Tag: fiction

What I Read in May (2025)

Books Read in  May: 21
Books Read for the Year:  107/225
Topical Books/Monthly Goal Books:

The Winter Sea, by Susanna Kearsley (TBR): This was such a good read!
The Art of Starting Over, by Heidi McLaughlin (TBR): This was an okay read, but felt very predictable.
River Road, by Charles Martin (TBR): Really enjoyed these essays!
Magic in the Shadows, by Devon Monk (re-read): Loving re-reading this series. I forgot about Stone.
The Opposite of Everyone, by Joshilyn Jackson (TBR, audio): I love Jackson’s books, but Paula was not a nice or good person. I didn’t care for her.
Closer than You Know, by Debra Webb. Solid thriller read. I’m liking this series.
For Review:

Bodies and Battlements, by Elizabeth Penney. That was a decent cozy mystery read, but the characters felt very surface level and undeveloped. It is the first in a series, so I assume that would change in further books.

Come As You Are, by Dahlia Adler. This was a cute, fun YA read. Nothing totally unexpected, but I enjoyed the read and the characters.

The Courage to Change, by Joyce Meyer.  Joyce Meyer is a solid author–and speaker–so I knew this would be a good read. And it did not disappoint!

The Other Side of Now, by Paige Harbison. This wasn’t quite what I expected, but I enjoyed the read! I liked the characters, and the juxtaposition between the two realities was interesting.

A Forgery of Fate, by Elizabeth Lim. I really enjoyed this read! Unique setting, and I love the worldbuilding and setting so much.

Tell Me Something Good, by Court Stevens. I listened to the audiobook, and I think maybe this just wasn’t a good fit for me, storywise. I didn’t like the characters and found them all pretty horrible. The narrator was excellent, I just didn’t like these people.

The Listeners, by Maggie Stiefvater. I’m a pretty big fan of Stiefvater’s YA books, and I was excited to read this. It wasn’t quite what I expected, but I enjoyed it all the same.

A First Time for Everything, by K. L. Walther. This was a solid YA read. I enjoyed it for the most part.

The Summer That Changed Everything, by Brenda Novak. This was a meh read. I found it bland and predictable.

A Far Better Thing, by H. G. Parry. This was a fantasy re-telling of A Tale of Two Cities. It felt very leisurely and I didn’t really care for the MC, but it was a solid read.

Rewind to Us, by Molly Morris. This was such a cute read! I loved the characters—all of them—and the premise was great.

The Ex-Girlfriend Murder Club, by Gloria Chao. This was such a comedy of errors! Very funny, with a nice twist.

Best of All Worlds, by Kenneth Oppel. This was mediocre at best. The author’s political/personal bias was glaringly on display…most white people are apparently evil in his mind, not to mention narrow-minded, backwards, and prone to conspiracy theories.

Look Before You Leap, by Virginia Heath. This was a cute romance read. I liked the female a lot.

A Magic Deep and Drowning, by Hester Fox. I enjoyed the beginning of this, but then it felt like it dragged and nothing made sense.

Left Unfinished:

Sing Me Home to Carolina, by Joy Calloway. The MC got on every nerve I had, and all the characters seemed like flimsy caricatures.

We Can Never Leave, by H.E. Edgmon. These characters seemed like very hateful and unpleasant people, and I stopped reading very quickly because of it.

A Most Puzzling Murder, by Bianca Marais. There was A LOT going on here and it did not mesh into a cohesive storyline.

Writing Mr. Right, by Alina Khawaja. I tried. I read about 35% of this before giving up. Aashiq was too…honestly, he felt a little too ridiculous to be real, and Ziya was so closed off to everyone and everything that she got on my nerves. Strong writing, but this just wasn’t a good fit for me.

The Ripple Effect, by Maggie North. This MC wasn’t for me.

Off Menu, by Amy Rosen. The cover on this is gorgeous, and it sounded great. Unfortunately, the MC is vapid and lacking in morals, so it’s a no for me.

Book Review: Come As You Are, by Dahlia Adler

Image belongs to St. Martin’s Press.

Title: Come As You Are  
Author: Dahlia Adler          
Genre: YA
Rating: 4 out of 5 

Hot on the heels of a broken heart, Everett “Evie” Riley arrives at Camden Academy ready for a new beginning – one far away from her cheating ex-boyfriend, the sister who stole him, and the best friend who let it happen. But her fresh start is stopped in its tracks when she’s accidentally placed in an all-boys dorm, with no choice but to stay.

When rumors and gossip about Evie’s housing predicament spread like wildfire, she decides the only way to survive is to lean into her questionable new reputation… but she’s definitely going to require help. Her grumpy emo dorm mate Salem Grayson isn’t exactly her first choice, but he does need her help to repair his relationship with his parents every bit as much as she needs his to learn how to be cool. And so they make a pact – he’ll teach her how to be bad, if she teaches him how to be good.

It’s a flawless plan, except while Salem thrives academically, even romantically, and – annoyingly enough – even physically, Evie’s quest feels like one dead end after another, and the girl she’s becoming certainly doesn’t feel remotely cool. But when Evie realizes what she wants more than anything, she’ll have to contend with her thrice-broken heart and figure out how to become someone capable of chasing happiness.

I thought this was a cute read! I liked Evie and Salem a lot, and even the secondary characters were fun (except Archie and Lucas). There were surprisingly-few Mean Girls moments which I liked. Some of the diversity bits felt shoehorned in there, not like they belonged in the story, but for the most part, this was a solid read with some really funny moments and a lot of character growth.

Dahlia Adler lives in New York. Come As You Are is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.)

Book Review: Bodies and Battlements, by Elizabeth Penney

Image belongs to St. Martin’s Press.

Title: Bodies and Battlements  
Author: Elizabeth Penney        
Genre: Mystery/thriller    
Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Herbalist Nora Asquith is delighted to welcome Ravensea Castle’s first guests to the picturesque village of Monkwell, Yorkshire. After a thousand years of ownership, her family has decided to convert the castle into a bed and breakfast. But when Hilda Dibble, a self-appointed local luminary, is found dead in the knot garden the next morning, Nora’s business is not only at risk—she’s a prime suspect.

Hilda had opposed the hotel plan every step of the way, and although she didn’t succeed in stopping the venture, her disagreements with Nora seem to only further her motive. One of Ravensea’s guests happens to be Detective Inspector Finlay Cole, who is new to the area and now finds himself with a murder case in his lap.

Nora and her actress sister Tamsyn decide to investigate for themselves. They look into the entangled dealings of their newly arrived guests, while also getting hints from Sir Percival, one of the castle ghosts. As they learn, Sir Percival’s tragic death centuries ago sheds light on present-day crimes. Surely they can get to the bottom of this mystery while keeping their new business afloat . . .

This was a decent cozy mystery read, but nothing standout enough to keep me highly invested in continuing the series, if that makes sense. I didn’t feel like the characters were well-developed enough to carry a series, but that should grow with time. Like the each had one quirk that made them interesting, but were otherwise bland. So, a decent read, but not a great read.

Elizabeth Penney grew up in Maine. Bodies and Battlements is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.)

Book Review: Our Last Wild Days, by Anna Bailey

Image belongs to Atria Books.

Title: Our Last Wild Days
Author: Anna Bailey
Genre: Mystery/thriller   
Rating: 4 out of 5

 The Labasques aren’t like other families.

Living in a shack out in the swamps, they made do by hunting down alligators and other animals. To the good people of Jacknife, Louisiana, they are troublemakers and outcasts, the kind of people you wouldn’t want in your community.

So, when Cutter Labasque is found face down in the muddy swamp, no one seems to care, not even her two brothers. The only person who questions the official verdict of suicide is Cutter’s childhood friend, Loyal May, who has just returned home to care for her mother. When she left town at eighteen years old, she betrayed Cutter. Now with a ragtag group from the local paper where she works, Loyal goes in search of answers, uncovering a web of deceit and corruption that implicates those in town. It may be too late to apologize to Cutter, but Loyal has restitution in mind.

I didn’t like any of these characters except maybe Sasha—and what was up with the staples in his hair? Excellent setting description and worldbuilding here…enough that the small town feel almost made me nauseous. Seriously. A place this tiny and run down is a no for me. I don’t really feel like there was any resolution with the whistling/masks in the woods or the dirty cops, so the ending felt a bit unresolved to me, and Loyal wasn’t likable enough for me to get truly invested in this story.

Anna Bailey is the author of Our Last Wild Days.

(Galley courtesy of Atria Books in exchange for an honest review.)

Book Review: Their Double Lives, by Jaime Lynn Hendricks   

Image belongs to Penzler Publishers/Scarlet.

Title: Their Double Lives
Author: Jaime Lynn Hendricks         
Genre: Mystery/thriller   
Rating: 4 out of 5

Living a double life always comes with a cost.

A down-on-her-luck waitress at a posh New Jersey country club, Kim Valva couldn’t be living a more different life from the carefree socialites she serves. Her live-in boyfriend recently cheated on her, her social life is in shambles, and her dog needs a life-saving surgery that she can’t afford. Then her luck seems to change when a mysterious figure identifying themself only as The Stranger contacts her with an offer she can’t Put a pill in the new member’s drink and, when he dies, she’ll have enough money to fix her dog and her life.

Her target turns out to be Tony Fiore—Kim’s bad boy ex-boyfriend from high school. Fifteen years have passed, and he now goes by Anthony Fuller. He’s cleaned up, made tens of millions, and his gorgeous fiancée, twenty-two-year-old PJ Walsh, is on his arm.

PJ had her own agenda from the second she met Anthony. Find him, trick him, marry him, kill him. It was supposed to be easy, but she finds that while living her double life, the lines blur between who she is and who she’s pretending to be.

Stunned to see Tony again, Kim can’t bring herself to go through with spiking his drink. Instead, it is PJ who dies horrifically at the table just as dinner ends. Was someone else at the club—member or worker—tasked with poisoning PJ just as she had been instructed to do to Tony? Who would want both of them dead? With no one to trust and The Stranger to answer to, Kim must peel back the layers of deceit to reveal a deeply buried truth, more shocking than she could ever imagine…

I was kind of ambivalent about these characters. I didn’t love them, didn’t really hate them (except maybe Anthony’s boss’s wife). The dog was probably the best character of all. The level of duplicity in these people was next level, and if this hadn’t been such a quick read, I’d have put it down just because of that. There were lots of twists and turns here, but I did figure out who The Stranger was before the reveal. A solid read—if you don’t need characters you love.

Jaime Lynn Hendricks lives in Florida. Their Double Lives is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of Penzler Publishers/Scarlet in exchange for an honest review.)

Book Review: Heart of the Sun, by Mia Sheridan

Image belongs to Harlequin/Canary Street Press.

Title: Heart of the Sun
Author: Mia Sheridan
Genre: Romance, fantasy
Rating: 4 out of 5

When the world is plunged into darkness, who would you turn to?

Amid the sun-drenched orange groves of California, childhood friends Tuck Mattice and Emily Swanson shared a bond that seemed unbreakable—until life ripped them apart.

Thirteen years later, Emily is a rising pop sensation in need of security, and Tuck, a brooding ex-con, is in need of a fresh start. When fate brings them together once again, Emily hires him on as her new bodyguard. They butt heads and bicker, just like the old days—yet neither can deny the heat rekindling between them.

But when a cataclysmic solar flare disrupts the electrical grid, society is suddenly plunged into chaos and darkness. For Emily, the familiar comforts of fame and fortune crumble, but for Tuck, this stark new reality could be the chance he needs to finally prove himself. As they come to terms with all they’ve lost and the bitterness that’s kept them apart, they must find their way back to one another and discover a new place, under the sun.

I enjoyed this read, although the childhood scenes did not make it seem like Tuck and Emily “shared a bond that seemed unbreakable.” It just seemed like the barely tolerated each other. I generally like dystopian novels, so I enjoyed that part, although Tuck and Emily seem much more trusting of people they meet than I would have been. This was a solid read, but I never really felt the characters were in danger.

Mia Sheridan is a bestselling author. Heart of the Sun is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of Harlequin/Canary Street Press in exchange for an honest review.)

Book Review: My Friends, by Fredrik Backman

Image belongs to Atria Books.

Title: My Friends  
Author: Fredrik Backman   
Genre: Fiction
Rating: 5 out of 5 

Most people don’t even notice them—three tiny figures sitting at the end of a long pier in the corner of one of the most famous paintings in the world. Most people think it’s just a depiction of the sea. But Louisa, an artist herself, knows otherwise and she is determined to find out the story of these three enigmatic figures.

Twenty-five years earlier, in a distant town, a group of teenagers find refuge from their difficult home lives by spending their days laughing and telling stories out on a pier. There’s Joar, who never backs down from a fight; quiet and bookish Ted who is mourning his father; Ali, the daughter of a man who never stays in one place for long; and finally, there’s the artist, a boy who hoards sleeping pills and shuns attention, but who possesses an extraordinary gift that might be his ticket to a better life. These four lost souls find in each other a reason to get up each morning, a reason to dream.

Out of that summer emerges a transcendent work of art, a painting that will unexpectedly be put into eighteen-year-old Louisa’s care. As she struggles to decide what to do with this bequest, she embarks on a surprise-filled cross-country journey to learn the story of how the painting came to be. The closer she gets to the painting’s birthplace, the more she feels compelled to unleash her own artistic spirit, but happy endings don’t always take the form we expect in this fresh testament to the transformative power of friendship and art.

This was a heck of a read!  I expect great characters and an intriguing story from Fredrik Backman, but this was just so, so good. On the surface, it doesn’t seem super appealing, but the characters were just so appealing and their friendship was fantastic. Hanging out with the four friends in the past just sounded fun, and Louisa and Ted in the future made me laugh a lot. Great read, with some excellent twists.

Fredrik Backman is a bestselling author. My Friends is his newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of Atria Books in exchange for an honest review.)

Book Review: Death at a Highland Wedding, by Kelley Armstrong

Image belongs to St. Martin’s Press.

Title: Death at a Highland Wedding   
Author: Kelley Armstrong          
Genre: Historical fiction, mystery/thriller, fantasy   
Rating: 4.5 out of 5

After slipping 150 years into the past, modern-day homicide detective Mallory Atkinson has embraced her new life in Victorian Scotland as housemaid Catriona Mitchel. Although it isn’t what she expected, she’s developed real, meaningful relationships with the people around her and has come to love her role as assistant to undertaker Dr. Duncan Gray and Detective Hugh McCreadie.

Mallory, Gray, and McCreadie are on their way to the Scottish Highlands for McCreadie’s younger sister’s wedding. The McCreadies and the groom’s family, the Cranstons, have a complicated history which has made the weekend quite uncomfortable. But the Cranston estate is beautiful so Gray and Mallory decide to escape the stifling company and set off to explore the castle and surrounding wilderness. They discover that the groom, Archie Cranston, a slightly pompous and prickly man, has set up deadly traps in the woods for the endangered Scottish wildcats, and they soon come across a cat who’s been caught and severely injured. Oddly, Mallory notices the cat’s injuries don’t match up with the intricacies of the trap. These strange irregularities, combined with the secretive and erratic behavior of the groom, put Mallory and Duncan on edge. And then when one of the guests is murdered, they must work fast to uncover the murderer before another life is lost.

This was a fun read. I thought I’d read the first book in the series—and not the second two—but maybe not. I still had no problems stepping in mid-series. I enjoyed the characters and the dichotomy between modern Mallory caught 150 years in the past. I found all the characters to be solid and (mostly) likable, and I truly had no idea what was really going on until the reveal at the end. Very solid historical/time travel mystery read with some great characters.

Kelley Armstrong is a bestselling author. Death at a Highland Wedding is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.)

Book Review: The Love Haters, by Katherine Center

Image belongs to St. Martin’s Press.

Title: The Love Haters   
Author: Katherine Center         
Genre: Romance    
Rating: 5 out of 5

It’s a thin line between love and love-hating.

Katie Vaughn has been burned by love in the past—now she may be lighting her career on fire. She has two choices: wait to get laid off from her job as a video producer or, at her coworker Cole’s request, take a career-making gig profiling Tom “Hutch” Hutcheson, a Coast Guard rescue swimmer in Key West.

The catch? Katie’s not exactly qualified. She can’t swim—but fakes it that she can.

Plus: Cole is Hutch’s brother. And they don’t get along. Next stop paradise!

But paradise is messier than it seems. As Katie gets entangled with Hutch (the most scientifically good looking man she has ever seen . . . but also a bit of a love hater), along with his colorful Aunt Rue and his rescue Great Dane, she gets trapped in a lie. Or two.

Swim lessons, helicopter flights, conga lines, drinking contests, hurricanes, and stolen kisses ensue—along with chances to tell the truth, to face old fears, and to be truly brave at last.

I loved this read! Katie was 100% relatable, from her body image issues and feelings of inferiority, to her mishaps and adventures. Her friendship with Beanie was great and I enjoyed their meandering conversations. Rue and the ladies in Florida were very entertaining and I loved their antics. Hutch was a bit hard to get a read on, but I ended up liking him—it was probably the way he took care of the dog.

Katherine Center is a bestselling author. The Love Haters is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.)

Book Review: Out of Air, by Rachel Reiss

Image belongs to St. Martin’s Press.

Title: Out of Air   
Author: Rachel Reiss         
Genre: YA    
Rating: 4 out of 5 

The deeper you go, the darker you fall.

Phoebe “Phibs” Ray is never more at home than when she’s underwater. On a dive six months ago, she and her four closest friends discovered a handful of ancient gold coins, rocketing them into social media fame. Now, their final summer together after high school, they’re taking one last trip to a distant Australian island to do what they love most – scuba dive.

While diving a local reef, Phibs discovers a spectacular underwater sea cave, rumored to be a lost cave with a buried treasure. But when Phibs and her best friend Gabe surface from the cave, they notice that they’re undergoing strange changes. Oozing gashes that don’t heal. Haunting whispers in their heads… Something has latched onto them, lurking beneath their skin, transforming them from the inside out.

When treasure hunters arrive, desperate to find the location of the cave and hold Phibs’ group for ransom, she’ll do anything to keep her friends safe. In the process she learns that, of all the dreadful creatures of the sea, she might be the most terrifying of them all.

This was a solid read. I enjoyed reading about the dives and the underwater scenery, but I wish there had been a bit more resolution at the end. I really enjoyed the friendship between the five teenagers and this was a quick read, perfect for a weekend binge.

Rachel Reiss lives in California. Out of Air is her new novel.

(Galley courtesy of St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.)