Completely Full Bookshelf

Welcome to February! This month, I'm doing something a bit unconventional with my reviews: I am reviewing four graphic novels (that's not the unconventional part, obviously ) that all feature witches/supposed witches/other related spookiness. I noticed I had a ridiculous volume of books like this on my to-be-read shelves, and since there's no time to review spooky books like February*, I'm getting started on this unusual adventure with a delightfully bizarre graphic novel: Snapdragon  by Kat Leyh. *Actually, there is a much better time to review books like this, but it wouldn't be the first time my Halloween reading occurred during not-Halloween.           I've seen many bloggers enjoying this graphic novel over the past few months, and since I love graphic novels, I decided to finally pick up a copy and see what all of the fuss was about. Snapdragon 's protagonist, Snapdragon Bloom (or Snap for short), lives with her single mother in a trailer park right ne

I hope everyone is managing to persevere through life! I am currently in a Very Stressful Period of my life, but it should settle down into a Regularly Stressful Period within a couple of weeks. Before I move on to the post, I want to remind everyone that (as was pointed out to me by Kellee Moye at Unleashing Readers ) the American Library Association is announcing their kidlit awards (the Newbery, the Caldecott, the Printz, the Coretta Scott King Award, the Schneider, etc.) on Monday at 8 AM, Central time at this link  (it will have already happened by the time most of you are reading this post). Keep an eye out for the winners—I'm definitely curious to see what gets selected! In an absolutely shocking turn of events, I am reviewing another graphic novel. I know this is definitely not what you were expecting, since I certainly  have no history of reviewing graphic novels, but this is what I'll be doing today with my review of City of Secrets  by Victoria Ying. This book is cl

(Update [6/22/2021]: I moved the section at the beginning of the post to the end of the post so the book cover, not my random photos, would show up in my blog archive. Thanks!) This is such a beautiful—and horribly depressing, once you look at it—cover. The illustration is by Stephanie Singleton.           About a year ago, I read, utterly loved, and reviewed what is likely Jacqueline Woodson's best-known book, an MG memoir in verse and Newbery Honor recipient called Brown Girl Dreaming . Despite realizing from this book alone that Woodson clearly has an incredible talent at writing MG books, I did not read anything else by her until now. Back in September, the wonderful bloggers Shaye Miller at The Miller Memo and Lisa Maucione at Literacy On The Mind  recommended this book, which just debuted that month, and following further reminders by Cheriee Weichel at Library Matters , I finally got around to reading it and getting it reviewed!           This synopsis is grim, so be prepa

So that was a week. It took *checks notes* 6 days for 2021 to become even worse than 2020 was, thanks to a group of rioters breaking into the U.S. Capitol building in order to halt the certification of President-elect Biden's victory and allow President Trump to continue to hold the presidency—all at his encouragement. I've heard people say that Trump was going to incite violence sooner or later, the way he was riling up his base, but I don't think anyone actually thought the violence would happen. I have no useful insights to offer up after this nightmarish event, but I am glad to see that democracy remains at least mostly intact despite Trump's intentions. And it's strange, because had this awful event not occurred, Wednesday would have been a stunning rebuke of Trump—Democrats officially took a majority of the Senate after flipping Georgia (not the first state I would have expected to flip, but Stacey Abrams really is just that good!). President-elect Biden is p

Welcome to 2021! I've been trying to write something profound or at least funny to say before we begin, but I have nothing. Except that, since 2020 is in the past, I guess you could say that hindsight is 2020 . Ha, ha...groan. I do want to mention that my plans to organize my bookcases hit a snag when the perfect bookcase I ordered showed up damaged in several places because the box had basically no padding. I got a refund, but I'm waiting now for different  bookcases to show up. Sigh. OK, on with the review! For MMGM and #IMWAYR, I am recommending the graphic memoir Almost American Girl  by Robin Ha. FYI, there is cursing in this book, which doesn't concern me at all, but I'm still telling you regardless.           This story magically algorithmically showed up in my Amazon suggestions a few months ago, so I bought it, and I loved it (though I'm not the first one—check out #IMWAYR blogger  Cheriee Weichel's recommendation of it as well on  Library Matters )!