Category Archives: Book Review and Content

Finish Lines by Sarah Broyles

Review: Finish Lines by Sarah Broyles

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Finish Lines
Sarah Broyles
First Second
Published June 16, 2026

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

About Finish Lines

Miranda needs something to write about in her college application essays. But what?

Miranda has a plan: ace her junior year, get into an Ivy League school, and skip anything that doesn’t look good on a college application. But the pressure is getting to her, and now her parents have cut her off from every club, competition, and committee she’s a part of.

Desperate to get back on track, Miranda sets her sights on the Texas Water Safari—a 260-mile canoe race her mom was set to do with her granddad. With her mom sidelined by an injury, Miranda joins her grandfather. It’s grueling, messy, and scorching hot.

Can a perfectionist survive the wild long enough to find out who she is outside of a college checklist?

My Review

I love seeing sports books celebrating activities beyond the traditionally represented ones, so I was especially excited to stumble upon this book about competitive canoeing. To describe this simply as a sports book, though, doesn’t leave room for some of the other wonderful components that Broyles has stitched together here.

At first, Miranda sees the canoe race with her grandfather as a way to skirt her parents’ new rule requiring her to take it easy and reduce her commitments. The race will make a great college essay topic, she reasons. Plus, it’ll be amazing if she and her grandfather win the race this year.

As Miranda and her grandfather prep for the race, Miranda realizes that the trek will be more challenging than she predicted. She’s also stunned to learn that her grandfather doesn’t approach the race with any intention of winning. Finishing the race, he reasons, is the real victory.

This attitude and some of the rules on the river challenge Miranda’s desire to push herself beyond what’s reasonable (and sometimes safe). She has to decide how to balance the elements of the race, her relationships with her family, and her school work.

I thought the parallel stories of Miranda’s overcommitment and her mom’s addiction recovery and chronic illness were really nicely done. We don’t think of socially acceptable forms of addiction as problematic, but they can be just as harmful to ourselves and our relationships with others.

This book made me want to get out on the river and spend time in nature. It also made me appreciate intergenerational relationships, especially those within families.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 14 up.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Mild profanity used very infrequently.

Romance/Sexual Content
None.

Spiritual Content
None.

Violent Content
Situations of peril on the river.

Drug Content
Miranda’s parents are recovered addicts. The story peripherally follows her mom’s struggle with chronic pain as an addict in recovery and frames Miranda’s tendency to overcommit as a kind of addiction.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Review: Lake Life by Tanya Boteju

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Lake Life
Tanya Boteju
Quill Tree Books
Published May 26, 2026

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

About Lake Life

Perfect for fans of Becky Albertalli, this charming, chaotic romance follows two teens who agree to fake-date when stuck together one summer in a quirky, scenic lake town.

This is definitely not how Maya wanted to spend the summer—depressed at her once-beloved cabin in Spruce Lake, and unable to avoid seeing her lifelong best friend, Rashida, after confessing her woefully unrequited love to her last year. Maya can’t decide if she wants to escape, or convince Rashida they’re still meant to be.

Gabe is sent to Spruce Lake by her mom in hopes she stays out of trouble. Gabe is NOT excited to be here. She does NOT like nature. She does NOT want to spend her summer in a tiny town with outdoorsy environmentalist types.

Gabe is pretty sure she’ll be spending this entire summer bored and alone…until she meets Maya. Together, they hatch a fake-dating scheme to make Rashida jealous and convince Gabe’s mom that Gabe has turned a wholesome new leaf.  

But as the plan plays out, and Gabe and Maya contend with protests, a relentlessly concerned community, and romantic twists, they start to realize that their assumptions about friendship and love might have led them completely astray. Can they find their way through this mess without hurting each other in the process?

My Review

There are so many fun summer themes in this book. I love the vacation setting and all the outdoor activities. The romance blossoms at just the right moment.

Far from simply being a summer romance, this book explores the impact of gentrification on natural spaces and the power of activism and allyship in support of an Indigenous group. Gabe, a girl thrust into a tiny lakeside community as punishment for causing trouble at home, finally finds her feet when an older Indigenous woman mentors her. Their relationship happens haltingly. It’s not something either of them necessarily looked for. But it’s clear they sense some kind of resonance in each other. And Gabe begins exploring new ways of seeing the small town and the potential for her to make a difference there.

The fake dating trope plays out in some charming and funny ways. Maya and Gabe aren’t an obvious fit, so they have to figure out how to enjoy activities together convincingly. I liked how each of them brings strengths to the relationship. For instance, Gabe’s zero tolerance for teasing Maya about things she finds painful helps give Maya a reprieve and space to heal from her heartache.

Maya’s passion for her community and her knowledge of the area help Gabe discover new outdoor activities that are surprisingly fun. The two of them ultimately make a great team, and it’s a lot of fun watching them discover that.

All in all, I enjoyed this book. I could see fans of Jennifer Dugan’s Summer Girls finding plenty to love in this summer romance.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 16 up.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Strong profanity used somewhat frequently.

Romance/Sexual Content
Kissing.

Spiritual Content
References to Indigenous spirituality and beliefs.

Violent Content
None.

Drug Content
Teens drink alcohol in a few scenes.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Review: Pet by Akwaeke Emezi

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Pet (Pet #1)
Akwaeke Emezi
Make Me a World
Published September 10, 2019

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

About Pet

A thought-provoking and haunting novel about a creature that escapes from an artist’s canvas, whose talent is sniffing out monsters in a world that claims they don’t exist anymore. Perfect for fans of Akata Witch and Shadowshaper.

There are no monsters anymore, or so the children in the city of Lucille are taught. Jam and her best friend, Redemption, have grown up with this lesson all their life. But when Jam meets Pet, a creature made of horns and colors and claws, who emerges from one of her mother’s paintings and a drop of Jam’s blood, she must reconsider what she’s been told. Pet has come to hunt a monster–and the shadow of something grim lurks in Redemption’s house. Jam must fight not only to protect her best friend, but also uncover the truth, and the answer to the question How do you save the world from monsters if no one will admit they exist?

In their riveting and timely young adult debut, acclaimed novelist Akwaeke Emezi asks difficult questions about what choices you can make when the society around you is in denial.

My Review

Pet has been on my reading list for quite some time. I picked up a copy of it at the bookstore in 2025, and since it’s such a short book, I decided to jump right into it as I started the new year.

It’s a really unusual story. There’s a bit of profanity in the text, and some themes that make it better suited for middle school students. To be honest, it reminded me a lot of The Giver by Lois Lowry.

The story takes place in a post-apocalyptic world in which everyone is supposed to be safe from monsters. The main character, a trans girl, is able to freely live as herself and make autonomous decisions about her body. Shadows of the past horrors still linger. For instance, Jam’s mother’s name is Bitter, and Jam knows she was named this because her birth was the result of “monsters monstering.”

Throughout the story, Jam wrestles with big questions about the world she knows. She has to decide when adults are telling her the truth and when there’s more to the story than they are ready to tell her or face themselves.

After Pet, a large, winged creature, emerges from Jam’s mother’s painting, Jam agrees to help him find the monster living in her town. He repeatedly calls her “Little Girl”, which only bothered me because he does it so frequently and doesn’t refer to her friend in a similar way, like calling him “Little Boy.” I suppose it’s meant to affirm Jam’s identity and reinforce the idea that Pet isn’t human and doesn’t think like one.

Conclusion

On the whole, I thought this was a deeply thought-provoking book. It’s so easy for us to assume that we’ve blocked all available pathways between danger and our kids, when, really, that isn’t the case. Sometimes, assuming we don’t have to be vigilant lets trouble in. Pet would make a great discussion book.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 12 to 14.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Profanity used infrequently.

Romance/Sexual Content
Vague references to sexual abuse. (Nothing shown on the page or described in any detail.)

Spiritual Content
Pet emerges from a painting Jam’s mother made. He is from another world and has come with instructions to hunt down and stop a monster.

Violent Content
Situations of peril. It’s unclear what Pet will do once he finds the monster, but it’s assumed that he may kill them. References to a past revolution that stopped monsters from harming others, but at great cost.

References to a child with unexplained bruises. Late in the book, one scene shows someone bound to a chair and hit repeatedly.

Brief references to a trial for child abuse.

Drug Content
In one scene, adults drink alcohol as part of a celebration.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I borrowed a copy of this book from the public library. All opinions are my own.

Review: Travelers Along the Way by Aminah Mae Safi

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Travelers Along the Way (Remixed Classics #3)
Aminah Mae Safi
Feiwel & Friends
Published March 1, 2022

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

About Travelers Along the Way

In the Remixed Classics series, authors from marginalized backgrounds reinterpret classic works through their own cultural lens to subvert the overwhelming cishet, white, and male canon. This thrilling female-led Robin Hood remix reframes the legend’s tales of the Third Crusade from a Muslim perspective, rewriting its origin’s male and overwhelmingly white Euro-centric narrative.

Jerusalem, 1192. The Third Crusade rages on. Rahma al-Hud loyally followed her elder sister Zeena into the war over the Holy Land, but now that the Faranji invaders have gotten reinforcements from Richard the Lionheart, all she wants to do is get herself and her sister home alive.

But Zeena, a soldier of honor at heart, refuses to give up the fight while Jerusalem remains in danger of falling back into the hands of the false Queen Isabella. And so, Rahma has no choice but to take on one final mission with her sister.

On their journey to Jerusalem, Rahma and Zeena come across a motley collection of fellow travelers—including a kind-hearted Mongolian warrior, an eccentric Andalusian scientist, a frustratingly handsome spy with a connection to Rahma’s childhood, and an unfortunate English chaplain abandoned behind enemy lines. The teens all find solace, purpose and camaraderie—as well as a healthy bit of mischief—in each other’s company.

But their travels soon bring them into the orbit of Queen Isabella herself, whose plans to re-seize power in Jerusalem would only guarantee further war and strife in the Holy Land for years to come. And so it falls to the merry band of misfits to use every scrap of cunning and wit (and not a small amount of thievery) to foil the usurper queen and perhaps finally restore peace to the land.

My Review

I really appreciate this series, which takes classic literature and reimagines it from a completely different perspective. I like that this invites a new point of view into a familiar story. It’s interesting to consider how the story changes when the main character is a different person.

I don’t know much about the history of the Crusades, but this novel seems very well-researched. The back matter includes a historical timeline, which helps place the events in the book in a broader historical context.

I’m generally a fan of a gender-flipped story because it also forces readers to consider the differences between male and female perspectives. I love the reversal in this novel that centers a girl, Rahma, as the infamous Green Hood, a thief who robs the rich and delivers the spoils to those impoverished by the war.

I spotted the connection between some of the parallel characters in Rahma’s band of thieves immediately, but it took me longer to place others. It was a lot of fun as the pieces clicked into place, and I recognized elements from the original story playing out in this new landscape.

I absolutely enjoyed this book, and I recommend it to anyone who enjoys reimagined classics. I think fans of We Hunt the Flame by Hafsah Faizal will enjoy this one.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages LIST.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
List.

Romance/Sexual Content
List.

Spiritual Content
List.

Violent Content
List.

Drug Content
List.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I borrowed a copy of this book from the public library. All opinions are my own.

Review: The Faraway Inn by Sarah Beth Durst

Book Review and Content, Fantasy, Romance, Young Adult/Teen 12-18, , , , , , , , ,

The Faraway Inn
Sarah Beth Durst
Delacorte Press
Published March 31, 2026

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

About The Faraway Inn

After a devastating heartbreak, a teen girl decides to spend her summer helping her eccentric great aunt manage her quaint Vermont inn–but this fixer-upper is hiding a magical secret–in this cozy and irresistable new fantasy from the New York Times bestselling author of The Spellshop.

Sixteen-year-old Calisa is desperate for a change of scenery after her lying ex ruins her perfect Brooklyn summer. When her parents suggest she head to rural Vermont to help her great-aunt run her cozy bed and breakfast for a few months, she jumps at the chance.

But when Calisa arrives at the B&B, she’s shocked to find a rundown inn with only a handful of guests. And to make matters worse, upon meeting with her great-aunt it quickly becomes clear that Calisa was not invited. Auntie Zee is determined to keep anyone from messing with her beloved inn…even if it is clear she needs the help.

To earn her keep, Calisa sets to work fixing up the inn, enlisting extra help from the groundskeeper’s (handsome) son. But the longer she stays, the more it becomes evident that there is something strange about the B&B—and its residents. Something almost…otherworldly.

The inn is keeping a magical secret—but to protect the place she’s come to love, Calisa must unravel the truth of it, and her aunt, before it’s too late.

My Review

This is the first time I’ve read anything by Sarah Beth Durst, but I’ve heard her name a lot before. She’s a prolific writer with books spanning a wide range of ages and vibes running from cozy to intense.

The Faraway Inn is one of her cozy fantasy books. Those cozy fantasy elements and sweet moments between characters are exactly the balm my reading soul needed right now. The story made for a lovely escape from reality and a fun summer read.

I actually could have seen this book marketed as adult fiction very easily. Calisa is supposed to be sixteen, but there aren’t many reasons the story has to be about a teenager. The pressure to return home for her senior year added some tension to the story, but that was probably the biggest element that targeted the story at a young adult audience.

One of my favorite characters was probably the lizard named Steve. I liked how he became part of the story and how Calisa’s relationship with him impacted her relationship with her aunt and her confidence in her ability to navigate trouble at the inn.

I would be interested in reading more books by this author. I’m curious about her middle grade titles. I could see the kind of cozy storytelling and humor in this book being well-placed in middle grade as well.

If you’re looking for a read that’s a perfect escape from reality and a fun summer romance, definitely put this on your reading list!

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 14 up.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Strong profanity used very infrequently.

Romance/Sexual Content
Kissing.

Spiritual Content
Magical creatures/characters and other worlds.

Violent Content
Situations of peril.

Drug Content
None.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Review: If You Were Here by Abigail Johnson

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If You Were Here
Abigail Johnson
HarperCollins
Published April 28, 2026

Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads

About If You Were Here

A charming and emotional standalone grumpy/sunshine romance set during a Nantucket summer. Lili needs Wren’s help to complete her father’s research and save her family’s reputation–but working together leads to more discoveries than either of them bargained for.

Lili Gardner hasn’t been back to Nantucket, her dad’s favorite place, since her parents divorced six years ago. But Dad passed away recently, leaving her a house on the island and an unsolved mystery about a maligned Gardner ancestor. Lili is determined to finish his life’s work, and convinces her mom and sister to spend the summer in Nantucket with her while she looks for answers, and for a connection to her dad.

Wren McCleave has a passion for history, but his father refuses to showcase anything real in their tourist trap of a “museum.” So when Lili asks Wren for help with her research, Wren can’t resist the opportunity to throw himself into something real, even if he dislikes tourists on principle.

Lili and Wren only have a summer to find out the truth about Lili’s ancestor. But the most surprising truths they uncover aren’t about the distant past, but about themselves right here in the present, and about what they want out of the future.

My Review

If you’re looking for a summer beach or vacation read, this one would be perfect. It takes place during the summer on Nantucket, in a small island community. Expect pizza on the beach, boat trips, and plenty of simmering romance.

I really enjoyed Johnson’s debut novel, so when I saw that she had a new one coming out this summer, I really wanted to read it. I like the way that she writes tender moments and the scenes filled with yearning, where the characters haven’t figured out how to be together yet and aren’t even sure their feelings are reciprocated. It’s so easy to get lost in the anticipation of those moments.

Wren has needed a wheelchair since an accident years before the story begins. For the most part, though, this book really doesn’t focus on his disability. There are a couple of scenes where it becomes a focus. At one point, Lili invites him to a place that isn’t accessible. She feels horrible when she realizes, and the two have a conversation about that. For the most part, though, we are busy thinking of Wren as a potential museum curator who is struggling to set boundaries with and express his wishes to his family.

Lili also has some family relationship matters to sort out. She’s trying to solve a mystery her dad left behind, which leads her to grapple with some of the wounds in the relationships her dad left behind. The story doesn’t explore him as a character in depth beyond his obsession with his family history. Lili’s relationships with her mom and sister are important, and she wrestles with how to balance those connections with her passion to uncover the past.

Wren and Lili have a little bit of a grumpy/sunshine vibe going, especially at the beginning of their connection. I love that they bond over their shared love of history. The relationship isn’t without its bumps and flaws. I could see part of the story being challenging for some readers, especially those who prefer neat, simple romances. But I appreciate that mistakes were made, and consequences happened. I like that Lili and Wren each had to reckon with the fallout of their choices, and that leads them to reconnect with other characters in ways that they needed to. Sorry that’s so vague– I don’t want to spoil anything.

All in all, this was a fun summer romance. It feels like a perfect book to take on vacation or to the beach for an afternoon.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 12 up.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Strong profanity used very infrequently.

Romance/Sexual Content
Kissing.

Spiritual Content
None.

Violent Content
References to an accident in which Wren broke his back. (Happened before the story began.)

Drug Content
None.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.