This Bird Has Flown by Susanna Hoffs

Me: nonono sister no secondary location
*has crack theory about who Tom is.
Ok so my crack theory was wrong. Way off base.
But also when you keep comparing a guy to Rochester, you can't be surprised when a Rochester-like thing happens.
368 Pages

Saturday Night at the Lakeside Supper Club by J Ryan Stradal

....No one talk to me, I'll be over here in the corner crying.
Trauma really do mess some people up and make people do crappy things.
Twas the 80s/90s.
The book blurb gives the impression that the book is only told from two perspectives, but there's more
352 Pages

TS Song: Bigger than the Whole Sky....(we're not talking about it) (that's not the only song, but I can't remember the rest)

Never Vacation With Your Ex by Emily Wibberley and Austin Siegemund-Broka

My eyes aren't watering.. . I'm not feeling attacked at all about trying to be perfect and having other people's expectations be the definition....
It definitley has "The Summer I Turned Pretty" vibes. Because childhood friends who vacation at a beach together.
Also.. volleyball. and beach volleyball.
There's fluff. There's angst. There's pining. It's a teenage romance. And cause it's set (mostly) in California in the summer, it's got all the summer vibes.
336 Pages

One for My Enemy by Olivie Blake

All the Romeo and Juliet vibes.
And the Shakespeare vibes.
I feel like there were more Shakespeare vibes that I was missing...because Roma gave me Lady MacBeth vibes...
432 Pages

The Secret Service of Tea and Treason by India Holton

IT'S MY BABY BOY'S TIME TO SHINE. (Also known as the Catholic butler who kidnapped a Protestant to talk about transubstantiation) 
Hi I would like more backstory and childhood details:

So we love competency in this house.
Also Daniel knowing how to help Alice when she has sensory overload, or pointing out when things are jokes...the deep pressure hugs...just...Can I have a Daniel
368 Pages 

Alone With You in the Ether by Olivie Blake

Hexagons are the bestagons


"Statistics: the con artist of math"
My math brain. I love it. My love of information. Yes. Tell me all the things.
The humor. The writing style. I love it.

The technicality arguing is just. Chef's kiss.
7 AM MASS. YAAAAAAAS.
It's the trying to figure the other person out and also knowing you'll never figure them out, and loving people with a mental illness for me.
I'm just...gonna be over here dying....because I feel seen....
304 Pages

TS Song: the verses of Dress, Archer

The Last Heir to the Blackwood Library by Hester Fox

when you keep hearing the line: "and I'll look back and regret how I ignored when they said run as fast as you can"
*rolls eyes at the way doctors are like "women. reading. gasp"
Me trying to find the scene that they reference in the last chapter.
My babies. My World War I babies. Must protect.
336 Pages

Daughters of the Dawn by Sarena Nanua and Sasha Nanua

A palace of ice.

So I zoned out. I cared for like...the first two thirds and then I was like...nah.
560 Pages

Rhapsodic by Laura Thalassa

It's the "don't touch her" and the protector vibes for me....
I have a type...it's Des...
Also there's like....the same feel as Hades and Persephone, but not....
400 Pages

Right Girl, Wrong Side by Ginny Baird

This conflict is stressing me out and irritating me...cause like...they're behaving like babies
352 Pages

Exes and O's by Amy Lea

The fact that the book starts off with a Taylor quote.
And the number of Taylor references.
And the Disney references...and like...the affirmation that you can be whatever princess you want, even if you don't look like them.
It's the bookstagram and vlog and talking about tropes for me....

and the screen long text messages
She reminds me of Charles Boyle and like...his level of extra and obsessive. 

Underneath his thin layer of grump he soft boi

They read together....goals

361 Pages

TS: Blank Space

Silver in the Bone by Alexandra Bracken

So I had trouble paying attention to it, but it got better when we dug into the characters, but like...
It was an interesting take on Arthurian legends
480 Pages

Oculta by Maya Motayne

The increased number of FMA vibes...
Hey look at the bigoted characters pretending to not be bigoted, but being bigoted anyways....
544 Pages

Rise of the Vicious Princess by C.J. Redwine

I KNEW IT I KNEW IT
It has all my favorite things. I'm dead.
I love CJ Redwine. I just need the next book...July isn't that far...
432 Pages

Royal Blood by Aimee Carter

All of the "What A Girl Wants" vibes
....I'm not crying.
And there's some Princess Diaries vibes and the Prince and I vibes....
content warning: sexual assault, date rape drugs
368 Pages

K-POP Revolution by Stephan Lee

Did I accidentally think this was a standalone and read part of the way through before reading KPOP Confidential...yes
I feel like some of the conflict was resolved too easily.
368 Pages

K-Pop Confidential by Stephan Lee

All of this just reminds me of Miss Americana and Taylor talking about 1989 World Tour.
When a company decides to control things and acts like it'll work, when science has proven that the opposite is true, and that what they're doing is actually extremely harmful...cough cough starving teenagers, not letting them sleep,
332 Pages

TS Song: YOYOK...especially the bridge.

Ordinary Monsters by J.M. Miro

So like....I got bored in the middle...and the end. And I think the kind of time jumps confused me.
yeah I got lost.
672 Pages

Cafe Con Lychee by Emery Lee

Do I live for the warring cafes with children who become love interests....yes
Also let's go talking about how the whites love to mess up other cultures and foods. Here for it.
Theo: AITA
Everyone except Gabi, cause he anxious: yes.
320 Pages

Finley Donovan by Elle Cosimano

 

Pages: 1,020

"Finlay Donovan is killing it . . . except, she’s really not. She’s a stressed-out single-mom of two and struggling novelist, Finlay’s life is in chaos: the new book she promised her literary agent isn’t written, her ex-husband fired the nanny without telling her, and this morning she had to send her four-year-old to school with hair duct-taped to her head after an incident with scissors. When Finlay is overheard discussing the plot of her new suspense novel with her agent over lunch, she’s mistaken for a contract killer, and inadvertently accepts an offer to dispose of a problem husband in order to make ends meet... Soon, Finlay discovers that crime in real life is a lot more difficult than its fictional counterpart, as she becomes tangled in a real-life murder investigation. Fast-paced, deliciously witty, and wholeheartedly authentic in depicting the frustrations and triumphs of motherhood in all its messiness, hilarity, and heartfelt moments."

Best beach read I could have taken on vacation. I could not stop reading these and was laughing the whole time. The hilarity with which Finlay gets herself tied up in different crimes, without committing a single one, is amazing. Another author-ception with Finley basing her new block-buster books after her adventures with her nanny (accountant/accomplice) and juggling a single-mother life with pseudo-contract killer reputation. I cannot wait for the next installment after the cliff-hanger at the end.