Balancing my Books #28: May 2023

I knew there was going to be a month in which the scales would tip unapologetically the wrong way. This is it. May 2023 was THE month when everything went tits up – and yet, I am oddly happy about it. So, what the hell happened?

Last month my physical TBR went up by one book – this month it went up by TOO MANY books. A couple of pre-orders came in, I dropped into a couple of charity shops, I bought a few books in a couple of series, a few poetry collections… All in all, it was a lot more than I meant to, but I am surpisingly ok with it. So, I added 19 books to my TBR.

As for my digital TBR, I ended up buying 7, all for 99p in some sort of Kindle deal or other. All were books that were already on my radar that I was waiting on a good deal for. Sometimes all your ships come in at once. Thanks to a couple of DNFs at least my digital TBR did not get bigger!

I may do a book haul for the past month, or I may not – not sure yet.

PHYSICAL TBR:

Start 2023: 343
1 April: 340
Acquired: 19
Read: 6 + 1 DNF
Balance: 352

DIGITAL TBR:

Start 2022: 175
1 April: 178
Acquired: 7
Read: 5 + 2 DNF
Balance: 178

I will see how things go in the next couple of months. I am trying not to buy any books until a UK trip in August, as I am sure I will peruse some charity shops whilst I am there.

***

MAY READING REVIEW

1. Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair (Pablo Neruda) 8.14 (4*) paperback
2. Small Worlds (Caleb Azumah Nelson) 9.86 (5*) e-book
3. The Age of Innocence (Edith Wharton) 7.93 (4*) audio/paperback
4. His Bloody Project (Graeme Macrae Burnet) 8.36 (4.25*) audio/e-book
5. Ship of Destiny (Robin Hobb) 8.86 (4.5*) paperback
6. Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries (Heather Fawcett) 6.71 (3.25*) e-book
7. Black Foam (Haji Jabir) 20-22 May 7.79 (4*) e-book
8. Go Ahead in the Rain (Hanif Abdurraqib) 9.71 (4.75*) audio/paperback
9. The Dragonet Prophecy (Tui T Sutherland) 8.57 (4.25*) paperback
10. The Makioka Sisters (Jun’ichiro Tanizaki) 8.64 (4.25*) paperback
11. Legends & Lattes (Travis Baldree) 8.07 (4*) e-book

Most of my reads were from my May TBR, but a couple were current popular reads that I ended up picking up because I see so many people talk about them I tend to pick them up in Kindle Daily Deal sales. Neither of these, (Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries and Legends & Lattes) quite hit the right spot and thought they were fine reads they did not end up among my favourites of the month. There was nothing that I finished that I rated under 3.25* . I did however end up with a record 3 DNFs. I have gotten much better at putting down books I am not enjoying and I feel it really helps me keep the mojo alive.

The books I DNFd were:

• Clockwork Angel (Cassandra Clare) – paperback – This one had been on my shelf quite a while and I actually DNFd within a couple of chapters – I just wasn’t interested in anything that was going on. The book went on my Unhaul pile.
• Suite as Sugar and Other Stories (Camille Hernández-Ramdwar) – e-book – this was a NetGalley eARC that I hoped I would enjoy, but I pushed until 35% in and realised I just did not enjoy the tone of the stories.
• A Shade of Vampire (Bella Forrest) – e-book – I think I went into this one already knowing that the chance of DNF was high. It had been sitting on my Kindle for years and I don’t really tend to enjoy vampire stories at the best of times. I hated the tone and DNFd at 25%.

However, I also had some amazing reads!

BOOK OF THE MONTH

I read another Hanif Abdurraqib book that I loved and the conclusion to the Liveship Traders trilogy was very good as well. However, Small Worlds by Caleb Azumah Nelson was a proper 5* book. Great writing and it hit just right. One of my favourite books of the year so far. I will get myself a physical copy.

LOOKING FORWARD TO JUNE

I have some very exciting books on my TBR in June. I have a few books I need to read to complete my Spring TBR, but considering the books they are it won’t be a chore to do so. I hope I will have time to catch up on some stuff as well.

Advertisement

WWW Wednesday: 31 May 2023

My reading mojo is doing ok and I am hoping it will stay like that into June!

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING

I am taking my audio book, The Earth Transformed by Peter Frankopan, into June. It’s a chunker, so you will see it in this space for weeks I imagine.

I am reading a poetry collection, which is Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rossetti.

I am about to pick up my new read, which will be Bearers of the Black Staff by Terry Brooks. It’s my next read in my chronological read of the Shannara books and the first book in the Legends of Shannara duology. I have never actually read this one, so I am excited. It’s a mass market paperback as well and I am one of those rare people that loves a good mass market paperback!

RECENTLY FINISHED

I just finished Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree. It was a fun read, even if I did not love it as much as other people seem to.

The other books I finished since the last WWW are The Dragonet Prophecy by Tui T Sutherland (an oddly violent middle grade story about dragons!) and The Makioka Sisters by Jun’ichiro Tanizaki (a Japanese translated novel from 1948). Both were really good reads!

READING NEXT

No idea yet. My audio book is long, so no chance of finishing it by next week and I will mood read from my TBR.

Book Thoughts: Legends & Lattes (Travis Baldree)

A nice escapist read

★★★★☆ – CALSPIE: 8.07

Title: Legends & Lattes
Author: Travis Baldree
Genre: Fiction / Fantasy / Cozy Fantasy
First published: 2022
Edition:  Kindle e-book

After a lifetime of bounties and bloodshed, Viv is hanging up her sword for the last time. The battle-weary orc aims to start fresh, opening the first ever coffee shop in the city of Thune. But old and new rivals stand in the way of success — not to mention the fact that no one has the faintest idea what coffee actually is.

***

I gave into the hype and picked this up when it was cheap on Kindle Daily Deal. Did I like it? Yes. Do I think it lived up to the hype? Maybe not quite.

Curiosity is a funny thing. When you see a book doing the rounds enough time, you do end up being seduced by it at some point. So it is that I ended up trying out this cozy fantasy novel that I have been seeing all over the place. Advertised as high fantasy, low stakes, it pretty much does what it says on the tin and it was kind of nice to read something relatively calm and warm.

Overall I liked the characters and the tone of the novel. I especially enjoyed reading about the new friendships that Viv struck up. The coffee shop aspect was neither here nor there for me. It was a good vehicle for the characters to connect, but I think the way the author incorporated modern world aspects was just a tad too cheesy for me, which surprised me really, as I am very much a coffee person and I do enjoy a nice café hang with good company. Maybe the combination of fantasy with contemporary culture simply does not work for me.

I did find myself getting a bit bored halfway through and though it did pick up again, I did not end up loving this as much as everyone else seems to.

It was enjoyable and it made a nice change. I would be happy to pick up the next book at some point when I am in the mood for it, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to. This was a solid escapist read, but for me it did not do anything extraordinary

4 out of 5 stars

***

CALSPIE: 8.07

• Characters: 8.5
• Ambience: 9
• Language: 8
• Story: 7.5
• Pacing: 7.5
• Interest: 8
• Enjoyment: 8

Book Thoughts: The Makioka Sisters (Jun’ichirō Tanizaki)

A story about sisters and tradition and progression

★★★★☆ 1/4 – CALSPIE 8.64

Title: The Makioka Sisters (Original title: Sasameyuki)
Author: Jun’ichirō Tanizaki
Translator: Edward G Seidensticker (from Japanese)
Genre: Fiction / Classic / Translated Fiction
First published: 1948
Edition:  Paperback, published by Vintage Classics in 2000

BLURB: Tanizaki’s masterpiece is the story of four sisters, and the declining fortunes of a traditional Japanese family. It is a loving and nostalgic recreation of the sumptuous, intricate upper-class life of Osaka immediately before World War II. With surgical precision, Tanizaki lays bare the sinews of pride, and brings a vanished era to vibrant life.

***

I went into this classic Japanese novel a little apprehensively. I had read a short essay collection by this author before, which I had absolutely loved, so I was confident I would like the writing, but this is a long book. Fortunately, once I got into the story it read away quite easily.

The story centres around the three youngest of four sisters and as the narrative goes on you cannot but feel sympathy for them. This is very much social commentary on Japan at the time, in the late 1930s going into the early1940s. WWII happens in the vague background and is mentioned, but not dwelt upon.

What is important to this family is seeing the second youngest sister married. We meet marriage prospect after marriage prospect over the course of the book, but they all fall by the wayside. Not helping is the wayward youngest sister, whose behaviour causes many headaches for the family. Four sisters, the youngest being a bit of a rebel…. remind you of anything? They’re such interesting characters and so different from each other. On one hand there’s Yukiko, who is quite obedient and traditional and on the other side we have Taeko, who is quite a modern woman and seems to long to make her own way in the world. I felt definite affection for Yukiko, who is kind of shy and ends up being the one with all the pressure on her shoulders and whose marriage negotiations keep going wrong, usually without any blame on her.

Anyway, I did really enjoy this novel. I am not sure it really needed to be 560 pages long, but I am glad I have read it. I liked the look into Japanese culture at the time and how between the sisters you see how a changing world affects their sensibilities.

Kimonos, cherry blossoms, fireflies, kabuki – so many typical Japanese buzzwords, add in a dash of Austen and it really does bring that atmosphere and tone that I really enjoyed.

I will definitely read more by this author.

4.25 out of 5 stars

***

CALSPIE: 8.64

• Characters: 9
• Ambience: 9
• Language: 9
• Story: 8.5
• Pacing: 8
• Interest: 8.5
• Enjoyment: 8.5

June 2023 TBR

May went much better than I expected to be honest! I am reading my final book for my May TBR and I am pretty much on schedule. I did DNF two of the books from my May TBR, which helped matters along quite nicely, I guess! I also DNFd a book that was already on my June TBR, which was one of my unlikely e-book choices for June.

Just a note: the unlikely book options were randomly chosen from a list with a number generator.

Anyway, my prompts for June ended up as follows:

1. Unlikely e-book: A Shade of Vampire (Bella Forrest)/ The Reindeer People (Megan Lindholm) / A Question of Us (Mary Jayne Baker) – Now officially, because I have DNFd one, I don’t need to read one of the other two, but I may do anyway. I will see how this month goes. (E-BOOK)
2. Blue to green spine: Bearers of the Black Staff (Terry Brooks) – The massmarket paperback I have has a partly blue spine, so I am glad I can fit this one in to continue my Shannara journey. Although most of this saga is a re-read, this part is new to me. I’m excited!
3. Unlikely physical book: Newton and the Counterfeiter (Thomas Levenson) / Valley of the Racehorse (Robin Oakley) / Attica (Garry Kilworth) – Two non-fiction options and a middle grade – not the best options, but I will read one of them. Right now I am leaning towards the middle grade by Garry Kilworth, as I have liked books by him before. (PHYSICAL)
4. Random Colour Generator – Red: Clytemnestra (Costanza Casati) – such a fun prompt. The hardback of this one is gold with red flowers all over it and red sprayed edges with black flowers. It’s gorgeous! (PHYSICAL)
5. Unlikely e-book: Ace of Shades (Amanda Foody) / History of Wolves (Emily Fridlund) / Last Tang Standing (Lauren Ho) – again this prompt – it’s useful though and makes me read books that otherwise just sit on my Kindle. I think I know which one of these I will read, but I will let my mood decide. (E-BOOK)
6. Seasonal or Yearly TBR: When All Is Said (Anne Griffin) – I was hoping to read this one in June, as the synopsis mentions June. This one is on both on my Spring TBR as well as my 2023 TBR. Perfect! (E-BOOK)
7. Flora or Fauna: Where Ivy Dares to Grow (Marielle Thompson) – The title has the word ‘ivy’ in it and the cover as some leafage on it. This is a NetGallet e-ARC. The synopsis sounds super intriguing, so I hope it’s decent! (E-BOOK)
8. Young Adult: Starsight (Brandon Sanderson) – The perfect excuse to continue this series. (PHYSICAL)
9. Bought 2017/2018: The Moon is Down (John Steinbeck) – this one is on my 2023 TBR and this seemed a good excuse to read it. (PHYSICAL)
10. ROLL-OVER: Pedro Parama (Juan Rulfo) – I decided to not to the 10th roll and instead add a book I did not get to from my March TBR. It would be good to get this one read. (PHYSICAL)

I have already started a book that was on my July TBR on audio (The Earth Transformed by Peter Frankopan). I did roll for July already, but I will let you know those at the end of june.

I am feeling confident about this TBR – apart from the unlikely books, I am quite excited about all the books! I managed to fit everything in that I wanted to.

Are you making a TBR for June, or are you just winging it?

Book Thoughts: The Dragonet Prophecy (Tui T Sutherland)

A far from childish middle grade fantasy about dragons

★★★★☆ 1/4 – CALSPIE 8.57

Title: The Dragonet Prophecy (Wings of Fire #1)
Author: Tui T Sutherland
Genre: Fiction / Fantasy / Middle Grade
First published: 2012
Edition:  Paperback, published by Gale/Thorndike Press in 2020

BLURB: The seven dragon tribes have been at war for generations, locked in an endless battle over an ancient, lost treasure. A secret movement called the Talons of Peace is determined to bring an end to the fighting, with the help of a prophecy — a foretelling that calls for great sacrifice.Five dragonets are collected to fulfill the prophecy, raised in a hidden cave and enlisted, against their will, to end the terrible war.But not every dragonet wants a destiny. And when the select five escape their underground captors to look for their original homes, what has been unleashed on the dragon world may be far more than the revolutionary planners intended . . .

***

Going into this middle grade fantasy book I was not quite sure what to expect, apart from the fact that it was from the perspective of dragons of course. I had read snippets with my daughter when she first started to read this series, but not enough to form an opinion or have a proper idea what the story was about. My daughter fell in love with the series and went on to read all the books. It was her that urged me to read it. I finally gave in.

I am glad I did, because this is a strong start to a series that I may well end up enjoying quite a bit. It is middle grade, but not childish in any way. In fact, I was shocked how much death and killing there was in this book. Not in a way that makes it unsuitable for children my daughter’s age (she was nine or ten when she read this first book), but definitely enough to make it not for the squeamish. Needless to say, my daughter clearly did not mind, because this is her favourite series.

The death and blood is countered by the fact that this is a book about wonderful friendships between the young dragons the story revolves around. The connection between them is heart warming and a joy to read about.

I can easily see why children would love these books and I will definitely read the next book at some point.

4.25 out of 5 stars

***

CALSPIE: 8.57

• Characters: 9
• Ambience: 8.5
• Language: 8.5
• Story: 8.5
• Pacing: 9
• Interest: 8
• Enjoyment: 8.5

WWW Wednesday: 24 May 2023

I have had a decent reading week. Spring is finally starting to warm up, which makes me happy! Time for a WWW!

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING:

My main read (which I will be finishing today) is The Dragonet Prophecy by Tui T Sutherland. It’s the first book in the Middle Grade series Wings of Fire. It’s about dragons and my daughter’s favourite book series. She’s been asking for me to read it for months, so I finally fit it in my TBR this month. It’s a surprisingly good read. I can understand why she loves it. It’s brutal in places, there’s quite a lot of death in it, but also great friendships as far as I can tell. R will be happy I liked it!

My audio book is one for the long haul. I started The Earth Transformed: an Untold History by Peter Frankopan yesterday. It’s a giant 650+ pages, 29 hour audio book. It’s about the effects climate changes have had on our world over the millennia, natural and not. I am sure it will be super interesting, even if I am usually not one for this type of doom subject, because it will end on what’s happening with climate change currently. I have a gorgeous hardback copy with sprayed edges!

RECENTLY FINISHED:

I finished two audio books since last week. The first was His Bloody Project by Graeme Macrae Burnet, which was a historical novel, followed by Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to a Tribe Called Quest by Hanif Abdurraqib. The latter was fantastic, like pretty much anything the author writes. Even not being a massive hip hop fan, I could appreciate the author’s passion and I was surprised with how much of the music he talks about I was actually familiar. In my top 10 books of the year, along with one of his other books (A Little Devil in America). Definitely my favourite non-fiction author.

Books I read with my eyes in the past week:

• Ship of Destiny by Robin Hobb – the final book in the Liveship Traders trilogy, was a great finale to a fantastically written series.
• Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett – this did not really work for me. I should have known ahead of time as it is a fae story and me and fae don’t really match. I liked the main characters, but it was not for me.
• Black Foam by Haji Jabir – I enjoyed this one. It was the first book I read by an Eritrean author and I found I knew surprisingly little about that part of the world. It is a refugee story and it was a bit different. I liked it.

All in all, this was a very good reading week in which I made superb headway in my TBR – at last!

READING NEXT:

I won’t be thinking about a new audio book yet, but my next physical read will be The Makioka Sisters by Jun’ichirō Tanizaki. I read a short essays works by him (In Praise of Shadows), which was fantastic, so I hesitantly trying this novel, which is almost 600 pages. I’m nervous, but quietly excited.

**

Let me know your WWW!

(audio) Book Thoughts: Go Ahead in the Rain (Hanif Abdurraqib)

This is indeed a love letter to a group, a sound, and an era

★★★★★ – CALSPIE 9.71

Title: Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to A Tribe Called Quest
Author: Hanif Abdurraqib
Narrator: Ron Butler
Genre: Non-Fiction / Cultural / Music / Biography
First published: 2019
Edition: Audio book & paperback, published by University of Texas Press

BLURB: How does one pay homage to A Tribe Called Quest? The seminal rap group brought jazz into the genre, resurrecting timeless rhythms to create masterpieces such as The Low End Theory and Midnight Marauders. Seventeen years after their last album, they resurrected themselves with an intense, socially conscious record, We Got It from Here . . . Thank You 4 Your Service, which arrived when fans needed it most, in the aftermath of the 2016 election. Poet and essayist Hanif Abdurraqib digs into the group’s history and draws from his own experience to reflect on how its distinctive sound resonated among fans like himself. The result is as ambitious and genre-bending as the rap group itself.

***

Let’s start off by saying I would read anything this author writes. He has a way of writing that just connects to me, maybe especially as a music fan. And as a music fan, it does not matter what music he is talking about, because the love and the passion is the same.

Going into this one, I was familiar with A Tribe Called Quest of course; the height of their fame was in the 90s, when I was a teenager. I soon found out that the touch points the author uses are way more familiar to me than I had expected. I had forgotten that in the early 90s I listened to a lot of hip-hop. It was the age that hip-hop acts felt new and interesting, refreshing, just before the rise of boybands and even grunge.

Listening to Hanif talk intimately not only about A Tribe Called Quest themselves and its individual members, but also about the mood and circumstances they rose and fell in, was a joy. He articulates his passion and inner fanboy so well. I easily connected to him, even when he is talking about a completely different type of culture than I grew up in. That is where the magic in his writing lies, in the connection – through passion, through love of a medium, through humanity.

This book is an ode, or a love letter as he calls it, to a different time, but one that is still relevant. I really hope that the guys from Tribe have given him a big hug for writing this, because they should. Besides enjoying revisiting A Tribe Called Quest for the first time in many years and remembering how much I enjoyed De La Soul back in the day, it is never a bad thing to feel an understanding and a connection to a culture other than the one you are most familiar with.

Cultural diversity is a beautiful thing and I will never understand people who think it isn’t. And that is why I love books like this – in the end music is music and if you are a fan of one type of music it is easy to relate to someone else’s love for a different genre. The biggest bonus is if you can spread the love and share your passion.

So, don’t mind this middle aged woman in the countryside as she goes and listens to some old school beats to get her through her cleaning chores,

And to Hanif Abdurraqib – thank you for the passion, the rhythm and the teenage memories I had forgotten.

5 out of 5 stars

***

CALSPIE*: 9.71

• Characters: 9.5
• Ambience: 10
• Language: 10
• Story: 9.5
• Pacing: 9.5
• Interest: 9.5
• Enjoyment: 10

*CALSPIE is designed for fiction, but I can roughly apply it to non-fiction books. I think of characters as subject. Ambience as the tone of the book. Story as the explanation. Pacing as the length and depth to which it goes into the subjects.

Book Thoughts: Black Foam (Haji Jabir)

A solid book by an Eritrean author

★★★★☆ – CALSPIE 7.79

Title: Black Foam (رغوة سوداء)
Author: Haji Jabir
Tanslator: Sawad Hussain & Maria Lynx Qualey (from Arabic)
Genre: Fiction / Literary
First published: 2018
Edition:  Kindle e-book

BLURB: Dawoud is on the run from his murky past, aiming to discover where he belongs. He tries to assimilate into different groups along his journey through North Africa and Israel, changing his clothes, his religious affiliations, and even his name to fit in, but the safety and peace he seeks remain elusive. It seems prejudice is everywhere, holding him back, when all he really wants is to create a simple life he can call his own. A chameleon, Dawoud—or David, Adal, or Dawit, depending on where and when you meet him—is not lost in this whirl of identities. In fact, he is defined by it.

***

Going into this I was not entirely sure what to expect. I have to admit I know very little about Eritrea besides where it is on the map. I guess that is exactly why I chose to read this book. Literature is often great way to learn.

This was a thought provoking read without being too hard to read. In fact, from the various refugee stories I have read, this one has the least amount of hardship. Not that life for the main character is easy. Far from it, he is always pretending to be anything other than himself. So much so that in the end I wondered whether he ever actually knew who he was as a person. In a way, I thought that was the saddest part. Maybe that was the point? He is a unreliable narrator, so you kind of end up having to read between the lines to discover his actual story, and his story appears so much more heart breaking than what is on the actual page.

It took me a bit of time to get into. The story is non-linear for the most part and in the beginning I found myself a little confused by what was happening. This got easier as the novel went on and it actually read away quite easily in the end.

Overall, I liked most of the writing, though I did not quite understand how the author handled Aisha’s character and her impact on our main character Dawoud/David/Dawit. I wish the author had spent a bit more time on her.

The ending was both terrible and perfect, especially when you then read where the author took his inspiration from. I realised how needed it is to tell (and read) these kind of stories.

Overall, although I enjoyed this novel, would I recommend it? It depends whether you have an interest in these type of stories. It’s a relatively quiet story – it’s not written in a heart wrenching manner or sensationalist, but I think that’s what I like about it.

I would definitely read more by this author.

4 out of 5 stars

***

CALSPIE: 7.79

• Characters: 8.5
• Ambience: 7.5
• Language: 8
• Story: 7.5
• Pacing: 8
• Interest: 7.5
• Enjoyment: 7.5

Book Thoughts: Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries (Heather Fawcett)

Not for me, but would still recommend

★★★☆☆ 1/4 – CALSPIE 6.71

Title: Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries
Author: Heather Fawcett
Genre: Fiction / Fantasy
First published: 2023
Edition:  Kindle e-book

BLURB: Cambridge professor Emily Wilde is good at many things: She is the foremost expert on the study of faeries. She is a genius scholar and a meticulous researcher who is writing the world’s first encyclopaedia of faerie lore. But Emily Wilde is not good at people. She could never make small talk at a party–or even get invited to one. And she prefers the company of her books, her dog, Shadow, and the Fair Folk to other people.

So when she arrives in the hardscrabble village of Hrafnsvik, Emily has no intention of befriending the gruff townsfolk. Nor does she care to spend time with another new arrival: her dashing and insufferably handsome academic rival Wendell Bambleby, who manages to charm the townsfolk, get in the middle of Emily’s research, and utterly confound and frustrate her.

***

I was attracted to the cover of this one, maybe knowing that stories about the fae tend not to be my favourite. I figured there were always exceptions and I hoped this one would be one. In fact, I almost bought a physical copy. I am glad I did not, because this was not an exception. The story just did not keep me engaged and my attention drifted too easily.

There is something about these type of stories – the glamour, the trickery, the standard fae stuff – it’s just not something that gets me invested. I had hoped this one would be a little bit different, but unfortunately it was just more of the same. To be fair I quite liked main character Emily and Wendell was kind of interesting, but everything else just was not for me. I still decided to read on, hoping I would end up liking it and it was not a very long book. It certainly was not a bad book writing-wise and at no point did I want to DNF it.

Something that is rare for a fae book, and which I actually really appreciated, is that this is not a romance-focused book. It is more about a bit of a mystery and a discovery of the fae world rather than anything else. There is kind a romance sub plot, but it is not really the focus of the story, and I actually kind of appreciated the relationship.

That I did not end up loving this book is purely on me and I probably should have known better than to pick up this book. However, if you do love all the standard fae stuff, you will probably enjoy this. It’s an easy read that you can get through in a weekend.

So, I would still recommend it – just maybe not if you don’t like fae stories… like me.

3.25 out of 5 stars

***

CALSPIE: 6.71

• Characters: 7.5
• Ambience: 6.5
• Language: 7.5
• Story: 6.5
• Pacing: 7.5
• Interest: 5.5
• Enjoyment: 6