Hello everyone! I’m back with another set of mini book reviews!
I’ve raced through ten more books in March, mostly due to their due dates. But also because a few of these were novellas or plays, so they were quite short. Even so, there were some very long books mixed in this list, so I feel like I didn’t cheat to this next installment LOL.
Note about my ratings: I’ve switched to using the StoryGraph to track and rate the books I’ve been reading. This site uses 1-5 stars, 5 being the highest, in 0.25 increments. Feel free to friend me on the StoryGraph – my username is StarringPamela there!
A Court of Silver Flames by Sarah J. Maas
I was totally confused by this book because I had been under the assumption that this was a novella and not a full book. Whoops! I haven’t been great at keeping up with the Maas books anymore but I still put a hold on this one and got it earlier than I expected from the library. I thought it was a good addition to the series but I wasn’t too into it because I felt like I’d forgotten who all the characters were, it’s been so long since I read the books! Again, it was a good addition to the story, I just wish I hadn’t forgotten everything from the first books already. Although, there was a TikTok I saw about the physical book being cheaply made. Apparently the binding isn’t a really good quality and someone who works in publishing talked about all the things that should have been done instead for a book in that price range. Yikes!
I gave this book 4.5 out of 5 stars.
The Young Queens by Kendare Blake
This was actually a novella, and even then I think it was half of one for Blake’s Three Dark Crowns series. My library finally got the ebooks of the novellas so I finally got to read them! This one centered around the lives of Mirabella, Arsinoe, and Katharine as children, before they had to try to kill each other for the throne. I really liked reading about their past as it was a series that I did enjoy.
I gave this book 3.25 out of 5 stars.
The Oracle Queen by Kendare Blake
This was the other novella, for the Three Dark Crowns series. Throughout the series Blake would reference Queen Elsabet, who had been the last oracle queen. In the series, each queen gives birth to triplets and gives up her crown afterwards. The triplets grow up with gifts, such as elemental, poisoner, or naturalist gifts, and eventual one must murder her sisters to become the next queen. Elsabet was a powerful oracle queen but her gift drove her mad and led her to kill three houses of innocent people. She was locked up until she gave birth to her triplets and since then any queen born with the oracle gift was immediately drowned. This novella reveals that the legend wasn’t exactly true and it was wild to read.
I gave this book 3.25 out of 5 stars.
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
This was my library’s book club book for March! I’m not going to lie, I voted for it only because of Gilmore Girls, as did the others who voted for it LOL. The book tells the story of Strayed, a woman who hiked the Pacific Crest Trail solo after many tragedies in her life. Strayed uses the hike to sort of reset her life and her mindset, which I thought was beautiful. I did enjoy the story although I felt like it was a little outrageous in a way. Strayed admits to a lot of bad decisions of her own and then blames a lot of people or events for leading her to those decisions so I felt like her extreme reaction to hike the trail with no hiking experience was a little over-the-top but it clearly worked for her so good for her!
I gave this book 3.75 out of 5 stars.
Clockwork Prince by Cassandra Clare
I have to be honest, I am totally over the Clare books. I’ve admitted before I’m only reading them because my sister likes them but omg I hate it. They’re so long and nothing really happens until the end of each book when everything suddenly works out with little to no effort. Anyway, this is the second of the Infernal Devices series and I really have no more to say other than I didn’t care much for it.
I gave this book 3.25 out of 5 stars.
Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
I’d heard about this book several times in the past years, and I think a TikTok finally got me to read it. I didn’t really know what it was about and didn’t recognize the author’s name at the time but eventually I realized that she was the one who wrote The Glass Hotel which I read for the Readheads book club last year. Anyway, as I started reading the book I realized, with horror, that it was about life after a worldwide pandemic that wiped out half of the population. Yeah, that was wild. I started to regret the choice but kept going anyway and I did really enjoy the story. I think I enjoyed it because I knew what to expect from Mandel after The Glass Hotel where she tells a beautiful story by taking various characters who are all unique and different and then tying their lives together in crazy ways. I’m not sure if I would have liked it as much had I not read her other book last year but I think the story of Station Eleven was way better than The Glass Hotel so I think I would have.
I gave this book 4.25 out of 5 stars.
The Tempest by William Shakespeare
Shakespeare’s works are always things I mean to read, but somehow never do. So I decided I was going to read one! When I was reading Station Eleven they referenced King Lear a few times but I wanted to read The Tempest because it was featured in the video game Life is Strange: Before the Storm. So I checked it out on Libby and started reading! For some reason, I found myself struggling with the text. I think I’m so unused to reading that style of writing now that I found it difficult to focus! But eventually I got into the rhythm of it and really enjoyed it. From what I researched, this is believed to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote before his death, so that was interesting to learn. I appreciated that the play moved pretty quickly though, and the characters were interesting and varied.
I gave this book 3.75 out of 5 stars.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare
After The Tempest I knew I wanted to read another Shakespeare play so I moved onto A Midsummer Night’s Dream. I’ve always been a fan of this one, and this is probably the only play I’ve read for fun before The Tempest. I really loved this play and after talking with a few friends we all laughed that we all wanted to be in a Shakespeare play after the pandemic and honestly, I think I’d make a really great Puck LOL.
I gave this book 4 out of 5 stars.
The Truths We Hold by Kamala Harris
I have to be honest, I didn’t know Vice President Harris had a book! I saw it listed as a featured book for National Women’s Month on the Libby app. There was a young readers version that had a 6+ month waitlist but the full version was available so I checked it out. I read it all in about two days because it was super interesting to learn about the VP’s life. I thought her career was so inspiring and I loved how she stressed that she took the fact that she worked “for the people” to heart. The part about meeting her husband was so cute too! I did feel like sometimes it felt more like a mini history lesson, as she did tend to start to explain issues she tackled by going way back to the root of the problem, but it was still super interesting and I loved her story.
I gave this book 4.5 out of 5 stars.
Nightbooks by J.A. White
I found this book on the Libby app while browsing through juvenile books. I had an idea for a middle grade book so I figured I should read books in that category to better understand how to approach writing my story. The book had a pretty interesting story, where the main character is a boy trapped by a witch who requires scary stories from him every day. It was a cool idea but I felt like the story wrapped up strangely and a little too quickly. The repercussions of the story were pretty much brushed away, but I suppose it might just be me having to get used to this category of books.
I gave this book 3.75 out of 5 stars.
So those are the ten books I’ve read recently! I am partway through a ton more books, so I imagine the next installment of mini book reviews will be up soon. Let me know if you’ve read any of these books and your thoughts if so. I rarely have anyone to talk to about these books besides the book club at my library after all.
Thanks for reading!
Pamela
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