Such a stunningly beautiful and emotional story! It reminded me a lot of A Little Life in the sense that it had the same vibes, emotions and melancholy, as well as the epicness in the tale about love/friendship during decades and the dealing with trauma and disability, but without the devastating level of pain and sadness. (A Little Life totally ruined me, so much that my stomach still twists when thinking about it. Luckily this book did not wreck me, just gave me a wonderful reading experience.)

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is a story about gaming, love and friendship, spanning thirty years. It lets us follow the main characters from their first meeting playing games together at a hospital as children to their university years on to their professional success and failures as game developers. It also lets us follow them as characters, growing from children to adults, through ups and downs, friendships and betrayals, love and jealousy, grief and loss, joy and resignation. It’s a love story, but not in the traditional romantic way. It’s also a beautiful tale about accepting your limitations but rising above them, finding strength in failure, pushing your boundaries, and acknowledging your need to be loved and to love.

This book was such a unique story that it’s difficult to make it justice in a review. It left a deep impression on me and gave me so much nostalgia and emotions. I didn’t always love the main characters or agree with their decisions, but I rooted for them wholeheartedly. The friendship was written in such a beautiful way full of soul it felt almost philosophical. And even though I’m not a gamer myself, the gaming parts really added to the story in the brilliant way Gabrielle Zevin used them as metaphors for life and emotions.

All in all, this book was pure joy to read (even though it was quite sad and made me tear up several times)! It’s one of the most beautiful and wholesome stories I’ve ever read about friendship and I know I will remember it for a long time. It’s one of those stories that truly made an impact on me and I cannot recommend it enough! 

Rating:
5 stars

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Gabrielle Zevin

This was such an emotional childhood friends-to-lovers mm romance with two amazing main characters to root for. It both wrecked me and filled me with hope. I loved how this book had a different vibe than many other sports romances, with the MCs having a childhood of neglect and abuse, respectively dealing with addiction, that added extra layers to the forbidden love trope.

The story follows the two basketball players Xander and Chris from age 14 to over a decade later, letting us be part of their life, love, growth, hopes and struggles. Xander comes from a broken home with an addicted mother and her violent and abusive boyfriends. The only good thing in his life is basketball. When he’s on the court playing nothing else matters and it gives him a chance to forget his misery for a moment. But when he meets Chris, there is suddenly something else in his life that matters as much as basketball. Chris’s family welcomes Xander into their lives and gives him love, food and a home.

I adored Chris’s family and the way they loved Xander unconditionally. I also loved the mutual respect and how Xander didn’t want for him and Chris to act on their feelings while living at their house. Due to this, the romance is such a burning slow one full of yearning, longing, suppressed feelings that threaten to explode and made this story so addictive and intense to read.

What wrecked me though was the horrible homophobia that Xander and Chris had to endure and how they had to hide and pretend. The lies and hiding were killing them, and me as a reader as well. Amy Lane did an amazing job describing the anxiety, the frustration and the longing for being allowed to show their true selves, and the toll it takes.

My only tiny complaint is that the cover doesn’t match the story, really, so don’t let the cover fool you into believing that this is an easy cute YA story, when it’s so much more than that.

All in all, this was a beautiful and emotional love story that was both hopeful and utterly heartbreaking at the same time. It will wreck you, but it’s worth it, I promise!

Rating:
5 stars

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Amy Lane

Erica Massey has definitely become an autobuy author for me! I love the Breakaway series so much - and I’ve binged all of the three books, then immediately wanting to reread them. There’s just something in the way Erica Massey writes about feelings and love that’s so far from any cliché but so raw and emotional and true. This series is a true YA romance one, so slow burn and awkward and relatable. And the characters are always amazing. Broken and full of flaws, but with big hearts and tenderness beneath their scruffy surfaces. This third book, All Hail the Underdogs, was no exception, it was just as brilliant as the others. An enemies-to-lovers romance at its finest! 

We actually did get a glimpse of the romance between Patrick Roman (Rome) and Damien Bordeaux in the last chapter of the second book, Like You've Nothing Left to Prove, when Alex became Rome’s captain after the NHL draft, and he and Eli had a talk with Rome and Damien (or rather Eli and Damien had a talk since their boyfriends are equally awkward with small talks…). So this book is almost like a prequel, giving us the full story of how Rome and Damien met and how their initial hostility turned into understanding and friendship and more…

The story takes place at a hockey prep school, to which Rome manages to get a transfer after his father is sent to jail for years of abusing him, and where Damien is, on the surface, a rotten spoilt rich kid. Rome immediately takes a dislike to Damien and the aversion just grows. But it turns out that Damien has his own problems to deal with. When Rome gets a glimpse of Damien’s struggles and when Damien learns about Rome’s past trauma and how he’s in the fight for his legal emancipation, how he’s not antisocial but has to work for his living and has problems trusting people, a heartwarming friendship starts to form.

​It truly melted my heart how vulnerable they were towards each other, so open and raw, it was just beautiful. I loved their awkwardness (the way they talked about ‘sex things’ was just the sweetest ever!) and how they truly felt like messed-up teenagers. And the character growth was amazing! Especially for Rome, as he learned to let people in, trust them and accept their love for him as he was, not because they wanted something from him.

As in all of Erica Massey’s books, the side characters were gold too. So supportive and just all around kind and good people! Great representation done in a low key way, like how one of the hockey players was a trans girl and how she was so naturally included into and supported by the team.

The ending was perhaps a little over the top sweet and adorable, bordering to cheesy, but they both, Rome especially, deserved all the happiness in the world, so I’m not complaining…

All in all, this was an absolutely beautiful, emotional and heartwarming story that dealt with difficult topics in a comforting way, and I cannot recommend this brilliant opposites attract, idiots to lovers, team mates romance enough! 

Rating:
​5 stars

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E.L. Massey

This ya sapphic rom-com was such a cute, fun and unique read about finding out what really matters in life! The moral of the story… be careful what you wish for! (And be aware of fanfic coming to life…) I absolutely loved this humorous, satirical, totally over the top and heartwarming love letter to fanfics!

When sixteen-year-old Ivy’s parents leave her home alone for the very first time, she’s looking forward to eating sweets whenever she wants to, not having anyone meddle in her personal business, eating pizza and watching the favorite show H-MAD with her best friend Henry. And not miss her former best friend, Mack. Not even thinking of her actually. But all of Ivy’s plans get derailed when she wakes up on the very first morning to find the main character of H-MAD and Ivy’s fanfiction, Weston in her bed.

From there, Sophie Gonzales takes us on a hilarious journey of hiding a completely unpredictable over-the-top romantic, brooding soul mate/superhero, to finding out who your heart truly desires and the beauty of friendship.

The characters were so fleshed out and relatable. I loved the slightly disastrous Ivy, the gorgeous Henry and the badass Mack. I loved how charmingly nerdy Ivy and Henry were with their H-MAD obsession, their fear of conflict and Ivy’s lack of social skills. And extra plus for the representation, with Ivy being bisexual, Henry aro/ace and Mack lesbian, and the way Sophie Gonzales covered just about every romantic trope out there in such a lovable way. It’s obvious how much Sophie Gonzales herself loves fanfiction and the romcom tropes, and how she wanted to explore the tropes and how they would work (or not work…) in reality. So this book is like a warm blanket to snuggle in, while enjoying the brooding superhero, the enemies-to-lovers, the miscommunication, the soul mate, the one-bed forced proximity and more in the best possible, humorous way.

Was it realistic? Well, no, of course not. But that was exactly the point. With the help of a little magic, Ivy gets a chance to discover what’s really important and real in life. And we readers get a chance to consider our own life choices and if we’ve fully listened to our hearts. And of course, we all get to learn that there is no such thing as a perfect guy, nor that always getting what we want make us happy.

(And how beautiful is the cover with art by Venessa Vida Kelley? Just looking at the book makes me happy! I definitely need to buy a paperback copy of this one when it’s released next year!)

I received an eARC for free via NetGalley, but I am leaving my honest review. Many thanks to St. Martin’s Press, Wednesday Books, and the author for the opportunity!

Rating:
4.5 stars rounding up to 5

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Sophie Gonzales

Abdi Nazemian’s book Like A Love Story is one of my all time favorite books, and ever since Abdi Nazemian is an autobuy author for me. And yet again, Abdi Nazemian has written a beautiful, heartfelt and intriguing story with wonderful characters told in three parallel stories by the POVs of each of the three generations of men in the same family, that come together in the end to give the main characters understanding and closure for each other and the mistakes made and the losses they’ve suffered in their lives.

This book follows three men – the grandfather Bobby/Babak, the father Saeed, and the son Moud – from the 1930s Hollywood to the 1970s Theran until today’s Los Angeles, and shows how the past is always connected with the present, and how actions and decisions made a long time ago affects generations to come. Moud is an out gay teen, who lives alone with distant a father, who doesn’t seem to be able to fully accept Moud for who he is, and who lives a closed-off life after the death of his wife. But as the story evolves, it becomes clear that Saeed has had his own struggles, and not the least how Babak’s life and struggles has affected the following generations.

These three characters and their friends and loved ones are what made the story! I adored every single one of them as the story unfolded. Abdi Nazemian described them with such integrity and empathy, allowing them to be real, with flaws and less likeable traits. I also loved the side characters, especially Ava in Iran. The only characters I immediately took a dislike to was the obnoxious, self-righteous know-it-all Shane (not until the end, when he kind of changed to the better) and of course, Babak’s horrible mother.

I loved the insights into Iranian life and culture throughout the three generations and the amazing character growth of both Moud and his father Saeed. But my absolute favorite of all was Babak and his amazing life journey of self-discovery, curiosity, bravery and his ongoing support for the queer community. He was such a kind and truly good man. I would have loved to get to know his father a little more, since he seemed the be the reason that Babak could find the right path in life, but maybe he will have a story of his own sometime later…

The way Abdi Nazemian writes is simply amazing (and one of the reasons I love all his books). He sure has a way with words, and managed to make all of the characters fully fleshed out and relatable, and tell the story in such a beautiful, almost poetic way. Just like his previous books, Only This Beautiful Moment was such a fast and intense read. All of the three stories completely pulled me in and I felt like I was flying through the pages.

All in all, Only This Beautiful Moment was a wonderful, gripping, enlightening and emotional story with the important message to value the beauty in life and live your life to the fullest! 

Rating:
5 stars

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Abdi Nazemian

This must be one of my favorite historical MM romances ever! Such a sweet and tender, slow burn, friends-to-lovers romance overshadowed by the constant fear of being found out, yet so full of hope and joy. We Could Be So Good is a true gem that I recommend with all my heart!

Set in the 1950s, this wholesome story follows the two young men, Nick Russo and Andy Fleming, who become unlikely friends at their newspaper work, despite all their differences. Nick with his rough Brooklyn background working as a criminal reporter and Andy, being the media mogul heir to take over the running of the entire newspaper. Nick, being sure of who he is and what he wants, but knowing the risks that entails, does all he can to hide his true self and not let anyone into his life. Not until freckled, gorgeous, earnest, clumsy and absolutely clueless Andy comes into his life and turns it upside down. Andy on his side struggles with heavy abandon issues and with finding his direction in life. And that thing about himself he might suspect he does all he can to suppress…

The characters in this book were amazing and so relatable. I immediately rooted for both Nick and Andy, they were so sweet and adorable and so real. I loved that the relationship developed slowly and with hesitation that felt true to the time. The yearning mixed with fear, the wanting mixed with anxiety, the hope mixed with tension was all too understandable considering the severe consequences of being found out, and made this love story even more epic and intense.

I also loved the secondary characters, and the wonderful found family they created, with Emily and her queer friends. Emily was such a wonderful, strong, courageous and fun best friend that always stood by Nick, and even Andy in the end. The way we got to see the creation of a queer community and their pride and support for each other made this book into both an important eye-opening story to tell about how queer love was forbidden, and the injustice in how society treated anyone falling outside the ordinary (especially anyone from the lower classes without good lawyer connections) and a swooning, sweet and emotional love story that took my breath away. It was a painful story about the struggles for the queer community in the past (and sadly still), but also such a hopeful and empowering tale about the power of love, found family and happiness. And the character growth, how Nick’s fear eventually lessens and how Andy grows in confidence and starts to stand up for what he truly wants, was amazing!

All in all, I absolutely loved this book, it really is one of the greatest romances I’ve read! Thank you so much for the recommendation, Nicole (Bookstagram  @nicolereadsmm), without it I might have missed this gem!

Rating:
5 stars

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Cat Sebastian

This was such a beautiful and poignant read! An epic love story with added layers of grief and betrayal. I loved the two parallel love stories, one present day and one in the past, and how they were intertwined throughout the book, empowering the present day romance by the discovery of queer history and its struggles.

Of Sunlight and Stardust follows two men who have been beaten by life. Tanner Rowe has had a tough upbringing as an orphan in and out of foster care, when he meets the love of his life, Emma. Only to lose her too when she gets sick and dies from cancer. In an attempt to honor and keep her close to his heart, he buys the house with the dilapidated barn Emma dreamed of owning. There, he meets homeless Cole Lachlan, who is just out of prison and needs a job. Renovating the barn together, the two lonely, broken men start not only to find hope and joy again, but also new kinds of feelings for each other.

This was such a wonderful and swoon worthy bisexual awakening romance with two amazing main characters to root for. I truly appreciated the way in which Tanner and Cole slowly began to open up to each other, and for Cole to possibly see a new beginning and for Tanner to hope for happiness and love again. The authors did a wonderful job with these two men, truly making us see and feel their loss and grief, loneliness and vulnerability and fear of opening up again and risking more pain. I also adored the secondary story that we got to follow through the diary that Tanner and Cole discovered in the barn, and how this story empowered their own journey of self-discovery.

All in all, this was a swooning, sweet and emotional love story with a historical and somewhat magical touch that connected four men and their love through different moments in time.

Rating:
4.5 stars rounding up to 5

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Riley Hart
Christina Lee

What an absolutely marvelous book! In Memoriam is heartbreaking but beautiful, romantic but full of horror, brutal but poetic. ​It’s a book I will never forget, nor its wonderful characters and their epic love story.

In short, it is set during WWI and follows two young British private school boys, Ellwood and Gaunt, who are best friends and secretly in love at a time when that kind of love wasn’t allowed, and follows them as the navigate the war’s horror and death surrounding them. It’s a haunting, devastating, beautiful and epic tale of friendship, lost hopes and dreams, the brutality of war and of love conquering it all.
​
This is Alice Winn’s debut book, which is an amazing accomplishment. The writing style is pure perfection, the research flawless and the storytelling is absolutely brilliant! I can only imagine what kind of masterpieces Alice Winn will write in the future, with this as a debut!

The characters in this book were amazing and so relatable. I immediately rooted for sweet Ellwood and stoic Gaunt and their deep affection for each other. It was completely endearing how they both valued their friendship and how they were both so in love with each other but too afraid to lose their friendship to tell the other. The way Alice Winn showed their different backgrounds in the minor details as well as the major privileged/working class differences in the military was so powerful, as was the way Gaunt struggled with the very idea of being in love with a man, knowing the dangerous consequences for a man with his lesser background. His mixed feelings of love and excitement with anxiety and tension was all too understandable.

I absolutely loved this book and cannot praise it enough! It’s both an important eye-opening story to tell, about the horrors of war, how gay love was forbidden and the injustice embedded in a class society, and as well as a swooning, sweet and emotional love story that took my breath away. Please do yourself a favor and read this book! It will probably break your heart, but you won’t regret it!

Rating:
5 stars

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Alice Winn

This was such a delightful, fastpaced and gorgeous enemies-to-lover story about two archenemies whose friends think they would be perfect for each other! But while it was sweet and fuzzy, it also had a lot of depth with anxiety issues, childhood trauma, parental neglect and alcoholism, all weaved together into a perfect heartwarming and emotional story. Absolutely loved it!

The two main characters, the introverted Dylan Ramírez with a childhood trauma and anxiety issues and the loud, confident and attention seeker Jonah Collins with a huge shameful secret that is almost crushing him, have hated each other from the first time they met as eleven-year-olds and Dylan beat Jonah in Uno. But when Dylan’s best friends Hanna and Jonah’s best friend Andre become the school’s power couple, Dylan and Jonah are forced to spend time together. But the most annoying part is how their friends keep nagging about how perfect they would be for each other just because they are the only two openly bisexual guys at school. ‘Cause there obviously can’t be any other reason for it, right? Well, when they start fake-dating to get their friends off their back they are about to find out…

This book had two of my favorite troops – enemies to lovers and fake dating – plus amazing, fleshed out characters, snarky banter and wonderful friends! But it was so much more than tropes, it was such a deep and special story dealing with trauma, mental health issues and abuse.

“You have to decide if it’s worth the sacrifice of losing him.”

The story had some truly heartbreaking parts, and I truly hated both Jonah’s dad and Dylan’s mother. No matter what they had been through, neglecting your children is unforgivable. I felt that they both got off the hook a little too easy, even though I’m of course happy for the positive turn of events. I also feel that Jonah’s friends could have done more to help him earlier, or hinted to Dylan about his struggles. But that set aside, I loved the friends and their banter. They were such an amazing, lovable and diverse squad!

The writing was flawless, you couldn’t tell at all that this was Amanda Woody’s debut book, and they made an amazing job combining the difficult topics with the lighter ones while still making it a very easy and joyful story to read. 

All in all, this was a sweet, fuzzy and funny read while also dealing with some pretty heavy topics, and with great representation. I finished this book in one sitting, ending it with a big goofy smile all over my face!

Rating:
5 stars

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Amanda Woody

I was lucky to get an ARC of the new edition of Wolfsong, which will be published on July 4th, by Tor Books and NetGalley. I couldn’t really tell what had been changed from the previous edition, but I can tell you this: This book is an absolute masterpiece! It’s a magical, beautiful and poetic tale about love and friendship, pack and mates that will make you cry and break your heart and then heal it again. It’s a book that hasn’t left my mind since I first read it, and that will always have a special place in my heart. Please give yourself the gift of experiencing the magical and heartfelt world of Green Greek and its werewolf villagers and read this book you too!

It’s not really possible to describe in words what makes this book so special and all the things it made me feel while reading it, nor properly explain the impact it had, and will continue to have, on me. It’s the way it sings to you, the way it speaks directly to your heart and the way it rips your heart in pieces and makes you fall madly in love with all the characters. But in short, Wolfsong is an urban fantasy/paranormal story taking place in the small village of Green Greek somewhere in USA, where the main character Ox gets abandoned by his father as a young kid. To help his mother, Ox starts to work for Gordo’s car repair shop about the same time as the intriguing Bennett family moves into the house next door, with the youngest son, Joe, immediately taking an interest in Ox. But as Ox is about to find out, the world is not what it seems, and there are werewolf and witches, kindness and cruelty, magic and destiny to discover.
 
Wolfsong is one of those epic family histories that lets us readers follow along for decades and tells the story by letting us readers truly get to know the characters and feel their feelings. The writing style is so unique and perfect it feels ethereal. And the characters are so lovable, so vulnerable, so full of flaws that you immediately take them all to your heart.
 
There is Ox, who’d always been seen as slow and stupid, but who was aimed for greatness. His POV is just one of the best I’ve ever encountered. He sees the world in such a beautiful way, and T J Klune really lets us see and feel all his emotions and his growth from insecure and sad to feeling loved and being able to love wholeheartedly and lead others.
 
“Things made sense, so much more sense now, but they didn’t. At all. The world was not full of monsters and magic. It was meant to be mundane and marred with little broken pieces of fucking retard and you’re gonna get shit, Ox.”
 
And Joe. Sweet, sweet Joe, who’d been so severely traumatized but who found a home in Ox and dared to start living fully again. Their journey to discover what’s howling between them is so heartwrenching and breathtaking. But also fun! T J Klune has this special humor that I adore.
 
“Except.
Except.
Joe wore a pair of low-slung shorts. Just the smallest things. And that was it.”
 
“He must have seen me out of the corner of his eye. He turned and grinned at me, and it was Joe, but it was Joe.
So, naturally, that’s when I walked into the side of the house. The tomatoes in my hand crushed against me. My head hit the wood siding and I thought, Oh shit.”
 
And all the members of the Bennett family with their amazing bonds and how they run and sing together, Gordo who is suffering from his own broken heart but who nevertheless wraps his love around Ox, the other workers at the shop who are like their own pack and the love and spirit of the village and the nature itself.
 
“I thought, I won’t let anyone hurt them because pack, because home, because love.”
 
I really don’t know how to explain how much I love these characters and their love for each other, the world building and the magical, poetically writing. All I know is that this is a book that hit me straight in the heart and will stay there forever.
 
Thank you to Tor Publishing Group and NetGalley for the ARC and the opportunity to read this marvelous book! All opinions are my own and I am leaving my honest review voluntarily.

Rating:
​5 epic stars

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T.J. Klune