Sravika's Books - Reviews and Other Trivia

 The Prisoner of Heaven  (The Cemetery of Forgotten Books #3) By Carlos Ruiz Zafon  Published Year: 2011 Page Count: 280 pages  Medium Used: Kindle PW  Genre: Historical Fiction, Drama, Schizophrenia, Devil, Prison Escape, Spain, 2026-read.  Rating : 5/5 😀😀😀😀😀 What a sensational read! I was hooked from the beginning till the last page. Although there is less action and less twists in this one than the other two books in the series, it didn't disappoint me. I was enamored with it all the same. I just fell in love with the brilliant prose and the sensational story telling of the author. I just wondered if the story title should have been a bit different because the character after whom it is titled had very little on screen presence. His was a subtle and nuanced presence - despite that he was the linchpin weaving the important events shaping the complex lives of the main characters. 😇 Digging into the story a bit, this story, for the most part, is told ...

 The Tenant  By Freida McFadden  Published Year: 2025 Page Count: 380 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre : Thriller, Murder Mystery, Drama, Suspense, Action, 2026-read.  Rating : 5/5 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰 Wow. What a fantastic read. The twists - well, the one major one actually - blew my mind. My heart leapt into my throat and my brain did a sky dive into an abyss of unexpected thrill. Miss McFadden has proven herself again as a master of her craft. Superb story telling. Creating blood curdling thrillers and murder mysteries. She had me hanging onto every sentence and it really worked because I wrapped this book in under a day. I was fully engrossed and some of the moments are etched into my memory. It is so good - don't miss up on this read! I liked how well the author has written both male and female voices/povs without blurring the lines between. This book has earned second place in the Goodreads Choice Awards for Mystery Thrillers and its totally worth my ti...

 Someone You Can Build A Nest In  By John Wiswell  Won 2024 Nebula Award Won 2025 Locus Award for Best First Novel  Finalist in 2025 Hugo Award  Published Year: 2024 Page Count: 310 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre: Fantasy, Speculative Fiction, Horror, Action, Drama, Romance, Monsters, 2026-read.  Rating: 5/5😇😇😇🥰🥰 Loved this one! Absolutely. Reading this, I couldn't slurp in the chapters continuously. I took them in snatches, got a break going elsewhere (into other books, silly 😋) and returning to digest more of this story. This is not an ordinary tale. John Wiswell is an immense talent. What he has created is not just a monster that lived while the story was read and forgotten afterwards. This creature thrives in memory and imagination. It doesn't have one concrete shape or name or body parts, organs..anything for that matter. It is a shape shifter that can ingest bodies whole. It has no conscience that stops her from harming anyon...

 The Housemaid is Watching  ( The Housemaid #3) By Freida McFadden  Published Year: 2024 Page Count: 402 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre: Thriller, Murder Mystery, Suspense, Drama, Family Dynamics, 2026-read.  Rating : 4/5  I really, really didn't like the ending. The last three to four chapters are so incredulous that it is hard to accept them as plausible. Yes, I agree the author wanted to add an element of surprise and also bring Millie's family out of the trenches but the way she did it is laughable! You don't just go and threaten a person into taking the fall for something they haven't done, right? Is it ok to do bad things to bad people and get away with it? The answer seems to be an yes here. Shouldn't it be the job of the justice department to decide who goes free and who gets punished, once all the secrets are laid bare in front of them?  Apparently not. It is easy to trick the system, to fool the people involved. Just so unbelie...

 The Iron Trial  (The Magisterium #1) By Cassandra Clare, Holly Black  Published Year: 2014  Page Count: 276 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre : Fantasy, Magic, Sorcery, Dark Fantasy, High Fantasy, 2026-read.  Rating : 5/5 😀😀😀😀😀 At the beginning, the plot felt a lot like reading from the Harry Potter series. I would definitely say that the authors have taken inspiration from it. But only just an inspiration. A basic outline. The rest is their own brain material. The main character cast consists of two boys and a girl. They are in their first year of training at a school for magical kids. There is a dark lord called the Enemy of Death who happens to be an ex-student of the school. But that's where the similarities end. There are wild creatures that are ingested with chaos - the Enemy of death has put chaos into their souls and made them his spies. There are creatures which have given up their souls to the elements of nature like Earth, Fire,...

 A Good Girl's Guide to Murder  (A Good Girl's Guide to Murder #1) By Holly Jackson  Debut Novel  Published Year: 2019 Page Count: 396 pages  Medium Used: Kindle PW  Genre: Murder Mystery, Thriller, Young Adult, Science and Tech, Detective, 2025-read.  Rating : 5/5  This happens to be my last read for the year 2025. Today is December 31st and I am super glad to wrap this year up with this sensational book. This story starts out with Pippa Fitz-Mobi, alias Pip, picking up a homicide case, that was closed five years ago, as her school project. The major focus of the plot is how she solves the case, finds the perpetrators who are still walking free, with little to no help from the police and all the while being haunted/chased by someone threatening/warning her to stop her research. She strongly believes in the innocence of the accused, Sal Singh, and resolves to prove herself right. She approaches and takes the aide of the accused's brother, Ravi Sin...

The Book Of Lost Hours  By Hayley Gelfuso  Published Year : 2025 Page Count: 391 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre : Science Fiction, Time Travel, Alternate Universe, Romance, Young Adult, Adventure, 2025-read.  Rating : 4.85/5 😀😀😀😀😀  I was munching candy while reading the book and the last few chapters, I forgot the count of how many I ate. I was surprised to find that I finished quite a lot of them. I was glued to the story. I was very invested in what the next chapter would unveil. I want to say wow, what a fantastic book this is. But I don't think I will. The main character is not flawless, moral and selfless which made her less of an adorable protagonist to me. She kept her lover and daughter first and foremost - above all other concerns. She killed, manipulated, hurt and harmed others so that her daughter would be safe. Yes, she was a typical mother. I think I could see her point to a certain extent and might very well do the same if I wer...

 A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking  By T. Kingfisher  Published Year: 2020 Page Count: 282 pages  Medium Used: Kindle PW  Genre : Fantasy, Bread Men, Magic, Action, Young Adult, 2025-read.  Rating : 4.25/5  This is my first book by the author. I have many other books from her in my tbr and having read this, I feel she is worth checking out! This book felt more targeted for children and adolescent audience but I also enjoyed it. I felt a bit of disconnect with the story because the narrator is so objective and detached in her style of writing. I didn't feel that invested in the plot as I would have had if there was more emotional depth created through the narrative. The Duchess,one of the key characters, in the story, seemed more interested in bestowing laurels, badges of honor on heroes of war than controlling the wild elements of her council or running her government efficiently. Lol. But still, this felt like a good enough story if not the most cr...

 Beneath the Sugar Sky (Wayward Children #3) By Seanan McGuire  Published Year: 2018 Page Count: 174 pages  Medium Used : Kindle Scribe  Genre: Novella, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Multiverse, Multiple Worlds, Academia, Adventure, 2025-read.  Rating: 3.65/5  Weaving this series around children at a school for special kids, magical worlds which are tempered and curated for each of their innate desires, which feel like true "home" for them, is very appealing to me. It feels warm, cozy and like a drug to my imagination. 🥰 Even when I come across one not so spectacular a story(a partial dud, in short😆) like this one - it doesn't put any significant dent in my opinion of the over all series. I guess what I didn't like about this book is that it is set in a very bright, colorful and frothing Sugar world where everything is made up of sugar syrup, candy or bread. I would have liked a world that is more darker.🤫 I am drawn to the drowned worlds, the underground wo...

 Rebel Witch  (The Crimson Moth #2) By Kristen Ciccarelli  Published Year: 2025 Page Count: 464 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre: Fantasy, Romance, Romantasy, Adventure, Magic and Sorcery, Witches, Witchcraft, 2025-read.  Rating : 3.5/5  I usually take a detour between books of a series but with this Crimson Moth, I liked the first one well enough to pick up the second one right away. This book started on great promise for me but then got to the point of me desperately trying to not DNF it. The romance angle between the lead pair, Rune and Gideon, felt distracting and after a while, I have had enough. This is one of the main drivers of  the narrative and I felt exhausted with all the repelling misunderstandings and attracting sexual tension between them. In this book we see their non committal, suspicious bonding evolve into trusting and selfless love. The other important thing is Cressida,the evil witch from book 1 who is revealed to have...

 Heartless Hunter  (The Crimson Moth #1) By Kristen Ciccarelli  Published Year: 2024 Page Count: 410 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre: Romantasy, Romance, Fantasy, High Fantasy, Witches, Witchcraft, Witch Hunters, 2025-read.  Rating : 4.25/5  I finished this book under two days. It felt so easy to read and connect with the main characters. I could sympathize with Rune for her vulnerabilities and applaud her for her bravery. I could understand what drives Gideon to hunt her kind and put them to death. The pacing is fast and the world building is flawless. Only towards the end, I thought the author took logic into her hands and twisted it so that it ceased to make much sense. At one point, Gideon wishes Rune to be the Crimson Moth so that it would be more of a intrigue and romantic challenge for him. But when he finally learns the truth, he doesn't hesitate to surrender her to death. Alex,Gideon's brother and Rune's bestie one moment feels like t...

 Dissolution  By Nicholas Binge Published Year: 2025 Page Count: 384 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre : Science Fiction, Memory Travel, Time Travel, Time Looping, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Prose, 2025-read.  Rating : 5/5 😀😀😀😀😀 This is a very easy and compulsive 5 pointer story. The prose is so good that I kept reading past the last page into acknowledgements. Despite being a story about time/memory travel and fighting a hungry force of nature, this story felt wholesome and soothing. The deep commitment and enduring love the main characters share over their decades of marriage with each other brought happy tears to my eyes. Even if they have now become old with rickety bones and batty minds, they and their love is something to cherish! So getting into the story. Stanley, Raph and Jacques are three students under a nearly blind, old, eerie professor Waldmen in their university. Stanley comes from a poor background and always felt an outsider i...

 Manacled  By Senlinyu Published Year: 2018-2019 Page Count: 957 pages  Medium Used: Phone  Genre : Romantsy, Romance, High Fantasy, Harry Potter Universe, Alternate Theory, Hermione Granger, Dark Magic and Sorcery, 2025-read.  Rating : 5/5  I have a habit of reading multiple books at a time. This book! This book has knocked me off my mind. I was glued to my phone reading and sticking to this one till the end. Even though this is a long book and had some of the actions mentioned on repeat, - like the multiple times the main characters meet and rescue or heal each other, the many times they spend together as a host and surrogate - it didn't feel boring. I never once said 'enough'. I wanted to keep reading.  This book is so so good. It recounts an alternate version to Harry Potter series. In order to fully understand and follow the book, one must also possess a knowledge - even if only very brief and vague - of the original series. In this book, Hermione...

 Black Sun Rising  (The Coldfire Triology #1) By C. S. Friedman  Published Year: 1991 Page Count: 516 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre: High Fantasy, Sorcery, Magic, Dark Fantasy, Vampires, Adventure, Action, Horror, 2025-read.  Rating: 5/5 🌟 😎 😀  👌 🌟  Spine tingling. Mind lickingly good! Some of the scenes are so enshrined within my mind - they are incorrigible. I have been reading this book for a while - shuffling/switching among other books and other work - and when I got back to this one, its like I have never left. So uncanny! The world building is great and reminiscent of beautiful, older times fantasy fiction. It brought the world of Erna to life in my mind's eye. The characters are flawed -  they have their reasons and personal motivations for setting out on this adventure but they abide by their promises and oaths - which made them all noble in my eyes.  A priest of the church, Damien, who is also a sorcerer that ca...

 The Incandescent  By Emily Tesh  Published Year: 2025 Page Count: 394 pages  Medium Used: Kindle PW  Genre: Fantasy, Magic, Sorcery, Multiple Planes, Demons, Action, Lesbians, 2025-read.  Rating: 4.75/5  This is my first book by the author and I find her prose good, logic sensible and acceptable. This story revolves around a centuries old Magic school, Chetwood, which houses six hundred students learning and practicing magic, teaching staff and other management. The school is carefully warded against demons that are always on the look out to cross over from a parallel demonic plane and possess objects, eat the enormous amount of magic that is here, all concentrated in one place. Among the people that are keeping the school and students secure is the Director of Magic, Sapphire Walden. She is the protagonist of this story. She is a thoughtful, compassionate teacher and a spectacular magician. She has spent all her career learning how to combat demons a...

 Alchemy of Secrets  (Alchemy of Secrets #1) By Stephenie Garber  Published Year:2025 Page Count: 324 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre: Fantasy, Science Fiction, Mystery, Adventure, Magic, Young Adult, Mythologies,2025-read.  Rating: 5/5 😄😄😄😄😄✌ Just amazed. I found this so immersive and gripping that I finished about 75 percent of the story in a day. Easily one of the best books to come out this year. Easily one of the best reads for me of all time. It is an alchemy of all the elements I like - dark magic, murder mystery, time loops .. all the twists in the story just had me going wow. It is a fast paced adventure story where the main character has to search and find an Alchemical heart - the most magically powered object in the world. She will die if she doesn't find it by 11.59 pm on Halloween. She has to solve a series of riddles her father has sent down from the past. She teams up with strange guys whom she doesnt know if she can fully trus...

 The Compound by Aisling Rawle Published Year: 2025 Page Count: 315 pages Medium Used: Kindle PW Genre: Young Adult, Romance, Reality TV, Horror, Suspense, Psychological Thriller, 2025-Read. Rating: 4.5/5 Very gripping. Very compelling. I guess what really kept me hooked and what worked out for me is that there is always a hint of danger, of things going out of control with the whole world sitting on its butt and watching, doing nothing, while a bunch of young contestants try to best each other, no matter how far they go, because stakes are high and they don't want to get back to the "real" world where their lives mean boring, exhausting and nothing.  It is a reality TV game which is set up in a desert like setting. The participants are ten boys and ten girls collected from different walks of life. They are given community tasks which all of them must participate in and they are rewarded for them with things they lack like wood, freezer, food and water. Should they fail t...

 The Bewitching  By Silvia Moreno Garcia  Published Year: 2025 Page Count: 371 pages  Medium Used: Kindle PW  Genre : Dark Fantasy, Mythical Beings, Supernatural, Horror, Sorcery, Magic, Dark Academia, Witches & Warlocks, Suspense, Psychological Thriller, LGBTQ, 2025-read.  Rating : 5/5 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰 First of all, what a gorgeous cover page. The glittery green with a gnarled witch's hand and a canary with seven pins stuck into its dead body .. breathtaking! Few pages into the book, I realized that this is the book I have been waiting for a long long time. It totally sucked me in - I forgot time and surroundings. With unwavering attention and a thudding heart, I flipped the pages. I wanted the story to never end but I was also skittish to reach the end of it. The surprise twists made my heart skip a few beats and my pulse to quicken. This is the stuff nightmares are made of. It is so very scary and it only gets better as the story progresses. Until the end,...

 The Mote in God's Eye  (Moties #1)  By Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven  Published Year: 1974 Page Count: 535 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre : Science Fiction, Aliens, First Contact, Speculative Fiction,Political Intrigues, 2025-read.  Rating : 5/5 😀😀😀😀😀 This is my first book with Larry Niven and I will definitely explore more of his brilliant concoctions in future. 🤞✌ Brilliant. I am speechless. The plot and narrative are simply superb. I wonder why the average rating on goodreads is not higher for this one. I got so invested in the story that I felt my fight or flight adrenaline spike in response to some events in the plot. I didn't want the aliens to visit human civilization because they could render the whole settlement useless. Yes, the first contact alien race is super intelligent and super good at using tools but they are madly involved in endless cycles of self destruction and repopulation. First, an alien artifact enters h...

 Isles Of The Emberdark  By Brandon Sanderson  (Novel set in the Cosmere Universe)  Published Year: 2025 Page Count: 495 pages  Medium Used: Kindle PW  Genre : Science Fiction, Fantasy, Multiple Realms, Strange Creatures, 2025-read.  Rating : 5/5  Went blind into this.. without knowing it is an amalgamation of science fiction, interstellar politics, fantasy, dragons, giant snakes and all the kthet wonderful things. Very happy with this read!  This is an easy 5 pointer. This story is a man's crusade to save his primitive/non technological  planet/home world from being enslaved by advanced and selfish men/creatures from the outside. There are many islands in his world but the island,Patji, which he comes from is special. It breeds birds that make bonds with humans and bestows special powers to them. It has a pool which acts as a portal between the physical realm and the spiritual plane also called ShadesMar. Naturally there are alien power...