The Lessons of Books: A Review Blog

"Everyone has their games, little lamb. The Kaiser plays them in the palace, the Theyn plays them on the battlefield, Soren plays them on his ships. Even your friend plays them -- quite well, too." ✰✰ ✰✰ 4/5 Blurb pulled from here : Theodosia was six when her country was invaded and her mother, the Fire Queen, was murdered before her eyes. On that day, the Kaiser took Theodosia's family, her land, and her name. Theo was crowned Ash Princess--a title of shame to bear in her new life as a prisoner. For ten years Theo has been a captive in her own palace. She's endured the relentless abuse and ridicule of the Kaiser and his court. She is powerless, surviving in her new world only by burying the girl she was deep inside. Then, one night, the Kaiser forces her to do the unthinkable. With blood on her hands and all hope of reclaiming her throne lost, she realizes that surviving is no longer enough. But she does have a weapon: her mind is sharper than...

“I don't know why it's so hard for people to admit that sometimes they're just assholes who screw up because they don't expect to get caught.”  ✰✰ ✰✰ ✰ 5/5 Blurb pulled from here: "Pay close attention and you might solve this. On Monday afternoon, five students at Bayview High walk into detention.     Bronwyn,  the brain,  is Yale-bound and never breaks a rule.      Addy,  the beauty,  is the picture-perfect homecoming princess.      Nate,  the criminal , is already on probation for dealing.     Cooper,  the athlete , is the all-star baseball pitcher.     And   Simon,  the outcast , is the creator of Bayview High’s notorious gossip app.   Only, Simon never makes it out of that classroom. Before the end of detention Simon's dead. And according to investigators, his death wasn’t an accident. On Monday, he died. But on Tuesday, he’d planned to po...

"I was nine years old when my mother threw me out of a moving car." ✰✰ ✰ ✰ 4/5 Blurb taken from here: "Trevor Noah’s unlikely path from apartheid South Africa to the desk of  The Daily Show  began with a criminal act: his birth. Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle. Born a Crime  is the story of a mischievous young boy who grows into a restless young man as he struggles to find himself in a world where he was never...

"Really, she saw a completely different side of him that night, one she had never seen during their marriage. Now, despite her efforts to find him, she still had no idea where he was." ✰✰ ✰ 2.5/5 Blurb taken from here: Tabitha Brewer wakes up one morning to find her husband gone, leaving her no way to support herself and their two children, never mind their upscale Philadelphia lifestyle. She’d confess her situation to her friends—if it wasn’t for those dreadful words of warning in his goodbye note: “I’ll tell them what you did.” Instead, she does her best to keep up appearances, even as months pass and she can barely put food on the table—much less replace a light bulb. While she looks for a job, she lives in fear that someone will see her stuffing toilet paper into her handbag or pinching basil from a neighbor’s window box. Soon, blindsided by catastrophe, surprised by romance, and stunned by the kindness of a stranger, Tabitha realizes she can’t keep her sec...

"I feel infinite" ✰✰✰✰✰ Blurb taken from here : Read the cult-favorite coming of age story that takes a sometimes heartbreaking, often hysterical, and always honest look at high school in all its glory. Also a major motion picture starring Logan Lerman and Emma Watson,  The Perks of Being a Wallflower  is a funny, touching, and haunting modern classic. The critically acclaimed debut novel from Stephen Chbosky,  Perks  follows observant “wallflower” Charlie as he charts a course through the strange world between adolescence and adulthood. First dates, family drama, and new friends. Sex, drugs, and  The Rocky Horror Picture Show . Devastating loss, young love, and life on the fringes. Caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it, Charlie must learn to navigate those wild and poignant roller-coaster days known as growing up. A #1  New York Times  best seller for more than a year, an American Library Association Best Book...

"All the best things in my life have started with a Dolly Parton song." ✰✰✰✰ Blurb pulled from here : With starry Texas nights, red candy suckers, Dolly Parton songs, and a wildly unforgettable heroine—Dumplin’ is guaranteed to steal your heart. Dubbed “Dumplin’” by her former beauty queen mom, Willowdean has always been at home in her own skin. Her thoughts on having the ultimate bikini body? Put a bikini on your body. With her all-American-beauty best friend, Ellen, by her side, things have always worked . . .  until Will takes a job at Harpy’s, the local fast-food joint. There she meets Private School Bo, a hot former jock. Will isn’t surprised to find herself attracted to Bo. But she is surprised when he seems to like her back.   Instead of finding new heights of self-assurance in her relationship with Bo, Will starts to doubt herself. So she sets out to take back her confidence by doing the most horrifying thing she can im...