Books, Music, And Coffee

Dark Lover (Black Dagger Brotherhood #1)
By: J.R. Ward
Release Date: January 1, 2011 (First published February 19, 2005)
Publisher: Piatkus Books
Rating: ★☆☆☆☆
Series: Black Dagger Brotherhood (#1)
Summary: In the shadows of the night in Caldwell, New York, there's a deadly turf war raging between vampires and their slayers. There exists a secret band of brothers like no other - six vampire warriors, defenders of their race. Yet none of them relishes killing more than Wrath, the blind leader of the Black Dagger Brotherhood.


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A Good Girl's Guide to Murder
By: Holly Jackson
Release Date: February 4, 2020
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Rating: ★★☆☆☆
Series: A Good Girl's Guide to Murder (#1)
Summary: Everyone in Fairview knows the story.

Pretty and popular high school senior Andie Bell was murdered by her boyfriend, Sal Singh, who then killed himself. It was all anyone could talk about. And five years later, Pip sees how the tragedy still haunts her town.

But she can't shake the feeling that there was more to what happened that day. She knew Sal when she was a child, and he was always so kind to her. How could he possibly have been a killer?

Now a senior herself, Pip decides to reexamine the closed case for her final project, at first just to cast doubt on the original investigation. But soon she discovers a trail of dark secrets that might actually prove Sal innocent . . . And the line between past and present begins to blur. Someone in Fairview doesn't want Pip digging around for answers, and now her own life might be in danger.

This is the story of an investigation turned obsession, full of twists and turns and with an ending you'll never expect.

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Death at Wentwater Court (Daisy Dalrymple #1)
By: Carola Dunn
Release Date: September 1, 2006 (First published January 1, 1994)
Publisher: Leisure Books
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Series: Daisy Dalrymple (#1)
Summary: This first installment of a cozy mystery series transports listeners back to the bygone era of 1923 Britain, where unflappable flapper and fledgling journalist Daisy Dalrymple daringly embarks on her first writing assignment, and promptly stumbles across a corpse.

No stranger to sprawling country estates, wealthy Daisy Dalrymple is breaking new ground in having scandalously traded silver spoon for pen and camera to cover a story for Town and Country magazine. But her planned interviews with the inhabitants of Wentwater Court give way to interrogation after suave Lord Stephen Astwick meets a dire fate on the tranquil skating pond.

Armed with evidence that his fate was anything but accidental, Daisy joins forces with Scotland Yard to examine an esteemed collection of suspects and to see that the unlikely culprit doesn't slip through their fingers just as the unfortunate Astwick slipped through the ice.

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Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, Vol. 1
By: Koyoharu Gotouge
Release Date: July 3, 2018 (First published June 6, 2016)
Publisher: VIZ Media LLC
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Series: 鬼滅の刃 [Kimetsu no Yaiba] (#1)
Summary:In Taisho-era Japan, Tanjiro Kamado is a kindhearted boy who makes a living selling charcoal. But his peaceful life is shattered when a demon slaughters his entire family. His little sister Nezuko is the only survivor, but she has been transformed into a demon herself! Tanjiro sets out on a dangerous journey to find a way to return his sister to normal and destroy the demon who ruined his life.

Learning to slay demons won’t be easy, and Tanjiro barely knows where to start. The surprise appearance of another boy named Giyu, who seems to know what’s going on, might provide some answers…but only if Tanjiro can stop Giyu from killing his sister first!


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The Black Dahlia (L.A. Quartet, #1)
By: James Ellroy
Release Date: January 1, 2006 (First published September 1, 1987)
Publisher: Mysterious Press
Rating: ★★☆☆☆
Series: L.A. Quartet (#1)
Summary: On January 15, 1947, the torture-ravished body of a beautiful young woman is found in a vacant lot. The victim makes headlines as the Black Dahlia—and so begins the greatest manhunt in California history. Caught up in the investigation are Bucky Bleichert and Lee Blanchard: Warrants Squad cops, friends, and rivals in love with the same woman. But both are obsessed with the Dahlia—driven by dark needs to know everything about her past, to capture her killer, to possess the woman even in death. Their quest will take them on a hellish journey through the underbelly of postwar Hollywood, to the core of the dead girl's twisted life, past the extremes of their own psyches—into a region of total madness.

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Twilight: The Graphic Novel, Vol. 2
By: Young Kim (Art/Adaptation), Stephenie Meyer (Creator)
Release Date: October 11, 2011 (First published January 1, 2011)
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Rating: ★★★★☆
Series: Twilight: The Graphic Novel (#2)
Summary: Having uncovered the dark secret of her enigmatic classmate, Edward Cullen, Bella Swan embraces her feelings for him, trusting Edward to keep her safe despite the risks. When a rival clan of vampires makes its way into Forks, though, the danger to Bella has never been more real. Will she make the ultimate sacrifice to protect the people dearest to her?

The second volume of The Graphic Novel completes the visual adaptation of Stephenie Meyer's worldwide bestselling debut novel and is a must-have for any collector's library.

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Innocent Traitor
By: Alison Weir
Release Date: February 27, 2007 (First published January 1, 2006)
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Rating: ★☆☆☆☆
Summary: I am now a condemned traitor . . . I am to die when I have hardly begun to live.

Historical expertise marries page-turning fiction in Alison Weir’s enthralling debut novel, breathing new life into one of the most significant and tumultuous periods of the English monarchy. It is the story of Lady Jane Grey–“the Nine Days’ Queen”–a fifteen-year-old girl who unwittingly finds herself at the center of the religious and civil unrest that nearly toppled the fabled House of Tudor during the sixteenth century.

The child of a scheming father and a ruthless mother, for whom she is merely a pawn in a dynastic game with the highest stakes, Jane Grey was born during the harrowingly turbulent period between Anne Boleyn’s beheading and the demise of Jane’s infamous great-uncle, King Henry VIII. With the premature passing of Jane’s adolescent cousin, and Henry’s successor, King Edward VI, comes a struggle for supremacy fueled by political machinations and lethal religious fervor.

Unabashedly honest and exceptionally intelligent, Jane possesses a sound strength of character beyond her years that equips her to weather the vicious storm. And though she has no ambitions to rule, preferring to immerse herself in books and religious studies, she is forced to accept the crown, and by so doing sets off a firestorm of intrigue, betrayal, and tragedy.

Alison Weir uses her unmatched skills as a historian to enliven the many dynamic characters of this majestic drama. Along with Lady Jane Grey, Weir vividly renders her devious parents; her much-loved nanny; the benevolent Queen Katherine Parr; Jane’s ambitious cousins; the Catholic “Bloody” Mary, who will stop at nothing to seize the throne; and the protestant and future queen Elizabeth. Readers venture inside royal drawing rooms and bedchambers to witness the power-grabbing that swirls around Lady Jane Grey from the day of her birth to her unbearably poignant death. Innocent Traitor paints a complete and compelling portrait of this captivating young woman, a faithful servant of God whose short reign and brief life would make her a legend.

“An impressive debut. Weir shows skill at plotting and maintaining tension, and she is clearly going to be a major player in the . . . historical fiction game.”
–The Independent

“Alison Weir is one of our greatest popular historians. In her first work of fiction . . . Weir manages her heroine’s voice brilliantly, respecting the past’s distance while conjuring a dignified and fiercely modern spirit.”

–London Daily Mail

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My Dress-Up Darling, Vol. 1
By: Shinichi Fukuda
Release Date: April 14, 2020 (First published November 24, 2018)
Publisher: Square Enix Manga
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Series: その着せ替え人形は恋をする / My Dress-Up Darling (#1)
Summary:Wakana Gojou is a fifteen year old high-school boy who was socially traumatized in the past due to his passion for dolls and doll-making. That incident left a mark on him that made him into a social recluse. But one day he was caught talking to his doll by Kitagawa Marin, a sociable gyaru who is perfectly open about her otaku interests -- in short, the complete opposite of him.

Instead of making fun of him, she's amazed by his skill on the sewing machine, and asks if he'll help her make a cosplay! Through sharing their passions, they end up in an odd but supportive relationship.

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The Sandman Vol. 2: The Doll's House
By: Neil Gaiman, Sam Kieth (Illustrator), Mike Dringenberg (Illustrator)
Release Date: November 20, 2018 (First published January 1, 1990)
Publisher: DC Vertigo
Rating: ★★★★☆
Series: The Sandman (#2), Colección Vertigo Salvat-ECC (#7)
Summary: The second installment of Neil Gaiman's seminal series, THE SANDMAN VOL. 2: THE DOLL'S HOUSE, celebrates its 30th anniversary with all all-new edition!

New York Times best-selling author Neil Gaiman's transcendent series SANDMAN is often hailed as the definitive Vertigo title and one of the finest achievements in graphic storytelling. Gaiman created an unforgettable tale of the forces that exist beyond life and death by weaving ancient mythology, folklore and fairy tales with his own distinct narrative vision.

During Morpheus's incarceration, three dreams escaped the Dreaming and are now loose in the waking world. At the same time, a young woman named Rose Walker is searching for her little brother. As their stories converge, a vortex is discovered that could destroy all dreamers, and the world itself.

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