BLOG TOUR: Hearts, Strings, and Other Breakable Things by Jacqueline Firkins [GIVEAWAY]

Hearts, Strings, and Other Breakable Things
by Jacqueline Firkins
Release Date: December 17th 2019
Genres: Young Adult, Romance, Retellings, Contemporary

SYNOPSIS: Mansfield, Massachusetts is the last place seventeen-year-old Edie Price wants to spend her final summer before college. It’s the home of wealthy suburbanites and prima donnas like Edie’s cousins, who are determined to distract her from her mother’s death with cute boys and Cinderella-style makeovers. Edie has her own plans, and they don’t include a prince charming.

But as Edie dives into schoolwork and applying for college scholarships, she finds herself drawn to two Mansfield boys who start vying for her attention. First there’s Sebastian, Edie’s childhood friend and first love. He’s sweet and smart and . . . already has a girlfriend. Then there’s Henry, the local bad boy and all-around player. He’s totally off limits, even if his kisses are chemically addictive.

Both boys are trouble. Edie can’t help but get caught between them. Someone’s heart is going to break. Now she just has to make sure it isn’t hers.

REVIEW: I just want to start by saying this is a good, faithful retelling of Mansfield Park. I think if you enjoy the original story, you’ll enjoy this as an updated version. With that being said, I have personal issues with the source material and that made this book slightly less enjoyable for me (I’ve always been a Fannie/Henry shipper).

With that in mind, let’s continue. I thought some of the characters were done well. Edie (Fanny) and Henry seemed well-developed. I liked that they were multi-dimensional and they both seemed to experience some growth as the story progressed. Edie’s uncle Bert was another fun character and I wished he’d gotten more screen-time. The rest of the characters were a little flat for me. Maria and Julia were especially tough for me 95% of the time. They were just so self-centered and MEAN to each other. They seemed to have zero morals.

The tone of the book was inconsistent at times. It read like your average YA book, but then randomly there would be a page that had a pretty explicit make-out scene. Another example of this is that there was almost no swearing the entire book except for a couple of f-words just randomly dropped in there. That kind of thing just made me feel a little blindsided and took away from the book.

Overall, I think if you really like Mansfield Park, this could be a good retelling for you. I personally enjoyed some of Austen’s other books better so if this author does some of Austen’s other books, I could see myself picking those up.

Overall Rating: 3
Language: Moderate
Violence: None
Smoking/Drinking: Moderate
Sexual Content: Moderate

This blog tour’s running a special Instagram giveaway for a hardcover copy of this book and one of three different book inspired dresses!

Click on the picture above to be taken to the giveaway!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Jacqueline’s a writer, costume designer, and lover of beautiful things. She’s on the fulltime faculty in the Department of Theatre & Film at the University of British Columbia where she also takes any writing class they’ll let her into. When not obsessing about where to put the buttons or the commas, she can be found running by the ocean, eating excessive amounts of gluten, listening to earnest love songs, and pretending her dog understands every word she says.

Website|Goodreads|Twitter|Instagram

Note: I received this book free from the author/blog tour in exchange for an honest review.

California Winter | November Wrap-Up & TBR Update

This month hasn’t been great blogging wise (you might have noticed) but it’s been pretty good reading wise! I was able to snag some library copies of a couple of my anticipated November releases, so that was awesome. It always feels like I’m slogging through a book that’s taking me too much time, so then I’m surprised when I see how much I’ve actually read in a month.

monthly tbr

The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern
Scavenge the Stars by Tara Sim [ARC 1/7]
The Map from Here to There by Emery Lord [ARC 1/7] – Read, review coming
Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens [Book Club] – Read, review coming
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
Caraval by Stephanie Garber [Book Club] – Read
Talking to Strangers by Malcolm Gladwell
The Queen of Nothing by Holly Black – Read, review coming
The Toll by Neal Shusterman – Read, review coming

Overall TBR:

TBR at the beginning of the year = 383
TBR at the beginning of November =305
Books added to TBR = 2
Books read/deleted from TBR = 7
Total on TBR now = 300

How did your reading go this month?

Summer Cleaning Mini-Reviews

If Spring Cleaning is a thing, that means Summer Cleaning is too, right? I have so many backlogged ARCs to review, it’s not even funny. Covers link to Goodreads.

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Say No to the Bro by Kat Helgeson [ARC]

Okay…to be perfectly honest I read this back in April and I’m having a hard time remembering everything. The notes that I wrote down for this, though, are as follows: “I’m not really buying their relationship. I feel like it doesn’t fit with who I think the characters are.” From what I remember of the book, all of a sudden the two main characters were dating and I was like, “Okay, that’s random.” Like, not random plotwise, but random because it didn’t feel genuine. I also remember not really liking any of the characters–they all just seemed really selfish to me. 2/5

Seeking Mansfield by Kate Watson [ARC]

I always love a good Jane Austen retelling and I’d heard good things about this book, so I was super excited. The issue I had with the original Mansfield Park is that I felt like Edmund just randomly decided to like Fanny in the end. Like, what was going on? Fanny deserves better than Edmund shrugging his shoulders going, “Well, I guess I’ll just marry Fanny now since that last relationship didn’t work out.” So I was hesitant going into this book in case it was the same thing. To some extent it was, but I did like the ending of this retelling better than the original ending. One thing that really bugged me is that I don’t feel like Harlan would have acted how he did towards Finley if he really respected her dad as he said he did. There was also a lot of angst that I could have done without. 4/5

A Million Junes

A Million Junes by Emily Henry [ARC]

First of all, stunning cover. My first impression was that the main characters were both super likable which is always nice. I also rejoiced to find a main character who loved both her biological father as well as her step-dad. I’d been searching for such a book and I absolutely loved the relationships that June had with both her father and her step-father. The plot itself was a little abstract and I did find myself confused a time or two, but I was still okay with it. The magical realism aspect of the book was so well done and definitely gave the entire story a dreamy quality. In my opinion, this book was a definite step up from Henry’s last book. I also thought this book was a really great look at grief and grieving in general. 4/5

Follow Me Back

Follow Me Back by A.V. Geiger [ARC]

So…this book is CRAZY. As I was reading, I thought that this was a nice departure from my normal genres–I don’t read a lot of thrillers (psychological or otherwise). I honestly didn’t expect too much from the plot. I thought it would just be a very basic twist at the end. But about halfway through I started to suspect that things weren’t going to end up being the way I thought they would be. Was Eric going to end up being the stalker instead of Tessa? What about that weird Mrs. Eric Thorn from Twitter? How does she fit in? What the heck happened to Tessa last summer? Then the ending kind of came out of nowhere, but it also makes sense. At this point, however, I find myself very uncertain about the very end (was it an epilogue?). I didn’t anticipate this being more than one book and I’m very confused as to what is actually happening. Confused in a good way though. The only thing I didn’t particularly care for is the way that Tessa’s mom and boyfriend treated her mental issues. I mean, I don’t know how I would react in their shoes, but they seemed so insensitive! Also, WHAT IS UP WITH TESSA’S PSYCHIATRIST??? 4/5

Songs About a Girl by Chris Russell [ARC]

I had high hopes for this book because I thought it was going to be something a little more similar to Audrey, Wait! by Robin Benway. Like, the main character goes to school with a guy who ends up being a massively famous pop star and turns out he carried a secret torch for her all through high school and so all the songs on his band’s new album are about her. That’s not what this book was about (but that would be an awesome book, right?). I didn’t really understand the plot all the way and I was really confused as to why Charlie felt so strongly that she needed to lie to her father. And I didn’t understand why she was being targeted at school. Also, to be honest, I thought this was going to turn into an accidental incest situation. It didn’t, but I had no idea where the plot was going for a while if not in that direction. 2/5

They All Fall Down by Roxanne St. Clair

This book could have been so good, but instead it was just freaking weird. I don’t know…somehow I thought there was going to be a little bit more of a mystery involved that the reader could try to solve. Instead, it’s just a big conspiracy thing that’s plopped in your lap in the last 50 pages. The characters were strange while also being blatant stereotypes (brooding bad boy, aggressive jock, mean girl cheerleaders). In addition, I thought Kenzie’s best friend was basically the most annoying side kick of a character I’d ever read. She only cares about becoming more popular and gets super upset when Kenzie isn’t interested in being popular as well. That drama was so unnecessary and just made the book that much harder to get through. Don’t read this. 2/5

Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan

Okay, let me stop you right there. This is not a book about Asian people who are crazy and rich. This is a book about Asian people who are crazy rich. Get the difference? This book was surprisingly funny and exasperating all at the same time–there are some seriously ridiculous characters and situations. As someone who is half-Chinese (I’m descended from Hong Kong peasants–no shame) I felt like this book was so refreshing. 99% of the characters in this book are Asian (with the exception of an Au Pair here or there). This book depicts such a wide range of Asian people and I loved it. We’re not all the same, you know? And even though the characters in this book are crazy rich (and I’m not) I still felt like I could relate to them? Anyway, this book gave me a giant hankering for some dim sum. I need a pineapple bun, stat. 4/5

Note: ARCs were received for free in exchange for an honest review.

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Tag: Mansfield Park