Reviews written by Christina Franke

What I Liked: THE CUTE. That is what this book is. So freaking adorable. I’ve read one Robin Benway book before this, but I tried the audio, and I feel like the adorbs did not translate quite as well to the audiobook format. Anyway, I totally understand why...

What I Liked: With Noggin, I really wasn’t sure what I was getting into and I was a little worried that I was heading for a non-Christina book. Would I wonder if I had my head screwed on straight when I chose to read this? Should I just head...

What I Liked: I’ve mentioned this before but props to Dahlia (The Daily Dahlia) for first putting this book on my radar. Since I’m not big on the mystery genre, I’d initially not been interested, but then she pitched it to me with LGBT and suddenly I NEEDED IT...

What I Liked: Earlier this year, I read my first Ellen Hopkins and I liked it enough to want to read more of them. It’s funny, though, how much more daring and dark this later book can be. I feel like this is a sign of publishers broadening the...

What I Liked: Middle grade novels are often quite hit or miss with me. Either they’re charming, clever and beautifully insightful or they’re painstakingly obvious and full of jokes that aren’t much fun past a certain maturity level. Both have their place, of course, but they won’t all be...

What Left Me Wanting More: Back in the day, when I was obsessed with chick lit, Sarah Mlynowski was one of the authors I loved to read. Seems like she followed me over to YA, but I’d actually not read any of her YA novels until now. I was...

What I Loved Was Everything: Much of the time, I know, give or take a star, what I’ll be rating a book when I finish within the first fifty pages or so. Depending upon what point you talked to me while I read Love Letters to the Dead, you...

What I Liked: The Well’s End by Seth Fishman is rather an odd book, one that goes through several genre changes as you read through it. I know that’s something that doesn’t work for a lot of people, so I think this book will be pretty hit or miss...

What I Liked: Putting it all out there, I actually really struggled with this book in the beginning. It’s slow-moving, not particularly character-driven, and there’s something about the narrative style that just made me feel sort off somehow. One hundred pages in, I was toying with DNFing, not because...

My love affair with magical realism continues. There is just something that’s more fantastical about the real world we live in being filled with these odd strains of magic than the most epic of fantasy worlds. Magical realism sends my mind into paroxysms of joy and imagination. The Strange and...

SURPRISE! You’re all (well, those of you who know me well anyway) looking at my rating and going “what the eff? I came here for a ranty review; this is a prank, right?” Nope, it’s not a prank. In fact, I would like to hold up this review as proof...

What I Loved: The blurb of The Riverman pulled me in but also repelled me. How can I not be intrigued by a book that name-drops such awesome titles. But, by the same token, the audacity! It’s not necessarily a good idea to draw comparisons to Carroll, Lewis, and...

What I Liked: For those considering starting this series, here’s a basic rundown on the world. Like Cory Doctorow’s Little Brother, Simmons’ series delves into what could happen if the worst political groups in the US were to take over. Where Doctorow focused on the Patriot Act, Simmons portrays...

Note: This review is of the British edition published by Gollancz. I've heard it might be different. What I Liked: Elizabeth May is totally awesome, and so I really wanted to read her book. This order of events has totally ruined me before, but in this...

What I Liked: As the title indicates, reactions to this books may vary. Indeed, they already have varied quite widely amongst my friends, varying from hatred to love, hitting pretty much every range in between. Coming off a streak of books I didn’t like, I was admittedly nervous to...