"The more we've travelled together, the more I've found myself emoting through him. He smiles, I feel joy, he frowns and my chest dips too. That's not just friendship. That's something deeper. I think I've known that for a while. But I've also seen how easily I ruin good things in my life."

GENRE: Romance
RATING: 4.75/5
FORMAT: eBook ARC
Tropes: Traveling (Euro Summer), Friends to Lovers, Only one bed, Slow Burn

Overall Impression: This was high up on my anticipated list after reading Quarter Love Crisis and it did not disappoint. We get a wholesome story with the horrors and reality of dating plus a dive into Amorie and Noah as people in their own path and as they come together!

Review:
This was such a fun read! I have read Jasmine Burke's book earlier this year (Quarter Love Crisis) and I LOVED it. I was super excited to dive into Around the World in 80 Dates and it did not disappoint. I literally binge read the book in a day!

This was truly such a journey, where we follow Amorie and go on a trip with her through her dates after she meets Noah. They both insist on being friends and so we see their dynamic and keep wondering: Is this the moment they tell each other that they are more than friends?! This takes us on a journey that let's us get to know the characters, who they are and what they think. We get to read Amorie's POV only and yet, we can see and learn so much about Noah from her. I truly loved reading about Amorie, getting to know her and seeing her grow.

We also get to see the reality of the dating world, with some of Amorie's horror story and a lot of right person, wrong timing concept (which ultimately always turns out to be the wrong person because wouldn't the right person come in the right time?). And I really loved how the topic of Grief is addressed here. It made me tear up a bit, the way we remember the ones we've lost and how it changes a lot of the choices we make is shown through both of our characters here.

ANDD I think what I enjoyed a lot was seeing how different and yet so similar the author's writing was compared to Quarter Love Crisis. In a way, both books have the author's voice and the same way of delivering the themes but there is a balance between the plot and character development that brings the story out differently. I can't wait to read more by Jasmine Burke and explore more of her writing.

I was provided a free advance reader copy and I’m sharing my honest thoughts.

In May, I had the pleasure of traveling to Berkeley and San Francisco (SF) for the 12th annual Bay Area Book Festival (BABF), and it could not have been more fun. I explored SF on Saturday and Berkeley on Sunday, and I wanted to share the itinerary (complete with restaurants, independent bookstores, timestamps, and audiobook recs) from my adventures to inspire your next SF trip. 🫶

~ Must-Listen Audiobooks to Fuel Your Travels ~

• Morbid Curiosities by S. Hati - A gripping, emotional YA thriller set in SF featuring a STEM dark academia atmosphere.

• Everything to the Sea by Alicia Upano - An evocative, captivating debut of grief, home, community, youth, and love following the effects of a devastating tsunami.

• Darkening Song by Delphine Seddon - A poignant, addictive contemporary debut of womanhood, friendship, power, and identity set against the backdrop of the music industry.

• Stranger Things Have Happened by Kasie West - A hilarious, cinematic contemporary romcom of family, love, and friendship.

• The Celestial Seas by T.A. Chan - An exhilirating, heartfelt YA sci-fi retelling of Moby-Dick.

• Prodigal Tiger by Samantha Chong - A magical, propulsive contemporary fantasy with Malaysian folklore.

• Salvación by Sandra Proudman - An atmospheric, gripping YA fantasy inspired by Zorro.

• Dragonfruit by Makiia Lucier - A vibrant, adventurous YA fantasy with Pacific Island mythology.

~ San Francisco ~

12:40 PM - I started the day at Hilda and Jesse, a delicious queer-owned restaurant. I highly recommend the Liberty Farms Duck Leg Katsu and the Fairy Tale Eggplant.

1:25 PM - I walked to Lush Gelato for their Pistachio and Fresh Mint & Chocolate Chunks ice creams.

1:40 PM - I walked to City Lights Bookstore, a multi-story bookstore with incredible selections "founded in 1953 by poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Peter D. Martin."

2:30 PM - I drove to the free Cable Car Museum and learned about the history of SF's cable car system.

3:20 PM - I drove to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and had the pleasure of seeing their Matisse: A Modern Scandal exhibit. It's open until September 13!

4:50 PM - I walked to Asha Tea House for a warm Chrysanthemum Tea, then headed over to the beautiful Best Bookstore in Union Square.

5:45 PM - My final bookstore stop before dinner was the amazing Argonaut Book Shop, established in 1941.

7:00 PM - I finished the delightful day with dinner at Liholiho Yacht Club. I highly recommend the Swordfish Katsu, Chicory Salad, and Baked Hawaii.

~ Berkeley ~

11:00 AM - I started the day with brunch at Tanzie's, a cozy cafe serving up "Chiang Mai-inspired Thai brunch." I loved their Lava eggs with the Vegan sides and Yum Sum O.

12:00 PM - I had a delicious scoop of Ube Malted Crunch ice cream at Melt Me Creamery.

12:10 PM - I explored the spectacular Bay Area Book Festival. The festival "stands as both a cultural celebration and a critical gathering space where activists, authors, and audiences can unite around today’s most urgent issues and uplift marginalized voices." The 2026 theme was "Writing the Future."

1:30 PM - I moderated the phenomenal "Swords, Seas, and Returning Home: Epic Quests and Cultural Magic in YA Fantasy" panel with Samantha Chong, Makiia Lucier, and Sandra Proudman. It was such a special panel about whimscial world-building, heartfelt adventures, and the meaning of home!

3:30 PM - I walked to Pegasus Books and browsed their beautiful collection of new and used books.

4:00 PM - I headed to Moe's Books, a wonderful multi-story new and used bookstore that opened in 1959.

4:25 PM - My final bookstore of the day was Sleepy Cat Books, where I met their adorable "Sleepy Cat," Lyla.

The BABF weekend was such a beautiful celebration of storytelling, and I can't wait for the next BABF from June 4 to 6, 2027!

"No medicine that would cure such devastating and hollowing pain. Cabanga was a yearning beyond comprehension, a hunger for something or someone so strong, your entire being transformed, and a cloud followed you."

GENRE: Contemp. Romance
RATING: 4/5
FORMAT: eBook
Tropes: Age Gap, Single Mom, Forced Proximity, Vacation Fling (set in a carnival), He falls first

Overall Impression: This is a sweet, funny and quick read! I really liked how we get to explore the dynamic of two people who are hesitant to put themselves first and watch as they learn to be vulnerable together.

Review:

This was a funny and quick read! I really liked both our MCs (Trinidad and Orlando), plus reading the book from a dual POV was a fun journey. I've only gotten back into Contemp Romance last Autumn and so I havent read much of Age-Gap Romance and this is one of the few I've read recently.

There's a lot of emotional focus from both POV. With Trinidad's perspective, we get to see how she is a single mom and has to do everything because she isnt co-parenting with the twin's dad. I really enjoyed how we get to dive into the journey of seeing Trinidad realise she doesnt have to give up everything to be a mom. While with Orlando, we get to see him be a caretaker and we learn more about his story than his emotions. I think the way their POV aare written lines up well with the way they think and behave too. I also felt like the descriptions of the carnival and the setting was super fun. We get to go through Ofele, see them attend the carnival and enjoy it all.

Another favourite thing from this read is that we get to meet a lot of the side characters and we get to learn about them too. I feel like we got to know Orlando's family, especially his mom a lot too. Diving into what happened and reading about grief, mental health, Cabanga and how it affects the whole family was a wholesome addition here. We also get to see Trinidad with her kids and how they love her and the way she supports them both.

I will say though that I think what didnt work for me is the pacing. Throughout the book, it alternates between fast and slow paced rather than being consistent with this. This would sometimes snap me out of the story a little but about half way through the story, I did feel the pace started getting stronger and that this stopped being an issue.

I will definitely be picking more books by the author and would recommend this one to readers looking for exploration of age-gap, single parenting and caretaking in their MCs. I think the best way to describe this is two people finding themselves and learning to prioritise what they need and this theme was done beautifully in the book.

Hi friends!

It's the very last day of July which means...it's almost time to discuss JADE CITY by Fonda Lee!

My schedule is a bit wonky as I've returned home from San Diego Comic-Con and set up a plethora of doctor appointments so we're all going to have an extra week to read before our discussion. The livestream will be on Thursday, August 6th, at 9:45am CST!

As for our August book club pick...I'm looking forward to something spooky. 👻

My friend Jess at The Hexed Library is hosting her annual Summer Scare Readathon! It takes place from August 7th to 16th and she has a host of fun reading prompts:

(There are also some Instagram prompts and cute reading wrap-up templates linked in her announcement video, too!)

Shopping my own shelves a bit, I found a selection of books I'm interested in reading during the challenge. :)

Although, from all the readathons I've participated in, I know I need to give myself at least three books for each category since I rely so heavily on my mood for what I want to read. So I'll be sure to post the full list later!

See you all on the 6th (and earlier, in my super spoiler-y reading vlog)! :)

Tropes are the currency of books nowadays.

In today's publishing and BookTok landscape, it feels like books are expected to be packaged around 1-3 major tropes before readers even pick them up.

And honestly?

I hate it.

Why can't we just let a book exist without immediately labeling every single thing about it?

I remember reading the back of a book and getting excited because it said the main characters hated each other and were eventually going to fall in love. It was exciting because I didn't know exactly how it would happen.

But now, sometimes I feel like knowing the trope before reading takes away some of the mystery.

Instead of a synopsis, we get a list of tropes.

Enemies to lovers.
Found family.
Grumpy/sunshine.
Forced proximity.

And while those things can be fun, sometimes I think they make us focus more on the ingredients than the actual meal.

I also think some of the best books are the ones where the author isn't trying to hit a checklist. They're just writing characters who feel real.

Like...what happened to themes?! I feel like tropes have flattened the way we talk about books. It used to be about more than just "enemies to lovers." It was about the way an author could take a character who was nothing more than ink on a page and make you feel like they were a real person with fears, flaws, dreams, and a heartbeat.

I think that's what makes books by authors like Kennedy Ryan and Abby Jimenez so special. Their books transcend the tropes.

They don't just have an enemies-to-lovers storyline. They have characters with trauma, friendships, fears, dreams, and entire lives who just happen to fall into that dynamic.

The trope is there, but it's not the point.

And I think we've lost a little bit of that in the way we talk about books now.

But...this is coming from someone who absolutely searches "enemies to lovers fantasy recs" on TikTok when I'm looking for my next read. 😂

So maybe tropes aren't the problem.

Maybe it's when the trope becomes the entire identity of the book.

What do you think? Have tropes helped readers find books they love, or have they changed the reading experience?

Hey y'all,

I'm gonna start this off by saying that I actually enjoyed watching The Odyssey. It's beautifully shot (I guess that's what 70 mm meant) and the acting was all very solid throughout. It's the kind of film worth sitting down for three hours.

BUT, I am an English major with disciplines focused on race, sex, and class. Of course I have my critiques. Spoilers for a 2000+ year-old story and its most modern adaptation ahead.

First, let's get into what Christopher Nolan left out:

1. Nobody

   Odysseus tricking the Cyclops by saying his (Odysseus) name was nobody doesn't happen at all.

2. Every other Greek god

   We don't see Poseidon or Zeus or the Sun God. They're all mentioned but never shown on screen.

3. The bed challenge

   Penelope challenging Odysseus to move the bed to make sure he's the real Odysseus (because he knows the bed is immovable) isn't shown in the film. Their resolution was quite soft but not as moving.

Now onto some of the racial dynamics. People complaining about there being BIPOC in the film didn't phase me. We see this all the time. Ancient Greece was a lot more diverse than the faded marble leads us to believe. But that's not what I want to talk about racially here. I think that Lupita Nyong'o is an excellent actress and a great choice for Helen. The few lines she was given were delivered wonderfully. I have some qualms about the scar. Having the only dark-skinned Black woman in the film be visibly scarred as retribution for adultery has some... questionable optics, to say the least. I'm still forming my own opinions there but rest assured, they're not positive.

The old joke about Christopher Nolan killing off MCs wives because he can't write women is one I can't help agreeing with. Though there are moments where these women shine, like when Penelope tears into Telemachus about the throne, or the iconic "back to your disguises" line from Circe. I can't help but wish to see more. Where's more of the manipulation from Calypso? Why don't we get a bit of nuance with Clymnestra? Can't we see Melantho's autonomy in ratting out Penelope's unraveling rather than it being a means of getting closer to Antinous?

I'll list a few books that have been making their rounds on the booksphere that give a bit more insight into these women and others within Greek mythology. In all honesty, several of these are on my TBR and I still need to finish Emily Wilson's translation of The Odyssey (I'm on Book 9) AND start her translation of The Iliad.

I'd love to hear what you think about all this in the meantime.

XoXo,

Rae