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Mini Reviews: Summerween Reading Wrap Up

Hello, my bookish besties! In case you didn’t know, one of my favorite readathons in the book community is the Summerween Readathon hosted by GabbyReads (and a special shoutout to her sister Rachel, who does so much for the readathon!). This year was the 5th anniversary of Summerween and my second year participating!

The Summerween readathon always has such fun prompts and I love prioritizing some horror/mystery/thriller reads in the summer (I say like these are not my most read genres anyway…) and this year was no different! 

In typical Caitlyn fashion, I set a high goal for myself to complete in the week of the readathon while being extremely busy with work, but, I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t! So, if you want to know what I read for Summerween and what I thought about each book, get comfy and cozy, grab your favorite beverage and let’s pretend that it’s Halloween with these scary reads.

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Review: The Last Love Song by Kalie Halford

A queer YA Mamma Mia! with a dash of Maureen Johnson, The Last Love Song celebrates the music of an uncertain heart—perfect for fans of Nina LaCour, Laura Taylor Namey, and Emma Lord.

After high school graduation, Mia Peters faces a summer full of painful goodbyes. Songwriting is her only solace. Everyone she knows is moving on, including Britt, her biggest supporter … and kind-of-sort-of girlfriend. Britt keeps pushing Mia to go bigger and do better than their small town, but Mia can’t imagine a life beyond Sunset Cove. Besides, she refuses to follow in the footsteps of her late mother—country music star Tori Rose—who abandoned her family to pursue her dream, leaving Mia and her two grandmothers alone.

Desperate for a sign of what might lie ahead, Mia finds the opposite—a mysterious letter from the past, addressed to her in her mother’s handwriting. It turns out to be the first of many. One by one they lead Mia on a wild scavenger hunt through a Sunset Cove she never knew, buried under the memorializing that has frozen her mother in time. Each new discovery brings Mia closer to the real Tori Rose, but with the clock ticking on Britt’s departure, Mia knows she is running out of time.
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With the summer winding down, Mia must decide if she is ready to face the present, confront her feelings, and forge the destiny she truly wants. A dazzlingly soulful debut, The Last Love Song is perfect for anyone who’s ever tried to decode the clues in the lead-up to a new Taylor Swift album.

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Monthly Reset: July 2024

Hi, bookish besties! Well, there have been quite a few changes around here lately! 

As you know, Cossette has decided to leave the blog (which I fully support and love her to pieces always and forever) and because of that, I’ve been thinking about how I want to move forward with the blog. I love having this platform, as well as my bookstagram to connect with you all, and have been thinking of new things that I can do to keep things fresh and I’m so excited to share that info with you! 

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Announcement: A Letter from Coco 💌

hi, hello, dear friends!

from getting to share my thoughts on books, to building a community and befriending so many of you on various platforms, i’ve had a lovely few years being a book blogger (and bookstagrammer). with a lot of personal things going on, i’ve realized that being a book blogger/bookstagrammer isn’t something that i can actively commit to doing at the moment— especially not in a way that i’d be proud of what i’m putting out. if you’d like to stay in touch, i’ll still be around on twitter @cossettebelle, and on goodreads @cossettereads! thank you all for the last couple of years; it’s truly been so lovely and i absolutely cannot wait to see what changes caitlyn has in store for the blog!

lots of love,

Mini Reviews: Reading Library Personal Recommendations

Am I currently getting many of my post ideas from BookTubers? Yes, I am, you know why? Because they have fantastic ideas and I follow some amazing BookTubers. So, today’s blog post is inspired by Meg from megwithbooks and Riley from RileyMarie — they’re not the only BookTubers to do this trend, but they’re two that I’ve recently seen do this/something like this and inspired me to try it myself. 

I’ve never gotten personalized recommendations from anyone aside from friends who know my reading taste well (aka Cossette and Helena, let’s be real), so I’m really curious to see what the librarian recommends and if I’ll like the books!

Meg and Riley both used TBR (Tailored Book Recommendations) and Riley also got personal recommendations from the library. I considered using TBR for this post in addition to the librarian recs, but Meg and Riley didn’t have a fantastic time with the books they were recommended from TBR, so I decided to stick with just the library recommendations. Especially because I love utilizing the library — for real, we are so lucky to have libraries, and if you’re able to I highly highly recommend donating to and supporting your local library.

You know the drill by now, get comfy and cozy and join me on this library recommendations journey!

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Review: You with a View by Jessica Joyce

Noelle Shepard is grieving the loss of her beloved grandmother when she discovers decades-old photos and letters that hint to a forbidden love in her gram’s past. Needing to know the full story, she creates a TikTok video appealing for information – and it goes viral.

Through her video, she manages to track down her grandmother’s secret love, Paul, who offers to take her on the honeymoon road-trip he and Gram planned but never got to go on.

Noelle jumps at the chance to make this one last connection with her grandmother. There’s just one problem – Paul’s grandson is Noelle’s frustratingly handsome high-school rival Theo.

And Theo has to come, too.

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ARC Review: A Novel Love Story by Ashley Poston

Eileen Merriweather knows a thing or two about romance.
As a professor of literature, she teaches prestigious courses on history’s greatest romantics, but one week out of the year she abandons her dusty textbooks and makes a pilgrimage to the Hudson Valley with her best friend Pru to meet their Super Smutty Book Club in person, and celebrate the romance series that brought them together—Quixotic Falls. It’s a week of wine and happily-ever-afters.

Or it’s supposed to be.

Pru bails at the last minute, and Elsy winds up lost in Hudson Valley—alone. In a thunderstorm. When she takes shelter in a bookstore, she immediately gets on the bad side of its grumpy (and infuriatingly sexy) owner, and finds herself in a quaint town that feels like it’s right out of a book…

Because it is.

Eloraton can’t be real, and yet… she’s here. The town is everything she imagined from her favorite series, where the candy store’s honey taffy is always sweet, and the local bar’s burgers are always a little burnt, and rain always comes in the afternoon. It’s perfect. A place built on meet-cutes and storybook endings.

Except, there’s something off in Eloraton. Because nothing changes, nothing moves, trapped in the last place the late author of Quixotic Falls left them. Which must be why Elsy is to find an ending to this last story, the one the author never finished.

The only problem? The bookstore owner never wants the story to end, and he might be the one person who can help her imagine this final happily-ever-after.

And maybe find one for herself.

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Let’s Talk: Summer TBR

Alexa, play What Time is It from High School Musical 2 because it’s my favorite time of year, summer! I’ve always loved the summer; when I was a kid I used to go to the beach every Wednesday with my friends, and so many of my favorite memories are from the summertime. 

While my summers have gotten busier (and more stressful) the older I’ve gotten, my love for the season has never changed. This summer, and June especially, is going to be super busy for me, and while I don’t typically do monthly TBRs, I do like setting up seasonal TBRs from time to time, so I thought it would be fun to share with y’all some books I’ve looking forward to reading over the summer!

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