Book Review | The Bride Test | Helen Hoang

Book Review | The Bride Test | Helen Hoang

Khai Diep has no feelings. Well, he feels irritation when people move his things or contentment when ledgers balance down to the penny, but not big, important emotions—like grief. And love. He thinks he’s defective. His family knows better—that his autism means he just processes emotions differently. When he steadfastly avoids relationships, his mother takes matters into her own hands and returns to Vietnam to find him the perfect bride.

As a mixed-race girl living in the slums of Ho Chi Minh City, Esme Tran has always felt out of place. When the opportunity arises to come to America and meet a potential husband, she can’t turn it down, thinking this could be the break her family needs. Seducing Khai, however, doesn’t go as planned. Esme’s lessons in love seem to be working…but only on herself. She’s hopelessly smitten with a man who’s convinced he can never return her affection. With Esme’s time in the United States dwindling, Khai is forced to understand he’s been wrong all along. And there’s more than one way to love.  - Goodreads

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Book Review | The Kiss Quotient | Helen Hoang

Book Review | The Kiss Quotient | Helen Hoang

Stella has heard it over and over from her mom, it’s time to get settled down and make some grandchildren. But with someone with Aaperger’s, that’s no easy feat. Stella has her routine, her system, and every encounter she’s had with a guy hasn’t been enjoyable. When she’s given the idea to try escorting, she jumps at the chance. This could be a way to be taught how to be a good girlfriend. What she never expected to find was a guy that fit her in every way. A guy that didn’t judge her for being different. A guy that made kissing enjoyable. Can they convince each other that this is more than a lesson on dating?

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Book Review | Roar | Cora Carmack

Book Review | Roar | Cora Carmack

In a world where having the power to control storms means life or death, a princess born without that power to protect her people is a bit of a problem. All her life, Aurora has hid this though, using her upcoming marriage as a way to keep her kingdom safe. But as the marriage approaches and Aurora finally meets her groom, she learns that selling herself to save her kingdom might be the end of her own life. She’s giving up one chain for an overpowering, manipulative husband. However, there may be a chance that she can become what her kingdom needs. She meets a group of storm hunters that have learned to capture magic without being born with a lick of it themselves. Aurora works with a trusted friend to make it appear like she’s been kidnapped in hopes that when she leaves, her groom will stay and help protect her people. But it’s turned into something much worse when the truth behind her groom’s marriage contract becomes clear.

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Book Review | The Good Luck Girls | Charlotte Nicole Davis

Book Review | The Good Luck Girls | Charlotte Nicole Davis

Good Luck Girls they are called, but Good Luck Girls they’re most certainly not. Told that they would be given food and safety, most families sell their girls for the idea that it’s a better future. They forget what the girls have to do to earn that future. When Clementine goes upstairs for her first night, she never expected to walk out alone, having killed the man that was supposed to be her first. But then again, no one ever talks about the rough ones that hold you down, choking the life out of you. Aster will do anything to protect her sister. So she devises a plan, a plan that can take Clementine and three other girls out of the Welcome House for good. But to truly be free, they have to remove the tattoos that mark them as Good Luck Girls. On the run from the law, the nasty Raveners that guard the Welcome Houses, and the man whose brother Clementine killed, they race to the only chance to be free of their pasts.

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Book Review | Lock Every Door | Riley Sager

Book Review | Lock Every Door | Riley Sager

Jules is given a second chance. A chance to hit the reset button on her life after it’s fallen to pieces. There’s no one to pull her out of the dark hole she’s in since both of her parents are dead and her sister is still missing. All the ad says is that they need an apartment sitter. What she doesn’t expect is for the apartment to be in the building from her favorite book growing up with sweeping views of Central Park. And she makes $12,000 if she stays the whole three months. She just has to follow all the rules. While there, Jules becomes friends with a fellow apartment sitter, Ingrid, who tells her that the sitter before her left unexpectedly. When Ingrid does the same, disappearing in the middle of the night, Jules goes on a hunt to find her. She discovers more than she wants as the building’s dark secrets come to life.

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Book Review | "Emergency Contact" | Mary H. K. Choi

Book Review | "Emergency Contact" | Mary H. K. Choi

Penny has her ticket away from her mom - college. It’s far enough away to stop daily visits but close enough to keep an eye on her. Sam is trying to keep his head above water. He’s just thankful to have a roof over his head and a job. A job that won’t be able to support the baby his ex-girlfriend says is his. Thrown together through a weird family connection with Penny’s roommate, Penny finds Sam on the side of the road feeling like he’s dying. Unable to pay for an emergency room visit, Penny agrees to play his emergency contact. But their little phone messages become so much more as they navigate the rough world of adulthood.

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Book Review | "A Darker Shade of Magic | V. E. Schwab

Book Review | "A Darker Shade of Magic | V. E. Schwab

Outside our world, grey in its loss of magic, lies three other versions, the same but different. Only the last two Antari alive have the magic to travel between them. Kell is one of them, working for the crown in his Red London. His job is to pass letters between the different crowns, but nothing else is allowed to be taken back and forth. Yet Kell is known by few as a smuggler between the worlds, creating his own fine collection of artifacts in a hidden room back home. It’s the one thing that makes him feel alive. Makes him feel like he’s in control. He may be considered loyalty living in the castle, but he feels far from it. When one smuggling job goes wrong, he finds himself with a piece of Black London, a London that has been shot off from the rest. Kell runs from the men that want his smuggled item and right into Lila’s sticky fingers. Instead of handing it over when he finds her, Lila forces herself into Kell’s adventure.

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Book Review | "A Constellation of Roses" | Miranda Asebedo

Book Review | "A Constellation of Roses" | Miranda Asebedo

Trix has a gift, a gift that lets her roam the streets and steal what she needs. It’s kept her alive and with a roof over her head since her mom went out one day and never returned. But then Trix’s luck runs out. She can either go live with family that’s she’s never even known about or go to jail. Both options mean that she has to stop running. Arriving in the little town is already a turn off. She wants to run away so fast, almost leaving the first day. But something makes her stay. Something about the way the women in her family act makes her stay. Something in the high school football star with his own dark past makes him stay. She decides staying might be the only thing that keeps her alive until she hears the one thing that makes her run.

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Book Review | "Blood Heir" | Amélie Wen Zhao

Book Review | "Blood Heir" | Amélie Wen Zhao

Affinities hold powerful magic, but instead of being honored, they’re locked away and sold into indentured servitude. Essentially shunned from society, thought of as less than human. Ana, the princess of the Cyrillian Empire, doesn’t know any different until she discovers that she too is an Affinity. Locked away, she barely escapes when she’s accused of her father’s murder. She fights to prove her innocence, finally discovering how the world really runs and the corrupt veins that run straight to her empire. Ana frees a con man, a man she hopes will help her find the real person that murder her father so she can clear her name. They make a Trade, but the con man has other ideas, wanting instead to reestablish his place in Cyrillian’s under belly crime ring.

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