Isaiah Roby's Blog: MI Book Reviews, page 112
October 30, 2018
Exquisite Corpse
“To serial slayer Andrew Compton, murder is an art, the most intimate art. After feigning his own death to escape from prison, Compton makes his way to the United States with the sole ambition of bringing his “art” to new heights. Tortured by his own perverse desires, and drawn to possess and destroy young boys, Compton inadvertently joins forces with Jay Byrne, a dissolute playboy who has pushed his “art” to limits even Compton hadn’t previously imagined. Together, Compton and Byrne set thei...
October 27, 2018
A Book of Light: When a Loved One has a Different Mind
Edited by Jerry Pinto
“In fiction and in cinema, we see people retreat into the family when they are hurt. There they are surrounded by love and warmth and they can lick their wounds in peace. But what if it is your mother who is wounding you and then soothing you by turns? What if it is your father who seems distant or desolate, living in a dark tower that you cannot enter?… What of the family where someone commits suicide and leaves behind a vacuum, a space that seems to mock every attempt...
October 25, 2018
Abroad: Book One
“Nick Melnikov doesn’t know where he belongs. He was just a kid when his Russian-Jewish family immigrated to Michigan. Now he’s in London for university, overwhelmed by unexpected memories. Socially anxious, intensely private, and closeted, Nick doesn’t expect to fall in so quickly with a tight-knit group of students from his college, and it’s both exhilarating and scary. Hanging out with them is a roller coaster of serious awkward and incredible longing, especially when the most intimidating...
October 24, 2018
Tell Me It’s Real
“Do you believe in love at first sight?
Paul Auster doesn’t. Paul doesn’t believe in much at all. He’s thirty, slightly overweight, and his best features are his acerbic wit and the color commentary he provides as life passes him by. His closest friends are a two-legged dog named Wheels and a quasibipolar drag queen named Helena Handbasket. He works a dead-end job in a soul-sucking cubicle, and if his grandmother’s homophobic parrot insults him one more time, Paul is going to wring its stupid...
October 23, 2018
Doggy Style
“Preston Evans is a legend in and out of the bedroom. He’s six foot two, gorgeous, and famous because his celebrity ex snapchatted his huge package. I hate him. I hate his stupid puppy store, Doggy Style. I hate the way he looks at me like I’m a piece of meat. I don’t care that his abs are chiseled, his arms are tattooed, and his face belongs on the cover of a magazine. Every dog bred means a shelter dog dead!
I chain myself to his store in protest, but instead of calling the cops, he throws...
October 19, 2018
Sense and Sensibility
By Jane Austen
“Marianne Dashwood wears her heart on her sleeve, and when she falls in love with the dashing but unsuitable John Willoughby she ignores her sister Elinor’s warning that her impulsive behaviour leaves her open to gossip and innuendo. Meanwhile Elinor, always sensitive to social convention, is struggling to conceal her own romantic disappointment, even from those closest to her. Through their parallel experience of love—and its threatened loss—the sisters learn that sense must m...
Bruiser
““There’s a reason why Brewster can’t have friends – why he can’t care about too many people. Because when he cares about you, things start to happen. Impossible things that can’t be explained. I know, because they’re happening to me.”
When Brontë starts dating Brewster “Bruiser” Rawlins – the guy voted “Most Likely to Get the Death Penalty” her twin brother, Tennyson, isn’t surprised. But then strange things begin to occur. Tennyson and Brontë’s scrapes heal unnaturally fast, and cuts disapp...
October 18, 2018
Dry
“The drought—or the Tap-Out, as everyone calls it—has been going on for a while now. Everyone’s lives have become an endless list of don’ts: don’t water the lawn, don’t fill up your pool, don’t take long showers.
Until the taps run dry.
Suddenly, Alyssa’s quiet suburban street spirals into a warzone of desperation; neighbours and families turned against each other on the hunt for water. And when her parents don’t return and her life—and the life of her brother—is threatened, Alyssa has to mak...
October 16, 2018
Leah on the Offbeat (Maddy’s Review)
By Becky Ambertelli
“Leah Burke—girl-band drummer, master of deadpan, and Simon Spier’s best friend from the award-winning Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda—takes center stage in this novel of first love and senior-year angst.
When it comes to drumming, Leah Burke is usually on beat—but real life isn’t always so rhythmic. An anomaly in her friend group, she’s the only child of a young, single mom, and her life is decidedly less privileged. She loves to draw but is too self-conscious to show i...
October 15, 2018
Broken Vows
“Sister Mary Margaret has been a devout nun for twenty years and has never questioned her devotion to the calling. But when she develops a crush on one of her parishioners, Maryann Foster, the passion between them is irresistible and her vow of celibacy isn’t enough to keep them apart.
But can she love both Maryann and the Church? She prays for an answer, only to question whether God has truly given her a sign or if she is just afraid to leave the only real home she has ever known.
Mary Marga...
