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Eighteen-year-old Amelia Griffin is obsessed with the famous Orman Chronicles, written by the young and reclusive prodigy N. E. Endsley. They’re the books that brought her and her best friend Jenna together after Amelia’s father left and her family imploded. So when Amelia and Jenna get the opportunity to attend a book festival with Endsley in attendance, Amelia is ecstatic. It’s the perfect way to start off their last summer before college.

In a heartbeat, everything goes horribly wrong. When Jenna gets a chance to meet the author and Amelia doesn’t, the two have a blowout fight like they’ve never experienced. And before Amelia has a chance to mend things, Jenna is killed in a freak car accident. Grief-stricken, and without her best friend to guide her, Amelia questions everything she had planned for the future.

When a mysterious, rare edition of the Orman Chronicles arrives, Amelia is convinced that it somehow came from Jenna. Tracking the book to an obscure but enchanting bookstore in Michigan, Amelia is shocked to find herself face-to-face with the enigmatic and handsome N. E. Endsley himself, the reason for Amelia’s and Jenna’s fight and perhaps the clue to what Jenna wanted to tell her all along.

I loved this book. The main characters are a bookworm and a writer which makes it all the easier to empathize with them (as a book nerd and writer myself). There are so many things woven into the story that I just nodded like ‘yep, I do that too’. 

Although it does have a romance, it is a very sad book. I think I almost cried at least three times. It’s a book about finding yourself and dealing with grief and I think the author did a great job of portraying that. Part of the reason she does may be because she only focuses on those aspects along with the character arcs unlike a lot of YA novels I’ve read. It really adds to the impact. 

When I looked back on the timeline of this book, I couldn’t believe it had happened over a couple of days. The romance between Nolan and Amelia doesn’t feel rushed. This could be partially because they already know a little bit about the other (Amelia because Nolan is a famous author and Nolan because Amelia’s friend talks to him about her). 

I think the two are adorable together. My favorite scene might be him reading to her from his book. Definitely made me jealous of them. 

This review is harder for me to write than others because I can’t find anything I disliked about the book. The amazing thing to me isn’t the main characters because the main characters are typically well developed. It’s the side characters. All of them have some sort of character arc. 

All the characters are likable. They all felt like real people, even the side characters. I want a boyfriend like Rolan. He gives me Darcy from Pride and Prejudice vibes and I like him (also because I too want a boyfriend that will willingly read books with me and talk about them). 

Basically what I’m trying to say is everything is on point. This book felt like a breath of fresh air. I’ve read hundreds of books over the years yet I don’t think I’ve read a book quite like this one. The writing style is engaging, the plot doesn’t feel slow at all and the way this book handles grief delicately makes an unforgettable story.

chapter three

I learn that books are liars when, less than a week after her departure, Jenna’s mother calls to tell me that Jenna is dead.

“Car accident,” she says. “The other driver sped through a red light.”

“How?” I ask. Stupidly, brokenly. “I don’t know,” she says.

“But she was in Ireland.”

Was. I’ve only known for a minute and Jenna is already a

was instead of an is.

Jenna’s mother barely stops to breathe; she uses her attorney voice, her no-nonsense voice, the kind she uses for client calls or when Mr. Williams doesn’t cut the Thanksgiving turkey into thin enough slices.

“Will you speak, Amelia? At her funeral, I mean?”

I say yes, but when the day comes and I’m standing in front of a congregation that moments before had been singing a hymn of celebration for Jenna and her “reunion with her creator,” I lose it. I let myself bleed onto every surface—the podium, the hideous floral arrangements, her

casket—as the stories and memories imprison my head and my voice.

If this were a photo I was trying to frame in my lens, I would stretch the shadows creeping from beneath her stupid casket as far as I could. I would stretch them until they smothered the somber faces in the pews and all that would be left unshadowed in the photo would be myself behind the podium and what’s left of Jenna. I would call it Survivor and a Half.

But my imagination can only keep me occupied for so long.

Countless pairs of eyes look at me with pity and heartbreak, and I feel the years of waiting in line for book signings, the late-night study sessions when one of us had procrastinated too long on research papers, the countless hours spent reading together. All that, and the stupid, stupid pictures tacked to her bedroom wall, work their way down from the lump in my throat to the choke hold squeezing my heart.

Eventually the pastor comes up to pat my back and lead me away from the microphone, my hiccupping sobs loud enough without the assistance of amplification.

It’s wrong, I keep thinking. Life isn’t following its script and

it’s not fair . . . I’m not prepared.

While some kids waited for their letter to be delivered by owl or for their closet to one day reveal a magical land with talking animals and stone tables, I’d waited for the other shoe to drop. Because if there’s one thing I learned from books, it’s that life is fair and unfair, just and unjust. When my father left us, I thought that was the end of it, but then Jenna found me and life was dreadfully out of balance again, too right and happy.

I waited for more hard parts, the ones books say begin when you’re young but always, always end in the early teenage

years to allow for happily-ever-after. The Final Big Bad Thing would happen before high school graduation. Everything bad happens to you in high school or after you’ve turned forty and have a spouse and six kids and a few decades of hard-earned disappointment under your belt.

Books lie. Life isn’t finished with you when you are eighteen or when you think you’ve had enough.

It’s never enough. You’re never in the clear.

Jenna thought her books should be new and pure, untouched by anyone but herself. I prefer my books to have already been occupied, to have stories independent of the one carried on the page. I like to imagine my used books as little soldiers that have gone off to serve their duty elsewhere before coming into my hands. Books are something to be stepped inside of, to be occupied and lived in. Maybe that’s why I tend to loan out my books while Jenna rarely parted with hers.

But Jenna is gone now. She’s gone, and her parents have bequeathed me her library.

“She’d want you to have them,” Mr. Williams says through tears, when he and Mrs. Williams come to check on me a few days after we watch Jenna’s body get lowered into the ground. This is only the second or third time they have been inside my mother’s house, and they look out of place seated on the

edge of my twin bed.

Mr. Williams is vying for me to spend the remainder of the summer with them, but something inside me balks.

“You wouldn’t . . . you wouldn’t have to sleep in Jenna’s room,” Mr. Williams says. “But we could get you all the help

you need. Counselors and therapists and college coaches, whatever you need . . . whatever you want.”

“I know,” I say, rubbing my temples to try to stop the low throbbing. “I know.”

“Mark,” Jenna’s mother says. Her tone is low, mildly chastising. “She doesn’t want to be in our house.”

She’s right. I can’t stand the thought of being smothered by the long hallways of their immaculate house, which hold almost as many pictures of me on the walls as of Jenna.

Pictures of us in mud masks and pajamas. Shots of us grinning in front of the ocean, with the tip of Mr. Williams’s pinky in the corner of the frame. The one of Jenna looking back over her shoulder and smiling her devastating smile, the one she rarely let people see, the one that made her face glow and her eyes crinkle.

That’s the photo Mrs. Williams had blown up and framed for the funeral service. During the reception at their house, Kailey Lancaster pointed to where the wrapped canvas picture sat on an easel and whispered to her boyfriend, “It doesn’t even look like her.”

It took everything in me not to “accidentally” knock her

plate of cheese cubes and fruit out of her hand.

I shove the memory from my brain and half try to give Jenna’s books back, to insist they return the six or so massive boxes to Jenna’s shelves, but her parents refuse to hear of it.

When they finally leave, I spend what feels like hours going through Jenna’s library and systematically destroying page 49 of each of her books, tearing the pages in half before sloppily taping them back together. The first roll of tape I grab from the kitchen junk drawer is double-sided. I

numbly use it for about twelve books. I don’t attempt to fix the others.

It was Jenna’s rule of reading excerpts, the page 49 thing. “Far enough to get a feel for what the author’s writing is really like without going too far and risking a huge spoiler,” she

always said.

I don’t know why I rip the pages. Maybe I’m hoping she will come back and chastise me for ruining her books. Maybe I’m trying to erase her, to make the books my own so I can forget perfect Jenna and her perfect books ever existed.

Or maybe I’m just stupid with grief and don’t know what I’m doing.

Later that night, summer rain patters against the window and drowns out even my most melancholy thoughts, and I try to read the book I started before graduation. Over and over, I try. I switch to Orman, and I try again. But my eyes refuse to change the letters into sentences, the sentences into pages.

I reread the same sentence no less than five times before   I give up. I close the book and lie on my back with my eyes closed.

My life has split in two. Before there was a before and a sub-

sequent after, I imagined myself a talented reader. Reading, for me, has always been more like playing a video game than watching a movie, an active experience that used to leave me physically and emotionally wrought.

I could step into a page and roam the described landscape independently of the characters that inhabited it. I’ve plucked the ring from Frodo and felt its inscribed Elvish on my finger- tips. I’ve sneaked gulps of milk from the Boxcar Children’s

hidden stash beneath the waterfall, borrowed Harry’s broom while he studied with Hermione, and played with the Bennet cats while Elizabeth and her sisters were dancing at Nether- field. I’ve stepped in the forest-green prints of Orman, my footprints dwarfing Emmeline’s and barely matching up to Ainsley’s. I’ve rested my palm against the cool stone of the lighthouse fortress that first greeted them upon their arrival, and smelled the salt from the sea below.

I’ve lived in books. I’ve eaten and breathed books for so long that I took it for granted. I assumed that, if they saved me once, they would always be there to pick me up, even if Jenna wasn’t.

But Jenna is gone, and the words stay on the page in their neat, orderly rows. The pages don’t rise up to meet me like old friends, and the characters are marionettes pulled by visible strings.

If I were going to take a self-portrait, I wouldn’t focus on my crumpled body curled on the bed with its mismatched sheets and pillowcases. I would take all of Jenna’s books and wrap them so tightly with masking tape that the covers would wrinkle beneath the binding. I would take my books and rip out the last two pages of each, because this is what it feels like without Jenna here to see what comes after this—college, careers, boyfriends, whatever. None of it will matter, because in all of my imaginings, it was always the two of us, sisters by choice rather than blood.

I’d arrange the ripped pages falling on the taped books and I would call it Time Heals No Wounds. Or maybe I would focus on the crumpled edges of the removed pages and call it Amelia Abridged.

When I eventually fall asleep, tears still pooling in my ears, a shadow monster with teeth chases me through endless swampy marshes. In my hand is an instruction manual on how to defeat it, but since I can no longer read, I run and run and run.

Before I begin, considering all the controversy surrounding ACOSF recently (A Court of Silver Flames for those who don’t know), I felt it necessary to give a personal statement and disclaimer at the beginning of this review. I did buy ACOSF. I’m not going to claim I’m not supporting her because I feel that is performative (and hypocritical). 

So then why am I buying her book? By talking about her characters and books I’m already supporting her. Pirating the book or waiting for a second hand option won’t change that. 

In these reviews I’m going to continue to point out the problems as any good reviewer should. Maybe one day, I’ll grow out of her books and stop reading them altogether. However, I don’t know if that will happen. ACOTAR helped me survive the most difficult surgery of my life. Throne of Glass helped me survive my severe anxiety freshman year of high school. 

I’m never going to stop buying and supporting books with well written, diverse representation from other authors. For those wondering why I’m also continuing to buy Maas’s books, I hope this explanation helps.

I forgot a lot of the events that happened in this series. Maas’s world building could be a lot better. Many of the rules of the magic system are unclear and the ones that aren’t are broken constantly. I mean Feyre, Rhysand and Amren are all resurrected. During the High Lords meeting, there are wards put in place to keep people from using their magic without some injury but somehow, Rhys, Azriel and Feyre manage to work around that with no explanation made except that they are different. It’s clear the main characters are too powerful for their own good. 

Did I still enjoy all the magic? Yes. I’m the type of person to not care if all the characters ‘sacrifice’ but still end up fairly well off at the end, which is the case with these books. 

On the reread, I realized I liked certain characters a lot more and others, I understood them a little bit more and by them I mean Lucien and Nesta. I will not stand slander for either. Lucien did just as much as Rhys was able to Under the Mountain and after Feyre left to the Spring Court. He healed her and risked warning her during the Middenguard Wyrm trial. Meanwhile Tamlin just tried to have sex with her. I swear for an originally Young Adult novel these characters are so horny. And Tamlin is a piece of shit. Yes, he does some good things later on but he still is horrible. Some people seem to think he will get a redemption arc. I doubt it. 

As for Nesta, she did her best to help out during the war, attempted to go after Feyre, and she’ll do anything for Elain. I’m glad ACOSF is about her because I’ve wanted a book about her. 

I can’t find anything to hate about Cassian and Azriel (especially Azriel I love him). They’re loyal, sarcastic, and hot. What more could I want? 

Rhys is a different story. I noticed there were some times where he made some questionable actions, even when it was told from Feyre’s point of view. The age difference between the two is one of the problematic elements in general. To me, I see him more as a twenty year old guy because otherwise it just gets messy. Every time people near Rhy’s age (or younger like one of the old human queens) calls Feyre a child, I cringe inside. Age aside, he has his moments. In ways he’s hornier than Tamlin. I mean they thought about having sex (thankfully didn’t actually do it but still) in a library created for sexual assult survivors and in the middle of the warcamp. I can’t forget about his temper. He and the Circle were not the nicest to Nesta in the beginning. They avoided her, at the dinner with Feyre they made constant jokes about Nesta’s understandable temper. No wonder Nesta was so fiery all the time. Not to mention he goes behind the back of his Circle a lot of the time. He made a deal with Eris, who he knew had a dark history with Mor, and didn’t tell her about it. Shit like that is not cool. Overall, he’s great for Feyre but I still need to bring up these issues. 

On to Mor. I like Mor. But, from what I understand, she’s one of the reasons people have problems with this series. She’s bisexual with a preference for women, which we don’t find out until very late in book three and while she does have a backstory, there are parts to her that are underdeveloped compared to the other members of the Inner Circle. She’s Rhys’s third but she barely fights in the books. She has a power of Truth but I’m not sure what that means? She can lie pretty easily so it’s not a power that makes her tell the truth and she doesn’t seem to be able to tell when others are lying, because during the war, Feyre was able to sneak off to find the Suriel. I’m not sure what else she does besides wear revealing clothes (clothes that I want but that’s beside the point) and that is probably the root of the diversity problem when it comes to her. 

I realize these are quite a few problems to have with the books. As I said above, I think you can still enjoy and read problematic books as long as you learn and discuss what the problematic elements are. On an entertainment level, the books are incredibly entertaining but if I was critically rating this, it would lose a few stars for all the issues with the plot, world building and character development.

The bride ‧ The plus one ‧ The best man ‧ The wedding planner ‧ The bridesmaid ‧ The body

On an island off the coast of Ireland, guests gather to celebrate two people joining their lives together as one. The groom: handsome and charming, a rising television star. The bride: smart and ambitious, a magazine publisher. It’s a wedding for a magazine, or for a celebrity: the designer dress, the remote location, the luxe party favors, the boutique whiskey. The cell phone service may be spotty and the waves may be rough, but every detail has been expertly planned and will be expertly executed.

But perfection is for plans, and people are all too human. As the champagne is popped and the festivities begin, resentments and petty jealousies begin to mingle with the reminiscences and well wishes. The groomsmen begin the drinking game from their school days. The bridesmaid not-so-accidentally ruins her dress. The bride’s oldest (male) friend gives an uncomfortably caring toast.

And then someone turns up dead. Who didn’t wish the happy couple well? And perhaps more important, why?

I loved this book. There’s not a lot I can say without giving spoilers but Foley does a great job of tying up all the loose ends (and there are a lot in the beginning) into something shocking. None of the characters are perfect, even the ones you think are in the beginning and a lot of the characters are withholding information from you, which I think is interesting. Lies are everywhere, and everyone is hiding something, whether or not that something is the reason a body ends up dead (you don’t even know who died until the end which adds to the mystery.) 

It’s the type of novel that once you get into it, you won’t want to stop reading (or in my case listening.) Near the end, at  the end of every chapter I had an “oh shit that just happened” moment. If I was physically able, I would’ve stayed up all night to finish.

Now for why I thought the loose ends tied up neatly. I’m going to be honest, at first I thought most of the stories were just background into the characters so that we would empathize with them later. I was left trying to not only figure out from those backstories which person was the murderer, but who died. Then all the plots came together and it clicked. Will as the victim made perfect sense. I about cackled when I found out it was him. He definitely deserved it which made the ending all the more interesting. Suddenly, everyone had a motive. Will had caused Hannah’s sister to kill herself. Johnno’s chance at a tv role was stolen. Jules was angry at being taken for a fool. Olivia was broken that she couldn’t talk to anyone about her dating Will without hurting Jules. And as for Aoife? Well she was the sister of the boy Will and Johnno killed years ago in a game of survival. I almost couldn’t believe it when I found out all of those details, but I thought back on it and the clues were all there. 

I definitely plan on reading more books of hers in the future.

(Photo Credit: Getty Images)

When I woke up this morning, politics was the furthest thing from my mind. I was thinking about all the homework for my AP classes I had to complete today. Then, I emerged from my online Calc class, and felt the collective shock of the millions of Americans watching as Trump supporters stormed the Capitol.

I couldn’t help but watch in horror at the photos of protesters climbing over walls and breaking windows. I saw a video posted of a guard allowing himself to be photographed with a protestor.  Multiple news outlets announced that a woman has died from shots fired. 

Thankfully, the mob seems to be under control, (or at least according to the New York Times), yet it still feels as though our democracy has been thrown off balance. Whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat, we must agree that this is unacceptable, and certainly not American. 

As a teenager, I should be able to look up to my leaders, but how can I look up to my president when he’s telling people trespassing and vandalizing government property that “we love you” and still claiming that the election was fraudulent. 

As individuals, we must continue to speak out against injustices such as this. As a nation, we need to do better.

What if America had a royal family?

When America won the Revolutionary War, its people offered General George Washington a crown. Two and a half centuries later, the House of Washington still sits on the throne.

As Princess Beatrice gets closer to becoming America’s first queen regnant, the duty she has embraced her entire life suddenly feels stifling.

Nobody cares about the spare except when she’s breaking the rules, so Princess Samantha doesn’t care much about anything, either . . . except the one boy who is distinctly off-limits to her.
And then there’s Samantha’s twin, Prince Jefferson. If he’d been born a generation earlier, he would have stood first in line for the throne, but the new laws of succession make him third. Most of America adores their devastatingly handsome prince . . . but two very different girls are vying to capture his heart.

Rating: 4.5 ⭐

Originally, I had given both books five stars but the more I thought about it, the more I realized I actually liked the first book a lot better. The second book felt like it was too caught up in the romances over all the political drama. I’ll get more into this in the spoiler section. 

Character wise, I’d have to say Nina and Samantha were probably my favorite. I did like Daphne in the first book but reasons (again I’ll explain later). I could relate to Samantha about constantly being compared to your siblings no matter how much you love them. I enjoyed Nina and Sam’s friendship. It had a lot of rough bumps like many friendships do but they still supported each other throughout it all. 

The series has many similarities to Gossip Girl and the Crown (at times being a little too similar to the latter) so if you like either or both of those- you’ll enjoy these books.

Now onto what I like to think of as the actual review! I love chaotic characters which is why I liked Daphne in the first book because she brought the drama. She was a terrible person in general but still entertaining. It was when the second book hit that her “I’m the queen bitch” energy got annoying. I mean she had the nerve to threaten Beatrice (and Beatrice took it which I cannot for the life of me understand). If there is a book three, which I think there will be since so many plot points were left unresolved, I want to see her get some karma for everything she did. 

As for something I liked? None of the girls (minus Daphne) came running back to their original love interests. I enjoyed all the friendships and the fact that they all had respect for themselves over the guys that hurt them. That being said, this was a series that heavily focused on the romances themselves so I don’t think the girls will stay single (or in Beatrice’s case engaged) for that much longer. 

Overall, it was a fun series but I think it needs a third book to wrap everything up.