Library Book Haul!

Hello, friends! I’m back with another library book haul. These are some of my favorite blog posts to write. I do have quite a few books so I can’t describe them all on here. I included the link to their Goodreads and their genre. I am very excited about all of these, but I don’t have enough time in the world to read all of them.

From Scratch: A Memoir of Love, Sicily, and Finding Home by Tembi Locke – Nonfiction | Memoir

The Overdue Life of Amy Byler by Kelly Harms – Contemporary Romance

A Woman is no Man by Etaf Rum – Contemporary | Historical Fiction

Transcription by Kate Atkinson – Historical Fiction

Recursion by Blake Crouch – Science Fiction

The Weight of Ink by Rachel Kadish – Historical Fiction

Henry, Himself by Stewart O’nan – Contemporary Fiction | Literary Fiction

Inspection by Josh Malerman – Thriller | Horror

Kill Creek by Scott Thomas – Horror

The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion – Contemporary Romance

The Rosie Effect by Graeme Simison – Contemporary Romance

The Dead Girl in 2A by Carter Wilson – Psychological Thriller

Trophy Life by Lea Geller – Women’s Fiction

The Wife Between Us by Sarah Pekkanen and Greer Hendricks – Thriller

Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan – Contemporary Romance

Honestly, We Meant Well by Grant Ginder – Contemporary Fiction

The Things We Cannot Say by Kelly Rimmer – Historical Fiction

Miracle Creek by Angie Kim – Contemporary | Mystery

Waiting for Tom Hanks by Kerry Winfrey – Contemporary Romance

Josh and Hazel’s Guide to Not Dating by Christina Lauren – Contemporary Romance

In Another Time by Jillian Cantor – Historical Fiction

The Night Tiger by Yangsze Choo – Historical Fiction | Magical Realism

The Bookshop of the Broken Hearted by Robert Hillman – Historical Fiction

Killman Creek (Stillhouse Lake #2) by Rachel Caine – Mystery | Thriller

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong – Literary Fiction

The Printed Letter Bookshop by Katherine Reay – Contemporary | Christian Fiction

The Red Daughter by John Burnham Schwartz – Historical Fiction

Stillhouse Lake (Stillhouse Lake #1) by Rachel Caine – Mystery | Thriller

Wolfhunter River (Stillhouse Lake #3) by Rachel Caine – Mystery | Thriller

Woman 99 by Greer Macallister – Historical Fiction

Meet Cute by Helena Hunting – Contemporary Romance

My Life as a Rat by Joyce Carol Oates – Contemporary | Literary Fiction

We went to the Woods by Caite Dolan-Leach – Contemporary Fiction

My Lovely Wife by Samantha Downing – Thriller | Mystery

Maybe Someday by Colleen Hoover – New Adult | Contemporary Romance

Paper Girls (Vol. 2) by Brian K. Vaughan – Science Fiction (graphic novel)

Roomies by Christina Lauren – New Adult | Contemporary Romance

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ROMANCEATHON TBR! (6/17-6/23)

Hello, everyone!

This is a new readathon hosted by BookTubers: gabbyreads and We Be Book’N

Dates: June 17-June 23

I have recently entered the world of romance novels, and I cannot be stopped. I read Birthday Girl by Penelope Douglas, and I was hooked. I would love to support these two by participating in the readathon. I encourage all of you to participate as well! If you want recommendations or any other details, go check out their channels!

Challenges:

Read a forbidden romance novel.

Read a new adult romance novel.

Read a romance novel with pink on the cover.

Read a 2019 release.

Read a romance novel with a man on the cover. (It can be pictures of abs. It doesn’t matter.)

Read an LGBTQ+ romance novel.

Read 7 books.

What I Plan to Read:

Forbidden Romance:

Fallen Too Far (Rosemary Beach #1) by Abbi Glines

New Adult Romance:

Maybe Someday by Colleen Hoover

Pink on the Cover:

Josh and Hazel’s Guide to Not Dating by Christina Lauren

2019 Romance Release:

Meet Cute by Helena Hunting

Man on the Cover:

Beautiful Bastard (Beautiful Bastard #1) by Christina Lauren

LGBTQ+ Romance:

When Katie Met Cassidy by Camille Perri

Seven Books:

Roomies by Christina Lauren 

or

All Your Perfects by Colleen Hoover 

This TBR will probably change as the week goes on. I may not end up enjoying one of these. I will have a wrap up after the readathon is over, so keep a look out for that if you’re interested. I think it’s going to be tons of fun. Definitely go check out the videos I linked to both of their channels!

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Book Review: The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren

The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren

Publication Date: May 14, 2019 by Gallery Books

ISBN: 9781501128035

432 pages

Genre: Contemporary Romance

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Amazon | B&N | Goodreads

Thank you to Gallery Books and Netgalley for allowing me to read this in exchange for an honest review.

Olive is always unlucky: in her career, in love, in…well, everything. Her identical twin sister Amy, on the other hand, is probably the luckiest person in the world. Her meet-cute with her fiancé is something out of a romantic comedy (gag) and she’s managed to finance her entire wedding by winning a series of Internet contests (double gag). Worst of all, she’s forcing Olive to spend the day with her sworn enemy, Ethan, who just happens to be the best man.

Olive braces herself to get through 24 hours of wedding hell before she can return to her comfortable, unlucky life. But when the entire wedding party gets food poisoning from eating bad shellfish, the only people who aren’t affected are Olive and Ethan. And now there’s an all-expenses-paid honeymoon in Hawaii up for grabs.

Putting their mutual hatred aside for the sake of a free vacation, Olive and Ethan head for paradise, determined to avoid each other at all costs. But when Olive runs into her future boss, the little white lie she tells him is suddenly at risk to become a whole lot bigger. She and Ethan now have to pretend to be loving newlyweds, and her luck seems worse than ever. But the weird thing is that she doesn’t mind playing pretend. In fact, she feels kind of… lucky.

I cannot and will not stop reading romance for as long as I live. It has quickly become one of my favorite genres to read. It’s hard for me to pick up anything else. When I got accepted to read this on Netgalley I almost cried. I have been seeing so many rave reviews, and it had such good ratings. I downloaded it and read it immediately!

Olive and Ethan are obviously in a hate to love relationship. They bond over their free fake honeymoon that Olive’s sister, Ami, was supposed to take with her new husband, Dane *barf.* I’m so happy that this exists. It’s a book that I would read whether I was into romance novels or not. The synopsis is just perfect.

I honestly relate to Olive in the sense that we have the worst luck. It’s not enough to ruin your life, but it’s enough to make you go crazy. This book entered my life at the perfect time. It gave me a fictional character to connect with. I thought that the job she wanted was actually quite interesting, but not worth it when your boss is a total jerk. I felt bad for her toward the end of the book.

Ethan is almost my fictional true love, but Aragorn from The Lord of the Rings pushes him into second place. Pike from Birthday Girl by Penelope Douglas is my third true love. Anyway, Ethan is just a trooper, but also very annoying sometimes. I don’t want to spoil, but he believes his dumb brother about something specific, and I wanted to SCREAM the entire time. He does help Olive along the way, and she helps him. He does hurt her a couple of times, but he makes up for it. I feel like his character could have gone two different ways, and I am happy with how they developed him.

The writing of this novel was pretty good. It was actually quite basic, but I thought it was really witty. I actually laughed out loud quite a few times. It takes a lot to get me to feel actual physical emotion while reading a novel. I tried hard not to show it while I was in the break room at work. The moral of the story is: DON’T LIE. It’s just not worth it. Thank you, and goodnight.

My only gripe is that is probably too long for what it is. There is some unnecessary drama that was supposed to keep the story going. It felt like they could have went about it a different way. I still really enjoyed it though, and it’s definitely a page turner.

I highly recommend it, and I will definitely buy it when it comes out. The cover is beautiful.

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Book Review: One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid *Minor Spoilers*

One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Published: June 7th, 2016 by Washington Square Press

ISBN: 9781476776903 (Paperback)

Genre: Contemporary Romance

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Amazon | B&N| Goodreads

Emma Blair, a simple girl who’s parents own their own bookstore, marries her high school sweetheart, Jesse, in her twenties. They end up traveling the world together, but it all comes to a halt when she notices the kind of life her sister, Marie, lives. On their first wedding anniversary, Jesse takes a trip in a helicopter that ends up disappearing somewhere over the Pacific.

Emma quits her job and moves back home, taking over the bookstore. While she’s back, Emma runs into an old friend, Sam, at a music store. Sparks ignite, and they end up getting engaged. Emma feels like everything is starting to fall into place. That is until she receives a call from Jesse, and now she’s stuck between a rock and a hard place. Now she has to figure out who she really loves.

I have now read two books, and a novella by Taylor Jenkins Reid. This is probably my least favorite of the three, but it was still an entertaining book. I gave it four stars for goodness sake. I don’t read romance, and I think that is why I didn’t enjoy it as much. I will say that TJR’s writing has improved since this novel.

This book had me turning pages, and I finished over half the book in one sitting. It just roped me in from the beginning. The story is definitely intriguing. The issue for me was the characters. The only person I enjoyed was Sam. He was Emma’s friend from high school that she ended up being engaged to. I just felt that he had the most raw emotion out of all of them. He genuinely cared for Emma in high school, her twenties, and her thirties. He accepted her for her. I understand why he was upset about how Emma pretty much led both of them on after Jesse returned.

Emma made me so upset throughout the entire story, but I was satisfied with her choice in the end. I’m glad she wasn’t a total ditz.

Jesse is probably one of my most hated fictional human beings. He only wanted Emma for certain reasons. He didn’t love her for who she became in her thirties. He wanted to think that she would eventually go back to who she was. I just wanted to slap him every time he appeared in the story.

One little detail that made me happy was that her parents owned a book store. Obviously, I love books with my whole heart, and details like that make me giddy. Stepping into a book store is one of the best feelings in the world. It’s comforting, and relaxing. I loved that even after Emma’s parents let Emma run the store, they still wanted to come in a see customers that they have interacted with for years. If I ever ran a bookstore I would do the same thing. Connecting with another person is a wonderful feeling. I’m glad TJR could provide all of this in a three hundred page novel. It’s little, but it makes a worlds difference.

Some other tender side notes is that Emma’s nieces were deaf. I hardly read anything that involves that. Emma’s friend, Olive, is bisexual, and I think TJR handled it well.  The book didn’t focus on either of these details, but as a reader I didn’t feel left out. I thought that it was there without being a big deal, and I loved that.

I will, no doubt, end up reading all of TJR’s books. I will enjoy more than others, but that won’t stop her from being one of my favorite authors. She is a beautiful writer, and the characters are always so flawed. It helps readers relate to them better. I recommend this novel, because it is extremely fun to read. If you are interested, go ahead and give this a go!

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