book reviews

The Great Reading Wrap-Up of 2021

In the grand tradition of December, let’s do some wrapping up. Wrap some presents. Wrap-up your post-holiday shopping. Write lots of wrap-up lists. Wrap-up small, misbehaving children Krampus style to mail to . . . haha . . . ooops. Don’t do that. Got carried away there. Number Of Books I Read: A very respectable 174 I kept my goal of 200, despite knowing that was stupidly unrealistic with me going back to work full time. And indeed, my reading…

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5 Tips for Writing a Book Review That Readers Will Enjoy – Guest Post by Desiree Villena

Today I’m welcoming freelance writer Desiree Villena to the blog. Desiree is a writer with Reedsy, a marketplace that connects authors and publishers with the world’s best editors, designers, and marketers. In her spare time, Desiree enjoys reading contemporary fiction and writing short stories, as well as the occasional book review! In the dim and distant past, book lovers scoured the pages of newspapers and magazines for reading recommendations. Today, when they want to discuss the latest page-turner or need…

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Reading Wrap-Up of 2019

2019 was the Year of the Book for me and all is merry and bright. New fabulous authors, great finds, perfect recommendations, fun series, five star reads, crazybananas alien romance FOR DAYS. This year made me so happy. This post also combines my last two Friday Favorites of the year. December 20: favorite releases of 2019 and December 27: Favorite Reads of 2019. Number Of Books I Read: 250 Um. In my defense, I was left unsupervised. With lots and…

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The Time When an Author Responded to a Bad Review: And It Worked.

For the rest of us normal mortals: DO NOT DO THIS! No, I mean it. EVER. I see your fingers twitching towards that keyboard. DON’T. It’s the fastest way to make yourself look like a terrible person, no matter what a review says about your book. In light of recent events concerning an author who straight-up stalked a reviewer that had disliked her book, this seems like a good time to drag out and re-state my position on this issue. The ladies…

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Books That Lived Up to Their Hype

Watching a book get smeared all over popular culture is a bit anxiety-inducing for me. When a book has legions of adoring fans, I want to trust them. I really do. They must like it for a reason, right? It’s popular and everyone seems to love it. But will I love it? Is it too hyped? Does it deserve all the praise? Wait, did yet another person just rate it five stars on Goodreads? Every bookworm knows this feeling. It’s anticipation, mixed…

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