emlawley's reviews
83 reviews

You Belong with Me by Mhairi McFarlane

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emotional funny hopeful medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

I was pretty disappointed with this book after enjoying the first in the series (and McFarlane’s other books) much more. I didn’t like the characters as much this time around and the story felt riddled with issues between Edie and Elliott to the point where I didn’t want them to stay together as they felt like a bad match. It’s full of Edie being insecure and lots of elements of body shaming herself and other uncomfortable patriarchal notions that I found hard to take. 
Just For the Summer by Abby Jimenez

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emotional funny hopeful reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

I didn’t realise I was listening to/reading Jimenez’s books out of order by starting with this one. But it didn’t impact my enjoyment of the story. I loved this book and can see why it was the top of the Summer Reads charts. I really liked both character’s complicated lives and backstories being given equal prominence, and having chapters written in each of their voices really helped accelerate my understanding of them and how much I grew to like them too. I couldn’t put the audiobook down and found ways to carve out hours at a time to try and listen to it as quickly as possible! 
The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna

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emotional funny hopeful reflective tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

This book surprised me. It was deeper and explored more topic and storylines than I had expected. I liked the combination of self discovery, magical elements and a slow-burn love story all coming together nicely in one story. Mika is a very likeable and strong female protagonist who I, rightly, the focus of the book. Everyone she meets at Nowhere House is equally as necessary to the story and likeable in their own ways - it’s one of the best cast of characters I’ve encountered in a book in a while. 
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Yours Truly by Abby Jimenez

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challenging emotional hopeful sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

I really enjoyed this book. There were complex elements to the plot but they were well-thought-out and made the book very compelling to the point I struggled to put it down! The premise is really interesting, which can be hard to find in the Love Story genre. The characters were all really well written and the pace was just right, with the twists and turns and ending feeling authentic and satisfying. 
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The Reappearance of Rachel Price by Holly Jackson

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challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.25

I loved Holly Jackson’s A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder series so I was excited to listen to this book. Her fantastic writing had me gripped once again and unable to guess what the truth was at all - always a tricky feat with a novel like this. I loved how I unravelled the mysteries along with Belle and found it very hard to stop listening as I couldn’t wait to find out what happened next. 
The only two drawbacks for me were some similarities between the plot lines of this book and the GGGTM series in the final chapters, as the rest of the book was so unique and unexpected in terms of plot. The other is that, while the narrator was otherwise excellent throughout, they cannot do a good British accent so that was a bit jarring! 
All in all, I’d highly recommend this book. 
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Take a Chance on Me by Emily Houghton

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emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

After really liking Emily Houghton’s other books I was excited about this one. I was left feeling slightly disappointed by the romantic love story ending as it did as I didn’t find myself enjoying that relationship developing as much as Olivia’s relationships with the other female characters she befriended. It felt more genuine with them as she opened up more with her new friends and grew as a character more whereas she and Jacob weren’t honest with each other during the time they got to know each other, making it hard for me to believe that they authentically fell in love during that time. Neither character was particularly likeable, but I think their flaws can largely be attributed to their traumatic lives thus far, and it would have been nice to see more character development for them both. The “will they, won’t they?” storyline kept me interested, but it certainly wasn’t a page turned like many of Houghton’s other books or the best in this genre. 
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The Keeper of Lost Things by Ruth Hogan

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emotional hopeful mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

This book surprised me a bit as its plot was more complex than I’d anticipated, with the story jumping between a present tense timeline and one in the past along with an unexpected supernatural element to the book. I think the premise of the book was interesting (after first hearing about it it was on my To Be Read list for months after reading the blurb) but the writing didn’t live up to expectations. I preferred the storyline that was looking back in time to the present day story, and I was disappointed with how that concluded as a result. I was also disappointed in the patriarchal tinge on the book (the way the main character judges herself and her perceived attractiveness harshly based on her age and appearance and by comparing herself to other women; the way she is judged by other characters). I found it distracting as it didn’t feel like it was written deliberately as an observation about how that is problematic. So that was jarring and surprising in a negative way and really detracted from my enjoyment of the book. I also thought the quality of the writing make the addition of the object stories-within-the-story a little jarring and confusing. One thing that I really did enjoy, however, was how Sunny was written. 
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Funny Story by Emily Henry

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emotional funny hopeful medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

After loving all of Emily Henry’s previous books, I was eagerly anticipating Funny Story. The first chapter sets the story up brilliantly and I couldn’t wait to see how the story unfolded! As always with Emily’s books, there was a great cast of characters who we got to know and love (or heavily dislike!), none of whom were “perfect”. What I particularly like about how she writes characters is that there is always a heart-warming and/or relatable element to them which endears you to the likeable characters. Another thing I like is that she delves into the psychology of the characters well, making it feel detailed enough and without excusing anyone’s behaviour.  That being said, I was left a little disappointed with this book after loving the others. I wouldn’t say this is her best book. There were some lazy errors in terms of typos/grammatical errors and, sadly, her sex scenes have become very formulaic, with the same things happening in the same way each time the two main characters get together for the first time. That really took the shine off the book for me after a very tantalising will they/won’t they anticipation that she had built up nicely. The ending also felt a bit rushed, like things simply had to be tied up with a “happy ending” bow after a storyline with such complex notes.
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Cold Open by Andrew Raymond

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challenging dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

After listening to the first three books in this series, I saw that this was available on Kindle unlimited so I thought I’d read the latest book (despite having loved the narration of the first three!). As with Raymond’s other Lomond books, I found the case interesting and I couldn’t guess what the outcome would be and that kept me up late several nights in a row as I really wanted to know what happened next! I really value not being able to guess the killer/criminal in detective/police procedural like this. I liked seeing more of Ross’s life and personality again as I enjoyed that in the previous books, and would have loved more of that. I did feel that the writing was pretty rushed - there were typos and poor grammar and even missing words and I found myself having to reread some sentences multiple times to understand them. I also don’t like the jarring way that chapters start and finish in the middle of a conversation/situation/scene. I also think a few elements were glossed over and not fully explored/resolved.
Still a good book. Just not the best in this genre, or even series. 
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Ashes of Betrayal by David J. Gatward

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adventurous emotional mysterious tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Very annoyingly, pesky ol’ life got in the way of me devouring Ashes of Betrayal on release day. I made up for that slight hiccough by listening to the whole thing in one day the day after, which massively helped whilst I did some very boring tidying!  

While I really love all of the Grimm books, they’re one of my favourite series, in my opinion I found Ashes was fully back to the top tier storytelling that got me hooked in the first place, after I felt a little something was missing with books 16 & 17. I particularly loved how I wasn’t able to guess “whodunnit” and the huge plot twists - I couldn’t have stopped listening even if I’d tried! I also adored having more “time spent with” individual members of Harry’s team within the book as they’re all so fab.

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