Category: Bookish and Bingeable

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Posted in Bookish and Bingeable

Small Favors

Posted on by Vikki Lynn Sorensen

By: Erin Craig

Ellerie Downing lives in the quiet town of Amity Falls in the Blackspire Mountain range–five narrow peaks stretching into the sky like a grasping hand, bordered by a nearly impenetrable forest from which the early townsfolk fought off the devils in the woods. To this day, visitors are few and rare. But when a supply party goes missing, some worry that the monsters that once stalked the region have returned.

As fall turns to winter, more strange activities plague the town. They point to a tribe of devilish and mystical creatures who promise to fulfill the residents’ deepest desires, however grand and impossible, for just a small favor. But their true intentions are much more sinister, and Ellerie finds herself in a race against time before all of Amity Falls, her family, and the boy she loves go up in flames.

NOTE: MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS

The Village meets Bigfoot!

Small Favors by Erin Craig serves up in no small way. This book is thoroughly enjoyable. Full of folklore and just the right amount of creepiness to keep you going until the very end.

Initially, this book gave me The Village vibes. Amity Falls is a small village seemingly cut off from the rest of the world. The people in it are self-reliant to some degree but have knowledge and  need of the outside world.

We meet Ellerie, a young girl who lives in the village with her family. Her family are beekeepers and they provide honey for the town and beyond. As strange events start to unfold, beginning with several men going missing in the woods as they go on a run for supplies. Her father and brother go out looking for them and both come back unsure of what they witnessed in the woods. As weird things start to happen, the village begins to implode violently until it’s beyond recognition.

Ellerie is a typical heroine. Spunky, smart and strong. We see her grow from a somewhat little girl at the beginning of the story to a woman, fully capable of defending and saving her family via any means possible. She risks herself in the end as she comes face to face with the cause of the mayhem in the village. She makes a bold choice and lets it play out. We see a nice development of her character throughout this story.

Honestly – I didn’t find a character that didn’t develop. For better or worse, everyone in the story was affected adversely by what happened in the village and the surrounding areas. And while this story is a Rumpelstiltskin retelling, the central character is fear and how fear plays on the minds of desperate people (much like today). We see a few villagers react to fear with kindness, attempting to draw everyone close together towards a common resolution. Unfortunately, most dig into their selfishness using fear to exact a measure of violence on each other until village life ceases to exist. We see this as a graduate, snowball effect.

I know some didn’t care for the ending however, I thought it was effective for the story. Not every monster is always destroyed. Some simply move on and continue their ridiculousness elsewhere. Key characters were released from their grasp which I was happy to see.

Over all, this didn’t feel like almost 500 pages. It’s a very fast read that keeps you guessing and keeps you in its grips until it’s done with you. Afterwards, I was exhausted.

This was my second Erin Craig book and like The House of Salt and Sorrow, I absolutely loved this one.

My rating: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star: 

Posted in Bookish and Bingeable

A Spell of Rowans

Posted on by Vikki Lynn Sorensen

By Byrd Nash

Raised by a narcissistic mother, the Rowan children’s magical talents were twisted to fit her needs. When Rachel dies, her children must confront the past to have a future.

Rachel Rowan could sniff out secrets and her antique shop, Rosemary Thyme, was a front to torment the residents of Grimsby. When she dies, her children are faced with the deadly fallout of blackmail, murder, and magic.

Victoria, whose empathic talent knows everyone’s hidden feelings; Philippa, whose glamour can bewitch; and Liam, the brother who touches objects to reveal their secrets, all find themselves in danger.

When her autistic brother is arrested, Vic needs to discover the truth to set him free.

A successful art restorer in the big city, Vic’s made a career of ignoring her past and hiding her strange powers. But with Rachel’s death, she must gamble away her secrets to face down forces determined to destroy her and her siblings.

And that hometown boy she dumped way back? He’s in Grimsby, and knows the truth about her.

This is a story of three siblings with magical abilities, an abusive mother and a father who turned a blind eye. There’s also a murder mystery, a former beau, old debts and new debts to settle as well as some sibling relational healing. All in all, it’s pretty power packed. 

I didn’t love this book but I didn’t hate it either. I grabbed me and kept my interested until the very end. The storyline was tough to read at times due to the subject matter but the plot was well-thought out and the characters were very well written. 

I went into this hoping for more of the magical element. There’s a touch here and there but the main theme in the story really is family relationships. Victoria is a strong woman carrying a huge secret and a fair amount of guilt over her past. Her brother and sister also start out as very flawed, broken people each in their own way. By the end of the story, there is a lot of healing and growth that happens which was really good to see. I like a good ending. 

The murder mystery, to me, felt like more of a subplot than the main plot. It was still cool to figure out who did it but I found myself so involved in the relational aspects of the story that I didn’t even try. I almost didn’t care who did it. That was a bit of a let down for me. 

Overall, it was a fast paced, decent read. Not sure I would recommend it to a murder mystery or fantasy fan but if you’re looking for a good story about twisted and damaged family relationships with some magic on the side and a bit of murder, this book is for you. 

My rating: :star: :star: :star: 

Posted in Bookish and Bingeable

The Lost Ones

Posted on by Vikki Lynn Sorensen

By Anita Frank

Some houses are never at peace.

England, 1917

Reeling from the death of her fiancé, Stella Marcham welcomes the opportunity to stay with her pregnant sister, Madeleine, at her imposing country mansion, Greyswick – but she arrives to discover a house of unease and her sister gripped by fear and suspicion.

Before long, strange incidents begin to trouble Stella – sobbing in the night, little footsteps on the stairs – and as events escalate, she finds herself drawn to the tragic history of the house.

Aided by a wounded war veteran, Stella sets about uncovering Greyswick’s dark and terrible secrets – secrets the dead whisper from the other side…

I loved this book!!! Gothic, ghostly, horrific, mystery….all the pieces were there for me. 

Stella is a grieving woman who goes to stay with her sister at Greyswick, a house full of terrible secrets. She finds her sister terrified. Her maid, Annie, talks with ghosts in the house and soon, it’s apparent that the house is harboring a deadly past and is looking for revenge. 

The main character of Stella is stubborn and strong. Still suffering from the loss of her fiance, she fights against the doctors and her parents who want to hospitalize her for “hysteria”. Upon arriving at Greyswick, she finds her bright, jolly sister frightened of every shadow. Stella delves into the mystery of the house, much to the dislike of the lady of the manor, her companion and the house manager. 

I absolutely loved her. I also loved little Annie, Stella’s maid with a gift for seeing and communicating with ghosts. She’s spunky, truthful and endearing. 

There were times when I, eager to get to the meat of the story, thought the story lagged. However, I actually discovered an appreciation for the author who took her time telling the story. It’s not really a who-dun-it as much as a what-happened. I found myself tumbling head-first into this story and didn’t let go until it was done. 

The ending was well done and again, not rushed through. Anita Frank does a great job of leading us through each and every step of the climax of the story, giving the reader time to recover before introducing the next twist. 

For a gothic ghost story lover, this book had all the goods. Creepy mansion. Weird housekeeper. Crabby old lady. Nice but mysterious companion. Babies crying in the night. Walls that whisper secrets. 

Absolutely brilliant. 

My rating: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star: 

Posted in Bookish and Bingeable

The Lost Girls of Ireland

Posted on by Vikki Lynn Sorensen

By Susanne O’Leary

The picturesque beach of Wild Rose Bay is the last place Lydia Butler thought she’d be. But having just lost everything, the run-down cottage she inherited from her Great Aunt Nellie is the only place she can take her daughter, Sunny. Hidden away in a tiny Irish village, she can protect Sunny from the gossip in Dublin, and the real reason they have nowhere else to live…

The cottage is part of the old coastguard station and other eccentric residents are quick to introduce themselves when Lydia arrives. Lydia instantly feels less alone, fascinated by the stories they have about Nellie, and she’s charmed by American artist, Jason O’Callaghan, the mysterious man who lives next door.

But the longer Lydia relaxes under the moonlit sky, the more the secret she’s keeping from Sunny threatens to come out. And as she finds herself running into Jason’s arms, she knows she must be honest and face up to the past she has tried to forget. Has she finally found people who will truly accept her, or will the truth force her to leave the cottage for good?

I love Ireland! I love everything about Ireland and cannot wait to go back there someday. It may seem weird to pick a book to read based on the setting. Yet, I did. Well, that and the synopsis. I was attracted to the story of a woman who’s lost everything and how she healed. I wanted to meet the residents of Wild Rose Bay. 

I didn’t hate it. I didn’t love it either. It was….ok. 

Lydia inherits a house from her great aunt and moves there with her daughter after her husband dies. There’s a tiny bit of a mystery surrounding the life her great aunt lived. I had hoped for more in that storyline but honestly, it wasn’t much. She simply fell in love with a German soldier whose plane crashed on the island. That was it. 

We meet our main character, Lydia, whose life has been full of fundraisers, dinner parties, designer clothes, opulent restaurants and an all-around higher class of living. She finds herself penniless after finding out her recently deceased husband was involved in several illegal business deals. Forced to sell all she has, she finds out she’s inherited a house in a small village. 

I really didn’t like Lydia at all. While we know she’s gone through a lot, there’s just no character growth. Her daughter solves most of their problems and what Sunny isn’t able to solve, everyone else in the village does. So, Lydia really doesn’t need to do much to adjust to this new life outside of working jobs she once thought were beneath her. She even inherits more money halfway through the story. There really isn’t a sense of struggling. 

There’s a love interest which seems really out of place and suddenly, really intense at the time when Lydia isn’t even sure she’s staying at the cottage. Jason seems odd and out of place and just as two dimensional as Lydia. 

I did like the setting. I love Irish cottages and have always dreamt of living in one. The seaside was atmospheric and chilly and altogether lovely. I also really liked the town and the people. I was more interested in their lives than Lydia’s. 

All in all, this was just ok. Not terrible. Not overly enjoyable. 

My rating: :star: :star: :star:

Posted in Bookish and Bingeable

The Woman with the Blue Star

Posted on by Vikki Lynn Sorensen

By: Pam Jenoff

1942. Sadie Gault is eighteen and living with her parents amid the horrors of the Kraków Ghetto during World War II. When the Nazis liquidate the ghetto, Sadie and her pregnant mother are forced to seek refuge in the perilous sewers beneath the city. One day Sadie looks up through a grate and sees a girl about her own age buying flowers.

Ella Stepanek is an affluent Polish girl living a life of relative ease with her stepmother, who has developed close alliances with the occupying Germans. Scorned by her friends and longing for her fiancé, who has gone off to war, Ella wanders Kraków restlessly. While on an errand in the market, she catches a glimpse of something moving beneath a grate in the street. Upon closer inspection, she realizes it’s a girl hiding.

Ella begins to aid Sadie and the two become close, but as the dangers of the war worsen, their lives are set on a collision course that will test them in the face of overwhelming odds. Inspired by harrowing true stories, The Woman with the Blue Star is an emotional testament to the power of friendship and the extraordinary strength of the human will to survive.

“The triumph of the human spirit”

I’ve fallen in love with historical fiction stories. I’m not sure why but there’s a certain vibrancy of human spirit on display in these stories. Pam Jenoff doesn’t miss a beat telling this story based on real life history of holocaust survivors. There’s something about these stories that fascinate me and break me. I know my own cowardice enough to know had I lived back then, I would have been neither brave nor selfless so it always astounds me to read about what folks survived and how they managed. 

Sadie and her family are forced to live in the sewer at the beginning at the story and that’s pretty much where she stays the whole time. While her surroundings don’t change, her circumstances so and it all changes her from a young girl to a brave young woman. She loses people she loves and does her best to stay alive as well as find a way of escape for her family and others with her. 

Elsa is a Polish girl. She has a warm bed, water and enough food but living in a home her late father shared with her stepmother brings its own challenges. For one, her stepmother has an affinity for German soldiers and entertains them frequently. She is abusive and degrading and often reminds Elsa she is not wanted. 

Elsa sees Sadie through the sewer grate and the two become entwined in each other’s lives. Elsa risks much to bring Sadie and those living with her food while Sadie does her best to try to figure out what their next move is going to be. 

As deplorable as Sadie’s conditions are, I love the growth we see in her. I don’t find her to be a spoiled character in the beginning but losing her father early on and taking on the strength of her mother, we see a beautiful woman emerging. She doesn’t take anything for granted (how could she) and yet, is willing to risk much to free them all from living in the sewer. 

Elsa also is another unspoiled character and yet we see her world grow from just herself and her harsh existence with a stepmother who hates her to a much bigger world, helping Sadie and coming to terms with her “lavish” lifestyle. She uses her blessings to be a blessing and that made me completely love her. 

The strength of the human spirit cannot be denied here. By the end of the book, when we discover what happened with both women and how they both fared, I was truly touched. This is a very moving story full of heart and hope. 

My rating: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star: