Rachel Reads & Reviews

Sharing books for everyone

  • Nonfiction Dog Books

    Until Tuesday: A Wounded Warrior and the Golden Retriever who Saved Him by Luis Carlos Montalvan shows the relationship between dog and man can help veterans after their tours with Tuesday giving the trust, openness and “normalcy” he craves as he deals with his ongoing PTSD.

    The Second Chance Dog by Jon Katz follows the author, Jon as he chases the love of his life, Maria by bonding with her dog, Frieda. It is more of a treatise about love, artistic endevours, and persistance but the relationship of Jon coaxing Frieda to trust him and opening his eyes to the remarkableness of the dog-human bond is as sweet as the romance.

    Thunder Dog: The True Story of a Blind Man, His Guide Dog and the Triumph of Trust by Michael Hingson follows the remarkable story of a dog, Rosella leading her blind master out of the collapsing Twin Towers. It’s harrowing as describes the chaos around him while his dog, keeps cal through it all.

    The Dog Who Saved My Life: Walking with Peety by Eric O’Grey is another man and dog story where the overweight decides to get his life on track and save himself from future heart failure. One of his first steps is to adopt a dog, that would be the obese Peety, and they go on to have a journey of exercise, vegitarianism and healthy living to push each other on to become their best selves.

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  • Covers era

    So it could be said that one can distinguish a book by its cover. Not that it can you tell the story inside, but one can usually distinguish the era. In the area of children’s fiction, ther covers tend to be phto-realistic, some have funky covers with psycedelic print or heart-shaped cuts. The 50s tend to be hardcovers with hand-draw illustrations of the protagonists.

    So what would you say the early 200s are distinguished by? I choose this era because it’s the one I grew up with, and when I think of all my favorite books, all their covers are unique. Magic Tree House had a illustrative style, the Animorphs had a photo-realistic, They both have moodier palettes, favoring greens, purples and blues, but other books had an upbeat color scheme like Judy Blume’s books or Rainbow Fairies.

    So anyone who is reading this, is there a distinguishing characteristic that can make you say- “Yes this book is from the 200s!”? The 2010s?

    Comment below!

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  • Families in Graphic Novels

    Fun Home by Alison Bechdel

    Truthfully, I was going to look for the musical first but when I saw this in the library I figured I should see the source material, and wow. I didn’t have any idea what it was about other than it was an memoir of family dysfunction so it really threw me for a loop to read what it was about.

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  • Wicked Trilogy ReRead

    Okay, yeah I didn’t get to Stephanie Plum #6-10 yet. It’s still out in my library so I decided to go full Diesel and read the Lizzy and Diesel trilogy or Wicked trilogy as I dubbed it due to the title.

    Written with Phoef Sutton, this rollicking supernatural read is much more my speed. Set in Salem, MA with Lizzy , an average woman who works at a bakery. The most supernatural thing about her is that her cupcakes are just that delicious. Everyone loves them.

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  • Book Highlight: Piglet

    This is not a review. As I mentioned in my Animal Books post, I automatically adore nonfiction books about animals and am completely biased so I adored this book. I literally cried (for the first time) because it was so adorable. I also cried because it was heartwarming and there was some animal death/abuse passages. But mainly it’s so cute! Look at the little thing.

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  • Hello, Psycho

    No one goes to intentionally befriend a psycopath. The problem is once you see past their charisma and friendliness and start piecing together the gaps in their stories, they may be onto you and will do anything to shut you up. At least that’s how it is for these protagonists.

    We Were Never Here by Andrea Bartz

    Emily has been best friends with Kristen since middle school, she’s the most supportive, loyal friend there is and willing to defend her to death if necessary. Which is exactly what happened in Cambodia when Emily is almost sexually assaulted. A vase over the head kills the creep and they hide the body in the jungle, promising never to think about it again, their bond strengthened albeit leaving Emily shaken.

    A year later, life goes on, Emily has even found love which she is eager to tell Kristen on their backpacking trip through Chile. it’s all nature and sun, and delicious food with Kristen hooking up with a handsome Spanish backpacker named Sebastian. Until Emily enters the room to find him dead and Kirsten crying that he tried to attack her.

    Can lightning strike twice? Apparently it has and so they bury another body, swearing not to tell anyone. Which she doesn’t, but even though Kristen is non-plussed, Emily starts seeing a therapist.

    The sessions bring a new perspective to Emily about her relationship with Kristen and her own low self-esteem and she begins to realize something is off about her best friend. Which is only compounded by Kristen moving in with her when she’s laid off. Spending this extra time with her makes Emily realize Kristen is not just a loyal best friend, she’s a possesive friend and she’s stalking her every move.

    Bartz does a great job in amping up the suspense as well as creating the disorienting effect of interacting with Kristen who gaslights and lies as easily as she breathes. The psychological sessions are well-done, informing in small doses how one can get entangled in such a toxic friendship and leaves a twist that is heartstopping.

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  • Contemporary Romance 4 mini reviews

    The Boyfriend Project by Farrah Rochon

    This is a fun contemporary romance that begins with female friendship, and what makes you faster friends with complete strangers than shared humilation. When Samiah finds out via twitter that the man she had been dating was catfishing her and two other women (while using her resturaunt reservation to boot), they go viral when they publically confront him. It’s a bit embarassing for Samiah who just wants to keep her head low and do the best tech work she can, but as the limelight dies down, she keeps meeting with the women, London and Taylor. After their experience they decide they’re going to focus on themselves, all this time wasted on finding “the one” when they could be hyping up their careers which is just the perspective she needs to start her dream-make her own app.

    But this a romance so of course, so Samiah does get swept away with the charm of the new guy, Daniel. He’s attentive, sweet, actually listens and is very supportive of her app plans and that’s all he is. There’s no drama that he’s distracting her on the job or they’re working together, he’s just there to keep her from burning out herself. So yep, it’s a pretty good romance since the attraction and communication was the foundational part of their relationship with some playful joking around that made them feel real.

    However, there’s one crucial thing Daniel didn’t communicate. His name is not Daniel, he’s not a tech guy. He actually works in the Finance branch of the FBI and he’s infiltrating her company to find out who’s embezzling funds. If he solves this, he’s preventing money from going into the hands of cartels/mafia/corrupt corporate exec. and may get a promotion. But now, he finds himself torn between his duty and his heart, ultimately he knows where his decision lies but he can’t stand to see Samiah’s reaction when she knows the truth.

    This was a lovely well-rounded book. I enjoyed the Squad girls’ friendship, and I’m excited to see where their stories unfold since this ended in a cliffhanger. The romance was lovely to read. Plus I enjoyed the additional conflict in the story of Samiah dealing with an upstart stealing her ideas/taking leadership under the guise of “teamwork” and the extra pressure black women are put under because of their race, and gender and how it affects her mental health/insecurities/decision making in terms of her promotion.

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  • Book Highlight: The Waterfire Saga

    For anyone who is a mermaid fan, this fantasy adventure is just for you. The six seas are made up of different kingdoms and are under threat by a monsterous levithan creature called Abbadon who was raised by even more mysterious ancestor come back from the dead and for revenge.

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  • Stephanie Plum Between the Numbers ReRead

    Okay, I didn’t get to Stephanie Plum six yet because someone else borrowed it in the library so I decided to go for the Between the Numbers novellas since they’re short and don’t really require knowledge of the other books that I don’t know.

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  • Fruit Basket Another Review

    Since I thoroughly enjoyed the original Fruit Basket series, I decided to take on the sequel. It’s a short series, only 12 chapters since it was supposed to be a limited run in celebration of the original series. As you may guess, it’s the next generation of Sohmas who are just the family that the insecure Sawa needs.

    It follows similar themes to the original in tracing the effects of parental abuse as seen by Sawa’s relationship with her unnamed mother. The mom is a complete narcassist who constantly insults Sawa as needy, lazy, ugly, annoying and goes out of her way to ruin Sawa’s friendships behind her back to fuel more insults. All while portraying herself as a hard-working, young single mother with an ungrateful daughter. So by the time Sawa enters high school, she is determined to become invisible so she won’t be as annoying/useless to others as she is to her mothers.

    Luckily for her, Hajime (son of Tohura and Hiro) and Mutsuki (son of Yuki) swoop in to invite her to the student government, to dinner and impart the meaningful advice. However, it is not all altruistic, they know Sawa from a secret incident way back in their childhood that she doesn’t remember, and so. . Well it goes into spoiler territory from there but it involves Shigure and Akito’s son, Shike.

    It’s a sweet trilogy, it has more high school slice of life than the evolving treatise on love and family that the original was. And I keep mentioning the original because it really is hard to separate these two. The relationship between Hajime and Mutsuki is notable because they are so close and are aware of how much their father’s would appreciate it considering their own lives. The topic of parental legacy and reputation rears here too.

    But because of the short length it feels very surface level. Readers know how deep and complex writing can be. But putting it all in 12 chapters makes it feel unfufilled. I wanted to know more about why Sawa’s mother treats her this way, how will she split herself from such toxicity? What is Shike’s trauma? And so on.

    Plus in having the next generation of Sohmas without showing their parents, it leaves me wanting more at least. It doesn’t have all the characters. It doesn’t mention how are doing. What happened to Arisa and Kureno and Kisa and so on?

    While it’s a cute story, it is bogged down by inevitable comparisons to the original, the shortness and the reliance on the OG characters that overshadow Sawa’s story.

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