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bookishvicky's reviews
173 reviews
Nevada by Imogen Binnie
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
Wanna preface this by saying I am a cisgender woman, so obviously this book is not for me and I’ll never be able to fully understand it. But my god this was BEAUTIFUL.
like the writing style is such a casual, blogging/ monologuing tone that it’s easy to understand this complex theory Maria talks about. It feels like Maria is a shitty old friend calling you up and telling you about her wild few months. Like she’s such a complex, cynical yet not character that I want 500 more pages of her inner dialogue.
Her Miranda Lambert rant, her “what do I not hate” rant, her thinking her bruise from getting slammed off her bike must look so cool— I love her and hate her. She’s everything.
The transition into James’s POV was a touch abrupt but I can overlook it since he’s also such an interesting character I wanna learn more about. As much as I wanna see his story progress, I think the ending was perfect. It was real, raw.
I can see why people cite this book as starting the trans literary genre. It’s a wild fucking ride and while again it wasn’t for me I still really enjoyed it.
like the writing style is such a casual, blogging/ monologuing tone that it’s easy to understand this complex theory Maria talks about. It feels like Maria is a shitty old friend calling you up and telling you about her wild few months. Like she’s such a complex, cynical yet not character that I want 500 more pages of her inner dialogue.
Her Miranda Lambert rant, her “what do I not hate” rant, her thinking her bruise from getting slammed off her bike must look so cool— I love her and hate her. She’s everything.
The transition into James’s POV was a touch abrupt but I can overlook it since he’s also such an interesting character I wanna learn more about. As much as I wanna see his story progress, I think the ending was perfect. It was real, raw.
I can see why people cite this book as starting the trans literary genre. It’s a wild fucking ride and while again it wasn’t for me I still really enjoyed it.
Haunted Ever After by Jen DeLuca
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
relaxing
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
I liked this one a lot! Boneyard Key felt very Salem-esque in being a tourist town with supernatural happenings. The vibes were comfortable and strongly small town without being too much of a stereotype.
I enjoyed the romance and characters, but nothing really jumped out. It was all pretty average.
I did however like the ghosts in this book! Sarah Hawkins communicating via magnet poetry was so fun, and the twist was well earned with how it was being teased. I found myself more intrigued with the Hawkins House story than Nick and Cassie’s romance, which at times felt rushed.
Overall, a good read for summer or fall if you want a mix of spooky and beach-y. I’m looking forward to the next in the series!
I enjoyed the romance and characters, but nothing really jumped out. It was all pretty average.
I did however like the ghosts in this book! Sarah Hawkins communicating via magnet poetry was so fun, and the twist was well earned with how it was being teased. I found myself more intrigued with the Hawkins House story than Nick and Cassie’s romance, which at times felt rushed.
Overall, a good read for summer or fall if you want a mix of spooky and beach-y. I’m looking forward to the next in the series!
Lucy Undying by Kiersten White
While this wasn’t my favorite interpretation of Dracula, I did have fun with it. The language was just so unique and distinctive and I liked Lucy and Iris’s romance. (You don’t need to have read Dracula before this to fully understand it, also, but it does add a layer having that prior knowledge.)
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
Thank you to NetGalley and Del Rey for an advanced eARC of Lucy Undying in exchange for a fair and honest review!
Rating: 4 stars
Pub Date: Nov 10 2024
“I have hidden sharp teeth after all, daydreaming the deaths of three perfectly fine men. I should repent. But repentance never seems to take with me.”
I was so, so excited to read this book, being an avid vampire fiction fan and lover of Lucy Westenra, who absolutely deserved her own book. However, Lucy Undying just didn’t scratch my itch for Lucy love.
The dialogue, format, and characterization of Lucy were all beautiful. I loved the epistolary formatting reminiscent of Dracula, and I found that despite going between three time periods at one point the narrative was easy enough to follow, and each kept me excited to learn more.
I ADORED reading about the Doctor, the Lover, and the Queen, these three nameless vampiric women Lucy encounters and tries to make companions with. Each had such distinct voices and personalities, and I could probably read a whole book about them.
However, despite the gorgeous language and unique characters, I found the plot to be lacking. The subplot about Iris and Godalming Life just felt out of place, and I wasn’t as invested in it as I was Lucy and Iris’s romance.
I also found that the book was one hundred pages longer than it had to be, and things sort of declined in excitement and pacing once the narrative took the characters to Boston.
My biggest disappointment, however, was the handling of the classic Dracula characters. I of course expected some subversion of the source material since Lucy is still alive here, but making certain characters villainous and resentful toward Lucy when in the novel they were anything but… kinda threw me for a loop.
Obviously this is just White’s interpretation, but personally it wasn’t my cup of tea to see characters from what I interpreted as a novel about the bonding together of humanity to defeat an evil being somehow turn out to be money hungry baddies.
I will say, there’s a point in the novel where it feels like White is directly writing to Lucy, and it was touching and raw and I found it to be such a fun idea to write a love story and letter to a classic literature character who got the short end of the stick.
While this wasn’t my favorite interpretation of Dracula, I did have fun with it. The language was just so unique and distinctive and I liked Lucy and Iris’s romance. (You don’t need to have read Dracula before this to fully understand it, also, but it does add a layer having that prior knowledge.)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Gore, Self harm, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Medical trauma, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Murder, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail
A Novel Love Story by Ashley Poston
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
“I was scared. I didn’t need love. But oh, oh, how I wanted it.”
I want to start this review off by saying that Ashely Poston has a magical ability to make me cry 30% through one of her books. Half of my comments consist of “love Poston’s humor,” “Ashley WHY,” and, most importantly, an embarrassing amount of notes screaming that we get another Benji cameo in one of her books.
A Novel Love Story hit too hard– I saw myself in Elsy, in her love for romance novels, a safe way to experience love and happy endings without risking heartbreak. The chapter detailing her story with Liam did fully make me cry. I’ll admit it. Poston has a way of making her characters come to life, and I found myself sympathizing with Elsy, feeling her devastation and heartbreak, her desire to get lost in familiar pages.
The concept of this book was so fun! I loved the details like the half thought-up menu, the graveyard of drafts, the repeating cycle of the days. My only complaint is I wish we knew more about HOW this fictional town came to life like it did– maybe it’s the fantasy fan in me, but I want all the details because it’s such a fascinating concept.
“I couldn’t remember the last time someone kissed me this passionately— savored me, like I was the last sentence in his favorite book.”
Onto Anders. I thought he was a touch bland compared to some other love interests Poston has given us, but I did enjoy seeing him and Elsy grow close, even if I did see the “twist” coming. As usual, Poston gave us a beautiful love story without relying too heavily on “spice,” which I find a lot of contemporary romances relying on to show us the connection between the main couple. Sometimes love is sugary spaghetti and tweed jackets, and it’s enough to make me want to bawl my eyes out :)
Another amazing read from Poston, absolutely 100% reccomend, I wanna open a bookstore now.
Fang Fiction by Kate Stayman-London
Fang Fiction does have some problems keeping pace and believability, but I did enjoy it. It was a fun fanfiction-like book with rich characters, witty dialogue, and some decent twists. Definitely recommend it if you're a fan of Buffy or The Vampire Diaries.
funny
hopeful
inspiring
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Thank you so much to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for an eARC of Fang Fiction in exchange for a fair and honest review.
“After three years of darkness, Tess Rosenbloom was finally ready to let in some light.”
I was unsure of this book at first, as a lot of the prologue and first few chapters were very much info dumps of Tess’s character and the lore of the books-within-a-book, Blood Feud. The dialogue felt stiff at times, and a lot of it was too unbelievable even for speculative fiction, until I realized I was reading it the wrong way— as the title and theme implies, this is fan fiction!
As soon as I just let myself have fun, I enjoyed this book a lot more. I do still have some questions, like why the tarot card was important, why witches could and did imprison vampires, why no one really cared their lives were being broadcast via books for years– but the ending definitely sets up for possible sequels and spin-offs, so I’m choosing to overlook those elements in favor of Joni and Octavia, the BEST couple and dynamic in this book.
Tess and Callum were a classic “Y/N and heart throb” story, but Joni and Octavia’s banter was so fun, I kind of wish the book was just about them, or at least setting Joni as the main protagonist.
Another thing, the perspectives were hard to follow at times, and there were a lot of instances where there’d be “and it was all a dream” scenes, which don’t sit right with me. I also found the transcripts annoying at first, but they grew on me toward the end.
I’d absolutely read any subsequent novels in this world, if not to learn more about the vampires (the scene where the side characters lamented being side characters in the Blood Feud books was pretty good).
Fang Fiction does have some problems keeping pace and believability, but I did enjoy it. It was a fun fanfiction-like book with rich characters, witty dialogue, and some decent twists. Definitely recommend it if you're a fan of Buffy or The Vampire Diaries.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness, Violence, and Blood
Moderate: Rape and Sexual assault
Queen Among the Dead by Lesley Livingston
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
I really wanted to like this, but there was WAY too much lore dumped at the beginning, and so much going on that I couldn’t really follow much or like the characters, who were kind of lacking in depth. Ronan was barely developed, and the romance fell flat.
The writing was vivid and beautiful, and the action scenes were done well. This would be ideal for fans of Tamora Pierce.
The writing was vivid and beautiful, and the action scenes were done well. This would be ideal for fans of Tamora Pierce.
Leather & Lark by Brynne Weaver
3.0
Every trigger warning imaginable
Not as fun as B&B ? Like it was fine, but neither character had much depth to them and the plot got lost in the romance too much
Not as fun as B&B ? Like it was fine, but neither character had much depth to them and the plot got lost in the romance too much
The Darkness Outside Us by Eliot Schrefer
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
“We’ve only ever known each other.”
So what the hell am I supposed to write for a review? Can I add a picture of me crying, of me finishing this in a day and feeling like I’m a little speck in a universe where this god damn thing exists?
You watch Wall-E? Yeah take that and multiply it by a thousand sadness and make it gay (I mean. Did the robots have gender? Was it already gay? I digress).
“You might be loving each other deeper than any humans have ever loved, have ever needed to love, have ever had the occasion to love.”
A gorgeous, gorgeous story of the will of love and humanity, the wood of a violin that still makes music thousands of years after the last trees have died. I tend to avoid sci-fi for this very reason, it makes me feel things and it makes me sad.
This novel was so raw. I haven’t felt this nauseous and struck since “Hell Followed With Us”. Good book. What the fuck though.
So what the hell am I supposed to write for a review? Can I add a picture of me crying, of me finishing this in a day and feeling like I’m a little speck in a universe where this god damn thing exists?
You watch Wall-E? Yeah take that and multiply it by a thousand sadness and make it gay (I mean. Did the robots have gender? Was it already gay? I digress).
“You might be loving each other deeper than any humans have ever loved, have ever needed to love, have ever had the occasion to love.”
A gorgeous, gorgeous story of the will of love and humanity, the wood of a violin that still makes music thousands of years after the last trees have died. I tend to avoid sci-fi for this very reason, it makes me feel things and it makes me sad.
This novel was so raw. I haven’t felt this nauseous and struck since “Hell Followed With Us”. Good book. What the fuck though.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cancer, Confinement, Death, Violence, Blood, Vomit, and Grief
Moderate: Mental illness, Sexual content, Terminal illness, Medical content, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Suicidal thoughts
My Vampire Plus-One by Jenna Levine
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group for an advanced eARC of this book for a fair and honest review!
“Could she tell just by looking at me how badly I wanted to bury my face in her hair? To bury my teeth in her neck, too– if she would allow it?”
I want to start this review off by saying this was leagues more entertaining than My Roommate’s a Vampire. I enjoyed that, but I feel like Levine really just nailed the balance of plot, romance, and vampire goodness in this one. Reggie was my favorite back in Roommate, and he is absolutely ADORABLE in My Vampire Plus-One.
I thought Amelia was a bit bland– not to compare FMCs, but Cassie had more personality than Amelia (though I did like her superpower being tax law, that was kinda fun). I do feel like it was needed to balance with Reggie’s chaos.
Unlike the first book, this wasn’t dull at all and had me laughing out loud a good number of times. The spice was spicing for sure, too (Reggie has a filthy mouth underneath Old Fuzzy). The romance felt developed, and while I wasn’t a huge fan of the overhaul of tropes in the Wisconsin scenes, I do feel like Levine made it unique enough to make it work.
One final note that may be a spoiler- I am SO disappointed we didn’t get Frederick turning Cassie in the last book or a sort of novella. I feel like this was a huge moment for that couple that just happened in passing during this book’s events, which sucks (no pun intended) because I truly enjoy Levine’s vampire lore compared to some other vampire-themed romcoms out there.
All in all, a fun and cute romance I devoured in a few days. Would definitely recommend for anyone looking for eye-rollingly bad humor and sweet bloodsuckers.