Love and Gravity by Revel Carter

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This is such a fun romance! Truly, a laugh-out-loud series of hijinks and adorable silliness. If you love friends to lovers, workplace romances, reformed playboys, billionaires, competence boners, this is the perfect book!

Grace is a lab manager for a scientific group at CERN, based in Switzerland. She spends her days keeping a tight leash on her scientists through coffee runs for focus and making sure everyone has the supplies needed for their great scientific discoveries. She also makes sure that no one runs off the rails and tries to invent devices that will destroy the planet. Or the lab. As Lab Queen, Grace has found success and respect amongst her co-workers and enjoys her work. When the lab’s main funding source, Anton Kovalev, makes an appearance at the lab, Grace is excited to finally meet the man in the person. Through months of emails and phone calls, the two developed an unlikely and unexpected friendship that Grace feels could become more, especially once Anton asks her out on date while he’s in Switzerland. But the man that walks into the lab is rude, demanding, and acting like a complete jerk.

Now Grace and Anton are forced to work alongside each other as they try to work out their feelings for one another.

I really enjoyed this friends to lovers romance! Grace is smart, spunky, and not afraid to be her full vibrant self amongst her colleagues and best friend Lou. She takes her job very seriously and genuinely cares for those around her. Anton is trying to be better than his former spoiled, playboy self but it’s a pretty big shadow that follows him everywhere. There is real chemistry between Grace and Anton and the pining! Oh, does Anton want Grace. One thing I really loved about this book is the amount of humor and joy found both in the lab and between Grace and Anton. The scientists get into some really wild shenanigans and Grace is always worried about someone going off the rails and setting something on fire or causing explosions.

If you would love to read this adorable rom-com, you can find ordering information here:

Thank you to Rebel Carter for this advanced copy of Love and Gravity. All thoughts, opinions, and mistakes are my own. This post may contain affiliate links, including Amazon Associate links, and I may earn from qualifying purchases.

Sci-fi Quickie: Upgrade by Blake Crouch

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Blake Crouch is back with another thrilling science fiction adventure. Logan Ramsey is a complicated and interesting character who works to find and convict people accused of genetic engineering, while also being the son of the most infamous genetic scientists to ever live. When he begins to notice changes to his physical and mental abilities, Logan finds himself on a dangerous and epic adventure to discover who is behind his transformation and what this could mean for the rest of the world.

In true Crouch fashion, it’s impossible to talk about this book without spoiling it. If you’ve enjoyed his other novels, you’ll definitely enjoy this one. To me, the stakes seem higher in this one and the interpersonal relationships more complex. Logan is put in one impossible situation after the other making for an incredibly tense and emotional book. The science is fascinating and the way it ties into the world building is really interesting.

Upgrade is a compulsive, action packed thriller that explores the meaning of humanity and how we are often our own worst enemy. If you would like a copy for yourself you can click on the cover for ordering information or click here.

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions and mistakes are my own. This post may contain affiliate links, including Amazon Associate links, and I may earn from qualifying purchases.

Folklorn by Angela Mi Young Hur

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Readers, this may be one of the most complex, multi-layered stories I have ever read. It is not an easy read, so if you are not in a place to deal with parental death, child death, child abuse, drug addiction, racism, and mental illness, save this book for a different day.

Elsa Park is in Antarctica studying particle physics when a ghost from her past suddenly returns. Her imaginary friend from childhood is now once again visible to her and Elsa is determined to discover the significance of her presence. When she returns to Sweden, Elsa receives news that her mother who has been nearly comatose for over a decade has spoken her first words in just as long. When Elsa discovers that her mother´s unexplained sudden speech coincides with the return of Elsa´s imaginary friend, it sets her off on a journey that will uncover long held secrets that span across the globe. Elegantly combining folktales, flashbacks, and unreliable narrators, Folklorn is a compelling and memorable story of family, love, and desperation.

This is such a complicated story and full of so many layers it´s difficult to know where to start. Elsa easily comes off as insufferable and rude, but as the story unfolds and we learn more about Elsa´s childhood and family, you quickly become more understanding of her interactions with her friends and the people who are trying to help her learn more about her mother´s past. Her parents did not have a healthy relationship and her mother´s pregnancy that ended in a stillbirth while in Korea visiting family alone, only made matters more tense. Add in her brother´s epilepsy diagnosis and the everyday strains of money and racism, and it quickly becomes clear that the family was under constant and intense stress. While on a celebratory road trip to take Elsa to a prestigious boarding school she won a scholarship for as an early teen, Elsa´s mother suffered a stroke-like attack that left her unable to speak or communicate. With one parent in a nursing home and another who had changed after a violent attack, Elsa was essentially left on her own.

To complicate Elsa´s life even more, after her mother´s death, she discovers that the baby her mother lost may actually be alive and had been adopted out. As Elsa looks further into her mother´s life, she believes that she has uncovered a secret message in the ancient folktales her mother told her growing up. When she reaches out to an expert on Korean folklore, she discovers that the expert was part of a large group of children who had been adopted from Korea by Swedish families. As the two work together to find meaning in her mother´s stories, Elsa and Oskar discover what it truly means to be Korean and how central and complicated their identities can feel. All of these matters, from the strained and abusive relationships to the struggles with identity and possible mental illness were written with such love and care for these characters. Every story, every flashback, felt essential to better understanding Elsa and her journey. It was fascinating to learn more about the history of the Korean children who were sent to Sweden and the importance and significance of the folktales included in this story.

While this is a tough read, it is one I highly recommend for the compelling and compassionate writing.

If you would like to add this amazing book to your shelf, you can find ordering information here:

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions and mistakes are my own. This post also contains affiliate links and I earn from qualifying purchases.

The Beautiful Ones by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

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Readers, I´m not going to lie, I was in the mood to read exactly like this when I discovered this gorgeous book in my inbox. I am a huge fan of Silvia Moreno-Garcia and each book I have read is better than the last. I fell in love with her writing in Mexican Gothic and immediately checked out Certain Dark Things from the Library. Fun fact! Certain Dark Things is going to be re-released this fall and it has a gorgeous cover.

In The Beautiful Ones, we are transported to Loisail and the glamorous homes of the wealthy who reside there. In a world where magic is considered ¨common” and for mere performers, a young socialite´s debut in the Grand Season is threatened when her uncontrolled powers jeopardize her ability to catch the eye of a wealthy gentleman. Antonina ¨Nina¨ Bealieu is overwhelmed by the enormity of the crowds and expectations of the Grand Season. She would much rather spend her days researching and cataloging her extensive insect collection. When she happens upon the great magical performer Hector Auvray in the Library during a ball, she is immediately smitten with his fame and charm. When Nina accepts his offer of a dance, she is completely unaware that she is now a pawn in Hector´s grand plan to win back her cousin´s wife, Valérie, a woman who was once engaged to Hector and still holds his heart.

As Hector maneuvers his way in to Nina´s life to gain access to Valéire, Nina develops feelings that grow from friendship to true love. As the two begin a genuine a courtship, Hectors quest to win back his love exposes dark and lurid secrets that have the ability to put everyone in danger.

This book is amazing! It´s a gorgeous combination of magical fantasy, historical romance, and intense drama. It´s perfect for fans of historical romance who want to branch out from the traditional story and discover a fresh and insightful take on the genre. The magical system is wonderfully developed and adds another layer of complexity to the societal expectations of the characters in this world. I loved how magic was used in this story. Nina is currently living with her adoring and wonderful cousin Gaétan Beaulieu and his critical and harsh wife Valérie during her debut. She is indebted to both of them and needs their contacts to find a suitable husband. Luckily for Nina, Gaétan is more progressive in his thinking and wants love and happiness for his younger cousin. Valérie, on the other hand, wants her married and out of the house. She has no desire to waste any of her time on someone else´s needs and actively despises her husband. When Hector comes back into her life, Valérie seems to genuinely enjoy toying with him and wants nothing more than to bring torment to everyone around her. She is a truly diabolical character and is written perfectly as the foil to Nina´s genuine kindness and curiosity of life and science.

This is the definition of a slow burn romance and watching the three main characters circle around and around each other had me on the edge of my seat the entire book. Over and over again Hector had the opportunity to realize how his love was really obsession and he yet he just kept stumbling in the wrong direction. Nina in all of her naivete, uses romance novels as her guide to courtship and is constantly confused when Hector doesn´t act as the novel´s heroes do and you just want to pat her on the head and have ¨The Talk¨ with her.

I absolutely loved this book and cannot recommend it highly enough. Moreno-Garcia weaves together an intricate and gorgeous story of love, betrayal, and the complexities of societal and familial expectations.

If you want to add this gorgeous book to your shelf, you can find ordering information here:

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions and mistakes are my own. This post also contains affiliate links and I earn from qualifying purchases.