Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley

 

Debut author Angeline Boulley crafts a groundbreaking YA thriller about a Native teen who must root out the corruption in her community, for readers of Angie Thomas and Tommy Orange. 

As a biracial, unenrolled tribal member and the product of a scandal, eighteen-year-old Daunis Fontaine has never quite fit in, both in her hometown and on the nearby Ojibwe reservation. Daunis dreams of studying medicine, but when her family is struck by tragedy, she puts her future on hold to care for her fragile mother. 

The only bright spot is meeting Jamie, the charming new recruit on her brother Levi’s hockey team. Yet even as Daunis falls for Jamie, certain details don’t add up and she senses the dashing hockey star is hiding something. Everything comes to light when Daunis witnesses a shocking murder, thrusting her into the heart of a criminal investigation. 

Reluctantly, Daunis agrees to go undercover, but secretly pursues her own investigation, tracking down the criminals with her knowledge of chemistry and traditional medicine. But the deceptions—and deaths—keep piling up and soon the threat strikes too close to home. 

Now, Daunis must learn what it means to be a strong Anishinaabe kwe (Ojibwe woman) and how far she'll go to protect her community, even if it tears apart the only world she’s ever known

MY REVIEW: 4 Stars ⭐️ 

There needs to be more Native American authors and books!! We need them in High Fantasy and Young Adult! This one is another crime type book and I would like to see the native people in fantasy and all other rolls. That being said, this was still a wonder debut novel by the author. 

The strength of the main character, Daunis, is fantastic! There are a lot of hard and sad things she has to go through. I found the family and side characters great too! 

* Thank you to Netgalley and MacMillian for a digital copy of this book? 

December Owlcrate Unboxing

 It's time for the Owlcrate December Unboxing. We got the same book as Fairyloot and we are getting the same books from both companies in January. I'm fine with it as long as they look different and I love the actually store. Lol

 

1. First we have some awesome leg warmers!

 

 

2. Next we have a 300 piece jigsaw puzzle from An Ember In The Ashes 

 

3. We have a Fiction Bath Company hand cream inspired by Of Fire and Stars 

 4. We have a Wrath and the Dawn inspired wooden ornament 

 

 5. We have a cute little rolling pin for baking cookies with little designs on it inspired by Spinning Silver

 

  6. We have the BOTM enamel pin 

 

 And finally, the book. We have a lovely art piece under the dust jacket and hardback embossed cover is gorgeous!

 

 

Happy Reading! Merry Christmas!

Mel 

Wider Than The Sky by Katherine Rothschild

 

In the wake of sudden tragedy, twin sisters uncover a secret that rips open their world. Katherine Rothschild explores the pain and power of forgiveness in a stunning debut novel that will shatter your heart and piece it back together, one truth at a time. 

Sixteen-year-old Sabine Braxton doesn’t have much in common with her identical twin, Blythe. When their father dies from an unexpected illness, each copes with the loss in her own way—Sabine by “poeting” (an uncontrollable quirk of bursting into poetry at inappropriate moments) and Blythe by obsessing over getting into MIT, their father’s alma mater. Neither can offer each other much support . . . at least not until their emotionally detached mother moves them into a ramshackle Bay Area mansion owned by a stranger named Charlie.

Soon, the sisters unite in a mission to figure out who Charlie is and why he seems to know everything about them. They quickly make a life-changing discovery: their father died of an HIV- related infection, Charlie was his lover, and their mother knows the whole story. The revelation unravels Sabine’s world, while practical Blythe seems to take everything in stride. Once again at odds with her sister, Sabine chooses to learn all she can about the father she never knew. Ultimately, she must decide if she can embrace his last wish for their family legacy—along with forgiveness.

MY REVIEW: 1 Star ⭐️ 

I just couldn’t really get into the book. I love the cover but I don’t remember requesting this book as it’s not a book I would be interested in reading. 

I’m sure many will love it and that’s awesome! So give it a try. 

* Thank you to Netgalley and SOHO TEEN for a digital copy of this book. 

Mel 

Black Widows by Cate Quinn

 

Blake's dead. They say his wife killed him. If so... which one?

Polygamist Blake Nelson built a homestead on a hidden stretch of land—a raw paradise in the wilds of Utah—where he lived with his three wives:

Rachel, the first wife, obedient and doting to a fault, with a past she'd prefer to keep quiet.
Tina, the rebel wife, everything Rachel isn't, straight from rehab and the Vegas strip.
And Emily, the young wife, naïve and scared, estranged from her Catholic family.

The only thing that they had in common was Blake. Until all three are accused of his murder.

When Blake is found dead under the desert sun, all three wives become suspect—not only to the police, but to each other. As the investigation draws them closer, each wife must decide who can be trusted. With stories surfacing of a notorious cult tucked away in the hills, whispers flying about a fourth wife, and evidence that can't quite explain what had been keeping Blake busy, the three widows face a reckoning that might shatter all they know to be true.

MY REVIEW: 3 Stars ⭐️ 

I absolutely love the cover, it and the synopsis is what drew me in! Unfortunately, I didn’t love the book as much as I would have hoped and I skimmed a bit of the book. 

I loved the beginning but it did start to lag a bit for me. I loved the ending, hence the 3 stars as it wasn’t a bad book. 

*Thank you to Netgalley and Sourcebooks for a digital copy of this book. 

Mel 

Between Two Kingdoms by Suleika Jaouad

 

A searing, deeply moving memoir of illness and recovery that traces one young woman’s journey from diagnosis to remission and, ultimately, a road trip of healing and self-discovery.

In the summer after graduating from college, Suleika Jaouad was preparing, as they say in commencement speeches, to enter “the real world.” She had fallen in love and moved to Paris to pursue her dream of becoming a war correspondent. The real world she found, however, would take her into a very different kind of conflict zone.

It started with an itch—first on her feet, then up her legs, like a thousand invisible mosquito bites. Next came the exhaustion, and the six-hour naps that only deepened her fatigue. Then a trip to the doctor and, a few weeks shy of her twenty-third birthday, a diagnosis: leukemia, with a 35 percent chance of survival. Just like that, the life she had imagined for herself had gone up in flames. By the time Jaouad flew home to New York, she had lost her job, her apartment, and her independence. She would spend much of the next four years in a hospital bed, fighting for her life and chronicling the saga in a column for The New York Times.

When Jaouad finally walked out of the cancer ward—after three and a half years of chemo, a clinical trial, and a bone marrow transplant—she was, according to the doctors, cured. But as she would soon learn, a cure is not where the work of healing ends; it’s where it begins. She had spent the past 1,500 days in desperate pursuit of one goal—to survive. And now that she’d done so, she realized that she had no idea how to live.

How would she reenter the world and live again? How could she reclaim what had been lost? Jaouad embarked—with her new best friend, Oscar, a scruffy terrier mutt—on a 100-day, 15,000-mile road trip across the country. She set out to meet some of the strangers who had written to her during her years in the hospital: a teenage girl in Florida also recovering from cancer; a teacher in California grieving the death of her son; a death-row inmate in Texas who’d spent his own years confined to a room. What she learned on this trip is that the divide between sick and well is porous, that the vast majority of us will travel back and forth between these realms throughout our lives. Between Two Kingdoms is a profound chronicle of survivorship and a fierce, tender, and inspiring exploration of what it means to begin again.

MY REVIEW: 5 Stars ⭐️ ALL THE STARS ACTUALLY 

I when I first saw this book on Netgalley, I thought, yes I need to read about someone who understands. Then I thought, oh no, this is going to bring on my panic thinking about all I went through in cancer treatment both mentally and physically. We both had two different kinds of cancer. We both had chemo, I had external and internal radiation, she had a bone marrow transplant. These are all traumatic and scary. 

This book made me cry and made me happy. I wish I had the strength of this woman! Ten times over I must say!! The cabin and road trips and people, I want all of that  I hope I can become strong like her someday  I have to push on that mental illness as well. 

I don’t want to say too much more, but you can damn sure believe I’ve just pre-ordered the hardback. 

*Thank you to Netgalley and Random House for a digital copy of this book! 

Mel 

Knight’s Ransom by Jeff Wheeler

 

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. A brutal war of succession has plunged the court of Kingfountain into a power struggle between a charitable king who took the crown unlawfully and his ambitious rival, Devon Argentine. The balance of power between the two men hinges on the fate of a young boy ensnared in this courtly intrigue. A boy befittingly nicknamed Ransom.

When the Argentine family finally rules, Ransom must make his own way in the world. Opportunities open and shut before him as he journeys along the path to knighthood, blind to a shadowy conspiracy of jealousy and revenge. Securing his place will not be easy, nor will winning the affection of Lady Claire de Murrow, a fiery young heiress from an unpredictably mad kingdom.

Ransom interrupts an abduction plot targeting the Queen of Ceredigion and earns a position in service to her son, the firstborn of the new Argentine dynasty. But conflict and treachery threaten the family, and Ransom must also come to understand and hone his burgeoning powers—abilities that involve more than his mastery with a blade and that make him as much a target as his lord.

MY REVIEW: 3 Stars ⭐️ 

I love this was set in the King Fountain world. Now, I’ve only read the first book in that series but I did enjoy it and plan to read the rest. 

This book is about Ransom, a boy who is turned away by his father, raised by a King, turned away again when bad things happen, trains to be a Knight with someone else and so on and so on.  

I enjoyed the book well enough to continue with this story. 

*Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a digital copy of this book! 

Mel 🖤🐶🐺🐾

Fairyloot December Unboxing

 It's time for the December Fairyloot Unboxing and everything looks awesome! 

1. We have an awesome beanie inspired by The Hobbit! 

2. We have our fourth and last Secret Book

3. We have a Damaris sword letter opener inspired by Throne of Glass! It has all of the wyrd marks on it as well! And we also got a notepad inspired by Children of Blood and Bone 

4. A fantastic 2021 calendar featuring artwork from, Throne of Glass, A Darker Shade of Magic, The Gilded Wolves, Scythe, Percy Jackson and Dance of Thieves. This calendar is stunning! 

5. There is a beautiful art print of  The Raven Cycle series by Maggie Stiefvater and the notecard for the month

6. The Tarot Cards of the month inspired by House of Earth and Blood by Sarah J. Maas

7. And last but not least, we have the book of the month: Master of One by Jaida Jones and Danielle Bennett. We have shimmery sprayed edges, art under the dustjacket and and foil design on the cover as well as signed by both authors. There is a stunning piece of art as well. 

Happy Reading! 

Mel ♥

OMG! Illumicrate Collections: Daughter of Smoke and Bone UNBOXING! 2020

For the love of all that's Holy, this special edition box of Daughter of Smoke and Bone is fanfreakingtastic! Follow me...

 

1. First we have Angel & Devil Bookends designed by: Noverantale and the opening line from the series inspired them! 

 

 2. Soul Thurible - We have a replica thurible and designed by Illumicrate 

 

3. A freaking two-sided Smoke and Bone book sleeve designed by Monolime and quote design by: Chatty Nora - quote is from the book and the art is of Karou and Akiva

 

 

 

4. A Door Between Worlds Book Tin - It's huge and adorable! Designed by: Rosie Thorns - It's where we hide all of our teeth from Brimstone =D

  

 

5. Wishbone Enamel pin - I love it as well! Designed by Stacey McEvoy-Caunt - it has a quote from the series of course

 

 

6. A beautiful foiled print

 

 

7. Fluttering Dreams Mug - Artwork by Rosiethorns88 - This is a mug from Strange The Dreamer an it's wonderful 

 

 9. AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST!!!! An exclusive 10th anniversary signed hardback edition of Daughter of Smoke and Bone, featuring a beautiful new illustration by Peter Strain. This edition has a foiled hidden design, sprayed edges, and exclusive artwork on the reverse side of the dustjacket by Jim Di Bartolo 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Reading!

Mel