patienceholmes's reviews
158 reviews

Cold by Mariko Tamaki

3.5

That Night by Chevy Stevens

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.75

Daisy Darker by Alice Feeney

adventurous dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.5

The Ravens by Danielle Paige, Kass Morgan

dark mysterious medium-paced

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

2.5

I was so excited to for this one and still think the plot and overall idea was amazing. It was just the ending that really ruined it all for me. For some reason the author goes really ham on explicitly spelling out every lesson learned to the point it’s cringey and really feels like she thinks the audience are dumb. It made the character development feel really dishonest. There was also lots of things that didn’t feel organic in terms of how the characters behaved in the last 50 pages or so of the book, things that were properly built up throughout. I’m also really confused about

why the ravens saw that vision of Tiffany after she’d been “kidnapped”?? Like it was never explained how they saw that when she was actually sitting right next to them disguised as dalia??

 

Overall it came really close to being a great book but the last 50 pages really let’s the whole thing down to the point I really wouldn’t recommend it. 

A Flicker in the Dark by Stacy Willingham

dark mysterious 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? It's complicated

3.0

The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa

emotional reflective sad slow-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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Terminal illness and Death

Moderate: Grief

Minor: Animal death, Death of parent, Medical content, and Car accident

These Witches Don't Burn by Isabel Sterling

emotional tense medium-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Medical trauma, Murder, Medical content, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury

The Island of Lost Girls by Alex Marwood
Did not finish book. Stopped at 17%.

There was some quite explicit verbal/emotional abuse of a child by their parent who was supposed to be presented as a sympathetic character and I just didn’t want to read about that character at all. It felt like the book was trying to gaslight me into thinking she was an ok parent

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse and Child abuse

Moderate: Colonisation, Classism, Misogyny, and Sexism

Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi

emotional hopeful inspiring reflective slow-paced

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

5.0