Category: Reviews



The Empress' New GownsThe Empress’ New Gowns by Gita V. Reddy

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Oops! I thought I actually wrote a review on this book as I ACTUALLY DID write a review already. But there was a computer glitch and the computer shut down. Then, well, life happened and I forgot. Luckily a friend “liked’ the review so I came back to the page and saw what I wrote wasn’t there. Sorry.

Let’s see if I can remember the gist of it. First of all, I do a lot of reviews for Gita V. Reddy. I like her work and when I saw this one I picked it up. I think I actually paid for this one but it was cheap and an author does deserve compensation for their work. I just am on such a limited SS budget that I rarely can buy a book. My small amount won’t keep a roof over her head, but I hope my reviews help lead people to try out her books for their edification and entertainment.

As for edification… this book was a cautionary tale to the pride that can be in each of us. The original tale of the Emperor’s New Clothes is the first part of the story. But the next part should be read by preteens, teens, and new adults. Pride can be a good thing, but if we keep it in check we retain our humanity. Gita was clever telling the female version of the original story. I enjoyed it.

Most readers will find this story fun. For me, the formatting stopped the full enjoyment. Since I do most of my reading at night and always using the black background with white font, I found I couldn’t see the words. I had to change my background to a lighter color but then found it too bright. Luckily, I always use Text-to-Speech and that worked fine. But had this been a longer story I think I would have given up. I have to read while listening as my brain needs to be fully engaged to get into a story. But for most people, this formatting issue won’t cause them a bit of a problem and they well enjoy this story fully.

View all my reviews


FaithfulFaithful by Alice Hoffman

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Disclaimer: I received this book free of charge from NetGalley dot com.

I read another book by Alice Hoffman, The Red Garden, and was very impressed. So when I saw this one offered for review I jumped at the chance. It was an ARC or Uncorrected Proof but when you get these from NetGalley it is hard to see the errors. At least, it’s that way for me. With most of the freebies I pick up through One Hundred Free Books, and the like, there are plenty of mistakes that even I can see. Sometimes there are so many I can’t get into the story. If the story is fantastic I can never see them. And this book hid the errors in a terrific story.

Okay. At first, I didn’t like the main character. Nearly stopped reading for her self-pity and hateful ways. But she grows on ya. Maybe that is because there is a line of characters that support and fill up the story. True, nearly killing yourself and best friend, knocking the friend into a permanent coma, would be hard to walk away from. One would think a person might learn that the negative behaviors didn’t help. But I don’t know how I would handle it all. I’m not a young person anymore. Hormones aren’t raging and I’ve seen my share of life. So who am I to judge this girl? So I did as I suggest other readers do, stick with it, get past it. She’ll grow on you. It was a great story. I’m glad I read it. Alice Hoffman is a fantastic writer!

View all my reviews


Daksha the Medicine GirlDaksha the Medicine Girl by Gita V. Reddy

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Disclaimer: I was given this book by the author for an honest review.

Sorry it took so long for me to write this review. See my review for Soul Slam to find out why (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show…).

I read this book in one evening quite a while ago. I remember enjoying it a lot. I loved learning about the main character, Daksha and her life. When you live in a society that is busy with it’s own goals of education and modern medicine, it is easy to forget that others have been living with herbal medicines and more holistic ways of living than we are used to. And they have survived centuries like that. So when we read about a young girl who apprentices for the local medicine man and finds this is her passion of life, it may seem a bit off. But we grow to love and understand her and her way of life.

The part I didn’t like was how the story was over before it had a chance to follow her next steps. I wanted to know more about her learning to read and getting that kind of education and how she might have taught others how to integrate her type of medicine with others we might have grown up with. Just a thought. I almost think this could be a series. I loved that it was centered around a girl. I just want more.

View all my reviews


Soul Slam (Soul Warriors #1)Soul Slam by Allie Burton

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Disclaimer: A few months ago I was asked to read this little treasure for an honest review.

For my own future reference, and for those who might care, I have been busy. I actually finished reading this weeks ago. But here’s my day: Get up, breakfast. Work on DuoLingo Spanish and then German. That lasts about three hours. Then I research Loom Knitting ideas for the Hats I want to work on or my work in process. I finish about one hat a day unless I get into a complicated pattern or make mistakes I have to ‘tink’ (knit backward–unknit) or frog (completely unravel to start again). The hats and gloves and scarves are for charity and I love doing them. I feel I am doing something useful with my life while doing them. AND I can distract myself from the fibro pain.

The rest is watching shows with my hubby while continuing knitting. So my reading time is late at night. That has drastically reduced my reading and writing review time. After I get into a swing of things I might find more reading time while working on easy patterns.

AND I’m getting excited because friends are coming to visit and I want to decorate for Hallowgivingsmas as I know once we are dead into winter no one will be able to navigate the icy roads to see us.

And while none of this has to do with this sweet/fun book, I will need to know later how it was that I put off writing a review for so long.

Now on to the book: It was fun. I would have loved to read this as a preteen or teen. What I really liked was that though the main character is a female, I think this would be a great read for guys, too. The fun part was watching this girl deal with the male being that takes over her soul. King Tut was supposed to take over a young male but circumstances have it to where the poor girl is in the wrong place at the right time. Then farts and spitting become a part of her being, even while she tries to deal with new love.

The other thing I love is that this story takes place in San Francisco with most important things happening in the tourist attractions we all know and love. It is easy to picture the adventure happening on the Golden Gate Bridge or Fisherman’s Wharf, or Lombard Street. It makes the story that much more fun. But even if you haven’t been to SF, the author does a good enough job describing the area as it fits into the story.

Please give this a read and share with the young people you know. You will have a lot of fun! I’m glad I had the chance!

View all my reviews


Any Loom, Any Hat, Any Time: Loom Knitting HatsAny Loom, Any Hat, Any Time: Loom Knitting Hats by Scarlett Royale

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I don’t usually buy books. I especially don’t spend over a couple dollars. But this one is not only worth the $9.99 I paid, I am hoping to get the paper version for even more. Meanwhile, I loved all the patterns so much I had to write them in my notebook (with proper attributions, of course) so I could work on these without my overheating laptop open.

I love how the author shares the formula for translating these patterns to smaller or larger looms. That is something I have always tried to do, see how to adapt patterns. But the formula Ms. Royale shares is so simple, and it works.

These patterns were well written and I finally chose the one I would use as my first from her book. The beret. She makes hers on the green (36 pegs) loom. I have a new, larger (48 pegs) size from CinDLooms that I used Scarlett’s formula on. IT WORKED! The hat was a good size to fit over my ponytailed hair so I think it will be a nice hat for someone who needs it.

If you have trouble interpreting the patterns and/or the formula, Ms. Royale has links in the book that lead to YouTube demonstrations to guide you through. For the most part, the tutorial helped me. May I put in here that I did have trouble seeing what I needed to see in the part where you need to do the Kitchener stitch. It seemed the camera didn’t show it up well and I finally gave up and just sewed the bits together. I would love Scarlett to do a separate tutorial of this stitch. I think another kind of formula would help. I kept looking around the webs for something that showed it better. Nope. didn’t find it. I wanted a written version that might say bottom down, top down, second peg upper up, first peg lower up, etc. That was about when I got lost. I attempted the whole thing, several times but it didn’t follow. But all in all, I was happy with the results and can’t wait to try it again on a smaller loom.

And, I can’t wait to try other patterns in the book. I will be buying more of Scarlett Royale’s books! BTW, here is the link to my Ravelry page with the hat I made: http://www.ravelry.com/projects/Darra…

View all my reviews


All the Missing GirlsAll the Missing Girls by Megan Miranda

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Disclosure: I was able to obtain this book for free from NetGalley for an honest review.

This book came highly recommended by my GoodReads friend, Melissa. Here’s where you can find her review: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/9…

I was not as impressed by a story told in reverse. I often found it confusing. But the reason why becomes clear at the end.

I’m not a mystery person, especially murder-mystery person. I often find these kinds of stories dark. And they don’t make good bedtime stories for me. But for some reason I cared enough about the main character and the people she cared for that I kept reading. And I’m glad I did.

Not my favorite. But interesting.

View all my reviews


Lesbian Romance: Catnipped (Cat Paranormal Shapeshifter Romance) (New Adult and College Women's Fiction Romantic)Lesbian Romance: Catnipped (Cat Paranormal Shapeshifter Romance) by Olivia Myers

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This review is a long time in coming. As I have said many times I don’t like anthologies, I don’t like collections of short stories, I don’t like short stories. And guess what this book was… A collection. Of. Short stories.

I was drawn in by the blurb about this book which I thought was going to be Lesbian Romance: Catnip (Cat Paranormal Shape Shifter Romance) (New Adult and College Women’s Fiction Romantic). The first story was the story about a shapeshifting cat who happens to be lesbian. The story was okay.

After that story, was a mass of fantasy and sci-fi erotica that was all very heterosexual. Much of it was disturbing to me. Some would’ve been good as stories without the erotica. Very creative. Under really have to admit that it felt like the old switcheroo. If the title had been different, and not centered in on the lesbian shapeshifter cat, I wouldn’t have felt cheated. Had each of the stories sold as singular short stories it might not have felt so weird. But then it took me so long to get through all of these stories and so many of them just were not interesting to me– I nearly quit several times.

All in all, I am just happy to be finished with this book.

View all my reviews

Review: The BFG by Roald Dahl


The BFGThe BFG by Roald Dahl

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When I read a children’s book, I try to imagine what kind of read-aloud experience it would be for me and my children when they were small. My review reflects that scenario.

But first… this was a tree book. When I was younger I wouldn’t have found the font difficult. But I could only read a few pages at a time now. Thank goodness for the smaller paragraphs and pictures.
Pictures! Why don’t adult books have pictures? Even simple ones like in this book are such a blessing to tired eyes and an inspiration to the inner artist. But I don’t think the pictures would have won my young critics hearts.

The story, on the other hand, would have been a tough bedtime read. Thinking of how comical it would have been for Mom to be reading the words of the giant. Word of warning to parents about to try that, READ AHEAD. That way you can pronounce the words silently before exposing innocent ears to words you didn’t mean to say. No, the Giant’s words are all G-rated. But there are tongue twisters I know I would have fallen for. I can see my kids now rolling on the floor laughing at Mom for the mistakes.

Some say this story is scary. I suppose that may be true but my children would have been delighted.
The child, Sophie, and the Big Friendly Giant were great characters. The bigger giants were scary but the reader feels protected by the intelligence and common sense of BFG and Sophie.

I wish, though, that the bad giants were given a chance to show they could learn to be good. All in all, this was a fun book that I was glad I got to read. Now I can watch the movie!

By the way, I want to thank Julie at our library for picking this up for me. Yay! Librarians!

View all my reviews


Loom Knitting Stitches: My Top Ten Volume 1Loom Knitting Stitches: My Top Ten Volume 1 by Denise M. Canela

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Denise M. Canela has been my online teacher for loom knitting. It is because of her and my Hugger Hats group that I am addicted to making hats (and other things) with the loom. My other thanks goes to Carol who took the time to teach me to make my first hat in person. But Denise is there night or day when I have a question I look it up on her web page or YouTube page to learn a new stitch or pattern.

This book isn’t items to make, just patterns for stitches you can use to create whatever you choose to. I like that because I can get creative with my hats, scarves, gloves, etc.

Though not free, any book by Ms. Canela is well worth it as there are links to videos to take you step by step through the pattern. And her mission with these hats is similar to that of Hugger Hats. She makes many of her creations for charities all over the world.

I will keep this book on the carousel of my biggest Kindle as I can see the pictures better. It is a great reference for all the things I want to make.

View all my reviews


Summer Crochet: 15 Gorgeous Crochet Projects That Are Perfect For SummerSummer Crochet: 15 Gorgeous Crochet Projects That Are Perfect For Summer by Adrienne Black

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Okay, once again, I didn’t READ this book. I leafed through the pages, looked at the pictures and decided if it had any patterns I would like to try.

Oh to be young and fit! There are some sexy beachwear, bikinis and the like in the beginning of the book. If you feel confident enough to try these, go for it! Unfortunately, even when I was young enough or fit enough, I lacked the gall to try wearing them. These are not for beginners but the patterns seem easy to follow. I still need more pictures for some stitches but, hey, that’s what YouTube’s for!

After the sexy pages of young nubile mermaids, there’s chapter 3-Shoes and Such. Finally something I might be able to feel good about. Flip Flops and sandals. Chapter 4 has a picnic basket and blanket. Then chapter 5’s odds and ends include a baby hat and a flirty skirt. So, really, for me, there was only the baby hat that I might make for the hugger hats. If I remember where it is. SEE, that is why I write these reviews. I will come here to find more hats.

View all my reviews

THE AVOERIA ARCHIVE

The Depth Behind The Ordinary

Life of Chaz

Books, games, music, and life β€” filtered through the mind of a writer, drummer, and philosopher who thinks too deeply about all of it. If it moves something in your chest, I'm interested.

Pieces Of My Heart

"Words & Wonders - Where thoughts meet art

πŸ’«The Afterlove Voice

Justice, Channeling,Spiritual,Astrology,Truth- Seeker.

Amin Academy

Education, Information, Motivation

Luso Loonie β€” Devin Meireles

Portuguese-Canadian Writing About This Portuguese Thing of Ours

UNDER THE WILL... OVER THE DRAMA...

Inheritance. Narcissism. Turf. Welcome to the family.

Selma

Finding the extra in the ordinary

Sip, Snack, See

A Blog About Food and Travels

Golu lodhi

I upload photos & videos Golu lodhi village pairakhedi

Creative

Travel,Tourism, Life style "Now in hundreds of languages for you."

intricate cantrips

twisted yarns, unraveled

Introverted Growth

The Introvert's Roadmap to Self Discovery and Growth

Histopedia

story telling from history