09-07-2024
For The Xennials. Yes, we are a tighter demographic than most others, but we - those born roughly 1978 to 1983 - are still mighty, and this book hits us pretty directly. While directly pulling from a hidden-just-e
[Continue Reading]09-06-2024
For this blog tour, we're looking at a book where *everyone* has secrets... and even the secrets have secrets. For this blog tour, we're looking at The Summer Reunion by Leah Mercer.
[Continue Reading]09-04-2024
A Cozy Comfortable (Cat) Blanket. Sometimes You Just Need Space To Heal. Ok, so I can't decide on a title for this review and both of those work, so this review gets two titles. :) The first was stolen from a phrase another reviewer us
[Continue Reading]08-30-2024
For this blog tour, we're looking at a book that has a WTF or two, but also quite a bit to love. For this blog tour, we're looking at Magical Meet Cute by Jean Meltzer.
First, the review I posted to the book sites (/ BookHype.com / BookBub.com / TheStoryGraph.com / Goodreads.com):
Lots To Love - With a WTF Or Two. First, my own "WTF" is the intense focus on anti-Semitism (meaning anti-Jew, specifically, even though Arabs are also Semitic, according to the actual genetic definition) throughout the text - but Meltzer actually uses that, eventually, to get into areas she's never really gone to in my experience reading most of her books. Thus, that actually turned into a good thing, as she was able to use it to further her growth as a storyteller.[Continue Reading]And that actually gets into the lots to love here. Meltzer is unapologetic in seeking to make Jewish lives more "normal" to an outside audience, usually by taking quirky characters and showing them loving, laughing, making mistakes, learning from them... you know, doing the stuff we pretty well all do. But also including quite a bit of Jewish specific elements, here mostly focusing on magic and in particular the concept of the golem - which is more often, in my reading experience, used in science fiction to varying degrees. (Both Jeremy Robinson and Kent Holloway have used them quite effectively, among others.) Meltzer even provides some in-story exposition on the histor
08-30-2024
Distorting The Discussion. For a book about the history of the Electoral College that opens up admitting that the author thinks the Electoral College is foolhardy at best... the actual history here is quite good, and absolutely stuff virtually no one learns about even with a major in American History in college. (Perhaps Masters' or PhD students specifically studying the EC or at least the Constitutional Convention that created it would know at least some o
[Continue Reading]08-30-2024
Solid - And Solidly Dense - Examination Of The Topic. You know those jokes about the Christmas fruitcakes that are so dense you could use them as an anvil or eve
[Continue Reading]08-30-2024
'Deliciously Dark' Sounds Apt But Becomes Problematic. Without going into spoiler territory, I can't find a better title for
[Continue Reading]08-27-2024
Strong Multi-Generational Tale. With this tale, Walker expands into something I've never seen from him (though I *am* a somewhat recent fan, only finding him within the 2020s or so) - a dual timeline, present day/ historical f
[Continue Reading]08-27-2024
Want An Election Themed Book That AVOIDS The Real Ones Entirely? Here Ya Go! Seriously, this book does a phenomenal job - tru
[Continue Reading]08-26-2024
An Imagined History. Pishko starts off this text openly admitting that, as the Southport NC Police Dept cop who murdered Keith Vidal in North Carolina a decade ago this year said less than two minutes after encountering Vidal - and 14 s
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