Review: Check, Please!: #Hockey, Vol. 1

Check, Please!: #Hockey, Vol. 1 by Ngozi Ukazu
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Laugh out loud funny! The graphic novel was good, but I really loved the tweets and extra comics at the end. Bittle is a figure skater who happens to play hockey, but hates to get checked. He loves to bake, vlog and tweet, and tends to get crushes on straight guys which doesn't help him much. But, guys, loooooveeee, happens in college! :)

Great book for high school kids!

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Review: The Blood Whisperer

The Blood Whisperer by Zoë Sharp
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Great standalone mystery/thriller from the author of the Charlie Fox series. The main character is fresh out of prison from serving a murder sentence that she didn't deserve--someone set her up. She was a "blood whisperer," a crime scene tech who asked too many questions when the detectives wanted the cases to be easily solved. Now she's on the run when another murder is framed on her. Fast action and a great mystery! I didn't guess all of the ending, so that's a good thing!

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Review: Pet Sematary

Pet Sematary by Stephen King
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I remember reading this back in junior high? And it freaked me out, because, you know, cats. I've always had them, but they still freak me out a bit. My cat right now scares me constantly--sprinting off my bed at 3 am to confront the invisible ghost that is on the hallway wall.

I do love King's short story collections, when he has to be tighter with words. Way too many adjectives and adverbs in this thing for me, but the narration of the new audio version keeps you listening. If you've seen Dexter, you will recognize the voice, and it helps with the creepy parts!

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Review: The Unlikely Spy

The Unlikely Spy by Daniel Silva
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book forever to finish. It's massive--the paperback is 724 pages, but I also finished up the year on RUSA's Listen List, so I had some major listening and re-listening to do.

Silva is at his best here with WW2 drama--both in Germany and England. Love all the intrigue and backstabbing and spying and smarts. The book has to be good to keep me going with this length!

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Review: The Silence of the Girls

The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Ahh, the good old Trojan war, when women were raped constantly, often by the men who killed their loved ones. Reading this novel from the POV of the Trojan woman whom Achilles "wins" puts a whole new spin on war. Horrible stuff. Talk about Stockholm syndrome.

Wonderful audiobook--the two narrators both are excellent and the production was spotless.

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Review: Wrecked

Wrecked by Joe Ide
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Snarky and exciting! I never read the first two books in the series, but I understood everything just fine. And now I will need to go back and read or listen to them. It's like a TV adventure mystery in book form. In audio, this book was wonderful. Great voices!

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Review: The Great Believers

The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Oh, man, this brings back everything I remember about AIDS (and don't remember) in the 1980s. I was so blissfully ignorant back then in elementary school. This brings back the emotions and will make your heart explode. Great audio--give it a listen. Worth your 18 hours.

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Review: Meet Me at the Museum

Meet Me at the Museum by Anne Youngson
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I'm not old enough to love this book. Two older people write each other back and forth, slowly falling in love as they do so. So much telling, which I know is the point of an epistolary novel, but it made for kinda boring reading for me.

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Review: The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century

The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century by Kirk Wallace Johnson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Who know that this book would be so interesting? A young American flautist breaks into a museum in England and steals a bag full of dead birds so that he can sell the feathers. Feather trafficking? These guys who build Victorian flies for fishing are crazy! I had no idea that they wanted all these endangered birds' feathers. Crazy stuff and somehow the book sucked me in.

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Review: The Tattooist of Auschwitz

The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

For those of you who like Holocaust fiction, this is based on the true story of the Jewish Slovakian who became the poor man who had to tattoo thousands of people on their entrance to the concentration camp.

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Review: West

West by Carys Davies
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I usually love westerns, but this was slow-going. And the end? I won't give it away, but geez, I felt like I had read a 1950's Boys Life column or something.

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