Book Review: An Embroidery of Souls by Ruby Martinez

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Rating: ★★★
Audience: YA Fantasy Romance
Length: 416 pages
Author: Ruby Martinez
Publisher: Knopf Books
Release Date: September 9th, 2025
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

Jade can manipulate souls with the tug of a thread–it’s up to her, and a boy with a soul as bright as the universe to stop a creature on the loose before it claims its next victim in this lush, Mexican & German inspired romantasy.

Jade Aguilar can kill a man with nothing more than a needle and thread. Like her mother, a thread speaker in the queendom of Mérecal, she has the unique ability to stitch love, beauty, intelligence and to unravel even death. When her mother goes missing, the queen orders Jade to find her or be conscripted into a life of servitude.
Lukas Keller is desperate to feed his family and makes a deal with a vicious gang leader. Though he swore never to seek the help of a thread speaker, he’s in over his head and it might be his only option.
Jade and Lukas form a mistrustful alliance. But as Mérecal erupts into chaos and the killer closes in, they must cling to one another for survival–and perhaps . . . something more?

LACKED DEPTH.

While I do think this is appropriate for YA audiences I was missing depth for multiple aspects of the story. The romance leans towards insta-love and that is always a problem for me. I do think there were some sweet/cute moments in here, but gimme MOOOORE.

The concept of the magic system was really cool. I liked learning more about it. There needed to be some boundaries to the way it worked because every time a new issue came up, all of a sudden the magic system could fix it.

The villains and twists aren’t anything surprising and you can see from far away. I did like the writing style and would be interesting in at least trying another book from this author.

Overall audience notes:

  • YA Fantasy Romance
  • Language: low
  • Romance: closed door
  • Violence: moderate

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ARC Book Review: This Changes Everything by Danielle McKechnie

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Rating: ★★
Audience: Contemporary Romance
Length: 352 pages
Author: Danielle McKechnie
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Release Date: September 8th, 2026
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

An aspiring actor caught on the Hollywood roller coaster is torn between following her dreams and choosing between two of her own leading men—her childhood sweetheart and the one who got away, or the fellow actor who understands just what she’s fighting for. A funny, sexy and heartfelt romance for readers of Yulin Kuang, Rebecca Serle and Emily Henry.

Ellie McCain has always dreamed of a bigger life, so when she’s accepted into a prestigious acting school in New York City, she packs her bags—even if it means leaving her family, her friends and Rory Campbell, the boy who held her heart for years, behind.

At first, life in New York is even better than she’d dreamed it would be—she loves her classes, she gets a position at a fancy production company and she’s even falling in love with her classmate-turned-roommate-turned-best friend, Ben. But soon the shine starts to wear her boss has made it clear that the only role he’ll be casting her in is “Unpaid Intern #3,” and while she’s happy that Ben’s career is starting to take off, she’s struggling to stay afloat. And it doesn’t help that everyone around her seems to be passing her by—even her childhood sweetheart, Rory, is living out his dreams as a professional golfer. But when she runs into Rory for the first time in ten years, she starts to wonder what exactly it is she’s running from, where she’s going and who is running with her.

Told in alternating timelines of the past and present and moving between Vancouver, New York and Los Angeles, This Changes Everything is the story of love—first love, one-that-got-away-love and true love—and asks if maybe, just maybe, all those loves can be one and the same.

Thank you Harper Perennial for the gifted ARC.

HIGHLY FRUSTRATING.

I wanted to like this but within the first 50 pages I feared I was in for a downfall and since this is an ARC I tend to not DNF so here we are.

The writing style is what got to me most. It was somehow explaining too much and not enough on the same page. The way that banter and drama was created was a bit cringy and over done. The FMC was wildly ridiculous running off and claiming “she’s a bird” multiple times rather than having the hard conversation. And I understand the negative side to working in this atmosphere but the drama created from that wasn’t woven in well either. It felt out of pocket and only written in to force the plot forward because literally nothing else was.

I liked both of the love interests fine enough. I think my overall disconnect means I wasn’t upset either way in this *loose* love triangle situation. I did hate that time jumps and flashback chapters. Some of the flashbacks helped but others were information that wasn’t needed.

I know I’m forgetting other things that I didn’t like, but you get the picture.

I’m not sure I’d read another book from this author. I’d wait to see what reviews from others looked like first. I might be an unpopular opinion on this one so I’m curious what others will think.

Overall audience notes:

  • Contemporary Romance
  • Language: moderate
  • Romance: 2ish open; moderate innuendo
  • Violence: low
  • Content warnings: sexual assault (on page)

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Book Review: The Crownless Queen (The Blood and Water Saga #4) by Cassidy Clarke

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Rating: ★★★★
Audience: Fantasy + Romance
Length: 845 pages
Author: Cassidy Clarke
Publisher: Self Published
Release Date: May 23rd, 2025
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

ANIMA, GODDESS OF LIFE, IS A TRAITOR TO HER KIND.

After losing the kingdom of Nyx to her chaos-hungry brother, Anima has pledged herself wholly to protecting her mortal friends…starting by returning her host’s body to its rightful owner. But when she discovers her power wasn’t the only thing released during the ritual, she must join forces with the ruling family of Arborius—including its most withdrawn, secretive. prince—to try and halt Tenebrae’s vengeful hand before it smothers the life from her beloved island.

SOREN ATLAS IS ENTERING A BATTLEFIELD SHE’S NEVER DARED BREACH BEFORE.

Freed from Anima’s influence on her body, the long path to recovery has begun. But to win her Arborian relatives’ support in taking back Atlas’s throne, she must brave the heart of a mountain to convince a stone-hearted king, an arrogant prince, and their faithless people to fight alongside an Heir with no crown. Because if they are to have any hope of defeating the god holding her family hostage, the kingdom of Tallis must agree to part with a weapon none have seen since its the fabled god-killer.

ELIAS LOCH IS CARRYING A BURDEN HE WASN’T BUILT TO BEAR.

His best friend has sacrificed himself. His people are scattered and leaderless. His dreams are haunted by chaos’s song. And if that wasn’t enough, the ring on his battlemate’s finger has crowned him with a new, terrifying the future King Consort of Atlas. With his goddess issuing commands that twist his conscience, a potential ally fraying the threads of his belief, and new vows calling the old into question, the time has come to choose which he will the convictions of his heart, or the demands of his faith.

MISSING SOMETHING.

I have loved this series (and still do) but I felt like this book was missing one key piece for me. It’s EIGHT HUNDRED FOURTY FIVE PAGES and I was missing at least four other POV’s from other characters of previous books and I didn’t like that at all. This book was heavily focused on Soren, Anima and Elias and I wanted to see what others were up to as well. With the gaps between books I worry how much I’ll remember now.

I still genuinely enjoyed the plot. Cassidy Clarke has a quality of writing that makes it easy to come back to. I love the conversation dynamics and banter between characters and there was a new romance added that I could not get enough of.

I think this progressed the larger arcs to some degree. I’m still obsessed with everyone here and I can’t wait for the finale!!

Overall audience notes:

  • Fantasy + Romance
  • Language: low
  • Romance: closed door
  • Violence: moderate

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Book Review: Vengeful (Villains #2) by V.E. Schwab

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Rating: ★★★★
Audience: Fantasy/Sci-fi
Length: 478 pages
Author: V.E. Schwab
Publisher: Tor Books
Release Date: September 25th, 2018
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

Magneto and Professor X. Superman and Lex Luthor. Victor Vale and Eli Ever. Sydney and Serena Clarke. Great partnerships, now soured on the vine.

But Marcella Riggins needs no one. Flush from her brush with death, she’s finally gained the control she’s always sought—and will use her new-found power to bring the city of Merit to its knees. She’ll do whatever it takes, collecting her own sidekicks, and leveraging the two most infamous EOs, Victor Vale and Eli Ever, against each other.

With Marcella’s rise, new enmities create opportunity–and the stage of Merit City will once again be set for a final, terrible reckoning.

A super-powered collision of extraordinary minds and vengeful intentions—#1 New York Times bestselling author V. E. Schwab returns with the thrilling follow-up to Vicious.

IT WAS TIME.

I’ve seen a little bit of marketing that the third (and final) book is finally coming out in 2026 so I figured it was time to see what the sequel was all about. I remember loving Vicious and the X-men vibes but make them all villains.

I don’t remember much from book one (I did not go reread it after 10 years), and I don’t think I really struggled with that fact. I was a little confused but the longer the book went on I did remember key pieces and that didn’t affect anything major. I’m grateful this book was pretty simple to fall into and the audiobook is fabulous.

The ever shifting POV is solid and makes the book flow well. There was less of Victor in this book than I was hoping and I think this lacked in some of the action I was expecting. The plot ramped up towards the end but was a slow starter in the beginning.

I’m definitely looking forward to seeing how the conclusion pans out.

Overall audience notes:

  • Fantasy/Sci-fi
  • Language: mild-moderate
  • Romance: very brief scenes (but this is a not a romance!!!)
  • Violence: very high
  • Content warnings: loss of life, murder, attempted murder, weapons violence, physical violence, torture, lots of death and discussions surrounding it

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