DRAGONFLY GIRL and A Few Other YA Books You Should Read

I can’t believe it’s already February and I haven’t yet shared a review roundup here on the blog! However, I’ve been reading quite a few ARCs (Advanced Reader Copies) for fellow #the21ders, and I plan to feature those books closer to when they release so you can actually get the books and/or request them from…

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What I Read in 2020

I read 99 books in 2020. With my own book coming out in 2021, I made a concerted effort to seek out and support 2020 debuts. Some of these were also fellow 2017 PitchWars mentees–bonus! And later in the year, I added another goal: I sought out books by Black authors for both myself and my kids….

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My Favorite Reads of 2020

I read so many fantastic books in 2020, it’s really hard to narrow down favorites. As I was reading back through my reviews from the year to decide, one of my major determining factors was the book’s unputtdownable factor (I guess that’s not a word, but oh well). So you’ll see how quickly I read…

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INSTANT KARMA and A Few Other Books You Should Read

Happy December, friends! I expect this will be my last review roundup of 2020, but I will still have some other fun reading features before the end of the year. As always, I plan to feature my favorite reads of 2020 the last week of year–although I have no idea how I’m going to choose….

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TRACKER220 and A Few Other Books You Should Read

I normally do review roundups on Mondays, but today is special because it’s the book birthday for my friend Jamie Krakover’s YA debut, TRACKER220! I didn’t want to let the day pass without celebrating with her, and while I’m at it, I might as well tell you about a few other books I’ve been reading…

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MOST LIKELY and A Few Other Books You Should Read

For the second year in a row, I completed author Jessica Brody’s 30 Books in 3 Months summer reading challenge on Instagram. You can see all of the books I read over the summer in the image below, and I already posted mini-reviews on a few of them. Keep reading for a few more, but…

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OPPOSITE OF ALWAYS and A Few Other Books You Should Read

I have quite a mix of books in today’s review roundup–YA time travel, adult dual timeline, contemporary middle grade, YA historical fiction, and YA contemporary. So that should offer a little bit of something for everyone! As soon as I finished OPPOSITE OF ALWAYS by Justin A. Reynolds, I knew it would be one of…

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10 Story Elements That Always Hook Me

As I was going through all the old posts on my blog to clean up the categories, I noticed it had been quite a while since I did a general reading post that wasn’t a review. I also noticed a number of my reviews included statements like “any book that includes _____ has my immediate…

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TRULY MADLY ROYALLY and a Few Other Books You Should Read

It’s time for another roundup of mini-reviews! In light of recent events, I took a hard look at my reading habits and realized that while I certainly wasn’t reading all white authors, I wasn’t making a concerted effort to read and support Black authors–or to bring those books to my kids’ attention. So as a…

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MMGM: THE UNWANTEDS by Lisa McMann (a middle schooler review)

While my son has read the entire Unwanteds series by Lisa McMann–including the spin-off books–several times, today he decided to focus on the first book for Marvelous Middle Grade Monday. The Unwanteds by Lisa McMann was a great story. It’s so good that I’ve read this series four times. There are seven books in the…

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