Welcome to Litsy!

Beyond excited to dig into the amazing @monalyisha 's #AuldLangSpine list in the new year! I've read (and largely loved) 6.5 (didn't finish Bear during #CampLitsy due to time, not disinterest!), including the tagged, which I read because it was on @Deblovestoread 's #AuldLangSpine list for 2024! 🦈❤️ Quite a few others were already on my TBR. Feeling lucky with these titles to choose from!

Thank you @Pogue for the book and chocolate for #JolabokaflodSwap24! It‘s perfect; it sounds so intriguing! And I cannot wait to try the chocolate! And thank you @MaleficentBookDragon for hosting again!

Yay! It‘s the day to open the #JolabokaflodSwap24 gift! Just received it yesterday just in the nick of time! @Pogue @MaleficentBookDragon

#ReadAway2024

Finished my first November #Roll100 pick (#39 Any Subscription Book) & I quite enjoyed this unusual story about a young couple Lewis & Wren.who find out shortly after their marriage that Lewis has an animal mutation & his body will turn into a great white shark. It‘s sounds odd but it becomes believable & is beautifully written too. The story moves back-&-forth in time & also tells Wren‘s story before the marriage & her mother‘s ⬇️

Up next on audio…our November book club pick!

#bookspinbingo

Late to post my #Roll100 picks for November but here we go:

#8 Any BOTM We Solve Murders
#38 Any ARC Kill g Me Soufflé
#39 Any Subscription Book Shark Heart (going with another BOTM to try & finish the challenge)

This was such a unique beautifully written book. The entire book is so symbolic and I think each reader can have their own interpretation of what is going on. 4.5 ⭐️

This may be my favorite book of the year. As of right now, it is number one and I can‘t imagine anything else topping this one. It was so beautifully written and the story was excellent. I love magical realism and this was just so good. So interesting. It felt real and I loved truly every single thing about this book.

A very unusual and poignant book about love, change, and loss. And about how the gifts of love linger on after the loved one is gone. If you like an unconventional story, this strange and moving book might be right up your alley.

#AboutABook

6 books from a #DebutAuthor that are still on my TBR shelf. My #BOTM & #Aardvark picks are always bigger than my capacity to get them read! 📚🤦🏻‍♀️📚📚

I‘m not into magical realism. At all. But this book worked for me. It was sweet and sad and hopeful and wistful all at the same time. I thought it kind of petered out toward the end, but I enjoyed the ride until then. I also appreciated how the author took unique creative chances with the narrative style and the character development. Recommend. 👍🏼

As someone who‘s not really into romance OR fantasy, I was fully prepared to not like this book. Boy, was I wrong. The premise might seem a bit silly at first (a guy turning into a shark?!) However, it‘s a beautifully-written examination of love in all of its forms. A rare ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ for me— and the author is a fellow Okie!

I really didn‘t think I would like this book when it was on @CBee list for #auldlangspine and I might not have read it, but my book group picked it this month so I decided to give it a go and I‘m so glad I did. It will make my top 10 list this year for sure. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

...sentiment lovely, wise, and replete rather than an indicator that a child was already carrying too much of the world.

It‘s another one of those times where I skip reading the blurb because of the consistently positive reviews…which means I‘ve been dropped into a strange reality without any warning.

I love this book already and I‘m not even halfway through.

One of my favorite (adult) patrons at the library will definitely never look at me the same way again after learning that I loved this one…but it was worth it. 😅

Weird? Yes. *Obviously.*
Captivating? Also yes.

To be fair, she hadn‘t gotten very far…but she was pretty sure she was going to bail. 🤷‍♀️🦈🩵

#ReadingBracket2024 #2024ReadingBracket

I knew this debut novel had a lot of love. I‘m not sure what I expected but it wasn‘t what I got.

I, like others, LOVED what I got.

Despite first impressions, bears only a surface resemblance to The Lobster (2015). I kept thinking, “This is like The Lobster except…” less self-consciously artsy, more intimate, more feminine. Eventually, the “excepts” piled up. The only real similarity is animal transmutation in an otherwise mundane world. 😅👇🏻

This book was beautifully written and had very meaningful things to say about love, loss, grief, joy, growing up, and many other things. Everything was very beautiful and heart-wrenching. I just wish there was more character development. I wanted to know and love the characters a little more. 4/5

I enjoyed this book, but I don't know. It had such sad parts to it, such beautiful love, such loss. It had a lot of “big feelings“.

Thank you again @AlwaysBeenALoverOfBooks

#AcquiredViaLitsy2024

Another #BirdBuddy

This book is STUNNING. One of the strangest stories I‘ve ever read, but it approaches love and loss with unflinching rawness and honesty. If you would have told me a book about a man mutating into a shark would be one of my favourite books of the year, I would have laughed at you. But, here we are. It‘s poetry. It‘s prose. It‘s art and paint and canvas. It‘s a love story. But mostly about self love and selfless love. Read it. Five stars.

This was so different, weird, and wonderful! Very strange premise but it worked. (16)
⭐️: 4/5

This book is strange. I'm 100 pages in and I'm still uncertain as to what i think of it.

Thanks again @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks #acquiredViaLitsy2024

A strange, beautiful, sad story about a couple who faces a tragic diagnosis and where they go from there. Going fairly blind is the best here. Note there are live stories, but not a romance. Though at the beginning of this book I had doubts, I loved this! 5⭐️
#botm

I really enjoyed this. It was refreshing to read something so original. Wren and Lewis have just gotten married when Lewis receives the diagnosis that within a year he will mutate into a great white shark. You would be forgiven for thinking that this is a horror story but It‘s actually a tender story of love and sacrifice. You could also presume to think that this is a silly story but it‘s actually very astute. ♥️ 🦈
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

This was a weird weird read, but it was written well so persevered till the end.

Thank you thank you thank you @AlwaysBeenALoverOfBooks I am so excited to start this one soon (need to finish a couple of things first, but it is next on the list to begin).

I thought it was a sweet romance that Wren and Lewis shared and all the hardships they went through really got to me but in all the ending was satisfying and it made me cry (a little) 5/5⭐️

As an audiobook, I thought it was good. If I were reading it physically... I probably would have lost interest when the POV changed half way through.
I'm glad I stuck it out.
This was a very sweet but also very sad story about love, loss, and growth.
I liked that the ending wasn't how I thought it would be.
This is a soft pick for me.

⭐️⭐️⭐️.5

03.21.2024

When I first heard about this one I thought it would be ridiculous, but I was very wrong… I especially related to this story as my husband had a stoke 5 months after we got married last year… This book is about so much more… it explores the way relationships change when someone is diagnosed with a terminal/serious diagnosis. This is a story of love 🦈💔 and the journey of change…

Did Margaret C. Finnegan remind anyone else of Dory? 🐠

Finishing this one today and still processing… so many feels 🦈 💔 I heard this song this morning and it seemed to fit perfectly 🎶 😢

Can you think of a song to match your book? Play and tag friends! #BookNotes 🎵

https://youtu.be/osdoLjUNFnA?si=fh6iRGiq4kxtQsAT

Happy Monday! I hope you all have a great day!

Tux is jealous of books 🤣 as soon as I open one he‘s in my lap! 🤗🐾❤️

#Adayinthelifeoftux
#Catsoflitsy
#LitsyLove

💛💛💛

“Are we all just actors, performing some unbound art form for God, the audience of space? I wish I could have seen then what I know now. All along, I had the starring role.”

🦈 💚

This book 🥹💔

Enjoying a beautiful day on the porch reading and my granddaughter brings me this bouquet 💐 she‘s the sweetest 🩷

“I like to think we met in a daydream once, a long time ago, and decided to meet right here, right now.”

#LitsyLove
#LitsyLoveReads

I‘m already loving this one 🦈 💚

What should I read next?!?!

#LitsyLove
#LitsyLoveReads

February #ISpyBingo didn't quite manage a bingo, but still had fun participating.

@clwojick @thearomaofbooks

This was such a strange, different, good book. Who would have thought that a story about a man who changed into a shark would be this good? The story wrote of all different types of love. It also spoke of the ability to carry on and love again after a huge loss. I put off reading this book for a while. I figured I wouldn‘t like it. Boy, was I wrong!

I had the 4.5 star reads in February (What Feasts at Night, Paladin's Faith, and Shark Heart), but I think Shark Heart is the one that will stick with me for the longest. But it didn't quite manage to beat The Heiress.

#readingbracket2024 #bookbracket2024 @CSeydel

Oh what a month! My monthly pick + free #BOTY finalist + free birthday book!

I‘ve been really underwhelmed with the BOTM picks recently, so I was excited to see several interesting options for March! I ended up choosing A Fate Inked in Blood, but I almost picked Annie Bot. If I see good feedback on that one, I might add on later.

The BOTY winner and other finalists were really not my jam this year (plus I‘d already read 2 of them), but I feel like Shark Heart is one I might actually enjoy.

Weird, beautiful, heart-wrenching, and poignant.

Thoughts on this year‘s BOTY finalists?

I had a lot of issues with the content and execution of Weyward, and I thought The Wishing Game was very mediocre with juvenile writing (despite a promising premise). Really surprised that they were voted that highly. Not interested in the romance or mystery/thriller options, so I guess I‘ll be choosing Shark Heart.

I young GMT folk up Lilly till loop ioookoi ooo pup

4.5/5

This is a book about change and grief and love and family and motherhood. It was both sad and hopeful. While there are many characters, it centers around Wren whose life is transformed when her husband begins to turn into a great white shark. Habeck doesn't shy away from the horrors of a world where humans can transform into other creatures, but it's not about the horror, but about the lives people live through devastating change.

“LEWIS: In the early days after I left New York, I would ruminate, doubt all my choices.“ #FirstLineFridays @ShyBookOwl

LEWIS: In the early days after I left New York, I would ruminate, doubt all my choices. But when I met you, I began to thank my failure. Maybe failing was a kind of miracle. Maybe everything happened just right.

#FirstLineFridays @ShyBookOwl

I am an outlier, I thought this was just okay. It started so promising, I for a minute thought this was going to be what I had wished The Lobster was, but I think those who think this is "weird" only read very real fiction. As a reader of "weird" books this didn't feel too out there. In fact I was a bit annoyed with the change of tone when we got to Angela's story - I got very annoyed quickly with the third person I couldn't read "Angela" 1 more x