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Tag: books

  • Book Review: “Daindreth’s Assassin” by Elisabeth Wheatley

    Stars: 4.5 out of 5

    Genre: Fantasy Romance

    Book Length: 276 pages

    Format Read: Paperback

    Published: 2021

    This book was highly enjoyable. I loved the slower pace and the enemies-to-lovers trope of the story. As this book also doesn’t contain sex scenes, the yearning is written excellently. To be fair, I would say the enemies-to-lovers trope is primarily at play at the beginning; they feel more like a friends-to-lovers couple as the story progresses. Friends-to-lovers is my favorite between the two tropes, so I was happy.

    The story’s pacing feels cozy until the action scenes begin; once we’re in a fight, the pace picks up appropriately, and the scene plays out in my mind clearly based on the description. This is perfect because I find I hate when a book’s action picks up too quickly and makes me go back to read like “wait, wait, WAIT, where are we? What happened??” I stayed immersed in this book from beginning to end.

    I enjoy Elisabeth’s writing as well because it clearly conveys the story and characters’ feelings, and it doesn’t have the shock factor written into it that some of the most popular authors lean on. The book is written for an adult audience, but without an abundance of cursing or crude jokes and comments. These things are in the writing, but not forced in for the sake of it; these moments fit the overall story or emotion for the moment.

    My Favorite Moments

    **Spoilers Ahead**

    Amira’s (second time) meeting Daindreth on pages 41-44, and specifically when he kissed her hand in greeting. Her sassing Thadred was also wonderful. I, too, choke to death all the time.

    Daindreth asking King Hyle for Amira’s hand in marriage on pages 48-50 was a top favorite moment. I felt just as confused as the rest of the room with the court.

    That moment is quickly followed by the fight between Amira’s stepmother and herself. The anger was palpable and satisfying. Queen Hyle never stood a chance. This results in what any good MMC does.

    Page 71 is one of the first moments that I really liked Daindreth. He betrays everyone’s feelings on this later, but he tries here and other times in the story.

    The meeting between Amira and the Empress sets the perfect tone for their whole relationship in the book.

    The whole of chapter 9. It’s an entire favorite.

    Page 141 – “Who did this?” Gets me every time.

    The kiss on page 176 and the resulting conversation with his possessiveness and yearning showing on 177-178 – gah! I have no words for how good it is.

    Chapter 17 made me mad in the best way. The betrayal.

    Finally, on page 233, my eyes couldn’t open any wider, and I might have cheered aloud. “The chokehold broke like a cut rope.”

  • Favorite Books I read in 2025

    In 2025, specifically starting in August, I got started on a whole reading kick. From August to the end of December, I ended up reading about 75 books. Today, I will share the ones that I read during that time that were my favorites. Some of them are considerably older than being released in 2025, so they weren’t released at that time, but I read them in 2025.

    A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas

    You may be tired of hearing about this book (or not), but this was the first book that started me on the reading kick and romantasy/fantasy romance genre in August 2025. I read it completely on August 16 in one sitting! The very next day, I had to get the next book in the series from my local Barnes & Noble.

    Many fans of the series say that this is their least favorite of the ACOTAR series, but I enjoyed this book so much because of everything that it lays out for the subsequent books. The author writes so many little sentences that don’t seem to foreshadow anything at the time, but then it comes back later, sometimes even 2 books later!

    I ended up loving all 5 books of this series that are currently out, but because the first one got me started on this whole new world of books and it was the first domino that led to 75 books being read, it has a special place in my heart.

    When the Moon Hatched by Sarah A. Parker

    This book destroyed me in the best way. The whole world that is presented in this story is so beautiful, and the writing is so poetic that I fell in love with this story and these characters. I am completely emotionally invested in their story.

    Without spoiling anything, the story does get bittersweet towards the end, but it is such a sweeping romance as well that I read it while my heart ached alongside these lovely characters.

    The next book in the series is coming out in May 2026, and I had to preorder it because of my absolute need to hear how their story progresses. As I said, I am completely emotionally invested.

    Tears of the Wolf by Elisabeth Wheatley

    This was my first step into proper fantasy romance genre books, as well as my first step into independently published books. I was not disappointed.

    Elisabeth’s writing is slower paced than what I began to expect from more “romantasy” type books, but it was refreshing in that way. The story itself doesn’t come across as slow; it feels more cozy until the action portions begin. I fell in love with these characters because this story was more “friends-to-lovers” than any of the previous stories I read above that are more of the “enemies-to-lovers” trope, so while I do enjoy a good “enemies-to-lovers”, I found that “friends-to-lovers” is preferable to me.

    I hope to continue reading and writing more reviews on the individual books that I have been reading; it’s just been difficult getting myself out of reading-mode and into writing-mode!

  • Stop the Doomscroll Weekly Recap

    Over the week, I did find two new apps to use but they are not time-wasters. The two apps are Wellos and Fable.

    Screen time recap last week

    Wellos is a health app that I have access to through my insurance. Fable is a book tracking app that also has book groups. I saw it through Instagram before I got rid of it and Fable is a great alternative to Goodreads since I’ve been trying to drop Amazon. (Goodreads is owned by Amazon.)

    Even with the addition of health and reading tracking, my screen time for the week went down by 58% from the week before.

    By creating a barrier to the apps for myself by only accessing them on my computer, I have greatly increased my reading time. I was able read the majority of the first Wheel of Time book in about 3 days. (The book is 744 pages!) I also finished reading ‘Home is Where the Bodies Are.’ (Not my favorite read.)

  • Stop the Doomscroll Day 2

    Today was a more typical day with listening to YouTube in the morning and the evening but it is still progress. The screen time app said that my daily average is down 76%!

    Screen time 3.24

    Even though it looks to be more than I would like, this is exactly what I was hoping for.

    As an anecdote, I feel that my mood has been more stable but also more neutral. That is to say, I often feel like I feel nothing. It’s true that emotions are not supposed to be up and down constantly and shifting from very high to very low quickly, but I just feel very neutral and it feels like nothingness right now. I hope that using my time productively by making things and cleaning things will help any boredom to become fulfilling.

    I have made progress in reading: I read two chapters of “Home is Where the Bodies Are” at lunch time and I read one chapter of the first “Wheel of Time” book in the evening.

  • My Favorite Christian Resources

    In this day and time, it is getting more and more difficult to find Christian resources that actually use the Bible as the foundation for the material. (Shocking.) Because I’ve been running into this problem repeatedly, I’m sure many other Christians are too so I want to share a list of some channels and books that have helped me in my studies. If you have some resources as well, I would love to hear what they are.

    Just a side note as well, I’m sure there are some minor issue disagreements that I have with some of the creators and authors that I’m listing here but overall, they are Christians who believe the Bible is the word of God and that faith in Christ is the only necessity for salvation.

    1. The Messed Up Church YouTube Channel – This channel is run by the Kozars, Steve and Paulette. They post videos critiquing messages from mega church pastors and ministry speakers who primarily use their speaking skills to make a profit rather than to properly teach from the Bible. The videos are slightly chaotic and disorganized, but their videos feel much more like a conversation uncovering the manipulative techniques in these speeches. They are both very clear that they are not teachers but they are laypeople, which makes most of their videos easily understood and relatable. I especially like their use of humor but they’re also clear that the tactics of these speakers is very serious and ruining the lives of their followers.

    2. Fighting for the Faith YouTube Channel – This channel was the inspiration for the Kozars with their channel but it is run by a Lutheran pastor, Chris Roseborough. He also primarily posts videos critiquing mega-church pastors and other church leaders who manipulate Bible verses to tell the story they want to tell or to support the life lesson they want to tell but only by ripping a verse (or passage) out of context. A bit that he also posts is called Prophesy Bingo, a game he plays with guests to essentially show that all of these self-proclaimed “prophets” use similar empty buzzwords and phrases in their supposed prophecies and predictions. This channel also uses plenty of humor while teaching the seriousness of understanding scripture to the Christian life.

    3. Long4Truth 1 YouTube Channel – This channel is another married couple, the Longs, Daniel and Robin, and they also discuss false preachers from mega-churches but they have covered additional topics such as “Christian” Bible study books and cults that have started due to the misinterpretation of scripture. They are also laypeople so they can explain these topics in ways that are easy to understand while still being a broad study of the development of mainstream Christianity.

    4. Counterfeit Kingdom book by Holly Pivec and Doug Geivett – In the same vein as the study of supposed “Christianity” is a book that discusses a false Christian movement that has arisen called the New Apostolic Reformation that is a branch that claims that the offices of apostle and prophet from the Bible are still active today. This is contrary to the previously well-understood role that apostles played in the New Testament. Apostles in the New Testament were in the role if they were eye witnesses of the resurrected Christ. Even the late comer Paul (previously Saul) saw Jesus Christ. This book goes into detail about the movement of the NAR and the results of the beliefs that the movement teaches to its followers including spiritual abuse.

    5. The ESV One Year Bible – This Bible is the easiest reading plan for reading the entire Bible in one year. I prefer the English Standard Version translation of the Bible and the One Year Bible is offered in multiple translations including NIV and NLT. I admit that I don’t read it perfectly every single day but each reading is dated, allowing you the ability to know where to read each day, which is often the first step to making a daily habit of reading the Bible – knowing what to read or where to start each day. The readings include a section from the Old Testament, a section from the New Testament, a section from the Psalms and a verse of Proverbs, making it very easy to read through the whole Bible.

    6. The English Standard Version Women’s Study Bible – This is a starting place for me to further understand some of my other reading in the One Year Bible. This Bible includes study notes and references to other related verses of the Bible such as the prophecies and their coming true. I’m building a further library of commentaries and notes regarding scripture but this Bible has been my starting place.

    Please let me know of your favorite study resources and I would be happy to look into them! I also want to continue to share more resources as I find them so I may do regular posts like this one.

    (None of the links in this post are sponsored)

  • Book Review: Counterfeit Kingdom

    As I’ve been taking a long commute to and from work, I decided to start listening to audio books and I decided to start with a book by Holly Pivec and Doug Geievett called Counterfeit Kingdom. As a Christian, I frequently watch YouTube videos regarding Christianity and Christian culture. So when channels I watch often like Fighting for the Faith and Alisa Childers began recommending this book, I added it to my reading list.

    As a quick explanation, this book is a summary of the apparent beliefs of a movement within Christian circles called the New Apostolic Reformation. One of the main things in this movement is a belief that there are current-day apostles rather than just the past apostles that are described in scripture. This book explains this and other beliefs in this movement in detail.

    A strange additional detail about this movement is that most of the churches that are in this movement deny being in this movement. This appears to be the heart of why this book was written, in order to show the unbiblical part of these beliefs, because many who wouldn’t normally be influenced by this movement have been influenced by this movement.

    Even as someone who isn’t an expert in religion or Christianity specifically, I’ve noticed these beliefs in my local churches. One of the ways I see this myself is through the jargon or buzzwords that are used in the movement. Because our culture is so centered on hashtags, trending, and buzzwords, we all are easily able to adopt words like this even if it means something slightly different than what we think it means. An example phrase is “prayer declarations.” Many in the NAR movement just talk about prayer but in teachings from the pastors of the movement, they only talk about prayer declarations, which is to say that in prayer, the person is declaring to receive what they are “praying” for. The scriptural view of prayer is of a humble request of God, not a declaration that God must give or will give what the person is “asking” for.

    A cultural example of a hashtag or trending phrase becoming popular or viral but it wasn’t understood by a large part of the population was “Netflix and chill.” This phrase is still used jokingly out of what its original meaning was, which was a code teenagers were using for sexual activity in order to hide it. But it still went viral because it was popular and people heard it often online so it caught traction. I think because we start to hear the phrases or buzzwords like “prayer declarations” on the radio like on KLOVE or in teaching videos online, they sound Christian in their use, they gain traction. They sound good but they don’t actually mean the same thing.

    I could say more about how much I agree with the thoughts of this book, but I will end here. I highly recommend this book to Christians not as a blaming book or a pointing fingers book, but as a helpful tool for true discernment. Being able to understand false teachings and discern them from biblical teachings is taught in scripture in the New Testament as being an important skill for the Christian to have. (Acts, 1 Timothy, Titus, and Jude contain some of these examples.)