Hey everyone! I realized the other day I am behind on some reviews. So here is my little reading review round up.

I saw this at the library and had to grab it. Look how beautiful it is! And the illustrations inside are just as gorgeous. And bonus, it counted towards the Nonfiction Reading Challenge! This book was interesting yet full of horrible stories. I think one thing made this one different than other true crime type books is that this book pointed out that many times these women were acting out a lack of agency in their own lives, trapped by the laws and culture of their time, trapped in abusive marriages, and acted out of desperation and a lack of hope. But then on the other hand, many of them were just horrible evil women. I literally could not get over how many children were killed. I was shocked. Anyway, this book was a book that places these crimes in the timeline of history.

Nonfiction Challenge Update: So far I have completed Nonfiction Nipper. I have read more than three nonfiction books, but most of them were memoirs! I have read 9 nonfiction in total this year so far.

Sigh. I wanted to love this book more than I did. It was sort of meh but I loved the setting, which was the Catskills at a resort during the 1950s. I feel like the author tried to tackle too much in one book, and should have focused more on a cozy mystery rather than trying to add in the red scare. She could have leaned in on the prejudice of women owning and operating a large business, and then the fun details of the resort, etc. Since there are only two books in this series, and the last one I believe was published in 2021, I think she might have lost interest as well. It just tried too hard but had a lot of potential in my opinion.

This was a cute middle grade horror. I read it to cleanse my brain of Yesteryear, and it was very effective. Calisa and her family travel to Ohio when the grandfather she never met passed away. They stay in his house/inn, and Calisa begins to see ghosts. There is a whole mystery, with lots of ghosts and it was pretty good. There was a bit of realism too, with her dad’s grief surrounding his father’s death, his guilt and grief and how he reacts. I think middle grade can shy away from adults having emotions and this one did not. There is a second one in this series and I plan on picking it up at some point.

The Growing Summer, or The Magic Summer depending on what country you are in, is a delight of a book. I needed this book the past week. It was just easy and gentle, and I loved reading about these four siblings who are sent to live with their Great-Aunt Dymphna in Ireland while their mom joins their father, who has fallen gravely ill while studying germs in a distant country. Their life had been ordinary and “normal”, school and bedtimes and mealtimes and regular laundry times before going to Ireland. However, Dymphna is not like that, and doesn’t really plan on doing all that for the children. Instead she sort of points them to where all those things are done, the kitchen, ingredients, the beach, and tells them to just go to it. Eat when they want, sleep when they want -it is an entirely independent existence. They have never done these things before so it is a learning curve for them all, and when they ask Dymphna any questions she usually responds in poetry, which would frustrate me to no end personally. Lol. The neighbors are the real heroes here. The kids also harbor a secret for the time they are there, which is pretty funny as well. It was a good gentle vintage read, and I loved that one of the neighbors gave the oldest brother the business for leaving all the home keeping to the oldest sister.

And that is it from me today. Peace and love to all of you.