Les's Book Nook

  Title  - All The Dangerous Things Author  - Stacy Willingham ________________________________________________________________   spice 🌶 - 0 scare 😱 - 1 plot 📖 - 3 characters  🧍- 3 stars ⭐ - 3.5   The truth is, people love violence—from a distance, that is. Anyone who disagrees is either in denial or hiding something      Messy but dry is how I would best describe All the Dangerous Things . The plot consistently moves forward, but it wasn't until the last quarter of the book that I had those "oh my god what just happened" moments. Willingham set everything up to be knocked down, but reading over 200 pages of set-up work is slow going. The last quarter of the book did start spiraling and didn't stop even through the epilogue. *spoiler* On the other hand, *spoiler*      The "then" chapters were... interesting. Isabelle was around age eight and her sister was around age eight. However, Isabelle is written like she is considerably older than Margaret. Even

Title  - Remarkably Bright Creatures Author  - Shelby Van Pelt ________________________________________________________________   spice 🌶 - 1 scare 😱 - 0 plot 📖 - 5 characters  🧍- 4 stars ⭐ - 5 “Expect the unexpected, dear.” I would have been okay if this book never ended and I was stuck in the town of Sowell Bay forever.  Remarkably Bright Creatures  is by far the best debut novel I have read so far! I had apprehensions about the elusion to Marcellus's "communicating" with Tova in the synopsis. However, once I began reading, I quickly realized the friendship between Marcellus and Tova would be one of the most heartwarming things I had read thus far. I appreciate Van Pelt not making every character overly likable and the plot was not "wrapped up with a bow". It added an extra dimension to the book that I think the majority of books in this category are missing. The different cultures brought into this little coastal Washington town were amazing as well. I al

  Title  - A Court of Wings and Ruin (ACOTAR #3) Author  - Sarah J Maas ________________________________________________________________   spice 🌶 - 3.5 scare 😱 - 0 plot 📖 - 4.5 characters  🧍- 5 stars ⭐ - 4.5 If you haven't read the series up to here, proceed at your own risk.  After the cliffhanger of the second book, I was READY for this book to be everything and more that A Court of Mist and Fury was. A Court of Wings and Ruin pivoted from A Court of Mist and Fury in a way I surprisingly liked. The smut gets turned down in ACOWR and is much more strategy and battle-based. I was 100% into it. Enjoying ACOWR reassured me that I will enjoy the rest of Maas's books. The main thing that bugged me about ACOWR was that *BIG OLE MAJOR SPOILER* . The ending is wrapped up with a pretty little bow and everyone lives happily ever after. It just seemed all too perfect for what happened throughout the plot.   Feyre's badassery takes a step down in the second half of the book.

        While I wish I was a perfectly balanced reader, I am not. I have my favorite genres that dominated my reading over the year because of this my last post did not highlight some books I think deserve to be highlighted. So, I am following up with this post, the five worst and best books I have read this year.        I know that authors put so much time, effort, and imagination into their books that it really sucks when I know I have to throw out a one or two-star review. I always try to remember that reading is supposed to be enjoyable and reading a book that is not good is not a fun experience. Unfortunately, not all books can be winners and we as readers should share our honest reactions to books so other readers do not have the same fate as us: struggling through 300 pages over weeks wondering if it's going to get better when you know in your gut it's not going to get better.       On the flip side, nothing beats writing a rave review about a book you LOVE. I did not ge

You've seen the Kindle TBR - now it's time for the physical TBR! While I love my Kindle dearly, nothing beats a good ole book. I do tend to read more books on my Kindle, and there are a few reasons for that. Kindles are more convenient because you can easily fit them in a purse or bag without weighing it down and it's easier to get books for cheap and even free. Regardless of those two exceptional reasons, physical books are still superior. Walking through a bookstore with a coffee on a Sunday afternoon finding that perfect read is something I will never give up, no matter how convenient the alternative may be.  The unread section of my bookshelf is far smaller than I thought it was - thank god! Most of them I bought in one day as well.  I found myself in a Half Price Books on Labor Day weekend and I went a little crazy. On top of their already great prices, they were having a storewide sale for Labor Day. Five of the books listed were bought on that day. One is borrowed f

  As you can see in the picture above - I have a lot of Kindle reading to do in 2024. To make it even worse, I actually have double the amount of unread books on my Kindle. On Stuff Your Kindle Day I, well, stuffed the living hell out of my poor Kindle. This event happens like three times a year, for the rest of you that do this, how do you keep up - I have questions!  Back to the point - I picked out sixteen Kindle books from my never-ending unread Kindle section and made them THE official Kindle TBR. Some are from the Stuff Your Kindle Day (I promise only to mention that event seventy-four more times in this post), some are from Libby (if you don't know what Libby is please ask me, it is a FANTASTIC resource for readers), others are from Goodreads giveaways, and the rest I actually bought... all two of them. Below I will list each book and let you know why I picked it for the 2024 TBR. We're going to be here for a while, so might as well get started!  #1 The Invisible Hour -