Rachel Reads & Reviews

Sharing books for everyone

  • Red Queen Review

    In a world divided by blood, Mare Barrow is nothing special. As a Red (blood), she’s believed that jer place is to serve, to fight, and to die at the whim of the supernaturally powerful Silver (bloods). She’s even less special in her family, a disappointment really as her only skill is a thief compared to her talented sister, Grisa whose weaving skills are the family’s only source of income while their brothers are at war.

    But when her best friend and her are on the line for conscription, her hasty decision to find enough money to pay smugglers go awry leads to a series of events that has her serving the royal family. That turns into a different disaster when a near death experience reveals that she has powers. That’s supposed to be impossible for a Red so the family makes up a story that she’s a long lost Silver nobless, now engaged to the second prince. And she better cooperate or else.

    Now with all that context out of the way, I must say this was a thrilling introduction to a brand new fantasy world (whose real world parallels are lightly touched on but quickly fall apart with the whole magical powers aspect) where love, revolution and power are major tools that all the players and pawns use in one deadly battlefield.

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  • Sandhya Menon Interview

    Sandhya Menon is the bestelling author of the When Dimple Met Rishi universe and Rosetta Academy series among other stand-alone rom-com books. Here, she generously took time out of her busy schedule to answer some questions about Desi representation, self publishing vs traditional and more.

    1. You majored in psych in university-Does that inform how you write your characters and their dynamics?

    Oh, most definitely! Studying human psychology gave me a depth of understanding into why we behave the way we do the way few other areas of study could have. 

    2. Since you started with self-publishing, was that process different from working with a mainstream publisher?

    Completely different! Of course, I was self-publishing more than a decade ago, so I’m sure things are very different now. But I found that working with an agent and a Big 5 publisher gave me the kind of support, distribution, and marketing I simply couldn’t afford myself. 

    3. A recurring theme explored in your YAs is mother-daughter relationships. What draws you to this family dynamic in particular?

    I have a daughter myself, and we’re very close. She often relays stories to me about her friends and their mothers and different relationship dynamics she’s exposed to. In my opinion, mother-daughter dynamics can be some of the most complicated, rich, and nuanced of any human relationships. And especially when the daughter is going through adolescence! I just find that so fascinating to write about. 


    4. Did you feel pressure about representing Desi culture in your books or do you feel like it’s a necessary push to showing more diversity in the book industry?

    I felt very honored to represent Desi culture, to be honest. It’s so great that this generation of readers will have so much representation from all walks of life compared to past generations! 

    5. How did you feel when “When Dimple Met Rishi” got a television adaption in Hindi (Mismatched)? What did you think of the results?

    It was fascinating to see what I like to think of as an AU (alternate universe) When Dimple Met Rishi! 

    6. What do you hope readers connect with in your characters?

    I hope they’re able to see a little bit of themselves in at least one character. 

    7. Any news or details of your upcoming works you’d like to share?

    The third and final Rosetta book, Of Dreams and Destiny, which is a loose Sleeping Beauty retelling and follows DE, will be out September 19th, 2023! And after that, well, let’s just say I’ve got a few pots simmering! 😉 

    Thanks for having me!

    If you want to learn more about Sandhya Menon and her books, follow her on social media and her website: https://www.sandhyamenon.com/

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  • The Heist Society Review

    A master of disguise.

    A smooth inside man.

    A beautiful femme fatal.

    A comedic duo of expolsive and distraction experts.

    A hacker extraordinaire.

    A mysterious rookie.

    These teens make up the Heist Society and they’re embarking on the most high-stake caper of their lives without the knowledge or permission of their elders.

    And time is running out.

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  • July Books

    Queen Charlotte by Julia Quinn and Shonda Rhimes

    Although I finished the Brigderton series the other year, I am a completist so I had to read this companion book even though it is connected more to the tv series than the original novels. I’ll admit, since it said companion I thought it would be more like a prequel to the events readers will see in the series but it isn’t. It’s more like a novelization of the first five episodes, only it goes in chronological order and has no flash forwards or framing device.

    Not that it is a complete waste. Novelizations often give deeper insight to the characters as we can see insidde their heads rather than interpret their facial expressions in the silence.

    For instance, readers are able to get inside George’s wandering mind malady as his inner dialogue rushes together and flies away when stressed. You also feel more connected to the characters as it adds little tidbits like how Charlottes enjoys apple strudal in the winter and Brimsley’s reoccuring fear of his corpse being stomped by Italian grape stompers and a goat.

    In fact, Agatha’s words about palace walls are more impactful here than in the series as she informs Queen Charlotte of her impact as a symbol for the great experiment, that she is able to wield power in her position rather than sulk over her feelings of being constrained and controlled and hidden away.

    Quinn’s humor and witty banter are still highlights and the love story is very sweet even though it doesn’t have the instrumental soundtrack of Wildest Dreams or whatever. Plus it is nicely balanced with the show’s themes of women maintaining and asserting independence and power within limited means.

    There Goes the Neighborhood by Jade Adia

    Rhea’s summer was supposed to be a time of laziness, graffiti and bonding with her two best friends, Diego and Malachi. But that quickly comes to a halt when the encroachment of gentrificiation kicks into high gear, threatening Rhea’s friends with eviction. She cannot stand the thought of being split up and so hatches a plan to use people’s fears against them. They’re gentrifying her block because they think it’s “safe” so what if she and her friends start a gang. A fake gang whose smoke and mirrors will drive developers away until someone gets murdered.

    While this was advertised as a comedy, it is more like a coming of age-summer summer hijinks turned murder mystery. It was sort of comedic in a surreal way in commenting how white people think they can get away with ridiculous stuff because of how rich they are.

    Nonetheless, the coming of age story is what sucks you in. Readers can immediately understand why Rhea is so posessive of her friends but her arc of learning to expand her circle to include the new kids in town (Marley and ), seguing into the learning to taking a chance on change.

    This nicely connects to the book’s broader themes of Rhea’s short term approach of creating a gang which she believes will get results faster than the activism and law cases creating by white savior college kids. Rhea can be very stuck on her sometimes black and white (and very judgemental first minute) impression of others and won’t listen to the alternative. Obviously, it gets her in hot water with the murder mystery but works well in the long run and Rhea manages to never veer into annoyingly stupid.

    I’m not putting this into much detail since one should read for themselves, but I believe Adia does a good job in demonstrating how gentrification negatively affects communities by sucking the diversity and displacing long time residences without offering them the better economic means gentrification is supposedly offering.

    The book also has a meaningful refrain that even though these kids are doing this dangerous, grown up thing, the kids are still viewed as adults because they’ve been forced to grow up faster thanks to racism, gentrification, shootings, creating a life is not fair mentality.

    This was just a great book full of distinct, dynamic characters (Love Auntie Inga!) that include girl supporting girl friendship, LGTBQ and autism rep. It doesn’t shy away from heavy stuff but is also lighthearted as well because black life is not all about pain and oppression as Adia writes in her author’s life note but full of black joy, community and sneaking into movie theaters with your best friends.

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  • Ranking Tales of the Frog Princess

    Yep, the same tale that Disney’s The Princess and the Frog was loosely based on. Mainly the kissing the frog and turning into a frog herself part, everything else veers off into a totally original and delightful fractured fairytale about Princess Emma (short for Emerald) and her adventures in honing her magic that include breaking a family curse, befriending dragons and finding that that onnoxious frog may actually be her prince.

    In fact, it was pretty hard to rank this as if I were going to individual review each of the books, they’d each be a solid four so it was all a matter of which had more memorable parts/world/character development.

    1. Once Upon a Curse: Emma’s family has been cursed for decades where when a female turns sixteen, any contact with flowers will turn her into a nasty, ugly hag, cruel to her loved ones and everyone else. A classic fairytale witch. Already, Emma’s grandmother and beloved aunt, Grassina have fallen to the curse and Emma desperately wants to break the spell. Especially as she doesn’t feel comfortable with accepting Eadric’s marriage proposal, knowing that if she ever touches a flower, her personality and love for him will disappear and she’ll drive everyone miserable. Not only does this story have exciting stakes between the curse, Emma’s sixteenth birthday and potential jousting disasters but it involves time travel. An easy to understand kind of time travel (as long as you don’t think too hard) that lets Emma meet her ancestors and find that not all the stories have been true.
    2. Dragon’s Breath: The second book in the series seems to expand the world to me. It feels like a step up in not only introducing more lore, but there’s the road trip adventure across the kingdom where Emma and Eadric encounter the Dragon Olympics, the Witches Retirement Home and secret island of Oflet. The characters feel more dimensional as we see Aunt Grassina totally turned about by finding her beloved that she neglects her responsibilities, forcing Emma to step up while trying to help her aunt break Haywood’s curse. Eadric also gets a little development as he sets aside his macho prince act to accept Emma’s magical help even though her spells are still sometimes fails. Also loved the surprise ending that sets up the next book.
    3. No Place for Magic: So much has happened since readers first met Emma and this adventure demonstrates how far she and everyone else has come. Now that Eadric’s parents know she’s the Green Witch, they want to forbid the match so Emma and Eadric go forward to his home-kingdom and end up having to save his kidnapped brother from trolls. Venturing past trolls, werewolves and cocktrices (I love how Baker never fails to find obscure and interesting monsters for the characters to face), Emma must learn to hold back on her reliance for magic. Not only to appease Eadric’s parents so they’ll see she’s not a stereotypical evil witch but to prevent trolls from tracking her through their special farseeing ball. It’s interesting additional challenge that shows Emma’s growth in confidence and magical abilities while reminding her of how special she is without it and just what made Eadric loved her in the first place. Plus all the other characters have their nice moments even her ultra-critical mother.
    4. The Salamander Spell: This prequel tells Grassina’s tale during the worst week of her life-her mother’s cursed, her sister blames her for it, her father dies and turns out she has magic? Okay, the last one is not so bad but she’s not sure how to harness it in a way that can save her kingdom. This was a nice prequel but I admit, it felt a bit repetitive as it was similar to Emma’s journey (being expected to be not special/non magical, wishing she could do more, animal sidekick, annoying suitors, always criticized by Chartruse). Although, I did enjoy seeing the beginning of Grassina and Haywood’s relationship and the explanation of the Vili making it extra sappy.
    5. The Frog Princess: As usual the first book, while a servicable intro to the world and the characters, always feels a little flat compared to the devlopement and more interesting twists of the other books. It plays it safe with a standard bickering boy-girl shapeshifting adventure while seeding themes, and plot points for future books.
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  • Warriors: Dawn of the Clans

    This was an amazing set. I think it may be my favorite. Not only does it show us how it all began, but the forshadowing and easter eggs make it a treat for fans to track the progress, knowing what will happen in the future. And for those who tire of the constant return of Tigerstar and other cats from the dead, this features a whole new cast, entirely separate from Firestar’s family.

    Also it’s very Lion King aka it’s very Hamlet filled with reluctant heroes, tragic villains, brotherly strife and full circle moments.

    It just generally felt like a breath of fresh air even as it continued the series’ general themes of enviromentalism, family and honor. Also it has bonus scenes at the end providing extra content about side characters and lore in this set.

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  • Warriors: Omen of the Stars

    This series continues after the cliffhanger in Power of Three, but unfortunately lacks the big twists and willingness to break the status quo the previous series had.

    You see, since Hollyleaf’s death leaves questions of who the real third cat of destiny is, it is quickly answered to be Dovepaw. Her journey is sort of a rehash of the original trio’s. First in denial and wanting to be normal before embracing the power and getting too ahead of herself before balancing her destiny with real life non-prophecy skills. Her sister, Ivypaw, takes Lionblaze’s rolle as the ‘darker’ cat whose jealousy of Dovepaw leads her to take Tigerstar’s advice so she can be a better fighter even though she has no power.

    Lionblaze’s and Jayfeather’s storylines are contiuations of their previous arcs with being battle-worthy and a good-healer respectively aong with the usual who’s my real parent, and love tribulations.

    I say this one felt like a step back in not only repeating the arc through Ivypaw and Dovepaw but it went back to the more black and white, good vs evil storytelling. There was no pushing the boundaries through the character’s actions as it felt clear who the real bad guy was. Same with the spiritual lore of the Starclan. Previously, Sol had made the cats really question Starclan’s purpose as a guide to the Clans and really made cats doubt the faith. Hunter tries to do this again, but it lacked tension.

    Then you add cats returning from the dead and the retread of Tigerstar being the big bad, it felt like the series was drawn out too long. I mean, there were some big surprise twist moments but it mainly dragged.

    Now to the rankings.

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  • Top 5 Archie’s Weird Mysteries

    I love Archie’s Weird Mysteries! Seriously, the comic and the show and I’m still waiting for the day where Archie Comics will sell an omnibus with all 24 issues but I digress. With its distinct art and ink style by Fernando Ruiz, John D’Agostino, and Rich Koslowski, and B-movie premise, its perfect for those who like some light horror-comedy than the more darkly ironic Archie Horror line.

    The Return of Scarlet: Aka the first Archie’s weird mystery I ever read. Even though it was a sequel story to the show that I hadn’t seen yet, I was immediately sucked in by the small recap and the high stakes fight of a enemy turned friend turned mysteriously enemy again. It has the usual Archie humor alongside the vampire attacks and the pathos that comes with Scarlet’s return and has Beaumont who is a major reoccurring character. So yeah, basically an ideal intro to the weird mysteries, 

    Lord of Earrings: Everyone’s heard of being careful what you wish for? In this case, a pair of earrings act as an evil genie wish. In Betty’s case, her desire to be as admired and as rich as Veronica turns her into an even worse version when she makes it big. Not only does Betty have Veronica’s ego, but it’s coupled with self righteousness as Betty knows shes a good person (well. . was a good person). While it is more preach than the usual weird mysteries fare, I liked the Archie twist to the story. 

    Fear of Frost: Upset by everyone’s antipathy to his work, Jack Frost decides to make Riverdale his ice kingdom. Sure, it won’t make people like him but he’ll have fun with it. While regular Archie fans may have enjoyed the return of the Mighty Crusaders, this is what I call an epic teamup as Beaumont, Archie and co. call upon the personification of all nature spirits to fight Jack Frost. 

    And Now a Word from Our Monsters: Satellite beams brings mascots to life? It can only happen in a little town called Riverdale, and nicely ties into Archie’s research paper on the effects of ads on people. The more aggressive they are, the more people buy. Who wouldn’t when a kaiju sized hose threatens to strangle you. It’s a classic, B movie fare with a clever solution from Jughead of all places. But then again, he knows best from all the McDonalds commercials he salivates over.

    The Faculstein Monster: When a mad scientist decides to make school more efficient by combining the Riverdale falculty into one Cereberus/Frankenstein monster, the Archie writers create something truly horrifying. I mean, one monster with Grundy’s head berating you with math, Coach Kleats making you do push ups and Weatherbee sending you to detention? The terror is real

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  • Ranking The Princess Tales

    It’s clear that Levine excells in her humorous fractured fairytales and the short stories of The Princess Tales are no exception.

    1. The Fairy’s Mistake: Maybe it’s cheating to put the first book as umber one but it’s such a fun introduction to the series and features one of my favorite obscure tales-Diamonds and Toads, and how the curse/blessing turns out to be quite the reverse.
    2. For Biddle’s Sake: This one’s based on a German fairytale called Puddocky which seems to be a combination of Rapunzel/The Frog Prince only the frog girl can do magic instead. I loved all the twists and turns and the dramatically vengeful Bombina.
    3. Princess Sonora and the Long Sleep: I enjoyed Levine’s twist on Sleeping Beauty in how she gives Sonora such a curious, knowledgable personality and how she takes charge of her fate by pricking the spindle so she could avoid a marriage was a cool twist. Plus the inadverted love triangle was very funny.
    4. Cinderellis and the Glass Hill: Cinderellis the inventor was such a sweet, adorkable protagonist who just wanted the friendship his older brothers shared. It instantly makes him rootable. Also it was nice of Levine to cleverly set up Cinderellis and Princess Marigold’s connection through disguise.
    5. The Fairy’s Return: While this was a nice full circle with Ethelridge getting her groove back after her Diamonds and Toads disaster, and had plenty of references to the other stories, it felt less charming compared to the others. Probably just a personal opinion thing.
    6. The Princess Test: While it was a cute retelling of the Princess and the Pea and I enjoyed the quriky characters, I heartily agreed with Trudy’s frustration with Rosella and her constant calamities. It made the story very humorous but leaves it last in the rankings.

    I highly suggest parents or at least librarians stock this series for story time. It’s a very whimsical series and kids are sure to enjoy it.

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  • Ever Review

    Olus is a lonely god, the youngest of the Akkran gods at seventeen compared to their thousands of millenium thus he is unusual fascinated by mortals or “soap bubbles” as his parents call them for their fleeting, ephermeral lives. On one such sojourn to the mortal realm, he travels to Hyete as a goatherd and spies Kezi.

    Kezi is an average girl whose belief in Admat is unbreakable and it is to him, the god of everything and everyone, that she prays to when her mother falls fatally ill. But the price for her mother’s health turns into her inadverted sacrifice and Olus will do anything to save the girl.

    By turning her immortal. Can these unlikely lovers defy fate?

    That sounds like an interesting premise, right? Too bad the execution turns this potential epic into a surface-level drama.

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