Top Ten Tuesday: Mother's Day Edition

hosted by The Broke and the Bookish

This week's Ten:

Mother's Day Freebie

8 Books With Bad Mothers


Night Road by Kristin Hannah

The Dead Inside by Cyndy Etler


Matilda by Roald Dahl


Macbeth by Shakespeare


Girl in Pieces by Kathleen Glasgow

Holding on to Zoe by George Ella Lyon

I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone by Stephanie Kuehnert

Compulsion (Max Revere #2) by Allison Brennan


and 2 Books with Great Mothers


Harry Potter series by JK Rowling


Where You'll Find Me by Natasha Friend

Please leave a comment and let me know what book mothers would be on your list - I know there ware some I forgot about!

The Other F Word ~ Natasha Friend (earc) review [@IAmMortified @FierceReads @fsgbooks]

The Other F Word
Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
March 07, 2017
336 pages
add to Goodreads/buy from Book Depository/or Amazon

A fresh, humorous, and timely YA novel about two teens conceived via in vitro fertilization who go in search for answers about their donor.

Milo has two great moms, but he's never known what it's like to have a dad. When Milo's doctor suggests asking his biological father to undergo genetic testing to shed some light on Milo's extreme allergies, he realizes this is a golden opportunity to find the man he's always wondered about.

Hollis's mom Leigh hasn't been the same since her other mom, Pam, passed away seven years ago. But suddenly, Leigh seems happy—giddy, even—by the thought of reconnecting with Hollis's half-brother Milo. Hollis and Milo were conceived using the same sperm donor. They met once, years ago, before Pam died.

Now Milo has reached out to Hollis to help him find their donor. Along the way, they locate three other donor siblings, and they discover the true meaning of the other F-word: family.

Natasha Friend's last novel, Where You'll Find Me was a book I really loved and which had me looking forward to The Other F Word. This really is a, "timely YA novel," like the description says. What I love most about the book is that, like in Where You'll Find Me, it shows us that not all families are that supposedly normal, not 2.4 kids and two heterosexual, married parents - or even two divorced ones.

Hollis and Milo have always known that half of their genes come from a sperm donor and half from one of their moms. The amount that man was a part of their lives (or at least the idea of him was) and how much they wanted to know varied quite dramatically between the two. Milo has always felt more curious about who his 'father' is.

I thought the author did a fantastic job showing readers the different ways in which the teens thought of the man who gave them half of their DNA and the different ways having that unknown has affected them. It seemed very realistic that they didn't see everything the same way or always want the same things out of Milo's search.

Natasha Friend does a superb job demonstrating through Milo, Hollis, Frankie, Suzanne, Leigh, JJ and the others that family is not always (or even often) cookie cutter or what you expect. I love that she shows us characters who are grieving, characters who are 'numbing,' confused characters, hopeful characters, funny characters and loving characters that seem to all find a way to bring their stories and their lives together.

This book really does help its characters and readers to discover the true meaning of family.








thanks to the publisher for the digital review copy, received via NetGalley

Top Ten Tuesday: Books I Loved More [@epicreads @scholastic @randomhousekids @frnkiebrwn @mikaela_everett]

hosted by The Broke and the Bookish

This week's Ten:

Ten Eleven* Books I Loved More Than I Thought I Would
(or than everyone else)

A Madness So Discreet by Mindy McGinnis

review + book info

The Unquiet by Mikaela Everett

review + info

A List of Cages by Robin Roe

review + info

Daughter of the Pirate King by Tricia Levenseller

review + info

Daughter of the Pirate King is out today, the 28th, so go get yourself a copy!!

Emmy & Oliver by Robin Benway

review + info

The Forgetting by Nicole Maggi
review + info

Girl in Pieces by Kathleen Glasgow

review + info

Where You'll Find Me by Natasha Friend
review + info


Tomorrow Girls: Behind the Gates (#1) by Eva Gray
review + info


The Orphan Queen (#1) by Jodi Meadows
review + info


Until We End by Frankie Brown
review + info

*It is eleven books, not ten, this week because I really couldn't decide which one to cut!

Please leave a comment and let me know what books you loved more than you thought you would - or than everyone else did! (Or which ones you loved less so.)

Top Ten Tuesday: Underrated Reads of '16

hosted by The Broke and the Bookish

This week's Ten:

Ten Underrated/Hidden Gem Books I've Read In The Past Year 

I used the number of ratings and reviews each book had on Goodreads as a sort of objective measure of what books, of those I most liked this past year, were less widely read and/or known. It's not a perfect indicator but, hopefully, a decent one. (About half of these have less than 100 reviews on Goodreads, the other half between 100 and 200 and all have less than 500 ratings.)

The Haunting by Alex Bell

Review // Goodreads

Cloud and Wallfish by Anne Nesbet

Review // Goodreads

Civilianized: A Young Veteran's Memoir by Michael Anthony

Review // Goodreads

The Last Harvest by Kim Liggett

Review // Goodreads

The Second Mrs Hockaday by Susan Rivers

Review // Goodreads

Trainwreck: The Women We Love to Hate, Mock & Fear . . . And Why by Sady Doyle

Goodreads

The Museum of You by Carys Bray

Review // Goodreads

The Secret Horses of Briar Hill by Megan Shepherd

Review // Goodreads

Where You'll Find Me by Natasha Friend

Review // Goodreads

The Greatest Zombie Movie Ever by Jeff Strand

Review // Goodreads

Please leave a comment and let me know what were your favorite underrated reads of the past year! If you've read any of those on my list, I would love to know what you thought.

Top Ten Tuesday: 2017 Reads [@torbooks @DelacortePress @delreybooks @fluxbooks @simonteen @penguinteen @swoonreads]

hosted by The Broke and the Bookish

This week's Ten:

 Top Ten Books I'm Looking Forward To For The First Half Of 2017

This week I really couldn't narrow it down to ten books, so there are thirteen (I thought I had it down to eleven which seemed great . . . only to realize I'd forgotten two I couldn't not include, so thirteen.):

Seeker (Riders #2) by Veronica Rossi

Goodreads // my review of Riders

I am really, really looking forward to seeing where this story (and series) go now that we have the general setup, know the characters, they know each other and some of what's at stake. Not to mention how the book ended . . . 

The Adjustment (The Program #3) by Suzanne Young

Goodreads // reviews of the series

I loved The Program as soon as I read it - Sloane and James are still two of my favorites from any book. At first, I was sorry that the characters wouldn't be carried over into the other books (The Remedy, The Epidemic) but once I read them, I really didn't care. (Or much, I do really like Sloane and James.) I love how the different books, different characters and different points in time all work together so well to create the world of the Program.

Now I Rise (The Conquerer's Saga #2) by Kiersten White

Goodreads // And I Darken review

The 'Vlad the Impaler' as a girl concept is till so much fun (and hold so many possibilities). Now that I know about Leda's childhood and her character, I'm curious to see what happens as she gets older and how close to history/legend it is.

Given to the Sea by Mindy McGinnis

Goodreads // The Female of the Species  & A Madness So Discreet reviews

It is never too soon for another Mindy McGinnis book to read. I love her characters, that there are girls, young women who aren't what you would expect - either because of the time period, because of society and what they think girls should be, or some combination of all of it. Plus, this one's a fantasy!

Blacksouls (Blackhearts #2) by Nicole Castroman

Goodreads // Blacksouls review

In Blackouls, I get those fantastic characters we met in Blackhearts and more pirate-ness? What culd be better? (Not a lot, that's the answer.)

The Edge of the Abyss (The Abyss Surrounds Us #2) by Emily Skrutskie

Goodreads // The Abyss Surrounds Us review

It's sea monsters, pirates, ships and now we can get even more into the story, the characters and the world!

Daughter of the Pirate King by Trish Levenseller

Goodreads

It's pirates! I kind of love pirates. Especially girl pirates and this one has a romance, a father-daughter relationship and sounds like a great read!

Bad Blood by Demitria Lunetta

Goodreads // In the After review

In the After and In the End are two of my favorite books. I love Amy and Baby and the wold imagined in those two books. Something new from Demitria Lunetta is an absolute, absolute must read for me, this one can't come out soon enough.

Wires and Nerves, Volume 1 by Marissa Meyer, illustrated by Douglas Holgate

Goodreads // Cinder review

It is a graphic novel and it's about Iko, what more do you need to know to need to read it? (Nothing, hopefully.)

Duels & Deception by Cindy Anstey

Goodreads // Love, Lies & Spies review

Love, Lies & Spies was such a fun read and I really am looking forward to more from Cindy Anstey (maybe just a bit more than I originally was because of the suggestion of 'duels.' Maybe.)

Alone (The Generations Trilogy #3) by Scott Sigler

Goodreads // Alive & Alight reviews

I don't want to be too specific with this one because I really don't want to accidentally spoil anything, at all! This series has been full of brilliant surprises and unbelievable endings. I thought Alive has an ending that couldn't be beat but oh did Alight's ending. So much happens in these books and I enjoy them so much, I really want to read Alone!  

The Other F-Word by Natasha Friend

Goodreads // Where You'll Find Me review

I enjoyed Where You'll Find Me so much more that I had ever expected to. I thought it was going to be sweet and cute and nice but there was so much more to that story. The characters (honestly, I really did love Marnie) were amazing and the way difficult subjects were tackled was really well done. It all has me excited to read The Other F-Word (not to mention it has an awesome title).

Traveler by L.E. DeLano

Goodreads

Traveler's alternate worlds, alternate versions of the main character's life and I haven't read an alternate realities book is a while. I am especially drawn to the fact that it isn't just one alternate world, but several. (That and the streampunk pirates bit, of course.)

Please leave a comment and let me know your most anticipated reads from the first half of next year!