wanderlustlover's reviews
3763 reviews

2018 Winter, audiobook:

This was one of the December free-to-member-picks from Audible, that, yes, I ended up listening to in January once Christmas rush was finally freed up and my traveling was over.

I didn't read close enough (or maybe at all) on the summary of this one, because somehow it skipped my brain entirely what this story was about (and as a history major, and being in love with Brooks' song about it, I know ALL ABOUT THIS event in history), but I didn't realize until they were walking out to meet the German's carrying the trees and the singing start, and then -- I was just in tears. Which lasted through the next almost ten minutes of it, and counts in as possibly the second only book (and only historical novelization) I've cried at.

It's beautiful. I love this fictionalized version of the events, the people, everything.

2021 Winter (February);

2021 Grishaverse Show Prep Read/Reread in preparation for the tv show dropping in late April 2021. I totally still agree with the little bit I read before, and it was very much retracing steps for someone who rarely does a reread, but I still love meeting The Darkling as a child, and seeing how rare/dangerous his family's gift is.

2016;
This whole series is going to be rated in fives. I hope you are ready.

I am starting to fall in deep love with [a:Leigh Bardugo|4575289|Leigh Bardugo|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1534446099p2/4575289.jpg] and I need to read everything she has after reading this one and [b:The Tailor|17997353|The Tailor (The Shadow and Bone Trilogy, #1.5)|Leigh Bardugo|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1369842991l/17997353._SX50_.jpg|25254362] after finished book one and the folktales. I am so moved and so heart wrenched by this inside like at The Darklings' childhood, his mother, the glimpse at where their people were before everything changed (previous to the main story).

I love, love, love Holly Black’s worlds and this was no exception. I should have read this months ago, when it was first suggested to me. I loved the gory, scary, love and death soaked beginning. I love the slow reveals (like the red cap), but also found the love hat super predictable from the beginning, of not the familial betrayal so close to home. I’m deeply interested in where this series goes.

Audiobook 2017:

My most favorite YA book of 2017, I was dying for this book from the reading the first 8 chapters last year after getting a copy when I met Taylor at Texas Teen Book Fest. This book did not disappoint in the slightest, and I loved that the few things I knew about this series only covered the first about 8 chapters, and then we were off into "here there be dragons" or, more aptly, "Here there be Gods, and what happens to everyone around them."

Even if the ending was a little too predictable from about 4 chapters before it happened, I am still in chills about this series and breathless to see where she takes all these characters and this city/story.

2018 Spring:

Just another Raven Cycle snippet as I made sure I had caught up on everything written in this series at learning of Opal, and wanting to be prepared for the books of dreaming and Ronan coming soon. This Christmas snippet was of Gansey and some strange, mystical carolers who continue to follow him around the world, and it gives us tiny hints of the still forthcoming ends of the books while they were being written.

I found this one so lovely, and it reminded me why I so deeply loved Gansey.

I spent this entirely book BOGGLING wide-eyed. There is 0% I can say about anything in the whole of Secret History without giving away spoilers. Even writing the main character of this new little chapter would be a spoiler. It's perfect and I'm dying for Secret History 2, 3, and 4 already now.

Spring 2020;

I loved this book so hard. End stop. I ended up tearing up in several places, feeling so angry and righteous and sad in so many different places, in so many different ways, for so many different reasons. I am sad I waited a year past hearing everyone talking about this book, and I think everyone reading this should go do so now. Don't wait. Take yourself to this world and leave your eyes open for all the ways it will break your heart.

Summer 2019 (Whispersync);

Laura told me to read this book months ago and I put it off while the end of the year ate me whole, but I set it aside, picking up both the kindle & audible on a sale day, and promised it would be the first book of my summer. This book was gorgeous. Truly, deeply gorgeous. Priory of the Orange Tree moved quickly before being halfway over into being a potential 5 star, and by the end had moved itself into being my favorite fantasy book of the year (tied neck-and-neck with Queen's Shadow for favorite overall of the year, too).

The world-building in this, across oceans as well as centuries, was breathing taking. I could absolutely see where all the divisions of land, old wars, and religions were, and I was so delighted and relieved when the reveals paid off in realistic, painful, beautiful ways, that absolutely made sense for how the dominoes would have fallen on on different continents through actions of wholly mortal, fallible, and inspiring characters.

I fell in love with every single one of our point characters. I fell in love with the lying warrior priestess. I fell in love with the trapped and scared, yet gorgeously brave, haunted queen. I fell in love with the dragon rider who crossed a whole sea to free her dragon regardless of how it could never free her. I fell in love with the young courtier who followed the words of his lover and fell out of his world and was irreparably changed by the choices he had to make. I fell in love with the exiled alchemist who loved so deeply the chains of his ghost echo in his every step.

This book is so rich, and I'm sighing just remembering it. I don't want to give a lot of spoilers due to this one being this year and the fact I need to talk another million people into reading it. Still, understand as a last leaving note, I've already picked up the first book in the author's other much longer series because I need to keep my eye on everything Samantha is writing in the future.

Spring 2109 (Netgalley, Audible, & Kindle);

Where do I even begin with this novel?

I have been meaning to read this novel since long before it was released. I received this book as an ARC from Netgalley, and picked up the Audible and Kindle versions as soon as they were available but even with all three I had not sat down and devoured it, even as I'd plowed through so much else that Valente had written from Labyrinth forward. I think because I knew how long this would sit with me, and how true it would bleach itself into my bones.

(As a cute beginning aside-

This novella begins "I'm dead. The deadest girl in deadtown," and continues to pluck and interview with the words of Holly Black short story-then-novel 'The Coldest Girl in Coldtown,' the alliterative mimicry of both likely fusing them forever into my mind. )

This novella is a love letter style fuck you to the Patriarchal White Male Superhero of decades, told in the style of the The Vagina Monologues about by the 'Women in Fridergators' as Gail Simone termed them. These are the stories of girlfriends and wives, who always bare the brunt, the abuse, and often the role of the murdered on the path of Responsibility and Greatness for The White Patriarchal Male Superhero.

This work is comprised of six stories of such women, in the "Hell Hath Club" with meets in Dead Town, told from each of their point of views. Each character is very clearly based on a specific, identifiable female from six different comics (Marvel and DC both), whom have been fridged in any (and often many) numbers of way by the universe they were in. They all tell a harrowing story of the life they had before and then after superpowers/superheroes came into their lives, with a sharp close look at the razor wire gender and genre tropes that cut them off at the knees at every turn after.

The writing in these pieces if fierce and fearless, coming for your blood and the love of anything that touched that world, to strip it bare from your hands. Cat pulls out all the stops for these pieces, eviscerating the roles when have been shoved into from good girl to whore, from sane to insane. The requirements of each role and the unsettled feelings the men around them get if they try to step outside of any of these roles, to claim fame, to grow larger, to be uncontrolled, or require respect, or even to want to walk away.

I won't give you any spoilers, but my favorite story was the one for Julia Ash (which I am sure none of you are truly surprised about since I've been in love with her comics counterpart since I was five years old, and I have torn the world asunder on number of these issues for decades of her comics arcs).

A deep and favorite love. Advised reading to all.

This piece is gorgeous. This was Valente's reaction to people telling her "stop talking about politics and go back to writing about you Fairyland." This is gorgeous, chilling, heart-breaking and heart-mending. It's about hope and strength, about being defeated and not-defeated-at-all. It's about holding on and fighting back, how fighting changes depending on what board, and how to never let go while waiting and acting.

No spoilers. This is a free internet Valente read and one of those exact reasons I'll read Valente until I die.