Tag: books

The Champions by. Kara Thomas | ARC Review

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Title: The Champions

Author: Kara Thomas

Format: eBook (NetGalley)

Pages: 336

Publication Date: 8/27/24

Publisher: Delacorte Press

Categories: Young Adult, Mystery, Thriller

Disclaimer: **I received this book free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.**

Thank you to Delacorte Press for giving me a chance to read this eARC in exchange for an honest review!

From the author of The Cheerleaders comes another dark YA thriller set in the same town of Sunnybrook. When a mysterious accident befalls a member of the all-star high school football team, the town’s deadly history stands to repeat itself—and the price of discovering the truth is higher than anyone could imagine.

It was the deaths of five cheerleaders that made the town of Sunnybrook infamous. Eleven years later, the girls’ killer has been brought to justice, and the town just wants to move on. By the time Hadley moves to Sunnybrook, though, the locals are more interested in the Tigers, the high school’s championship-winning football team. The Tigers are Sunnybrook’s homegrown heroes–something positive in a town with so much darkness in its past.

Hadley could care less about football, but shortly after she gets assigned to cover the team’s latest championship bid for the school newspaper, one of the Tigers is poisoned at a party, and almost immediately after, Hadley starts getting strange emails warning her to stay far away from the football team.It’s becoming clear Sunnybrook’s golden boys have secrets, and after a second player is mysteriously killed, Hadley’s beginning to suspect that someone wants the team to pay for their sins. Or does this new target on the football team have something to do with what happened to the cheerleaders all those years ago?

As an outsider in Sunnybrook, Hadley feels like she’s the only one who can see the present clearly, but it looks like she’s going to have to dig up the darkness of the past to get to the bottom of what’s happening now. Luckily, there are still some Sunnybrook High grads who never left–people who were around eleven years ago—and if she can just convince them to talk, she might be able stop a killer before another Tiger dies.

Content Warning: underage drinking, death, mention of hazing, mention of rape

I never read The Cheerleaders but always wanted to and then I got the arc for The Champions and thought I could jump into the story without reading the first book and I think I caught up with everything pretty good.

Hadley is an outsider at Sunnybrook high school which has a winning and popular football team. She’s new to the town so she wasn’t there when the five cheerleaders died there in the past but of course she’s heard of it. She wants to go into the journalism and belongs to the school newspaper when she gets a chance to interview the football team but gets embroiled in something deeper.

This is a story about a school covering up the bad deeds of some of the popular boys in class and how things get unravelled and Hadley being in the middle of it all even if she is an “outsider”. She’s not best friends with any of the popular kids but they know her and talk to her so she’s not ignored at school.

I liked that the story moved fast and I didn’t get lost even though I didn’t read The Cheerleaders. It is the typical story of a cover-up in the athletics department of a popular school and kids getting hurt or killed because of this secret. I do think at times there were too many names for me to follow and I kept having to remind myself who was who.

My Thoughts:

This is a pretty solid, quick read! I was invested in finding out what the football team was covering up and it’s pretty bad but I’m glad in the end there was some justice.

Find me here: Instagram (bookstagram📚) | Instagram (crafts🎨) | Twitter (X) | Etsy (shop)

Book Links:

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

That Weekend by. Kara Thomas | Book Review ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Weekly Wrap Up | 8/4/24

Aloha friends!

This week was just us having some simple fun before school starts and to make sure I got all the school supplies. We went to my daughter’s meet and greet on Friday and dropped off all her school supplies. I have to remind the kids that it’s time to wake up early again lol…they don’t like that but at least it’s still August and not dark outside in the morning. So goodbye summer! Hello school days again.

Anyway, I hope all of you have a good week!

Blog Posts:

Books I Read:

  • Can’t Help Falling in Love by. Sophie Sullivan
  • Nothing Like the Movies by. Lynn Painter

Currently Reading:

Why do I love this color combo right now in the titles I’m reading?! The pink and green? Love!🥰

  • Shadows of Perl by. J. Elle
  • Fear the Flames by. Olivia Rose Darling
  • Butcher & Blackbird by. Brynne Weaver
  • Isabel and the Rogue by. Liana De la Rosa
  • Happy Medium by. Sarah Adler

Shows/Movies/Music I Watched/Listened To:

  • House of Dragon –

  • Olivia Rodrigo Guts (Spilled) – I just added this vinyl album to my collection! 💜 I love it.

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!

First Lines Fridays | 8/2/24

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!

“It was always a gamble, dropping off a body at Birdsall & Son, Undertakers, but this morning, the Bride of FOrtune favored Hart Ralston.”

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⬇️

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Can you guess what book it is?

Did you guess it? Have you read this one?

📖 ~ Yolanda

The Break-Up Pact by. Emma Lord | ARC Review

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Title: The Break-Up Pact

Author: Emma Lord

Format: eBook (NetGalley)

Pages: 320

Publication Date: 8/13/24

Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin

Categories: Adult, Romance, Contemporary, Chick Lit

Disclaimer: **I received this book free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.**

Thank you to St. Martin’s Griffin for giving me a chance to read this eARC in exchange for an honest review!

Two viral break-ups. One fake relationship. Five sparkling, heart-pounding dates.

June and Levi were best friends as teenagers – until the day they weren’t. Now June is struggling to make rent on her beachside tea shop, Levi is living a New York cliché as a disillusioned hedge fund manager and failed novelist, and they’ve barely spoken in years.

But, after they both experience public, humiliating break-ups that spread like wildfire online, a photo of them together has the internet convinced they’re a couple. With so many people rooting for them, they decide to put aside their rocky past and make a pact to fuel the fire by pretending to date. After all, that will help June’s shop stay open and make Levi’s ex realize what a mistake she made.

All they have to do is convince the world they’re in love, one swoon-worthy photo opp at a time. Then they can happily go their separate ways with no regrets . . . right?

Content Warning: grief, death of friend

I usually love Emma Lord books but I have to say this might be my least favorite of her books. Let’s start off with the things I did love. I loved when June and Levi finally get intimate with one another – the steamy scene was good. I also like this little beachside community that June, Levi and their friends grew up in – most of them stayed, some left and came back like June. But I liked that whole issue about leaving your hometown and maybe coming back after you’ve been out there in the world. Also, yes these people are in that time of their lives where they are settling down, or trying to figure out what their careers will be and all that, so that is relatable.

It’s got some fun tropes like fake dating and friends to lovers.

What I didn’t enjoy was the miscommunication between June and Levi which just created this huge riff between them. Life comes between them, they date other people, coincidentally they both get humiliated online and it goes viral – not sure how relatable that is, but Levi is still holding out for the girlfriend who cheated on him. That’s the current state of things in the story for most of the story which was frustrating. There is some fake dating, which gives us a chance to see the chemistry between them grow but honestly, I wasn’t feeling the fake dating and didn’t connect to the characters.

My Thoughts:

I’m bummed I didn’t love this one but I just wasn’t connecting with the characters and something was missing for me. I just wanted more from Levi at some points. The miscommunication trope has to be one of my least favorite in any book and it frustrated me in this one for sure. The story had some cute moments and even a good steamy scene but everything around that was complicated. Not my favorite but I’ll still be reading any books she writes!

Find me here: Instagram (bookstagram📚) | Instagram (crafts🎨) | Twitter (X) | Etsy (shop)

Book Links:

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

The Getaway List by. Emma Lord | ARC Review ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Begin Again by. Emma Lord | ARC Review ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

When You Get the Chance by. Emma Lord | ARC Review ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

You Have a Match | ARC Review ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

ARC Review | Tweet Cute ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

WWW Wednesday | 7/31/24

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?

This is the LAST day of July folks…I am so not looking forward to being back to school/activities schedule next week lol…I have loved just lounging around with my kids and just enjoying time together. I feel like when school kicks in the days fly by SO fast and then you know it’s Christmas. I’m trying my best to get through this arcs and borrowed books but I think I’m reading too many at one time. 😅

What are you currently reading?

Shadows of Perl by. J. Elle – 37% – this one is slow going I think because I don’t remember much from book one! lol…but I’ll probably finish it by the end of this week.

Guava and Grudges – Alexis Castellanos – 2% – no progress

Nothing Like the Movies – Lynn Painter – 31% – I don’t know why but this one is slow going for me!

Isabel and the Rogue by. Liana De la Rosa – 3% – I’m hoping to get moving on this one because it’s a library ebook and soon it will expire!

Fledgling by. S.K. Ali – 13%

What have you just finished reading?

The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy by. Megan Bannen – ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Can’t Help Falling in Love – Sophie Sullivan – ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

What are you going to read next?

What are you reading right now?

Weekly Wrap Up | 7/28/24

Aloha friends!

This one’s a little late because my week was busy. My hubby went back to Okinawa yesterday but that only means the wait for him to come home for good is shorter! Just a few months away. My daughter has her teacher meet and greet this Friday and they both start next week Monday and Tuesday. 😢 So summer and the mornings of sleeping in is over – sigh. But I’m glad my kids will be back in school, mostly for my daughter, because she gets really bored. I just can’t believe kids being back in school means we are close to the holidays. I’m not ready! lol but time doesn’t seem to care if I am or not.

Anyway, I hope all of you have a good week!

Blog Posts:

Books I Read:

  • The Champions by. Kara Thomas
  • A Fire in the Sky by. Sophie Jordan
  • The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy by. Megan Bannen (audiobook)

Currently Reading:

  • Can’t Help Falling in Love by. Sophie Sullivan
  • Nothing Like the Movies by. Lynn Painter
  • Shadows of Perl by. J. Elle

Shows/Movies/Music I Watched/Listened To:

  • House of Dragon – I’m an episode behind but it was such a busy week. Hoping I catch up this week.

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!

The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy by. Megan Bannen | Audiobook Review

Review: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Title: The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy

Author: Megan Bannen

Format: audiobook (borrowed)

Pages: 336

Publication Date: 8/23/22

Categories: Romance, Contemporary, Fantasy, Paranormal


Hart is a marshal, tasked with patrolling the strange and magical wilds of Tanria. It’s an unforgiving job, and Hart’s got nothing but time to ponder his loneliness.

Mercy never has a moment to herself. She’s been single-handedly keeping Birdsall & Son Undertakers afloat in defiance of sullen jerks like Hart, who seems to have a gift for showing up right when her patience is thinnest.

After yet another exasperating run-in with Mercy, Hart finds himself penning a letter addressed simply to “A Friend”. Much to his surprise, an anonymous letter comes back in return, and a tentative friendship is born.

If only Hart knew he’s been baring his soul to the person who infuriates him most – Mercy. As the dangers from Tanria grow closer, so do the unlikely correspondents. But can their blossoming romance survive the fated discovery that their pen pals are their worst nightmares – each other?

Content Warning: death, violence, grief

I finally got around to reading or listening to this book and I can see why so many readers love it! This was a fun, engrossing and heart warming story all wrapped up in a sort of “You’ve Got Mail” situation but in a contemporary fantasy world. The world-building is unique and really fleshed out with gods, demigods, talking creatures/animals, and zombies! But what I really loved about this book were the characters.

Mercy is an undertaker and I really love her family dynamics. They are chaotic, but such a lovable bunch. Hart, is gruff and grumpy and he and Mercy do not get along at all. But then they are writing letters without knowing they are writing to each other. Of course they will have to deal with the moment they finally meet and know the truth. There is a lot of chemistry between Mercy and Hart and they have some very spicy moments together.

The secondary characters really rounded this feeling of community in this story from Mercy’s family members, to Hart’s found family.

I might have not caught on to some things because I was listening to the audiobook for about 60% of the book. The last 40% I read the ebook because I felt like I wasn’t getting all the details. I did with Mercy and Hart had more good times together before the fall out and that she gave him a chance to explain at least.

My Final Thoughts:

This was such a unique romance with so much going on but what I really loved were the characters and their interactions with one another. Mercy’s family was just so much fun and the whole world of Tanria was fascinating. I look forward to reading the next book!

Find me here: Instagram (bookstagram📚) | Twitter (X)

Book Links:

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

First Lines Fridays | 7/26/24

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!

“The ending needed to be altered .”

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⬇️

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Can you guess what book it is?

Did you guess it? Have you read this one?

📖 ~ Yolanda

WWW Wednesday | 7/24/24

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?

What a week right? At least in the news world! I saw my college bestie and we got to catch up, my is here for this week, we went to get my son’s school schedule and I got a mini tour of his new school and is happy at what I saw! I also got my daughter’s room and teacher information so we are ready for school I think. I am reading a bunch of books right now and hoping I can finish at least two books a week.

What are you currently reading?

Shadows of Perl by. J. Elle – 22% – will probably finish this one by the end of the week!

Guava and Grudges – Alexis Castellanos – 2% – no progress

Can’t Help Falling in Love – Sophie Sullivan – 11% – no progress

Nothing Like the Movies – Lynn Painter – 25% – I’ll probably finish this one this week too.

The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy by. Megan Bannen – 42% – listening to the audiobook

What have you just finished reading?

The Champions by. Kara Thomas – ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Birding with Benefits – Sarah T. Dubb – ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

The Paradise Problem by. Christina Lauren – ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

A Fire in the Sky by. Sophie Jordan – ⭐️⭐️⭐️

What are you going to read next?

What are you reading right now?

Weekly Wrap Up | 7/21/24

Aloha friends!

What a week! It started off slow but then Wednesday came around and I got to see my old college friend and her family. We hung out at the beach and talked while our kids played in the sand and water. I haven’t seen her in 5 years and it felt SO nice to catch up with life. I love those friends where you don’t see for years and you pick up where you left off like you were never apart. 🥰 It just made my soul happy to see our kids together.

We hung out for almost three hours but my hubby flew in while we were at the beach so the kids were excited to go see him at home! So it was nice. It was so nice that my hubby and I both forgot the day he flew in was our 13th wedding anniversary LOL. Anyway it was a nice week and tomorrow my son goes to pick up his school schedule. It just makes us realize summer is coming to an end for us, only 2 more weeks left. That’s crazy. It’s going to be August. 🤯

Anyway, I hope all of you have a good week!

Blog Posts:

Books I Read:

  • Birding with Benefits by. Sarah T. Dubb
  • The Mist Thief by. L.J. Andrews
  • The Paradise Problem by. Christina Lauren

Currently Reading:

  • Shadow & Storms by. Helen Scheuerer
  • Can’t Help Falling in Love by. Sophie Sullivan
  • Nothing Like the Movies by. Lynn Painter
  • Shadows of Perl by. J. Elle
  • The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy by. Megan Bannen (audiobook)
  • The Champions by. Kara Thomas

Shows/Movies/Music I Watched/Listened To:

  • House of Dragon

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!