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rinnykitty's reviews
5 reviews
Happy & You Know It by Laura Hankin
dark
emotional
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
This is book I definitely read at the wrong time, but ultimately I loved reading it. I'm a big fan of "rich people drama", not sure why but its my cup of tea. I'm a sucker for petty drama and gossip, I'm reality TV watching trash so that may be why. I loved the characters, the interaction between them, their flaws and background. This book is centered around a mom group, one that honestly I would love to be friends with. They stood up for each other when necessary, and there was a lot of laughs in this book despite dark subject matter.
Loved it all.. up until the big reveal. This is why I said I probably read it at the wrong time.I just recently started ADHD medication after 8 years fighting for my diagnosis to be treated, being told by countless doctors that adderall isn't much else than a "addictive party drug". Anyway, even though I'm the best I've ever felt, not the best time to be slapped with a reveal that paints an ADHD man and her sister as the villains with their "evil speed pills".
Gwen's brother Teddy develops an ADHD medicine met to be a "cure", but after that plan tanks Gwen decides to use it for nefarious purposes, disguising it as a vitamin. I honestly feel like it would've went better differently.. I dont know, maybe it's just me but ADHD meds get enough villainization, even though the bigger part is the problem of secretly drugging moms. Maybe it could've I dont know.. just not be a medication that's helpful but gets an annoying amount of negative criticism. Like cocaine? Meth? Something?
Also, wanted to mention the fact Vicki wasn't really affected by it. I was thinking it was because she might've not been neurotypical (thus not getting the "manic" effect), but it was never explained. That's just my thought on it.
Anyway, I know it's stupid to take off 1.25 stars only because I *happened* to read it at a bad time and probably would think differently if I read it a year from now (which is why it's only one star and two, because I'm just being a little whiny bitch baby right now), but eh, it is what it is. I'm also the type of person who's really generous with my star ratings since anything I enjoy deserves a lot of praise in my opinion.
Do I suggest this book? Yes, all in all it was a fun page turner.
Loved it all.. up until the big reveal. This is why I said I probably read it at the wrong time.
Gwen's brother Teddy develops an ADHD medicine met to be a "cure", but after that plan tanks Gwen decides to use it for nefarious purposes, disguising it as a vitamin. I honestly feel like it would've went better differently.. I dont know, maybe it's just me but ADHD meds get enough villainization, even though the bigger part is the problem of secretly drugging moms. Maybe it could've I dont know.. just not be a medication that's helpful but gets an annoying amount of negative criticism. Like cocaine? Meth? Something?
Also, wanted to mention the fact Vicki wasn't really affected by it. I was thinking it was because she might've not been neurotypical (thus not getting the "manic" effect), but it was never explained. That's just my thought on it.
Anyway, I know it's stupid to take off 1.25 stars only because I *happened* to read it at a bad time and probably would think differently if I read it a year from now (which is why it's only one star and two, because I'm just being a little whiny bitch baby right now), but eh, it is what it is. I'm also the type of person who's really generous with my star ratings since anything I enjoy deserves a lot of praise in my opinion.
Do I suggest this book? Yes, all in all it was a fun page turner.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Infidelity and Sexual content
Moderate: Addiction, Toxic relationship, Mental illness, Drug use, Vomit, and Alcoholism
Minor: Excrement, Abortion, and Car accident
This book is not in first person but each chapter switches the character it focuses upon, going into background info and their daily life. Some of their childhoods contain moderate dark subject matter. As well as their relationship with their husbands. Some are in good marriages, others can be described as "toxic" in my opinion.
The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
after finishing Reincarnation Blues by Michael Poore, I had a bit of an existential crisis and realized all the lives I wont have. I started to think, how cool would it be if when we die, we get to pick a point of our lives where we made a decision and make a different one. So not reincarnation, yet our life flashing beyond our eyes in different ways. Or something.
And then I stumbled upon this book. I think my already existential thinking somewhat influences my rating of this book. It was exactly what I was thinking, awesome! Except whenever she chooses another decision, instead of starting from when that decision is chosen, it starts from what age she is in between life and death. Which makes if very awkward as she's in a life she knows nothing about, so a lot of time is wasted on her figuring out what the hell is going on.
Also, it started throwing quantum physics and string theory in there, and even though it wasn't that heavy or complicated, it still completely flew over my head. I had to just skip whole paragraphs that my stupid little brain couldn't comprehend. But dont worry, I saw that comment of "brains just try to simplify things that we see, making humans dumber", which yes I'm aware I'm a dumb bitch. And yes this book was a bit preachy with the philosophy and all that ar some points.
BUT. The ending made up for it. As someone who's afraid I'll grow up to be not only a dumb bitch but a boring bitch, the message was I gotta say, uplifting.
This book isn't only about Nora trying to correct her regrets, but also her journey on realizing she doesn't want to die. Even though this book could be complicated, boring, preachy.. above all that it also told the journey of realizing life is worth living wonderfully. It feels like a lot packed into less than 300 pages, I know.
And then I stumbled upon this book. I think my already existential thinking somewhat influences my rating of this book. It was exactly what I was thinking, awesome! Except whenever she chooses another decision, instead of starting from when that decision is chosen, it starts from what age she is in between life and death. Which makes if very awkward as she's in a life she knows nothing about, so a lot of time is wasted on her figuring out what the hell is going on.
Also, it started throwing quantum physics and string theory in there, and even though it wasn't that heavy or complicated, it still completely flew over my head. I had to just skip whole paragraphs that my stupid little brain couldn't comprehend. But dont worry, I saw that comment of "brains just try to simplify things that we see, making humans dumber", which yes I'm aware I'm a dumb bitch. And yes this book was a bit preachy with the philosophy and all that ar some points.
BUT. The ending made up for it. As someone who's afraid I'll grow up to be not only a dumb bitch but a boring bitch, the message was I gotta say, uplifting.
This book isn't only about Nora trying to correct her regrets, but also her journey on realizing she doesn't want to die. Even though this book could be complicated, boring, preachy.. above all that it also told the journey of realizing life is worth living wonderfully. It feels like a lot packed into less than 300 pages, I know.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, and Death of parent
Moderate: Animal death, Cancer, Grief, and Alcoholism
Minor: Car accident
The Chicken Sisters by K.J. Dell'Antonia
emotional
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
As someone who has mostly been watching Food Network for the past month and have a guilty pleasure of watching reality TV, this book was right up my alley.
This book was so goddamn wordy I found myself skimming a lot of paragraphs. I felt like it was going so slow and not going slow at the same time. I've seen reviews complaining of the miscommunication, but that's what makes good reality TV so I thought it was somewhat fitting. Despite my first complaint, I thought this was very well written. I felt Amanda's existential crisis of living in a small town only working at a chicken place every day for possibly the rest of your life, and I dont even live in a small town. This book also made me crave fried chicken, all I wanted while reading this was a big bucket of fried chicken. The drama was good enough to get me anxious thinking "oh no you messed up real bad this time, let's see how you solve this". The ending took a lighthearted turn which I enjoyed, but oh wait did I say the ending? I meant the last chapter. Because the publisher thought it'd be a good idea to take the epilogue out of the kindle version and put in a link to enter my email. I never got the email with the link to the epilogue. So I'm sitting here wondering what they ended up doing afterwords. I dont know, maybe never will, but damn I hope they all live happily ever after.
This book was so goddamn wordy I found myself skimming a lot of paragraphs. I felt like it was going so slow and not going slow at the same time. I've seen reviews complaining of the miscommunication, but that's what makes good reality TV so I thought it was somewhat fitting. Despite my first complaint, I thought this was very well written. I felt Amanda's existential crisis of living in a small town only working at a chicken place every day for possibly the rest of your life, and I dont even live in a small town. This book also made me crave fried chicken, all I wanted while reading this was a big bucket of fried chicken. The drama was good enough to get me anxious thinking "oh no you messed up real bad this time, let's see how you solve this". The ending took a lighthearted turn which I enjoyed, but oh wait did I say the ending? I meant the last chapter. Because the publisher thought it'd be a good idea to take the epilogue out of the kindle version and put in a link to enter my email. I never got the email with the link to the epilogue. So I'm sitting here wondering what they ended up doing afterwords. I dont know, maybe never will, but damn I hope they all live happily ever after.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Car accident, Miscarriage, Child death, Death, Chronic illness, and Death of parent
We Were Liars by E. Lockhart
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Since this is such a strong "go in blind book" that you shouldn't even know anything before reading the first page, time to spoiler tag my entire review.
first off, I really liked the writing style. I like quick reads and the fact there were less words per line made me finish this book in a day. It was easy for me to read, as well, even though some of the metaphors seemed more literal than figurative (I've seen other reviews wonder if Cady explaining her blood wrists were just a metaphor, and honestly, I dont know either).
Other than that, I actually found myself relating to the main character. I'm poor as fuck, never committed a crime, and dont have migraines - but I do have memory loss due to neurological issues that wiped most of my teenage memories completely and made my mother constantly worried about me. I understood when she said she didn't want to be pitied, and then Gat said well why the fuck you saying all this shit about your migraines then. Like, dude, just because she doesn't want to be pitied doesn't mean her migraines poof! become less of her life.
And same with the romance. Sadly I still remember some of my pathetic flings, how as a youngster you think the first love is real and forever and the best thing since Betty White. The romance was a damn mess but didn't we all make bad, cringey, makes us look back and think "oh no girl what are you doing" type relationship choices as teens.
And.. the twist. Goddamnit I picked it up right away.. when Cady realized no one was responding to her emails. Yeah the first thought should be "they're too rich to care about their email account", but with how absent they were my mind went straight to "they're dead aren't they. Oh no you better not". And they were. Even worse, why not throw them in as ghosts and badly explain the whole entire last part of the book. And the whole reveal be a fire. All died in a fire. And became ghosts. What a twist. Yaaaawn. When it comes to rich people drama, The Cousins by Karen McManus came out on top. That's the type of twist I was looking for, not something on the same level as "it was all just a dream!" (But instead, replace dream with ghosts).
Other than that, I actually found myself relating to the main character. I'm poor as fuck, never committed a crime, and dont have migraines - but I do have memory loss due to neurological issues that wiped most of my teenage memories completely and made my mother constantly worried about me. I understood when she said she didn't want to be pitied, and then Gat said well why the fuck you saying all this shit about your migraines then. Like, dude, just because she doesn't want to be pitied doesn't mean her migraines poof! become less of her life.
And same with the romance. Sadly I still remember some of my pathetic flings, how as a youngster you think the first love is real and forever and the best thing since Betty White. The romance was a damn mess but didn't we all make bad, cringey, makes us look back and think "oh no girl what are you doing" type relationship choices as teens.
And.. the twist. Goddamnit I picked it up right away.. when Cady realized no one was responding to her emails. Yeah the first thought should be "they're too rich to care about their email account", but with how absent they were my mind went straight to "they're dead aren't they. Oh no you better not". And they were. Even worse, why not throw them in as ghosts and badly explain the whole entire last part of the book. And the whole reveal be a fire. All died in a fire. And became ghosts. What a twist. Yaaaawn. When it comes to rich people drama, The Cousins by Karen McManus came out on top. That's the type of twist I was looking for, not something on the same level as "it was all just a dream!" (But instead, replace dream with ghosts).
Content Warnings
Graphic: Chronic illness, Animal death, Vomit, Suicidal thoughts, Medical trauma, Cursing, and Death
Moderate: Grief, Dementia, and Blood
Minor: Death of parent and Infidelity
We Set the Dark on Fire by Tehlor Kay Mejia
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.25
This book takes place on an island where every man of power gets two wives. And there's nothing we love to see more than the two wives of one of the most powerful men on the island fall in love and turn on him in the name of the revolution. If you're looking for a book about the weak and powerless fighting as hard as possible to stick it to the man, this book is worth checking out. It leaves on a giant cliffhanger, so it'll probably end up making anyone want to buy the second book right away. Also, I can not stop thinking about the part where La Voz puts on a performance while wearing masks and burns down the marketplace. As horrifying it must've been, it sounded beautiful as well.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Hate crime and Police brutality
Moderate: Gun violence, Death, and Toxic relationship
Minor: Car accident and Medical trauma
This book is heavily centered on the military/police/authority power of the island. There is mention of death, guns, injuries, and a car accident. Also, the practice of buying wives and marrying strangers is in of itself what I consider a toxic relationship.
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