An Invisible Girl Left Her Library and Found Real Life

~The Library of Lost Things~
By Laura Taylor Namey
Amazon ~ Powell's

From the moment she first learned to read, literary genius Darcy Wells has spent most of her time living in the worlds of her books. There, she can avoid the crushing reality of her mother’s hoarding and pretend her life is simply ordinary. But when a new property manager becomes more active in the upkeep of their apartment complex, the only home Darcy has ever known outside of her books suddenly hangs in the balance.

While Darcy is struggling to survive beneath the weight of her mother’s compulsive shopping, Asher Fleet, a former teen pilot with an unexpectedly shattered future, walks into the bookstore where she works…and straight into her heart. For the first time in her life, Darcy can’t seem to find the right words. Fairy tales are one thing, but real love makes her want to hide inside her carefully constructed ink-and-paper bomb shelter.

Still, after spending her whole life keeping people out, something about Asher makes Darcy want to open up. But securing her own happily-ever-after will mean she’ll need to stop hiding and start living her own truth—even if it’s messy.


This one popped up on my Facebook feed as an ad from Inkyard Press with the description "Fangirl meets Jane Austen" and I immediately glombed onto it for its promise of romance, books, and a quick and easy stand-alone format. I guess two out of three ain't bad.

The Civilization That Disproves This Axiom

~Axiom's End~
Noumena
Book 1
By Lindsay Ellis
Amazon ~ Powell's

Truth is a human right.

It’s fall 2007. A well-timed leak has revealed that the US government might have engaged in first contact. Cora Sabino is doing everything she can to avoid the whole mess, since the force driving the controversy is her whistleblower father. Even though Cora hasn’t spoken to him in years, his celebrity has caught the attention of the press, the Internet, the paparazzi, and the government—and with him in hiding, that attention is on her. She neither knows nor cares whether her father’s leaks are a hoax, and wants nothing to do with him—until she learns just how deeply entrenched her family is in the cover-up, and that an extraterrestrial presence has been on Earth for decades.

Realizing the extent to which both she and the public have been lied to, she sets out to gather as much information as she can, and finds that the best way for her to uncover the truth is not as a whistleblower, but as an intermediary. The alien presence has been completely uncommunicative until she convinces one of them that she can act as their interpreter, becoming the first and only human vessel of communication. Their otherworldly connection will change everything she thought she knew about being human—and could unleash a force more sinister than she ever imagined.


I've been following this author for a good while now. I thoroughly enjoy her video essays, her deep dives into the Transformers movies, her work with PBS, and especially her exploration of (and cynical look at) YA fiction with Awoken and Booze Your Own Adventure. So when she announced that she was releasing her own novel this year, I knew I had to jump on it. Obviously, yes, I am biased in that I already enjoy her content, and so went into the book expecting to enjoy it (ideally, one would go into every book they decide to pick up expecting to enjoy it). But by no means am I about to gush about it like it's a must-read for everyone, cause it's definitely not.

In London a Bookseller Feller / Wore One Glove Surprisingly Yeller

~The Left-Handed Booksellers
of London~
By Garth Nix
Amazon ~ Powell's

In a slightly alternate London in 1983, Susan Arkshaw is looking for her father, a man she has never met. Crime boss Frank Thringley might be able to help her, but Susan doesn’t get time to ask Frank any questions before he is turned to dust by the prick of a silver hatpin in the hands of the outrageously attractive Merlin.

Merlin is a young left-handed bookseller (one of the fighting ones), who with the right-handed booksellers (the intellectual ones), are an extended family of magical beings who police the mythic and legendary Old World when it intrudes on the modern world, in addition to running several bookshops.

Susan’s search for her father begins with her mother’s possibly misremembered or misspelt surnames, a reading room ticket, and a silver cigarette case engraved with something that might be a coat of arms.

Merlin has a quest of his own, to find the Old World entity who used ordinary criminals to kill his mother. As he and his sister, the right-handed bookseller Vivien, tread in the path of a botched or covered-up police investigation from years past, they find this quest strangely overlaps with Susan’s. Who or what was her father? Susan, Merlin, and Vivien must find out, as the Old World erupts dangerously into the New.


Garth Nix has been on my to-read list since the 90's. I've heard his Abhorsen series is great, his Keys to the Kingdom series even got my quasi-illiterate sibling to read a little, and I've drooled at the covers for the Seventh Tower series during many a bookstore visit. So when I saw this new book on my Facebook feed, with that cover and a title that promised to involve bookish characters, how could I put it off any longer?

This is About the Lodestar Initiative

SPOILER ALERT
This review is for those who have read or are familiar with the previous four books in the Keeper of the Lost Cities series, or don't mind knowing spoilers for them.
SPOILER ALERT

~Lodestar~
Keeper of the Lost Cities
Book 5
By Shannon Messenger
Amazon ~ Powell's

Sophie Foster is back in the Lost Cities—but the Lost Cities have changed. The threat of war hangs heavy over her glittering world, and the Neverseen are wreaking havoc.

The lines between friend and enemy have blurred, and Sophie is unsure whom to trust. But when she’s warned that the people she loves most will be the next victims, she knows she has to act.

A mysterious symbol could be the key—if only she knew how to translate it. Every new clue seems to lead deeper into her world’s underbelly and the Black Swan aren’t the only ones who have plans. The Neverseen have their own Initiative, and if Sophie doesn’t stop it, they might finally have the ultimate means to control her.


With the last book leaving us on a rather precarious cliffhanger, I knew I'd be back at this series soon. I mean, who doesn't love Keefe? Judging from the fan comments on GoodReads, not many. So I just hoped for the best as I dove in, and...I think I came out okay?