Review and Interview: The Girl Who Could Not Dream by Sarah Beth Durst @sarahbethdurst @HMHKids

Title: The Girl Who Could Not Dream
Author: Sarah Beth Durst
Publisher: Clarion Books (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Release Date: November 3, 2015
Sophie's favorite place in the world is the hidden shop beneath her parent's bookstore where dreams are bought and sold to select and secretive strangers. Sophie is fascinated by dreams -- weird, scary, or magical -- in part because she has never had a single dream of her own.

When the shop's dreams are stolen and her mother and father go mysteriously missing, Sophie must unravel the truth to save her parents. Together with her best friend -- a wisecracking and fanatically loyal monster named Monster -- she must decide who to trust with her family's carefully-guarded secrets. Who will help them, and who will betray them?

Interview

Amber: Thank you so much for stopping by Bibliophilia, Please again for your newest book! Please tell us what has been going on since your last stop?

Sarah Beth Durst: Lots of writing!

I've pretty much pared down my life these days to (1) writing and (2) spending time with my family. Also eating. And sleeping. And last weekend I watched too many episodes of Tiny House Hunters because I simply cannot imagine my book collection ever fitting in a house like that and I was fascinated. But I'm counting that as "spending time with my family" because I didn't watch alone.

Amber: What should we know about your new book, The Girl Who Could Not Dream?

Audiobook Review: The Watchmaker of Filigree Street by Natasha Pulley #BibPleaseReview #audiobook #historicalfiction

Title: The Watchmaker of Filigree Street
Author: Natasha Pulley
Narrator: Thomas Judd
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Audio Publisher: Audible
Release Date: July 14, 2015
Acquired Via: Audible
1883. Thaniel Steepleton returns home to his tiny London apartment to find a gold pocket watch on his pillow. Six months later, the mysterious timepiece saves his life, drawing him away from a blast that destroys Scotland Yard. At last, he goes in search of its maker, Keita Mori, a kind, lonely immigrant from Japan. Although Mori seems harmless, a chain of unexplainable events soon suggests he must be hiding something. When Grace Carrow, an Oxford physicist, unwittingly interferes, Thaniel is torn between opposing loyalties.

The Watchmaker of Filigree Street is a sweeping, atmospheric narrative that takes the reader on an unexpected journey through Victorian London, Japan as its civil war crumbles long-standing traditions, and beyond. Blending historical events with dazzling flights of fancy, it opens doors to a strange and magical past.

Excerpt


My Review

I have been putting off this review for over a month because reviews of mediocre to blah books are the most difficult for me to write. The Watchmaker of Filigree Street would have been put aside if it had started thus, but the "meh" came gradually.

As you probably realize, The Watchmaker of Filigree Street is historical fiction that had quite interesting premise - Thaniel, who can see the color of sounds, gets a watch, finds a bomb threat, and then tries to figure out how the watch had been programmed to save his life. Running parallel to his story is Grace, who wants to be a scientist but is being met with the issue of her lacking a penis in Victorian England. As these two story lines come together, we meet a variety of characters: Mori, the titular watchmaker of Filigree Street; Katsu, Mori's clockwork and kleptomaniacal octopus; and Matsumoto, Grace's Japanese buddy whose wardrobe is often the victim of her cross-dressing adventures. It should all work, but Katsu was the only character I remotely liked by the end, and I detested Mori.

Review: Until the Beginning by Amy Plum (ARC)

Title: Until the Beginning (After the End #2)
Author: Amy Plum
Publisher: HarperTeen (HarperCollins)
Release Date: May 5, 2015
Acquired Via: Around the World ARC Tours
Amy Plum, international bestselling author of the Die for Me series, delivers a heart-pounding adventure perfect for fans of Michael Grant, Veronica Rossi, and Alexandra Bracken. Until the Beginning brings this duology to a stunning and captivating conclusion.

Juneau has been searching for her people and for answers . . . and she is about to find both in the exhilarating sequel to After the End, which Marie Lu, New York Times bestselling author of the Legend series and The Young Elites, called "Wonderfully riveting."

When Juneau's clan disappeared, she lost so much more than her friends and family. She soon discovered everything she thought she knew about her life was a lie. Her people's gifts were actually secret abilities that others wanted, desperately enough to kidnap an entire village.

Juneau and her new companion Miles's cross-country journey to find her clan has led them to a game preserve in New Mexico. Now Juneau's people are finally within reach, and she will stop at nothing to save them. But she has a target on her back too, because unbeknownst to her she is the key to unlocking everything. To rescue her people — and herself — Juneau must discover what she, and her abilities, are truly capable of.

My Review

You can read my review of the first book, After the End, HERE.

I hate to say this about a book that I enjoyed at the time, but I remembered almost nothing about After the End when I started reading Until the Beginning. I recalled the premise, but I couldn't recall the character names or the whole of the situation. And unfortunately for me, Until the Beginning picks up right where book one leaves off.

Blog Tour (Review): The Witch of Painted Sorrows by @MJRose

The Witch of Painted Sorrows Tour Schedule
Welcome to my stop on international-bestselling author M.J. Rose's virtual tour for The Witch of Painted Sorrows that is running from February 16th – April 30th.



Title: The Witch of Painted Sorrows (The Daughters of La Lune #1)
Author: M.J. Rose
Publisher: Atria Books (Simon & Schuster)
Acquired Via: Historical Fiction Virtual Book Tours
Release Date: March 17, 2015
Possession. Power. Passion. New York Times bestselling novelist M. J. Rose creates her most provocative and magical spellbinder yet in this gothic novel set against the lavish spectacle of 1890s Belle Époque Paris.

Sandrine Salome flees New York for her grandmother’s Paris mansion to escape her dangerous husband, but what she finds there is even more menacing. The house, famous for its lavish art collection and elegant salons, is mysteriously closed up. Although her grandmother insists it’s dangerous for Sandrine to visit, she defies her and meets Julien Duplessi, a mesmerizing young architect. Together they explore the hidden night world of Paris, the forbidden occult underground and Sandrine’s deepest desires.

Among the bohemians and the demi-monde, Sandrine discovers her erotic nature as a lover and painter. Then darker influences threaten—her cold and cruel husband is tracking her down and something sinister is taking hold, changing Sandrine, altering her. She’s become possessed by La Lune: A witch, a legend, and a sixteenth-century courtesan, who opens up her life to a darkness that may become a gift or a curse.

This is Sandrine’s “wild night of the soul,” her odyssey in the magnificent city of Paris, of art, love, and witchery.

READ AN EXCERPT.

Praise for The Witch of Painted Sorrows

“Rose’s new series offers her specialty, a unique and captivating supernatural angle, set in an intriguing belle epoque Paris—a perfect match for the author’s lush descriptions, intricate plot and mesmerizing storytelling. A cliffhanger ending will leave readers hungry for the next volume. Sensual, evocative, mysterious and haunting.” – Kirkus Reviews

“A haunting tale of possession.” – Publishers Weekly

My Review

M.J. Rose is one of the first authors that I ever reviewed as a blogger, so when I got the opportunity to read and review The Witch of Painted Sorrows, I was very excited. The Witch of Painted Sorrows is almost as good as what I've read in Rose's Reincarnationist series. I mean, we can all agree that Rose writes some beautiful stuff, right? Right.

Blog Tour (Review & Giveaway): The Thing About Great White Sharks by Rebecca Adams Wright

Title: The Thing About Great White Sharks
Author: Rebecca Adams Wright
Publisher: Little A (Amazon Publishing)
Release Date: February 10, 2015
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours
In this collection’s richly imagined title story, our brutal and resourceful protagonist is determined to protect her family from a murderous, shark-ridden world—at any cost. Elsewhere, an old woman uncovers a sinister plot while looking after a friend’s plants (“Orchids”), and a girl in the war-torn countryside befriends an unlikely creature (“Keeper of the Glass”). In “Barnstormers,” a futuristic flying circus tries to forestall bankruptcy with one last memorable show. At the heart of “Sheila” is the terrible choice a retired judge must make when faced with the destruction of his beloved robotic dog, and “Yuri, in a Blue Dress” follows one of the last survivors of an alien invasion as she seeks help.

Extending from World War II to the far future, these fifteen stories offer a gorgeously observed perspective on our desire for connection and what it means to have compassion—for ourselves, for one another, for our past…and for whatever lies beyond.

My Review

I really enjoy short story anthologies, but I had no idea what a fucking treat The Thing About Great White Sharks would be. (I'm using coarse language to convey feeling, not my trashiness, by the way.) This is literary fiction just the way I like it - with a little bit of magical realism, a touch of sci-fi, and a mix of something else. It's shocking, horrible, and wonderful, all rolled into one.

Blog Tour (Review): Season of the Dragonflies by Sarah Creech

Title: Season of the Dragonflies
Author: Sarah Creech
Publisher: William Morrow (HarperColliins)
Release Date: August 12, 2014
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours
As beguiling as the novels of Alice Hoffman, Adriana Trigiani, Aimee Bender, and Sarah Addison Allen, Season of the Dragonflies is a story of flowers, sisters, practical magic, old secrets, and new love, set in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

For generations, the Lenore women have manufactured a perfume unlike any other, and guarded the unique and mysterious ingredients. Their perfumery, hidden in the quiet rolling hills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, creates one special elixir that secretly sells for millions of dollars to the world’s most powerful—movie stars, politicians, artists, and CEOs. The Lenore’s signature perfume is actually the key to their success.

Willow, the coolly elegant Lenore family matriarch, is the brains behind the company. Her gorgeous, golden-haired daughter Mya is its heart. Like her foremothers, she can “read” scents and envision their power. Willow’s younger daughter, dark-haired, soulful Lucia, claims no magical touch, nor does she want any part of the family business. She left the mountains years ago to make her own way. But trouble is brewing. Willow is experiencing strange spells of forgetfulness. Mya is plotting a coup. A client is threatening blackmail. And most ominously, the unique flowers used in their perfume are dying.

Whoever can save the company will inherit it. Though Mya is the obvious choice, Lucia has begun showing signs of her own special abilities. And her return to the mountains—heralded by a swarm of blue dragonflies—may be the answer they all need.

Praise for Season of the Dragonflies

"Season of the Dragonflies is a magical, romantic, and riveting novel. You won’t be able to put it down, and as soon as you finish reading, you’ll begin waiting for Sarah Creech’s next book. What a dazzling new talent!" — Nina de Gramont, author of Meet Me at the River

My Review

When I was given the option to review Sarah Creech's debut, Season of the Dragonflies, I jumped at it. I know I read a lot of YA and "genre fiction", but I also have a deep love for "literary fiction". (I'm using quotation marks because those aren't my labels, as I enjoy them all.) Season of the Dragonflies did not disappoint, and I read it all in one sitting while suffering from insomnia. It has everything promised in the description, and so much more.

Review: After the End by Amy Plum

Title: After the End (After the End #1)
Author: Amy Plum
Publisher: HarperTeen (HarperCollins)
Acquired Via: Around the World ARC Tours
Release Date: May 6, 2014
"I have no idea what is truth and what is fiction. I'm all I've got now. I can't trust anyone."

World War III has left the world ravaged by nuclear radiation. A lucky few escaped to the Alaskan wilderness. They've survived for the last thirty years by living off the land, being one with nature, and hiding from whoever else might still be out there.

At least, this is what Juneau has been told her entire life.

When Juneau returns from a hunting trip to discover that everyone in her clan has vanished, she sets off to find them. Leaving the boundaries of their land for the very first time, she learns something horrifying: There never was a war. Cities were never destroyed. The world is intact. Everything was a lie.

Now Juneau is adrift in a modern-day world she never knew existed. But while she's trying to find a way to rescue her friends and family, someone else is looking for her. Someone who knows the extraordinary truth about the secrets of her past.

My Review

I have to tell you, it's super hard to write a spoiler-free review for Amy Plum's After the End. You see, there are things that are not as they seem to one of the main characters, Juneau, regarding her life in Alaska. However, there were also some surprises in store for me, as I had this preconceived notion of what this book was going to be.

Early Review: (Don’t You) Forget About Me by Kate Karyus Quinn

Title: (Don't You) Forget About Me
Author: Kate Karyus Quinn
Publisher: HarperTeen (HarperCollins)
Acquired Via: Around the World ARC Tours
Release Date: June 10, 2014
Welcome to Gardnerville.

A place where no one gets sick. And almost no one ever dies.

Except…

There’s a price to pay for paradise. Every fourth year, the strange power that fuels the town exacts its payment by infecting teens with deadly urges. In a normal year in Gardnerville, teens might stop talking to their best friends. In a fourth year, they’d kill them.

Four years ago, Skylar’s sister, Piper, was locked away after leading sixteen of her classmates to a watery grave. Since then, Skylar has lived in a numb haze, struggling to forget her past and dull the pain of losing her sister. But the secrets and memories Piper left behind keep taunting Skylar—whispering that the only way to get her sister back is to stop Gardnerville’s murderous cycle once and for all.

My Review

(Don't You) Forget About Me is a YA novel by Kate Karyus Quinn that goes heavy on the magical realism and the strange. It has been compared to Stephen King's work - and for good reason - but not for the gory horror that many expect but the exceedingly queer world-building that you may not understand until the very end - if at all. (Don't You) Forget About Me's setting of Gardnerville and main character, Skylar, will capture your interest but leave you scratching your head until the last chapters.

Review: The Ring and the Crown by Melissa de la Cruz

Title: The Ring and the Crown
Author: Melissa de la Cruz
Publisher: Disney Hyperion
Acquired Via: Around the World ARC Tours
Release Date: April 1, 2014
Princess Marie-Victoria, heir to the Lily Throne, and Aelwyn Myrddn, bastard daughter of the Mage of England, grew up together. But who will rule, and who will serve?

Quiet and gentle, Marie has never lived up to the ambitions of her mother, Queen Eleanor the Second, Supreme Ruler of the Franco-British Empire. With the help of her Head Merlin, Emrys, Eleanor has maintained her stranglehold on the world's only source of magic. She rules the most powerful empire the world has ever seen.

But even with the aid of Emrys' magic, Eleanor's extended lifespan is nearing its end. The princess must marry and produce an heir or the Empire will be vulnerable to its greatest enemy, Prussia. The two kingdoms must unite to end the war, and the only solution is a match between Marie and Prince Leopold VII, heir to the Prussian throne. But Marie has always loved Gill, her childhood friend and soldier of the Queen's Guard.

Together, Marie and Aelwyn, a powerful magician in her own right, come up with a plan. Aelwyn will take on Marie's face, allowing the princess to escape with Gill and live the quiet life she's always wanted. And Aelwyn will get what she's always dreamed of--the chance to rule. But the court intrigue and hunger for power in Lenoran England run deeper than anyone could imagine. In the end, there is only rule that matters in Eleanor's court: trust no one.

My Review

The Ring and the Crown is a YA fantasy novel by Melissa de la Cruz that I would love to see more books like. It is a well-constructed blend of historical fiction, alternate history, fantasy, and romance. The characters are all fascinating and demand your interest, keeping you glued to the pages. By the way, did I mention that there was royalty, scandal, and swooning? No?! Well, there is, and it is glorious!

Early Review: Rebel Belle by Rachel Hawkins

Title: Rebel Belle
Author: Rachel Hawkins
Publisher: Putnam Juvenile (Penguin)
Acquired Via: Around the World ARC Tours
Release Date: April 8, 2014
Harper Price, peerless Southern belle, was born ready for a Homecoming tiara. But after a strange run-in at the dance imbues her with incredible abilities, Harper's destiny takes a turn for the seriously weird. She becomes a Paladin, one of an ancient line of guardians with agility, super strength and lethal fighting instincts.

Just when life can't get any more disastrously crazy, Harper finds out who she's charged to protect: David Stark, school reporter, subject of a mysterious prophecy and possibly Harper's least favorite person. But things get complicated when Harper starts falling for him--and discovers that David's own fate could very well be to destroy Earth.

With snappy banter, cotillion dresses, non-stop action and a touch of magic, this new young adult series from bestseller Rachel Hawkins is going to make y'all beg for more.

My Review

Rebel Belle by Rachel Hawkins is my favorite novel to have a protagonist with superpowers in a long time. Let that sink in a little. Now, let me know you that lately all superhero/superpower novels have earned the glorious "DNF" badge from me, so much so that I was starting to believe that I did not like either of those as a plot device. Thankfully, Rebel Belle exists and showed me that superpowers books can be smart, sassy, and utterly entertaining.

I am so tired of having a heroine that has this mediocre life, meh self-esteem, and ends up being this dazzling diamond-in-the-rough. Harper Jane Price is just the opposite of that - she is a special snowflake, but only because she's worked her ass off for it her entire life. She's the Homecoming Queen-overachiever who heads various clubs and committees, is the president of SGA (student government association), and is in the running for valedictorian. Do I fault her for any of that? Nope, because we're shown her dedication to all of those things. I also like how she's rounded out into a realistic being by the depth added to her regarding her sister, Leigh-Anne (which thankfully was not overdone), and how she navigates her relationships with Ryan and Bee without revealing the truth behind her strange behavior. (Face it - if your best friend told YOU that s/he suddenly had superpowers and was a Paladin, you'd think they had boarded the crazy train.) Harper's response to her new powers is also hilarious.

First of all, I had gotten totally screwed on the "origin story" front. All superheroes have origin stories, like how Bruce Wayne's parents get killed and he goes to Tibet or whatever, and Superman is an alien, and Spiderman had that radioactive spider. Me? I kissed a janitor in the school bathroom. — p. 56, ARC

Also, how could I not like a character who says "no thank you" to a lifelong epic quest. Personally, I'd have just run when faced with the same.

The mythology/fantasy aspect of Rebel Belle was a refreshing change in a young adult novel. I haven't seen many (if any) mentions of Charlemange or Paladins - especially in an Alabama high school. I won't lie, if I had been told only "Paladin YA novel", the first thing on my mind would not have been a novel centered on a Cotillion-ready cheerleader. I know it's wrong to think it, but it's usually the boys who get to be the magical knight defenders. Want an even better gender twist? Too bad, read the book.

Rebel Belle was a fun book that colored outside the lines of YA. If you like your heroines level-headed and outside of the YA-heroine box, give Rebel Belle a try. You won't be disappointed.

- 4/5 Stars -

Buy Links
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Book Depository | Fishpond


To satisfy FTC guidelines, I am disclosing that I received an advance copy of the book briefly for reviewing purposes through Around the World ARC Tours in exchange for an honest review. The book was likely provided to the tour by the publisher or author, which has in no way affected the outcome of my review. All opinions expressed are rambling, honest, and completely my own.

Review: Blythewood by Carol Goodman

Title: Blythewood
Author: Carol Goodman
Publisher: Viking Juvenile
Acquired Via: Around the World ARC Tours
Release Date: October 8, 2013
Welcome to Blythewood.

At seventeen, Avaline Hall has already buried her mother, survived a horrific factory fire, and escaped from an insane asylum. Now she’s on her way to Blythewood Academy, the elite boarding school in New York’s mist-shrouded Hudson Valley that her mother attended—and was expelled from. Though she’s afraid her high society classmates won’t accept a factory girl in their midst, Ava is desperate to unravel her family’s murky past, discover the identity of the father she’s never known, and perhaps finally understand her mother’s abrupt suicide. She’s also on the hunt for the identity of the mysterious boy who rescued her from the fire. And she suspects the answers she seeks lie at Blythewood.

But nothing could have prepared her for the dark secret of what Blythewood is, and what its students are being trained to do. Haunted by dreams of a winged boy and pursued by visions of a sinister man who breathes smoke, Ava isn’t sure if she’s losing her mind or getting closer to the truth. And the more rigorously Ava digs into the past, the more dangerous her present becomes.

Vivid and atmospheric, full of mystery and magic, this romantic page-turner by bestselling author Carol Goodman tells the story of a world on the brink of change and the girl who is the catalyst for it all.

My Review

I almost didn't read this book. You know how it goes - you get busy, life poops on you, blah blah blah... I said to hell with my reading schedule, and I read this book when I was already behind. I spent extra time with the book because it released after my turn with the ARC. I wouldn't say that I couldn't put the book down, but I picked it up at every opportunity that I had.

Review: Shadows by Robin McKinley

Title: Shadows
Author: Robin McKinley
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books (Penguin)
Acquired Via: Around the World ARC Tours
Release Date: September 26, 2013
A compelling and inventive novel set in a world where science and magic are at odds, by Robin McKinley, the Newberry-winning author of The Hero and the Crown and The Blue Sword, as well as the classic titles Beauty, Chalice, Spindle’s End, Pegasus and Sunshine.

Maggie knows something’s off about Val, her mom’s new husband. Val is from Oldworld, where they still use magic, and he won’t have any tech in his office-shed behind the house. But—more importantly—what are the huge, horrible, jagged, jumpy shadows following him around? Magic is illegal in Newworld, which is all about science. The magic-carrying gene was disabled two generations ago, back when Maggie’s great-grandmother was a notable magician. But that was a long time ago.

Then Maggie meets Casimir, the most beautiful boy she has ever seen. He’s from Oldworld too—and he’s heard of Maggie’s stepfather, and has a guess about Val’s shadows. Maggie doesn’t want to know . . . until earth-shattering events force her to depend on Val and his shadows. And perhaps on her own heritage.

In this dangerously unstable world, neither science nor magic has the necessary answers, but a truce between them is impossible. And although the two are supposed to be incompatible, Maggie’s discovering the world will need both to survive.

My Review

I am a long-time fan of Robin McKinley's work, ever since I was in middle school, and I've read quite a few of her novels. (Most of them multiple times, and we're not going to talk about The Hero and the Crown.) When I started Shadows, I had my heart set on the world-building or characters to rival those beloved reads. Instead, I got a story which, if I had to wrap it up with ony one word, is "meh".

Blog Tour (Audiobook Review & Giveaway): Zoe & Zak and the Ghost Leopard by Lars Guignard

Zoe & Zak and the Ghost Leopard Tour Schedule



Title: Zoe & Zak and the Ghost Leopard (Zoe & Zak Adventures #1)
Author: Lars Guignard
Publisher: Fantastic Press
Acquired Via: CBB Book Promotions
Release Date: February 26, 2013
Zoe and Zak are lost in exotic India, where gods and magic still exist. Before they can find their way home, they just have to do one little thing...

...Save a mythical creature from an ancient evil that wants to rule the world.

When Zoe Guire goes along on her mom's business trip to India, things get very weird, very quickly. An elephant god speaks to her from the bottom of a swimming pool... She and her classmate Zak get locked in a trunk and shipped off to a strange city near the foothills of the Himalayas... and a crazy snake charmer tells them they've been chosen to protect a mythical creature called the Ghost Leopard from an ancient evil that wants to take over the world.

As they travel deeper into the majestic mountains known as the Realm of the Gods, things get even weirder. If she and Zak want to make it back to their parents, they're going to have to tap into powers they never knew existed.

Because if they don't, things will never be the same for any of us ever again.

My Review
Zoe & Zak and the Ghost Leopard by Lars Guignard is a super fun audiobook that I listened to over the course of about two weeks. It is about two kids who go to school together who happen to run into each other in India while traveling with their parents. They weren't really friends at the start of the novel, but we see the progression of their relationship. (Not THAT kind of relationship - they're eleven.) It reminds me of The 39 Clues series mixed with magical realism.

Blog Tour (Review): The Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo

Title: The Ghost Bride
Author: Yangsze Choo
Publisher: William Morrow Books (HarperCollins)
Release Date: August 6, 2013
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours
"One evening, my father asked me if I would like to become a ghost bride..."

Though ruled by British overlords, the Chinese of colonial Malaya still cling to ancient customs. And in the sleepy port town of Malacca, ghosts and superstitions abound.

Li Lan, the daughter of a genteel but bankrupt family, has few prospects. But fate intervenes when she receives an unusual proposal from the wealthy and powerful Lim family. They want her to become a ghost bride for the family's only son, who recently died under mysterious circumstances. Rarely practiced, a traditional ghost marriage is used to placate a restless spirit. Such a union would guarantee Li Lan a home for the rest of her days, but at a terrible price.

After an ominous visit to the opulent Lim mansion, Li Lan finds herself haunted not only by her ghostly would-be suitor, but also by her desire for the Lim's handsome new heir, Tian Bai. Night after night, she is drawn into the shadowy parallel world of the Chinese afterlife, with its ghost cities, paper funeral offerings, vengeful spirits and monstrous bureaucracy—including the mysterious Er Lang, a charming but unpredictable guardian spirit. Li Lan must uncover the Lim family's darkest secrets—and the truth about her own family—before she is trapped in this ghostly world forever.

My Review

Being as a tend to read a lot of young adult novels, it is easy for me to forget out delicious a well-written piece of literary fiction can be. The Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo is a beautiful novel that satiated my adult reading hungers. Journeying with Li Lan through the spirit world and watching her meet various spirits unfold the mysteries surrounding the Lim family and her own was mesmerizing.