Book Review: Dear Pen Pal (The Mother-Daughter Book Club, #3) by Heather Vogel Frederick

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Dear Pen Pal (The Mother-Daughter Book Club, #3)  by Heather Vogel Frederick  is the third book in a middle grade book series that is being rereleased. Chaos erupts in this third installment as the daughters in the book club get themselves into trouble. Each of the girls have big changes in their lives:  Jess is going to boarding school; Megan's grandmother comes to live with her; Emma starts a campaign against school uniforms; Cassidy has a lot of unexpected change coming to her family. Will the mother daughter book club stay together? I'd like to thank NetGalley, Simon and Schuster Children's Publishing, and Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers for an Advanced Readers Copy (ARC) of Dear Pen Pal  by Heather Vogel Frederick with it's upcoming rerelease to the public. I always love a good book that involves books, even if its target audience is children between the ages of eight and twelve. It wasn't until I reached the end of the book that I realized that it...
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Book Review: The Doll's House, A Short Story by Lisa Unger

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book review the Doll's House short story lisa unger

The Doll's House: A Short Story by Lisa Unger is expected to be published on September 12, 2024 and is about Jules and her daughter Scout moving in with Jules' fiancé named Kirin. Like Jules and Scout, he's lost loved ones and wants to make them feel safe and secure. However, strange things start happening in the house and on the property. Is Jules imagining it, or is it real?

I'd like to thank NetGalley for the Advanced Readers Copy ARC of this short story. I received a copy for free in exchange for my honest review. Lisa Unger is one of my favorite authors and the cover art is amazing, so I was excited to read this latest story by her.

Told from alternating perspectives of Jules and Scout, the story was engaging and hard to put down. It has a familiar feel to it, and I let my mind go wild with different theories of where Lisa Unger was going with it. None of my theories panned out, which I'm glad about. 

Since The Doll's House is a short story, the author had to get to the ending quickly. However, I wish it had been a full fledged novel because it could have been fleshed out more and much spookier. I just wanted more to the story than what we received. Four out of five stars.

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