REVIEW: My Secret Admirer (book) by Carol Ellis

My Secret Admirer is a YA thriller/horror novel originally published in 1989. I got my copy via interlibrary loan.

This review includes mild spoilers. 

Review:

Jenny's parents are adventurous and enjoy living lives that involve moving from one place to the next in a relatively short amount of time. Jenny, on the other hand, would like it if they just stayed put for a while. She'd really like a chance to get to know people, make friends, and put down roots.

Jenny's not really sure that the latest town they've moved to will be a good fit for her - the rimrocks near their new home make her a little anxious, and it seems like everyone at her new school has known each other their whole lives. Still, she does her best to settle in, and it's not long before Sally, a teen who's both an extrovert and a chatterbox, is introducing her to everyone. Jenny instantly finds herself a little drawn to David, the guy she's teamed up with during a scavenger hunt. She's also intrigued by a secret admirer she seems to have acquired, a guy who confesses his feelings for her via a message on her answering machine but who isn't quite brave enough to talk to her in person. 

Everyone and everything around Jenny starts to take on a more sinister feeling when Diana, the school's queen bee, is injured in an apparent accident at the cliffs. She doesn't actually know any of these people, their relationships with each other, or what they're really like. Can she really trust her new friends? 

REVIEW: Bad Men (book) by Julie Mae Cohen

Bad Men is a darkly humorous thriller. I bought my copy new.

Review:

Saffy Huntley-Oliver is 12 years old when she drowns her stepfather in the pool where he'd been sexually abusing her since she was 5. He'd been preparing to start abusing Saffy's beloved younger sister, Susie, as well, and she absolutely could not let that happen.

Seventeen years later, Saffy is a gorgeous, wealthy, and outgoing socialite. She's still fiercely protective of her younger sister...who has no idea that Saffy is now an experienced serial killer who targets bad men. Lately, Saffy has found herself drawn to Jonathan Desrosiers, a successful true crime podcaster who genuinely believes in bringing justice to victims and closure to their families. He seems like a great guy. It's too bad he's married.

Jonathan has just wrapped up a signing for his book when he finds out that his wife is leaving him. As if that wasn't bad enough, he wakes up the next morning to find a garbage bag on his doorstep containing a chopped up body missing its head and hands. Jonathan is immediately reminded of the Bin Bag Killer. Unfortunately, his subsequent investigation and discoveries lead to him being scarred both physically and emotionally.

Will Saffy manage to overcome Jonathan's doubts about his work investigating and podcasting about true crime, Jonathan's lingering feelings for his soon-to-be ex-wife, the police suspecting Jonathan of murder, and creepy threats in order to achieve her very own storybook romance with a good guy?

REVIEW: Narwhal: Unicorn of the Sea! (graphic novel) by Ben Clanton

Narwhal: Unicorn of the Sea is a children's graphic novel. I checked my copy out from my library.

Review:

This includes three Narwhal and Jelly stories, with some miscellaneous stuff in between each. In the first story, Narwhal and Jelly meet for the first time, and both think the other may be imaginary. In the second story, Narwhal learns on the internet that they're supposed to be part of a pod, but, since Jelly has never seen any other narwhals, Narwhal goes around inviting a bunch of other sea creatures to put on a horn (or tusk-tooth) and become part of their pod. In the third story, Narwhal is reading a book...that happens to be blank. Using their imaginations, Narwhal and Jelly turn that blank book into an awesome story about a waffle and its strawberry sidekick.

The miscellaneous bits in between each story include: some narwhal and jellyfish facts and the Narwhal Song.

Narwhal and Jelly could sort of be considered a mismatched pair - not quite grumpy sunshine, but close. Narwhal is goofy, happy, and has a positive attitude about everything, while Jelly is a little more serious and prone to more negative emotions, like annoyance or jealousy. Through it all, though, they get along and stay friends.

This was cute, with a sketchy, simple art style. 

REVIEW: Operation: True Love (manhwa, vol. 1) by kkokkalee, illustrated by Dledumb

Operation: True Love is a contemporary-set manhwa with fantasy elements. I assume there will be romance in the future, based on the title.

Review:

Su-ae has been dating her boyfriend Minu for a while. Even though he's regularly dismissive or even outright mean to her, she's always ready and willing to forgive him. Literally everyone, even Su-ae to a certain extent, can see how toxic this is. For some reason, Su-ae is only really bothered by one person's judgment of her decision to keep putting up with Minu. Minu's best friend, Eunhyeok, always seems to be looking at her like he thinks she's pathetic.

Then one day Su-ae finds a mysterious Jellypop flip phone that keeps sending her snide texts about her relationship with Minu. She assumes the phone is Eunhyeok's and that he's the one who's texting her, but that doesn't seem to be the case. 

REVIEW: Vigilance (novella) by Robert Jackson Bennett

Vigilance is science fiction. I bought my copy new.

Review:

In this near-future America, mass shootings have been monetized and turned into entertainment. John McDean executive produces Vigilance, a game show supposedly designed to keep Americans vigilant against all threats. At unspecified intervals, a public space is selected and several contestants (the active shooters) are set up at various entrances with weapons of their choice and all the ammo they could want. There are monetary prizes for contestants who manage to kill all the civilians and survive, for civilians who manage to kill a contestant, and more. 

McDean is a marketing wizard who has all of this down to a science. He knows who his Ideal Person, his target audience is, and he knows exactly what they want. He's so good at what he does, in fact, that his bosses have used his work to train a new AI, Perseph, to do what he does, only better, and Perseph is set to debut at the height of the most recent Vigilance.

REVIEW: Steven Universe: Too Cool for School (graphic novel) created by Rebecca Sugar, story by Ian Jones-Quartey, written by Jeremy Sorese, illustrated by Asia Kendrick-Horton with Rachel Dukes

This is a graphic novel based on the Steven Universe cartoon series. I bought my copy used.

Review:

I'm a latecomer to the joys of Steven Universe, so, sadly, all the graphic novels based on the series have since gone out of print. I was glad to come across this one.

In this graphic novel, Steven gets up early for a mission only to learn that all the Gems are too busy to spend time with him and that the mission isn't happening until that evening. With nothing better to do, Steven decides to go to school with Connie. Things are a little rocky at first, but Steven decides he really likes school and wants to bring in a snail shell from his latest mission for show and tell. Unfortunately, things don't go as planned.

The volume wraps up with a few pages devoted to Steven and the Gems going to a yard sale.

REVIEW: Victoria of Many Faces, Vol. 1 (book) by Syuu, illustrated by Nanna Fujimi, translated by Andria McKnight

Victoria of Many Faces is basically a slice-of-life story set in a fantasy world without magic. I bought my copy of this volume new.

Review:

When she was only eight, Chloe was sent to be raised as a spy for the kingdom of Hagl. She would no longer be allowed contact with her family, but, in exchange, she could send them money and other things in order to see to it that they lived comfortably. Chloe's handler, Lancome, took care of the deliveries, and Chloe trusted him fully for 18 years, when she visited her hometown in an effort to catch a glimpse of her family and learned that they'd all died in a fire a couple years ago. She then spent the next year planning her escape.

Using the skills she gained as a spy, Chloe steals the identity of a missing person from the neighboring kingdom of Randall. Now living as Victoria, she then travels to the kingdom of Ashbury with the intention of stopping for only a while and then continuing on. However, not long after arriving in Ashbury, Victoria meets a six-year-old girl named Nonna who has been abandoned by her mother. 

Circumstances lead to her essentially adopting Nonna. She finds a place for both of them to live and gets a job as a maid and assistant to an elderly historian named Bernard. It's a quiet life in which Victoria finds herself making more and more connections with those around her. Leaving behind her life as a spy isn't quite so easy, however. Even though she knows she needs to keep a low profile so that Lancome doesn't find her, she can't bring herself to just stand by while harm befalls others around her.

REVIEW: I Deliver Parcels in Beijing (nonfiction book) by Hu Anyan, translated by Jack Hargreaves

I Deliver Parcels in Beijing is basically a work-related memoir. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This starts off with an in-depth look at a couple of the author's work experiences, first working the night shift at a vast logistics warehouse, and then working as a courier delivering parcels in Beijing. After that, the author went backwards in time in order to cover basically every one of his work experiences from his school days onward, including working at restaurants, working at a bike shop, and owning his own clothing store, before finally catching up with the experiences that started the volume off.

I didn't know anything about this book before going into it. This is one of those cases where I was hooked by the title and cover. The first part of the book was more what I expected I might get, based on the title. I definitely did not expect the author to cover his entire life's work experiences, so I floundered a bit there, not sure where the author was ultimately planning to go with the book.

REVIEW: Gamer Girls: 25 Women Who Built the Video Game Industry (nonfiction book) written by Mary Kenney, illustrated by Salini Perera

Gamer Girls is nonfiction. I bought my copy used.

Review:

In addition to the 25 women that this book covered in more depth, there were also short "side quest" sections that mentioned additional women. This covered several women I already knew something about (Robert Williams, Jane Jensen, and, in a "side quest" section, Christine Love), but also many, many that I'd never heard of before.

This was an engaging read, but also a little depressing, since it seemed like most of the women mentioned ended up leaving the video game industry for one reason or another, some more quickly than others. 

I was delighted at the mention of otome game history and the Nancy Drew games. I think I've seen mentions of the Nancy Drew games in other video game history books I've read, but this is the first time I've encountered anything that talked about otome game history.

I didn't count how many women were actually mentioned in this, but, if you counted the "side quests" it was definitely more than 25. That said, some of the women mentioned in those "side quests" weren't actually involved in video game development but rather more broadly game development - the precursor to Monopoly, and Jenga, for example.

All in all, a good read that touched on aspects of video game history I haven't seen mentioned in some of the other video game history books I've read. 

REVIEW: Platform Decay (book) by Martha Wells

Platform Decay is the 8th entry in the Murderbot Diaries series. I bought my copy new.

Review: 

In this latest entry in the series, Murderbot is leading a rescue mission into corporate territory, with Three acting as a distraction. The mission isn't taking place on a planet, but considering the size of the station (a massive ring that encircles the decaying remains of a planet), it might as well be on a planet, and Murderbot isn't happy about the difficulties this causes. Honestly, Murderbot isn't happy about a lot in this particular book.

One of the things that struck me about the beginning of this book was how "off" Murderbot seemed, which I should have learned, by now, means that it's dealing with a lot of stress and emotions. Similar to previous entries in this series that have taken a little while to clue readers in on the full scope of whatever is going on, it takes a while before readers learn exactly who Murderbot is trying to rescue and how this situation came about in the first place.

REVIEW: Home Office Romance (manga) by Kintetsu Yamada, translated by Matt Treyvaud

Home Office Romance is a contemporary romance one-shot manga. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This is technically set during pandemic lockdown times, but there's no sense of strict restrictions and very little talk of the pandemic itself - the time period is mostly just an excuse for Nokoru to suddenly be asked to work from home and for Natsu to find herself stuck in Japan, unable to go on digs due to travel restrictions.

Anyway, this manga is told from the POV of Nokoru, an exhausted and overworked systems engineer. When his company tells him he needs to start working from home, he's faced with the realization that he's spent so little time at his place that, even after living there a year, most of his stuff is still in boxes. He does his best to make his home, now his new work space, more livable, even going so far as to create an Angkor Wat-like paradise on his balcony. 

It's during this time of working from home that Nokoru meets his neighbor, Natsu, a grad student in archaeology. Nokoru soon finds himself thinking about Natsu a lot, looking forward to opportunities to talk to her and spend time with her, and trying, in his awkward way, to figure out if she's as interested in him as he is in her.

REVIEW: This Inevitable Ruin (book) by Matt Dinniman

This Inevitable Ruin is the 7th book in the Dungeon Crawler Carl series. I bought my copy new.

Review:

In this book, it's time for the 9th floor, the Faction Wars, in which the Syndicate corporations and governments can take direct part in the game, fighting against each other and conscripting crawlers to their teams. This time around, however, both the crawlers and the NPCs have their own armies and have a chance at winning as well.

This is guaranteed to be a book of gut-wrenching and emotional developments, as Carl finally gets the opportunity to meet former Dungeon Anarchist's Cookbook authors (although he still can't talk about the book, which leads to some confusing moments for his fellow crawlers), and Katia and Donut must finally deal with the consequences of those warnings on the Enchanted Crown of the Sepsis Whore.

REVIEW: Down a Dark Hall (book) by Lois Duncan

Down a Dark Hall is YA horror. I checked my copy out from the library.

Review:

Kit is about to go to an exclusive boarding school, Blackwood School for Girls. Ordinarily, she would have been excited, but she'd found out that her friend Tracy hadn't been accepted and had been dreading going ever since.

The school, which used to be a private residence, is impressive-looking, but Kit can't help but think of the word "evil" when she sees it. There's just something about it. She's one of the first arrivals, so she hopes that it'll feel more welcoming once the other girls are there. It's a shock when she learns that there are only three other students besides her: Sandy, who Kit instantly bonds with, and Ruth and Lynda, who'd previously gone to school together. 

What makes the four of them so special that only they were accepted to this school? It's only the first of many questions Kit has about the school as more and more strange things happen.

REVIEW: Hit and Run (book) by R.L. Stine

Hit and Run is YA horror originally published in 1992. I checked my copy out from the library.

Review:

This stars a group of teens: Cassie (a girl who has a sorta kinda crush on Scott, although she hates the way his laugh sounds), Scott (an all-around kind of guy, more of a follower than a leader), Eddie (timid, poor, and often picked on), and Winks (a prankster).

The group decides to go practice driving - illegally, since none of them have their licenses, but they figure it should be fine since they've picked a fairly empty stretch of road. It goes mostly okay until Eddie is behind the wheel and Winks pulls a mean prank on him, making him think something is in the road. The experience is clearly upsetting for Eddie, and yet it's Eddie who, not too much later, suggests that they all go out and practice again. It seems he wants to prove that he wasn't too scared that one time, although he does make Winks promise to behave himself.

When Eddie takes his turn driving, however, he really does hit someone this time. They drag the man to the side of the road and try to pretend it never happened, but then everybody but Scott starts to getting calls and messages, apparently from the dead man. Has he come back to get revenge, or is there something else going on?

REVIEW: Sōseki Nasume's I Am a Cat: The Manga Edition (manga) retold and illustrated by Chiroru Kobato, translated by Zack Davisson

This is a manga adaptation of Sōseki Nasume's I Am a Cat, originally serialized between 1905 and 1906. I bought my copy new.

This review includes spoilers. 

Review:

The whole thing is told from the point-of-view of an unnamed cat, who was found as a kitten and taken in by a teacher named Kushami. The cat observes the various goings on of Kushami's household. There's Meitei, a friend of Kushami's who likes to make things up just to see if Kushami will believe him. There's Mizushima Kangetsu, a former pupil of Kushami's, who has supposedly caught the eye of Kaneda Tomiko, the stuck up daughter of a businessman. Tomiko's mother has a nose so large that Kushami has nicknamed her Lady Nose.

The situation between Kangetsu, Tomiko, and Tomiko's parents is a bit of a mess, with Tomiko's mother only willing to accept Kangetsu as Tomiko's husband if he gets his doctorate. Meanwhile, Kangetsu is cheerfully dragging his feet. There is much joking about Tomiko's mother's large nose (and efforts to convince Kangetsu not to marry Tomiko, since her nose may eventually grow to match), not that Kangetsu seems all that interested in Tomiko in the first place.