I feel like I'm one thing away from a full-on brain scramble. Where there will just be so much going on in my head that it'll become mush. Or maybe it's already mush, who knows. Which is my excuse for why I'm a day late on Monday Reads.

I've seen this cover somewhere before...

First up is SECRETS AFTER DARK by Marie Higgins. This is one of those books where the concept is really good but the execution just wasn't. There were things I liked about the book, but things that fell flat. And I'm just going to leave it at that.

CARAVAL by Stephanie Garber. Another book where I loved the concept. I read a lot of reviews talking about the flowery language, but I didn't feel like it was over the top. I loved the twists and turns of this book- just when I thought I knew what was happening, something else happened instead. The book always left me guessing. I also loved Scarlett and Julian as characters. While I gave it 5 stars, it's actually more of a 4.5 for me, mostly because Scarlett and Tella's dad was very one-dimensional EVIL. Also, Tella (Scarlett's sister) isn't very nice. Scarlett does everything for her, but since we see Tella very little in the book, and what we do see of her is mostly selfishness, it's hard to understand why Scarlett's main focus is on protecting Tella the whole time. Otherwise, excellent world-building and lovely story.

Last, I read MORNING STAR, the third book in the RED RISING trilogy by Pierce Brown. This book felt just like the others for me in that I wanted to know what happened, but I wanted to be done it already. I'm not sure exactly what it was- the violence maybe, or so much going on that it ended up feeling unnecessary... not really sure, but I never connected with these books like I wanted. They have some excellent characters, full plots, and big bang endings, but unfortunately I was often bored in the middle. Still, a four-star read for me like the others.

Now I'm in the mood for some fun and swoony romance.