A Heart in the Body in the World

A Heart in the Body in the World
by Deb Caletti

Annabelle had something bad happen in her life, now she is filled with anxiety and what the doctor told her was post traumatic stress.  What happened is haunting her, then one day she decides she is going to run.  Run across the country from Seattle to Washington, D.C.  

She is already a runner, having done two marathons, but two marathons and all the way across the country are two different things.  Soon her Grandpa Ed is following her in the RV as backup, meeting her at select locations, so she has somewhere to sleep, and will have food and drink and a place to refuel.  Her friends get behind her, soon organizing a GoFundMe to help pay for her road trip.  She is transformed by the run, able to work through the past and becomes an inspiration to others.

Annabelle's goal is to run 16 miles a day, day after day, she does take a day off here and there but it is not very often.  That just sounds brutal on her body.  People have done this, run crazy long distances, but it is rare.  The distance is just mind-boggling.  I ran a marathon once, it was so long, and that is way shorter than the distance Annabelle is running.

It took a while to find out what this incident was that she was running from.  You know it's something bad, something that somehow effected other people, the whole town was upset about something.  And when you finally find out what happened, oh wow, so sad, it made me cry.  

Caged

Caged
by Ellison Cooper

Sayer Altair, an FBI agent who prefers to do research rather than actually go out in the field and hunt criminals.  After a girl is found starved to death captive in a cage, Sayer is called to lead the investigation of what turns out into a serial killer.

Some of the parts are a bit dark, but it is an FBI agent hunting down a serial killer.  

This one was really good, it reminded me a bit of Lisa Gardner or Lisa Castillo, the way the book drew you in, that it was a FBI agent or detective, and the strong female character.  

This looks like the first in a new series featuring Sayer Altair, and I can't wait to read the next one.  I liked the character: strong, working on her first big case, yet she still struggles as she misses her fiance and doesn't see her family as much as she would like.  So she's strong but she's not perfect, which makes her more realistic.

Zero Limit

Zero Limit
by Jeremy K. Brown

Caitlin is a miner working on the moon. Due to a terrorist attack, travel between the moon and Earth has been banished, which is not good for Caitlin as she is currently separated from her young daughter.  This motivates her to accept a job that is both dangerous and illegal.

Caitlin and her crew are to mine an asteroid.  Something goes wrong and now the asteroid is going towards earth.  

The book reminded me a bit of Artemis by Andy Weir and the Armageddon movie.  Which isn't a bad thing because I enjoyed both of those.  It was an interesting book, I enjoyed it.  I wouldn't know if the science stuff (re-entering space, etc) or the political stuff (the President considering a nuclear device and how the punch codes are carried around) if any of that was accurate.  But it didn't matter, I was more there to just enjoy a good story and that's what the book delivered.  

I would like to see this book become available in audiobook, as my husband might like it, but he very rarely reads a book, but he will listen to an audiobook.

SingYour Heart Out

Sing Your Heart Out
by Crystal Kaswell

Meg, a math student, randomly stumbles upon rock star Miles having sex.  She is shocked and flustered, herself being a virgin.  Next thing you know Meg and Miles are friends and Meg is no longer a virgin as they have decided they will be friends with benefits.

Not a whole lot of story line in this one either.  I reviewed Dangerous Kiss recently, and this one was bad, but not quite as horrible as that one. As in her other book, it's basically just one sex scene after another, with little plot or story line.  I did bump this one up a star since the ending was actually cute and I liked that. 

I don't plan on reading more books by this author.  If I want to read a steamy romance novel, there are just other authors that write so much better.

Dangerous Kiss

Dangerous Kiss
by Crystal Kaswell

Violet and Ethan were once together and in love and then they broke up and two years have passed.  Since then Violet has been in school getting her master's degree and Ethan has gone on to become a rock star.  Now they see each other again and might get back together but both are hurt from the past and their breakup.  Old feelings resurface. 

This book was terrible.  I hate giving negative feedback and low ratings.  This book was basically just one sex scene after another.  I don't mind reading a book that has a lot of sex in it, but I want a plot, a story, really anything to go along with that.  I don't understand the high ratings on this one.  I wasn't caring about either character, there was no depth, very little story.  Disappointing.

Read Sylvia Day or Penelope Douglas instead.

The Other Sister

The Other Sister
by Sarah Zettel

Geraldine has come back home after running away twenty years ago when her mother mysteriously died.  Geraldine Monroe is the bad sister. Reckless and troubled, she ran away shortly after the mysterious death of their mother twenty years ago.  Her sister, Marie, has been home all this time; Marie is thought of as the good daughter and she has a son.  
Their father Martin, is cruel and cold-hearted.  The sisters start potting together of how to kill him.

I really wanted to like this one, but I just really didn't get into it. I only got through about half of the book.  It seemed like there were just way too many characters, I was trying to get Geraldine and Marie straightened out of who was who.  And then the author would bring in another character, their mom.  And then it was bouncing back and forth between present day and the past.  

Normally that would have all been fine, but for some reason, it was a jumble mess of confusion.  It was disappointing, as this book sounded like something I would really like.  And I bet there was a twist or something at the end, but I didn't get there as I got tired of wondering what was going on and who was who that I just went on to a different book.

New Uses for Old Boyfriends

New Uses for Old Boyfriends
by Beth Kendrick

Here is another book in the Black Dog Bay series.  In this one, Lila has come home to stay with her mother.  Lila has grown up rich, went on to marry someone with money, but is now back home going through a divorce.  She soon finds out that before her father died, he had racked up massive debts trying to save his business.  Lila and her mother are not in good financial shape, they are about to lose everything if they don't move quickly.

Lila ends up opening a vintage clothing store with her mother. It was a neat idea, something they could work on together to pay off some of their debts.  There's a lot about vintage clothes, sometimes I started skimming those parts as it was more than I really cared to read about vintage clothing.  I'm really not into fashion, vintage clothing or pricey handbags.

While back home, Lila runs into a couple of her old boyfriends.  One she dated for a while and was heartbroken when he broke up with her to go off to college, and the other, she barely remembers, but she's noticing him now!

This was another fun one in the series, I'm planning on reading the rest in the series.  They are fun, nice reads.  

The Taster

The Taster
by V.S. Alexander

It is 1943 in Nazi Germany and Magda lives in Berlin with her parents.  Because of the war, her parents have her go to live with her aunt and uncle.  Her aunt tells her that she needs to get a job immediately.  The only work to be found is to work for the Reich, which she has not yet joined. 

She is soon training for her new job, a food taster for Hitler, the Fuhrer.  This is scary, she is to taste his food in case someone has poisoned it.  Every day her life is at risk, because if it's poisoned, and she doesn't notice it looks or smells slightly different (if there is even anything to notice) she will die. She doesn't want to do this job, but she has no choice but to be of service to the Reich.

Magda struggles, she wants the war to be over.  People are suffering and she hears rumors about people being taking away and never being seen again.  She meets a SS officer that feels the same way that she does and they fall in love.

This was really interesting.  I have read many different books about the Nazis and World War II and this one was a little different.  What was it like for German women who basically had no choice but to work for the Reich, even if they didn't agree with them.  And then the horror of as the war is ending and soldiers from Russia moved in and they feared for their lives.

Falling Away

Falling Away
by Penelope Douglas

Another book in the Fall Away series, this one focusing on K.C. and Jaxon.

K.C. is back in her hometown.  She is in college, but there was an incident while she was there and now she is home to complete her community service.  There she sees Jaxon again, she hasn't seen him for a couple years, and wow, do sparks fly between the two of them.  Well, sparks fly when they aren't arguing.

This one was pretty steamy, it seems like it might even be more steamy than the last one I read by this author.

I liked that in this book you got a little behind the scenes, you heard a bit about K.C.'s past.  What happened with her family when she was younger, and why she was going by the name K.C. instead of her real name, Juliet. You also hear more about Jaxon growing up.  His mother abandoned him as a baby and his father, once he found Jaxon in foster care, took him in, but it was a horrible, abusive place to grow up in.

One of things I liked the best about this one, was the ending.  Jaxon's dad is saying that nobody cares and is there for him, and then multiple people step up saying they care, they are his family, they will be there for him. 

That Kind of Mother

That Kind of Mother
by Rumaan Alam

Rebecca is a new mother and she is finding life with a newborn difficult.  In arrives Priscilla, to help her with getting breastfeeding figured out with her child. Rebecca finds Priscilla to be so helpful, and she convinces her to quit her job to become a nanny for her child.  They soon become friends, or as much of a friend when one is actually working for the other one.

Down the road, Priscilla becomes pregnant and dies in childbirth.  Rebecca ends up taking the baby home to help out.  (It is with the family's permission.)  Priscilla has a daughter that this baby would have gone to being the next of kin, but Priscilla's sister is overwhelmed herself having just had a baby.  Eventually Rebecca ends up adopting Priscilla's baby and loves him as much as she does her own biological child.

The author did a really good job at the beginning of the book when Rebecca is a new mother, exhausted, going on no sleep, struggling with breastfeeding, etc.  It brought back memories of when I had my first baby.  And I looked at the back of the book and saw the author was a man, I was surprised!  He did such a good job of writing about a woman, he did a good job capturing what being a new mother was like.  

Here and Now and Then

Here and Now and Then
by Mike Chen

Kin seems like your average, normal person; he works, he's married, and he has a teenage daughter.  But he is actually a time-traveling secret agent from 2142.  He was stranded in San Francisco in the 1990s after a mission went wrong.  And now eighteen years have passed.

Kin has kept his past a secret from his family, but it has been hard lately since he has suffered from more and more blackouts and memory loss.  His family is worried about him, but he can't tell them the truth, that he is a time traveler and his brain is having a hard time handling two time-lines.  The body was only meant to remember one.  

He is rescued and sent back to his own timeline.  Well, eighteen years have passed for him, but it has been a mere few weeks in his time.  While he was in the past, his brain remembered some of his life from his own timeline, but he had forgotten large chunks of it.  Now he is remembering parts and people he had forgotten.  He is torn between the fiance he had forgotten he had and his wife and daughter from the past.  Eighteen years is a long time, and he worries about his family, particularity if his daughter is going to be okay.

Oh, I just loved this one!  It reminded me a bit of The Timekeeper's Son by Mike E. Miller.  The storylines were both different, it just reminded me of that because it also had time travel and was just such a good, imaginative story.  

I read through this one quick, it was such an enjoyable story that drew you in.  I liked the characters.  It was a dad worrying about his family, a genuine good guy when it came down to it.  If I'm looking for a nice, solid, science fiction story that has some time travel in it, this really hits the spot.  This is the debut book from this author and I'm looking forward to reading more books by him in the future.

Unbury Carol

Unbury Carol
by Josh Malerman

Carol has an interesting condition, she will suddenly fall into a coma that will last for days.  She wakes up fine, but while in the coma she is aware of everything happening around her.  It's a bit disturbing to be stuck in her body, aware of what's going on and completely unable to move.  

Another problem is that she appears dead to others while she is in these comas.  The only people aware of her condition are currently her husband, Dwight, and the other is her lost love, James Moxie.  Dwight is aware of her condition, so he wants to bury her in a hurry so he can get all her money.  James Moxie is told that Carol has died and he realizes its one of her incidents and is rushing to get back in time before Carol gets buried alive.

It was an interesting idea from the same author as Bird Box, but this one isn't as good.  Maybe I just wasn't relating to any of the characters.  If you randomly fell into these comas, I don't know why you wouldn't tell a few more people.  So she didn't want many people to know, to be judged or who knows maybe even experimented on.  But maybe a few should know just in case she fell into the coma and I don't know, so maybe she doesn't get buried alive.

Anyway, not as good as his other book that I have read (Bird Box), but I'm planning on reading a few of his other books.

The Cassandra

The Cassandra
by Sharma Shields

Mildred has a special ability: she can see the future through her dreams.  She runs away from home to become a secretary at the Hanford Research Center.  It's the 1940s and they are working on a mysterious product that is to aid the war effort.  

She is happy to be working on a special project, but is soon horrified when she realizes what that special product is.  It's plutonium, to be used on the first atomic bombs.  She has visions of what will happen with this product.  It's terrifying and disturbing.

Her sister and mother were not very nice to her, they are using her.  They are not happy when Mildred runs away to get a job, yet they sure seem to like the checks that Mildred sends back to them.  Mildred comments about a bonus she received and how she would like to spend a few of the dollars on a a pair of shoes and her mother and sister guilt her for being so greedy and not sending the entire bonus to them.  

Mildred is constantly sleepwalking which leads to problems.  She is out and about in the middle of the night in her pajamas and it is not safe.  People are not understanding that she is sleepwalking and that she is not doing it on purpose.  

Towards the end there is a violent part, something bad happens to Cassandra.  And then the ending was a surprise.

Rival

Rival
by Penelope Douglas

A couple years ago Madoc and Fallon were together.  Sorta.  They were never public, but were sleeping together behind closed doors.  Something happens and Fallon goes away to boarding school for two years.  Now she is back and old feelings are resurfacing.

It's another book about toxic relationships and forbidden romances.  Forbidden as in they are stepbrother and stepsister, so not related by blood, but they are supposed to be siblings, not lovers.  It's also another toxic relationship, they both don't treat the other one as they should; they both just kinda treat the other one like dirt, and just not communicating to the other one, including something they should have really both have known about.

There is a bit of a double standard.  Madoc is sleeping around with multiple other women and nobody really bats an eye.  But then any of the girls that are sleeping around are considered sluts. 

It was another good story by Penelope Douglas.  If you like Sylvia Day, or maybe 50 Shades of Grey, you will probably like this one.  Some of the parts are pretty steamy.

Until You

Until You

by Penelope Douglas

Here is another book in the Fall Away series, featuring Tate and Jared. This one is told from Jared's perspective.  

Tate and Jared used to be friends, best friends.  Then he went away for a few weeks to visit his dad and when he came back he was a different person.  He was mean to Tate, a bully.  This book gets into his side of the story.  Where was he going on the weekends?  He talks about his brother, visiting his dad in jail, and what really happened when he was dating Tate's best friend K.C.

And it's yet another book where I wonder why Tate and Jared get together.  Their relationship is so toxic, why does she want to be with someone who treats her poorly?

It was a good story.  Though if you read Bully, you already know what's going to happen.  It's the same book, told from a different perspective.  I really don't like when authors do that, I would prefer that they write something new and original instead of milking another book out of a story that has sold well.  I seem to be reading a lot of Penelope Douglas lately, so that's why i went ahead and read it. I'm still going to keep reading her books, they are good.  

Firefly: The Magnificent Nine

Firefly: The Magnificent Nine
by James Lovegrove

This is the second in the new Firefly series that has recently come out.  An ex-girlfriend of Jayne's has reached out to Serenity for help.  Bandits are on their planet hoarding the water and it is getting desperate for the rest of the people; they need water to survive.

The Serenity crew agree to go and help, when they get there they discover Jayne's ex-girlfriend has a daughter named Jane.  A daughter who would be the correct age for when they were together.

Oh, this was another fun one.  It's almost like having another Firefly episode to watch.  It was a good story and so nice to have another story with the characters from the show.  I'm looking forward to reading the next one in the series when it comes out and I hope they continue to write more.  They are well done and I have really enjoyed them so far.

The Asylum for Wayward Victorian Girls

The Asylum for Wayward Victorian Girls
by Emilie Autumn

Autumn attempts suicide and soon after is sent to a psych ward.  While there, she discovers letters from another girl in a pysch ward from the late 1800s. 

This one started out promising.  I started it, it was interesting, it was making me think of Girl, Interrupted.  Reading about her being in a psych ward, making friends, hopefully getting better made for a promising sounding book.

Well, soon, it's mostly about this girl living in the past at the psych ward.  And parts of her story were interesting, but it was just losing my interest.  I did finish the book and it just got weird in spots.  

It starts out promising, then just gets a bit boring and weird.  The ending was interesting.  That made you think a little of what was going on and what had happened.

An Ocean of Minutes

An Ocean of Minutes
by Thea Lim

A deadly flu pandemic is sweeping across the country when Polly's boyfriend Frank gets sick.  Time travel has been invented and there is a cure in the future.  Polly agrees to time travel 12 years into the future and work as a bonded laborer for a certain amount of time and in exchange Frank will be given the cure.  

Instead of Polly going 12 years into the future to 1993, she is rerouted to 1998.  Frank and Polly had a meetup spot, but that goes wrong.  Instead of 12 years, it has been 17 years and the world is quite different.  Polly can't get to the meetup spot as the United States has divided into two different countries, the United States in the north and America in the south.  During the flu pandemic, the country was divided as they tried to stop the flu from spreading.

After Polly time travels, she is alone in a strange new world.  She works to work off her bondage so she can go and find Frank.  She has a special work status so she gets treated better than some of the other workers.  You see a definite division in the way the immigrants are treated.  

This one was really good.  It was an imaginative new world that Polly time travels into.  It had that science fiction time travel, it even had romance as Polly is trying to get back to Frank.  It was just what I wanted, an imaginative story.  I hope the author is working on more books.

Between Me and You

Between Me and You
by Allison Winn Scotch

When Ben and Tatum first meet, she is a struggling actress and he is a screenwriter.  They get married, have a child, and eventually grow apart and are in the process of a divorce.  Tatum goes from a struggling actress to a successful and famous actress.  Ben has some success of his own, but it is nowhere near the success that Tatum has.

What I did like about this book was the way it was written.  Each chapter rotated between Ben and Tatum.  Ben's story went from present day backwards, and Tate's story went from the past to present day.  I thought that was a little different.  It was just a different way to tell their story.

The not so good news.  The story itself was okay, nothing remember-able, and I actually got a bit bored.  Maybe I just didn't care all that much about either Ben or Tate.  I wasn't really rooting for either.

Foe

Foe
by Iain Reid

Junior and his wife, Hen live on a farm out in the country.  It's quiet and they rarely get visitors.  One day a stranger arrives and says that Junior has been selected to travel far away.  He is on the list, and he might not leave for a couple years, or more.  The stranger comes back a couple years later, and asks question after question.  He is to find out as much as possible about Junior, for a replacement for Hen.

This was one of the weirdest books.  Most of it I was going, what's going on.  It reminded me of The Twilight Zone, or one of those science fiction shows on Netflix.  It's a really quick read, something a little different.  It has a bit of a twist at the end.  I was expecting something odd to happen, but I didn't guess that.  Anyway, it was just weird, but it was weird in a good way.  Very interesting.

The Stranger Game

The Stranger Game
by Peter Gadol

Rebecca's boyfriend has gone missing, but the police do not seem concerned.  They think he is just playing the newest craze called the "stranger game."  

Basically you follow strangers, stalking them, wondering about their life and try to not get caught.  It's creepy and weird and the world is obsessed with this newest craze. Considering that people ate those tide pods for a while, I could see this actually happening.  

Anyway, Rebecca tries to track Ezra down.  In the process, she tries this new game and meets Carey.  

It was different.  Let's hope the tide-pod eating people don't read this one and decide this stranger game sounds like a good idea.  Stalking is not a good idea.  

The Similars

The Similars
by Rebecca Hanover

Emma is at a prestigious boarding school when six clones join the junior class.  Cloning is illegal and there was a big discussion and secrecy of who the clones are.  They are not allowed to share with the outside world who the clones are.

Emma's best friend, Oliver died just a few months ago.  She is still in mourning and she is shocked when one of the clones looks just like Oliver.  She immediately takes a dislike to Oliver's clone, but it makes you wonder if they will eventually become friends, or more.  He is Oliver's clone and they might have similar personalities, or he might be a completely different person with the same face, who knows.

It was interesting, bringing the clones to school.  A discussion of are clones human, do they have rights, are they the same as their human original?

If the author writes more in this series, I would read them.  However, for a young adult book with clones at a school, I would recommend Rachel Vincent's Brave New Girl series. That one was really good.  

This one was still a good story, it just felt like for a while the story wasn't actually going anywhere and I was starting to wonder what was the point, it picked back up towards the ending and had a couple of surprises.

The Next Flame

The Next Flame
Penelope Douglas

This book has two novellas featuring characters from the series Fall Away.  


Aflame
This is the continuation of the story of Tate and Jared from the book Bully.  Since then, Tate and Jared were happy living together for a couple years.  Until Jared decided he wasn't happy and left her.  He said it was because he wasn't happy at college and needed to go find himself, and that he would come back for her.  It's been two years since then.  He broke her heart.  And now he's back and wants to be forgiven and back together.

More heartache and wondering when the two will get back together.  They both still love each other, so you kinda figure they will get back together after more drama.  It was a good story, bringing back characters and seeing what happens to them a few years later.  I liked the ending and reading the characters all having families and being happy.  


Next to Never
Quinn has grown up under the careful watch of her older brothers: Jared, Madoc and Jaxon.  One day a mysterious package turns up under her doorstep.  It reveals family secrets.

I really didn't get into this one.  It took me a while to figure out who Quinn was.  Maybe it would have been better reading this story after I have read the rest of the Fall Away series.  The other books I have read by this author have been really good, so it was a disappointment to come across one I didn't care for, but it happens.

Bully

Bully

by Penelope Douglas

Tate and Jared used to be best friends, then Jared went away for a few weeks one summer and came back a different person.  Since then, a couple years now, he has been mean to Tate.  Embarrassing her, being mean, overall a bully.  Tate doesn't know what happened or why someone who was once her friend now seems to hate her so much.

She goes to France for a year, a year of peace.  Then when she comes back she decides instead of just crying and taking it, she is going to fight back.  

There were definitely issues with the story.  Jared is treating her like dirt, but deep down Tate likes him.  It just seems like a bad idea to get with someone who has treated you like dirt.  It's just a bad situation.  It makes an interesting story, but if it were real life, don't go with him, date a nice guy instead. And then her best friend starts dating him.  That doesn't even make sense.  If a guy was being a jerk to your best friend, you don't go out and date the jerk.  And then why was Tate's dad gone for months?  Even if she is 17, I don't think she can live alone like that since since she would still technically be a minor.  I could be wrong.

It's a good book that will draw you in.  This is the second book I have read by this author, and so far they have been pretty good.  I see there are others in this series, featuring different characters, I'm looking forward to reading those.

Puddin'

Puddin'
by Julie Murphy

This is the second in the Dumplin series.  The description says its a companion novel to Dumplin; however, stuff happens in the first one that is mentioned in this one, so this one is definitely taking place after that one.

This novel rotates between Millie and Callie.  Millie has gone to fat camp every year, but this year she doesn't want to go.  She has accepted that she is fat and she's okay with that.  She tends to be positive.  Callie is a popular girl who ends up getting in trouble, and then she crosses paths with Millie.  At first they aren't friends, but then they start to grow a friendship.

This one took me a little bit to get into, I thought I wasn't going to like it at first.  But then after a while, it was pretty good and I liked this one a little more than the first book.  Overall it's a good series.   It has a nice message of accepting yourself.