ARC Roundup: April 2018

April 19, 2018 - Monica Leave a comment

It’s been so long since I’ve had a chance to blog that a lot of really wonderful ARCs I’ve received lately have gone un-reviewed–until today! Today’s roundup includes books about friendship, science fiction, and (of course) murder mysteries.

Death at the Selig Studios

The next book in the Emily Cabot series is set in 1909 and involves the blossoming film industry. Interestingly, Emily is very judgmental of the actors and actresses, thinking that the films are tawdry and for the working class. When Emily’s brother Alden, who is involved in the movies (and possibly with one of the actresses), is accused of murder, Emily is torn between her desire to vindicate her brother and her desire to make him face the consequences of his choices.

I like how the historical setting in this book made such a difference in the characters’ actions and attitudes, making it different from many historical fiction mysteries I’ve read in which the time period stays firmly in the background. If you enjoy the combination of historical fiction and murder mysteries, you might want to give this series a try.

Strawberries and Strangers

Dumped by her cheating husband, Jenny King is trying to build a new life in the small seaside town of Pelican Cove. Locals are lining up at the Boardwalk Café for her tasty cakes and muffins. But when her aunt is accused of killing a stranger, Jenny is forced to set her apron aside and put on her sleuthing cap.

Jenny battles with the cranky local sheriff and quirky local characters to get to the truth. Aided by her new friends, she will move heaven and earth to find out who the dead stranger was and what he was doing in Pelican Cove.

If you like cozy murder mysteries with friendly small towns, scenic settings, yummy food and a touch of romance, you will like Strawberries And Strangers. (Summary via the author)

Romance and mystery abound on a small island on the East Coast. After a murder at one of the most exclusive parties in this small town, Jenny splits her time between wrangling with the sheriff, whom she can’t seem to meet without arguing, and trying to prove the innocence of her aunt.

I enjoyed the island setting–you know I love a cozy mystery with a good setting–and the interesting characters who populate the island. I’m usually not a big fan of romance, so I didn’t care much about Jenny’s love life in the book, but I am curious about where it will go in future installments. If you prefer a modern cozy mystery over a historical one, this is a light, relaxing read.

Belong

This book about friendship was lovely; much better than I anticipated. The design of the book is beautiful, and the advice contained within goes far beyond the usual tips for making friends. Agrawal suggests that you go IN first and gently deal with your own baggage, discovering what kind of friends you’re looking for and what kind of friends you need to distance yourself from, before you go OUT and find these people in the real world. Some of her advice wasn’t great (I couldn’t fathom why the author is so against identifying as an introvert or extrovert when this can be such a helpful tool in understanding personality, especially since both types clearly want and need friends), but on the whole, I greatly enjoyed the book. If you want a book about making friends that avoids cliches and has a lovely design, I highly recommend this one.

Rating: Pretty Darn Good

Fresh Ink

I really enjoyed this collection of YA short stories. Some are SFF, some are stories set in the real world, and all feature diverse characters of all kinds by many wonderful authors. I would love to read some full-length books by these authors (and, in fact, I have several of their novels on my TBR list!).

Rating: Pretty Darn Good

Apple Strudel Alibi

This book is a fun addition to the Oxford Tearoom series, in which Gemma and the Old Biddies go to Vienna and must solve a murder which takes place in their hotel. I missed the usual Oxford setting (always one of my favorite parts of the books in this series), but it was fun to see Gemma and some of our other favorite characters in a new setting. As always, the mystery and the characters are fun and lighthearted. If you’ve enjoyed other books in this series, you’ll like this one too.

Rating: Pretty Darn Good

Bob

Bob is a fun, short story of a girl rediscovering a childhood friend–who might just be a zombie. But this middle grades book isn’t scary. It’s fun and sweet and heartwarming and a little magical. It hasn’t stuck with me, but I enjoyed it as I read it.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

The Inventors at No. 8

George, also known as Lord Devonshire, is living in a crumbling house with only an old manservant for company, after the unlucky deaths of both his parents. When he reluctantly tries to sell his grandfather’s map, he meets up with Ada (a young Ada Lovelace) and Oscar, who loves painting and adventuring with his orangutan. They go on a wild adventure across Europe in order to find George’s lost family treasure, find Oscar’s pirate father, and save Ada from the organization who wishes her harm.

I liked Ada and her flying machine, but I found both orangutan-owning Oscar and curmudgeonly George to be irritating. Still, the group’s adventure was fun, and their friendship despite the frequently insensitive or hurtful comments they made to each other was a lot more realistic than most friendships in MG books.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

The New Jim Crow

April 6, 2018April 6, 2018 - Monica Leave a comment

The New Jim Crow was hugely popular when it came out a couple of years ago. It took me a while to get to it, as I knew it was going to be depressing, but I finally read it. It wasn’t exactly eye-opening for me–I knew a fair amount of this information already–but from the buzz around the book, it seems like a lot of people weren’t aware. Today I’ve teamed up with my husband to ask him about his thoughts on some of the things I found interesting from The New Jim Crow. Although he hasn’t read the book, he spent a year working as a correctional officer, and his insights on life in prison are helpful in light of the contents of this book. I’ve chosen a few of my favorite quotes and takeaways from the book, and he has responded to several of them. (My own notes are in italics.)

Prisons “create crime rather than prevent it” — What a lot of people don’t realize is that prison has this tendency to teach people to do what they can get away with in order to make their lives even a little easier, largely because the system isn’t designed to be worked within. For instance, the facility that I worked at had housing units with one central HVAC system that had a thermostat that only the maintenance personnel had access to (even I, as the unit officer, couldn’t access it to make it more comfortable for myself). Often the inmates who were really cold at night would block their vents with cardboard to make it warmer, even if it was against policy. During morning inspection, on a regular basis, I would hear inmates get caught with blocked vents, and they were told that they would get written up. Many of the non security personnel or lower ranked command staff would say something along the lines of, “Do what you need to do to be comfortable at night, but make sure it’s down by inspection so I don’t have to write you up.” That attitude doesn’t exactly teach or reward people for working within the system, rather the opposite, and it was just one of many things that I saw day to day that showed how counterintuitive the American idea of rehabilitation is.

“Many offenders are tracked for prison at early ages, labeled as criminals in their teen years, and then shuttled from their decrepit, underfunded inner city schools to brand-new, high-tech prisons.” — I began working as a correctional officer right after graduating college, around the age of 23. A surprising amount of inmates in my general population unit were my age or younger, and they often told me about how they were shuffled from extended families to juvenile detention to the foster care system, until they found themselves in prison. It always showed itself as a socioeconomic thing. I rarely heard a story of how someone had an upbringing of affluence and advantage and ended up in prison. (The New Jim Crow states that, ironically, the poor and black citizens of our country “find it increasingly difficult to obtain education, especially now that funding for public education has been hard hit, due to exploding prison budgets.” If you want to learn more about how socioeconomic status, race, and school zoning are interconnected in ways that make it hard or impossible for students of color to get ahead, you must read The Shame of the Nation, which covers this topic in depth.)

Charges associated with parole, probation, etc. can’t be paid by felons who can’t get a job, so they often end up back in prison, where almost all their wages go toward room and board in the prison. — As a housing unit officer, I was directly in charge of two housing units that held 54 inmates apiece, so I was in direct contact with 108 convicted felons on a daily basis. I would estimate that at least half of those inmates were up for parole or release within five years. The lucky ones would talk about living with a cousin or their parents for a while. One guy talked about how a family member had a used car lot in Knoxville, so he’d give selling cars a try instead of cocaine. A lot of them simply talked about how their family was either dead or wanted nothing to do with them, and most their friends were either dead or in prison as well. These people usually said they were trying to get into a halfway house that might let them stay for a couple months, but had nothing in the way of job prospects or contacts. Our facility didn’t have much in the way of job training. They closed down the HVAC school while I was there, the culinary program was really small and usually only populated by inmates on good behavior (i.e. those who were often down for long sentences), and the GED program was usually run by people who couldn’t cut it teaching in a real school (like so many non-security positions in our facility). For inmates without a support system after getting out, all I saw was desperation and apprehension. I’m not surprised at all that the recidivism rate is so high in America.

The main thing I took away from this book is how flawed our entire justice system is. From the policies our representatives make (so many policies, like the five year time limit on TANF, requiring an ID for voting, etc. seem legitimate until you look at how they affect the disenfranchised) to the police who enforce them (did you know that police can confiscate property whether or not you are eventually charged with a crime?) and the judges who sentence them (it’s amazing how much lawyers and the Supreme Court rely on upholding former cases and laws, even if they are clearly flawed), every step on the path to prison is filled with issues that need to be solved.

And these issues disproportionately affect black people, which is, of course, why the author calls mass incarceration “the new Jim Crow.” If you need stats, these are the ones that I found most shocking:

“In less than thirty years, the U.S. penal population exploded from around 300,000 to more than 2 million, with drug convictions accounting for the majority of the increase.”
The United States currently imprisons a larger percentage of its black population than South Africa did at the height of apartheid.
“The mass incarceration of people of color is a big part of the reason that a black child born today is less likely to be raised by both parents than a black child born during slavery.”

If mass incarceration and racial disparity in our judicial system are topics that you want to know more about, this book will inform you and outrage you. Definitely recommended.

Newbery Roundup: March 2018

March 22, 2018March 20, 2018 - Monica Leave a comment

I’m continuing to request all the oldest Newbery books through our amazing interlibrary loan, but since it takes time to get each book shipped to my library system, it has been slow going. These three books are the latest (oldest) Newbery honors I’ve been reading.

Jane’s Island

I enjoyed Jane’s Island a lot more than I anticipated. Ellen is hired to care for Jane, a free spirited girl spending the summer with her family in a scientific community on the water. Their summer is full of adventure, swimming, fishing, exploration, picnics, and science experiments. If you like old-fashioned children’s adventures like The Penderwicks and Swallows and Amazons, you’ll enjoy this book.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

Out of the Flame

This historical fiction novel was all right, but I must say it took me a while to get into the story. In fact, I thought it started out really boring. The book follows Pierre, a page in the French court, who goes on adventures and tries to befriend Prince Henri. I think I would have enjoyed this book more if I knew more of the actual history behind Pierre, the young princes, and the royal family in general.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

Boy of the South Seas

This one was… okay. This book covers the adventures and travels of a Polynesian boy, but these are not very exciting. After accidentally stowing away on a boat, the boy is dropped off on an island near Tahiti, where he makes his home and learns more about the ways of both the island’s colonizers and his own people. The book is short, and not much happens. I can’t see many of today’s children becoming engrossed in the story.

Rating: Meh

Fiction Roundup: February 2018

February 28, 2018 - Monica Leave a comment

An eclectic assortment of fiction books I've been reading lately. | Book reviews by NewberyandBeyond.com — .

I’ve been reading an eclectic mix of fiction over the past two months, and they’ve all been enjoyable in different ways. But if you want to find out which book actually captured my imagination and kept me turning pages, scroll down to the end of this post!

(All summaries via Goodreads.com)

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency

What do a dead cat, a computer whiz-kid, an Electric Monk who believes the world is pink, quantum mechanics, a Chronologist over 200 years old, Samuel Taylor Coleridge (poet), and pizza have in common? Apparently not much; until Dirk Gently, self-styled private investigator, sets out to prove the fundamental interconnectedness of all things by solving a mysterious murder, assisting a mysterious professor, unravelling a mysterious mystery, and eating a lot of pizza – not to mention saving the entire human race from extinction along the way (at no extra charge).

This mystery/ghost story/sci fi novel by Hitchhiker’s Guide author, Douglas Adams, is just about what you would expect it to be. The book is funny and bizarre, and although it is (mostly) centered on earth rather than on space, it still has that science fiction/supernatural element that Adams is known for. If you’re looking for a quirky, entertaining book that defies strict genre classification, you’ll probably like this book.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

Little Elvises

LA burglar Junior Bender has (unfortunately) developed a reputation as a competent private investigator for crooks. The unfortunate part about this is that regardless of whether he solves the crime or not, someone dangerous is going to be unhappy with him, either his suspect or his employer.

Now Junior is being bullied into proving aging music industry mogul Vinnie DiGaudio is innocent of the murder of a nasty tabloid journalist he’d threatened to kill a couple times. It doesn’t help that the dead journalist’s widow is one pretty lady, and she’s trying to get Junior to mix pleasure with business. Just as the investigation is spiraling out of control, Junior’s hard-drinking landlady begs him to solve the disappearance of her daughter, who got involved with a very questionable character. And, worst news of all, both Junior’s ex-wife and his thirteen-year-old daughter, Rina, seem to have new boyfriends. What a mess.

I read the first book in this series a long time ago, and I finally got my hands on a copy of the second book. The Junior Bender series has a bit more grit and gore than the mysteries I typically read–think action movie complete with guns and car chases–but it’s nothing too intense. Just like in the first book, the characters are interesting, the writing is fast-paced, and the mystery will keep you engaged. I did find a fair amount of weirdness in this book (why does the 37-year-old character living in 2012 not understand how to use Google and YouTube? What’s up with Junior’s relationship with his ex-wife, his daughter, and women in general?), but I’m still looking forward to reading the next book in the series.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

No matter what he does or the decisions he makes, when death comes, Harry always returns to where he began, a child with all the knowledge of a life he has already lived a dozen times before. Nothing ever changes.

Until now.

As Harry nears the end of his eleventh life, a little girl appears at his bedside. ‘I nearly missed you, Doctor August,’ she says. ‘I need to send a message.’

This is the story of what Harry does next, and what he did before, and how he tries to save a past he cannot change and a future he cannot allow.

This book has some similarities to Life After Life, which you may recall is one of my favorite books ever. The kalachakra live the same life over and over again, with complete memory of all previous lives. Harry has to outwit his former friend Vincent, who is having kalachakra killed before they are born, destroying Chronus clubs, and trying to build a quantum mirror, no matter what the cost.

I think the fact that this book is similar to one of my all-time favorite books did it a disservice, as I kept comparing it unfavorably to Life After Life. The other main issue I had with the book is the torture scenes (yes, multiple). It was a little too intense for me, and I had to stop listening to the audio book and borrow an ebook version so I could skim the rough parts.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

The Maltese Falcon

Sam Spade is hired by the fragrant Miss Wonderley to track down her sister, who has eloped with a louse called Floyd Thursby. But Miss Wonderley is in fact the beautiful and treacherous Brigid O’Shaughnessy, and when Spade’s partner Miles Archer is shot while on Thursby’s trail, Spade finds himself both hunter and hunted: can he track down the jewel-encrusted bird, a treasure worth killing for, before the Fat Man finds him?

I don’t enjoy a detective story as much as other kinds of mysteries, but I can see why this book is a classic. Sam Spade is iconic as the hard-boiled PI, and I did enjoy reading about his adventures. The book is very well written, but (of course) filled with sexism. I have another Dashiell Hammett book on my TBR list, so I’m looking forward to more tight writing, well-crafted characters, and several sighs and eyebrow raises over the author’s treatment and portrayal of women and minorities.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

Year of Wonders

When an infected bolt of cloth carries plague from London to an isolated village, a housemaid named Anna Frith emerges as an unlikely heroine and healer. Through Anna’s eyes we follow the story of the fateful year of 1666, as she and her fellow villagers confront the spread of disease and superstition. As death reaches into every household and villagers turn from prayers to murderous witch-hunting, Anna must find the strength to confront the disintegration of her community and the lure of illicit love. As she struggles to survive and grow, a year of catastrophe becomes instead annus mirabilis, a “year of wonders.”

This book is my favorite on this list, and honestly, one of my favorite books of 2018 so far. It provides a well-researched, heartbreaking look at a village who cut themselves off from the world when the plague started to ravage their residents. The novel looks not only at how the disease makes life difficult, but how residents sometimes turn on each other rather than supporting each other. It’s fascinating historical fiction, and the author’s note provides interesting information on how much of the story is based in fact. I highly recommend Year of Wonders whether or not you think you’re interested in the plague. It’s that good.

Rating: Pretty Darn Good

Comics Roundup: February 2018

February 21, 2018 - Monica Leave a comment

The best of the comics I've been digging into lately--starring strong, interesting, flawed female leads. | Book reviews by NewberyandBeyond.com — .

I’ve been reading a lot of comics over the past few weeks, and I’ve found some that I really enjoyed. I discovered that most of my favorite comics are published by Boom! Studios (Lumberjanes, Adventure Time, Giant Days, and Goldie Vance are all theirs), so I’m really excited to explore some more of their series. (Note: Because I’ve read varying numbers of issues for each of these series, I’m just writing a brief summary of the series as a whole, rather than trying to give a specific rundown of each issue’s plot!)

Giant Days

Three college girls overcome boy troubles, finals, and childhood enemies, making each college event an adventure.

I’m loving the female characters and their college mishaps in this series! The girls are very different from each other, which makes them a lot of fun to follow, but it also creates tension within their group. I’m really looking forward to reading the rest of this series. It brings back memories about the crazy adventures of college, while also coating all the boring parts with a layer of fun and silliness.

Rating: Pretty Darn Good

Lumberjanes

A group of girls at summer camp discovers that there’s more to the camp than meets the eye–in fact, there are a lot of magical creatures and adventures to discover.

The continuing adventures of the Lumberjane girls! I read several issues of this series previously, and I really enjoyed it. I wish I hadn’t waited so long to read the most recent issues, as I had forgotten some of what happened in earlier issues. But this is still one of my favorite comics ever.

Rating: Pretty Darn Good

Goldie Vance

Goldie Vance, a young valet at a hotel in Florida, is constantly getting wrapped in mysteries.

Goldie is constantly getting into trouble investigating mysteries when she’s supposed to be parking cars, but that’s exactly what makes her fun to follow. The old-fashioned Florida resort is a great setting, too.

Rating: Pretty Darn Good

Paper Girls

A group of rough and tumble girls discover a possible alien invasion during their route and have to fight to stay safe.

This series is a bit harsher than the other comics I’ve been reading lately. There is more swearing and more content that is… not for kids. It feels similar, really to the other Brian K. Vaughan comic I’ve read. I did enjoy reading it, but I’m not sure if I will continue the series.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

Gravity Falls

Dipper and Mabel end up spending the summer at Gravity Falls, fighting wacky monsters while hanging out with their weird Grunkle Stan.

This was okay. I’ve never seen Gravity Falls, although I’ve heard the show is very good, so maybe I’m missing something? I’ll probably read the next collection in the series, just to make sure. It just doesn’t come across as quite as funny or clever as I’m sure the TV show was.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

ARC Reviews: The Boy from Tomorrow and Seven Pets for Seven Witches

February 16, 2018 - Monica Leave a comment

Quick ARC reviews of The Boy from Tomorrow and Seven Pets for Seven Witches. #spon | Book reviews by NewberyandBeyond.com — .

*Note: I received a free copy of these books from the publishers. All opinions are my own.

(All summaries via Goodreads.com)

Seven Pets for Seven Witches

Double, double toil and trouble…
The pets in these cozy paranormal short stories are stirring up nothing but fun—and maybe a dash of trouble—for the witches in their lives.

These short stories are fun, cozy mysteries about witches and their pets/familiars. It’s impressive how, although these stories are written by different authors about different characters, they all hang together so well–each has a similar feel. All the stories are silly and sweet. If you like cozy mysteries with a bit of magic, you’ll find plenty of new authors here.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

The Boy from Tomorrow

Josie and Alec both live at 444 Sparrow Street. They sleep in the same room, but they’ve never laid eyes on each other. They are twelve years old but a hundred years apart.

The children meet through a handpainted spirit board—Josie in 1915, Alec in 2015—and form a friendship across the century that separates them. But a chain of events leave Josie and her little sister Cass trapped in the house and afraid for their safety, and Alec must find out what’s going to happen to them. Can he help them change their future when it’s already past?

A girl from 1915 and a boy from 2015 are able to communicate through a talking board (basically a Ouija board), and what they say changes each child’s life. It’s both exciting and heart-wrenching to watch as Alec uses his resources–the library and the internet–to help Josie and her sister escape from their abusive mother.

At the beginning, this book seems like it’s going to be spooky and mystical. Both Alec and Josie initially think they’re communicating with spirits through the talking board. But when it becomes clear that the two kids are communicating across time, the story becomes much more interesting.

This book isn’t for everyone. I think younger kids are likely to be frightened by the spooky events, or by the abuse Josie and Cass suffer. But for older kids, this book has a fun twist on the typical ghost story.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

Newbery Reviews: 1945

February 9, 2018February 9, 2018 - thetangoclubgirl Leave a comment

Quick reviews of the 1945 Newbery books. | Book reviews by NewberyandBeyond.com — .

Today we’re going back in time again, this time to review the Newbery books of 1945! (Book summaries via Goodreads.com)

Medal Winner: Rabbit Hill

It has been a while since Folks lived in the Big House, and an even longer time has passed since there has been a garden at the House. All the animals of the Hill are very excited about the new Folks moving in, and they wonder how things are going to change. It’s only a matter of time before the animals of the Hill find out just who is moving in, and they may be a little bit surprised when they do.

I remember this as a very cute animal story by Robert Lawson (and as longtime readers know, I usually don’t like animal stories). This is a fun book for younger kids, but I’m not sure I would re-read it as an adult.

Rating: Good but Forgettable

The Hundred Dresses

Eleanor Estes’s The Hundred Dresses won a Newbery Honor in 1945 and has never been out of print since. At the heart of the story is Wanda Petronski, a Polish girl in a Connecticut school who is ridiculed by her classmates for wearing the same faded blue dress every day. Wanda claims she has one hundred dresses at home, but everyone knows she doesn’t and bullies her mercilessly. The class feels terrible when Wanda is pulled out of the school, but by that time it’s too late for apologies. Maddie, one of Wanda’s classmates, ultimately decides that she is “never going to stand by and say nothing again.”

In this Newbery classic, Wanda is constantly bullied and teased by her classmates, and it isn’t until she leaves the school that her classmate Maddie learns the truth about Wanda. This is a sad but sweet and touching story with beautiful illustrations. Eleanor Estes wrote several Newbery books, but I think this is her most memorable. I would definitely recommend you give this short book a read (or a re-read).

Rating: Pretty Darn Good

Small Goals + What I’m Into, February 2018

February 2, 2018 - Monica Leave a comment

I'm sharing my February 2018 small goals + the things I'm into right now. | Book reviews by NewberyandBeyond.com — .

As always, I’m linking up with writes like a girl for my February 2018 small goals, and Leigh Kramer for my monthly what I’m into.

What a whirlwind January was! It was stuffed with craziness, some of it good, a lot of it… not good. To be honest, I totally forgot what my small goals were until I re-read my post this morning!

~~Make appointments for upcoming events~~. I’m working on it. Some appointments finished, some scheduled, some still waiting to be decided. But I’m counting this one finished for now.
~~Read at least three books in the towering TBR pile by my bed~~. I actually did great on this one! I read five books from my TBR stack, I only checked out one book from the library, and I requested only four ARCs (usually I go a little crazy and request a bunch at the beginning of the year), two of which I’ve already finished.
~~Make dinner more often~~. Well… mostly. I’ve made dinner twice, which doesn’t seem like a lot, but it’s a start.
~~Do a digital declutter~~. Sigh. Yes. I hated it, but I did it.

I am amazed that amidst the stress and busyness of January, I was able to complete all four of my goals! Here’s hoping my February goals go even better:

Design a library bag. I need a big canvas bag to carry all my library books. I saw an adorable one on Etsy that sadly is no longer for sale, so I’ve ordered a plain canvas bag and iron-on transfer paper. Now I just need to design it!
Start meditating again. Whether you call it mindfulness or meditation, it helps keep my anxious thoughts from spiraling. And I’ve been neglecting this lately. I want to get back into meditating more consistently.
Go on a spending freeze. It’s that time again! Whenever a particularly large bill hits, I like to go on a spending freeze so we can start rebuilding our savings.

What I’m Into

Books I’m looking forward to reading: The one new thing I have requested recently is comics! I have several digital copies awaiting me, and they’ve been a really nice, relaxing thing to read in between heavier books.

TV shows I’ve watched: I just started watching The Good Place, and it is bizarre and wonderful.

Instagram account I’m loving: I’ve been laughing at Overheard New York‘s hilarious (and often swear-filled, so be aware!) overheard conversations.

My favorite Instagram:

Curious what my TBR stack looked like at the beginning of the month? Here it is:

My goal for January is to tackle this towering TBR stack. So many great books that I still haven’t gotten around to reading! Please tell me I’m not the only one whose TBR has gotten out of control… #bookstagram #tbrpile

A post shared by Monica Fastenau (@monica.fastenau) on Jan 17, 2018 at 6:29am PST

If you’d like to follow me on Instagram (I post lots of book pictures and the occasional selfie), you can do so here.

If you want to see more of what I’m into every month, along with sneak peeks and my favorite posts from the blog, sign up for my email newsletter! It’ll show up in your inbox about once a month and bring you the latest blog news and the things I’m loving.

What are you all up to this month? Let me know in the comments!

ARC Roundup: April 2018

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The New Jim Crow

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Newbery Roundup: March 2018

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Fiction Roundup: February 2018

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Comics Roundup: February 2018

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ARC Reviews: The Boy from Tomorrow and Seven Pets for Seven Witches

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Newbery Reviews: 1945

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Small Goals + What I’m Into, February 2018

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