Month: June 2024

Weekly Wrap Up | 6/23/24

Aloha friends!

It was a chill week and I got to finish two books at least! Can you believe June is almost over? I cannot. Because that means I have to go back to school shopping already. I went to Target last week and they still had their summer stuff but we’ll see if the school stuff appear soon. And that’s that – my daughter will be in 2nd and my son will be in 6th and time just keeps flying by! 😅

I hope all of you have a good week!

Blog Posts:

Books I Read:

  • This Summer Will Be Different by. Carley Fortune
  • The Break-Up Pact by. Emma Lord
  • The Mirror of Beasts by. Alexandra Bracken

Currently Reading:

  • House of Thorns by. Isabel Strychacz
  • The Unmaking of June Farrow by. Adrienne Young

Shows/Movies/Music I Watched/Listened To:

  • House of Dragon (Season 2, Ep. 1) – not much to say so far. Expected more but it is episode 1 and I know it has to build. 🐉
  • Dune 2 – now that I renewed my Max subscription, I’m trying to watch what I can before I cancel after watching House of Dragon lol. Honestly the story is slow but I love this movie series because of the visuals. It’s really amazing! 📽
  • Inside Out 2 – my kids and I went to the theater and loved this movie! I love how they portray our complicated emotions. It’s a great way for them to learn about it and I wish I had a movie like this when I was young. 🍿
  • Brat – Charlie xcx – I bought the vinyl (yes how am I a vinyl collector now?! As if I needed a new expensive hobby). This album is so good, who needs coffee? This album is like caffeine.🎧
  • The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess – Chappell Roan – I just bought the vinyl so definitely had to give it a listen. 🎵

How was your week? Did you get a lot done? Watch anything good? Read any amazing books or books you didn’t finish? What are you reading?…Leave me a comment below!

New Library Book: Dungeons and Drama by. Kristy Boyce

It’s been awhile since I went to my local library but since it’s summer time, I thought it was time to make a trip there with my kids. I didn’t see many books I wanted to read, but I did see a lot of books I read as arcs. But this one was a book I was wanted to read so I was happy to see it at the library!

Title: Dungeons and Drama

Author: Kristy Boyce

Pages: 304

Categories: young adult, romance

Have you read this one?

First Lines Fridays | 6/21/24

First Lines Fridays is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?

  • Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
  • Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
  • Finally… reveal the book!

“Two beads of water form at the top of my mirror and then slowly begin to race each other down to the bottom.”

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Can you guess what book it is?

Did you guess it? Have you read this one?

📖 ~ Yolanda

This Summer Will Be Different by. Carley Fortune | Book Review

Review: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Title: This Summer Will Be Different

Author: Carley Fortune

Format: ebook (borrowed)

Pages: 361

Publication Date: 5/7/24

Categories: Romance, Contemporary, Chick-Lit



This summer they’ll keep their promise. This summer they won’t give into temptation. This summer will be different.

Lucy is the tourist vacationing at a beach house on Prince Edward Island. Felix is the local who shows her a very good time. The only problem: Lucy doesn’t know he’s her best friend’s younger brother. Lucy and Felix’s chemistry is unreal, but the list of reasons why they need to stay away from each other is long, and they vow to never repeat that electric night again.

It’s easier said than done.

Each year, Lucy escapes to PEI for a big breath of coastal air, fresh oysters and crisp vinho verde with her best friend, Bridget. Every visit begins with a long walk on the beach, beneath soaring red cliffs and a golden sun. And every visit, Lucy promises herself she won’t wind up in Felix’s bed. Again.

If Lucy can’t help being drawn to Felix, at least she’s always kept her heart out of it.

When Bridget suddenly flees Toronto a week before her wedding, Lucy drops everything to follow her to the island. Her mission is to help Bridget through her crisis and resist the one man she’s never been able to. But Felix’s sparkling eyes and flirty quips have been replaced with something new, and Lucy’s beginning to wonder just how safe her heart truly is.

Content Warning: death of a loved one

I’ve been meaning to read a book from this author and now that I finally did I can knock that off my list.

This is a romance between Lucy and her best friend’s brother, Felix. It has flashbacks through the years from the moment they met to where they are now in the present and how it was always a secret, casual thing between them but the sparks are undeniable. Life happens between the times they are together, they date different people, Lucy gets close to their family and she loses someone she loves very much. Through it all are memories of the times they are together where everything feels right between them but what does that mean for a future between them?

I liked the setting of Prince Edward Island and Toronto since I don’t read much books about those places. It did give lots of summery vibes especially when it flash-backed to times spent on PEI.

I thought this one was okay. Maybe I went in with high expectations but I felt like everything was so predictable and I didn’t love the ending where they decide to be together and then few days later they go back to taking it slow? No, I wanted it to be happy ever after by then but nope, had to have the dose of reality at the end where they have to find themselves first. I also didn’t feel connected to the characters. I felt like I was just coasting through the story. And I was also getting frustrated with Bridget’s (her best friend) secret taking so long to be revealed.

My Final Thoughts:

I think I wanted more depth to this story. It was just okay for me but I think I will try her most popular book to see if she’s an author I’ll continue to read because I did like some elements of the story. Maybe I just went in with high expectations.

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Book Links:

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

WWW Wednesday | 6/19/24

WWW Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Sam over on Taking on a World of Words.

The idea is pretty simple, every week you dedicate a post to the three W’s:

What are you currently reading?

What have you just finished reading?

What are you going to read next?

Happy Juneteenth! Summer is finally starting for us I feel. We watched Inside Out 2, on Sunday. I finished Bridgerton season 3 and am now in the middle of watching House of Dragon Season 2. We don’t have much plans except to go to the library and maybe the pool and my son’s piano lessons on Saturdays. So I should have more time to read, right? I hope so!

What are you currently reading?

The Mirror of Beasts by. Alexandra Bracken – 2% in – I haven’t really worked on this one but I WILL this week since publication is coming up.

Shadows of Perl by. J. Elle – 2% just started this one, trying to get my bearings and remember what happened in book one.

A Game of Malice and Greed by. Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti – 4% in

House of Thorns by. Isabel Strychacz – 9% this one is fascinating so far, a sentient haunted house? A missing sister? Another sister on drugs and hearing the house calling her back? We’ll see where the story takes me…

This Summer Will Be Different by. Carley Fortune – 15% into the book. I’ve been meaning to read a book from this author and glad it showed up for me to borrow just in time for some summer reading!

The Break-Up Pact by. Emma Lord – I’m 7% into this arc. Another timely summer read though!

What have you just finished reading?

A Magic Fierce & Bright by. Hemant Nayak – ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

What are you going to read next?

What are you reading right now?

Happy Book Birthday | New Releases | 6/18/24

Happy book birthday to these new releases! Check out this list today:

Not in Love by. Ali Hazelwood

A forbidden, secret affair proves that all’s fair in love and science.

Rue Siebert might not have it all, but she has enough: a few friends she can always count on, the financial stability she yearned for as a kid, and a successful career as a biotech engineer at Kline, one of the most promising start-ups in the field of food science. Her world is stable, pleasant, and hard-fought. Until a hostile takeover and its offensively attractive front man threatens to bring it all crumbling down.

Eli Killgore and his business partners want Kline, period. Eli has his own reasons for pushing this deal through – and he’s a man who gets what he wants. With one burning exception: Rue. The woman he can’t stop thinking about. The woman who’s off-limits to him.

Torn between loyalty and an undeniable attraction, Rue and Eli throw caution out the lab and the boardroom windows. Their affair is secret, no-strings-attached, and has a built-in deadline: the day one of their companies will prevail. But the heart is risky business – one that plays for keeps.

Goodreads | Amazon

Mirrored Heavens by. Rebecca Roanhorse

She’s rewriting his love story. But can she rewrite her own?

Emma Wheeler desperately longs to be a screenwriter. She’s spent her life studying, obsessing over, and writing romantic comedies―good ones! That win contests! But she’s also been the sole caretaker for her kind-hearted dad, who needs full-time care. Now, when she gets a chance to re-write a script for famous screenwriter Charlie Yates―The Charlie Yates! Her personal writing god!―it’s a break too big to pass up.

Emma’s younger sister steps in for caretaking duties, and Emma moves to L.A. for six weeks for the writing gig of a lifetime. But what is it they say? Don’t meet your heroes? Charlie Yates doesn’t want to write with anyone―much less “a failed, nobody screenwriter.” Worse, the romantic comedy he’s written is so terrible it might actually bring on the apocalypse. Plus! He doesn’t even care about the script―it’s just a means to get a different one green-lit. Oh, and he thinks love is an emotional Ponzi scheme.

But Emma’s not going down without a fight. She will stand up for herself, and for rom-coms, and for love itself. She will convince him that love stories matter―even if she has to kiss him senseless to do it. But . . . what if that kiss is accidentally amazing? What if real life turns out to be so much . . . more real than fiction? What if the love story they’re writing breaks all Emma’s rules―and comes true?

Goodreads | Amazon

Icon and Inferno by. Marie Lu

Spies meet romance meet popstars in this thrilling follow up to Stars and Smoke by bestselling author Marie Lu.

A year has passed since superstar Winter and secret agent Sydney Cossette went undercover – on a dangerous mission to bring down the baddest man in London.

Winter hasn’t stopped thinking about Sydney since, and she’s been trying not to think about him

Family secrets and nasty newspapers has Winter desperate to re-enter the secret world. And it’s not long before he gets his chance.

Sydney is back, and this time the mission goes right to the heart of the United States of America. A rescue gone wrong, an assassination attempt – and the return of an old flame – puts Winter right back into the action . . . and into a country on the brink of chaos.

And when a murder accusation has Sydney on the run, suddenly it’s not just a life at stake, but all-out war.

Goodreads | Amazon

Love, Off the Record by. Samantha Markum


The Hating Game meets Alex, Approximately in this smart, chemistry-filled teen rom-com about two rival journalism students competing for the same position on their university newspaper.

Wyn is going to beat Three even if it kills her—or, preferably, him. Being freshmen staffers on the university newspaper puts them at the bottom of the pecking order—until a rare reporter spot opens up. Wyn and Three are both determined to get the position, starting a game of sabotage that pushes them to do their worst, from stealing each other’s ideas to playing twisted mind games. No road is too low when it comes to winning.

As Wyn’s search for the perfect story leads her to an anonymous, campus-wide dating app, she hits it off with a mystery man she thinks might be the cute RA from her dorm. But Wyn is all too familiar with being rejected because of her weight, and she’s hesitant to reveal her identity, even as she grows closer with someone who might be the guy of her dreams.

When Three breaks a story that’s closer to home than he or Wyn expects, the two must put aside their differences to expose the truth—and face their real feelings for each other, which threaten everything Wyn has built with her anonymous match.

Goodreads | Amazon

Shadow & Storms by. Helen Scheuerer

Release Date: June 20, 2024

“She was ready to shed blood, ready to take back what was hers.”

The time has come to make one last stand against the forces of cursed men and monsters. But Thea’s enemies are only getting stronger. With allies divided and an outnumbered army, she must race against her own fate to secure the future of the midrealms – or die trying.

A prophecy is looming, and Thea’s life is in the balance. Does she have the power to cheat death itself?

Love and loyalty will be tested. Bonds will fracture forever. But all must fight for a better world.

In the final war for survival, will Thea and Wilder emerge victorious? Or will the shadows consume them at last?

Fans of Fourth Wing, The Witcher and The Bridge Kingdom, brace yourselves for sizzling romance, found family and heart-pounding battles in Shadow & Storms, the epic finale to The Legends of Thezmarr.

Goodreads | Amazon

Are you getting any new books this week?

Happy Reading!

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Books on My Summer 2024 To-Read List | TTT | Top Ten Tuesday 6/18/24

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Please check out her website for more TTT topics!

This week’s topic is:

Books on My Summer 2024 To-Read List

Summer reading list already?! Where has the year gone…seriously…how are we here at mid year? 😭 I’m hoping I get to these books this summer! Even though my kids are off for 2 months, it goes by SO fast. Because I’m not sure what books I’ll actually be getting this summer, I’m showing you what arcs I have to read this summer, plus books I have on my holds list for my online library, and just some books I hope to get eventually.

The Seventh Veil of Salome by. Silvia Moreno-Garcia – this is an arc that I have to read by August so I’m looking forward to it.

What’s on your TTT?

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Top Ten Tuesday Topics:

May 7: May Flowers — Pick your own title for this one to reflect the direction you choose to go with this prompt (books with flowers on the cover, flower names in the title, characters whose names are flower names, stories involving flowers/gardeners)
May 14: Favorite Book Quotes (You can pick your favorite quotes from books, or about books! You can set a theme like quotes from books about love, friendship, hope, etc. or you can just share quotes you loved from your recent reads!)
May 21: Authors I’d Love a New Book From (These could be authors that have passed away, who have retired from writing, who have inexplicably gone quiet, or who might jut not be able to keep up with how quickly you read their books!)
May 28: Books I Was Super Excited to Get My Hands on but Still Haven’t Read

June~~
June 4: Books I Had VERY Strong Emotions About (Any emotion! Did a book make you super happy or sad? Angry? Terrified? Surprised?)
June 11: Bookish Wishes (List the top 10 books you’d love to own and include a link to your wishlist so that people can grant your wishes. Make sure you link your wishlist to your mailing address or include the email address associated with your e-reader in the list description so people know how to get the book to you. After you post, jump around the Linky and grant a wish or two if you’d like. Please don’t feel obligated to send anything to anyone!)
June 18: Books on My Summer 2024 To-Read List
June 25: Most Anticipated Books Releasing During the Second Half of 2024

July~~
July 2: Books with My Favorite Color on the Cover
July 9: Throwback Freebie (Pick a TTT topic that has been previously done. Maybe you missed it, weren’t blogging then, or you’d like to update an old list you made. All previous topics are listed below.)
July 16: Ten Things I Loved About [Insert Book Title Here] (Pick any book and tell us ten things you loved about it!) (submitted by Cathy @ WhatCathyReadNext)
July 23: Debut Novels I Enjoyed (A debut novel is an author’s first published book. You could also choose to share genre or age group debuts if you’d prefer, such as an adult fiction author’s first YA book or a mystery writer’s first romance.) (submitted by Angela @ Reading Frenzy)
July 30: Books I Wish Had More/Less [Insert Your Concept Here] In Them (for example: more/less romance, more/less world building, less info dumping, more/fewer pages, more character development, fewer characters, fewer descriptions, more suspense, etc.)

New Book on My Shelf | 6/17/24

I’ve been on a book buying ban for a few years but these sprayed edges that are popping up all over Amazon are really making me break my ban! I couldn’t help myself with this one:

Title: The Wren in the Holly Library

Author: K.A. Linde

Synopsis:

Can you love the dark when you know what it hides?

Some things aren’t supposed to exist outside of our imagination.

Thirteen years ago, monsters emerged from the shadows and plunged Kierse’s world into a cataclysmic war of near-total destruction. The New York City she knew so well collapsed practically overnight.

In the wake of that carnage, the Monster Treaty was created. A truce…of sorts.

But tonight, Kierse―a gifted and fearless thief―will break that treaty. She’ll enter the Holly Library…not knowing it’s the home of a monster.

He’s charming. Quietly alluring. Terrifying. But he knows talent when he sees it; it’s just a matter of finding her price.

Now she’s locked into a dangerous bargain with a creature unlike any other. She’ll sacrifice her freedom. She’ll offer her skills. Together, they’ll put their own futures at risk.

But he’s been playing a game across centuries―and once she joins in, there will be no escape…

Have you read this one or planning to read it? What book have you added to your bookshelf?

Weekly Wrap Up | 6/16/24

Aloha friends!

My daughter and I are recovered and we had a much more chill week, which was so needed. My son did a summer program this past week at his new middle school and he came home excited each day. He’s really looking forward this new phase of his life and I just hope it stays that way. I know when the work begins he’ll probably have a change of heart but we’ll see.

I did a lot of cleaning around the house, took things to be donated, cleaned up the rooms – especially with all the stuff my kiddos bring home at the end of year from school. So much papers to go through and decide what to keep and trash. It gets overwhelming but I got it done. I hope I get to read more this week since we don’t have much planned. We’ll probably go watch Inside Out 2 today or tomorrow.

I hope all of you have a good week!

Blog Posts:

Books I Read:

  • A Magic Fierce & Bright by. Hemant Nayak
  • Happily Never After by. Lynn Painter

Currently Reading:

  • The Mirror of Beasts by. Alexandra Bracken
  • The Break-Up Pact by. Emma Lord
  • This Summer Will Be Different by. Carley Fortune

Shows/Movies/Music I Watched/Listened To:

  • Hierarchy (Netflix) – So much drama! Too many long dramatic looks with music but I still ate it all up.
  • Bridgerton Season 3 Part 2 (Netflix) – I hate that there was two parts to season 3 because it’s such a fun season. I felt like there was more humor in this one. I love how this one was about friendships whether it’s about best friends or friends to lovers. There were so many different relationship dramas going on but in the best way. The Queen is hilarious and her wigs are magnificent! But from what I’ve heard of Francesca’s story…I feel like that one will devastate me so I’m scared for hers – already her love story is so sweet. I think Kate and Anthony is still my favorite couple and I love seeing them still in the show. ❤️
  • Hit Me Hard and Soft – Billie Eilish – cleaning the house and playing this album really passes the time!
  • Brat – Charlie xcx – Honestly I only picked this up because she was all over my FYP on tiktok and I liked what I was hearing and honestly it’s summertime and I wanted to put away the sad girl music! THIS is summer music. Makes me wish I was in my 20’s and still partying lol.
  • The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess – Chappell Roan – This was on repeat for me at the end of 2023 and my kids and I loveeeeeeee singing her songs (no, they don’t know what any of the sexual stuff in her songs mean lol). So happy to see her star is rising!

How was your week? Did you get a lot done? Watch anything good? Read any amazing books or books you didn’t finish? What are you reading?…Leave me a comment below!

Book Covers: Summer Time Vibes

It’s summer time. It iss hot outside and honestly I’m not the type to sit by the pool and read because I get too hot. But I do love a book with a cover that embodies everything about summer like these books below:

Have you read any of these or plan to?