient to blame me, and a girl when they wanted to use me.”

Ugh this was boring but I did finish it. I liked the dark academia undertones with gloomy, stormy atmosphere. However, the pace was too slow for my liking. Effy was too childish in my opinion but I liked her character improvement at the end. I was waiting for her mother's retribution but turns out there's a book 2 so maybe that'll be included in the next book. The romance was a bit meh.
Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 74%.
Well I thought this would be lovely and filled with passion and yearning. I remembered loving the movie but this one is just them admiring buttocks and pubic hairs.
The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

4.75

"You know, one of the hardest things to admit is that we weren’t loved when we needed it most. It’s a terrible feeling, the pain of not being loved.”

I knew Alex Michaelides from his other work, The Maidens, and when I dived into this book, I knew the twist would be a bomb. I loved it. He knew how to keep readers on the edge of their seats. 

I loved the usage of Alcestis as a plot device. Nothing entices me more than Greek mythology. However, what irked me is that Alicia feels just that, a plot device. She did not come across as a real character.

There's just one thing that hurts me the most about books that include art in the plot. I can only imagine the paintings! I want to see them, too!