littleredmacks's reviews
491 reviews

You're Not Listening: What You're Missing and Why It Matters by Kate Murphy

informative fast-paced

It Didn't Start with You: How Inherited Family Trauma Shapes Who We Are and How to End the Cycle by Mark Wolynn
Did not finish book. Stopped at 45%.

While I was interested in the premise of this it def felt like the author took a lot of creative liberties and pushed reality to unbelievable limits. 

Throwback by Maurene Goo

emotional inspiring 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? Yes

5.0

I fell in love with every part of this book. I feel like so often our parents aren't people to us and this story follows a girl learning all the trivial things she thinks her mom wants are tied to things that happened when she was younger. And the side plots were *chef's kiss*. This story was beautiful. 

The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder by David Grann

3.0

I went into this with no expectations. While interesting, it was mostly just meh.

Frizzy by Claribel A. Ortega

emotional hopeful inspiring reflective fast-paced

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

4.0

The message of this story is so important for every kiddo with curly hair and it honestly helped heal a part of my inner child who hated her curly hair because it was frizzy and not the beauty standard. 

I do wish we had seen more of a resolution with the bullies because that felt like a loose thread. ESP because one of them was her cousin. 

The Ornithologist's Field Guide to Love by India Holton

funny lighthearted fast-paced

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

4.0

This book is so silly. There’s almost no seriousness at all but I loved it. The romance was really cute. I loved the pining after one another.

That being said we needed more birds! We had this objective that propelled our story forward but I wanted more birds. More research. And I feel like the subplot the author had going on made it so we just couldn’t have that. 

Hoard of the Dragon Queen by Wizards RPG Team, Steve Winter, Wolfgang Baur

I don't feel like this book needs a rating because it's meant to be for DM's but I wouldn't recommend this as your first game if you are a new DM. 

Loud: Accept Nothing Less Than the Life You Deserve by Drew Afualo

funny inspiring reflective fast-paced

5.0

I didn't know I need this book. It was one the library app recommended to me so I checked it out thinking I was just getting a memoir based on the cover and title. Boy, I was wrong. I was unprepared for how wonderful this book was going to be, for how much it was going to speak to me, for how much I applied to my own life. 

I'm so sad I didn't read this as a physical copy because I KNOW my annotations would have been all over this one. I will be buying a physical copy of this book and annotating it at some point because this book deserves to be read again. 

Mutual Aid: Building Solidarity During This Crisis by Dean Spade

informative fast-paced

3.0

There were things in this book that were really insightful, however, I did have issue with the lack of sources as well as the fact that the author was very fixated on the binary that charity is bad and mutual aid is good. I think in reality, even the author didn't seem to have a clear distinction between mutual aid and a non profit that was run well. 

It also felt like the first half functioned a lot on theory, which is fine, but I thought come the second half we would get more concrete examples of this playing out in the real world, but it read way more as a self-help book (eg avoiding burnout). 

**also docked points for the ebook format. There was a section totally unreadable due to the table overlapping several pages of the book. And with how many tables there were in this book, you'd think we wouldn't have that issue. 

Brownstone by Samuel Teer

emotional inspiring lighthearted reflective sad fast-paced

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

4.0

This is a very nuanced graphic novel that tackles some tough concepts. The artwork is beautiful and I would read this again in a heartbeat.