The Fortune Hunter by Daisy Goodwin

Title: The Fortune Hunter

Author: Daisy Goodwin

Publisher: St. Martin’s Press 2013

Genre: Historical Fiction

Pages: 473

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Unread Shelf; In Case You Missed It - 2013

Empress Elizabeth of Austria, known as Sisi, is the Princess Diana of nineteenth-century Europe. Famously beautiful, as captured in a portrait with diamond stars in her hair, she is unfulfilled in her marriage to the older Emperor Franz Joseph. Sisi has spent years evading the stifling formality of royal life on her private train or yacht or, whenever she can, on the back of a horse.

Captain Bay Middleton is dashing, young, and the finest horseman in England. He is also impoverished, with no hope of buying the horse needed to win the Grand National—until he meets Charlotte Baird. A clever, plainspoken heiress whose money gives her a choice among suitors, Charlotte falls in love with Bay, the first man to really notice her, for his vulnerability as well as his glamour. When Sisi joins the legendary hunt organized by Earl Spencer in England, Bay is asked to guide her on the treacherous course. Their shared passion for riding leads to an infatuation that jeopardizes the growing bond between Bay and Charlotte, and threatens all of their futures.

Another absolutely disappointing book! I was hoping that we would get a glittering portrayal of the Empress of Austria complete with expansive descriptions of time and place. I wanted a more glamorous version of Downtown Abbey. Instead, we focus more on Charlotte and Bay than Sisi and plod through their ridiculous “relationship.” I was thoroughly disgusted with Bay’s treatment of both Charlotte and Sisi and could not imagine what either woman saw in him. He’s nothing special at all. He spends all his lamenting his station in life and expressing love for his horse. Why would an heiress and the Empress of Austria covet a man like that? And there’s the fact that we get little to no information about Sisi throughout the book. She has a tiny waist, likes to hunt, and has ridiculously long hair. None of those things are personality traits and definitely none of those things make her an interesting figure. I really should have just off loaded this book, but you never know until to read it. At least it’s off my shelves.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Mrs. Sherlock Holmes by Brad Ricca

Title: Mrs. Sherlock Holmes: The True Story of New York City's Greatest Female Detective and the 1917 Missing Girl Case That Captivated a Nation

Author: Brad Ricca

Publisher: St. Martin’s Press 2017

Genre: Nonfiction - True Crime

Pages: 448

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Nonfiction Reader; Library Love

Mrs. Sherlock Holmes tells the true story of Mrs. Grace Humiston, the detective and lawyer who turned her back on New York society life to become one of the nation's greatest crime fighters during an era when women weren't even allowed to vote. After graduating from N.Y.U. law school, Grace opened a legal clinic in the city for low-income immigrant clients, and quickly established a reputation as a fierce, but fair lawyer who was always on the side of the disenfranchised.
 
Grace's motto "Justice for those of limited means" led her to strange cases all over the city, and eventually the world. From defending an innocent giant on death row to investigating an island in Arkansas with a terrible secret about slavery; from the warring halls of Congress to a crumbling medieval tower in Italy, Grace solved crimes in-between shopping at Bergdorf Goodman and being marked for death by the sinister Black Hand. She defended women clients who had killed their attackers and fought the framing of a Baltimore black man at the mercy of a corrupt police department. Known for dressing only in black, Grace was appointed the first woman U.S. district attorney in history. And when a pretty 18-year-old girl named Ruth Cruger went missing on Valentine's Day in New York, Grace took the case after  the police gave up. Grace and her partner, the hard-boiled Hungarian detective Julius J. Kron, navigated a dangerous mystery of secret boyfriends, two-faced cops, underground tunnels, rumors of white slavery, and a mysterious pale man -- in a desperate race against time to save Ruth. When she solved the crime, she was made the first female consulting detective to the NYPD.

But despite her many successes in social and criminal justice, Grace began to see chilling connections in the cases she had solved, leading to a final showdown with her most fearsome adversary of all and one of the most powerful men of the twentieth century.
 
This is the first-ever literary biography of the singular woman the press nicknamed after fiction's greatest detective. In the narrative tradition of In Cold Blood and The Devil in the White City, her poignant story unmasks unmistakable connections between missing girls, the role of the media, and the real truth of crime stories. The great mystery of Mrs. Sherlock Holmes -- and its haunting twist ending -- is how one woman dedicated to finding the missing herself become so lost to history?

This was one giant dud of a book! I was hoping for an examination of how one of the first women detectives in the United States proved her qualifications and solved crimes. Instead, I got a jumble of book more intent on telling all the tiny irrelevant details of one particular case while alluding to others but not exploring them. We get a ton of inside information about the thoughts and feelings of a variety of people related to the missing woman’s case, but nothing from Grace. We meander around the case while dropping weird hints and observations. But we don’t really get to the point. We don’t get to place Grace in the time and geographic location. This is certainly no Erik Larson style book that connects the dots so that the audience can understanding why the story is truly groundbreaking. I wonder if this was an article and the author was pressured into padding it out to a full length book? That might explain the complete necessary information and side tangents that take up a majority of the pages.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Underground Airlines by Ben H. Winters

Title: Underground Airlines

Author: Ben H. Winters

Publisher: Mulholland Books 2016

Genre: Science Fiction

Pages: 336

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Unread Shelf; 52 Book Club

A young black man calling himself Victor has struck a bargain with federal law enforcement, working as a bounty hunter for the US Marshall Service in exchange for his freedom. He's got plenty of work. In this version of America, slavery continues in four states called "the Hard Four." On the trail of a runaway known as Jackdaw, Victor arrives in Indianapolis knowing that something isn't right -- with the case file, with his work, and with the country itself.

As he works to infiltrate the local cell of a abolitionist movement called the Underground Airlines, tracking Jackdaw through the back rooms of churches, empty parking garages, hotels, and medical offices, Victor believes he's hot on the trail. But his strange, increasingly uncanny pursuit is complicated by a boss who won't reveal the extraordinary stakes of Jackdaw's case, as well as by a heartbreaking young woman and her child -- who may be Victor's salvation.

Victor believes himself to be a good man doing bad work, unwilling to give up the freedom he has worked so hard to earn. But in pursuing Jackdaw, Victor discovers secrets at the core of the country's arrangement with the Hard Four, secrets the government will preserve at any cost.

I was intrigued by this alternative history, but ended up really disappointed in the execution. The main issue is that I am uncertain as to the point of this book. Are we supposed to understand that everyone is terrible? Are we supposed to root for any of the characters? Because I truly don’t. It’s a cluster of unlikeable characters, confusing sequences, and an unsatisfying ending. As an extra note, the narration alternates between straight forward descriptions to a strange bit of stream of consciousness. I did not enjoy the book.

Next up on the TBR pile:

White Cat by Holly Black

Title: White Cat (Curse Workers #1)

Author: Holly Black

Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books 2010

Genre: Fantasy

Pages: 310

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Fall TBR

The first in a trilogy, this gritty, fast-paced fantasy is rife with the unexpected. Cassel comes from a shady, magical family of con artists and grifters. He doesn’t fit in at home or at school, so he’s used to feeling like an outsider. He’s also used to feeling guilty—he killed his best friend, Lila, years ago.

But when Cassel begins to have strange dreams about a white cat, and people around him are losing their memories, he starts to wonder what really happened to Lila. In his search for answers, he discovers a wicked plot for power that seems certain to succeed. But Cassel has other ideas— and a plan to con the conmen.

After two amazing reads, I was really hoping that this one would land as well. But it didn’t. In fact, I finished this one and really wanted to through it against the wall. Considering that I listened to it on my phone, I restrained myself. What did I like about this book? Nothing really. We get terrible characters, a slow-moving plot, and lots of problematic scenes. Cassel is a total piece of cardboard. I cannot for the life of me understand why anyone would want to be around this guy. He’s not anti-hero, he’s just super boring. The plot took way too long to actually get going and by that time, I didn’t care at all. Everything was super obvious and boring. I will definitely not be reading more into this series.

Curse Workers

• #1 White Cat

• #2 Red Glove

• #3 Black Heart

Next up on the TBR pile:

Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala

Title: Arsenic and Adobo (Tita Rosie’s Kitchen Mysteries #1)

Author: Mia P. Manansala

Publisher: Berkley 2021

Genre: Mystery

Pages: 307

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Summer TBR; Unread Shelf; BOTM Cleanout

When Lila Macapagal moves back home to recover from a horrible breakup, her life seems to be following all the typical rom-com tropes. She's tasked with saving her Tita Rosie's failing restaurant, and she has to deal with a group of matchmaking aunties who shower her with love and judgment. But when a notoriously nasty food critic (who happens to be her ex-boyfriend) drops dead moments after a confrontation with Lila, her life quickly swerves from a Nora Ephron romp to an Agatha Christie case.

With the cops treating her like she's the one and only suspect, and the shady landlord looking to finally kick the Macapagal family out and resell the storefront, Lila's left with no choice but to conduct her own investigation. Armed with the nosy auntie network, her barista best bud, and her trusted Dachshund, Longanisa, Lila takes on this tasty, twisted case and soon finds her own neck on the chopping block…

Oof! I had hopes for a fun cozy mystery with some food talk. And that’s what I thought I was getting in the first chapter. But then, things got very repetitive, silly, and seemingly lacking of emotion. I was interested in the food talk, but then the food talk became an every other paragraph thing. How many times do we need the same foods described in detail? I did not. If you would have removed the repetitions, almost 40% of the book would have disappeared. As it stands, the food descriptions just felt like padding. Beyond that, I was annoyed by the seeming incompetence of detective and even of Lila. There wasn’t enough actual amateur detective work. And don't get me started on the fact that Lila and all the main characters seemed to not care at all that people have died. I thoroughly disliked this book.

Next up on the TBR pile:

The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick

Title: The Man in the High Castle

Author: Philip K. Dick

Publisher: 1962

Genre: Fantasy

Pages: 259

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Summer Reading Challenge

It’s America in 1962. Slavery is legal once again. The few Jews who still survive hide under assumed names. In this world, we meet characters like Frank Frink, a dealer of counterfeit Americana who is himself hiding his Jewish ancestry; Nobusuke Tagomi, the Japanese trade minister in San Francisco, unsure of his standing within the bureaucracy and Japan's with Germany; and Juliana Frink, Frank's ex-wife, who may be more important than she realizes.

These seemingly disparate characters gradually realize their connections to each other just as they realize that something is not quite right about their world. And it seems as though the answers might lie with Hawthorne Abendsen, a mysterious and reclusive author, whose best-selling novel describes a world in which the US won the War... The Man in the High Castle is Dick at his best, giving readers a harrowing vision of the world that almost was.

I had some expectations going into this book and I was very very disappointed. I wanted an adventure filled look at an alternate history. I wanted some social commentary on the real world in 1962. Instead, I got a very boring look at very boring characters that shifted focus too many times. The big mystery of the author wasn’t really anything interesting. And the book lacked an imagination. I am intrigued by what the television series did to change the story and make it more engaging. Maybe I just need to go watch that instead.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Icebreaker by Hannah Grace

Title: Icebreaker

Author: Hannah Grace

Publisher: Atria Books 2022

Genre: Romance

Pages: 447

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 52 Book Club - Starts with “I”

Spice Rating: 5

Anastasia Allen has worked her entire life for a shot at Team USA. It looks like everything is going according to plan when she gets a full scholarship to the University of California, Maple Hills and lands a place on their competitive figure skating team.

Nothing will stand in her way, not even the captain of the hockey team, Nate Hawkins.

Nate’s focus as team captain is on keeping his team on the ice. Which is tricky when a facilities mishap means they are forced to share a rink with the figure skating team—including Anastasia, who clearly can’t stand him.

But when Anastasia’s skating partner faces an uncertain future, she may have to look to Nate to take her shot.

Sparks fly, but Anastasia isn’t worried…because she could never like a hockey player, right?

Why did I pick this one up? Oh yeah, the Bookstagram got me on this one. I should have known that I wasn’t going to lovely a college romance book between a prickly figure skater and heart-of-gold hockey player. I could have gotten past that if the book had had substance to it. But alas, this is just full of parties, drama, and hookups. I wasn’t a fan of how their relationship progressed (seriously, hookups in the back of Ubers? no thank you, I am too old for that shit). I wasn’t a fan of how Anastasia and Ryan (her former FWB) continued on even after he supposed started to exclusively date another woman. I wasn’t a fan of how shallow all the characters seemed. I just need to scratch this series off my list of future reads. Not a fan.

Next up on the TBR pile:

The Vampire Villain by Melody Raven

Title: The Vampire Villain (Evil Rising #2)

Author: Melody Raven

Publisher: 2019

Genre: Fantasy

Pages: 232

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Spring TBR; COYER

Spice Rating: 5 (albeit with a vampire)

Marcus might look like an angel, but he's always been a villain. So when he's tasked with infiltrating the Vampire rebellion he doesn't expect it to be complicated. But his plans might take on a new path as he grows closer to a mortal, who can't--or won't--die.

After Gena is brutally murdered and mysteriously resurrected, she sets out to discover the truth about her supernatural background. But when she crosses paths with the sexy and vengeful Marcus, she realizes that there is more to her past than she ever realized.

With time running out, Gena and Marcus search for answers to her past, while going head-to-head with their enemies. Will it end the same way it began--with Gena's death?

Oof this one did not land at all. I read the first one and, for the most part, enjoyed it. I liked the spin on the vampire myth. This volume I could not get behind at all. First off, Gena is just way too blasé about everything and never truly understands how much danger she is in. I really hated that she never really asked enough questions about what was going on. And Marcus is the worst of the alpha male type. He never tempted me at all. And then we find out just what Gena and I got even more annoyed. Nope. Don’t believe, don’t care. Guess I am done with this series.

Evil Rising

• #1 The Lost Vampire Prince

• #2 The Vampire Villain

• #3 Her Very Own Demon

• #4 The Werewolf and the Siren

• #5 Beauty and the Shapeshifter

Next up on the TBR pile:

The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee

Title: The Thousandth Floor (Thousandth Floor #1)

Author: Katharine McGee

Publisher: Harper Collins 2016

Genre: YA Science Fiction

Pages: 441

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Unread Shelf; Spring TBR

New York City as you’ve never seen it before. A thousand-story tower stretching into the sky. A glittering vision of the future, where anything is possible—if you want it enough.

Welcome to Manhattan, 2118. A hundred years in the future, New York is a city of innovation and dreams. But people never change: everyone here wants something…and everyone has something to lose.

Leda Cole’s flawless exterior belies a secret addiction—to a drug she never should have tried and a boy she never should have touched.

Eris Dodd-Radson’s beautiful, carefree life falls to pieces when a heartbreaking betrayal tears her family apart.

Rylin Myers’s job on one of the highest floors sweeps her into a world—and a romance—she never imagined…but will her new life cost Rylin her old one?

Watt Bakradi is a tech genius with a secret: he knows everything about everyone. But when he’s hired to spy by an upper-floor girl, he finds himself caught up in a complicated web of lies.

And living above everyone else on the thousandth floor is Avery Fuller, the girl genetically designed to be perfect. The girl who seems to have it all—yet is tormented by the one thing she can never have.

Much too Gossip Girl nonsense for me. I was intrigued by the premise and the setting. I was hoping that it was going to be a more action filled version of High Rise, but it really fell flat for me. We get too much teenage angst and the love triangles were killing me. I just felt myself getting more and more bored with the story as the pages went by. That’s never a good sign. And then we get to the big ending and I just did not care about the characters at all. Definitely not the book for me. This book was more teenage romantic nonsense than science fiction story.

Next up on the TBR pile:

The Stranded by Sarah Daniels

Title: The Stranded

Author: Sarah Daniels

Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire 2022

Genre: YA Sci-fi

Pages: 450

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 52 Book Club - Dystopian Fiction

Welcome to the Arcadia.

Once a luxurious cruise ship, it became a refugee camp after being driven from Europe by an apocalyptic war. Now it floats near the coastline of the Federated States―a leftover piece of a fractured USA.

For forty years, residents of the Arcadia have been prohibited from making landfall. It is a world of extreme haves and have nots, gangs and make-shift shelters.

Esther is a loyal citizen, working flat-out to have the rare chance to live a normal life as a medic on dry land. Nik is a rebel, planning something big to liberate the Arcadia once and for all.

When events throw them both together, their lives, and the lives of everyone on the ship, will change forever...

Another Currently Reading made me pick it up, but unlike the last one, this book did not land for me at all. Red flag #1: this is a Young Adult thriller. Somehow I totally missed this fact and came into the book expecting something very different. YA Thrillers are not usually my cup of tea and this definitely fits into that. Red flag #2: the main female protagonist is incredibly annoying. I could not stand her at all. And she never really grew throughout the book. I could not at all. Red flag #3: I never could really understand the world and why the rebellion was happening. Things just didn’t make sense to me at all. Random red flag #4: I somehow got through most of the book before realizing that Hadley was a full adult, and not the same age as Esther and Nik as I thought. The end result was a bit of a mess and a massive cliffhanger on the last page. I really really disliked this one.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Timemaster by Robert L. Forward

Title: Timemaster

Author: Robert L. Forward

Publisher: Tom Doherty Books 1992

Genre: Scifi

Pages: 301

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Winter TBR

Read the tale of Randy Hunter, billionaire industrialist, who communicates with aliens, achieves interstellar flight and explores far-flung worlds in a future filled with technological wonders. The future physics is mind-boggling but firmly grounded in the science of today, and the action never stops.

This was a recommendation from J that ended up really not landing for me at all. I was intrigued by the science included in this book. We get some interesting sections detailing various new scientific ideas and inventions. Unfortunately, in between all those sections was an appalling collection of characters and interactions. The misogyny is rampant with some very offensive dialogue. I kept thinking that this book was written in the 1950s. Imagine my surprise when I realized that the book was actually written in 1992! Seriously, I just couldn’t get over this fact and very quickly soured on the book.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Priest by Sierra Simone

Title: Priest (Love Story #1)

Author: Sierra Simone

Publisher: No Bird Press 2022

Genre: Romance

Pages: 378

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 52 Book Club - Featuring one of the “Seven Deadly Sins”; Romanceopoly - Passion Place

Spice Meter: 8 (for the taboo nature of the pairing)

There are many rules a priest can't break. A priest cannot marry. A priest cannot abandon his flock. A priest cannot forsake his God. I've always been good at following rules. Until she came. Then I learned new rules. My name is Tyler Anselm Bell. I'm twenty-nine years old. Six months ago, I broke my vow of celibacy on the altar of my own church, and God help me, I would do it again. I am a priest and this is my confession.

CW: Suicide, Sexual Abuse

I am so very disappointed in this book. It’s been all over Bookstagram; featured on all the super spicy romance lists. But I came to the end of the book very uncomfortable and not turned on at all. My main issue with this book really centers on the religion piece. All of the characters seem to take their faith very seriously, but also reject all the “rules” that they claim to be so important. I couldn’t wrap my brain around these seemingly contradictory stances. I was very uncomfortable with how the characters try to find the loopholes and edge cases to justify their actions. I would have greatly preferred if they realized that they didn’t actually believe in the religion at all. But it continue claiming to be believers and still not really repenting for their transgressions just felt icky to me. I was hoping for a good deep dive into the ways that the Catholic Church has mishandled the abuse scandals and it’s current stance toward sex, but that seemed to be teased at the beginning and then pushed to the side. At the end, it seemed like everything the characters did was justified because they got married. I just couldn’t with this book. I will not be reading the sequels.

Love Story

• #1 Priest

• #1.5 Midnight Mass

• #2 Sinner

• #3 Saint

Next up on the TBR pile:

Fledgling by Octavia E. Butler

Title: Fledgling

Author: Octavia E. Butler

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing 2007

Genre: Horror

Pages: 310

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Fall TBR

Fledgling, Octavia Butler’s last novel, is the story of an apparently young, amnesiac girl whose alarmingly un-human needs and abilities lead her to a startling conclusion: she is in fact a genetically modified, 53-year-old vampire. Forced to discover what she can about her stolen former life, she must at the same time learn who wanted—and still wants—to destroy her and those she cares for, and how she can save herself. Fledgling is a captivating novel that tests the limits of "otherness" and questions what it means to be truly human.

I picked this up as an extra buddy read with my Nerdy Bookish Friends group after we had read Parable of the Sower. I was definitely intrigued by the idea of Octavia Butler writing a vampire story. I dove in and was very disappointed by the actual story. The entire conceit is that our main character, a vampire, is suffering from amnesia. We have to learn about the world as she learns about the world. I get the concept, but it ends up resulting in a ton of exposition dumps. And the dialogue is often very clunky. None of the conversations seem natural. Finally we get the real reason that I gave it only 2 stars. Our main character is supposed to be 53 years old, but looks like she is 10 years old. Okay fine, but then she engages in very adult sexual encounters. Nope nope nope.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl

Title: Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise

Author: Ruth Reichl

Publisher: Penguin 2006

Genre: Nonfiction

Pages: 364

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Unread Shelf; Unread Shelf RC - Food/Cooking

GARLIC AND SAPPHIRES is Ruth Reichl's riotous account of the many disguises she employs to dine anonymously. There is her stint as Molly Hollis, a frumpy blond with manicured nails and an off-beige Armani suit that Ruth takes on when reviewing Le Cirque. The result: her famous double review of the restaurant: first she ate there as Molly; and then as she was coddled and pampered on her visit there as Ruth, New York Times food critic.

What is even more remarkable about Reichl's spy games is that as she takes on these various disguises, she finds herself changed not just superficially, but in character as well. She gives a remarkable account of how one's outer appearance can very much influence one's inner character, expectations, and appetites.

One of my book club selections for September and a book that has languished on my shelf for years. Unfortunately, I think it probably should have stayed there. I really enjoyed Reichl’s Save Me the Plums and hoped I would encounter the same fun and relatable woman in this earlier work about her job as a food critic. Instead, I feel like we get a very out-of-touch upper class woman intent on showing the common people the joy of food who actually shows us just how snobby many people (herself included) are when it comes to food. I am no stranger to good food and really enjoy tasting new flavors and expertly crafted dishes. But I realize that that’s not an everyday reality for most people (even me). Sometimes you just have to eat. Not everyone can be catered to and pay for a $100+ meal for one person. After about the fourth chapter, the book got really repetitively. I just ended dreading having to come back to this book.

Next up on the TBR pile:

The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin

Title: The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

Author: Gabrielle Zevin

Publisher: Algonquin Books 2014

Genre: Fiction

Pages: 260

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 

A. J. Fikry’s life is not at all what he expected it to be. He lives alone, his bookstore is experiencing the worst sales in its history, and now his prized possession, a rare collection of Poe poems, has been stolen. But when a mysterious package appears at the bookstore, its unexpected arrival gives Fikry the chance to make his life over--and see everything anew.

Definitely not my book. I should have known that anything labeled “sweet” was probably not going to appeal to my reading tastes. I was interested with the first two chapters, but then things went downhill immediately. Too many cutesy coincidences. Too many sweet interactions. Too many heartwarming conversations. I was rolling my eyes throughout the entire book. Curmudgeon characters are not my thing. I dislike when terminal diseases are used to pull at the heart-strings. I was not a fan of the weird time jumps. Overall, I very much disliked this book.

Next up on the TBR pile:

The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake

Title: Atlas Six (The Atlas #1)

Author: Olivie Blake

Publisher: Tor 2020

Genre: Fantasy

Pages: 375

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 

The Alexandrian Society, caretakers of lost knowledge from the greatest civilizations of antiquity, are the foremost secret society of magical academicians in the world. Those who earn a place among the Alexandrians will secure a life of wealth, power, and prestige beyond their wildest dreams, and each decade, only the six most uniquely talented magicians are selected to be considered for initiation.

Enter the latest round of six: Libby Rhodes and Nico de Varona, unwilling halves of an unfathomable whole, who exert uncanny control over every element of physicality. Reina Mori, a naturalist, who can intuit the language of life itself. Parisa Kamali, a telepath who can traverse the depths of the subconscious, navigating worlds inside the human mind. Callum Nova, an empath easily mistaken for a manipulative illusionist, who can influence the intimate workings of a person’s inner self. Finally, there is Tristan Caine, who can see through illusions to a new structure of reality—an ability so rare that neither he nor his peers can fully grasp its implications.

When the candidates are recruited by the mysterious Atlas Blakely, they are told they will have one year to qualify for initiation, during which time they will be permitted preliminary access to the Society’s archives and judged based on their contributions to various subjects of impossibility: time and space, luck and thought, life and death. Five, they are told, will be initiated. One will be eliminated. The six potential initiates will fight to survive the next year of their lives, and if they can prove themselves to be the best among their rivals, most of them will.

Most of them.

Goodness this was not good. I was super intrigued by the premise (I’m always up for a book about the Library of Alexandria), but this book did not live up to any of the promise. The plot moves incredibly slow with nothing really happening for about 80% of the book. I never felt compelled to pick it up and keep reading. That’s never a good sign. The characters are all pretty terrible. The jacket copy makes it seem that although they all start out as enemies, the six characters will come to care deeply for each other. They didn’t. They mostly hate it each other throughout the entire book. I just wanted to see some genuine affection for another person. If these six people are the best of the best, we are a species are doomed. They are all terrible. Libby may have been the least terrible, but she would have been a pain to live with and ended up with the corruption arc. That didn’t make any sense at all… I hated this book.

The Atlas

• #0.5 Sacred Hospitality

• #1 The Atlas Six

• #2 The Atlas Paradox

Next up on the TBR pile:

Pachinko by Lee Min-Jin

Title: Pachinko

Author: Lee Min-Jin

Publisher: Grand Central 2017

Genre: Historical Fiction

Pages: 490

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 

In the early 1900s, teenaged Sunja, the adored daughter of a crippled fisherman, falls for a wealthy stranger at the seashore near her home in Korea. He promises her the world, but when she discovers she is pregnant--and that her lover is married--she refuses to be bought. Instead, she accepts an offer of marriage from a gentle, sickly minister passing through on his way to Japan. But her decision to abandon her home, and to reject her son's powerful father, sets off a dramatic saga that will echo down through the generations.

Richly told and profoundly moving, Pachinko is a story of love, sacrifice, ambition, and loyalty. From bustling street markets to the halls of Japan's finest universities to the pachinko parlors of the criminal underworld, Lee's complex and passionate characters--strong, stubborn women, devoted sisters and sons, fathers shaken by moral crisis--survive and thrive against the indifferent arc of history.

Unfortunately, this one really did not work for me. Everything was so dour and bleak that I never wanted to pick this volume up. I let it languish on my nightstand for days while I read other books. I dreaded having to go back to this very serious novel. And I definitely was not a fan of the time jumps. I don’t really enjoy the “sweeping family saga” genre of books and this one fits that to a tee. The writing was very detached and void of emotion during the most intense scenes. I forced myself to finish as we had picked this one for book club., but I was not fan at all.

Next up on the TBR pile:

A Flicker in the Dark by Stacy Willingham

Title: A Flicker in the Dark

Author: Stacy Willingham

Publisher: Minotaur Books 2022

Genre: Mystery Thriller

Pages: 357

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 

When Chloe Davis was 12, six teenage girls went missing in her small Louisiana town. By the end of the summer, her own father had confessed to the crimes and was put away for life, leaving Chloe and the rest of her family to grapple with the truth and try to move forward while dealing with the aftermath.

Now 20 years later, Chloe is a psychologist in Baton Rouge and getting ready for her wedding. While she finally has a fragile grasp on the happiness she’s worked so hard to achieve, she sometimes feels as out of control of her own life as the troubled teens who are her patients. So when a local teenage girl goes missing, and then another, that terrifying summer comes crashing back. Is she paranoid, seeing parallels from her past that aren't actually there, or for the second time in her life, is Chloe about to unmask a killer?

Ooof. This is not what I wanted tor read this past week. I was hoping for a good mystery/thriller, but this is just full of 2-dimensional characters and terrible tropes detrimental to women. Our main character sometimes act like she’s 19 and other times like she’s 30. There’s a big mixed bag to her behaviors. And then we see how she operates as a psychologist and there is just so many ethical violations that I couldn’t take her seriously. Worst yet, she’s painted as an addict popping pills and downing alcohol that leaves her in a fugue state for most of the book. Can we stop with this trope. Women can have lots of issues and baggage to deal with without resorting to drugs and alcohol. And some women are addicts and alcoholic without the issues and baggage. The book really paints Chloe as some “typical” damaged woman and I was very over it but the middle of the book. And then we get to the central murder mystery and I cannot believe how the plot resolved itself. I was so angry. One visit from Chloe to her Dad or even her listening to mother would have pointed Chloe to the real killer. Instead we get the big red herring of the fiancee. And don’t get me started on the fact that the fiancee never actually communicated anything with Chloe. All these people kept way too many secrets from each other and that resulted in multiple girls being murder. I just could not handle this book at all.

Next up on the TBR pile:

The Bone Orchard by Sara A. Mueller

Title: The Bone Orchard

Author: Sara A. Mueller

Publisher: Tor Books 2022

Genre: Fantasy

Pages: 432

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Summer TBR

Charm is a witch, and she is alone. The last of a line of conquered necromantic workers, now confined within the yard of regrown bone trees at Orchard House, and the secrets of their marrow.

Charm is a prisoner, and a survivor. Charm tends the trees and their clattering fruit for the sake of her children, painstakingly grown and regrown with its fruit: Shame, Justice, Desire, Pride, and Pain.

Charm is a whore, and a madam. The wealthy and powerful of Borenguard come to her house to buy time with the girls who aren't real.

Except on Tuesdays, which is when the Emperor himself lays claim to his mistress, Charm herself.

But now—Charm is also the only person who can keep an empire together, as the Emperor summons her to his deathbed, and charges her with choosing which of his awful, faithless sons will carry on the empire—by discovering which one is responsible for his own murder.

If she does this last thing, she will finally have what has been denied her since the fall of Inshil—her freedom. But she will also be betraying the ghosts past and present that live on within her heart.

Charm must choose. Her dead Emperor’s will or the whispers of her own ghosts. Justice for the empire or her own revenge.

I’m very meh about this book. I was intrigued by the premise, but it think the story was too convoluted to live up the premise. Right away we’re thrown in a world without much information. That’s pretty standard for fantasy books. However, I don’t think this one every really explained much. We get a very confusing premise of the bone ghosts as being parts of Charm herself. If so, then how does Charm actually live. Splitting one’s self into different parts doesn’t seem like it would allow the original to live. And maybe she doesn’t really, the story get very unclear and strange from there. I couldn’t really keep her other parts straight and was confused about their names. Names hold power and usually tell us something about the character, but I couldn’t quite connect the dots on these. And then we get to the murder mystery/political intrigue sections of the book and I was completely over it. I did not care at all! I’ll be interested to see what everyone else thinks at book club, but this one was definitely not for me.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro

Title: Klara and the Sun

Author: Kazuo Ishiguro

Publisher: Knopf 2021

Genre: Scfi

Pages: 303

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Summer TBR

Here is the story of Klara, an Artificial Friend with outstanding observational qualities, who, from her place in the store, watches carefully the behavior of those who come in to browse, and of those who pass on the street outside. She remains hopeful that a customer will soon choose her. Klara and the Sun is a thrilling book that offers a look at our changing world through the eyes of an unforgettable narrator, and one that explores the fundamental question: what does it mean to love?

It’s the second Ishiguro that I’ve tried and he is definitely not for me. Overall, my big thought is that Ishiguro is just retreading sci-fi tropes and ideas but without adding anything new or interesting. I never found any part of this book to be new or fresh. I found no real message about humanity or identity. I definitely did not connect with any of the characters. Klara has the mindset of a 5-year-old and never really changes. Josie is a brat throughout the entire book. Ishiguro never really explains much of anything about the larger world or being “lifted.” The reader is left in the dark for most of this story and I just didn’t appreciate it. Is this supposed to be our future? If yes, then I need a actually discussion of how we are going wrong and how we can avoid it. We don’t get any of that. It’s just a superficial story. And don’t get me started on Klara’s insistence that the sun will bestow some blessing on Josie. Just ugh!

Next up on the TBR pile: