podanotherjessi's reviews
811 reviews

Love You a Latke by Amanda Elliot

hopeful lighthearted slow-paced

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

2.25

Allow me to start this review with a series of bold claims.

1. This is a book about Jewish people, but it isn't for Jewish people.
This book assumes the reader has no idea what Hanukkah is, and very possibly no idea what Jewish life is at all. There's an extended info dump about the Maccabees early in the book, and it's referred back to frequently as if to say "hey, remember what this is about!" And that's just one example of the overexplaining that goes on in the book.

2. These main characters aren't from NYC and have possibly never been there before.
I don't know if Elliot, the author, is from New York. But I don't believe Seth or Abby are. Abby feels like a Hallmark character just because she <i>takes a NYC cab</i>?? They call things the wrong names, and they just feel like they aren't familiar with the city.

3. This relationship isn't going to last.
I do see chemistry between Seth and Abby, which is obviously a plus. But what is their romance even based on? I swear Abby just falls for Seth because he's the first person that's ever been kind to her. So while I could root for them to kiss and want them to find happiness, I just didn't think this was a real HEA, and that just takes a lot of the steam out of a romance for me.

4. Abby isn't just grumpy, she's an absolute jerk.
Maybe this is subjective (or more subjective than any other part of this review). But I love a grumpy character in a romance now and then. But grumpy to me means someone that's a little curt and in a bad mood now and then. Not someone who lacks common courtesy or empathy. And Abby is the latter. She is outright mean to Seth when we see them interact, and it's not because of something he's done that makes her not like him. She's literally just a cruel person.

Lovelight Farms by B.K. Borison

lighthearted medium-paced

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

1.75

This book feels like it was perfect for me. Fake dating romance! Set on a Christmas tree farm!! But it really fell flat for me. So here's a list of the things I really didn't like in this book in the order I realized I didn't like them.

1. I don't like the narrator. That's not something I judge the book on, but it did affect my enjoyment. Her voice just grated on me.
2. The fake dating situation didn't need to happen. I'm willing to suspend my disbelief on fake dating because obviously it's silly. But in this case, the situation could have so easily been avoided. Even with Stella still lying, she had months between submitting her story and the influencer coming. It would have been much easier to lie and say they broke up than to do this whole thing. Which even so I'd be willing to move past if not for...
3. Stella is clearly in love with Luka from the jump. This isn't even an inference; she says it outright. A romance with characters that are already interested in each other is a hard sell for me because I really enjoy watching characters falling in love. But it's way worse to me in a fake dating scenario because even being in Stella's head and knowing how reluctant she was, it's hard not to feel kind of icky about her asking Luka to do this. It just feels like ulterior motives, no matter how many other reasons she has for it.
4. It's only single perspective. This is a preference, but I just vastly prefer to see the romance develop from both sides. And in particular, I love seeing a man completely obsessed with a woman, which we don't see here because we don't get Luka's perspective. Nonetheless...
5. Luka is also obviously in love with Stella. Without being in his head, this is still so clear. And it makes Stella look horribly stupid that she doesn't see it. He makes a "you're so cute when you X" comment in like chapter 3, and there's no platonic explanation for that.

And that's all just in the first couple chapters. When I get to spoiler territory, there's more even more specific issues. Such as

how incredibly, creepily possessive both Stella and Luka are. Luka gets jealous because Stella is smiling with another guy?? And it's not even that he thinks there was flirting going on. He just thinks her smile belongs to him?? And Stella thought it was relatable???? You should want to see the person you love happy, even if it's not directly because of you.

And on top of all that, so much of this book was setting up the sequels. This would bother me more if I was enjoying what was going on with Luka and Stella, but really it was just a little something to make me roll my eyes.

That said, this book wasn't all bad. I really did love the cast of characters, even if they were exaggerated and silly. The setting was really lovely too. I probably won't continue reading the series, but those two elements do have me second-guessing that decision.

The Shadow Thieves by Anne Ursu

adventurous informative slow-paced

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

The Treasure Hunters Club by Tom Ryan

sad slow-paced

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

2.0

I didn't care for the writing or the character work, so I don't know that there was any saving this book. But I can envision a better version of this story where it doesn't try to be a mystery and instead sticks to being a multi-generational adventure and treasure hunt.

The writing style is mostly a me thing, and I think some people will get on well with it. It was just very simple and straight forward, which is not a style that I personally enjoy. I got used to it as the book went on, but I was never fully engaged in the story. The style didn't add anything. Each pov character sounded more or less the same.
And whoooo boy, the characters. There was such strange gendered weirdness going. Women are called "girls" and have interests in Emily in Paris and tik tok. Men and boys play video games and go on forechan. Men drink beer or whiskey and women drink wine or cocktails (although, the cocktail in question was also wine?).
And I really want to add spoilers because the last 10% of the book really made everything worse. There's a drastic personality shift for one character. Another one (or three) felt completely unnecessary when all was said and done. And so many of these problems felt like they were introduced by the author simply to throw the reader off of the scent of the twists he wanted at the end.

If you took the mystery out and didn't try to have a big reveal at the end, I think this book would improve. Or make the mystery where the treasure is and have an adventure with our characters finding out info through journals and digging and everything else. The twist didn't add anything to this book.

Those Beyond the Wall by Micaiah Johnson

4.75

This book picks up 10 or so years after the end of The Space Between Worlds. (I don't know where I heard this was more of a companion or a prequel, but that's wrong. It's definitely a sequel. You could definitely read it without having read the first and it would work as a standalone, but you'll get a lot more out of it reading in order.)
We follow Mr. Scales, a runner under the brutal leader of Ashtown NikNik. She's loyal, but she also has a secret - one only she and NikNik know. And she's present when one of her close friends dies gruesomely with seeming no cause at the exact same time as several people within the walls of Wiley City. She and the other runners must find the cause and then the solution, no matter how distasteful it may be.
This book puts you in the place of the villains from the previous novel and forces you to find sympathy for them. I never fully agreed with their methods or Scales's justifications, but I found myself grappling with questions of whether ends justify means way more than I expected. It's a book about community - healing and rehabilitation being most prominent among them. It's about trauma. And, continuing on from the last book, it's about privilege and how those who have been denied it may not be able to respond peacefully.
This book is much angrier than the last one. Johnson has a wonderful forward explaining how she wrote it at the height of protests over racial injustices and the value anger can have. It took me a while as I was reading to settle into that anger and embrace it, but Scales is an incredible character to follow. It was really illuminating to see this world through her eyes because she sees things very differently from Cara.

Man Made Monsters by Andrea L. Rogers

informative slow-paced

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

3.25

This has the same problem as many short story collections, which is to say some of the stories are great and some are not so great. I liked the stories at the beginning that leaned more fantasy more than the sci-fi ones toward the end, but they were a mixed bag throughout.
The added challenge in this collection is that the stories are meant to be interconnected and tell a complete saga of a family through the generations, and it fails to meet that challenge. There's not quite enough of a through-line outside of the biological one and a thin theme about injustice. Some stories actively contradict previous ones in a way that left me very confused as to what was real and what wasn't for a very long time.
Overall, I applaud the ambition of this book, but it just didn't quite land for me.

Lute by Jennifer Marie Thorne
Did not finish book. Stopped at 46%.

There is nothing wrong with this book, but my reading mood shifted away from spooky things, and therefore my interest plummeted. Honestly though, I wasn't super hooked even before that. The main character spending half the book cryptically thinking about "The Day" even though she clearly knows the superstitions and therefore the reader could too was getting on my nerves. A little sad to put it down just as things were kicking off, but it took too long to get here.

Nestlings by Nat Cassidy

dark tense slow-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? Yes

4.5

Nestlings follows a young couple who have had a very hard year - Anna is partially paralyzed after a difficult childbirth, and Reid's mother has died. But maybe their luck is turning as they get picked for an apartment lottery and are able to move into a beautiful luxury apartment in Manhattan. Before long, however, things start to feel off and their baby, Charlie, is acting different.

This was a rollercoaster of a book. I loved the first half immensely, but after that my feelings slowly dissipated until by then end I still liked it, but I had a lot more mixed feelings about it.
There was just So Much going on in this book. I almost think I would have preferred it as a novella and kept more focused. There are so many different horror elements, and so many side diversions, and so many different themes. But despite all that, it doesn't feel scattered or messy. Everything makes sense in the context and adds to the overall picture in an incredible way.
And then I read the afterword. While I subscribe rather heavily to death of the author, I feel like the words of the author included intentionally in the first printing of a book should probably be taken into account. And what Cassidy said in his note really reframed that too much-ness I felt about the book. It definitely would not have made me like the book if I wasn't already feeling positive, but it took my mixed yet good thoughts and coalesced them into a more concrete "this is great!" 

A Little Less Broken: How an Autism Diagnosis Finally Made Me Whole by Marian Schembari

inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.0

This book did what I like memoirs to do. This is focused mostly on Schambari reflecting on her life and the way so much makes more sense in light of her autism diagnosis. But she also incorporates a lot of research, and the balance between the two was perfect. There's a light of humor in the book, and also a lot of emotion. I would highly recommend this book.

My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante
Did not finish book. Stopped at 8%.

I've barely started this book, not even an hour into the audio. But I just was completely incapable of absorbing the story. I tried a couple times, but each time it was like when a friend is telling you a story and like 5 minutes later you realize you haven't heard a word they've said. This is definitely a me problem; I clearly just don't have the mind space for it at this time. I do want to try again later, but for now I have to put it down.