Hi friends, here are the rest of my June review books! Most of these were really great!

Thirty to Sixty Days by Alikay Wood
Where Echoes Die by Courtney Gould
Whether Violent or Natural by Natasha Calder
The Infinite Miles by Hannah Fergesen
Night’s Edge by Liz Kerin

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Thirty to Sixty Days by Alikay Wood
Published by Amulet Books on June 20, 2023
Pages: 320
Format:eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

A hilarious and irreverent coming-of-age YA novel in which three teens facing uncertain futures embark on a madcap adventure that challenges each of their identities

Hattie Larken doesn’t know if she’s ever really been real in her life. A compulsive liar with a quick-witted response to everything, she’s willing to do whatever it takes to just skate through the rest of high school until she can graduate and escape it the mind-numbing monotony of this town, the guilt of everything that happened with her dad, and the debt that her mom’s dealing with that she feels responsible for.

But then Hattie finds out she’s dying. Not like in that overdramatic way that people sometimes say they’re dying. She’s literally dying. Apparently, she was exposed to a parasite because of a mistake her mom’s company made. (And no, the irony of that all is not lost on Hattie…) And she’s not the only one. Two other kids from her class also have been exposed to the Carmen, who seems to be totally perfect, with the class presidency, a loving family, and a totally beautiful girlfriend; and Albie, a quiet kid who survived childhood cancer only to deal with this, which feels like an incredibly cruel joke from the universe.

Hattie, Albie, and Carmen are told they only have thirty to sixty days to live. But instead of just sitting around a hospital and waiting to die, the three kids form an unlikely alliance to live the last days of their lives out to the fullest. Stealing and sailing a boat to Miami? Absolutely. Adopting the turtle that a random college student hands to them? Of course—they couldn’t leave Scooter to fend for himself! Sneaking into the sold-out music festival in town? You better believe it! And if Hattie just happens to find a way to raise some money for her mom through filming all their misadventures—well, she’s not going to not do that then.

Snarky, bold, and deeply real, Thirty to Sixty Days examines the ways that three teens grapple with the thread of imminent death—and how each ultimately discovers what life ought to be.

This is such a charming gem of a book! If you are looking for something to make you laugh and lift your heart, this is the one for you! Now look, it does require a bit of suspension of disbelief, but I promise, it is worth it. And here is why I say it did require some suspension of disbelief: why, just why, would you test a deadly entity without first making sure you could reverse its effects? That was my one gripe with the story, but I was able to put it aside and fully enjoy the book.

First, despite the whole “death imminent” bit, it was funny! The characters, and the writing style, were just very clever and amusing, and it made the reading experience so enjoyable. Hattie, our main character, is… well she’s kind of a mess of a person? And she knows this about herself, and fully admits it, which is kind of refreshing. She’s got a lot of unresolved issues, and frankly, a lot of them stem from her own behavior and choices. She also feels extra guilty because she takes responsibility for her mom’s debt, which caused her mom to have to take a job she didn’t want to take, which lead to the current debacle, but that’s a whole other story.  And one Hattie will have to figure out for herself (and you will have to read about!)

But Hattie isn’t the only one who has maybe been infected! No, two other kids from her school, Carmen (wildly popular, class president, seemingly perfect life) and Albie (cancer survivor who can’t seem to move past the “poor cancer kid” stage) have also been exposed. Hattie thinks it absurd for them to sit around in  the hospital and wallow, so they set out on an adventure to live while they still can. And what an adventure it is! They steal and boat and head to Miami, where all kinds of entertaining shenanigans ensue.

And while all of their travels and adventures are quite fun to read about, the real gem of this book is the character development. We already know from the start that Hattie has a lot to work through, but it turns out that she isn’t the only one. Albie and Carmen both have plenty of work to do themselves. It’s really heartwarming to see them all navigate their own journey, as well as their relationships with each other and their families and friends who wait at home. And you simply cannot help but cheer them on while they do so!

Bottom Line: This is equal parts fun and heartwarming, and I loved every minute of Hattie and Company’s adventures!

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Where Echoes Die by Courtney Gould
Published by Wednesday Books on June 20, 2023
Pages: 352
Format:eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

Beck Birsching has been adrift since the death of her mother, a brilliant but troubled investigative reporter. She finds herself unable to stop herself from slipping into memories of happier days, clamoring for a time when things were normal. So when a mysterious letter in her mother’s handwriting arrives in the mail with the words Come and find me, pointing to a town called Backravel, Beck hopes that it may hold the answers.

But when Beck and her sister Riley arrive in Backravel, Arizona it’s clear that there’s something off about the town. There are no cars, no cemeteries, no churches. The town is a mix of dilapidated military structures and new, shiny buildings, all overseen by the town’s gleaming treatment center high on a plateau. No one seems to remember when they got there, and the only people who seem to know more than they’re letting on is the town’s enigmatic leader and his daughter, Avery.

As the sisters search for answers about their mother, Beck and Avery become more drawn together, and their unexpected connection brings up emotions Beck has buried since her mother’s death. Beck is desperate to hold onto the way things used to be, and when she starts losing herself in Backravel and its connection to her mother, will there be a way for Beck to pull herself out?

In her sophomore novel Courtney Gould draws readers into the haunting town of Backravel and explores grief, the weight of not letting go of the past, first love, and the bonds between sisters, mothers and daughters.

TW at start of book: “Much of the thematic material in Where Echoes Die involves, grief, loss of a family member, and emotional abuse at the hands of family. This book also involves intense descriptions of mental illness, PTSD, and memory loss. For a more detailed description of sensitive content, please visit gouldbooks.com/books/wed.”

Where Echoes Die was a very atmospheric and haunting story about two sisters who are searching for information about a town that kept drawing their mother to it during the last years of her life. Well- one sister is, the other sister is kind of tagging along because she is a good sister. Beck is deadset on figuring out why their mom was so enamored with the small, seemingly random town of Backravel, Arizona. Honestly even the name suggests you needn’t pay it a visit, right? But since their mother’s passing, they have to go live with their father in Texas, so they take a little side trip on their way there. They lie to Dear Ol’ Dad, of course, but it still feels like incredibly irresponsible parenting to let your teen girls deal with the death of their mother (and only involved parent, from the sound of things) and then drive themselves across the country. Even if they lied about the stop (something about hanging out with a friend’s relative at the beach)… Dad sucks, is what I am saying.

So on one hand, it’s a wee bit Parent-In-YA-Syndrome, but on the other, it certainly explains why Beck is going to be more concerned about her dead mother’s secrets than getting to dad’s place. I’ll allow it. Of course, nothing in this town is as it seems, and people seem… off. Everyone seems suspicious of Beck and Riley stopping by, which in itself is strange. There is only one place available to stay in the town (a very janky Airbnb, which is basically an RV on some rando’s property, seems totally legit and not at all terrifying for two teenage girls). Anyway, point is, maybe the girls should just head to the beach with Fake Grandma?

But they don’t, obviously, or this would be a dull story! No, instead Beck dives right into  her search, consequences be damned, and what she finds will definitely not be what she expects. And I will leave you at that, because what fun would it be if I said any more? During the story though, Beck will form some relationships, and have to figure out her relationship with her sister, and of course, come to terms with what happened to their mother. So it is definitely emotive, and certainly mysterious!

Bottom Line: A solid sophomore offering from Courtney Gould. I felt quite invested in this creepy town as well as Beck’s journey. Can’t wait for more from this author!

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Whether Violent or Natural by Natasha Calder
Published by The Overlook Press on June 27, 2023
Pages: 224
Format:ARC, eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

An unnerving, sinister, and brilliant dystopian novel about the choices we make at the end of the world, posing the question: Who can you trust when there’s almost no one left?

Years after complete antibiotic resistance has brought about global devastation, Kit ekes out an existence on a remote island alongside the taciturn Crevan, who has more recently fled the mainland. With once-curable diseases running riot, desperate measures are in place there: Those not yet infected are given experimental vaccines, and those for whom it’s already too late are culled. But Kit and Crevan are safe, protected on their island by a collapsing castle that holds a greenhouse and a well-stocked bunker within its ruins.

When a woman washes ashore—near drowned but clinging to life—the question of her fate threatens the fragile balance of Kit and Crevan’s isolated world. While Crevan wants to keep her alive, Kit isn’t so sure. And there’s more to wrestle with: Kit and Crevan each have secrets—secrets they have been keeping both from each other and from themselves. As the crisis brought about by the drowned woman’s appearance consumes them, the fictions of their shared existence crumble, and the truth begins to emerge.

Whether Violent or Natural is a startlingly original and thrilling novel for readers of Susanna Clarke’s Piranesi, Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle, and Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven. In the tenseness of its plotting, the gradual unfolding of truth, and in the strange and gripping intensity of its narrator’s voice, Whether Violent or Natural is an intelligent, unputdownable novel that welcomes a huge new talent to the genre.

I really wanted to like this book. Hell, I really tried to like this book! Alas, friends, I did not like this book. I had problems, they were many, and I can’t find a ton of redeeming bits, though it wasn’t all bad so I will try? The concept of antibiotic resistance is certainly timely and relevant and plausible, and I like that it was presented as such a dire situation. Because it would be, of course. I don’t really get the connection with plastic, but whatever, that was the least of my concerns.

So let’s talk about those concerns. Or things I simply did not like. First, we have our main character, “Kit”. At first, I legitimately thought that Kit was somewhere between ages 10-12, and was therefore fairly certain that Crevan was a pedophile. But! He is not, because ma’am is at least 27 years old. Which is shocking, because she one million percent has the mindset of a preteen at best. Now, the whole book is narrated through the rambling, off-putting perspective of Kit, who is seemingly not a reliable narrator. Crevan is…well we don’t really know what his role is for most of the story. She calls him “daddy” a lot, which absolutely scarred me for life, but he isn’t really in a caretaker role as much as the wording suggests? I mean, she is a grownass adult, and they even have some… weirdly inappropriate moments? Crevan seems to hate her as much as I did at times, so I figured at least he knows this is weird?

So THEN they find an unconscious woman in the water, and Crevan rescues her because he is not Satan incarnate I guess. This is where things really took a turn for the worse for me, because Kit would have just let the lady wash away because she is The Worst™. The bit that bugged me the most here is that this woman, who is on death’s door, if you recall, has a cleft lip. And Kit is… rudely fascinated with it? Look- this may just be a personal sensitivity that I have, or maybe the fact that I was already irritated with Kit, but the way she spoke of the woman bothered me. And THEN if this was not bad enough… View Spoiler »The author made the woman with the cleft a villain. Like a fucking Disney movie, where all people with craniofacial defects must be “bad”.  Oh and Kit murdered her, long before she knew that she was a “bad guy”- just because Kit did not want to “share” Crevan’s attention because Kit is a deranged psychopath  « Hide Spoiler And that was IT for me, this book could not be redeemed, sorry not sorry.

Now, as I said in the spoiler tag, for those of you who did not read it, I am pretty sure Kit is suffering from some kind of severe mental illness. But that isn’t addressed at any point, so I can’t even give it points for like “well at least they talk about what a mess this woman is” because nope. Also, there is a big ol’ twist at one point that kind of made no sense for me narratively, and here’s why: View Spoiler »If Kit is supposed to be unreliable, why am I supposed to buy that everything she said in the book thus far was a lie, but THIS particular bout of spewed consciousness was in fact the truth? « Hide Spoiler

Bottom Line: This was a mess. Actually, it may have been a two star mess until it made me mad, but the only thing saving it from being zero now is the actual world issues.

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The Infinite Miles by Hannah Fergesen
Published by Blackstone Publishing on June 20, 2023
Pages: 320
Format:eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

Fans of Claudia Gray and Kelly Link will love Hannah Fergesen's wild and poignant debut -- a wacky time-traveling sci-fi odyssey wrapped in an elegiac ode to lost friendship and a clever homage to Doctor Who . To save the future, she must return to the beginning Three years after her best friend Peggy went missing, Harper Starling is lost. Lost in her dead-end job, lost in her grief. All she has are regrets and reruns of her favorite science fiction show, Infinite Voyage . Then Peggy returns and demands to be taken to the Argonaut, the fictional main character of Infinite Voyage . But the Argonaut is just that ... fictional. Until the TV hero himself appears and spirits Harper away from her former best friend. Traveling through time, he explains that Peggy used to travel with him but is now under the thrall of an alien enemy known as the Incarnate -- one that has destroyed countless solar systems. Then he leaves Harper in 1971. Stranded in the past, Harper must find a way to end the Incarnate's thrall ... without the help of the Argonaut. But the cosmos are nothing like the technicolor stars of the TV show she loves, and if Harper can't find it in herself to believe -- in the Argonaut, in Peggy, and most of all, in herself -- she'll be the Incarnate's next casualty, along with the rest of the universe.

The Infinite Miles was one of my most anticipated books of the year, and I was not let down! I loved this story about friendship and fandom, set across time and space. My one minor qualm was that some of the more technical stuff went a wee bit above my head, but that did not take away my enjoyment of this great story! I am going to tell you why I liked it, because that is always fun!

• It felt like a love story to fandom. So, as likely everyone reading this knows, I am inordinately enamored with The 100. Like, it has become a huge part of my life, even after Jason tried to ruin our lives it ended. So from the start, I could relate to Harper and Peggy’s love for Infinite Voyage, and how deeply it had rooted itself in their lives and friendship. I know this is an homage of sorts to Doctor Who, but the truth is, anyone who has felt deeply about any fandom can relate to this story.
• The characters were great. I loved Harper, I really did. She just felt so realistic, so… average, and I don’t mean that in a negative way! Just that she could be any of us, having the ups and downs of regular life, when she’s thrown into this time traveling, alien mess. And so, she fumbles. A lot, because we would too. But she clearly has the best interests of her friends, and even strangers, at heart, which made me feel that much more invested.
• I also really enjoyed the world building. So, this alien collective mind thing reminded me of The 100, where they are kind of a hive mind of sorts? And just like in The 100, these beings somehow got the idea that they should be able to control all the species, which is really annoying, especially if you are part of a species that doesn’t fancy being controlled, as humans are. So that was compelling in itself, but the time travel stuff was really fascinating too. I don’t really want to tell you much about what kind of time travel this is (is it weird that there are like, “brands” of time travel? Well- I worry that if I tell you what “brand” this is it’ll give away too much, so shh), but I haven’t seen a ton of its kind, and I really was intrigued by it!
• There are a lot of great twists! I love when I am like “ahhh so THAT is why that thing happened!” and everything falls into place and makes you feel satisfied. There is a lot of that in this story, and I dug it. A lot.

Bottom Line: While the time travel and alien aspects are awesome, the warmth and strength of the characters is what made me really love this book!

 

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Night's Edge by Liz Kerin
Series: Night's Edge #1
Published by Tor Nightfire on June 20, 2023
Pages: 288
Format:eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

“This one’s a killer.” ―Erika T. Wurth, author of White Horse

Liz Kerin’s Night’s Edge is a sun-drenched novel about the darkest secrets we hide and how monstrous we can be to the ones we love most.

Having a mom like Izzy meant Mia had to grow up fast. No extracurriculars, no inviting friends over, and definitely no dating. The most important Tell no one of Izzy’s hunger – the kind only blood can satisfy.

But Mia is in her twenties now and longs for a life of her own. One where she doesn’t have to worry about anyone discovering their terrible secret, or breathing down her neck. When Mia meets rebellious musician Jade she dares to hope she’s found a way to leave her home – and her mom – behind.

It just might be Mia’s only chance of getting out alive.

“ Night’s Edge is a gruesome and surprisingly heartfelt page-turner.” ―Alexis Henderson, author of House of Hunger

Sure, this is a vampire story, and it is often times horror-y, but it is also… really nice? Heartfelt? Coming of age? There are a lot of genre-defying terms I could likely use here, but know that it isn’t all of any one thing. It isn’t your straight up blood-drinking horror, nor is it a typical story of a young woman trying to figure out her life. It’s… a pretty awesome mix of those, basically.

We meet Mia, who is having a pretty rough time. I mean, first of all, she is literally her mom’s meal source, after her mom was turned into a vampire thirteen years ago. Imagine having to drain your own blood on the nightly, so your own mom can consume it? That is what Mia’s got going on. And, she’s trying to live a somewhat normal life while this goes on. She works at a bookstore, but for reasons you can imagine, she doesn’t have anyone close to her outside her mom. It’s been her and her mom, and only her and her mom, for more than a decade. And when Mia learns that her mom has been in contact with the awful dude who turned her… well you can see how Mia would be questioning everything.

When Mia meets Jade, she feels drawn to her in ways that are new and exciting. Jade is… well Jade has problems of her own, and she’s kind of a mess, but Mia should be able to make her own typical young adult mistakes, right? And not have to worry about who her mom is going to have for dinner. But alas. So Mia has some difficult choices to make: either she keeps on living, quite literally, for her mom, or she has to finally muster the courage to make her own choices. It isn’t easy, especially because she has been so sheltered and closed off from the rest of the world. But I loved that we get to take this journey with Mia- all while enjoying some very cool vampire culture and mythology! I was so excited when I found out that this book was going to have a sequel, because I cannot wait for more!

Bottom Line: Growing up is hard, especially when your only parent doesn’t want to chat at the dinner table, but feast on you at it.

Have you read any of these books? Plan to? Let us chat about them!