Bite Size Book Reviews

I give you reviews of books in 200 words or less. Genres include, but not limited to, contemporary literary and popular fiction, young adult fiction, middle grade, humor, graphic novels, children's books, and anything else that strikes my fancy. A companion to my book nostalgia blog, whatireadbackthen.wordpress.com

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Flip by Ngozi Ukazu

Chi-Chi Ekeh is a high school senior, on scholarship at a very fancy prep school. The daughter of Nigerian immigrants, Chi-Chi has a bad habit of falling for rich white boys who don't know she exists. When she decides to prom-pose to her current crush, Flip Henderson, it goes all wrong and the result is a Freaky Friday-esque body switch between Chi-Chi and Flip.

Body swap stories are always good for a lot of humor (enter Flip's best friend telling Chi-Chi in Flip's body that Flip has been texting him all about her menstrual cycles) and Ngozi Ukazu plays that for great effect here. But at its heart, this book is so much about Chi-Chi's low self worth and how she is her own worst critic. It's honestly heartbreaking how she sees herself. Depressed with a father in jail for a white collar crime (think Enron type scandal), Flip isn't faring much better. He just has the privilege of being able to hide it better. This book will make you laugh, and it'll break your heart, but also give you a warm happy feeling by the end.

This book is really just lovely. Fans of Check Please are definitely going to go for this one, probably more than they did Ukazu's last work, Bunt. Her style is so unique and the art and writing moods match perfectly.

Flip is set for release on September 23.

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The Life Impossible by Matt Haig

Somewhere out on Tumblr, there is a post bemoaning the fact that Chosen One books often have a teenage character as the chosen one, and why not someone else.

Let me introduce you to Grace Winters, 72 year old depressed widow, who is a chosen one. It takes her longer to believe it than it does the readers.

I loved this book, but the reviews are mixed on Goodreads. I found it so thoughtful about humanity and grief and forgiving ourselves.

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A Heart That Works

A Heart That Works

Rob Delaney

135 pages

Spiegel & Grau, November 2022

You forget that my son dies. Then you remember. The you forget again. I don’t forget. I don’t hanker much about Victorian times, but the idea of wearing all black following the death of someone you love makes a lot of sense to me. For a while, anyway, I’d have liked you to know, even from across the street or through a telescope, that I am grieving.

I don’t even know how to review this book. Rob Delaney, a comedian and actor best known for his role in Catastrophe, wrote a book about his son who died. When little Henry was only eleven months old, he was diagnosed with brain cancer. From there, this little boy would spend the next fourteen months hospitalized, mostly recovering from brain surgery that left him with some disabilities.

For a while it seemed like little Henry was slowly getting better and he was allowed to come home. But the cancer returned and nothing could be done to save the toddler.

A gifted writer and obviously deep in grief, Delaney’s ode to his son is like nothing I’ve ever read. Part love letter, part angry diatribe, part muses on parenting and part advocacy for sick kids and universal health care, it’s so deeply touching and laced with humor.

Only to be read at a time where you’ll be able to cry openly, and be prepared to keep thinking about Henry and the family who loves him for a very long time after you’re done reading.

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Glitterland

Glitterland

Alexis Hall

336 pages

Sourcebooks, 2013

There was little I feared more than happiness, that faithless whore who waited always between madness and emptiness. My moods, when they were not sodden with medication, could turn upon a tarnished penny; happiness was merely something else to lose.

Ash Winters, a writer living in London, is bipolar and often dependent on his best friend Niall when things get tough mentally. At the start of the book, Ash is having a panic attack after cutting out on a one night stand. But the thing is, this one night stand was with aspiring model, Darian Taylor. And when their paths cross again, there’s an undeniable spark. 

These men are as different as can be. Ash is well-educated and a little poshy. And his mental illness has left him fearful of living life. Darian on the other hand is from Essex and has the accent to go along with it. He’s confident and full of life and loves sparkly things. There’s no reason they should work together. Except, of course, that they just do. And when Ash nearly destroys that, he has to work through a lot of his own baggage to win Darian back. 

This book works in a lot of ways. The two main characters are believable, the mental illness appears to be well written and the couple of sex scenes are good and steamy. The worst part is that Darian’s Essex accent is written phonetically, which wasn’t a great choice by the author. (If you’re in the US, the idea of someone being from Essex is a little bit of a mystery, but through context I think it’s sort of equivalent to someone being from the Jersey Shore.)

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The Dictionary of Lost Words

The Dictionary of Lost Words

Pip Williams

384 pages

Affirm Press, 2021

Words change over time, you see. The way they look, the way they sound; sometimes even their meaning changes. They have their own history.

In the year 1901, six year old Esme is playing under the table in the “scriptorium” in Oxford England. The first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary is being written, and Esme’s widower father is one of the lexicographers. That day, a slip of paper with the word ‘bondmaid’ falls under the table and Esme secrets it away to a box in her bedroom. Over the years, Esme becomes a collector of words - both through theft from the scriptorium, but also from listening to people. 

As Esme ages and befriends an actress suffragette, she realizes that the words that fail to make it into the dictionary are just as worthy as the ones that do. That the words used by the lower classes and used more exclusively by women may not be what is considered scholarly, but they are important. And so she writes The Dictionary of Lost Words in the hopes of creating some sort of written history for these words. 

There is so much to love about this book. Many of the characters (though probably not Esme) are based on real people, including James Murray who was the original editor of the OED, and Ditte, Esme’s Aunt who was a prolific volunteer for the book. But where it really shines is in the author’s clear love of language. 

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Too Bright to See

Too Bright to See

Kyle Lukoff

192 pages

Dial Books, 2021

Eleven year old Bug is used to having ghosts in the house. But when Bug’s beloved Uncle Roderick dies, the ghostly activity changes and Bug is sure it’s Roderick. While Bug is trying to find a way to tell her best friend Moira that Moira’s newfound interest in makeup and teen magazines is of no interest, the ghost of Roderick seems to have an urgent message for Bug....who is having trouble figuring out what it is. Until it smacks Bug right in the head - he is transgender. 

This middle grade novel that is part coming of age, part ghost story and part coming out is such a delight. All three parts of the book come together beautifully, and especially strong is the protagonist, Bug. Bug isn’t afraid of the ghosts in his house. And he’s not afraid of this new ghost, because he loves Uncle Roderick.  

My only very small complaint is a worry that Roderick’s ghost more forced Bug out of the closet rather than gently encouraged it. I hope some younger readers don’t read this and get the idea that anyone in the LGBT community is only valid if they’re out. 

But other than that, it’s a really sweet and short book that tackles gender identity in a loving way. 

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Like Real People Do

Like Real People Do

E.L. Massey

NineStar Press

August 2022

Alexander Price, the NHL’s youngest captain and Elijah Rodriguez, a figure skater-slash-food vlogger with seizure disorder certainly have an inauspicious first meeting when Price takes up the only accessible parking space at the ice rink. Alex feels bad and tries to make up for it by taking Eli out for lunch. From there, these two very different guys just barely out of their teen years form a strong friendship. But Eli, disabled and flamboyantly out of the closet for years, and Alex, who is well known for his abrasive and douchey behavior on and off the ice, seem awfully different. 

But when the internet gets wind of, and is delighted by, this unlikely friendship, Alex’s carefully sculpted public persona begins to crumble and eventually he realizes someone might be worth coming out of the closet for. 

The cast of characters are really what makes this book so special. From Alex with his hard exterior but soft-bro inside, to Eli who’s had a lot to deal with in his young life, to Alex’s best friend on his team who’s an outspoken LGBT ally and feminist, to the goofy and lovable Russian hockey player, to Eli’s solid best childhood friend, and of course Eli’s constant companion Hawk, a seizure detecting service dog, they’re all well developed. But really, it’s the friends to lovers storyline that brings this whole thing together. 

Like Real People Do is such a warm hug of a book. An LGBT-friendly love letter to hockey bros, people trying to better themselves, healthy communication and service dogs. 

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The Nobleman’s Guide to Scandal and Shipwrecks

The Nobleman’s Guide to Scandal and Shipwrecks

Mackenzi Lee

592 pages

Katherine Tegen Books, 2021

“I’m not going to spend the rest of my life heaving myself up this goddamn mountain when everyone else gets a flat country road. Something is wrong with me, and I’m either going to fix it or it’s going to kill me. I won’t go away or heal or get better. I’m either broken or I’m not.” 

The third, and youngest, Montague sibling finally gets his own book. The First two installments can be read about here and here.  In the last book, Adrian Montague was just a baby. This book finds him an adult, a passionate writer of liberal politics, engaged to be married, nearly ready to take his father’s place in the House of Lords. But the thing that really defines him is his mental illness. (Today we’d likely say he has OCD and anxiety, but those weren’t actual diagnoses in the 18th Century). Adrian’s brain makes day-to-day living extremely difficult. 

Adrian’s mother died six months before the start of this book, and to say he isn’t handling it well is an understatement. When her belongings are returned to him, it includes a broken spyglass that she was never without. This spyglass becomes an object of Adrian’s obsession, and the start of a mystery that he can’t let go. He discovers that he has two older siblings, and he and his newfound brother Monty travel to Morocco, Portugal (where they find Felicity) and Iceland to try to uncover this mystery of exactly how their mother died. But Adrian’s mental health, and the secrets that Monty holds could put everything in jeopardy. 

Every single book in this series has been so much fun. This one took a slightly more serious tone, with Adrian’s mental health almost taking the forefront of the story even above the spyglass mystery. It’s still written nicely and with a lot of character development. Even Monty and Felicity - nearly two decades older than Adrian- still get to do some growing up. It’s lovely when a found family trope in literature is an actual blood-related family. 

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Sea of Tranquility

Sea of Tranquility

Emily St. John Mandel

255 pages

Knopf, April 2022

“....as a species, we have a desire to believe that we’re living at the climax of the story. It’s a  kind of narcissism. We want to believe that we’re uniquely important, that we’re living at the end of history, that now, after all these millennia of false alarms, now is finally the worst that it’s ever been, that finally we have reached the end of the world.” 

Nobody writes a story with intersecting stories over long periods of time like Emily St. John Mandel. Sea of Tranquility is no different. In this book, stories of a man off a small Vancouver Island in 1912, a writer living on a moon colony but going on an Earth tour for her pandemic novel in 2203, a detective in the days before Covid-19, and a violinist at an Oklahoma City airport in the late 2100′s all collide in a way that is truly mind-boggling. 

When Edwin St. Andrew experiences a glitch in his mind near a maple tree in Caiette Canada in 1912, it starts the story of others who’ve experienced the same glitch throughout history. Gaspery Roberts, a hotel detective in the year 2401 struggles to find a historic answer. 

No spoilers, but the ending of this book literally left me gasping out loud. It’s not so much that there’s a twist ending, but that it’s an ending that feels like a twist, but in reality has been foreshadowed all along. It’s such a difficult thing for an author to craft, but it’s handled perfectly by St. John Mandel. 

Sea of Tranquility is sure to be a modern classic and holds up every bit as well as Station Eleven, the work St. John Mandel is best know for. 

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The Mysteries of Pittsburgh

The Mysteries of Pittsburgh

Michael Chabon

1988, Harper Collins

297 pages (Harper Perennial 2005 edition)

Art Bechstein is spending the summer after he graduates college in a humid and sultry still-industrialized Pittsburgh. He plans a fantastic summer of working a low-pressure job in a chain bookstore, meeting new people, and avoiding going to work for his father in the Jewish mafia. He meets Arthur Lecomte, a gay, well-mannered, diplomat in the making, and the beautiful Phlox Lombardi, a French major who used to be a punk. Art starts a relationship with Phlox, but finds himself increasingly attracted to Arthur. Add in Arthur’s friend Cleveland, a bad boy who is desperate for Art to use his mafia connections to get him a job, and it’s definitely a summer Art will not forget. 

I’ve read this book probably five times since I first picked it up in 1999. Written and set in the 1980′s, it mostly ages well (though some of the discussions of race are a bit on the nose for modern readers). Chabon’s genius writing is apparent in this, his first novel, published when he was only in his twenties. 

Eloquent and moving to the extreme, it bursts with life and easily takes its place on literature shelves as a more well-rounded Great Gatsby (which is its obvious main influence). It’s earnest in the best way possible - the way a truly great coming of age novel absolutely must be. 

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Reblogging because this book is 1.99 on Kindle today (May 12, 2022)!

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Anne of West Philly

Anne of West Philly

Ivy Noelle Weir & Myisha Haynes

Little Brown Books for Young Readers

March 2022

In this modern-day graphic novel retelling of Anne of Green Gables, we find young Anne Shirley as an eighth grade foster child. She’s been moved from home to home for most of her life, often tasked with taking care of younger children. Here she leaves South Philly for the first time and is placed with a brother and sister (Matthew & Marilla Cuthbert) in West Philly. 

This book works best for those familiar with Anne of Green Gables, though for children, they would probably enjoy it regardless. This modernized Anne feels SO much like Anne Shirley, with her precocious vocabulary, hot temper and vivid imagination. It’s so funny reading Anne (either this version or the original) as an adult and recognizing so much of Anne’s personality as a trauma response rather than moralizing over keeping your chin up no matter your circumstances. Anne befriends Diana, a wealthy girl who lives in the neighborhood, makes an enemy of Gilbert Blythe, the smartest boy in school, before begrudgingly befriending him, and has to rise above the prejudice of being a foster child. 

The character of Marilla is especially well written here. Where in the original she often came across as cold and unfeeling, here she comes across as cautious but not unkind. Matthew is the one who warms to Anne first, and it takes Marilla a bit to understand her new charge, who is her complete opposite in personality. 

Overall, the art is super cute and the story moves along really well. And the nods to the original are there for the adults to enjoy. 

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Retro Review: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

RETRO REVIEW

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

Michael Chabon

658 pages

Random House, September 2000

He knew that he was being unreasonable. But for a year now, unreason - the steadfast and all-consuming persecution of a ridiculous, make believe war against enemies he could not defeat, by a means that he could never succeed - had offered the only possible salvation of his sanity. Let people be reasonable whose families were not held prisoner. 

Josef Kavalier’s family does everything in their power to get Josef out of Prague before the Nazis take over, and just barely succeed. Josef winds up in New York City living with his comic book obsessed cousin, Samuel Klayman. Josef is a gifted artist (as well as a trained magician/escape artist) and Sam has a knack for story telling. In the years leading up the war, Josef and Sam become Kavalier & Clay, writing comics books for Empire Comics. Their headlining superhero is the Escapist. 

The shadow of Hitler and the danger that Joe’s family are in loom large over the story here. Especially as the book takes a sharp turn when the US and Joe enter the war, leaving Sam (who can’t serve because of a post-polio condition) behind to struggle in comics and with secrets of his own. 

Taking place over the course of fifteen years (1939-1954) Kavalier & Clay is a dense book, but one with prose that will break your heart. It an obvious love letter to New York City, the golden age of comics, and Jewish history all wrapped up in one of the greatest coming of age stories ever told. 

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A Marvellous Light

A Marvellous Light

Freya Marske

372 pages

Tordotcom, 2021

"I'd like to introduce my fists to whoever taught you to stop talking about the things that interest you."

Still in the mourning period from his parents’ deaths, Sir Robert ‘Robin’ Blyth is granted what is supposed to be a quiet civil service job in order to keep the family fortune (or lack of it, thanks to his parents unwise spending) afloat. What Robin is shocked to realize is that he’s mistakenly been put in charge of liaising between the government and a secret, hidden magical world. To top it off, the man he took over the position from is mysteriously missing. Enter Edwin Courcey, a magician with weak powers and a prickly personality, who just wants Blyth’s predecessor back. The two don’t get along, but they team up to search for the missing man, and uncover a secret plot that leaves Robin cursed and could destroy every magician in Britain. And while they’re doing that, they also uncover feelings for each other. 

I don’t know if I can say enough good things about this book. From the lush Edwardian setting, to the magical plot, to the adversaries to begrudging co-workers to friends to lovers development, to two amazing main characters, and even the couple of steamy sex scenes - I loved it all. It’s rare to find a book where everything comes together to create something perfect. Between characters and plot and prose, it was all just so lovely and compelling. 

As if this book wasn’t good enough - a sequel is expected in 2022!

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The Last Chance Library

The Last Chance Library

Freya Sampson

337 pages

Berkley, 2021

June Jones is a painfully shy thirty year old Library Assistant. More than a decade earlier, June had put off going to university to care for her mother with cancer. When her mother passed away, the grieving June took the job at the library and somehow got stuck living in her small village and unable to even get rid of any of her mother’s things. June spends her days at the library and her nights eating takeout and with her nose in a book. When the city council decides to cut library budges and threatens several smaller village libraries with closure, including June’s beloved library, she has to come out of her shell to try and save it, along with a merry band of library-loving misfits. 

The Last Chance Library is a fluffy low-stakes book. It fits firmly in the chick-lit category. It’s high on charm with it’s small village setting and a cast of quirky characters, from Stanley the elderly man who spends his days in the library, to Mrs. Bransworth a rabble-rouser always looking for a cause to fight for, to Chantal a sixteen year old desperate to get out of her small crowded house and make it to university, and of course, Alex Chen, the handsome solicitor staying in the village to help his ailing dad run the local Chinese takeaway. 

Overall, it’s a fairly predictable little story, but it’s still an entertaining read. Books that take place in libraries or bookstores are always welcome for any book lover, and an introvert learning to use their voice is such a lovely trope. 

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Teen Titans: Raven/Beast Boy/Beast Boy Loves Raven

Kami Garcia / Gabriel Picolo

DC Comics 2019/2020/2021

Kami Garcia (Known best for Beautiful Creatures) has been tasked with revamping the Teen Titans series, this time as a Y.A. graphic novel. Up first is Raven, a personal favorite of Garcia’s. Raven Roth’s memories have been lost after she and her foster mother were in an accident. Moving in with her mother’s sister, Raven starts her whole life fresh - not knowing who she is. But she does quickly realize she has abilities, and with the help of her foster sister, Max, tries to hide them. But she can’t hide forever, and when a mysterious stranger offers help, she decides to head off by herself to Nashville to find this stranger. 

In Beast Boy, Garfield “Gar” Logan is a senior in high school whose biggest problem is that he’s the smallest guy in class. Short and skinny (but big on snark) all Gar wants is a little respect from the popular kids. But when he stops taking meds for a condition his parents always told him he has, strange things start to happen to his body - and not just a very quick onset of puberty. He doesn’t know what to do with these animalistic powers, but a mysterious stranger offers to help. And so Gar heads off to Nashville. 

Nashville is the setting for the third installment. Raven and Gar both have three days to kill while waiting for help from the mysterious Slade. They have a chance encounter and spend those three days getting to know each other and having a great time. Which makes the stakes that much higher when they’re kidnapped by a questionable organization. Luckily, Max couldn’t let Raven go off on her own and had been trailing her. She meets another kid with some kind of abilities (no spoiler who he turns out to be) and together, they’re able to rescue Raven and Gar from...whatever agency it is that’s kidnapping kids with powers. The four realize they have to go on the run.

This is a really fun addition to the Teen Titans library. Picolo’s artwork is fabulous and expressive and the use of minimal color is perfect. Garcia manages to create a lot of story with few words, and to capture the emotional turmoil the characters are dealing with. Even a casual DC fan (which I am) is sure to fall easily into this series.  

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The Charm Offensive

The Charm Offensive

Alison Cochrun

354 pages

Atria Books, 2021

*I’m going to preface this review with the fact that I hate reality TV. One season of American Idol and one season of Survivor were enough to teach me that reality shows are very much not my thing. There is way to much good scripted television out there for me to waste my time on these shows, particularly the Bachelor(ette) franchise. That said.....

I loved this book.

Dev Deshpande is a romantic who believes in fairy tale endings. He’s a wannabe screenwriter who has found himself working on Ever After, a Bachelor-esque reality TV show, as a contestant handler. Charlie Winshaw is a tech genius millionaire who agrees to be the Prince on the Ever After, only doing so to rehabilitate his image after being kicked out of the company he started. Though Dev normally works with the women contestants on the show, he is assigned to “handle” Charlie, who is awkward on screen, suffers from nerves, absolutely hates to be touched, and is in no way interested in finding true love on this show. Dev is positively offended when Charlie insinuates that the entire show is fake anyway. That animosity doesn’t last for long though, and Dev and Charlie are quick to fall for one another. But that leaves a lot of questions in the air, namely that Charlie is contractually obligated to propose to one of twelve women after eight weeks. 

Make no mistake, this book is a standard romance and it follows the standard romance formula very closely. But the formula notwithstanding, The Charm Offensive is an amazing read. The characters and their development is top notch. It’s an unabashedly queer novel (there likely are more LGBTQIA characters than straight characters), but where it really shines is with how it handles mental health. The mental health aspects of this (both main characters have mental health issues) is handled with such kindness and tenderness, it nearly brought a tear to my eye. The only complaint I have is that I wish the author had leaned into Dev’s Desi heritage a little more. But even with that complaint, I wouldn’t hesitate to anyone who’s a fan of romance or LGBT novels. 

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Middletown

Middletown

Sarah Moon

283 pages

Levine Querido, April 2021

In the small town of Middletown, thirteen year old Eli and Seventeen year old Anna are sisters who have a close bond. They have to have such a close bond, because their mother is a neglectful alcoholic. When the mom gets sentenced to sixty days in rehab after a DUI, Anna poses as their Aunt Lisa in order to avoid them going into foster care. I seems like it might almost work, but a week of bad decisions on Anna’s part and a fistfight on Eli’s part (against a bully who makes fun of her for being a boyish lesbian), and suddenly, they have to run and figure out how to stay together. 

I mostly picked up this book because I grew up in a town called Middletown. But I’m still glad I read it. It’s such an interesting book that seems to straddle middle-grade and YA fiction. The sisters were complex characters who don’t always make great choices, but they are at least understandable. I love that Eli was gender non-conforming, and didn’t always feel like a girl, but that wasn’t the central storyline. This was first and foremost a story about sisters desperate to stay together. Anna turning from a jock to a goth and Eli’s gender and crush on her best friend are definitely important, but are more B stories. 

Although Middletown started out slow, and some of the dialogue veered into unbelievable territory, it’s still a sweet story about love and redemption.