shelleys_book_nook's reviews
449 reviews

Five Days by Zoe Folbigg

adventurous emotional hopeful reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

Based on other reviews and the rating I liked this book a lot more than I thought I would. The premise is amazing and was executed beautifully. It was so refreshing to read a romance where it is a slow burn and they're friends first. Yes, they got kinda googly-eyed over each other very early BUT they realized it and they were mature adults about it. Both of them knowing that recently coming off a breakup is not a good time to start a new relationship and fall instantly in love. One of the characters is actually seeing a therapist and I was so here for it. I loved how real and raw and true to life the plot was.

I adored the two main characters. I was cheering Millie and Jesse on, not just for them to get together romanticly but their lives in general. I felt invested in the outcome. They were both very relatable despite having famous parents. Jesse's secret was an unexpected twist in the best way possible, not in a creepy secret kind of way. It was more in the I don't want to hurt you kind of way.
The book has many locations, London, Paris, Provincial France and Los Angeles. I felt like I was there. One of my favourite scenes was when Millie went shopping in France.

If you're looking for a captivating romance that is so much more than a romance because it deals with not only love but life and family and broken hearts and all that other messy stuff...this is the book for you. This is my fifth book by the author and it's so nice to get a winner every time. I highly recommend The Three Loves of Sebastian Cooper.

Imaginary Strangers by Minka Kent

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense 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

4.5

I loved both The Stillwater Girls and When I Was You by this author so it was a no-brainer to request this on NetGalley and am I ever glad I did. This is a well-done psychological thriller. Not a lot happens but Minka Kent's writing style is easy to read and it sucked me in right away. The best part? She totally caught me by surprise and that doesn't happen very often.

Using a two-timeline format (or is it three?) we get Camille in the present raising her two kids in California with her adoring doctor husband. We also get Camille in the past (six years ago), when she lived in Chicago, via therapy sessions and in those sessions she speaks about her past, especially her childhood. This was a hard book to read at times because Camille did not have the best childhood. It was mega disturbing to me and I have a rough background myself.

This book was so intense with short punchy chapters. I held my breath without realizing it and flipped through the pages like a maniac. We readers know all about Camille's secrets as she takes us on a journey of trying to discover who is trying to reveal her past while protecting her family from the perpetrator, in a word...gripping. This one starts out with a bang and never lets up. The super fast pacing and wonderful writing were such a joy to read.

I took half a star off because some of the happenings at the end were a little too convenient for my liking, which is typical of thrillers nowadays. I did love the ambiguous ending though. This one is a part of a series and I didn't know that when I requested it, it happens. I am not a series reader but I cannot wait to see what happens with Camille next. 

The Very Long, Very Strange Life of Isaac Dahl by Bart Yates

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing sad tense fast-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? No

5.0

 The absurdity of my very long, very strange life hits me, too, and suddenly I’m laughing with him. What else can I do?

I loved this book and Isaac Dahl so much. The format Bart Yates used was wonderful. He wove real-life historical moments with Isaac’s fictional ones seamlessly. We get twelve chapters of important events in Isaac’s life, in eight-year increments, starting when Isaac was just eight years old in the 1920s.

The book’s historical sections are impeccably researched and what I loved the most about the book is the fact that even things that aren’t monumental to everyone made it into Isaac’s important chapters. Yes, there was war, unbelievable natural disasters and other phenomena but we also get the mundane, like when Isaac’s great-nephew goes through puberty one winter weekend at the beach.

The chapters are long and I usually don’t prefer that but it was needed in the case to clearly understand why that part of Isaac’s life was so important for him to share. Yates’ writing style was so absorbing that the twenty-page chapters just flew by. The book itself is fairly short at 240 pages and I was so into it I read it in a couple of sittings. The pages are filled with love, history, loss, adventure and adversity. This book was everything. All. The Stars. 

A Certain Kind of Starlight by Heather Webber

emotional slow-paced

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

2.0

This is my second book by this author and I tried to like her books but have realized she just isn't for me. I loved the premise but the execution fell flat and I found I had the same issues as I did with At the Coffee Shop of Curiosities , it is more chick-lit than magical realism. Too much Hallmark movie and not enough magic. This should have been right up my alley, a southern bakery location and a plot with a bit of magic. I found it to be more along the lines of a soap opera. I hate tropes with lack of communication and big secrets, it frustrates the hell out of me. Like just grow up, keep a secret if you promise to and get on with your life. You're a grown-ass woman stop saying you'll let it out by accident.

There are too many characters and we don't focus on just one or two long enough to get to know them. We meet everybody in the whole damn town and their brother. I just didn't click with any of the characters, even the two main ones. Everything was spread too thin and felt watered down. The entire thing bored me to tears. The pacing was just so damn slow and I know that's how they do things in the south but I dreaded picking this book up and it took me a long time to finish. The characters seemed two-dimensional, flat if you will. The ending felt very rushed and all too tidy for my liking.

I did appreciate that romance was not at the forefront of the plot and I loved how each chapter started with a baking hack and a bit of wisdom from Verbena. The recipes and discussions of making the cakes made me hungry and I swear I gained ten pounds just reading about them. If you like sickly sweet, heartwarming stories with a lot of characters, this book may be for you. 

The Story Collector by Evie Woods

adventurous challenging emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

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

4.5

This was such a magical read. It’s about a woman named Sara going on an impromptu trip to Ireland and she ends up healing herself from “the terrible thing”. The story takes place in two different timelines one is Sara in 2011 and she finds Anna’s diary written in 1911. Even though they’re a hundred years apart they have a lot in common and the two timelines flowed seamlessly.

As is usual with me and my preferences I liked the older timeline much more. I think part of the reason was because I didn’t like Sara. And even though she went through something awful I felt no sympathy for her. Anna on the other hand grabbed my heart. What a hard thing she went through, things were so very different back then, especially for women and the underclass. I enjoyed being on the adventure of learning about the faeries with Anna and Harold. I loved being in Ireland, back in the very early twentieth century, with these characters.

This would have been a five-star read for me but I didn’t like that Sara had a romance. The last thing Sara should be doing is getting into a new relationship. She’s an alcoholic and has just left her husband the day before she arrived in Ireland. Why couldn’t she have just found herself and become a strong woman who finally finds her passion? Why did romance have to be in the equation at all? Do we need a man to be happy and move forward?

All in all, I really enjoyed this read and could have read an entire book on Anna and Harold alone. I have The Lost Bookshop by this author on my TBR, I’ll have to bump it up the list. 

The Summer of Yes by Courtney Walsh

adventurous 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

This book was slow to start, it felt like nothing really happened in the first 45% of it. And even when it did get interesting it became very repetitive. I was hoping for an adventure of two women with lots of regrets and what I got was two women who have unrealistic romances. It was too sickly sweet and cheesy for my tastes and I wish the romantic relationships were built up to a little more… They felt very rushed.

Our main characters are at a crossroads in their lives. Kelsey was hit by a car and Georgina is very ill. I did like that Kelsey learned to love herself and got some confidence in her abilities along the way. She takes a chance on herself and learns to have some fun. Georgina also learns to have some fun but also to let love in because she deserves it. Both women are pretty work-orientated and realize they must put themselves and their friends and family first.

The romance parts felt very shallow to me, it was insta love in one case and one hundred percent forgive and forget in another. I found both really hard to believe. Maybe I am a cynic? The whole plot is very predictable and the health issues didn’t fly with me. I have been hit by a car and more than seven years later I am still suffering the effects of it. The ladies met in the hospital and Georgia’s outcome was just too convenient. There weren’t enough troubles or issues or drama for me. The whole thing was just saccharine and it gave me a toothache.

I did like that we get both character’s points of view in differing chapters. They are two women who have a lot in common despite being decades apart in age. I didn’t like how much Kelsey butted into Georiga’s life uninvited. She was really naive but smarmy at the same time. She is a complete stranger to this family and doing what she did was not okay no matter how you look at it.

A lot of people have loved this book and this author. I don’t think she is for me. I like happy ever afters as much as the next person but I like things to happen along the way to getting there. 

The Night the River Wept by Lo Patrick

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.0

I am an outlier once again but this time on the positive side, I enjoyed this book. I loved Lo Patrick’s first book The Floating Girls so when I saw this on NEtgally I jumped at the chance to read it and am I ever glad I did. I love Southern fiction, especially the historical variety. This one takes place in the very early oughts (historical?) but the case being looked at happened in 1983. Most of the timeline is from twenty years ago, but we get journal entries, investigation details, and discussions about what happened back then.

I found the main character, Arlene, a little annoying. She was very immature at times and her thoughts seemed to ramble. The entire book is from her perspective and there is a lot of internal dialogue. I liked this because I felt like I got to know Arlene a little better. The unsolved case gives her something to do while she mourns a lost pregnancy and deals with her husband’s alcoholism.

The crime itself evoked a lot of feelings in me, the death of children is hard on the psyche. Lo Patrick writes beautiful engaging stories and she makes the setting an atmospheric part of it all, whether it be tensions between characters or the temperature I felt like I was there. I was so disturbed by how different people are treated from the other side of the tracks and so was Alrlene. If you’re looking for a haunting mystery, look no further. 

The World After Alice by Lauren Aliza Green

challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.0

Alice took her own life twelve years ago. Her best friend and brother are now to be wed, they have been secretly dating and got engaged without their parents' knowledge and spring it on them at the last minute. The story takes place over a weekend and we also have flashbacks to the "before" leading up to the event where Alice tasks her own life.

Alice is a main character of this story, even though she is dead and not physically represented, because she is in the other characters' consciences throughout. This is a very character-driven story and they are written wonderfully, flaws and all. I could look past all their faults because of what they went through.

The writing of this tale is very dry so I can understand the low ratings BUT I also found the writing to be very engaging. I was intrigued right away, I wanted to see how all this would play out, and because of that, I liked this a lot more than most reviewers.

This is such a sad story and how Alice's death affected everyone in her inner circle and continues to do so. There are a lot of secrets and grudges held because of past hurts. These characters are going through pain, loss, grief and guilt. These feelings were almost characters as well. Everyone is trying to look and get past these feelings to go forward with a celebration. This was such a great debut and I have always loved a good family drama as long as it isn't my own family. 

The Love of My Afterlife by Kirsty Greenwood

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted mysterious reflective relaxing sad tense fast-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? It's complicated

5.0

This is my first book by Kirsty Greenwood and it won’t be my last. I loved it all, from the unique premise to the wonderful all-the-feels ending this book was chef’s kiss.🤌 The author uses her love of books (especially of the romance variety) throughout the story and I loved that. All the name and title-dropping had me smiling and thinking “I know that one!”.

I love quirky characters and Delphie is definitely quirky. I had a hard time figuring her out, is she a wimp? Is she a strong woman for what she went through and then does to help herself? Either way, I liked her, she was a wonderful main character. She was hard to like at first because I thought she was wallowing in self-pity, but then I started to get where she was coming from. I saw so much growth from her through the book and she grew on me. I loved how she and Cooper worked together to help each other out despite not being on the best of terms. Delphie grows up and opens up, she stops being scared and it opens up a whole new world for her.

The side character Mr. Yoon was also one of my favourites, and Delphie’s relationship with him really touched my heart. In fact, all of the side characters are pretty amazing and Delphie learns about herself through them and she realizes life is worth living fully and one shouldn’t let past hurts get in the way of a happy ending.

Greenwood mixes genres expertly and that’s not an easy task and to please this reader isn’t easy either but she did it. We have science fiction, magical realism, a touch of the paranormal and of course romance. There was just so much to love about this one. I look forward to what the author has coming next and checking out her backlog. All. The. Stars. 

Storm Warning by David Bell

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? It's complicated

0.25

This is my first book by David Bell and also my last, as you can probably surmise I was not thrilled with this one. Jake is driving from Florida back to his estranged wife and daughter in Ohio. Jake's estranged wife and daughter are driving to Florida from Ohio to see him. So this is a family of people who drive a thousand miles without telling the person they're visiting. That was the first thing I shook my head at, who does that!? And what are the chances that they both decide to do that on the same day no less I mean really?

There's been a murder and Jake reports it to the police but no officers come, like none at all ever. That's the second thing I shook my head at. I know there's a storm and all but we're talking about a dead body with a hole in the head that wasn't put there by an accident. That's the second thing I shook my head at. There is a category three hurricane and no one leaves the building? The police don't evacuate and make people take shelter? Way too far-fetched. 

Every character in this story made stupid mistakes repeatedly. Gawd I really hate it when I read a book and I feel like the author thinks his readers are too dumb to catch on to his mistakes. Well guess what...your book is really dumb. The ending was really terrible too, I felt ripped off. I read three hundred pages for that? Let's go skip off into the sunset all hunky dory. Truthfully by that point, I didn't care. I wish I could give negative stars.