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Book Review: The Witch’s Orchard

Rating: 4 stars

A ninth generation Appalachian herself, Archer Sullivan brings the mountains of North Carolina to life in The Witch’s Orchard, a wonderfully atmospheric novel that introduces private investigator Annie Gore.

Former Air Force Special Investigator Annie Gore joined the military right after high school to escape the fraught homelife of her childhood. Now, she’s getting by as a private investigator and her latest case takes her to an Appalachian holler not unlike the one where she grew up.

Ten years ago, three little girls went missing from their tiny mountain town. While one was returned, the others were never seen again. After all this time without answers, the brother of one of the girls wants to hire an outsider, and he wants Annie. While she may not be from his town, she gets mountain towns. Mountain people. Driving back into the hills for a case this old—it might be a fool’s errand. But Annie needs to put money in the bank and she can’t turn down a case. Not even one that dredges up her own painful past.

In the shadow of the Blue Ridge, Annie begins to track the truth, navigating a decade’s worth of secrets, folklore of witches and crows, and a whole town that prefers to forget. But while the case may have been buried, echoes of the past linger. And Annie’s arrival stirs someone into action.

I received a digital copy of this book through the publisher on NetGalley for an honest review.

From start to finish, The Witch’s Orchard was a thrilling read that I couldn’t wait to read to its conclusion. With the setting taking place in a small mountain town in North Carolina, I felt like I could imagine what the inhabitants were like whenever Annie described them, as they all seemed like the typical people who would live in such a place. I also felt that I could imagine the terrain where this story takes place, and I was excited to find out where Annie’s investigation would lead me as a reader.

One of my favorite things about the story here was uncovering the mystery surrounding these young girls’ disappearances. There’s just something really exciting to me about reading books where people go missing through the investigator’s eyes to uncover who’s responsible and why. I think a lot of the excitement, to me, stems from trying to figure out who’s responsible, as the investigator is interviewing people and uncovering clues. And along with that, these disappearances happened in such a small town, which made it more interesting because there are only so many people who could’ve taken them. I found myself feeling like Annie and having a difficult time pinpointing who I thought had taken them.

What I also enjoyed about The Witch’s Orchard was the local story about the Quartz Creek Witch. During her investigation, Annie asked everyone in the town about this story, and each person’s account of it was different. And I loved that not everyone told her this story the same way, because I felt like it was just another mystery, along with finding out what happened to the girls who disappeared in this town. It also made you wonder if the person who took the girls felt a connection to the Quartz Creek Witch in that the person responsible felt like they were giving these girls a better life than the one they had.

If there’s anything with this book, I didn’t particularly enjoy it was the lack of character development and the ending. In this book, I wanted to learn more about Annie and her life. While The Witch’s Orchard does give you a sneak peek into her past before coming into this town, I felt like it gave me just barely enough to keep me hooked on the story. But I wanted to learn more, especially about her relationship with Leo, which gets hinted at throughout, and how she grew up, which also gets hinted at here. I also wanted to learn more about these characters in this small town she goes to, but I feel like with this book, we barely get to know them before the case is solved and she goes back home. That’s why I wasn’t particularly fond of the ending, too, because I wanted to see what happened with these characters now that Annie figured out who took the girls.

But overall, I enjoyed reading The Witch’s Orchard. It was a book with just enough mystery to keep me hooked and coming back for more. I also enjoyed the setting, taking place in a small mountain town in North Carolina, and the different local stories about the Quartz Creek Witch. The perfect read for anyone looking for a simple mystery to enjoy. The Witch’s Orchard was published on August 12, 2025, for anyone interested in giving this book a read.          

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Book Review: At Last Sight (Witch City #2)

Rating: 4 stars

At Last Sight, book two in the Witch City series, follows Imogen, a reluctant clairvoyant on the run from her past, and Cade, the stubborn detective determined to give her a future…

Imogen Warner has spent ten years running scared.

After a childhood in the spotlight, the clairvoyant left home at fifteen without looking back. In the decade since, she’s moved from place to place like a ghost, keeping her head down, her powers hidden, and her name out of the newspapers. But anonymity is no longer an option when she finds herself in Salem, Massachusetts.

Despite Imogen’s initial determination to hold everyone at arm’s length, she’s quickly caught up in the unique magic of the town — and its eccentric residents. She feels at home for the first time in… forever. At least, until an annoyingly persistent — and annoyingly handsome — local detective demands she use her unique abilities to help solve his latest case.

Cade Hightower never runs from a fight.

The decorated detective thrives on a challenge, whether it’s with the case files on his desk or the women in his bed. He’s instantly captivated by the beautiful new arrival in his town — the one with the witchy eyes and the mysterious past. The more he interacts with Imogen, the more he wants to peel back her layers one by one. (And, while he’s at it, peel off her clothes piece by piece.)

Too bad he’s got no time for either. Cade’s top priority is tracking down the young trick-or-treater who vanished seemingly into thin air on Halloween night. And he’s willing to use any tactic — even Imogen’s unconventional ones — to bring the child home before it’s too late.

Tensions — and tempers — run hot in this opposites-attract romance set in the infamously witchy city of Salem. At Last Sight is a total standalone romance of 140,000 words, balancing a fair bit of suspense with spicy scenes, spooky moments, and lots of laughs. (Note: while the story is a total standalone, it does contain some crossover characters and settings from book one, Bad Luck Charm.)

Like I enjoyed reading Bad Luck Charm last year, I enjoyed At Last Sight just as much. This second book in this series reminded me why I enjoyed reading these books so much, from the witty back-and-forth banter between Imogen and Cade to Imogen’s interactions with the residents in Salem. What made this book stand out from its predecessor was that as a reader, we could see the story told from the perspective of someone freshly arriving in Salem, Massachusetts. So when Imogen was explaining what this place was like, we were able to see the quirkiness and charm of this place vividly.

I also enjoyed Imogen as a character. Yes, she has quite the baggage which results in a lot of trauma that her character hasn’t fully healed from due to her always being on the run. But as the book goes on, you see the immense character development of her character as she starts to realize that Salem is where she wants to be, and she learns to trust the people of Salem when she usually struggles to trust anyone. I also found her to have quite a bit of personality through her interactions with Cade. When seeing these two characters together, I already knew there was something there as it was very apparent from the moment Cade came up to her car and offered his help. So I was excited to see how things would unfold between Imogen and Cade as I continued reading their story.

What I also enjoyed about reading At Last Sight was getting to see the same characters from Bad Luck Charm play a role in Imogen’s story. Which makes sense since Imogen got a job at Gwen’s shop. But it was still nice getting to see Gwen, Florence, Desmond, Sally, Agatha, and Graham again even though Imogen’s story seems to take place shortly after the events in the first book in this series. I enjoyed this too though as it feels like this book picks up where its predecessor left off but with different characters as main characters. I also loved how these characters welcomed Imogen into their lives even with her initially hesitating in opening up about her past. It was nice because it was obvious how much Imogen was struggling with wanting to make friends in Salem since she was initially planning to leave as soon as she could.

I especially loved the romance between Imogen and Cade and the other story that’s happening while their romance takes off. Like I said earlier, from the moment Cade helped Imogen with her car, I felt like I could see the connection between the two of them. As the story goes on, I find myself loving their relationship more and more because you can see how much they care about each other. I also loved the story here with regards to the missing boy that was happening while you get to see Imogen and Cade’s relationship develop. I enjoyed this aspect of the story because you get to see Imogen’s character develop as the characters in the story want her to use her gift and trust that she’ll be able to help save him. I feel like this helps Imogen realize she has a home in Salem, and she doesn’t have to run from her past anymore because she’s gained some friends in her life that will support her.

If there was anything with At Last Sight I didn’t particularly enjoy it would have to be how easily the conflicts in this book were resolved. The best example that comes to mind for me is Imogen’s past with her ex-boyfriend Adrian and her uncle. I felt like the aspects of Imogen’s past that she was running away from were just easily resolved in this book. A lot faster than I was expecting whenever Imogen starts talking about her past with the friends she’s made in Salem and Cade. It almost made it feel like her story was far from being told or like the trauma she was running away from was something that could be resolved with only a few words. This bothered me only because I felt like these aspects of her story should’ve been fleshed out a little more than they were.

As a whole though, At Last Sight was a wonderful read and I enjoyed it immensely. It was nice to see all of these characters again and to see Cade have his happy-ever-after with Imogen. Can’t wait to read the next book in the Witch City series, Worst Laid Plains whenever it comes out as I know I will enjoy it.   

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Book Review: Sherlock Holmes: The Complete Novels and Stories Volume II

Rating: 5 stars

Since his first appearance in Beeton’s Christmas Annual in 1887, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes has been one of the most beloved fictional characters ever created.

Now, in two paperback volumes, Bantam presents all fifty-six short stories and four novels featuring Conan Doyle’s classic hero—a truly complete collection of Sherlock Holmes’s adventures in crime!

Volume II begins with The Hound of the Baskervilles, a haunting novel of murder on eerie Grimpen Moor, which has rightly earned its reputation as the finest murder mystery ever written.

The Valley of Fear matches Holmes against his archenemy, the master of imaginative crime, Professor Moriarty.

In addition, the loyal Dr. Watson has faithfully recorded Holmes’s feats of extraordinary detection in such famous cases as the thrilling The Adventure of the Red Circle and the twelve baffling adventures from The Case Book of Sherlock Holmes.

Conan Doyle’s incomparable tales bring to life a Victorian England of horse-drawn cabs, fogs, and the famous lodgings at 221B Baker Street, where for more than forty years Sherlock Holmes earned his undisputed reputation as the greatest fictional detective of all time.

Just like the first volume, which you can check out my review of here, I enjoyed reading this volume of the rest of Sherlock Holmes novels and stories. Like with the first volume, I still enjoy seeing Holmes and Watson interact with each other and how they go about solving cases together. Their relationship with each other was still enjoyable to me to read and I continued to love how Watson described their cases. It also felt like their relationship and trust with each other had grown since the first volume, which I liked to see.

Like with the first volume, there were a lot of cases in this one that weren’t just murder. And I feel like I enjoyed a lot of those cases more in this volume than the last one. It just felt like they were more interesting to me story wise.

There were also a lot of cases in this volume that I really enjoyed overall which made this book an enjoyable read to me. Some of my favorites were The Hound of the Baskervilles, The Valley of Fear, His Last Bow, The Adventure of the Dying Detective, The Adventure of the Sussex Vampire,  and The Adventure of the Lion’s Mane, just to name a few. What all of these stories have in common in comparison to the others in this volume for me is that the stories were interesting to me in ways I didn’t expect. They had twists in their plot I wasn’t expecting that made me continue to read them to find out what happened next.

My biggest criticism with this volume was how Holmes was still keeping Watson in the dark at times when they’d solve cases together. While I understood why, I definitely felt like there were times he could’ve at least let Watson know what was going on so he could better help him. I also was sad when I finished reading this volume because of how much I was enjoying these stories. While I’m happy to have now read all of Sherlock Holmes because of how much I enjoyed my experience, I’m sad to have finished these stories as I know the next time I read them it won’t be the same since it won’t be my first time reading them.

If you’ve read this post, thank you so much for stopping by! Please leave a comment below if you feel like you can relate to feeling sad after reading a book for the first time that you really enjoyed like I did with these two volumes.

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Book Review: Good Me Bad Me

Good Me Bad Me Book Cover

Rating: 3 stars

Good Me Bad Me is dark, compelling, voice-driven psychological suspense by debut author Ali Land.

How far does the apple really fall from the tree? 

Milly’s mother is a serial killer. Though Milly loves her mother, the only way to make her stop is to turn her in to the police. Milly is given a fresh start: a new identity, a home with an affluent foster family, and a spot at an exclusive private school. 

But Milly has secrets, and life at her new home becomes complicated. As her mother’s trial looms, with Milly as the star witness, Milly starts to wonder how much of her is nature, how much of her is nurture, and whether she is doomed to turn out like her mother after all. 

When tensions rise, and Milly feels trapped by her shiny new life, she has to decide: Will she be good? Or is she bad? She is, after all, her mother’s daughter.

I enjoyed reading this book but was also disappointed with it at the same time. There are a lot of aspects of the book I really enjoyed. However, there was a lot left to be desired too.

What I loved about Good Me Bad Me was getting to see into the mind of a serial killer’s daughter. Getting to see how this trauma of witnessing her mother murdering children affected Milly’s life in her new home. When the story begins, you as the reader can’t help feeling sympathetic to Milly. She’s just a young girl after all who lives alone with her mother, whose story really tugs at your heart and makes you want to cheer her on as she adjusts to a new life that is full of complications of its own. Especially since you get to see into her thoughts and how she reacts to being bullied by Phoebe and her friends while she’s just trying to make it through each day before the trial that’ll forever cement her into her new life. I found this aspect of the story interesting, though Milly’s thought process wasn’t at all what I expected from her, but I understood that because I knew she went through something most girls her age never have to deal with.

I also like that the story is told from her perspective because it becomes apparent in the story that she’s an unreliable narrator. This becomes obvious close to the end of the story when certain truths are later revealed to you. Its also apparent because as the reader you observe her omitting information from other characters in the story because she believes she’s lying to them for their own good, though you as the reader already know exactly what’s going on.

Another thing I like about this book is the different subject matters this book talks about, despite not fully talking about these things in the story. This story talks about things such as cutting, bullying, suicide, abuse, psychology, alcoholism, rape, trauma, and cheating. But somewhat does it in a way that as a reader makes you think about what’s happening in the story even though we’re only hearing about all these details from Milly’s perspective. These different topics add interesting layers to this story and make you as the reader deeply think about what’s happening. Make you question what you think you know and what you think will happen in the story.

But, there’s also a lot of fault that can be found in Good Me Bad Me too. For starters, there are a lot of characters that are hard to like. I especially had a hard time liking Phoebe because she’s such a bitch throughout and Phoebe’s mother Saskia wasn’t very likable either. In general, I didn’t like the whole family Milly stayed with because I felt like the parents were clueless to the bullying Milly endured and it seemed like despite the father Mike being an expert therapist, he seemed clueless about the problems going on in his own family. I liked Milly as a character because she had depth and was interesting to read about, but even she at times could be a little too whiny for my liking. Or acted in a way I didn’t expect her character to act. Even her mother who was a serial killer wasn’t much of a character in this story even though the whole book centered around her. You only get glimpses of her but we as readers never get to really see her character in the way Milly describes.

There were also parts of the plot I wasn’t overall pleased with either. I especially was disappointed with how the proceedings for the trial went. Milly made it out like there was going to be a showdown between her and her mother, but nothing of the sort happened. It was just a short court proceeding with very little conflict of significance. What happened in the trial with the one defense lawyer was the most interesting thing during the trial, but nothing became of it in a way that truly impacted Milly’s life or the outcome of the trial.

Another example with the plot that comes to mind for me has to do with Phoebe’s character and her treatment of Milly throughout the story. While I’m not fond of her character, I thought the way they made this conflict between the two of them go away didn’t add anything to the story. Yes, it was interesting and made me want to find out how this impacted their lives. But I felt like it was the easy way out instead of making the two of them have a conversation and attempt to resolve their differences. Or letting their conflict come to a head and seeing what exactly Phoebe was planning to do. Because while I hated Phoebe’s character and believe she got exactly what she deserved, I didn’t think that’s the way the story should’ve gone for her and Milly. I find that’s my biggest problem with the plot: there’s conflict, but its never talked about or fully resolved in a way I as a reader can appreciate. These two moments in the story, the trial and Phoebe, are two of many examples in this story that have conflict that gets solved in such a simple way it’s disappointing to me as a reader.

I also wasn’t fond of the decision Ali Land made with regards to the direction Milly’s character would go. I wouldn’t have minded it so much if Milly’s character overall acted that way throughout the book. But to me, I felt like her character did a complete turn in the opposite direction she was originally heading, and I wasn’t okay with it. While I understand why the story ended the way it did, I also felt like it wasn’t the right call because Milly’s character wasn’t like that through most of the story. I think part of my problem with it is because I was really rooting for Milly to be a better person, to make good decisions and not follow in her mother’s footsteps. This story made me believe she would turn her life around and do things for herself so that she could finally be happy and not have to deal with her mother’s shadow. It also doesn’t help that the story all a sudden ends and we never find out what happens next. We never get to find out whether Milly is going to stay with the family she considers home or if she’s going to be sent to a different home because of her problems.

So, while I enjoyed reading Good Me Bad Me, there’s a lot with this book I didn’t like too. That doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy reading it, I just can’t say I enjoyed everything about it because there’s a lot in the story for me not to love. It was an interesting read though because of Milly’s character and perspective and because I found the subject matter interesting. I just can’t say though that it didn’t have any problems because for me, it did.

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OnlineBookClub.org Book Review: Isabella’s Painting (Karina Cardinal Mystery #1)

Isabella's Painting Book Cover

Rating: 4 stars

https://forums.onlinebookclub.org/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=87551

I was going to in my next book review for OnlineBookClub.org put some of my first couple paragraphs from my review on the site on my blog post and then link to the review. However, in order for me to do so, I’d need to get in contact with someone from the site to make sure that was okay.

But when I actually did that, my message never went through to the person I was trying to send it to. I don’t know why because I put a lot of effort into writing that message. I found out because whenever I didn’t hear back from them I went into my Inbox and discovered that the PM never went through. Once I found out that happened, I was going to attempt to send another message. But right now, I quite frankly just wanted to put up my review on the site for you all to go check out sooner rather than later. And I just didn’t feel like spending another ten minutes working on another private message for it not to go through once again.

As a result, I have provided another link to a review I’ve written on OnlineBookClub.org. I’ll try sending a private message again later whenever I have the energy for it so that with these reviews in the future you can catch a glimpse of a little of what I’ve written. But until I’m able to get permission from the site, this is what I’m going to continue having to do.

Until then, please read my review and share it if you really like it. That would mean so much to me.

Also, I have some really exciting news I’m planning on sharing with you all on my next blog post. It’s personal/life stuff so I’m going to write a new blog post about it once the excitement of it wears off for me.

Until then, I hope you all have a good day today and enjoy my review!

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Book Review: Look For Me

Look For Me Book Cover

Rating: 4 stars

In #1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Gardner’s latest twisty thrill ride, Detective D. D. Warren and “Find Her“‘s Flora Dane return in a race against the clock to either save a young girl’s life . . . or bring her to justice. 

The home of a family of five is now a crime scene: four of them savagely murdered, one—a sixteen-year-old girl—missing. Was she lucky to have escaped? Or is her absence evidence of something sinister? Detective D. D. Warren is on the case—but so is survivor-turned-avenger Flora Dane. Seeking different types of justice, they must make sense of the clues left behind by a young woman who, whether as victim or suspect, is silently pleading, look for me.

I enjoyed this book quite a bit more than I thought I would. But at the same time, I wish I’d read this book later after realizing it’s the ninth book in a series. It made this read a little difficult because some of the characters in the story more than likely played an important role in earlier books.

However, I still enjoyed reading this book for a number of reasons. Part of the reason I enjoyed this book so much was due to the characters and the story. I found the detectives involved in the case to be enjoyable because I loved seeing them really put their best effort into finding out the truth of what happened. I also enjoyed Flora Dane as a character. I know part of that is due to my own experiences in life (in particular being a domestic violence survivor) and I felt like I learned a whole lot from her. In essence, I felt like I could really relate to her character and the rest of her little band of misfits. I also loved what she brought to the story with regards to finding out information and trying her best to help others who’re dealing with their own personal traumas, like Sarah. I really enjoyed watching her help detective D. D. Warren but also trying her best to make sure Roxy was safe. I also loved her relationship with D. D. Warren despite their characters being portrayed as different from each other. Their interactions with each other made me chuckle , made me interested in seeing what trouble Flora was going to get herself into next.

What I also enjoyed when reading Look For Me is the case as a whole. A sixteen year-old girl goes missing during the murder of the rest of her family while she’s taking their two dogs on a walk. You as the reader begin to learn more about Roxanna Baez’s past, which involves a lot of emotional twists and turns. You learn how terrible the foster care system can truly be, how it can affect the children involved as well as how cruel the world can really be. You start to feel for Roxanna like I did as D. D. Warren and Flora continue uncovering the truth of why her family was murdered. The reason I enjoyed this case so much is because it’s emotional. D. D. Warren goes back in forth on her belief that Roxy is someone involved in the shooting of her family and Flora does whatever it takes to uncover the truth of it all. It’s an emotional rollercoaster with an unexpected twist that hurts your heart even more, making it a read I really enjoyed.

What also made this book an emotional read for me were the chapters that involved Roxy writing about the perfect family. These chapters were actually mostly about Roxy talking about her own family, including the problems they were dealing with, such as their mother being an alcoholic and having to go into foster care. I really enjoyed reading these chapters because I felt like we as the reader were introduced to Roxy even though you don’t meet her in the story until close to the end. It made me even more sympathetic to her character and everything she was going through. These chapters also made me believe like Flora that Roxy had nothing to do with the death of her family.

However, there are some problems I have with Look For Me. In this book, the twist of discovering who actually killed Roxy’s family and why wasn’t at all what I was expecting. The killer also wasn’t someone I wanted to be heavily involved in the case either. I was already emotionally invested in this book because Roxy lost her whole family and had no idea who killed them. But I feel like making this person the killer made me feel terrible for Roxy. I felt terrible for her because she’s pretty much lost every person who’s ever cared about her. While I do understand the killer’s motivation, I really hated how this was done and wished it was someone else entirely. While it made for a neat twist in the story, I just truly wish someone else was involved because I didn’t want Roxy to lose anyone else in her life.

I also feel like while we learned a lot about Flora Dane and her past, we didn’t particularly learn a lot of information about D. D. Warren. Maybe that’s because this is the ninth book in the series and all of the information you learn about her as a detective has already been uncovered, but she just seems like someone I want to know more about. I feel like there might be some similarities between her and Flora that would allow them to become friends, but the author just hasn’t disclosed them yet. Again though, I haven’t read the rest of the books in this series so this criticism mostly stems from what I’ve read from this book.

But overall, I really enjoyed reading Look For Me. I thought the characters were really interesting and sympathetic, and the case as a whole was a huge emotional rollercoaster from beginning to end. I loved hearing from Roxy via the chapters that centered around her writing about what it means to have a perfect family. The only criticisms I had for this book were the twist of uncovering who the killer is and not learning as much about D. D. Warren as I’d like. But overall, reading this book just made me want to read the rest of the series so I can see what all I’ve missed. Because I believe with all my heart that this series is probably a really good one that I need to one day invest in reading.

 

 

 

 

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Book Review: I Am Watching You

I Am Watching You Book Cover

Rating: 3 stars

What would it take to make you intervene?

When Ella Longfield overhears two attractive young men flirting with teenage girls on a train, she thinks nothing of it—until she realizes they are fresh out of prison and her maternal instinct is put on high alert. But just as she’s decided to call for help, something stops her. The next day, she wakes up to the news that one of the girls—beautiful, green-eyed Anna Ballard—has disappeared.

A year later, Anna is still missing. Ella is wracked with guilt over what she failed to do, and she’s not the only one who can’t forget. Someone is sending her threatening letters—letters that make her fear for her life.

Then an anniversary appeal reveals that Anna’s friends and family might have something to hide. Anna’s best friend, Sarah, hasn’t been telling the whole truth about what really happened that night—and her parents have been keeping secrets of their own.

Someone knows where Anna is—and they’re not telling. But they are watching Ella.

I Am Watching You is an interesting read, filled with mystery and suspense. It’s not my favorite book of its genre, but it was a nice quick read that I felt like I needed.

One of the things this book has going for it is multiple points of view from different characters who played a major role in the disappearance of Anna, which I both loved and hated. I found switching between the perspective of different characters in each chapter interesting because it made me yearn to find out more about what happened to Anna and the people she cared about. But at the same time, it annoyed me too. What annoyed me about it is that there were too many characters whose perspective we were hearing from. It also didn’t really add anything to the story either other than creating more suspense over who could’ve taken Anna. I think I would’ve preferred to only have the perspective of the two characters who played a major role in the storyline, Ella and Sarah. Not only because their perspectives in the story were the most interesting to read, but because they actually contributed to having more information on what happened. Plus, we didn’t really need Matthew and Henry’s point of view because neither of their perspectives contribute too much to the overall storyline.

I did enjoy reading I Am Watching You though because I found the story to be interesting. There was so much mystery surrounding Anna’s disappearance that I really wanted to find out what happened to her. I wanted to find out what secrets Sarah was keeping and to find out who was leaving the postcards to Ella. This book had so much mystery to it, making it a page turner for me because I wanted to find out the truth. Even if the truth of everything was too ugly to handle.

But at the same time, when I finally finished reading this book, I was disappointed. The story was interesting enough to keep me turning the page, but didn’t fully deliver. I think what made me disappointed in reading this book is that there are no hints at all to who the antagonist is going to be. Every time I thought I had an idea of who was responsible for Anna’s disappearance, the person was cleared of having nothing to do with her whereabouts. Then when we finally do find out the truth, it completely catches me off guard. It’s not at all a character we’d expect, a person with motives that nobody had any inkling of a clue about. The clue that reveals who really took Anna isn’t revealed until the end, almost as if the author had no more story left to tell so she just put it in the end to get the reader turning the page. So I was very disappointed when the mystery of this story was revealed to us because it just didn’t make all that much sense to me as a reader.

Another aspect of I Am Watching You that I didn’t enjoy was the overall storyline itself. It’s interesting, makes you want to turn the page. But with each different character’s perspective, certain moments in the story start becoming repetitive. It’s also very rushed, especially after the anniversary of Anna’s disappearance. You find out more information about what happened, secrets are revealed. But none of the secrets or information you find out is really that revealing to where Anna could possibly be. For example, the information Sarah was keeping secret wasn’t really that big of a reveal to the reader. It wasn’t anything that would’ve really helped the police have any clue as to where Anna had gone because we already knew she left Anna on her own while in London. I do feel sympathetic to her because of the other information she reveals to us, but none of that really helps find Anna.

While I Am Watching You is an interesting read, filled with a lot of mystery and suspense, that’s all it really is. It’s a good quick read, but will leave you feeling disappointed at the overall storyline and at the final reveal of what happened to Anna. Getting multiple perspectives of the story from characters who knew Anna adds another layer to the story, but is often repetitive, making it more of any annoyance than anything else. I enjoyed reading this book, but was overall disappointed when the truth of what happened was revealed.

 

 

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Book Review: Carry On

Carry On Book Cover

Rating: 3 stars

Simon Snow is the worst Chosen One who’s ever been chosen.

That’s what his roommate, Baz, says. And Baz might be evil and a vampire and a complete git, but he’s probably right.

Half the time, Simon can’t even make his wand work, and the other half, he starts something on fire. His mentor’s avoiding him, his girlfriend broke up with him, and there’s a magic-eating monster running around, wearing Simon’s face. Baz would be having a field day with all this, if he were here — it’s their last year at the Watford School of Magicks, and Simon’s infuriating nemesis didn’t even bother to show up.

Carry On – The Rise and Fall of Simon Snow is a ghost story, a love story and a mystery. It has just as much kissing and talking as you’d expect from a Rainbow Rowell story – but far, far more monsters.

After reading Fangirl, I knew I needed to read this book to see if I’d enjoy it just as much. And I did, maybe even more so for several reasons. But I found I couldn’t give it a higher rating than Fangirl because I found a lot more things wrong with it that I’ll discuss shortly.

Carry On is about the universe Cath fantasizes about in Fangirl. It’s about the world of Watford, a school for those with magic. It centers on Simon Snow, a boy who’s supposed to be the greatest mage the World of Mages has ever seen. In this book, he returns to school for his last year at Watford and his biggest nemesis/roommate Baz doesn’t return until several weeks later. It centers around the death of Baz’s mom along with Simon stopping the evil Humdrum who’s face is very similar to his.

What I enjoyed so much when reading this book is that it’s unique. While the storyline, characters and everything else in it are supposed to be a play off of Harry Potter, you can tell when reading it that it’s a completely different universe. I like that this story is very similar to the world I already love because it made it that much easier for me to understand everything that happened. The universe was very similar to Harry Potter, but in a humorous way that I appreciated. It was like Rainbow Rowell was writing a one novel parody of the Harry Potter series, but twisting it into something else that is just as enjoyable.

You Know You've Read a Good Book Paul Sweeney Quote
Via Popular Inspirational Quotes

I enjoyed reading Carry On so much that when I was finished, I was sad to see the story end. It felt like a piece of me had gone and went into Simon Snow’s world. And I know why I felt that way. This book has all of the elements I like in a story. It’s fantasy with a mixture of mystery, comedy, and its young adult literature that features LGBTQ characters. I like that the world Rowell portrays has magic in it, yet also has some real world elements mixed in that allow you as the reader to see magic alongside normal reality.

But most of all, one of my favorite features in this book is the relationship between Simon and Baz. Both characters are confused about their own identity, yet end up finding each other and connecting in a way you as the reader don’t expect: through the loss of a parent, aka, Baz’s mom who died many years ago at the hands of vampires. Simon could relate to what Baz was going through because of his own loss of not growing up with parents. So Simon did what he thought was right: to help Baz find out who really orchestrated the attack on the nursery that resulted in her death. This connection resulted in showing us their relationship continue to grow, from being roommates who hated each other to lovers. I loved seeing it come together because it was fun to watch the commentary between both of them as they uncovered the truth. It was entertaining, a breath of fresh air that I didn’t realize I needed. And it made moments in the story when things were turning weird more enjoyable for me. I could see the love for each other with each page I read and just couldn’t wait to watch their relationship continue to grow.

Carry On Simon Snow and Baz Pitch Because We Match Picture
Via Pinterest 

What also made Carry On an enjoyable read for me was the different points of view. I enjoyed reading this story from all of the character’s perspectives. It allowed me a better understanding of what was going on, gave me a clue about things I didn’t know before. It also made this book even more interesting because we were given access to these character’s thoughts and feelings, given an understanding as to what they were doing and why. I liked having access to all of the characters in this way because it allowed me to immerse myself even further into the story. It’s also different from any other fantasy novel I’ve read because there’s usually only one perspective that you have access to.

While Carry On is definitely a page turner, there were some elements when it came to the story that I disliked. For one, I thought the names of the spells in this world was ridiculous. I don’t know what Rowell was thinking when she came up with that idea, but it didn’t make sense to me. Especially because it wasn’t at all realistic to what magic is normally like in books. While this allows her world to be uniquely different, I don’t see how these different incantations would even be justified for someone with magic to say. I don’t know if she thought of this as a way to make fun of magic or something, but I just don’t see why magic wielders would have incantations that are nursery rhymes or common sayings that someone normal could say. That sounds like it could potentially lead to an accident, an incident that very easily could’ve been prevented.

I also wasn’t particularly fond of Agatha’s character. I felt like she acted throughout the story like she was above everyone else and just didn’t seem to care about the people she had called friends for the past seven years. Throughout Carry On, she was completely selfish, focusing only on the things that affected her life. She didn’t seem at all remotely interested in keeping up a friendship with Simon and Penelope, yet felt like she could criticize both of them for working with Baz to uncover the truth about his mother’s death. I felt like her character just existed in the story, but didn’t really belong. She was just in the story, wasting space that could’ve been better spent on other characters that played a crucial role in the overall plot.  I just didn’t like Agatha and wish she wasn’t a part of the story at all.

While this book was definitely a page turner for me, another criticism I have is that the overall plot was okay. It definitely had quite a chunk of holes in it that made it difficult to enjoy it as much as I’d have liked. I think part of the problem for me is that Simon Snow’s story is rushed. The whole plot structure in this story runs a little too fast, leaving very little room for making sure nothings being left out. I think part of the reason this is even a problem is because I feel like this story should’ve been spread out into multiple books. That would’ve given Rowell the chance to get the structure and story together and figure out how to end it. Instead, this story is at the final chapter of Simon Snow’s whole story. You learn most of what Carry On is about if you’ve read Fangirl, but I don’t think it’s enough because we miss out on all of the other years Simon Snow is at Watford. You get bits and pieces of some of the important details, but it’s not enough for us to just jump to the finale and see how everything will end for Simon Snow, which by the way is actually pretty disappointing too. With the plot, it feels like you’re missing something, yet not missing anything at all. It would for me be like only reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in the Harry Potter series and expecting to know every detail of the whole series without reading any of the other books. I feel like we miss too much and that the details we are given aren’t enough and have holes in them that don’t really connect the story.

Overall, I enjoyed reading Carry On much more than Fangirl. But because of the amount of criticisms I found myself having about it, it would’ve been unfair to give it a higher rating. But that doesn’t make it any less of a good read for those who want to be taken away to a magical world or for people who want to read about two boys falling in love.

 

 

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Book Review: Color Blind (Dr. Jenna Ramey #1)

Color Blind Book Cover

Rating: 4 stars

SYNESTHESIA: 
A neurological condition characterized by automatic, involuntary sensory perceptions triggered by seemingly unrelated stimuli.

There is something unusual about Dr. Jenna Ramey’s brain, a rare perceptual quirk that punctuates her experiences with flashes of color. They are hard to explain: red can mean anger, or love, or strength. But she can use these spontaneous mental associations, understand and interpret them enough to help her read people and situations in ways others cannot. As an FBI forensic psychiatrist, she used it to profile and catch criminals. Years ago, she used it to save her own family from her charming, sociopathic mother.

Now, the FBI has detained a mass murderer and called for Jenna’s help. Upon interrogation she learns that, behind bars or not, he holds the power to harm more innocents—and is obsessed with gaining power over Jenna herself. He has a partner still on the loose. And Jenna’s unique mind, with its strange and subtle perceptions, may be all that can prevent a terrifying reality…

Wow, what an enjoyable read! This book was quite the page turner. It was a mixture of crime fiction and neurology. The story centers on Dr. Jenna Ramey, a woman with the ability to read people through a neurological condition that allows her to see colors surrounding people. She uses her special ability to help profile and catch criminals. But she also had to use this ability to save her family from her wicked mother when she was younger. Now, she’s called to help with a case involving a mass murder who holds power even when he’s behind bars and who might possibly be connected with her mother in some way.

What I enjoyed about reading Color Blind is seeing the story from Dr. Jenna Ramey’s perspective. I loved learning more about her condition, being able to see the detail put into describing the colors she was experiencing from the people she talked to. I’ve never read a crime fiction story that went this much into detail, and I found each piece of information I learned about Dr. Ramey more and more interesting. It made the story that much more interesting for me to want to continue reading to find out what happened next. It also showed that Colby Marshall did her research on synesthesia, a condition I’ve never really heard of myself until now. Makes me want to do my own research on the topic to see what more I can learn.

I also enjoyed this read because I found the story and characters to be interesting. I liked getting to hear more about Dr. Ramey’s background, find out about her mother Claudia and how she saved her family from uncertain death. I like how personal this case ended up being for Dr. Ramey because you could see her doing the best she could to save those around her. I found myself really engrossed in this story because of how interesting the storyline became that I couldn’t put this book down. I wanted to find out how Isaac was connected to Claudia and how that resulted in the events that followed. I also found Dr. Ramey’s relationship with Yancy to be most interesting, even though I don’t really understand why her connection with him is stronger than what she had with Hank.

I also like Color Blind because it’s crime fiction. I especially like that they showed Dr. Ramey as someone who doesn’t bask in her celebrity status. She’s a sincere person who wants to do things to keep those she cares about safe from the harm her mother will cause. Because once her mother gets out, she knows her mother will come for her and those she holds dear. This book was just such a page turner for me that I couldn’t wait to find out what happened next.

I appreciate that they include some video game talk in this book. I like that Marshall has Isaac and Sebastian meet each other to make their plans in a video game that they both play. It’s something you normally don’t see in crime fiction stories, so I was surprised by it, but really liked it.

There are only a couple of things with this book I didn’t particularly like. For one, I felt like the connection between Isaac and Claudia was too disappointing. While it was an interesting spin I didn’t see coming, it wasn’t all that surprising for me to begin with. You could tell there was a connection between the two from the beginning just from the way Isaac interacts with Dr. Ramey and how he knew more about her than anyone else.

I also felt like most of the ending was pretty rushed because the last half of the story moves along very fast. Everything happens all at once, like the pieces were there just waiting to be lined up. While I usually don’t mind that, in this story the pieces that came together were pretty disappointing. For example, they made the capture of Thadius too easy to me and I found myself actually feeling for Sebastian. Despite his ties to Isaac, he didn’t seem like too bad of a kid, just troubled and in need of serious help. The end itself while interesting just didn’t do too much for me other than make me sad that the book was over. The only thing interesting about it to me was what happened with Claudia because I find her character to be really intriguing.

Despite these small things most people wouldn’t have minded, I found Color Blind to be a fantastic read. It had a little bit of everything I enjoy about crime novels, plus gave me the chance to learn something new. I’m really looking forward to the opportunity to read the rest of the series to see what happens to Dr. Ramey next.

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