Henry's Shelves #9

 

Hi, all!  I'm back today with another edition of Henry's Shelves.  It's been awhile since I shared what our little guy has enjoyed reading, and this one is definitely all about the hot air balloons!  He's (still) obsessed with them and wanted to read all about them in January.  Thankfully I was able to find quite a few to fit the bill, many of which are featured here, along with a couple other books that have been on repeat in our house.  We've also been enjoying our trips to the library!

The Great Balloon Hullaballoo // And Away We Go! // Curious George and the Hot Air Balloon

 Hot Air // Penguin's Big Adventure // How Do Dinosaurs Say I Love You?

5-Minute Spidey and His Amazing Friends Stories // Don't Push the Button! // Hot Air Henry

Have you read any of these?

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Recent Reads

 The House Across the Lake by Riley Sager (2023)

Casey spends her time at her family's lake house by spying on the people living in the house across the water - but when the wife disappears, Casey becomes obsessed with trying to figure out what happened to her.  The first half of this book felt very cliche - the drunk, unreliable narrator using binoculars to watch her neighbors, convinced something nefarious is going on.  It didn't feel fresh or new, but it wasn't necessarily bad.  Then, the second half took a strange, supernatural twist, and that's where Sager lost me.  It was a bit surprising but unfortunately didn't work for me at all.  3 stars

The Paris Novel by Ruth Reichl (2024)

After her mother's death, Stella travels to Paris.  At first, Stella is careful and cautious, but after impulsively purchasing a beautiful dress, Stella discovers a whole new side to Paris - and herself.  Reichl's memoir Save Me the Plums was a favorite of mine a couple years, so I was excited to read a fiction book from her.  I love a Paris setting and no one writes about food like Reichl does - and Stella eats a lot of fabulous meals.  Stella meets a lot of new people during her time in France, solves an artistic mystery, and opens herself up more than she ever dreamed she could.  The story felt a little twee to me, as things just keep working out for Stella in kind of unbelievable ways, and I just never felt as invested in the story as I wanted to be.  3 stars

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Michele's Monday Picks #65

Angela is so generous to let me pop in with my little series, Michele’s Monday Picks!  I’m not a blogger or bookstagrammer, but I love getting excited about new releases with the rest of you.  Here I’ll be sharing new books I’m really looking forward to!

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Gifted and Talented

By Olivie Blake

Expected Publication: April 1, 2025

From Goodreads:

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Atlas Six comes the story of three siblings who, upon the death of their father, are forced to reckon with their long-festering rivalries, dangerous abilities, and the crushing weight of all their unrealized adolescent potential.

Where there’s a will, there’s a war.

Thayer Wren, the brilliant CEO of Wrenfare Magitech and so-called father of modern technology, is dead. Any one of his three telepathically and electrokinetically gifted children would be a plausible inheritor to the Wrenfare throne.

Or at least, so they like to think.

Meredith, textbook accomplished eldest daughter and the head of her own groundbreaking biotech company, has recently cured mental illness. You're welcome! If only her father's fortune wasn't her last hope for keeping her journalist ex-boyfriend from exposing what she really is: a total fraud.

Arthur, second-youngest congressman in history, fights the good fight every day of his life. And yet, his wife might be leaving him, and he's losing his re-election campaign. But his dead father’s approval in the form of a seat on the Wrenfare throne might just turn his sinking ship around.

Eilidh, once the world's most famous ballerina, has spent the last five years as a run-of-the-mill marketing executive at her father’s company after a life-altering injury put an end to her prodigious career. She might be lacking in accolades compared to her siblings, but if her father left her everything, it would finally validate her worth—by confirming she'd been his favorite all along.

On the pipeline of gifted kid to clinically depressed adult, nobody wins—but which Wren will come out on top?

This blurb gave me Umbrella Academy vibes. Do you think you’ll be picking this one up?

Fiction/Nonfiction Quick Reviews: The Astor Edition

 Astor: The Rise and Fall of an American Fortune by Anderson Cooper and Katherine Howe (2024)

The Astor family is probably one of the most well-known throughout American history, starting from humble beginnings to become one of the wealthiest families in the country.  In this book, Anderson Cooper and Katherine Howe detail the Astor family tree, from how they started, to ruling the Gilded Age, to falling in spectacular fashion in the early 2000s.  I've always loved Gilded Age history and the Astors factor prominently there, so I was excited to learn more about this family.  It does get a bit confusing when so many family members have similar names, and some of the chapters made me scratch my head at why they were even included, but I did really enjoy this book.  4 stars

The Second Mrs. Astor by Shana Abe (2021)

This novel imagines the courtship and brief marriage of John Jacob "Jack" Astor and Madeleine Force, his second (and much younger) wife, before his untimely demise on the Titanic.  Madeleine is just 17 when she begins a relationship with Jack, and this coupled with his famous name cause them to be swamped by press.  Even in tragedy and heavily pregnant, Madeleine cannot escape them.  I thought this book was just beautiful.  It's practically impossible to know the true nature of their relationship, but Abe imagines it as a love match on both sides.  The feelings she is able to evoke through her words are so lovely - it's romantic, it's ethereal, the way the two are so entranced with each other that everything else fades away.  I truly felt transported and invested in their story, although it is bittersweet knowing how quickly and sadly their story would end.  5 stars

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Can't-Wait Wednesday: Cold Eternity

Can't-Wait Wednesday is hosted by Tressa at Wishful Endings and helps us spotlight upcoming releases we're eagerly anticipating!

Cold Eternity

S.A. Barnes

Expected publication date: April 8, 2025

Cold Eternity, the newest space horror novel from the author of Dead Silence and Ghost Station, blends the dystopian dread of Severance with the catastrophic approach to AI from M3gan.

Halley is on the run from an interplanetary political scandal that has put a huge target on her back. She heads for what seems like the perfect place to lay low: a gigantic space barge housing the cryogenically frozen bodies of Earth’s most wealthy citizens. The ship and its cryo program are long defunct, but Halley starts to think she sees figures crawling in the hallways, and there’s a constant scraping, slithering, and rattling echoing in the vents. It’s not long before Halley realizes she may have gotten herself trapped in an even more dangerous situation than the one she was running from….

Recent Reads

 Let's Call Her Barbie by Renee Rosen (2025)

A fictionalized look at the creation of one of the world's most recognizable and famous toys, the Barbie doll.  I really enjoyed this historical fiction novel, which tells the story of Ruth Handler, co-founder of Mattel, and Jack Ryan, an engineer at Mattel, and how they worked together (and sometimes against each other) to bring the doll to the masses.  Rosen acknowledges in the book's Author's Note that Barbie's history is a bit controversial and murky in places, so she has taken some liberties with the story, but there are definitely aspects based on fact.  I think many readers will enjoy the character of Ruth, who, while tough and even mean at times, also wanted to create something that would allow little girls to dream bigger than they ever imagined.  4 stars

The Hotel Nantucket by Elin Hilderbrand (2023)

Lizbet is ready for a fresh start in Nantucket and that involves reinvigorating the defunct Hotel Nantucket into a luxury spot, and the story follows her, the employees, and the guests over the hotel's first summer.  I enjoyed the descriptions of the hotel and some of the shenanigans that the guests and employees got up to.  A haunting in the hotel was a fun inclusion, although I wish the ghost herself didn't play such a large role in the story.  There are a lot of characters to keep track of, but they were all so distinct, so it wasn't a huge deal.  A couple of reveals at the end felt a bit nonsensical and outlandish, but I guess it did wrap up everything in a neat little bow.  3.5 stars

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Month in Review: February 2025

 

I'll be honest, this month was a total blur, so this is going to be a short recap!  Work is getting busy, Henry continued his music classes, and I spent a lot of time reading and doing puzzles.  We had some nice weather and I was able to get some walks in.

The Books

My Salty Mary // The Art of Catching Feelings // Past Present Future // The Writing Retreat

Heavy Hitter // From Here to the Great Unknown // The Jewel of the Isle // Puck & Prejudice

The Stolen Queen // Let's Call Her Barbie // The Hotel Nantucket

The Posts and Reviews

Fiction/Nonfiction Quick Reviews: The Heiress Edition

Michele's Monday Picks #63

Sports Romance Quick Reviews

Can't-Wait Wednesday: Sunrise on the Reaping

Guest Blogger: My Favorite Audiobooks #3

Michele's Monday Picks #64

Romance Mini Reviews

How are you doing?

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