Tag: eARC

Sundays in Bed With… #MyWeeklyWrapUp

Dini @ dinipandareads12 Comments

We’re back with another Sundays in Bed With… meme! This meme dares to ask you what book has been in your bed this morning and is hosted by Midnight Book Girl. Come share what book you’ve been you’ve spent time curled up reading in bed with, or which book you wish you had time to read today!

This Sunday I spent part of the day in bed with The Die of Death which is book II of The Great Devil War by Kenneth B. Andersen. It’s nice to be back with Philip after book one — I feel in ways that he has grown a lot although time didn’t pass in the real world when he was in hell. I’m looking forward to learning more about Mortimer (Death) and seeing what happens next!

Philip’s adventures as the Devil’s apprentice have changed him—in a good way. Although he misses his friends in Hell, he has made new friends in life.
But when the future of the underworld is threatened once again, Philip’s help is needed. Death’s Die has been stolen and immortality is spreading across the globe.
Philip throws himself into the search—and discovers a horrible truth about his own life along the way.

The Die of Death is volume 2 in The Great Devil War-series and winner of the ORLA-Award.

The Great Devil War-series is a humorous and gripping tale about good and evil, filled with biblical and historical characters, such as Judas, Goliath, and Pontius Pilate, as well as modern figures such as Elvis Presley, Albert Einstein, Winston Churchill, and many more.

The Great Devil War-series is a Danish bestseller, topping library and school reading lists among teens and young adults. The books have been published in more than ten countries and have won numerous awards. 

What are you currently reading?

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Top 5 Saturday: Books by Debut Authors

Dini @ dinipandareads20 Comments

We’re back with another Top 5 Saturday! Just in case you don’t know Top 5 Saturday is a weekly meme created by Mandy @ Devouring Books and it’s where we list the top five books (they can be books on your TBR, favourite books, books you loved/hated) based on the week’s topic. You can see the upcoming schedule at the end of my post 🙂 This week’s topic is: books by debut authors!

I’m always surprised by how many debut authors I have on my TBR because I don’t usually pay a lot of attention to that especially if it’s from a different genre than I normally read. For this list though I decided to keep it simple for myself and focus on the books being released by debut authors in 2020. I’m pretty sure that all of these are by debut authors but sorry if I get anything wrong!

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The Henna Wars Blog Tour: Review and Favourite Quotes

Dini @ dinipandareads18 Comments

Hi, friends! I’m so excited to be back with another The Fantastic Flying Book Club tour post today for The Henna Wars by Adiba Jagirdar! I really can’t believe I got picked for this blog tour because it’s a hot one that’s on a lot of TBRs, so I died a little bit inside out of pure happiness because it’s such a privilege to be chosen 🥰 Huge thanks to the FFBC for organising these amazing tours and to the authors for making the eARCs available to us.

Be sure to click on the banner above to see the other bloggers on tour! 😊

The Henna Wars
Publisher: Page Street Kids
Release date: 12 May 2020
Genre: Young Adult Contemporary, LGBTQ+

Panda Rating:



When Dimple Met Rishi meets Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda in this rom com about two teen girls with rival henna businesses.When Nishat comes out to her parents, they say she can be anyone she wants—as long as she isn’t herself. Because Muslim girls aren’t lesbians. Nishat doesn’t want to hide who she is, but she also doesn’t want to lose her relationship with her family. And her life only gets harder once a childhood friend walks back into her life.

Flávia is beautiful and charismatic and Nishat falls for her instantly. But when a school competition invites students to create their own businesses, both Flávia and Nishat choose to do henna, even though Flávia is appropriating Nishat’s culture. Amidst sabotage and school stress, their lives get more tangled—but Nishat can’t quite get rid of her crush on Flávia, and realizes there might be more to her than she realized.

Amazon (US) | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | Google Play

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#WWWWednesday: 13 May

Dini @ dinipandareads26 Comments

Hello, hello and welcome back to another episode of WWW Wednesday, a weekly meme hosted by Sam @ Taking On A World of Words, which means I’ll be answering these questions:

  1. What did you read last?
  2. What are you currently reading?
  3. What will you read next?

This is going to be a bit of a long one so if you manage to read through to the end, thank you 😉

It’s been a hot minute since I made one of these posts but a nice surprise is that I’ve been reading! …Okay, it’s still mostly blog tour reads but considering how I wasn’t even reading at all at certain points in the last month, it’s good progress! Since I last updated two weeks ago I’ve managed to finish 6 books and lucky for me I enjoyed all of them!

The Henna Wars by Adiba Jaigirdar ★★★★½
I finished this morning and I’m glad to say that I really enjoyed it (plus this cover is just 😍)! I wish this existed when I was still in school but I still related to it now. I loved the diversity, queer rep, cultural rep and discussions about appropriation, religion and identity. My review for the blog tour is up tomorrow so watch out for that if you want to know more!

The Hopes and Dreams of Libby Quinn by Freya Kennedy ★★★★☆
This was a perfect transition book that left me feeling the warm fuzzies at turning the last page. It’s about chasing your dreams and it’s full of hope despite the many doubts that plague our MC. I’m surprised by how much I enjoyed it and how I really related to Libby. Check out my full review!

Harrow Lake by Kat Ellis ★★★★☆
I took a big step outside my comfort zone to read this horror/thriller and I’m glad to report that I didn’t end up feeling that scared (although I made sure to not read this one at night)! Kat Ellis masterfully builds this sinister and eerie atmosphere throughout the read. I do wish we got more answers though… Check out my full review!

Auxiliary: London 2039 by Jon Richter ★★★☆☆
This “dark fiction” was also pretty well outside my comfort zone but I still managed to enjoy parts of it. The characters were lacking but the world building had Scythe, Warcross, Ready Player One vibes that I loved! One thing is for sure: I will never ever buy a 3D printer for home. If you’ve read this, you’ll know why! Check out my full review!

War and Speech by Don Zolidis ★★★★☆
I’ve never read a book about speech/debate but this was so interesting and the MC really won me over. She was snarky and hilarious and I loved seeing her character grow through the read. It was fast paced and fun, and I’m so glad I got to read this one! Check out my full review!

Sunshine Over Bluebell Cliff by Della Galton ★★★☆☆
It’s been a while since I read women’s fiction but this one had all the elements to remind me whyI like them. The best parts were definitely the atmosphere/setting! I could picture it so easily and it made me nostalgic for Norwich 💙 (even though it’s not set in Norwich… but still). Check out my full review!

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ARC Review: To Kill A Mocking Girl (A Bookbinding Mystery #1) by Harper Kincaid

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Thanks to NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review

Goodreads: To Kill A Mocking Girl (A Bookbinding Mystery #1)
Publish date: 12 May 2020
Publisher: Crooked Lane Books
Genre: Cosy Mystery

Panda Rating:

Bookbinder Quinn finds herself in trouble when her ex’s fiance turns up dead and if she’s not careful, her days might be numbered in this debut perfect for fans of Kate Carlisle and Eva Gates.

Quinn Victoria Caine is back in her quirky town of Vienna, Virginia, starting her new life as a bookbinder in her family-owned, charm-for-days bookshop, Prose & Scones. With her trusty German Shephard RBG-‘Ruff Barker’ Ginsburg by her side, what can go wrong? Okay, sure, bumping into her ex, Scott, or her former high school nemesis, Tricia, is a drag. It certainly doesn’t help they have acquired the new hobby of shoving their recent engagement in her face every chance they get. But that doesn’t mean Quinn wanted to find Tricia dead in the road. So why does half the town think she may have done it?

Quinn is determined to find Tricia’s killer, even if it means partnering with her cousin-turned-nun, Sister Daria, and Detective Aiden Harrington, her older brother’s too-movie-star-handsome-for-his-own good, best friend. They believe she’s innocent, but of course that doesn’t influence the police, who peg her as their prime suspect. Or, at least until she’s poisoned.

But there is no way Quinn is going to stop now. Vienna is her town and-for better or worse-Tricia was one of their own. Someone may have killed the mocking girl, but no one’s going to stop the notorious QVC.

This is my first cozy mystery and I’m wondering why I’ve never read one of these before because what didn’t I like about it?! Right now I’m coming up blank because I enjoyed every single moment of this fast-paced murder mystery set in the small close-knit community of Vienna, Virginia. I can’t believe this is Kincaid’s first cosy mystery because she had me reeled in from the first page! Is it too early to be chanting for more when this book hasn’t even been published yet?

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April Monthly Wrap Up!

Dini @ dinipandareads11 Comments

To say that April was a bit of a wretched month for reading would be a bit of an understatement. Echoing the sentiment that many fellow bloggers have been saying in their wrap ups, while March felt like it crawled by, April was pretty much gone in a blink. I’m honestly not mad about it though. I’d ideally like to have a do-over of this shite month, but it is what it is. By now we all know that my reading took a huge nosedive this month is mainly because of Animal Crossing New Horizons… I had no idea how dangerous this game would be for me as I let my sister convince me to finally buy it–not that it was very difficult, mind you.

So here we are today… With the first exams I’ve ever failed in my life (O.W.L.s), a seemingly unscalable (e)ARC Mountain still to climb, and a total of seven books read this month. At least I have a nice (in game) island though, right? 😅

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Sundays in Bed With… #MyWeeklyWrapUp

Dini @ dinipandareads13 Comments

We’re back with another Sundays in Bed With… meme! This meme dares to ask you what book has been in your bed this morning and is hosted by Midnight Book Girl. Come share what book you’ve been you’ve spent time curled up reading in bed with, or which book you wish you had time to read today!

This Sunday I probably should’ve spent the day in bed reading Auxiliary: London 2039. This is my next blog tour read for next week and I started it last night. I haven’t gotten far into it yet but it’s giving me Warcross, Ready Player One and Scythe vibes, so it has been interesting so far. There are some scenes that have me scratching my head (a little bit in discomfort) because I don’t know if they’re necessary but let’s see what happens. It’s definitely an interesting world — not so far-fetched and futuristic that it’s impossible to believe which is honestly just a little bit scary!

The silicon revolution left Dremmler behind, but a good detective is never obsolete.

London is quiet in 2039—thanks to the machines. People stay indoors, communicating through high-tech glasses and gorging on simulated reality while 3D printers and scuttling robots cater to their every whim. Mammoth corporations wage war for dominance in a world where human augmentation blurs the line between flesh and steel.

And at the center of it all lurks The Imagination Machine: the hyper-advanced, omnipresent AI that drives our cars, flies our planes, cooks our food, and plans our lives. Servile, patient, tireless … TIM has everything humanity requires. Everything except a soul.

Through this silicon jungle prowls Carl Dremmler, police detective—one of the few professions better suited to meat than machine. His latest case: a grisly murder seemingly perpetrated by the victim’s boyfriend. Dremmler’s boss wants a quick end to the case, but the tech-wary detective can’t help but believe the accused’s bizarre story: that his robotic arm committed the heinous crime, not him. An advanced prosthetic, controlled by a chip in his skull.

A chip controlled by TIM.

Dremmler smells blood: the seeds of a conspiracy that could burn London to ash unless he exposes the truth. His investigation pits him against desperate criminals, scheming businesswomen, deadly automatons—and the nightmares of his own past. And when Dremmler finds himself questioning even TIM’s inscrutable motives, he’s forced to stare into the blank soul of the machine.

What are you currently reading?

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War and Speech Blog Tour: Review and Favourite Quotes

Dini @ dinipandareads10 Comments

Hello, friends! I’m back with another The Fantastic Flying Book Club blog tour today for the hilarious YA contemporary: War and Speech by Don Zolidis! Every time I get picked to be part of any FFBC blog tour I die a little bit inside out of pure happiness because it’s always such a privilege 🥰 Huge thanks to FFBC for organising these amazing tours and to the authors as well for making the eARCs available to us.

Be sure to click on the banner above to see the other bloggers on tour! 😊

War and Speech
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Release date: 05 May 2020
Genre: Young Adult Contemporary, Realistic Fiction

Panda Rating:



Not everyone can be a winner…
Sydney Williams knows this better than anyone. After her white-collar- criminal dad is sent to prison, Sydney fails almost all of her classes and moves into a dingy apartment with her mom, who can barely support them with her minimum-wage job at the mall. A new school promises a fresh start. Except Eaganville isn’t exactly like other high schools. It’s ruled with an iron fist by a speech team that embodies the most extreme winner-takes-all philosophy. Sydney is befriended by a group of fellow misfits, each of whom has been personally victimized by the speech team. It turns out Sydney is the perfect plant to take down the speech team from within.  With the help of her co-conspirators, Sydney throws herself into making Nationals in speech, where she will be poised to topple the corrupt regime. But what happens when Sydney realizes she actually has a shot at . . . winning? Sydney lost everything because of her dad’s obsession with being on top. Winning at speech might just be her ticket out of a life of loserdom. Can she really walk away from that?

Amazon (US) | Book Depository | Barnes & Noble | Google Books

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Incendiary Blog Tour: Review and Favourite Quotes

Dini @ dinipandareads26 Comments

Hello, friends! I’m back with another The Fantastic Flying Book Club blog tour today for the amazing Incendiary by Zoraida Cordova! Every time I get picked to be part of any FFBC blog tour I die a little bit inside out of pure happiness because it’s always such a privilege 🥰 Huge thanks to FFBC for organising these amazing tours and to the authors as well for making the eARCs available to us.

Be sure to click on the banner above to see the other bloggers on tour! 😊

Incendiary (Hollow Crown #1)
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Release date: 28 April 2020
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy

Panda Rating:



I am Renata Convida.
I have lived a hundred stolen lives.
Now I live my own.

Renata Convida was only a child when she was kidnapped by the King’s Justice and brought to the luxurious palace of Andalucia. As a Robari, the rarest and most feared of the magical Moria, Renata’s ability to steal memories from royal enemies enabled the King’s Wrath, a siege that resulted in the deaths of thousands of her own people.

Now Renata is one of the Whispers, rebel spies working against the crown and helping the remaining Moria escape the kingdom bent on their destruction. The Whispers may have rescued Renata from the palace years ago, but she cannot escape their mistrust and hatred–or the overpowering memories of the hundreds of souls she turned “hollow” during her time in the palace.

When Dez, the commander of her unit, is taken captive by the notorious Sangrado Prince, Renata will do anything to save the boy whose love makes her place among the Whispers bearable. But a disastrous rescue attempt means Renata must return to the palace under cover and complete Dez’s top secret mission. Can Renata convince her former captors that she remains loyal, even as she burns for vengeance against the brutal, enigmatic prince? Her life and the fate of the Moria depend on it.

But returning to the palace stirs childhood memories long locked away. As Renata grows more deeply embedded in the politics of the royal court, she uncovers a secret in her past that could change the entire fate of the kingdom–and end the war that has cost her everything.

Amazon (US) | Book Depository | Barnes & Noble | iTunes | Kobo | Google Books

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#WWWWednesday: 29 April

Dini @ dinipandareads27 Comments

Hello, hello and welcome back to another episode of WWW Wednesday, a weekly meme hosted by Sam @ Taking On A World of Words, which means I’ll be answering these questions:

  1. What did you read last?
  2. What are you currently reading?
  3. What will you read next?

Well, we’re back to my reading taking a hit thanks to Animal Crossing (yes, still)! It’s the second to last day of April and let me just tell you… April was a bit of a failed month for me! Since last Wednesday I’ve still only managed to finish one book and it was a book that I felt went on FOREVER and it was definitely not in a good way!

Ruthless Gods (Something Dark and Holy #2) by Emily A. Duncan ★★★☆☆
This book had me hitting struggle town hard and I don’t know whether I’m at 2.5 stars or 3. I still haven’t learned how to DNF a book so I pushed onward with it but I just… I don’t even know how I feel. No, I do. I’m annoyed because Nadya was so awful in this book and she completely ruined it for me. I wanted more Gods! More back story to these monsters that people worshipped but instead we got a very frustrating “romance” and a lot of pining. I still need to write my review but… Yeah. No. It just didn’t work for me.

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