The Glowing Review

The Glowing (The Glowing, #1) by Tom Rimer 

Nice guys often finish last, but sometimes last is all that's left. Majestic Mount Greylock always cloaked the small berkshire town of Adams in its shadow...until now. Until the skies illuminated. Until the Glowing began. When Kamryn Coe, her disheveled teacher, and a group of geeks that'd put a comic convention to shame witness the destruction of their hometown, they must combat a land teeming with drooling alien hordes, while Kam faces the truth of her own birth and its connection to the catastrophe unfolding around her. Time travel, extraterrestrials, humanity's end.

TIME TO SAVE THE WORLD. (Summary from Goodreads)

The Glowing has a definite 80s vibe to it, which I liked. A group of kids (and one adult) against a group of aliens, seems like such an 80s movie. It was really good. This book has trigger warnings for blood, gore, and death.

Kam is a good main character. She shows real emotions when things go to hell, but she also shows strength at the end of the book. There are some things about her and her family that are set up very nicely at the start. It has a great follow through at the end as well.

Kam, her friend Lucy, and her crush Olin have a love triangle that thankfully goes nowhere because they have more to worry about at that moment. There are also some nice moments between Heather, a bully type character, and a girl Dani, who he used to bully. The group of kids really do pull together to make it out alive. The one adult, Mr. Flowers, is just as messed up as the kids, but really tries to hide it for their sakes. It doesn't always work, but he tries.

The aliens are very interesting. They speak a broken English as well as their own language, are violent as hell, and have interesting powers. They sound terrifying in all honesty. They come down in purple stones in the meteors and are connected to them somehow.  Purple is very much a theme of the book.

Overall, I really enjoyed the book. I wasn't sure how I felt about two characters being an unwashed, geek stereotype, but I suppose it fit into the 80s vibe of it all. The book has 48 chapters, but it a quick read. The pace really picks up when the aliens arrive and doesn't slow down. I am looking forward to the sequel.

The Mermaid, The Witch, and The Sea Review

The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea by Maggie Tokuda-Hall 

A desperate orphan turned pirate and a rebellious imperial daughter find a connection on the high seas in a world divided by colonialism and threaded with magic.

Aboard the pirate ship Dove, Flora the girl takes on the identity of Florian the man to earn the respect and protection of the crew. For Flora, former starving urchin, the brutal life of a pirate is about survival: don’t trust, don’t stick out, and don’t feel. But on this voyage, as the pirates prepare to sell their unsuspecting passengers into slavery, Flora is drawn to the Lady Evelyn Hasegawa, who is en route to a dreaded arranged marriage with her own casket in tow. Flora doesn’t expect to be taken under Evelyn’s wing, and Evelyn doesn’t expect to find such a deep bond with the pirate Florian.

Soon the unlikely pair set in motion a wild escape that will free a captured mermaid (coveted for her blood, which causes men to have visions and lose memories) and involve the mysterious Pirate Supreme, an opportunistic witch, and the all-encompassing Sea itself. (Summary from Goodreads)

The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea is an amazing book. It's filled with romance, pirates, and more. There is murder, torture, and blood, so beware of that. These pirates do not mess around. There is also mentions and hints of the rape of a young boy, but it is never shown or stated outright.

The story focuses on Evelyn and Florian as they navigate their feelings and the pirate ship. Evelyn has cold, uncaring parents who force her to marry a man she has never met. She, Lady Ayer, a friend of Evelyn's mother, and others are passengers aboard the Dove. Actually, the Dove is pirate ship lead by the Nameless Captain and they will be sold into slavery.

Flora is needed to watch over Evelyn so that the male pirates don't try to rape her. Evelyn doesn't know Florian's true identity until much later, but doesn't care as they come to fall in love. Together they rescue a mermaid, gain the Seas favor, and manage to slip away from the pirates. Then things just go wrong.

They are separated and Flora is trained by a witch to use their powers. They do and help Evelyn escape from her husband-to-be. In the end, everything works out for the best for the couple. I don't want to say more because of spoilers, but as a reader, I got hit in the feels right near the end.

I would love a sequel or continuation of the world, as it was interesting and well built. There was enough information about the world that you could extrapolate information, but I just want to dive into more of it. There is also a wonderful character called the Pirate Supreme who I would definitely read a whole book about.