Jane Litte's Blog, page 133

October 12, 2020

REVIEW: Simmer Down by Sarah Smith



In this finger-licking good rom-com, two is the perfect number of cooks in the kitchen.


Nikki DiMarco knew life wouldn’t be all sunshine and coconuts when she quit her dream job to help her mom serve up mouthwatering Filipino dishes to hungry beach goers, but she didn’t expect the Maui food truck scene to be so eat-or-be-eaten—or the competition to be so smoking hot.


But Tiva’s Filipina Kusina has faced bigger road bumps than the arrival of Callum James. Nikki doesn’t care how delectable the B...

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Published on October 12, 2020 06:00

October 10, 2020

REVIEW: Elvis Puffs Out: A Breaking Cat News Adventure by Georgia Dunn



This just in: your favorite purr-nalists are back and reporting on all of the most pressing cat issues in this third collection of Breaking Cat News comics for middle-grade readers.


Anchor cat Lupin and his faithful field reporters, Elvis and Puck, are as cute and funny as ever in Elvis Puffs Out. There’s no shortage of news to cover this time around: In the wake of a winter snowstorm, the team tries their hand at meteorology (with mixed results). Man and Woman nurse a stranded kitten back to ...

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Published on October 10, 2020 06:00

October 9, 2020

REVIEW: Spoiler Alert by Olivia Dade



Marcus Caster-Rupp has a secret. The world may know him as Aeneas, star of the biggest show on television, but fanfiction readers call him something else: Book!AeneasWouldNever. Marcus gets out his frustrations with the show through anonymous stories about the internet’s favorite couple, Aeneas and Lavinia. But if anyone discovered his online persona, he’d be finished in Hollywood.


April Whittier has secrets of her own. A hardcore Lavinia fan, she’s long hidden her fanfic and cosplay hobbies f...

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Published on October 09, 2020 06:00

October 8, 2020

SPOILERIFIC THREAD: Return of the Thief & the Queen’s Thief Series by Megan Whalen Turner

A thread for discussing Megan Whalen Turner’s Queen’s Thief series with spoilers included. All your thoughts are welcome.


For those readers who prefer spoiler-free reviews and discussions, reviews of the earlier books can be found below:


The Thief

The Queen of Attolia

The King of Attolia

A Conspiracy of Kings

Thick as Thieves


We’ve also had two interviews with Megan Whalen Turner where she discusses her books and her writing process:


Interview: Megan Whalen Turner, Author of the Queen’s Thief Se...

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Published on October 08, 2020 07:00

JOINT REVIEW: Return of the Thief by Megan Whalen Turner

Trigger warning:



Spoiler: Show



Child abuse, ableism (on the part of the villains), miscarriage.




READERS PLEASE NOTE: The following review contains MASSIVE spoilers for the earlier five books in Megan Whalen Turner’s Thief series and this is one series where spoilers should be avoided at all costs. Seriously, don’t even read the blurbs for the later books. If you’d like to try the books, start with the first one, The Thief. -Janine



Janine: It’s been a long wait for the conclusion to this ser...

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Published on October 08, 2020 06:00

October 7, 2020

INTERVIEW: Megan Whalen Turner is Back, and So is Eugenides

Readers please note: the following interview contains SPOILERS for books 1-3 in Megan Whalen Turner’s Queen’s Thief series.


As I mentioned the last time I interviewed Megan Whalen Turner, her Queen’s Thief series is one of my favorite YA series, novels filled with high-stakes intrigue and deception, loyal friendships, dangerous missions, and a couple of touching romantic relationships, too. Their author has won several accolades, including an LA Times Book Award, a Boston Globe/Horn Book Honor, ...

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Published on October 07, 2020 06:00

October 6, 2020

JOINT REVIEW: A House East of Regent Street by Pam Rosenthal

Jennie: When Janine mentioned this expanded novella, and suggested we review it together, she asked if I’d read it when it originally came out in 2004. My book log says no, but my brain says yes. If I didn’t read it I must’ve read a lot about it back when it was first published, enough to retain information about it. (The way my brain works: I’ll forget entirely something that happened yesterday but remember the plot of a movie I read a review of but never actually saw in 1986.) There’s somethin...

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Published on October 06, 2020 08:00

REVIEW: Murder on Cold Street by Sherry Thomas


Disclosure from DA reviewer Janine: Author Sherry Thomas is my friend and critique partner. Jennie, who wrote the review, has no personal relationship with her, however.-Janine


Blurb time!:


Charlotte Holmes, Lady Sherlock, investigates a puzzling new murder case that implicates Scotland Yard inspector Robert Treadles in the USA Today bestselling series set in Victorian England.


Inspector Treadles, Charlotte Holmes’s friend and collaborator, has been found locked in a room with two dead men, bo...

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Published on October 06, 2020 06:00

October 5, 2020

GUEST POST: The Journey Home: Reading Romance While Sheltering in Place by Pam Rosenthal

Note from Janine: Guest poster and romance author Pam Rosenthal, whose novella A House East of Regent Street is being published in digital format for the first time tomorrow, has contributed the lovely essay below.


How do you read during a pandemic? For facts or for escape? Survival information in the baleful here and now, or a reminder of how life ought to be?


For me it’s all of the above. But when it’s time to go to sleep – especially if I actually want to get to sleep in times like this – I n...

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Published on October 05, 2020 06:00

October 2, 2020

REVIEW: Tudor Christmas Tidings by Blythe Gifford, Jenni Fletcher, and Amanda McCabe



Make Merry at Court


…with three Tudor Christmas stories!


In Blythe Gifford’s Christmas at Court, Sir John Talbot and Lady Alice’s secret betrothal must wait until Henry Tudor claims the throne. Next in Secrets of the Queen’s Lady by Jenni Fletcher, the lady-in-waiting to Anne of Cleves is unexpectedly reunited with a handsome—younger—diplomat at the palace’s festivities! And in His Mistletoe Lady by Amanda McCabe, Catherine seeks help from a mysterious Spaniard to free her father in time for C...

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Published on October 02, 2020 06:00

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