Hello From Your Friendly Neighborhood Book Wench!

Hi all. I’m JoAnn and, at the tender age of 30, hold the position of Crone in The Book Wenches. I split my work life between managing the operations of the bookstore and being a massage therapist. I split my personal life with reading, gaming, various crafting, and pounding back movies/shows/anime.

I have fairly eclectic reading tastes, but my go-to comfort zone is genre fiction (sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, horror, and romance). I also read a bunch of YA and graphic novels.

I’m a giant nerd so that is my wheelhouse and probably going to be really evident in the bulk of my posts.

Claire here!

Okay, so I have recently finished the lovely Kate Hattemer’s new YA novel The Land of 10,000 Madonnas.

It is about a group of 5 teenagers sent on a quest to Europe as a dying wish from their friend and cousin, Jesse, who died of a heart defect nearly a year previously. It is beautiful, sad, funny, bittersweet, and sometimes slightly gross. The gross factor is mostly due to Ben’s penchant for smoothies for every meal which sometimes include unusual choices for a liquefied meal.)

Kate’s sophomore novel reminded me a little bit of Maureen Johnson’s 13 Little Blue Envelopes. But I suppose that is more for the similarities between their teenaged characters going on trips across Europe after losing a loved one. I find Kate’s characters more real and relatable than Johnson’s. Cal, Trevor, Ben, Lillian, and Matt aren’t meant to discover some great and magical cure for their grief and then fall in love. They are and have been grieving. They deal with their grief on a daily basis and in myriad ways. And they are only beginning to come to terms with Jesse’s death. As teenagers, they are often prickly in their mourning, and don’t always agree. And like many teenagers I know, they do not say what they mean and feel immediately or clearly to each other. Hattemer’s portrayal and the perspectives she offers from her characters is one of her strengths in this book. They aren’t special in any extra way, they are normal, and they have been dealt a tragedy. And they react and exist accordingly. 

The book did take me a little while to get through, but that is in part because I tend to be a distracted reader and also this is a book that will make you think and reflect.  This is a novel that will be a good cathartic read. Hattemer made me tear up more than once while I was reading, but she brought me out on the brighter side at the end. I will be recommending this to fans of David Levithan, Maureen Johnson, Ava Dellaira, Emery Lord, and even John Green readers. I think that Kate Hattemer is going to be an author to keep an eye on and a voice to be heard in YA in the coming years.

Release date is April 19th 2016. I highly recommend it. And if you can, get it from a bricks and mortar bookstore or the library!

Waiting on Wednesday

A weekly meme hosted by Breaking the Spine that spotlights upcoming releases that people are eagerly anticipating.

My choice for Waiting on Wednesday this week is:

The Land of 10,000 Madonnas by Kate Hattemer

Publication: April 19th 2016 by Knopf, 352 pages

Five teens backpack through Europe to fulfill the mysterious dying wish of their friend in this heartwarming novel from the author of The Vigilante Poets of Selwyn Academy. Jesse lives with his history professor dad in a house covered with postcards of images of the Madonna from all over the world. They’re gotten used to this life: two motherless dudes living among thousands of Madonnas. But Jesse has a heart condition that will ultimately cut his life tragically short. Before he dies, he arranges a mysterious trip to Europe for his three cousins, his best friend, and his girlfriend to take after he passes away. It’s a trip that will forever change the lives of these young teens and one that will help them come to terms with Jesse’s death. With vivid writing, poignant themes, and abundant doses of humor throughout, Kate Hattemer’s second novel is a satisfying journey about looking for someone else’s answers only to find yourself.

Wink Poppy Midnight by April Genevieve Tucholke

Publication: March 22nd 2016 by Dial Books, 352 pages

The intrigue of The Virgin Suicides and the “supernatural or not” question of The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer coalesce in this young adult mystery, where nothing is quite as it seems, no one is quite who you think, and everything can change on a dime. Every story needs a hero. Every story needs a villain. Every story needs a secret. Wink is the odd, mysterious neighbor girl, wild red hair and freckles. Poppy is the blond bully and the beautiful, manipulative high school queen bee. Midnight is the sweet, uncertain boy caught between them. Wink. Poppy. Midnight. Two girls. One boy. Three voices that burst onto the page in short, sharp, bewitching chapters, and spiral swiftly and inexorably toward something terrible or tricky or tremendous. What really happened? Someone knows. Someone is lying. For fans of Holly Black, We Were Liars, and The Raven Boys, this mysterious tale full of intrigue, dread, beauty, and a whiff of something strange will leave you utterly entranced.

Okay y’all, Melissa here and we have something extremely important to discuss today.  I just finished reading the third book in the Winner’s Curse trilogy, so let me give you the spoiler-free lowdown on...

The Winner’s Kiss

First off, I’ll just say that I hate the title.  Like, YES there is considerably more kissing in this book than in Crime (LOLLLLL ‘cause there was none in Crime), but kissing wasn’t the point of this finale??? I personally think that The Winner’s CROWN would have been a much better title (also would have kept the “C” trend.  It’s actually perfect. ugh no one consults me.)

BUT I will TOTALLY take a dumb title over the AWFUL NEW COVERS they were proposing! For those of you who somehow missed that whole debacle, Macmillan announced back in November that they were going to do a complete overhaul of the covers.  Before the series was even finished.  After releasing the original cover for the new book (as seen above).  COMPLETE MAYHEM ENSUED.

UGH. I physically cannot look at them.  The best part, though, is that... Don’t these covers look familiar? Hmmmm... Like, super familiar.

WAIT. I KNOW.

Look at that.  It’s uncanny.  And so unfortunate.  ‘Cause unlike Celaena of Throne of Glass, Kestral is not an assassin. IN FACT she can barely throw a knife. No, Kestral uses her wit and smarts to tear you down.  As soon as you show any weakness, she will destroy you with her words and war tactics.  She’s very Sherlockian at times.  So these new covers make no sense.

But this rant has a happy ending!  Macmillan heard our cries! They listened!  Over Christmas they announced that they were throwing out the new covers and going back to the originals.  Which is HUGE.  I have been lamenting various cover changes since the dawn of time and no one has ever listened. It is so heart-warming.

Anyway, the point of all of that is that I would take a title like The Winner’s Poop Bucket if it meant I didn’t have to look at those covers on my book shelf.  REJOICE.

So let me get back to my thoughts on the actual content of the final book, haha.

The Winner’s Kiss (foreal this time)

Ugh, guys, it was SO. GOOD.  You will not be disappointed in this last installment.  I will admit that I had been extremely hesitant about starting this book because I just couldn’t see how everything would be resolved in a way that I wanted.

First, the ending of Crime was BRUTAL. Like tear my heart out, throw it on the ground, and jump on it repeatedly brutal.  Let’s just recap the ending real quick (if you don’t want to be spoiled because FOR WHATEVER REASON you haven’t read Crime, don’t read):

Kestral gets shipped off to a prison camp in the north

Arin sails away for his home in Heran

They both said some pretty gross things to each other beforehand

My babies, come back! Love each other! 

So how was Kiss going to fix everything?!  Even if Arin and Kestral somehow made their way back to one another, how could they reconcile all the things that were said??? Needless to say, I was emotionally distraught before I even started this book.

BUT WORRY NOT. Marie is badass, and she throws some completely unexpected twists at you from the very beginning. And, between you and me, she COMPLETELY makes up for the lack of kissing in Crime.  And then some. (I’m wiggling my eyebrows right now).  Girlfriend totally got my back.

And, some might say more importantly, she wraps up the major conflict with the emperor of Valoria in a way that I greatly enjoyed, but didn’t guess at all.  You go, Marie.  Like, I had a couple guesses for how everything would end, but even when I only had 50 pages left to read, I still had no idea.  So HOLLER.

The Winner’s Kiss is definitely worth the wait and all of the drama over covers.  Honestly, I’m going to go back and read it again ‘cause I sort of inhaled it this time around lolllll

The book doesn’t actually come out for another month (March 29), but GUYS IT’S SO WORTH IT. Just hold out a bit longer!  And then come back here and discuss it with me, obvs.

Peace, Melissa

Made a note on my manuscript while slightly drunk last night, looked at it this morning and all it says is “#foreshadowing”

Hello!

I’m Claire. I am 25, still shelving away at the bookstore, and hopefully a librarian someday. A little about me: My favorite things in the whole wide world are reading, movies, popcorn, tiny towns on Lake Erie, music, art and making art, and British panel shows. And also my fellow booksellers. I will love them forever.

I tend to be a bit of a reading odd-ball. I adore children’s books, especially middle-grade, picture books, and YA. And pretty much in that order. I read a possibly unhealthy amount of romance novels, fair number of graphic novels, the occasional literary memoir, and fiction. I will probably post a lot about illustrators, book covers, and picture books. Because they are pretty much my favorite things about the book industry.

This year I am attempting to branch myself back out into grown-up people lit. Because, like Tori, I don’t usually have the attention span for an adult book that takes me longer than a week to read.

My favorite books of all time are the Queens Thief middle grade series by Megan Whalen Turner. I will probably be writing at least one entire post about my love for her and her books. I have a very strong belief that absolutely everyone needs to read her books. They are wonderful and hilarious and Eugenides is just the bomb-diggity and holy-crap Attolia and Eddis are badasses and I could go on and on. -> Like that sentence, WHAT!

I can’t wait to get started!

MY PRECIOUS! So excited to find out what's happening in Feyre and Tamlin's world.

Not familiar with this AMAZING Fantasy Young Adult Series? Check out my review for A COURT OF THORNS AND ROSES here:

http://readitrealgood.com/2015/10/30/a-court-of-thorns-and-roses/

May can't come soon enough ❤️

We’re so thrilled to reveal the covers for Sarah J. Maas’s A COURT OF MIST AND FURY! Share it if you love it!

On a Chris Haughton kick today. Cannot wait for his new book, Goodnight Everyone,  in the fall. <3

Chris Haughton’s beautiful storybook Shh! We Have A Plan was recently transformed into a live theatre production by Cahoots NI. We were lucky enough to make the backdrop animations, including these little fellows.

YAAAAAASSSS! Well Read Black Girl is awesome. Check out this great interview and get with it. <3 Also Follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

The Biggest Problem in Publishing? The Invisibility of Black Women Writers

And how #WellReadBlackGirl is changing the game.

MC: What do you hope people will get from following WRBG?

GE: Whenever I read a book that speaks to me, I immediately want to tell the world about it. Every post [on Instagram] is about a writer I admire, a book I’ve read, or a title I’m adding to my “To Be Read” pile. When people use the hashtag #WellReadBlackGirl, it suddenly transforms the solitary experience of reading into a social activity.  

People are constantly looking for diverse reading recommendations. I spend a lot of time finding compelling content produced by Black women: new book releases, essays, poetry, culture writing, etc. I want WRBG to give these extraordinary writers a voice and introduce them to new audiences. Publishers need to fully acknowledge the role Black women play in literary culture. We’re creators, as well as consumers. We deserve that recognition.