ARC Review: Dear Killer

NOTE: This is a review of an ARC that comes out in April.

The book Dear Killer is by Katherine Ewell and it's about Kit, a girl who has a part-time job as the most notorious serial killer in London.

When I say it like that, it kind of seems campy. But trust me, this book definitely isn't.

This book was intense. I finished reading it in February and I'm still not over how intense it was wow.

Me before/during/after reading Dear Killer

And it was good, in that wow-I-just-read-something-really-intense-and-life-is-weird-now.

Here are reasons why YOU (yes you) should read this book when it comes out.

It has serial killers. This probably just makes me seem really creepy/crazy but serial killers really fascinate me and Ewell did a great job of getting into that mindset and writing believable murders and motives and ways to kill people and it was just really fascinating to read.

i'm not crazee i sware

The moral dilemma aspect. One of the themes of the book was moral nihilism and how Kit was taught by her serial killer mother to kill people without feeling bad about it. Kit, at first, is fine with killing people without emotion/guilt because she believes in the ideal that there are no such things as morals because of the way they very and she used that as her justification of murder. Plus, Kit as a serial killer was interesting and unique.

(I mean this in the nicest way possible) It made me feel very dirty while reading it because of all the talk of "Morals don't exist, let's kill people" was actually kinda plausible and intelligent in its debate.

The plot. This book was addicting and intense, and definitely not a beach read so read this when you feel like questioning everything.

But yes, this book was well-written and I hope you do check it out when it's published. 200 Serial Killers out of 203.

Farewell!

Owyn

ARC Review: Don't Call Me Baby

NOTE: This is a review of a book comes out April 22nd, 2014.

The book Don't Call Me Baby by Gwendolyn Heasley is about Imogene, a girl who's been the focus of her mom's parenting blog since before she was born. Major moments of her life like her name, her first period, and other embarrassing moments have been documented on the blog "Mommylicious," with Imogene being "Babylicious." And Imogene's kind of done with this, and her mom won't listen, so she uses her new school assignment of starting a blog to fight back against this.

I really enjoyed reading this book. And here are the reasons why:

The voice. Imogene's voice is really well done. The character is confused and still trying to figure out who she is, but also knows what she wants, and you really sympathize with her situation even though you probably haven't been in it.

The premise. God, I'm still in such awe of the idea of this book and it was executed really well. And, Heasley did a great job of showing the pros and cons of having the blog, and how you shouldn't hold grudges and the whole story was just well executed.

How happy I am with the premise

The Blog Posts. Along with traditional first-person-POV of Imogene, the book also featured excerpts from Imogene's, Sage's, and Imogene's mom's blog. These were so much fun to read. I kinda wanted more but, honestly, the amount in there was good.

The romance. THE ROMANCE WASN'T A HUGE THING DO YOU KNOW HOW HAPPY THAT MAKES ME! As much as I love romance, this book didn't stray from the fact that it should really be geared more towards good mother-daughter relationships and friendships and that made me so happy. It was like Brave with a blog.

This book was awesome and amazingly fun to read, so I hope you all check it out when it's published.

Rating: 13 Blogs out of 14 :D

Thank you for reading!

Owyn