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CozyBookNook

@cozybooknook

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Lacey
Reader, spreadsheet nerd, introvert
Thrillers • Mystery • Fantasy

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My @bookofthemonth choices:
- When the Night Comes Knocking: There’s a monster in the Appalachian Mountains where Jane and her brother are trapped in a store.

- I Must Betray You: An add on from an author I enjoy reading for my birthday month. A historical thriller set in Romania.

My @aardvarkbookclub choice:
- Bodies of Magic: A dark academic fantasy book about five magical mages and one dead body.

Q: What’s the last book you purchased? by @cozybooknook

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7 days ago

✨Book Review✨

Thank you @hsalvaurence for sending me a digital copy of this book.

This is a super short novella about a very dysfunctional family set in a fairytale world. A ghastly human mother raises one half fae son she doesn’t want while pining for her human son that was stolen from her. The story not only addresses the question of what we would do for family, but also why do we take advantage of what we don’t realize we have. I find the latter so relatable, but I guess we all have family drama.

It’s a bit dark and gritty, so naturally I thoroughly enjoyed it. It’s a quick read that’s very entertaining.

Q: What’s your favorite fairytale, dark or otherwise? by @cozybooknook

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14 days ago

✈️Book Tour✈️

Thank you @bibliolifestyle @blackstonepublishing #partner for the book.

I’ve read part of this one. It’s part travel book, part memoir. Jen is a travel influencer who just went through a major break up. Each chapter is named after a location she visits. Part of the chapter is about the location and all the perks she receives as a travel influencer and part is about her personal life. I preferred the destination info to the personal info. The places she visits are amazing, and I’ve been enjoying all the details.

SYNOPSIS:

In All You Need Is Flights, Jen Ruiz transforms an unexpected breakup into a gift: the catalyst for an inner journey toward greater self-worth through another year of solo travel adventures.

A major life transformation starting on your thirtieth birthday, leading to an entirely different and exciting new career? Jen Ruiz (aka @jenonajetplane) has been there and done just that ... and shared that first adventure with readers in 12 Trips in 12 Months.

Getting dumped and having to restart your life completely (again!) just before your thirty-fifth birthday? Definitely not on the agenda.

Abruptly single, Jen made a wish on an Egyptian statue, which became the catalyst for another year of adventure and personal growth.

In All You Need Is Flights, readers are whisked away again for a year of exploration and growth as Jen regains her solo travel magic and learns to love herself. Whether she is eating pizza on a volcano in Guatemala, mending ceramics with gold in Japan, marveling at the Moai on Easter Island (Rapa Nui), or walking among the giant sequoia trees in Yosemite National Park, this intrepid travel writer faces health scares and mountain climbs with curiosity and her signature wit—all while discovering what truly matters and how setbacks can make you stronger.

Q: Where is your favorite place to travel? by @cozybooknook

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23 days ago

💙Book Review💙

Thank you @simonandschuster and #netgalley for the e-ARC.

My first Emiko Jean books were the Tokyo Ever After duology, which are YA romance. They were fun reads about a girl who discovers she’s a Japanese princess. Emiko wrote her first mystery/thriller in 2024, The Return of Ellie Black. It’s such a good book and where we were introduced to Detective Chelsey Calhoun.

Calhoun is back in this second novel in a series. A woman is killed and her daughter vanishes. Calhoun races against the clock to find the missing girl, which uncovers a legacy of violence that spans Japan to Seattle. We also learn more about Calhoun’s past in this one.

First, there spoilers for the first book in this book. So read the first one before this one if you don’t want spoilers. Second, I enjoy Calhoun as a character. She’s great at her job and I like how the author explores her background so we learn a little more in each book. While the mystery comes to a conclusion, questions about her background are still lingering and I predict there will be another book. Third, I honestly was just meh about the mystery until about the halfway point. There are multiple POV and I didn’t enjoy them all until about the halfway point. The book takes a turn that I wasn’t expecting and I became much more interested. I also appreciate how the author incorporates Japanese culture into each of her books. It ended up being a solid read for me.

Q: What are you reading this week? by @cozybooknook

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a month ago

✨Book Review✨

This book has been everywhere. I’m not normally a big romance reader, but I’ve been dipping my toe into romance here and there throughout the year so I thought I’d give this one a try.

I really enjoyed it. This is a fake dating premise where the female protagonist, Dolly, is a bit of an eldest daughter. She’s an adult who is a teacher with two or three side hustles. She’s a single mom and still visits her hometown often to help out her dad and brother. She runs into Stewart Whitfield, a member of the wealthiest family in Whitfield, Rhode Island, her hometown. He’s in a bit of an image crisis and offers to pay her to date him so he doesn’t lose his chance for a promotion in the family business.

Dolly really shows some growth throughout the book. She tends to take care of everything and everyone and it was great to see her start to out herself first. Stewart also showed some growth. His sister is a side character I would love to know more about. It’s a sweet book that pulled at my little black heart strings. I understand the high praise.

Q: What book have you read recently that is outside of your usual favorite genres? by @cozybooknook

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2 months ago

✨Book Review✨

Thank you @jrmann.author and @booksirens for the #gifted book.

Wow. This is categorized as a science fiction book and I guess it is because I do really hope that it is truly fiction, but it could definitely be seen as more of a horror book because the edge it toes isn’t totally unrealistic.

Alex is our main character and this is set in London in 2040 or so. Forgive me if I’m wrong, my copy is electronic and it’s hard to go back and skim for details. He’s a finance guy who serves the ultra wealthy. He is assigned a case from a colleague who has gone missing. As he goes through his notes he stumbles upon something he shouldn’t have stumbled upon and is immediately fired. As he further investigates he pairs up with an old friend turned activist, Mira. This is a dystopian world. AI has replaced most people in the work place and many are without jobs or homes. The job he was fired from has been building Banyan, a secret network of underground high end sanctuaries to save a select few from this AI driven world.

I mean, it’s fiction, right? This is definitely a thriller and I flew through it. There has to be a second book based on that ending and I can’t wait to read it. My only critique is that I wish the characters were fleshed out a bit more so I felt more connected to them.

Q: What are you reading this weekend? by @cozybooknook

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2 months ago

⭐️Book Review⭐️

Thank you @bookmarked and #netgalley for the #gifted book.

This one pubbed yesterday.

The blurb on this one does compare it directly to The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and I do think it’s a great comparison. This one gives a little more drama, though. The Evelyn Hugo book isn’t my favorite, I liked this one more. Possibly because of the dead body, but we’ll get to that.

This is about an iconic feud between two movie stars. Nadine Heywood and Harper Moore have been rivals since drama school. They feed off the drama, and have built their careers off the drama. There has also always been an underlying tension behind it all. Then Harper shows up at Nadine’s door covered in blood.

The story flips between a present day documentary about Nadine and Harper and a history of the rivals told from Nadine’s POV. You know right away that Harper has been arrested.

Now, set your expectations accordingly. The first genre listed on Goodreads for this book is thriller and this is not that. This is more of a salacious, drama filled read with a hint of mystery to it. It’s not about finding out who killed the deceased, it’s about finding out who will be blamed for it and will it stick. The dead body doesn’t show up until well into the second half of the book and this one is 448 pages.

But, it roped me right in and I couldn’t look away. The drama is over the top, very reality TV-ish, and the murder kept me flipping those pages. It’s also incredibly well written with many nostalgic nods to the past, as it is set in the 90s and early aughts.

Q: What’s your favorite decade to read about?

#BetterThanRevenge by @cozybooknook

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2 months ago

✨Book Review✨

Thank you @celadonbooks and #netgalley for the #gifted ARC.

It seems like I’m perpetually a week behind on ARCs. The good news is that this one pubbed last week so you can get a copy now.

This is the second in the Jeep Mullane series and you don’t have to have read the first one to read this one. However, if you do want to read the first one, I recommend you reading it first as this one does spoil the first one.

Jeep (his first and middle initials are GP, hence Jeep), is the Police Chief of a small town on Long Island, which is where he grew up. He is a former NYPD detective. As a storm blows through his town the assistant of his close childhood friend calls him for help. Jenny has been attacked.

Jenny is adamant that she doesn’t want it investigated and refuses to file a report, so Jeep decides to investigate without her help.

The story is told over five action packed present days and several flashbacks to the past. This is a crime thriller and I enjoyed the read as Jeep worked the clues and uncovered the answers. But I also enjoyed the flashbacks and watching as Jeep and Jenny’s friendship unfolded over the years.

There’s also a second crime to investigate when a man intertwined in Jenny’s life turns up dead.

It was a solid read for me. I enjoy Jeep as a character and am looking forward to the next one.

Also, the authors, Kevin Wade, is screenwriter and was a showrunner for Blue Bloods.

Q: What’s your favorite TV show? by @cozybooknook

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2 months ago

✨Book Review✨

I made a mistake reading this book the same week that Jackie the beautiful bald eagle died. There may have been a lot of tears this week.

It took me a minute to get into this one. In fact there for a while I did not understand why so many of you love this one so much. Then it hit me and I was all in.

It says it plainly on the cover, but this is a love story. If you start it thinking it’s about space, you will be disappointed. There is some space talk but this is mainly about Joan and how she comes to understand herself and find her true love.

I’ve read Project Hail Mary and The Martian both this year and while I appreciate the lack of potatoes and astrophage, I did want just a little more about space. This isn’t a sci-fi book though and like I said, I cried through the entire ending. I also gave it five shiny stars, so trust me when I say I loved it. And no, I’m not saying anymore than that. If you love love, then read it.

Bonus - Julia Whelan is one of the narrators of the audiobook. The audiobook is really good.

Here’s my ranking from what I’ve read so far:
- Atmosphere
- Carrie Soto is Back
- Daisy Jones and the Six
- The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

Thanks again to @brettsbookclub for the nudge on picking this one up.

Q: What/who normally influences you to read a book? by @cozybooknook

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2 months ago

✨Book Review✨

Thank you @stmartinspress and #netgalley for the gifted book. This one pubbed last week, so you can get it now.

I’ve read several Pekkanen books, and while this one isn’t my favorite I love what she brings to the table. She’ll always be an auto-read author for me.

This one is a spine-tingling paranormal thriller. We have a present day POV with Riley, who is down on her luck after a rough divorce. She takes on a position as a caregiver to Betty, who is elderly and wheelchair bound. There are also four other POV, which are voices from 1964 and they are Betty, Kathleen, Ivy, and Helen. They are also known as the four girls who have been identified as having ‘the gift’ or a sixth sense. They are all part of an experiment group for groundbreaking research on parapsychology.

I loved the paranormal aspect. There are snippets throughout the book about paranormal aspects that occurred in real life and those were some of my favorite parts. Through the multiple POV we were able to get the full picture of the experiments in the 1960s. There is also some very healthy boundary setting in the last few chapters and I love to see that in a book. The main villain was an absolute creep, which makes a great thriller.

I wanted a little more from the story. The pieces felt a little disjointed and it took from the reading experience for me.

Overall it was a fun read.

Q: What are you reading today? by @cozybooknook

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2 months ago

✨Book Review✨

Happy Pub Day! Thank you @delreybooks and #netgalley for the #gifted book.

I also purchased a special edition copy of this one from @aardvarkbookclub , but I am traveling this month, so I don’t have a picture of it. This is the third book in this series and @aardvark has a special edition for each book. I love that they do this.

We are back with Din and Ana in this third installment of the Shadow of the Leviathan series. It’s a mystery, it’s fantasy, it’s a bit of sci-fi, sprinkle in some horror – and it’s one of the best and most unique series out there. I loved the first two books, and I absolutely loved this one.

Din and Ana are assigned to a murder that is reminiscent of Romeo and Juliet, only to discover someone has created a fungus that can control the human brain. We learn more about Ana in this one and Din has a blast from his past. There is also quite a bit more information about the empire overall.

I’ve really enjoyed this series. Ana is such a strange character, but I love her no nonsense ways. Din is learning more about his augmentations and how they affect him long term.

As I’ve said several times, I love this series and I love this book. I read this one via my Kindle. I did read the second book via audio, and I find I enjoy the print versions more. This is a five star read for me.

Q: What was your last five star read? by @cozybooknook

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2 months ago

✨Book Review✨

Well I loved this one. I didn’t know much about tennis before I read it, and I honestly don’t know much more now, but that’s not the point of the book.

Carrie Soto is 37 years old and retired from professional tennis, when one of the younger players takes her record for most slam titles. She decides to come out of retirement and be coached by her father to reclaim her record.

There is a lot of perfectionism when it comes to Carrie. She doesn’t want to lose because she doesn’t want people to think less of her. She wants to be the best. In her career she was called the battle axe for her determination to win at any cost. Her dad has always wanted her to be a great tennis player, but one that loves and enjoys the game. They previously clashed over her inability to be anything but perfect. In her comeback she will train hard, inside and out.

That is what the book is about: overcoming perfectionism, opening up to love, and living a more fulfilling life.

I’ve read Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones by this author, with Daisy Jones being my favorite. This one just became my new fave.

Thank you @brettsbookclub for nudging me to read this one.

Q: Do you have a fave by Taylor Jenkins Reid? What are you currently reading? by @cozybooknook

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3 months ago