Dead Lucky by Andreina Cordani

I really enjoyed this! It was a random Book outlet purchase, but it worked out. It’s about four influencers on an app called Playmii in the UK: Ed, Maxine, Leni and Xav. When Xav is murdered live on camera, Maxine is given the task of finding a file of secrets he was keeping about his fellow creators, or else.

I enjoyed the author’s writing style, the pace of the story and the commentary on what life is like for influencers. Each character is given a distinct voice and the book has mental health and LGBTQ representation. I didn’t figure out who did it, so that was fun. I would recommend this to people who like murder mysteries and books about influencers and/or online culture.

4 stars.

Don’t Let the Forest In by C.G. Drews

This book is about two boys who are best friends and attend a boarding school together. Shy, anxious Andrew writes dark fairy tales to cope with the world and artsy, brash Thomas illustrates them. One night Andrew follows Thomas into the woods behind the school, which are off limits, because he thinks he’s been secretly meeting up with Andrew’s twin sister, Dove, there. What he sees is even more shocking, Thomas’ drawings have come to life! They vow to fight them each night to protect the school, but how can they stop them?
The descriptions and writing in this are amazing and beautiful. I could picture the monsters so vividly that they could’ve walked off the page (Kindle), but I’m happy they didn’t! I figured out the twists before the end, but this was still a good read. A bunch of topics are covered in this book such as: mental health, sexual orientation, bullying, child abuse, homophobia. and obsession. If any of those bother you, this may not be the book for you. Otherwise, I recommend it to fans of spooky horror.
I received a copy of this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Wish You Weren’t Here by Erin Baldwin

This is about two frenemies, Juliette and Priya, who have been stuck with each other for their whole lives. They called a truce, so they’re nice to each other and won’t talk about each other to their friends, but they still aren’t fans of each other. All Juliette wants to do is spend summer at Fogridge Sleepaway Camp, a place she can be herself. She’s already sad that it’s her final summer there and then Priya shows up.

I like both of the main characters, especially as we learn more about them and they learn more about each other. The side characters are all well done and nobody is “just there.” I’ve never had a summer camp experience, but I can see that resonating with a lot of people. The romance was well done and not rushed.

I’d recommend this to anyone who likes books about being at summer camp, former or current theater people and readers who like lgbtq+ books.

I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own. The book comes out on June 4, 2024.

Amplified by Tara Kelly

Amplified is about a girl named Jasmine who moves to Santa Cruz, CA to try to make it as a musician, despite facing opposition from her dad and dwindling finances.

I like that the book is a realistic look at what it’s like to chase your dream and struggle to make it. Jasmine really is struggling in this book. Her car breaks down, she barely has a home or a band and half the time she doesn’t know if she has friends. Her relationship with her dad is rough too. I really enjoyed the parts about her playing guitar and playing with the band.

The book was pretty good up until the last 100 or so pages when I felt like too many side stories were added in. Most of them weren’t really dealt with, so it just took away from the story for me. I gave this a 3.5 and I’d read the sequel.

Femme (Lorimer Sidestreets) by Mette Bach

Femme is a hi/lo book for struggling readers that I received for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

It’s about a girl named Sofie who isn’t doing very well in school. She’d rather spend time on the internet, play Candy Crush and hang out with her boyfriend, Paul. When she’s paired with smart over-achiever (and out lesbian) Clea she finally starts applying herself and things change for her.

I feel like the book tries to tackle a lot of subjects in a short amount of pages and just kind of touching on each of them, which has been my issue with all of the Lorimer books that I’ve received. Some of the issues that are talked about in this book are expectations (personal, parental and societal), labels (from society and oneself), bullying/cyberbullying, friendships, coming out, relationships and graduating. The bullying here is basically done and over with once they find out who did it. It’s not quite realistic.

I do like how the relationship between Sofie and Clea develops. I think that part of the book was well done and realistic.

Love is Love by Mette Bach

The characters in this book, with the exception of Jude, are ridiculous. The book starts off with Emmy hooking up with a classmate because she thinks it’ll make her popular (it doesn’t) and arguing with her mom, who sends her to live with family in Vancouver. Emmy lives in a closet at their house and her snotty cousin, Paige, introduces her to Jude, who she instantly falls for.

There are a lot of issues in the book and none of them really get resolved. It’s mentioned that Emmy’s taking anxiety medicine, but she “comfort eats,” over-analyzes everything and stalks Jude online. As someone with anxiety, I don’t think that’s anxiety. Then there’s her cousin, the stereotypical mean girl, who keeps misgendering Jude and saying he’s bad and crazy. Nobody ever explains what bad things he does or has done and it’s just really rude.

I feel like more could’ve been done with this story. I do like that Emmy was accepting of Jude.

I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

Same Love by Tony Correia

This book is a quick read, but I really didn’t like it. It’s about a boy named Adam who gets sent to a Christian camp by his parents after he comes out. It’s really stereotypical and the characters are really bad. There’s rampant homophobia, racism and slut shaming throughout the whole book. I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone.

I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Cursed Cruise (Horror Hotel #2) by Victoria Fulton and Faith McClaren

This is the sequel to the first Ghost Gang adventure, Horror Hotel, and this time they’re going on a cruise…but it’s cursed. You can read this one by itself, but some things might not be explained all the way. I liked being back with this group of characters again and seeing where they were in life after the events of the first book.

We catch up with them as they’re about to board the RMS Queen Anne luxury liner, a ship with a past full of deaths (and hauntings). Things go wrong on the first night when a member of their group goes missing and it just gets worse from there. There’s a mystery in this one on top of the hauntings just like last time as well as some drama between the characters.

I enjoyed getting each character’s pov like in the last book, and the first 3/4 of the book was fun, but I felt like the ending was a bit rushed and things were tied up a bit too neatly. I wouldn’t have minded the book being a few chapters longer to let things fully play out.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced copy. All opinions are my own. This book will be available on (or around) March 19, 2024 in paperback and on Kindle.

Horror Hotel by Victoria Fulton & Faith McClaren

Horror Hotel is about a group of four teens with a ghost hunting show on Youtube called the Ghost Gang who are planning to spend the night in a haunted hotel in Los Angeles. I liked getting to know the different characters (we get chapters from each pov) and it added to the book for me, especially Chrissy’s chapters. She’s psychic and what she describes seeing is vivid and creepy.

It turns into a murder mystery halfway through, and I figured out the killer, but I don’t think that took away from the story. It’s not a long book and it moves along at a good pace. It was a fun read for me and I recommend it if you want a quick, spooky read. 3.5 stars from me.

In Nightfall by Suzanne Young

I had a lot of fun reading this. I like the atmosphere of it and I could picture the town of Nightfall as I read. The author’s descriptions were really good. This book is basically a modern day re-imagining of the movie The Lost Boys, so vampires with family dynamics thrown in.

I did find myself yelling at the main character, Theo, because she just wasn’t getting it. Nice girl, maybe not the brightest. That was honestly ok with me though. It was nice that she wasn’t the prettiest, smartest, most popular girl ever. All of the characters were fully fleshed out and nobody felt like they were just there. The vampires are actually scary too!

I’d recommend this to fans of the author, vampire fans and fans of young adult thrillers.