Here at Chapter Break, we don’t always write a full review of every book we read. Well, now we decided to do these monthly wrap-up posts with roundups of our reviews this month and mini-reviews to fill in the gaps. Enjoy!
Mini Book Reviews
Julie:
Inventor Adventure: A self-watering journey: A wonderful read with so many great life lessons as well as science lessons throughout. Lilo learns how to invent a self-watering plant setup for all his plants with minimal help from adults. He learns through his failed attempts and grows his ideas. His family helps him interpret the steps with life lessons. A great read for kids of upper elementary age and beyond.
Boss Bandit and the Mysterious Hole (The Boss Bandit Series) The author sent me all 3 Boss Bandit books to read with my son. It’s a fun connection because the author lives in the smallish town my husband is from. But back to the books, they are about a silly puppy and I know all about silly puppies ha. Boss Bandit gets into all kinds of scary adventures in each of the 3 books, but as it turns out, it is all a puppy dream. Or is it? The illustrations are super cute and the story fun, though The Mysterious Hole was bit scary. I can’t say these books teach a specific lesson to kids, as most of the children’s books we read do, but it’s fun and entertaining for kids with pet dogs.
Different is not wrong: A really cute children’s book about how we are all different inside and yet there is room for us all. It covers bullying and anti-bullying in a sweet way with lots of great rhymes, geometrical shapes, and doodles.
Oscar and Emmy Foster Kittens is an adorable book about sweet kids helping their local shelter with fostering kittens. I loved how they took care of the itty bitty baby kitties that needed to be fed by bottle. As the kiddos learn about caring for foster kittens, the reader does too. Fostering is a great way to get your kitten fix and help socialize kittens before they go to their forever home. Fostering is also such a great experience for children so I’m glad this book helps share that.
Wrong Place Wrong Time: A Reese’s Book Club Pick This is one of the best books I have read in a long time. I tend to shy away from thrillers/crime novels because they are daunting, but this one was so exciting and well done. I really enjoyed traveling backward in time with the main character to understand and prevent a crime from happening and find secrets about her family along the way. It started out feeling a little Groundhog Day, with her waking up just the day before and attempting to convince her husband of something each time. But then she understood it was up to her, and she was the only one who remembered; as the times got farther and farther, her digging got so much more fascinating.
Stella Steals the Moon: A riotous rhyming picture book for children curious about all things science and outer space. This was a really cute book about a parent and child space creatures that are flying through space when they see the moon, and the daughter wants to use the moon as a toy. She cannot contain her excitement over the adorable moon. The book goes on to share why the moon is important to Earth, how it is tidally locked to our planet and other facts that are great for kiddos to learn. As a toddler, my son was obsessed with the moon, so this would have been the perfect book to read then. I do wonder who these space creatures are that float around and find planets and their moons to explore. They must be HUGE to think the moon is a ball, what other trouble do they get into and are they ever spotted. HA.
Hexed: This was described as a children’s paranormal, and by that I would say it is middle grade. I would put it to the same audience as the Goosebumps books. The title is not at all unique, but the story line was interesting. The mystery unraveling between finding the gravestone and the key was fun and at times the book got quite a bit scary and dark. The book was rather short, so we didn’t get to know the 4 characters that run the story all that much. I felt like we got to know the ghosts better, which maybe was the point. I enjoyed it, overall; a quick read that’s fun for Halloween readers or fans of YA paranormal that is clean and easy to read.
Lynn:
HOUSE OF FLAME AND SHADOWS: Satisfying is about all I can say without spoilers. LOADS of action. Non-stop action at that. Surprising, not as many steamy scenes as previous Maas books. The many points of view really worked here, keeping us apprised of everyone’s actions within the story. If you are wondering if all 816 pages were necessary, I’d say yes.
DIED IN THE WOOL: With Grant out of commission from the actions of the previous novel, Abi is on her own through most of this novel. And Grant’s absence was noted by me. But I do enjoy Abi and Liam’s adventures. This time around had many red herrings and potential murderers. And honestly, I must have missed all the clues because I didn’t see the ending coming until we were almost there. Generally enjoyable. And makes me want to visit Scotland and take up knitting. Or at least buy someone else’s knitting.
STATION ETERNITY: I’ve technically been reading this book for more than a year. I got the ebook from NetGalley in December of 2022. It’s not that the book wasn’t interested. It’s the whole sitting and reading an ebook (or any ebook) that’s not working for me. I noticed the audio was available at the library and decided to finally finish. Lesson learned – I should not bother requesting books from NetGalley! I really like the concept here – closed room murder mystery on a space station. We get character backstory from flashbacks. The seemingly random connections of all the characters must have taken quite a bit of planning on the author’s part! The different species on the station are all distinct, interesting, and well-developed. The mysteries and murders were solved in a flash by the combined character. Overall, an enjoyable read. And I’m disappointed in myself that I didn’t finish this earlier!
Books we reviewed this month:
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I’m intrigue by Wrong Place Wrong Time.
Have a great April Reading month.
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