Christine's Book Corner

Get lost in the many lives of Greta in The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells,  a Science Fiction by Andrew Sean Greer where one woman lives three different lives in three different eras. It's 1985 and Greta Wells just lived through the death of her twin brother, Felix, due to AIDS, the epidemic of the time.  Depression from her brother's death and breaking up with her longtime boyfriend, Greta finds herself getting treatment from a psychiatrist.  The side effects of the treatment are strange and Greta soon finds herself living in 1918, 1941, and present day of the book, 1985.  In each era, she is living how she would had she been alive during that time.  In each time that Greta travels to, she finds each event paralleling to each other, experiencing losses each time.  As the ending of her treatments come near, Greta must choose which period to stay in.  Does she really want to return to 1985, the only time when her brother is gone for good? What I ...

It's not your classic werewolf story in Mostly Human,  a fantasy novel by D.I. Jolly about a young boy who becomes a werewolf by accident and learns how to live with his new changes in life. Alex Harris is a famous rock star known from the band The Waterdogs.  While the world knows of him as an ordinary rock star, his life is anything but ordinary.  He has been hiding a secret since he was ten years old, a secret only his family knows and they do all they can to keep it that way.  In Mostly Human,  Jolly takes us through Alex's trials as a werewolf and all the changes he grows through in his life, from teenager to adult. Jolly gives us a new take on the classic werewolf story as we see how Alex is bitten by a werewolf, all because he thought he was saving a regular wolf.  Alex was only ten when we find out he was bitten, giving us more of an insight in what his life was like before the incident.  But at the beginning, Jolly brings us to Al...

You'll wish you could do a disappearing act in Victoria Kelly's Mrs. Houdini, a historical fiction novel about the love of Harry and Bess Houdini and how death can't even keep two lovers apart.   Bess Houdini was given a code by Harry while he was on his death bed.  A code only she knew and kept from the public for many years after his death.  It was a code that would show Bess he was trying to communicate to her from the other side, keeping his promise from the night they met that not even death could keep him away.  Bess spends many years trying to find this code, only to discover there was a more urgent message he was trying to send her and it wasn't only the fact that he was never going to leave her side.  Along the way of her search, Bess is led to a young man who is a photographer and she knows that he is part of the message Harry is trying to send to her, but in the end, was it worth it to find out a secret Harry kept hidden throughout their enti...

You will cruise through Bruiser  by Neal Shusterman, a fantasy novel about Brewster who is a loner throughout life and doesn't make friends for one reason.  When he makes friends and starts to care for someone, weird things start to happen.  In Bruiser , Brewster goes against what he believes and starts dating Bronte, twin sister of Tennyson.  Tennyson worries about his sister dating Brewster, especially after all the rumors that have been spread around the school.  The secrets Brewster once held so dearly are soon discovered by Tennyson and Bronte and they soon show their trust by keeping his secrets.   What I liked: This book was very fast paced and I found it hard to put it down.  Brewster was a loner, something I was able to relate to from my high school days.  Shusterman brought him to life that I felt for him right from the beginning.  People didn't give him a chance or never wanted to get to know the real Brewster.  I felt ...

It's nothing but pure boredom when you go inside the Sanctum, the fantasy novel and second book in the series by Madeleine Roux. We are reunited with Dan, Abby, and Jordan after the horrible summer they spent at Brookline.  The three of them haven't been the same since they returned to their homes, having nightmares of the asylum they dormed in during the summer.  When Dan takes a trip to visit Felix, he realizes he and his friends have been given weird old-time carnival pictures.  Against their wishes, the three must travel back to Brookline, realizing the mystery is not over as the carnival returns to the campus for the first time since the 1920's.  Pretending to be students are considering going to the college, the travel back to the campus on a hunt that takes them all across abandoned houses in the neighborhood and even finding a secret group that has been around since the time of the carnival.  Is Dan's connection to the warden of Brookline worse t...

Let your mind wander and go crazy once you enter Asylum , a fantasy novel by Madeline Roux. Daniel Crawford is a 16-year-old high school student who is spending the summer in New Hampshire to attend a college prep program at New Hampshire College.  While the regular dorms are being renovated, students of this program are put up in Brookline, a former Asylum that holds many secrets.  Dan soon makes friends with Abby and Jordan while attending the program and together, they decide to go against campus rules and explore the hidden, forbidden ward of the building to find out what secrets it holds.  Is there a time when secrets should be kept quiet?  What is it about Brookline that people from the area don't want others to find out?  Roux takes you on an adventure of a lifetime with Dan and his friends as we spend the five weeks with them as they attend college prep in Brookline. Roux really brought these characters to life and you couldn't help but rela...

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep  by Philip K. Dick Summary from Goodreads It was January 2021, and Rick Deckard had a license to kill. Somewhere among the hordes of humans out there, lurked several rogue androids. Deckard's assignmet--find them and then..."retire" them. Trouble was, the androids all looked exactly like humans, and they didn't want to be found! My Thoughts  First off, let me say that the title of this book didn't describe the book at all.  Why did Philip K. Dick even make this a title.  We only saw an electric sheep mentioned at the beginning of the book and towards then end, when the main character got a goat.  Other than that...I saw nothing to do with electric sheep and the link with androids sleeping.  Androids, yes they were a major part of the book.  But I didn't see any other connection there to the title.  I really did have hope for this book when I began reading it, but slowly, the book kept changing bet...

Summary from Goodreads Catch a fallen star... Tristan Thorn promised to bring back a fallen star. So he sets out on a journey to fulfill the request of his beloved, the hauntingly beautiful Victoria Forester - and stumbles into the enchanted realm that lies beyond the wall of his English country town. Rich with adventure and magic,  Stardust  is one of master storyteller Neil Gaiman's most beloved tales, and the inspiration for the hit movie. My Thoughts:  I had no idea this book was a movie until I was halfway through reading it.  Having said that, I have to see the movie now (and not only because Ben Barnes is in it), but because I hope that the movie is better than the book. Gaiman's writing in this book had be hooked at the beginning and I was really looking forward to where it was heading and then just like that, the book lost me.  I began to lose interest and found myself skimming through some of the chapters.  Too much ...

Photo from Goodreads.com Summary  from Goodreads Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children  was the surprise best seller of 2011—an unprecedented mix of YA fantasy and vintage photography that enthralled readers and critics alike. Publishers Weekly called it “an enjoyable, eccentric read, distinguished by well-developed characters, a believable Welsh setting, and some very creepy monsters.” This second novel begins in 1940, immediately after the first book ended. Having escaped Miss Peregrine’s island by the skin of their teeth, Jacob and his new friends must journey to London, the peculiar capital of the world. Along the way, they encounter new allies, a menagerie of peculiar animals, and other unexpected surprises. Complete with dozens of newly discovered (and thoroughly mesmerizing) vintage photographs, this new adventure will delight readers of all ages. My Thoughts: Rated 5 Stars. Riggs had me hooked with Miss Peregrine's Ho...

Summary:  Taken from Goodreads The first installment of an adventure featuring stolen books, secret agents and forbidden societies - think Doctor Who with librarian spies! Irene must be at the top of her game or she'll be off the case - permanently... Irene is a professional spy for the mysterious Library, which harvests fiction from different realities. And along with her enigmatic assistant Kai, she's posted to an alternative London. Their mission - to retrieve a dangerous book. But when they arrive, it's already been stolen. London's underground factions seem prepared to fight to the very death to find her book. Adding to the jeopardy, this world is chaos-infested - the laws of nature bent to allow supernatural creatures and unpredictable magic. Irene's new assistant is also hiding secrets of his own. Soon, she's up to her eyebrows in a heady mix of danger, clues and secret societies. Yet failure is not an option - the nature of reality itself is at st...

Title: Wink Poppy Midnight Author: April Genevieve Tucholke Photo from Goodreads.com Synopsis: Wink is the girl no one wants to know from school.  The one that's at the end of constant bullying and from a family that others consider weird.  She isn't described as beautiful and is known as Feral Bell to those who tease her.  Added to her weirdness, she has a mother who does tarot cards and reads tea leaves.  She and her siblings live with their mother after their father had run out on them.  Poppy is the most popular girl at school, every guy fawns over her.  But it's Midnight who's the first guy she sleeps with, only because the guy she really loves, Leaf Bell (Wink's brother) doesn't like her and says she's an ugly person on the inside.  She is one of the characters who is always bullying Wink.  Midnight gets himself involved in a love triangle between these two women when he decides he's had enough of Poppy and how she...

Photo from goodreads.com Summary from goodreads.com Title: A Darker Shade of Magic Author: V.E. Schwab Rating: * * * * * Kell is one of the last Antari, a rare magician who can travel between parallel worlds: hopping from Grey London — dirty, boring, lacking magic, and ruled by mad King George — to Red London — where life and magic are revered, and the Maresh Dynasty presides over a flourishing empire — to White London — ruled by whoever has murdered their way to the throne, where people fight to control magic, and the magic fights back — and back, but never Black London, because traveling to Black London is forbidden and no one speaks of it now. Officially, Kell is the personal ambassador and adopted Prince of Red London, carrying the monthly correspondences between the royals of each London. Unofficially, Kell smuggles for those willing to pay for even a glimpse of a world they’ll never see, and it is this dangerous hobby that sets him up for acci...