Angieville

Retro Friday   is a weekly meme hosted here at Angieville and focuses on reviewing books from the past. This can be an old favorite, an under-the-radar book you think deserves more attention, something woefully out of print, etc. Everyone is welcome to join in at any time! I include roundups from participating bloggers in my weekly post. In anticipation of Valentine's Day, I cast around for a good Retro Friday book to review. I wanted one with a compelling romantic storyline, but not one that was necessarily primarily focused on the romance. You know me. Then I remembered this beautiful book I read, oh, almost four years ago, and it struck me as the perfect one to highlight today. I never hear very many people talk about it as anything other than a beach read (at best) and I wonder if it just flew under the radar a fair bit or if only I thought it was meaningful.  I do have to say that I haven't read any of the  Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants  books and...

The best reads of the past month: Ninth Key , Reunion , Darkest Hour , Haunted , and Twilight by Meg Cabot I blew through this series and it was sort of a blast. The not-so-faint hint of menace in these books shows that Cabot can turn her hand to any genre she wants and still tickle her audience. The Suze/Jesse/Paul triangle worked for me and I liked how Paul inhabited the gray area between irredeemably vicious and uncertainly vulnerable. Happily, Cabot worked out the perfect ending. I've been on a real paranormal/urban fantasy jag lately and this series was just the thing for a lighter dark mood. The Last Summer (of You and Me) by Ann Brashares I haven't read any of the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants books and I haven't seen the movie. But when I read about Brashares' first adult foray, it sounded like the right time to give her a shot. The Last Summer is just lovely. The writing tripped along as pleasantly as waves washing up on Fire Island. Main trio Alice, Pau...