Transitive Verve

This copy was provided for free from Netgalley in exchange for a fair and honest review. Thoughts at a glance: ** (It was okay) Technically, I did not finish. But I did get over 3/4 of the way through. Maybe I will at some point pick this up again, but for now... it was okay (as my rating says). It wasn't bad, and I liked it okay. Bianca is a first-year student at Miss Mabel's School for Girls, a school of magic for girls to become witches. A long time ago, Miss Mabel had placed a curse on her grandmother, and it has been passed on to her, and Bianca may die if Miss Mabel doesn't remove the curse. I like how, at least so far, it's an all-female cast of characters. It's been a while since I've read something like that, where the story does not revolve around men/boys or romantic interests. I also liked how so much of the novel so far reminded me of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire . There's a competition for the top spot at the school, and only...

I just got to spend a Night on the Towns! As with TFIOS , there was a special early showing of Paper Towns simultaneously across the continent, followed by a livestream Q&A with the cast, crew, and John Green.  A short summary of the story: Quentin has been in love with Margo ever since they were kids. Over the years, they've drifted apart, and Quentin has watched Margo become the most popular, legendary girl at school, thanks in part to her hijinks of mythical proportions: she often takes off to go do whatever, leaving behind clues as to her whereabouts. After Margo solicits Q's help out of the blue for one night of crazy schemes, she suddenly disappears. With the help of his friends, Q finds clues that Margo has left behind, and he finds himself on a mission to bring back the girl he loves. For a more detailed discussion, check my writeup of the book here . My writeup of the movie assumes that you have read the book, or that you don't care about me spoili...

This copy was provided for free from Netgalley in exchange for a fair and honest review. Thoughts at a glance: **** (I really liked it) It's Philadelphia, 1876, and Benjamin Grimm and Eleanor Banneker, best friends forever, have not seen each other for seven years. Ever since her stepmother threw out his (servant-class) family when they were ten, they haven't heard a peep from each other. Ben divides his time between working with his mother at their family bookstore, working with his father at the theater, and working on his own trying to become an illusionist and feeding his obsession for automata and steam-powered machinery. When he picks out Ellie among a crowd of theater patrons one night, she is even more shocked than he is. When they meet up later on, she confides in him her fear that her stepmother, Olivia, has put a spell both on her and her father - for the last seven years, it's as if everyone she's met has been seeing a girl with some other face, even...

This copy was provided for free from Netgalley in exchange for a fair and honest review. Thoughts at a glance: **** (I really liked it) I'm going to paste here for you the official book blurb instead of summarizing it on my own, because for once I want to point out specifically the way it's described: Eighteen-year-old Tally is absolutely sure of everything: her genius, the love of her adoptive family, the loyalty of her best friend, Shane, and her future career as a Nobel prize-winning astronomer. There's no room in her tidy world for heartbreak or uncertainty—or the charismatic, troubled mother who abandoned her soon after she was born. But when a sudden discovery upends her fiercely ordered world, Tally sets out on an unexpected quest to seek out the reclusive musician who may hold the key to her past—and instead finds Maddy, an enigmatic and beautiful girl who will unlock the door to her future. The deeper she falls in love with Maddy, the more Tally begins to r...

This copy was provided for free from Netgalley in exchange for a fair and honest review. Thoughts at a glance: ** (It was okay) Note: This novel was originally written in Spanish, and I read it in translation. Marcos lives in a world where people can take injections to stop sleeping. The night after his much-beloved mother passes away, he is on the brink of injecting himself when two seemingly-unrelated things happen to change his mind: 1) he is drawn to a girl he can see off in the distance from his balcony, and 2) he gets a phone call that an alien has been captured, and his police detective boss needs him to use his special gift to identify him. Marcos has the ability to look at people and see a whole lot about them: their extreme best and worst moments, as well as a bunch of other moments in between. And... yeah. Did that summary seem abrupt? That's because this story is hard for me to explain. On the one hand, there's the meandering storyline about the alien and ...

This copy was provided for free from Netgalley in exchange for a fair and honest review. Thoughts at a glance: **** (I really liked it) Sixteen-year-old Robin loves music more than anything. Even her list of criteria for the perfect guy specifies that he must have great taste in music, in addition to the usual points like tall, dark, handsome , etc. So when Carter walks into the restaurant where she works, things get a little complicated. In addition to being tall, dark, and handsome, Carter is deaf. He is also tired of feeling like an outsider among hearing people in this small town in upstate New York that he's visiting for the summer, so he's eager to get back to his life in the big city where he can sign as fast as he wants to and he doesn't get left out of in-jokes. But the attraction is instant, and the chemistry is undeniable, and before long, the two are facing the age-old question: "A fish may love a bird, but where would they live?" Meanwhile, ...