Penny Thoughtful: All Things Books and Running

Disclaimer: The reviews in the next few recent reads will likely be shorter. With the start of the school year, I continued reading but often lacked the energy for creative output so many of the reviews piled up. I did not expect Johnson to continue int eh world that she created with Ellie Engle but I’m glad…

Reading definitely slowed down this month but just wait for September…it’s about to ramp right back up!

The massive TBRs have become a default apparently. In this month I put a whole bunch of books on the list to continue working through my yearly goals as well as complete the Autumn Equinox semester of Magical readathon and continue to make progress in HRCYED (the Hardest Reading Challenge You’ll Ever Do). All of…

In this story, Henrietta finds herself an orphan but then brought to receive a massive inheritance from an uncle she knew nothing about. There’s just one problem. The war that made her an orphan has somehow continued inside the massive “house” that she now owns. This first installment raises far more questions than it answers…

After reading City Spies a year or so ago, I set my expectations appropriately. Thus, I expected something fairly average and mildly entertaining. I ended up being pleasantly surprised when this book slightly exceeded those expectations. This book features a brother/sister pair, a couple friends, their eccentric grandfather, and their talented lawyer mother. The brother and his…

These two installments continue Zita’s mad cap adventures int his fantastical space world building and ever growing found family of humans (whose backstory and adventures would make for an excellent spin off series), robots, and aliens. Hatke wraps up the main macro-plot of this trilogy by the end of The Return but also left the…

I really appreciate how Roumani crafted this story set around the time of the Arab Spring. The narrative has two points of view starting with a young middle school age boy living in Syria who has gotten swept up, along with several of his friends in the protests against the unjust establishment through street art.…

I continue to enjoy these adaptations and will definitely seek out – whether in the book room at school or a book store of some sort – the other adaptations thus far int he series. See my reviews for books 1 + 3 for more thoughts on the series. After reading the first book, I…

Of course I have decided (a couple months ago) to participate in another ridiculous challenge. QWordy’s website has all the details. This installment worked much better than the second book and me extremely interested in the fourth book which I have an eARC of. I also really appreciated how Ortega used the reveals of this…

When I saw the description of this book being Addie LaRue but darker, I lowered my expectations. I read Addie long before I read other works from Schwab and found myself simply whelmed, not over or underwhelmed. Unfortunately, I have to agree that the comparison is accurate. Schwab has a magnificent writing style, one that adapts so well to…