The Christmas Doll by Elvira Woodruff, 151 pages
From the MARC: "As Christmas approaches, Lucy, a ten-year-old orphan living on the streets of London, is overjoyed to be given the job of sewing hearts for the dolls in ThimbleBee's Doll Shop."
Showing posts with label found family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label found family. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 3, 2026
Friday, February 28, 2025
Under the Whispering Door by TJ Klune
Under the Whispering Door by TJ Klune with Kirt Graves (Narrator), 15 hrs. (376 pages)
"When a reaper comes to collect Wallace Price from his own funeral, Wallace suspects he really might be dead.
Instead of leading him directly to the afterlife, the reaper takes him to a small village. On the outskirts, off the path through the woods, tucked between mountains, is a particular tea shop, run by a man named Hugo. Hugo is the tea shop's owner to locals and the ferryman to souls who need to cross over.
But Wallace isn't ready to abandon the life he barely lived. With Hugo's help he finally starts to learn about all the things he missed in life.
When the Manager, a curious and powerful being, arrives at the tea shop and gives Wallace one week to cross over, Wallace sets about living a lifetime in seven days.
By turns heartwarming and heartbreaking, this absorbing tale of grief and hope is told with TJ Klune's signature warmth, humor, and extraordinary empathy."--Provided by publisher
This re-read was the perfect palette cleanser after reading some heavy and complicated books. TJ Klune can be counted on to bring the fuzzy warm feelings, some laughs, and just a general calmness with his stories. What can be a very emotional topic was written with love and friendship and comradery. I will always pick up a TJ Klune book!
Sunday, August 27, 2023
The Shadow Cabinet by Juno Dawson
"Niamh Kelly is dead. Her troubled twin, Ciara, now masquerades as the benevolent witch as Her Majesty's Royal Coven prepares to crown her High Preistess.
Suffering from amnesia, Ciara can't remember what she's done--but if she wants to survive, she must fool Niamh's adopted family and friends; the coven; and the murky Shadow Cabinet--a secret group of mundane civil servants who are already suspicious of witches. While she tries to rebuild her past, she realizes none of her past has forgotten her, including her former lover, renegade warlock Dabney Hale.
On the other end of the continent, Leonie Jackman is in search of Hale, rumored to be seeking a dark object of ultimate power somehow connected to the upper echelons of the British government. If the witches can't figure out Hale's machinations, and fast, all of witchkind will be in grave danger--along with the fate of all (wo)mankind."--Goodreads blurb
I reread the first one so I was able to go with the first book fresh in my mind and this second installment did not disappoint. I couldn't put it down. It wasn't just a fantasy book, it was a thriller with the reader getting to know a lot more than the characters did at the time. There are always two sides to every story, and while you might not want to see a bad guys' side, it's there. Dealing with favorite characters being dead or not who we really thought they were plagued my mind the whole time reading, and I believe that's a mark of great storywriting. Book 3 in this trilogy can't come quickly enough!
Her Majesty's Royal Coven by Juno Dawson
"If you look hard enough at old photographs, we're there in the background: healers in the trenches; Suffragettes; Bletchley Park oracles; land girls and resistance fighters. Why is it we help in times of crisis? We have a gift. We are stronger than Mundanes, plain and simple.
At the dawn of their adolescence, on the eve of the summer solstice, four young girls--Helena, Leonie, Niamh and Elle--took the oath to join Her Majesty's Royal Coven, established by Queen Elizabeth I as a covert government department. Now, decades later, the witch community is still reeling from a civil war and Helena is now the reigning High Priestess of the organization. Yet Helena is the only one of her friend group still enmeshed in the stale bureaucracy of HMRC. Elle is trying to pretend she's a normal housewife, and Niamh has become a country vet, using her powers to heal sick animals. In what Helena perceives as the deepest betrayal, Leonie has defected to start her own more inclusive and intersectional coven, Diaspora. And now Helena has a bigger problem. A young warlock of extraordinary capabilities has been captured by authorities and seems to threaten the very existence of HMRC. With conflicting beliefs over the best course of action, the four friends must decide where their loyalties lie: with preserving tradition, or doing what is right.
Juno Dawson explores gender and the corrupting nature of power in a delightful and provocative story of magic and matriarchy, friendship and feminism. Dealing with all the aspects of contemporary womanhood, as well as being phenomenally powerful witches, Niamh, Helena, Leonie and Elle may have grown apart but they will always be bound by the sisterhood of the coven." --Goodreads blurb
This was a reread for me, and this is what I said the first time I read it: "This was a fantastic surprise for me, as I fell in love with this book. I realized too late that it was the first in a series, and I usually try not to read series books until there are at least a couple out in the series, because like some kind of addict, I get angry when I can't continue on with a story I love when I know there is going to be more! This was a quintessential good vs. evil, yet there were some grey characters. I'm new to this author, and while it did get a little mired in the "lesson" of the book at times, I really loved this book and these characters. Can't wait until the next one is out!"
Monday, January 30, 2023
The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna, 336 p.
"As one of the few witches in Britain, Mika Moon knows she has to hide her magic, keep her head down, and stay away from other witches so their powers don't mingle and draw attention. And as an orphan who lost her parents at a young age and was raised by strangers, she's used to being alone and she follows the rules...with one exception: an online account, where she posts videos pretending to be a witch. She thinks no one will take it seriously.
But someone does. An unexpected message arrives, begging her to travel to the remote and mysterious Nowhere House to teach three young witches how to control their magic. It breaks all of the rules, but Mika goes anyway, and is immediately tangled up in the lives and secrets of not only her three charges, but also an absent archaeologist, a retired actor, two long-suffering caretakers, and...Jamie. The handsome and prickly librarian of Nowhere House would do anything to protect the children, and as far as he's concerned, a stranger like Mika is a threat. An irritatingly appealing threat.
As Mika begins to find her place at Nowhere House, the thought of belonging somewhere begins to feel like a real possibility. But magic isn't the only danger in the world, and when a threat comes knocking at their door, Mika will need to decide whether to risk everything to protect a found family she didn't know she was looking for...." --Goodreads blurb
This came highly recommended on book social media and for good reason. I adored this book. Cozy fantasy at its finest. Good, immersive story with fun characters and a great female lead. Found family is one of the best storylines for me personally, and this one was a great one.
Friday, December 30, 2022
The Reading List by Sara Nisha Adams
"Widower Mukesh lives a quiet life in the London Borough of Ealing after losing his beloved wife. He shops every Wednesday, goes to Temple, and worries about his granddaughter, Priya, who hides in her room reading while he spends his evenings watching nature documentaries.
Aleisha is a bright but anxious teenager working at the local library for the summer when she discovers a crumpled-up piece of paper in the back of To Kill a Mockingbird. It’s a list of novels that she’s never heard of before. Intrigued, and a little bored with her slow job at the checkout desk, she impulsively decides to read every book on the list, one after the other. As each story gives up its magic, the books transport Aleisha from the painful realities she’s facing at home.
When Mukesh arrives at the library, desperate to forge a connection with his bookworm granddaughter, Aleisha passes along the reading list… hoping that it will be a lifeline for him too. Slowly, the shared books create a connection between two lonely souls, as fiction helps them escape their grief and everyday troubles and find joy again. "--Goodreads blurb
Wow. This book came highly recommended, and I am so glad I read it. This is one I will recommend to anyone, though please check trigger warnings beforehand. The characters and emotional storyline sit in your heart and won't leave for quite a while!
Monday, December 26, 2022
A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
"With his breakout debut novel, Rules of Civility, Amor Towles established himself as a master of absorbing, sophisticated fiction, bringing late 1930s Manhattan to life with splendid atmosphere and a flawless command of style. Readers and critics were enchanted; as NPR commented, “Towles writes with grace and verve about the mores and manners of a society on the cusp of radical change.”
A Gentleman in Moscow immerses us in another elegantly drawn era with the story of Count Alexander Rostov. When, in 1922, he is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, the count is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and must now live in an attic room while some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history are unfolding outside the hotel’s doors. Unexpectedly, his reduced circumstances provide him a doorway into a much larger world of emotional discovery.
Brimming with humour, a glittering cast of characters, and one beautifully rendered scene after another, this singular novel casts a spell as it relates the count’s endeavour to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be a man of purpose."--Goodreads blurb
This book came highly recommended to me and was a great palette cleanser after a run of high-octave fantasy novels. Following Alexander through his hotel and raising not one, but two surprise daughters while never leaving the hotel made for quite a story. So much nuance and emotion in this wonderful story and I loved it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)