Candy Bunny Reader

  Before I get into it, can I just say this is the second book from Beverly Cleary I read as an adult? The first was was Muggie Maggie , which I reviewed back in 2022. I did read a lot of Beverly Cleary's books as a kid, though! I read all of the Ramona books (those are my favorites from her, Ramona is so hilarious and relatable. She's basically Junie B. Jones before Junie B. was a thing), the trilogy about Ralph the Mouse , and the first Henry Huggins book. I also read Socks and some of Otis Spofford but I can barely remember those two. I need to reread them sometime. I also need to read the rest of the Henry Huggins books. And the rest of her standalones and maybe her memoirs.  Anyway. Ellen Tebbits is about Ellen, who has a rather embarrassing secret. When she meets a new girl named Austine in her ballet class, it turns out she has the same secret! So they become best friends. The rest of the chapters are about Ellen and Austine getting into all sorts of mishaps whi...

  All the books I read in June! I read a total of 5 books.  As always, I hope you had a great reading month, too. Links to my full reviews will be added if applicable.  What was your favorite book that you read in June? 1. Frieren Volume 5 by Kanehito Yamada-3 stars 2. Unfamiliar Volumes 1 and 2 by Haley Newsome-both 5 stars! 3. Bianca Torre is Afraid of Everything by Justine Pucella Winans-5 stars 4. The Pirate Captain's Daughter by Eve Bunting-4 stars

  Yeah, I just talked about the first book a few days ago, but I got to talk about the sequel! Something I rarely ever do, but that's because this sequel blew my mind! Unfamiliar Volume 2 by Haley Newsome is the sequel to Unfamiliar Volume 1 . In this sequel, it is a lot more story driven, a lot more darker, and a lot more serious. There's more character development, and twists about some characters we've met in previous volumes. While out witchy girls continue dealing with mishaps mostly involving ghosts, two of our characters fall in love (yup, a Sapphic romance! 😃). But overall, it still has the same cozy vibes just like the first book. A pure 5 star book ! I hope I convinced you to put these books on your TBR if you haven't already. I'd seriously love to read anything else this author puts out! I've also started watching her YouTube channel. 😉

  This book was sooo sweet and sooo cute! The Sprite and the Gardener by Rii Abrego and Joe Whitt takes place in our world--with some magic! Sprites have lived for centuries helping all kinds of plants grow with their magic. Until humans came along and started doing gardening themselves. The sprites are still around but they help less and less. One little sprite named Wisteria secretly discovers a human girl named Elena who takes care of her mother's flower garden, as her mother is out working all day. Wisteria decides to secretly help Elena's garden grow, as long as she isn't discovered.  If you couldn't already tell, Wisteria does get discovered by Elena. And everything changes from there.  What a magical book! I love the whimsical illustrations, and I loved what a chill, slice-of-life cottagecore book this was.  It is a pure 5 star book . I want to read more from this author and illustrator. What was the last "chill" book you read?

Another great book by Kate DiCamillo ! The Puppets of Spelhorst is about 5 sentient puppets: a boy, a girl, a king, an owl, and a wolf. They get bought by an old sailor with the last name Spelhorst. After the sailor dies, the box gets donated, bought, and gifted to two young rich sisters--Emma and Martha. They decide to write a play for the puppets that they can perform, but before they can, the puppets get into some mishaps in and around the girls' house. Eventually the play is performed, and the puppets find out what their true purpose is. I love the whimsical style the story was written in. It felt like a modern day fairy tale. I'd say this book is like a mixture of DiCamillo's two other most popular books: The Magician's Elephant and The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. They are both short books with a huge emotional impact, and they are both about sentient toys.  Apparently this is also the first in a series. I can't wait to read more! It is a pure 5 star ...

  I finally got around to reading this! They Called us Enemy by George Takei is a graphic novel memoir of actor George Takei. It recounts experience as a child in a Japanese internment camp during WW2. He showcases his feelings as a kid experiencing something where he didn't always understand what was going on, but he knew it was something terrible. Growing up, he learned more about what it was being a victim of racism in the United States. He also teaches the audience things they might have not known about the internment camps and how they were able to end them after WW2. He also talks about the aftermath and his overall identity as a Japanese-American, and briefly his time about becoming and actor and being on the critically-acclaimed show, Star Trek.  I loved this book so much! I learned so much about what it was like being in an internment camp from someone who experienced it firsthand, and I also learned more about George Takei in general. I think everyone needs to read t...

My wonderful friend @books.below.stars over on Instagram tagged me in this and I thought it looked neat!  This tag is based off of songs by Maisie Peters. As always, feel free to do this tag if you see this.  1. you signed up for this (a book character you relate to) It's a tie between Richeh from Witch Hat Atelier and Luffy from One Piece . 2. cates brother (your favorite tropes) Found family, friends to lovers, witchcraft, and mysteries. 3. glowing review (most recent 5 star book) Fake Dates and Mooncakes by Sher Lee 4. there it goes (comfort book) It's a tie between Anne of Green Gables, Kisses and Croissants, and Just Ella .  5. john hughes movie (a book you want an adaptation of) Let the Bone  graphic novel series by Jeff Smith finally have an adaptation!!! 6. truth is (a book you wish you didn't read) Unpopular opinion but...Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen  7. adore you (a book you will always recommend) Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace L...

The PERFECT romance book! Fake Dates and Mooncakes by Sher Lee is about Dylan, a teenage boy who works at his Aunt Jade's Singaporean Chinese takeout shop. His family has been struggling financially, and they are worried they won't be able to keep the shop open. Dylan finds out about a mooncake making contest run by a celebrity chef named Lawrence Lim. The winner will get their restaurant showcased on Lim's TV show. Dylan decides to enter the contest, thinking if the shop makes some publicity, they might get more customers.  Then, one day Dylan accidentally gets the order wrong of a rich customer named Adrian, and Adrian makes a big deal out of it. Adrien's equally rich friend Theo, who was there when the incident happened, makes up for it by visiting and eating at the takeout shop. Eventually Theo and Dylan become friends, and Theo decides to make a donation to Dylan's aunt Jade to keep the shop afloat for much longer. Dylan's family is very happy about it. Th...

  Aka the best books of this year, along with their respective reviews. Tell me your best books of the year! Here are mine... Among the Brave by Margaret Peterson Haddix Heartstopper Volume 4  by Alice Oseman Heartstopper Yearbook by Alice Oseman Legends and Lattes  by Travis Baldree Sleeping Around  by Morgan Vega Talli: Daughter of the Moon  by Sulhya Among the Enemy by Margaret Peterson Haddix Among the Free by Margaret Peterson Haddix Bone Volumes 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 by Jeff Smith Milk and Honey  by Rupi Kaur Nancy Drew and the Bungalow Mystery  by Carolyn Keene Witch Hat Atelier Volumes 1 , 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9, and 10 by Kamome Shirahama Nancy Drew and the Mystery at Lilac Inn  by Carolyn Keene Garlic and the Vampire  by Bree Paulsen Garlic and the Witch by Bree Paulsen Laziness Does Not Exist  by Devon Price Chef's Kiss  by Jarrett Melendez The Doll People set Sail by Ann M. Martin How to be Ace  by Rebecca Burgess One Pi...

  I think I found a new favorite manga series! Akane-Banashi by Yuki Suenaga and Takamasa Moue is about Akane, a teenage girl who grew up watching her father practice and perform rakugo. Rakugo is a traditional Japanese art where a sole performer tells a short story and plays all of the characters, usually while seated. While she was in elementary school, Akane's father and a bunch of other candidates took an exam to rise up in the rankings of rakugo performers, but for some reason the judge proctoring the exam decided to expel all of them. Akane's father gets a job in construction work, and Akane decides to take his place in being a rakugo performer to showcase that rakugo can be a real job. Over the years she starts taking secret lessons from her dad's old instructor, and during her teen years she slowly makes herself known among his other pupils and rakugo fans, all while trying to perfect her craft.  I was pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed this! I saw this manga...

  You have no idea how long I've wanted to read this memoir. I finally got to read it this past month! My Life in France by Julia Child and Alex Prud'homme is Julia Child's memoir. It is her story on how she got into cooking after she and her husband Paul Child moved to Paris, France. They moved there because of Paul's job at the US Embassy there. In her first few years in France, Julia learned to cook all sorts of French dishes and desserts at a world famous cooking school, and she met two of her long-time collaborators there: Simone Beck (nicknamed Simca) and Louisette Betholle. Julia then got the idea of making a cookbook with French recipes, but for an American audience. Aside from talking about her everyday life in France, she also gets into details on how she, Simca, and Louisette wrote there first and most famous cookbook: Mastering the Art of French Cooking . It was not an easy process! But their book became super-successful overseas (in the United States), to ...

This is the second Kelly Barnhill book I've read so far. The first one I read was The Girl who Drank the Moon back in 2021, which I gave 4 stars to. The Ogress and The Orphans is set in a fantasy world in a small town called Stone-in-the-Glen, which has fallen on hard times ever since the town's library burned down and other buildings such as the school have mysteriously been destroyed, too. Now no one trusts each other and almost nobody ever leaves their homes. The town orphanage has also been struggling financially. The owners and the orphans are very supportive of one another, and they've been trying to get the town to come together again, especially on market days where they sell handmade soap and food from their mini-farm, but to no avail. At the same time on the outskirts of the town, an ancient Ogress has started to live there and she has noticed how the town has been struggling, so every night she secretly leaves food, baked goods, and handmade cards to the people...

  I can't delve too deep into them since they are the 2nd and 3rd book of the series, but I will tell you right now that I loved them and I gave them both 5 stars! They are just as heartwarming, whimsical, magical, and sweet as the first one, and have both great LGBT and disability rep. I will tell you the 2nd book is a prequel to the first one. And in the third book the characters from both the 1st and 2nd book all come together for a perfect conclusion.  The Tea Dragon Society series is now an all-time favorite graphic novel series for me. It literally had everything I love in fictional storytelling. Thank you Kay O'Neill for your creation!

  Middle School and Other Disasters: Worst Broommate Ever! by Wanda Coven is a middle grade book (first of a series) of a girl named Heidi Heckelbeck who starts middle school at a boarding school that secretly offers magic classes (casting spells and stuff like that, not magic tricks). Heidi herself comes from a long line of witches who attended the same boarding school. Heidi is nervous about starting middle school without her family nearby and her friends from elementary school, but when she arrives there, she ends up loving the campus. She also runs into an old friend of hers named Sunny, and also becomes friends with Sunny's roommate, Annabelle. Unfortunately, Heidi's roommate is a girl she always had a huge rivalry with since second grade: a girl named Melanie Maplethrope! Now she thinks middle school will be a nightmare, but then she learns she and Melanie have a lot more in common than they thought...and maybe they could become friends? Man, this book was so refreshing ...

  I loved this one! Note: I actually read this back in June, but it was at the very end of June, and I decided to instead include it in my July reads. Either way, it's worth a read! Cosmoknights by Hannah Templar follows a young woman named Pandora (or Pan as she is usually called) who lives on another planet named Viridian somewhere far off in the future. She is secretly friends with the princess of said planet, named Tara. Tara becomes tired of being raised in isolation and asks Pan to help her escape, which she does, but then the rest of the royal family and the planet get angry at Pan for helping Tara escape.  So Pan ends up spending most of her time in her father's repair shop years after that incident. Around that the same time, there are these televised competitive games where different knights from different planets across the galaxy fight to compete for the hand of the princesses of certain planets. Two of the knights are frequent winners, and they're actually a ...

🎵I am so happy because I finally got around to reading this book!🎵 It took me so long to find this book be available at my local library and when I did see it, I snagged it as quickly as I could.  The Tea Dragon Society by Kay O'Neill is about Greta, a girl who works at her parent's blacksmith shop, but it hasn't been doing so well since the tools that they make are less in demand. One day while walking outside, she rescues a little dragon, which happens to be a tea dragon owned by a family friend named Hesekiel. Tea dragons are special dragons that sprout leaves on their backs that can be used to make all kinds of tea, depending on what herb the dragon grows. When Greta returns the tea dragon to Hesekiel, she meets another girl about her age there who doesn't speak much and has memory loss. Her name is Minette, and she used to be a prophetess in training. Greta and Minette decide to hang out and become friends, and then they both learn more about raising tea dragons...

  So here are all the books I read last month! I read a total of 8 books.  Witch Hat Atelier Volume 8 by Kamome Shirahama -Well, this is obviously a sequel that is several books into the story. All I can say is it's still a masterpiece. 5 stars You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson -a YA contemporary novel about a girl named Liz who wants to go to a prestigious college to be in their orchestra and then go to medical school. But she didn't get the financial aid she applied for, so she decides to join the race to become prom queen and get a scholarship. She falls in love with another one of the contestants, a girl named Mack. 5 stars Witch Hat Atelier Volume 9 by Kamome Shirahama -The reason this one got half a point off was because of one chapter I didn't read in this book. But there was a content warning in the beginning and it even said you didn't have to read that chapter in order to understand the rest of the story. Other than that, great sequel! 4.5 stars Wit...

Since it's (approximately?) halfway through the year, I thought I would share with you my favorite books of the year so far. These are all 5 star books. I also put links to their respective review pages if you want to check those out/revisit them. Just click on the title of the book. (Well, most of these have reviews...those that don't are usually sequels in series that I obviously can't talk about because that will go into spoiler territory!) Among the Brave by Margaret Peterson Haddix Heartstopper Volume 4 by Alice Oseman Heartstopper Yearbook by Alice Oseman Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree Sleeping Around by Morgan Vega Talli: Daughter of the Moon by Sulhya Among the Enemy by Margaret Peterson Haddix Among the Free by Margaret Peterson Haddix Bone Volumes 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 by Jeff Smith Milk and Honey by Rupi Kaur Nancy Drew and the Bungalow Mystery by Carolyn Keene Witch Hat Atelier Volumes 1 , 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9, and 10 by Kamome Shirahama Nancy Drew an...

Another very favorite contemporary novel! You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson is a YA contemporary novel about high school senior Liz Lighty, who has a dream of going to the prestigious college Pennington College, being in their orchestra, and then going to medical school. However, she and her family struggle financially and she didn't get the financial aid she applied for. Liz finds out she can get a scholarship and recognition if she becomes prom queen of her high school. The competition is not all fun and games as it is a struggle to get to the top, but Liz also meets someone she has a lot in common with in the process: a girl named Mack. And they start to fall in love with each other... This book was literally everything I love seeing in contemporary romance books. The perfect balance of the emotional moments making you feel things in your chest, and the lighthearted and funny moments making you smile. Leah Johnson is a great writer! I gave it 5 stars. I don't kno...

  I finally got around to reading Chef's Kiss By Jarrett Melendez  ! And it was awesome! This book came at the right time in my life. Not to mention I am in the same area of my life as the characters in this book (a twentysomething trying to find her dream job), so it was beyond relatable. Chef's Kiss is about Ben, who majored in English in college due to his parent's wishes, but has trouble finding a full time job that involves writing. He starts to look for part time jobs that supposedly require less skills but doesn't do so well initially until he stumbles upon a small restaurant run by a hotheaded owner named Chef Davis. Ben is already somewhat good at cooking since he cooks for himself and for his three roommates/friends all the time at home. Either way, his new friend/co-chef and crush, Liam, and two other chefs named Emilia and Mel train him in some of the restaurants' menu items to prove to Chef Davis that he can work there in the kitchen. Ben gets ideas on ...