minimicropup's reviews
496 reviews

emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.5

This sounded interesting but was disappointing (and frustrating). I didn’t like the forced plotting, stale dialogue, and heavy-handed moralizing. If the synopsis sounds good to you, try it out. If we don’t share pet peeves, you may like it more than me.

Energy: Faux. Shady. Sanctimonious.

🐺 Growls: Heavy-handed explanations and flat, cringey dialogue. The writing style isn’t bad, but the lines are. Everything felt forced and tell-not-show. It was hard to believe in the character interactions (especially the romance). The pacing drags for the first half, then glosses over a bunch of reveals in a rush near the end. The characters kept re-explaining the plot.

🐕 Howls: All the characters sounded alike with this dreamy, oddly formal way of talking (even those not involved in the wellness group). The main character was too much of a Poor Me, popular-but-doesn’t-realize-it caricature and kept randomly changing her beliefs and motivations to fit the needs of the plot. Awkward explanations and clunky moralizing (especially at the end…this read like a middle grade book with a moral message tying too hard to seem unintentional about it). The main character kept getting in the way of the story and she’s the only perspective – I wish we got the PoV of a friend or her girlfriend.

Scene: South Brent, New Jersey, USA

Perspective: A private high school student on scholarship with a group of misfit friends. They are crushing hard on the popular girl, whose mother owns is a semi-famous wellness influencer/CEO and are curious about attending her youth group.

Timeline: Current (2010s or 2020s).

🔥 Fuel: What are Julia's intentions in inviting a classmate to her mother’s wellness party? Is the wellness youth group toxic, dangerous, or helpful? Is Frances’ crush actually crushing back? Who can she trust in her girlfriend’s group and family?

📖 Cred: Plausible to suspended disbelief

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Victorian goth style. Dewey skin. White lace. Cushions. Parasol. Patchouli & lemon. Lymphatic drainage facials. Crystals.

Linear, single perspective timelines
Tagging along, peering over shoulders, theorizing
YA romantic suspense & drama
Falling for the popular girl
Plot-driven, reflective, simplistic writing style
Behind closed doors of sketchy wellness youth group
Blinded by love, I-can-change-for-them sapphic romance
Mentor-protégé toxicity
Red flags everywhere
Moral exploration defining victims and perpetrators

Content Heads-Up: Adult/minor relationship, grooming (20-something with teens). Alcohol addiction (family history, parent; recovery-relapse, death). Alcohol use (underage). Cannabis use (gummy; underage). Cult. Drugging. Drug use (psychedelics). Emotional abuse. Loss of parent (as teen). Murder.

Rep: American. Jewish heritage. Hindi and Black peripheral characters. Cis. Lesbian. Gay. Hetero. Ghostly, dark, and tanned skin tones.

📚 Format: Advance Reader’s Copy from Penguin Group-Penguin Young Readers Group | G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers, and NetGalley.

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Unfollow Me by Charlotte Duckworth

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dark mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
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

3.5

This is a character-driven mystery with lots of moral ambiguity, a hint of stalking, and an undercurrent of obsession. Good if you’re looking for slow-build tension and characters studies focused on motherhood. Took awhile to capture my interest but then I liked it until the ending.

Energy: Simmering. Cross. Dubious.

🐕 Howls: I was getting confused with the husbands/partners and who-was-who at first. It spends a lot of time hashing topics of motherhood, fertility, and how they tie in to womanhood, which at first was boring (but I don’t identify with maternal worries, so it might be a me thing); eventually I found it compelling to see what was motivating the mothers (and wannabe mothers). The ending was a little ‘that’s all?’ wrap up.

🐩 Tail Wags: Full of morally grey and unlikeable characters, decisions, secrets, and a low-key sense of unease. Characters making terrible choices (even when they have sympathetic motives).

Scene: 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Set in London, England

Perspective: Two separate followers of a mommy influencer who suddenly removed all her blogs and stopped posting. One is a young single parent who escapes into the influencer’s posts given their frustrations with their own child. The other is in their 40s and really wants a baby but is facing fertility issues with their much younger partner. We also get snippets of perspective from the missing influencer’s spouse and comments/theorizing from online forums.

Timeline: 2017 leading up to the Christmas holidays 🎄

🔥 Fuel: Why has the mommy influencer stopped posting? Is she okay? Is the husband hiding something? How do the characters stories connect? What is one of them afraid of falling back into, and what secrets is the other hiding?

📖 Cred: Plausible

Mood Reading Match-Up:

YouTube. Sidewalk. Playground. Pregnancy tests. Online posts.

Unlikeable, morally grey, and self-destructive characters
Slow-burn inner lives mystery
Noirish exploration of mommy problems
Missing (or is she) momfluencer
Low key obsession and unravellings
Regretting parenthood feelings
Desperate for a child feelings
Parallel/interconnecting plots
Psychological domestic suspense
Relationship drama and scandal

Content Heads-Up: Postpartum depression. Alcohol (self-medicating, over-drinking). Male infertility. Fertility (IVF, ovulation tracking, stages of conception). Pregnancy (stages, experience). Infidelity. Paternity ambiguity. Sexual assault/rape (brief memory). Domestic abuse, intimate partner violence.

Rep: British. Cis. Hetero. Ambiguous skin tones.

📚 Format: Audible

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What You Leave Behind by Wanda M. Morris

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 65%.

I just can’t get into this. It’s not bad and has an important message but it feels like that’s all it has. I feel like I’ve been listening to this for days and it’s the same story with a lot of telling.

25 Days by Per Jacobsen

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adventurous challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

I loved this except for one huge thing – the way it turned out. This is a slow-burn, day-by-day winter thriller that’s immersive, scary…but so frustrating. I read one chapter a day as an advent read to start and I looked forward to seeing how the characters were doing every day. Then it got scary high stakes and I couldn’t help it, I read it all in a day.

Energy: Troubling. Instinctive. Ruthless.

🐺 Growls. Don’t expect any of your questions to be answered 🥺. I don’t know if it was to make a statement or for a sequel, but it felt more like written-into-a-corner unfinished.

🐕 Howls. The survival aspects make up most of the story and are so intense, every horrible thing that could happen is being thrown at them (I’m not a big survival trope person) so I kept overanalyzing how they’d even be alive still.

🐩 Tail Wags: How it started off cozy and creepy where something unsettling lurks in the background. Immersive and atmospheric. How if you read it as an advent read, it felt like these characters were out there living this story in real-time somewhere.

Scene: 🌎 Set in woods near the small community of Willowbend

Perspectives (4): A family of four. A spouse/parent hoping to reconnect with their spouse who has been distant lately. A spouse/parent not feeling anything for their spouse. A 15 year old. Their younger 9 year old sibling.

Timeline: Dec 1st to 25th. Each chapter is a full day.

🔥 Fuel: Will the holiday vacay help reconnect the spouses? Who is leaving ‘presents’ and what do they mean? Who keeps coming around the property? Is the family being stalked? Are they in danger? Will they survive?

📖 Cred: Plausible to suspended disbelief

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Dancing snowflakes. Biting cold. Photo slides. Stocking. Snowman. Bunnies. Valley. Snowy road. Snowmobile headlights.

Cozy, creepy, wintery atmosphere
Brutal survival thriller-suspense
Family battling against the odds
Stalking, mental and physical torture
Unknown assailant(s)
High stakes fight-for-life escape horror

Content Heads-Up: Animal cruelty, death (

chicken, rabbit

). Gun violence. Injuries, wounds, infection, fever. Kidnapping, confinement (unsanitary conditions). Stalking, threats. Torture.

Rep: American. Cis. Hetero. Pale, freckled and ambiguous skin tones.

📚 Format: Kindle Unlimited

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None of This is True by Lisa Jewell

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dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

This was unsettling, claustrophobic, and kept me hooked despite a few minor hiccups. The story leans heavily on slow burn details so if you’re not into character-driven, day-by-day storytelling, it might feel drawn out. If you like character-driven psychological thrillers and don’t mind a story that takes its time to build tension, check it out.

Energy: Dark. Intense. Brooding.

🐕 Howls: The prologue gave away too much—if you haven’t started yet, skip it! It made so many things predictable that I would have preferred to be surprised by. I preferred the text over audio (the Netflix-style excerpts were narrated too fake in the audiobook).

🐩 Tail Wags: The push-pull dynamic between the two main characters (one character pushing boundaries relentlessly, the other too polite to push back). Show-not-tell style of piecing together the truth, making predictions. The “situationship” friendship is so well-written. The little “wait, what?” moments dropped throughout.

Scene: 🇬🇧 North London, UK

Perspective: A podcaster with two young kids having trouble with a spouse who is drinking too much and disappearing for nights at a time. A parent with two grown kids reflecting on their life and how they ended up where they are. On their 45th birthday they decide it’s time for a change.

Timeline: Mostly in summer from June to July 2019. Fast forwards to October 2020 and March 2022.

🔥 Fuel: What is going on with Alix’s and Josie’s husbands? What’s the situation with Josie’s daughters? Who are the victims the documentary keeps referring to? What is it Josie wants to reveal to Alix? Who can we trust?

📖 Cred: Realistic; truth is stranger than fiction believable.

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Guest room. Awkward dinner party. Dog shit. Benders. Rumbling bus. Pomchi. Liquefied leftovers. Dust& body spray. Inky summer sky. Rainy days.

Third person narrator with limited perspective based on character
Letters, episodes, media, podcast transcripts, documentary recordings
Secretly in the room, sometimes in the know, sometimes in the dark
Piecing things together as we go, theorizing on character motivations and what will happen
Long ‘walls of text’ chapters
All the ‘dunnits (Who died? Where? Why? How?)
Socially awkward, second-hand cringe
Complex, unreliable characters and imperfect victims
Character driven slow burns
Touch of popcorn thriller
Behind closed doors all in the family dysfunction
Juxtapositions, lies, and lives unraveling
Red flags psychological suspense
Dark domestic drama

Content Heads-Up: Abusive parent (toward adult child, recall of childhood). Adult/minor relationship, marriage. Alcohol abuse (black outs, binge drinking). Death. Domestic violence. Drugging. Infidelity (discussion, suspected). Kidnapping. Kleptomania. Loss of parent. Loss of romantic partner. Misandry. Murder. Narcissism. Obsession, manipulation, stalking. Pandemic restrictions (brief recall). Panic attack (brief). Personality disorder/psychopathy. Teen sexual abuse, incest (accusations). Toxic feminism. Toxic parent.

Rep: British. Cis. Hetero. Lesbian. Freckled and pale skin tones. Oppositional defiant disorder. Autism spectrum disorder

📚 Format: Kindle

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Under Your Skin by Sabine Durrant

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dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

0.5

I actually hated this (no hate to anyone who enjoyed it). I had high hopes because the synopsis sounded so intriguing, but unfortunately, this one didn’t work for me at all. I think this book was trying to emulate the psychological tension of Gone Girl but I think it failed miserably.

The writing style was verbose and dry and fragmented. The language was overly complex trying too hard to be gritty and edgy.
Clunky transitions and short, stilted sentences. I swear, sometimes it was a literal word salad.
Chapters dragged on with nothing happening, it was excruciatingly slow. It was always telling when I wanted to be shown and showing when it should have just been said.
The main character narrates in such a disjointed way that it was hard to follow. She’d reference people or events with no explanation as if we should know them.
Something important would happen and our main character would skip the summary to give detailed descriptions of trivial things like a shoe (there’s a reason for this but…ugh).
The plot was overly contrived and gimmicky.
The main character’s behavior around the police made no sense, which made this immediately predictable for what the ‘twist’ is.
The main character was one-dimensional. Being cryptic and repetitive was her core personality.
The reveal felt ick like it was trying to go for a female rage good-for-her, but it’s the opposite.
There’s a transphobic comment that felt outdated even for 2013?

📚 Format: Paperback

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Candy Cain Kills by Brian McAuley

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adventurous dark emotional lighthearted sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

This delivers on fast-paced kills and Christmas vibes, but I felt like something was missing?

Energy: Enervated. Grim. Vicious.

🐕 Howls: Leaning on cheesy puns and clever one-liners got a little forced campy and broke it for me. The jump between the spooks learning about the history of the house to brutal slashing was so quick. The tone went from campy to sad.

🐩 Tail Wags: Flipping between a terrifying moment and the mundanity of family life. Fun jump-scares. It feels like a holiday horror because it isn’t relying on “there was a Christmas tree in the room” for atmosphere. Despite being so short we get a sense of who the characters are before the body counts (effective use of multi perspective). Once the killings begin, things move fast.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Set in San Bernadino mountains, California, USA

Perspectives: A junior in high school stuck on a last-minute family trip up north to a house in the woods for Christmas break. Their 12-year-old sibling feeling like a burden in a fractured family. A parent and spouse who had big dreams and is resenting how domesticated their life has become. The landlord of the vacation home.

Timeline: 2005. 🎄December (Christmas time).

🔥 Fuel: What happened to the contractor helping renovate the vacation house? Did people really die in the house? How and what happened? Is the family who rented the house in danger? Will they survive?

📖 Cred: Supernatural

Mood Reading Match-Up:

MapQuest. Tabletop jukebox. Basement. Singing off key. Uggs. Christmas carols. Diner food.

Stuck on family road trip
Christmas vacation house horror
Friend crush coming of age
Snowy festive atmosphere
Don’t get too attached to anyone slashings
Hits of body horror and gore
Found footage popcorn horror
Tragic origins supernatural villain
Creepy religious town
Fast paced fight to escape survival
Love among the chaos

Content Heads-Up:

Ableism (slurs, bias). Alcohol (underage, brief mention). Body horror, gore. Cannabis (underage, brief mention). Corruption (police). Divorce (anxiety about, parents arguing). Emotional abuse (childhood). Familicide. Fatphobia (very brief character thoughts). Financial anxieties (medical bills). Fire (building, fatalities, burns). Loss of parent (as teen). Loss of spouse. Religious trauma. Theft. Vomit.

Rep: American. Cis. Gay. Juvenile idiopathic arthritis. Asthma.

📚 Format: Kobo Plus

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Follow Me by Elizabeth Rose Quinn

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dark funny mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

I liked this! I think it did well balancing sharp social commentary without losing the sense of fun and leaving room for thought-provoking moments. It read like a mini-series so I hope that Amazon Studios will be able to make it one 🙏.

Energy: Caustic. Zealous. Imaginative.

🐕 Howls: There are some over-the-top villain moments at the end but it didn’t derail me, just got an eyeroll.

🐩 Tail Wags: The blend of social commentary, satire, and twisty mysteries. The examination of cult-like parenting cliques and “performing” motherhood. How we get to know and (possibly) care about the missing character before the incident. How the dual timelines allow us to uncover what’s changed at the retreat over the course of a year and guess at why. The delightfully unhinged plot (and characters). The commentary around addictive behaviours – whether it’s substances or judgy parenting.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Set in and around the Mendocino Hills, California, USA.

Perspectives (2): Twins who were living the party life. One changed after marrying and deciding to have kids. They unintentionally went viral after posting a clip of their kids online. The other twin is childfree by choice and cringing at their sibling, while struggling with missing the way things were.

Timeline: Current (2020s-ish). June. October.

🔥 Fuel: What happened to the missing sister? Will her twin uncover anything at the retreat or is it a lost cause? What is going on behind closed doors at the retreat?

📖 Cred: Satirical realism

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Slate-grey minivan. Tiny American flags. Tie-dye. Fireworks. Capture the flag. Corn maze. Mini-Mom Squad. Scarecrow husband. Adele.

Complicated twin/sibling bonds
Toxic Mommy Influencer culture and addictive perfectionism
Scary incident + missing person
Vengeance driven by grief
Undercover amateur sleuthing and infiltrating
Frenetic, unhinged characters
Mean mommy cliques and popularity contests
Detective perspective moments
Piecing together the puzzle and following clues alongside the main character
Psychological suspense -> Quirky popcorn slasher dramedy

Content Heads-Up: Addiction (Alcoholics Anonymous; recovery and relapse cycles, cravings). Alcohol abuse. Blackmail (brief). Blood. Burn injury/attack. Cannabis use (smoking). Depression. Drug use (on and off page; prescription). Financial insecurity (in childhood). Homophobia (character comments). Loss of sibling. Mentally ill parent (depression). Murder. Physical attacks (descriptive on page). Police dismissal (prejudice; victim blaming/bias). Postpartum anxiety.

Rep: American. Filipina American. Cis. Hetero. Ambiguous skin tones. Childhood stutter. Childfree-by-choice.

📚 Format: Advance Reader’s Copy from Thomas & Mercer and NetGalley

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Hairpin Bridge by Taylor Adams

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adventurous dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

This is a fast-paced, action-heavy thriller with tense cat-and-mouse moments. Some elements drag a little, but overall it was solid with plenty of tension and action, even if a few things didn’t completely land for me.

Energy: Impulsive. Emotional. Determined.

🐺 Growls. I know the epilogue was aiming for emotional impact, but I could not get over the ending scene where a completely untrained civilian to allowed to perform a dangerous maneuver because…heroism?

🐕 Howls. I couldn’t stop questioning the main character’s decisions and ridiculous scheming – most of them are eventually addressed, but until then my over-analyzing brain was so annoyed it undermined the tension. The spatial awareness around where characters and vehicles are relative to each other, and escape/attack routes were so murky at times (I always struggle with this reading action/fight scenes). The weakest part for me was the “book within a book” section that explores the truth behind the mystery (it wasn’t poorly done, it just felt more like a dream sequence and I hate those).

🐩 Tail Wags. From the first chapter, it dives straight into action and tension. It’s genuinely scary at times.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Set in Howard County, Montana, USA

Perspective: Our main character is grieving the death of their estranged twin. They have asked to meet with officer who last spoke with their sibling at the bridge she allegedly jumped off. We also get snippets of a blog where the main character is writing their thoughts and plans, the perspective of the officer, and excerpts from a book the main character is writing about what really happened.

Timeline: September 2019. Linear

🔥 Fuel: Did our main character’s twin sister really commit suicide? What happened in the interaction between her and the cop before her death? What will happen when our main character confronts the officer with her questions and evidence?

📖 Cred: Suspended disbelief

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Diner food. 2007 Toyota Corolla. Gasoline. Fire smoke. Charcoal-tasting air. Strawberry antacid. Gunpowder.

Third person, like watching a movie
Grief and suspicion
Book within a book
Sibling on a quest
Vengeance mission
Sketchy small-town cop
Shoot outs and car chases
Isolated roads
Gritty mind-games action thriller
Moral greyness
Serial killings mixed with total assholery
Cat-and-mouse battle of wills, upper hand yo-yoing
Complicated twin bonds

Content Heads-Up:

Ageism (character opinion; against Gen Z). Animal death (brief but descriptive; deer, snake). Body shaming (very brief character opinion; weight). Child death, kidnapping (descriptive recall). Financial insecurity (living in car). Forest fires. Gore, blood loss, wounds (on page, descriptive). Grief. Gun violence. Loss of sibling. Murder. Schizoid personality disorder. Suicide (discussion, description, planning, religious beliefs). Violence against women, femicide, misogyny (recall).

Rep: American. Vietnamese ancestry. Cis. Pale, and tanned skin tones.

📚 Format: Paperback

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The Quiet Unraveling of Eve Ellaway by Melanie Hooyenga

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challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

This was slow with plenty of melodrama-in-the-mundane alongside the heartbreaking and strange, but I think that’s exactly what it’s supposed to be. If you enjoy psychological tension, fractured family dynamics, and YA romance, you may really like this—just be prepared for a slower middle section and a few unanswered questions by the end.

Energy: Vacillating. Affected. Ingenuous.

🐺 Growls: The writing gets repetitive going over the character’s plans and the realizations. Some of the dramatic musing on things like romance, friendships, and the future fit the tone at first, but eventually it felt tedious and more like filler.

🐕 Howls: It was often ambiguous when the main character was pretending to be her twin vs imagining hearing her voice. I liked the ending in theory, but the execution felt a little written-into-a-corner and sudden.

🐩 Tail Wags: How the ending made me re-examine everything in hindsight. The YA romance was a mix of swooning and cheesy lines, but I know that’s because I’m an adult - I can imagine it as sweet and hopeful to my younger self.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Set in small town on the shore of Lake Michigan, USA

Perspective: A twin whose sibling was kidnapped as a baby and never found. To stave off the complete mental breakdown of their mother, our main character has been pretending to be both themselves and their twin sibling, but they’re questioning the health of this charade.

Timeline: Current (2010s or 2020s). Spring. Linear.

🔥 Fuel: What happened to the twin sister kidnapped as a baby? Is she alive? What will happen to the mother if they get her to understand reality? Who will our main character choose as a romantic partner?

📖 Cred: Suspended disbelief to plausible.

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Friends TV show. Crashing waves. Knitted scarf. Treehouse. Beach jogs. Baseball game. Sweatshirt. Prom.

Separated at birth sibling loss
Dysfunctional family drama and tragedy
Long chapters, heavy on reflecting and ‘telling’
Multiple romantic interests trying to win over the main character
Conflicted feelings teen romance
One-sided relationships
Twisty ends
YA romantic suspense
Unhinged situations
Deep in the character’s mind getting their tunnel vision perspective and thoughts/interpretations

Content Heads-Up:

Abduction (child). Abusive parent (emotional abuse, distant; physically abusive brief recall). Agoraphobia. Bullying (outing, passive aggressive, gaslighting). Homophobia (parental disapproval). Loss of child (as baby). Mental illness (dissociation, C-PTSD, delusions). Murder. Outing. Trafficking (human; discussion, class project).

Rep: American. Second generation Honduran American, Indian-American peripheral character. Queer. Hetero. Lesbian.

📚 Format: Advance Reader’s Copy from Left-Handed Mitten Publications, Independent Book Publishers Association (IBPA), Members’ Titles and NetGalley.

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minimicropup's reviews 496 reviews

minimicropup's reviews
496 reviews