themermaddie's reviews
467 reviews

i love it when books catch me off guard, this was much better than i expected but definitely different than what i was expecting.

this book's shining moment is how each character is so well developed, i fully believe that these are all real people with complex and complicated emotions. this is just such a great cast of characters. it has excellent family dynamics and explores the way we are all deeply shaped by our families, and of course, shows off different kinds of non-romantic love (a favourite theme of mine!). i was a big fan of quinn's relationships with her family, her complicated love and resentment for her parents and asher are so well expressed. her relationship with asher was one of my favourites, navigating this new phase in both of their lives and staying close despite their age gap. the plot concerning quinn's misbelief that her family's love is conditional was my favourite of the book, the overall message of working through things with the ones you love because they're worth it was so lovely. this is definitely a family heavy story and it warmed my heart.

the author clearly understands her characters' psychologies so well, i'm so obsessed w the way that tarek and quinn's respective approaches to romance clash so perfectly. the romantic and the cynic trope isn't new but this is such a good take on it, rachel lynn solomon has absolutely understood the assignment. i love that their romance was built on proper friendship, their conflicts were all the result of their own specific pathologies and it was so believable and honest. definitely less of a friends to rivals to lovers story and more of a friends to lovers story, with some miscommunication due to misunderstandings.

the writing is deceptively simplistic at times, but i think that it actually did a good job with speaking between the lines, particularly because a great deal of the story had instances of miscommunication. i was briefly worried at the beginning bc i was afraid that it was going to fall into the miscommunication trope (my least favourite trope) but luckily it was handled very well! this book really emphasises the importance of communication, building misunderstandings to resolve them with difficult but necessary conversations. i'd say the story as a whole is about these characters relearning how to express love for others and themselves in healthy ways, and i loved watching tarek and quinn fight and find compromises.

to be honest the romance was the least interesting plot for me, but still really enjoyed it and i love these characters. i was more invested in the bildungsroman aspect of quinn trying to figure out who she is outside of her assigned role in the family. i love her insecurities and uncertainties about what she wants from life when everyone around her seems to have it all figured out, and i loved her relationship with maxine; two lovely lost and lonely people finding friendship with each other. i was so invested in quinn's future and her rediscovering her love for the harp; i really liked the scenes with characters explaining their love for their respective passions, like tarek with baking and asher with wedding planning. i also really liked the mental illness rep, i loved the depictions of quinn's ocd and tarek's depression, it wasn't dramatised or exploited as an excuse for shitty behaviour.

overall this is a fantastic coming of age romance with above average characterisation, this is a must read if you want a YA novel that discusses messy complicated teen feelings <3

what a stunning book!! owens' writing is so beautiful and lyrical, her descriptions are so physical and it really brings the setting to life. the marsh is so atmospheric and has such a character of its own, i loved it. this sprawling account of kya's life and love for the marsh is so beautiful and completely deserves its accolades.

kya was such a wonderful main character to follow, she is so sympathetic and her resilience made me love her so much, it is so so easy to root for her. all the characters feel believable, jumpin and mabel have a little place in my heart, we love a lil found family moment.

the dual timelines took a little while to cross, and i was more invested in kya's timeline than the murder mystery angle, but both were interesting. the mystery aspect was less urgent and prevalent than i was expecting, and the murder actually ended up being less important. i liked the final 'twist' a lot, it was somehow unexpected while also entirely obvious. overall a very lovely book with an incredibly well-developed and atmospheric world.

the premise: morally grey lesbians try to out con each other in 1800s england and end up falling in love

i'm sorry WHAT???? lady and her servant?? friends to enemies to lovers??? identity theft trope??? morally dubious cast of characters??

is this the lesbian historical romance i've been waiting for my whole life????? YES IT IS

sarah waters has me in a chokehold for this, she is such an insanely talented storyteller. this started out fun but still relatively predictable, then i finished part 1 and everything went absolutely off the rails and i still have not recovered. waters hides so much in between the lines, her writing is subtle and deeply evocative of the most intense emotions. i was blown away by waters' storytelling, at no point did i ever know where the plot was going. every character is so shifty and untrustworthy, it makes you look at every single person through a lens of suspicion because you never knew who would be the next person to betray a friend which was so thrilling. it took me so long to read this book bc i honestly just didn't want it to end. sue and maud really put themselves through the ringer with this one; oh god, there was so much angst. it was delightfully tropey without ever feeling cliche or unearned; i cannot emphasise how tight the whole plot is.

i first heard of this book on a list for "classic lesbian lit" and it's taken me forever to get around to reading it, but i'm so glad that i have. fingersmith has absolutely earned its spot on the list of classic sapphic stories and it's just, chef's kiss.

ok that's the end of my official review, the rest is just going to be me ranting about random things about the book in no particular order, spoilers ahead obviously.

first of all are you telling me that the ENTIRE LIBRARY WAS JUST LESBIAN EROTICA???? HUH???? sarah waters just won't let me rest even when there are two pages left. i knew that maud had read sex scenes to the visiting gentlemen before, but i didn't realise that literally ALL of it was just straight up porn. mr lilly really had her reading lesbian erotica to other grown men for their pleasure from the ages of ten to seventeen???? VOM.
it kinda makes his death really funny tho, she basically went thru his porn folder and deleted everything and he got so sick he fucking died. like this man was so dedicated to lesbian porn he dedicated his entire life to it to the point of neglecting all his other needs, what the fuck. this was so throwaway but i'm not over it. he literally turns maud into an erotica writing machine, what an absolute queen. all this time they had us think he was a serious scholar. PORN. ALL OF IT. i cant get over it.

i was so concerned, thirty pages from the end, that the ending wouldn't land bc i couldnt see how things would be resolved with the way things were going but i should know better by now not to doubt sarah waters, of course she pulled it off. the letter was just ideal, and sue and maud's final scene was just perfect. i was so glad it wasn't just a reunion and also that it wasn't full of dramatics, that kind of quiet and resigned reconciliation fit them so well. after all they have been through, their meeting after all this time was deserved. the rollercoaster of alternating yearning for one another and threatening to kill each other? MWAH. chef's kiss. there was so much lesbian yearning going around and it makes me absolutely ache. "it is filled with all the words for how i want you"? HELLO? that's bars. the idea that two women who, at the beginning, set out to rob the other of everything, in the end loving each other so much that they give up on their selfish cons to protect each other ... you have me hooked. ANYWAY sue and maud's romance has me by the throat.

i love how conflicted i still am about mrs sucksby now having finished the story, i love that i'm suspicious of basically everyone by the end still. no one is obviously good or bad enough to truly trust and it's awesome. i'm pretty sure maud killed gentleman, i think that's what the text implies but i'm also open to discussing why mrs sucksby actually did it. i would've loved for sue to be able to confront mrs sucksby but it's deliciously bittersweet that she can never do so, i hope she has a chance to ask maud about everything that happened in those three months. i think mrs sucksby did love sue on some level, but they're all too crooked at heart to ever love anyone but themselves without strings attached. the hanging was a beautiful full circle; in the end, both sue and maud's mother did end up being a hanged murderess, and it is so satisfying. although, the whole murder scene was kinda confusing tbh bc everyone was speaking in riddles so that sue didn't understand, it was so expertly written. the whole conversation was landmine of misunderstandings. awesome.

god i just love this book so much

genuinely so happy with the way this series is turning out, each book just keeps getting better. strongly defined characters who all have interesting relationships with one another and not just their love interests, the plot is moving along at a really exciting pace, and it balances the fine line of lighthearted humour and serious emotional turmoil that really tugs on your heart strings. the whole story is just so earnest. i'm not gonna lie, this one made me cry a little. damn.

this is an incredible in between story!! i was initially hesitant bc i wasn't sure if levana's character was going to justified through some really tragic backstory, but meyer does an incredible job of creating a nuanced and complex portrait of levana without leaning into the sob story. young levana evokes pity and awe, she's smart and undervalued and deeply traumatised by her sister's abuse, and her actions are never justified to the reader, only showing levana's warped thought process. meyer paints a complicated portrait of a woman who only wanted love and was never shown any, pushed to the brink.

i loved all the little details from the main canon that are revealed in this story, like watching winter grow up and seeing how her childhood unfolded, and the circumstances of selene's birth. i particularly liked the explanation of levana's hatred of mirrors and the real reason behind her excessive use of glamours, i liked that it wasn't just simple vanity or envy of winter's beauty. levana was so fleshed out and intriguing, you understand that she's doing bad things and getting into awful situations and it's all her own fault but you just can't help but feel pity and sympathy for her. you're not quite rooting for her because this story isn't removed from the context of the main canon, but i wanted to root for her and her personal development. she is so ambitious and clever and overlooked, she's clearly a talented and ruthless leader and you can't help but admire her for it, despite everything. this was an excellent extra novel in this series, i'm so glad meyer was able to execute it so well, because it makes levana a much stronger villain now knowing everything about her past. now not only am i excited to see how they defeat levana, but i'm also invested in levana's fate.

this felt like a classic early 2000s rom com! i thought this was fun and quick but easily forgettable. it's admittedly less managing their bosses' hijinks and more about learning to recognise unequal/abusive relationships. even though it's told from dual povs, carey is very clearly the main character and shes the one who gets her ultimate catharsis moment.

the beginning sets the scene of the tripps, their fame, and carey's role with them. it's a little world info heavy at first, and carey and james' relationship went from bickering to making out to capital L love pretty quickly, i think it was a couple weeks. their interactions are sweet and i think they're well suited each other though. i liked the descriptions of carey's disability and mental health.

i thought the police interviews were a really quirky way to frame the story, it was fun and unusual and it kept the intrigue going. i liked the little social media inserts as well. the honey don't list is a quick and easy romance to clean your palate in between books, but nothing particularly worth writing home about.

3.5 stars

an inarguably beautifully book, i just don't think this kind of story is my cup of tea; the ending pushed me to round up to 4 stars in the end.

pratchett is a wonderful storyteller, maybe this is just bc i thought tom hanks did a great job with the audiobook, but i loved the oral feel of this book, as though danny were sitting in a creaky rocking chair relaying the entire story to me with all the gift of retrospect. pratchett creates such lifelike characters and paints realistic portraits of everyone without sparing their flaws, yet still endearing them to you. you can't help but feel fond towards them even as they make questionable decisions.

the dutch house is in itself a character, the descriptions are lovely and the weight of this building pulls all the characters down into its gravity. it feels a bit like the painting in The Goldfinch, in the way that it's not always present in the narrative but everything is inevitably linked to it somehow and it circles back to be all about the house in the end. i'm suspicious of it but i will credit pratchett for creating such a mesmerising building.

her writing is incredibly evocative, though to be honest i'm not sure what emotion she evoked in me. i said that the ending pushed me to round up to 4 stars on goodreads, because towards the end i found myself getting gut-wrenchingly invested in the outcome of these characters lives. i picked up this book on the premise of "a dark fairytale"; i mean yeah, i guess that's true, but i think i set my expectations askew by hanging the fairytale sign above it. the only reason i would give this book anything less than 5 stars is bc i just don't think sprawling family histories are in my particular interest, i thought it was excellently executed and i can recognise that while also acknowledging that it's not getting a spot on my top shelves.

interesting.

MARISSA MEYER PLEAAAAAASE slow down i'm going to break something w the way i fall for your romances

this was so incredibly cute oh my god. i actually really enjoyed how unlikable prudence is at first, it made me excited to see how she would grow and marissa meyer does not disappoint. this entire world is so wonderfully fleshed out and realistic, i love all the characters in this little beach town, it just feels like a community bubble. the seaside atmosphere and the wildlife preservation workers are such a great setting to read about, the animals are so sweet and the characters all get to unite around a common passion and cause. i thought prudence and quint's characters were so well developed, they had all this space to just be normal teenagers and i ended up getting a lot more from this YA book than i expected. i love the lunar chronicles but the quiet beach town setting is so insular and really worked to the book's advantage. this is such a good use of first pov limited, prudence's surly behaviour and impossible standards are understandable but not entirely sympathetic, and her romance with quint is developed over time with excellent pacing. we fucking love a rivals to lovers arc, yes we do.

i initially thought the karma power was going to be underutilised, and only pulled out to show prudence's hypocrisy, but i actually really liked the way it tied everything together thematically in the end. i thought it did a lovely job with helping prudence let go of her need to control everything and trust the people around her, and it ended up being a well-used device.

there were moments where prudence was almost eye-rollingly oblivious to the way she treats people, and the fact that quint always had a real excuse for his "slacker" behaviour made him occasionally come off as a manic pixie dream boy, but i still love him. i think prudence at the beginning definitely did not deserve him, but i'm glad she evolved into someone who did. i think quint was a little too perfect at times, besides the occasional "mean streak" (which ends up being dismissed in the end anyway bc prudence admits what he said was true) but he is such an incredible love interest!! i love their chemistry and their tension and i think they're so well matched for each other, and this is just such a perfect feel good book that pulled me out of a bad mood.

an incredibly fun conclusion to an epic series!! i adore what meyer has done with all these fairytales and i'm so glad i gave it a chance. the worldbuilding in this series incredibly cool and very interesting, i loved being able to see more of luna. parts of it were quite predictable, and it was definitely a HEA, but i think i would've been upset had it been anything less than a HEA too. at the same time, i like that meyer wasn't afraid to get a little messy; i like that there was death and torture and real consequences for their failure. this book is massive but does a pretty good job at concluding an excellent YA series and all around good story.