Thank you to netgalley for providing me with a free digital advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Title: Flower Girl
Author: Amy Bloom
Illustrator: Jameela Wahlgren
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Publication Date: May 2, 2023
Book Description:
From celebrated and best-selling author Amy Bloom comes a jubilant story of self-love, individuality, and gender expression.
Nicki’s favorite aunt is getting married, and Nicki is excited to be the Flower Girl: she is all in for love and pretty petals. But when the family goes shopping to find outfits for the wedding, Nicki doesn’t feel like herself in any of the dresses her mom and aunt pick out for her, and all her happiness and excitement for the wedding evaporates. Nicki must find her voice—and her own style of expression to match it—to make Aunt Carmela’s big day absolutely perfect.
Infused with intelligence and charm and complemented by art by Jameela Wahlgren that’s as warm and tender as a hug, Flower Girl celebrates the magic of finding the clothes that help us shine.
My Thoughts:
This book has a great message that is a lesson to children and adults alike. Nicki is excited to be a flower girl, but she’s “not really a dress kind of girl”. Instead of pushing her to wear a dress, her family helps her to find the outfit that will make her shine. I love the way Nicki’s family embraces her individuality. Wonderful story with a wonderful message.
Welcome to my stop for the TBR And Beyond Tours for Fox Point’s Own Gemma Hopper
Book Info:
Fox Point’s Own Gemma Hopper by Brie Spangler
Genre: Middle Grade Contemporary
Publishing Date: April 11, 2023
Synopsis:
A heartwarming graphic novel about a baseball-obsessed 7th grader, trying to find her place in the sports world and her family.
In their tiny corner of Fox Point, Rhode Island, Gemma Hopper’s older brother, Teddy, is a baseball god, destined to become a Major League star. Gemma loves playing baseball, but with her mom gone and her dad working endless overtime, it’s up to her to keep the house running. She’s too busy folding laundry, making lunches, getting her younger twin brothers to do their homework, and navigating the perils of middle-school friendships to take baseball seriously.
But every afternoon, Gemma picks up her baseball glove to pitch to Teddy during his batting practice–throwing sliders down and away, fastballs right over the middle (not too fast or he’ll get mad), and hanging curveballs high and tight.
Could baseball be Gemma’s ticket to the big leagues or will it mean the end of her family as she knows it?
My Review:
After Gemma’s mother left, she carries the burden of holding the family together. This doesn’t leave a lot of time to pursue her passion for baseball. Her brother, Teddy, is the baseball star of the family. But, when a video of her pitching goes viral it looks like it might be her big chance too.
This book does a great job of realistically portraying the impacts of a mother abandoning her family. Gemma and Teddy both feel responsibility beyond their years, and feel resentment towards each other. Beyond the home, the issues carry into school as Gemma is assigned a school project about her family history. She’s also faced with typical changes in teenage friendships, when her oldest friend seems more interested in impressing popular kids than Gemma’s feelings.
Despite the problems explored in the story, Fox Point’s Own Gemma Hopper, doesn’t feel like a “heavy” book. The graphic novel format adds a lightness by showing the emotions through pictures. The focus on baseball also makes it high interest for young readers. It was very refreshing to have a sports-centered book with a female protagonist.
Author/illustrator of children’s picture books and YA novels, Brie Spangler loves to draw and write stories and drink massive amounts of caffeine, but not quite Dave Grohl “Fresh Pot!”/require hospitalization levels. Writing down the ideas in her head was scary as a kid, so she turned to making pictures instead. Brie worked as an illustrator for several years before she began to write and immediately became a frothing addict. BEAST is her debut novel.
Welcome to my weekly post where I look back at some of my four and five star reads before I started Nicole’s Nook.
Today’s book: Snow White Red-Handed by Maia Chance
Publishers: Berkely Prime Crime
Publication Date:November 4, 2014
Date Read: September 3, 2016
My Rating: 4 stars
Favorite Quote:
Goodreads Synopsis:
Miss Ophelia Flax is a Victorian actress who knows all about making quick changes and even quicker exits. But to solve a fairy-tale crime in the haunted Black Forest, she’ll need more than a bit of charm…
1867: After being fired from her latest variety hall engagement, Ophelia acts her way into a lady’s maid position for a crass American millionaire. But when her new job whisks her off to a foreboding castle straight out of a Grimm tale, she begins to wonder if her fast-talking ways might have been too hasty. The vast grounds contain the suspected remains of Snow White’s cottage, along with a disturbing dwarf skeleton. And when her millionaire boss turns up dead—poisoned by an apple—the fantastic setting turns into a once upon a crime scene.
To keep from rising to the top of the suspect list, Ophelia fights through a bramble of elegant lies, sinister folklore, and priceless treasure, with only a dashing but mysterious scholar as her ally. And as the clock ticks towards midnight, she’ll have to break a cunning killer’s spell before her own time runs out…
My Thoughts:
This book combines all of my favorite genres: romance, mystery, historical fiction and fantasy. As if that isn’t great enough, there’s also a fairy tale connection. This is a delightful twist on fairytale retellings, where they are investigating the truth behind Snow White’s story.
Thank you to netgalley for providing me with a free digital advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Title: You and Me
Author: Caley Nunnally
Illustrator: Audrey Schmid
Publisher: Ninewise Publishing
Publication Date: April 26, 2023
Book Description:
Celebrate the things that make us all different!
Each of us seem the same in many ways—we all have eyes, ears, noses, and hands. But those things are also what make us very unique from one another. Where one friend loves noodles, another friend may say, “Eww, no thank you!” It’s these differences that make the world—and each of us—more interesting. Mine make me ME, and yours make you YOU!
The world was made for us to play, learn, and dream. If we were all the same, how boring would that be?
My Thoughts:
I loved the way this book used the senses to show our differences. What looks, sounds, feels, tastes or smells good to one person makes someone else cringe. That’s made okay by the repeating the phrase if we were the same “how boring would that be?” At the end of the book, the author also included tips for parent to teach perspective. This is a fun way to teach kids an important lesson.
Welcome to my weekly post where I look back at some of my four and five star reads before I started Nicole’s Nook.
Today’s book: Saving Fish From Drowning by Amy Tan
Publishers: G.P. Putnam’s Sons
Publication Date: January 1, 2005
Date Read: Before I joined Goodreads in 2008
My Rating: 4 stars
Favorite Quote
“The only thing certain in times of great uncertainty is that people will behave with great strength or weakness, and with very little else in between.” ― Amy Tan, Saving Fish from Drowning
Goodreads Synopsis
On an ill-fated art expedition into the southern Shan state of Burma, eleven Americans leave their Floating Island Resort for a Christmas-morning tour-and disappear. Through twists of fate, curses, and just plain human error, they find themselves deep in the jungle, where they encounter a tribe awaiting the return of the leader and the mythical book of wisdom that will protect them from the ravages and destruction of the Myanmar military regime.
Saving Fish from Drowning seduces the reader with a fagade of Buddhist illusions, magician’s tricks, and light comedy, even as the absurd and picaresque spiral into a gripping morality tale about the consequences of intentions-both good and bad-and about the shared responsibility that individuals must accept for the actions of others.
A pious man explained to his followers: “It is evil to take lives and noble to save them. Each day I pledge to save a hundred lives. I drop my net in the lake and scoop out a hundred fishes. I place the fishes on the bank, where they flop and twirl. ‘Don’t be scared,’ I tell those fishes. ‘I am saving you from drowning.’ Soon enough, the fishes grow calm and lie still. Yet, sad to say, I am always too late. The fishes expire. And because it is evil to waste anything, I take those dead fishes to market and I sell them for a good price. With the money I receive, I buy more nets so I can save more fishes.”
My thoughts:
Amy Tan’s one of my favorite authors. While not necesarrily my favorite, this is the one that sticks out in my mind the most. It departs form her usual theme of the relationship between Chinese-born mothers and their Chinese-American daughters. In this case, the narrator is a recently deceased woman whose friends go on an expedition to Myanmar in her honor. I love the mixture of adventure, mystery and magical realism.
“I knew I was keeping it together by only the thinnest of threads, but that was better than not keeping it together at all.”
Paige Shelton, Thin Ice
Goodreads Synopsis:
Beth Rivers is on the run – she’s doing the only thing she could think of to keep herself safe. Known to the world as thriller author Elizabeth Fairchild, she had become the subject of a fanatic’s obsession. After being held in a van for three days by her kidnapper, Levi Brooks, Beth managed to escape, and until he is captured, she’s got to get away. Cold and remote, Alaska seems tailor-made for her to hideout.
Beth’s new home in Alaska is sparsely populated with people who all seem to be running or hiding from something, and though she accidentally booked a room at a halfway house, she feels safer than she’s felt since Levi took her. That is, until she’s told about a local death that’s a suspected murder. Could the death of Linda Rafferty have anything to do with her horror at the hands of Levi Brooks?
As Beth navigates her way through the wilds of her new home, her memories of her time in the van are coming back, replaying the terror and the fear–and threatening to keep her from healing, from reclaiming her old life again. Can she get back to norma, will she ever truly feel safe, and can she help solve the local mystery, if only so she doesn’t have to think about her own?
My Thoughts:
This book was a great kick off for a mystery series. The Alaskan setting is perfect for a murder mystery. The isolation and harsh weather conditions add an element of danger. Normally, I find it improbable when series are set in small communities that have murders take place every couple of months. It works here for a couple of reasons. First, it’s a place people in trouble go to as an escape. Second, there’s a halfway house bringing in a criminal element. So, the danger makes sense. I also like that there are two mysteries: the main mystery which is solved within the book, and the bigger mystery of Paige’s stalker which I assume will progress in each book.
Besides the fact that their kids all attend the same fashionable Brooklyn Heights private school, Bess, Robin, Carla, and Alicia have little in common. Thrown together on the tony school’s Diversity Committee, the women impulsively turn their awkward first meeting into a boisterous game of poker. Instead of betting with chips or pocket change, however, they play for intimate secrets about their lives.
As the Diversity Commitee meetings become a highly anticipated monthly ritual, the new friends reveal more with each game. Picture-perfect housewife Bess struggles to relate to her surly teenage daughter and judgmental mother. Robin, a single mom, grapples with the truth concerning her child’s real father. Carla, an ambitious doctor, attempts to balance the colossal demands of her family with her dream of owning her own private practice. And to distract herself from her troubled marriage, shy copywriter Alicia fantasizes about an attractive younger colleague.
Putting all their cards on the table, the four women grow to rely on one another, bracing for one final showdown.
My Thoughts:
Full disclosure: I don’t remember a lot of the specific details of this books because I read it in 2016. But, what stayed with me is the idea that there are layers to everyone and you never know what others are facing. While these women seem very different on the surface, they are all dealing with issues. Even though the problems may be different, comraderie and comfort that comes with sharing our burdens with other women is universal.
Welcome to my weekly post where I share some of the great books I read before starting Nicole’s Nook.
Today’s Book: Soy Sauce for Beginners by Kirsten Chen
Publisher: New Harvest
Publication Date: January 1, 2014
Date Read: December 27, 2016
My rating: 4 stars
Favorite Quote: “One cannot refuse to eat just because there is a chance of being choked.” ― Kirstin Chen, Soy Sauce for Beginners
Goodreads Synopsis:
Gretchen Lin, adrift at the age of thirty, leaves her floundering marriage in San Francisco to move back to her childhood home in Singapore and immediately finds herself face-to-face with the twin headaches she’s avoided her entire adult life: her mother’s drinking problem and the machinations of her father’s artisanal soy sauce business.
Surrounded by family, Gretchen struggles with the tension between personal ambition and filial duty, but still finds time to explore a new romance with the son of a client, an attractive man of few words. When an old American friend comes to town, the two of them are pulled into the controversy surrounding Gretchen’s cousin, the only male grandchild and the heir apparent to Lin’s Soy Sauce. In the midst of increasing pressure from her father to remain permanently in Singapore—and pressure from her mother to do just the opposite—Gretchen must decide whether she will return to her marriage and her graduate studies at the San Francisco Conservatory, or sacrifice everything and join her family’s crusade to spread artisanal soy sauce to the world.
My Thoughts:
I love a good story about starting over and facing family issues. The background of a soy sauce empire made this one unique. I knew next to nothing about soy sauce aside from using it as an ingredient, and thought little about the quality. In addition to the story of Gretchen’s self-discovery, there were lots of tidbits about the soy sauce industry, I never would’ve known. I was surprised when I saw how long it’s been since I read this book, because I still think of it. I love books like this where I can gain knew knowledge through fiction.
Welcome to my weekly post where I share some of the great books I read before starting Nicole’s Nook.
Today’s book: The Love Interest by Cale Dietrich
Publication Date: May 16, 2017
Date Read: April 15, 2018
My Star Rating: 4 Stars
Favorite Quote:
“I don’t exist to teach her a lesson, and it irks me that she thinks labelling me is okay now. Like, by liking guys, I automatically take on that role in her life. That I’m suddenly a supporting character in her story rather than the hero of my own.” ― Cale Dietrich, The Love Interest
Goodreads Synopsis:
There is a secret organization that cultivates teenage spies. The agents are called Love Interests because getting close to people destined for great power means getting valuable secrets.
Caden is a Nice: The boy next door, sculpted to physical perfection. Dylan is a Bad: The brooding, dark-souled guy, and dangerously handsome.
The girl they are competing for is important to the organization, and each boy will pursue her. Will she choose a Nice or the Bad?
Both Caden and Dylan are living in the outside world for the first time. They are well-trained and at the top of their games. They have to be – whoever the girl doesn’t choose will die.
What the boys don’t expect are feelings that are outside of their training. Feelings that could kill them both.
My Thoughts:
The Love Interest had mixed reviews on Goodreads. The key is not to take it too seriously. It’s meant to poke fun at the overused tropes in YA romance. It is full of angsty romance and teen discovery. I enjoyed the concept of an agency manipulating major events through romance. I also liked the repeated analogy of life to a book as Caden fights to be the protagonist in his own life. Overall, it was a fun read with a good mix of romance and action.
When Rylan’s best friend ditches him for the cool kids, Rylan thinks a summer spent working on a French farm will be the perfect chance to reconnect. But he doesn’t count on his long-lost father showing up. This funny, touching novel is perfect for fans of Gary D. Schmidt and John David Anderson.
Rylan O’Hare has been drifting apart from his best friend, Wilder, for months. Wilder’s family became mega-rich when his mom invented an app that reminds people to drink water, and now he barely has time for Rylan. So when Wilder invites Rylan to join him at a summer farming program in France (all expenses paid), Rylan see it as a chance to repair the friendship. Not only that, but he’ll get to learn French, milk goats, and eat lots (and lots) of cheese.
But before they take off, Rylan’s mom drops a bomb: His dad (whom he hasn’t spoken to since he was three) lives in France, too, and he wants to meet.
Between being swarmed by bees, pooped on by pigeons, and sprayed with goat milk, Rylan’s great French escape isn’t quite what he thought it would be. Even worse, Wilder ditches him for some cool French kids he meets along the way. And Rylan still can’t decide whether or not he should actually meet his father.
But somewhere in all the chaos, Rylan begins to find his way, and he realizes that sometimes you have to release old expectations to discover new destinations.
My Thoughts:
The premise of this story is not new. A kid reluctantly is sent away for a summer program and gets a new outlook on life. A couple of things make this story unique, though. First, I thought it was a realistic portrayal of adolescent behavior and how their friendships evolve. Second, the message differed from the usual themes of second chances and forgiveness. While there was an element of that, it emphasizes that you should surround yourself with the people that will support you. This is a message I don’t think young people hear enough. I did feel that the plot was a little rushed, and plot points could have been more developed in some spots. But, as a whole, it is an excellent middle grade read.
