rjsetserauthor's reviews
857 reviews

Review to come!

Humor is just too vulgar for my taste.

I love a good educational kids' book and Adventures of a Pangopup takes you to the world of endangered animals! 

A baby pangolin befriends a dik dik deer and they end up in some trouble. The adventure excellently ties in facts about the pangolin and dik dik so that young readers can walk away from story-time with knowledge. This would be a great classroom lesson resource, too, because at the back of the book, there are additional facts about the animals, why they're endangered, and a step-by-step guide to draw both a pangolin and a dik dik. 

Overall, this is a well-illustrated, well-written, and just a fun book to add to a kids' library!

Ty Scarlet caused me to throw my "responsible reader" persona to the wind as I chose to forsake sleep on a work night in order to binge this book in almost one sitting. Even now, I need sleep about as much as Ty does, but you're going to get a sleep-deprived, caffeinated review instead.

Everything about this book was just plain fun! I gut-laughed at the tongue-in-cheek humor. I gasped in shock at every plot twist and, on multiple occasions, concerned my husband with passionate outbursts. I lived this story with Ty and will now have delusions of having a friend named "Ty Scarlet".

This book ("book": a generic reference that just doesn't seem to describe my recent experience) is about as far from what I expected as Pluto (which IS a planet, by the way. I learned the song in grade school) is from the sun. I expected a Perry Mason type of plot going into it, and what I got was a (younger) Walt Longmire-ish character thrown into a convoluted Perry Mason case with astronomical twists. Bordering on the ridiculous, I couldn't guess where anything was going, yet it was so brilliantly executed that I questioned my own sleuthing logic on so many occasions. Especially when Ty broke the 4th wall and addressed my concerns as if he'd seen my eye-roll or heard my exclamation of "Wait. What?".

One of my favorite parts of reading is getting to know the author through their writing and when I tell you that this is so excellently written that I forgot that Ty, himself, wasn't the author (though I'm not entirely convinced that they aren't the same person), I'm not exaggerating. The many (many, many) pop culture and literary references made this book feel so incredibly real (I dang near passed away when Ty made a Carmen Sandiego reference; those games had me in a CHOKE-HOLD as a kid and the greatest thief of all time is probably to blame for my obsession with noir). I didn't want to miss a single line of this book; so much so that I often back-tracked and re-read lines, highlighting them and even reading them aloud to my husband.

All that said, this book fluidly weaves in and out of the genres of Mystery and Science Fiction so seamlessly that when you're reading about the case, you forget that there are hints of science fiction until Ty reminds you. If you're a fan of classic case-cracking mysteries and the Avengers, this book should pique your interest. I had way too much fun with this book and I sincerely hope Ty Scarlet will become a series that will have as many books as Perry Mason so that I can forever binge them.

Content disclaimers: No on-page romantic scenes (only implied "good nights"), though there are plenty of out-of-pocket comments and extremely brief descriptions of blackmail photos and videos. Action/Gore: several descriptions of the crime, albeit brief, and nothing I haven't come to expect from mysteries. Cursing/Vulgarity: Lots of cursing and f-bombs would make this a rated R movie. The heated conversations, regarding infidelity, lead to some vulgar lines and insults.

Review to come!

"Welcome to Fen, where everything wants to eat you."

Atom Bomb Baby is everything you expect of a "retro-future dystopian". The themes of the book are edgy, sarcastic, and full of action-packed encounters with rebels, monsters, and robots! It feels a bit like a cyber-punk novel mixed with dystopian and a dash of sci-fi. If I had to compare it to other forms of media, I'd say that it reminded me of The Maze Runner by James Dashner and, as far as how the story was told (keeping the reader in the dark, etc), I thought about the movie A Quiet Place a few times, too.

Ashe is nothing less than a "spunky" main character and her attitude of disdain and reluctance towards her crumbling world is easily what drives this book forward. She encounters every obstacle with a roll of her eyes and an adolescent attitude of "whatever, not my problem", even though she's going to act anyway, against her better judgement. She is definitely an anti-hero. I didn't like her in the beginning of the book, and even towards the end she still annoyed me with her attitude towards others, but you learn so much about her that it's difficult to not at least sympathize with her plight. This book would not be the same story without her attitude, so I wouldn't want her to be any other way. It's also a bit refreshing to see a young woman in fiction allowed to be angry throughout most of the book instead of falsely positive for the sake of having a likeable female. And if anyone had reason to be angry, it was definitely her.

My reasoning for 3.75 stars, instead of 5, is hinged mostly on details of the story world. There are little to no descriptions about what the monsters are, so they are left almost entirely up to your imagination. I mentioned earlier that this book reminded me of The Maze Runner, and I actually found myself mentally plugging scenes in this book with clips from The Maze Runner movie, just because I didn't know what the monsters were or what the Kraal is. Upon finishing the book, there are a lot of open-endings and few conclusions, which left me baffled as to what the government's objective was, what controlled the robots, etc. etc. Which, if I recall correctly, was the same issue that I had with finishing The Maze Runner the first time, so perhaps this style is intentional and all will be revealed in the last book of this series? 

Overall, I enjoyed the adrenaline rush of the storyline, the tender moments with Jade, and the subtle themes of how trauma can affect memories, especially when said trauma happens at a young age. I do wish I could've immersed myself more fully into the story world, but I'd read the sequel and additional work by this author! 

Content disclaimers: Cursing: infrequent, mild language (though mentions of crude hand gestures). No romantic content. Gore: I'd say roughly PG-13 rating, depending on the readers imagination. There aren't detailed descriptions, but some fight scenes are pretty intense.

Trigger Warnings: many themes of death and loss. Trauma-induced memory loss. Survival in an apocalyptic setting.

DNF’d after the attempted r*pe scene. Just too much, too early in the book. I didn’t even have enough time to get to know the characters. 

Humorous and light-hearted, this is a fantasy you want to read around a campfire.

I really enjoyed the simplicity of the quest and I love (love, love, love) fantasy that focuses on food. The adventures of Chef Muffin reminded me a lot of the series "Delicious in Dungeon" and often had me laughing out loud. This mix-matched band of characters are charming and their misadventures are anything but predictable. 

That being said, as is usually the case with humor-based fantasy, there was a decent amount of cursing and the humor tended to lean more into the vulgar side of things (almost branching into satire) which I skipped over because it wasn't quite my cup of tea. But overall, the story kept my interest and the characters were loveable and easy to root for. 

Content disclaimers: Cursing - high. Spice: None on page, but *very* often a topic of conversation (or thought) and there were many out-of-pocket remarks. Gore: I would say none, but if you're squeamish about the details of hunting for food, then you might consider some scenes uncomfortable. Other content: There's a character who would smoke literally anything to get h*gh. So, the dr*g and alcohol references are extremely present.