CAN MY BOY CATCH A BREAK GAH DAMN

This book felt intimidating when I first picked it up. But genuinely, it is such a breeze to get through. While it is 600+ pages, it never feels slow or boring at any moment

Vis as a character is just so heartbreaking. He genuinely can't catch a break or trust anyone even though he is just a kid. I loved his character sm, but my heart would shatter whenever he was reflecting on the fact that he has to be naturally distrustful and dishonest to everyone in his life

Eidhin has my heart, and I can't forgive the author what he did to Callidus 💔✌️✌️

I had already read this book when it came up as a readalong book but decided to reread it for one very key reason: I first read it in February 2022. I remembered very little of the book beyond the premise. I remembered not liking it much. And yet. I rated it 5 stars.

Why did you do that, Past Liz? I didn’t know. And I needed to know. The mystery was eating at me, and the explanation, while true enough, that I am not the same woman that I was in 2022, was not a complete enough answer.

And so I set about my quest. I have updated my rating. I think all of us mature in our reading over time and with practice and experience, and… I am just so so so far removed from 2022 Liz. And that’s fine! I just had not remembered that 2022 Liz was someone who would give 5 stars to a book she didn’t love.

After and during rereading, I saw what a lot of folks had been pointing to, that the book has a very narrow target audience (that a progressive white millennial woman from California does not fit into), and that it is gratuitously violent and does not really have satisfying character growth or reflection. There are sections that are written very unevenly. This is what I didn’t like back then, too, but Past Liz was not really talking to other folks about books or analyzing what she read that deeply and did not have the language to express that.

I suspect that a Boomer or perhaps Gen X man who enjoys action movies and buddy comedies (yeah ok I am describing my own dad) might really enjoy the book.

So why the 5 stars? Did I figure it out? Believe it or not, I think I might have. I suspect that Past Liz felt that while quite intense and yet shallow, the book was addressing an uncomfortable and important reality (homophobia and racism and the ways that might be expressed in the South), and gave the book 5 stars for being Important™️.

I have since rereading this one also reread a book for a readalong that I remembered nothing about except that I really loved it in high school. And now, I thought it was… fine! Honestly kind of eager to reread more often and see how my thoughts and taste have evolved (that is not to imply that my thoughts/taste are necessarily better now, liking this book and other books that I didn’t is totally valid!!)

So anyway, here is to PB and all of you for making me a more thoughtful reader!

I feel ??? and !!! and shattered and also vulnerably held all at the same time?

Olivie Blake has blended the genre of romance with literary fiction to perfection. This book is so philosophical and contemplative. While Alone With You in the Ether is, on the surface, a romance novel, the exploration of romance moves past the idea of completion or wholeness.

Instead of the romance being fixated on a happy ending, or a mathematical equation with a correct answer, Blake is focused on the transcendent mundanity of connection. Rather than Regan and Aldo being two parts of one whole, they are two imperfect wholes who are expanded by knowing each other. Their connection exemplifies the way another person's thoughts begin to invade your mind, how you begin to see them in your everyday moments, how their perspective becomes layered on top of your own.

So much happens in so little time, and yet so much time passes that you feel like you've begun to inhabit the consciousness of the characters themselves. In essence, that is what this novel is about. The impossibility of existing within someone's consciousness, enough to change them and enough to matter.

Aldo and Regan are such a stunning example of what love feels like for someone who sometimes feels like they might be fundamentally broken. This almost primal fear that if someone truly knew you, they would discover the defect at your core, that everything you love is destined to leave.

Alone With You in the Ether understands that fear so intimately, and Regan and Aldo stand on opposite ends of that abyss. In fact, for a majority of the book, they arguably aren't seeking romance at all, but are asking whether their existence can become indispensable to someone else's. If their minds might be beautiful and valuable enough to be loved and held and absorbed by another.

I don't think I will ever get over the things this novel had to say about time, connection, and the way relationships layer and build over time. These are ideas that often consume me in my daily life, the way our lives are ever-changing in ways that we don't notice as we're weaving them but only become clear in retrospect.

A conversation about bees, a shared meal, noticing something that meant nothing until it mattered to someone who mattered to you. The fear of being unknowable but the hope that another person might nevertheless come to inhabit your consciousness and allow you into theirs.

This existentiality is so genuinely difficult to articulate and surprisingly elusive to explain. There will always be cliches about soulmates, about "finding your better half," but the reality is often so much stranger and so much more understated.

Much like how it feels to know and be known, Alone With You in the Ether is a novel built upon a foundation of accumulation. It happens slowly, stacking up through dozens of conversations and tiny recognitions, until you realize you're no longer observing Aldo and Regan as characters but carrying their questions around inside your own mind.

Blake makes you feel the unbearable fragility of being known at all, acknowledging that to truly let another person into your mind is terrifying because they gain the power to alter it forever. Even more, she insists that this vulnerability is what gives life so much of its meaning. Because love - in all of its forms - may not guarantee happiness, but it allows us, however briefly and imperfectly, to escape the illusion that our consciousness is entirely solitary.

I could write 3,000 words summarizing the plot or identifying the themes or quoting the gorgeous prose, but none of those things fully capture what happened between me and this novel. It's an experience and a perspective that deep down I knew I needed and one that I'm doubtful I'll ever experience in the same way again.

In fact, I suspect that I'll understand what it meant to me more clearly a month, six months, or a year from now than I do today, because I'll have time to look back and finally see all of its layers.

The Moonsingers is a cozy fantasy for the misfits in a delightful fantastical small town. This book is a good choice for when you're in the mood to gently move through a story.

Our main character is very endearing and relatable in her offbeat and well-intentioned ways. I was a little baffled that she thought she knew better than the townspeople about bringing a train to their town, but she won me over by the end of the book. Her relationships with the girls were very sweet, and the girls provided much needed levity. The girls were my favorite characters of the story, and when we left their scenes, I was less engaged. The love interest was also very sweet and an overall gentler male love interest than I often see, which I appreciated. I do think that their relationship was a little fast, but they were so lovely together that it can be forgiven. The characters who introduce conflict, however, were a little less developed and brought some confusion to an otherwise clear tale.

The pacing was a little odd throughout the book. The blurb for the book reveals the fairy identity of the family, but we are stuck waiting quite a while for the main character to learn this information. The emotional arc of the main character is the most developed part of the story, while Williams and Marceline are less clear plot points. The story starts and stops a bit finding the rhythm, and there were multiple spots where my attention started to wane. The whimsical vibes were there, but the story could have been a little tighter.

There is brief discussion of loss of parents but overall this is a pleasant tale. If you are looking for a charming cozy fantasy that takes the scenic route, I think you will enjoy this book.

Thank you, Poisoned Pen Press, for the arc!

The Moonsingers delivers everything you could possibly wish for in a cozy fantasy, in my opinion.

This is a story about stepping into yourself - about recognising that not fitting society’s idea of “normal” doesn’t make you any less worthy of love, care, or belonging. There’s such beautiful freedom in that. This book mended small cuts in my neurodivergent heart that I didn’t realise were still quietly bleeding.

We follow Ismay as she leaves behind her old life in Port Skerry after an accident at her school and becomes a governess to three young girls in a small village. But the girls and their father aren’t what they seem, and many of Ismay’s attempts to help or better the lives around her go awry - including her well‑intentioned push for a railway line to reach their remote village. The survey for that railway brings Hamish Breck into her world, and something tender begins to unfurl amid the chaos.

What worked for me I love Ismay, plain and simple. I saw entirely too much of younger me reflected in her - in the way she’s treated by a world that doesn’t understand, value, or make space for her, and in the way she tries to fold herself into boxes she was never meant to fit. Even writing it out makes my throat tighten. It feels as though Pritzker reached into the most delicate parts of me and laid them bare for anyone to see.

Ismay’s growing bond with her pupils is tender and full of small, wild joys, and I adored watching all of them embrace the untameable pieces of themselves. And the dynamic between Ismay and Hamish? It had me biting back smile after smile and kicking my feet. Their connection was like something soft blooming in a place that didn’t expect warmth.

The Scottish setting is wonderful, and the world‑building is lush without ever overwhelming. The inclusion of Gaelic words throughout the chapters adds a grounded, atmospheric texture.

Why my rating isn’t higher I wish I could rate the book higher, but a few things didn’t quite work for me.

The blurb contains a major spoiler about the Underhill family. This wouldn’t be an issue if we didn’t spend the first 25–30% of the book watching Ismay try to puzzle out what makes them act so strangely. While this section also builds her backstory and the world, it dragged. I found myself waiting for her to catch up so the story could start to unfold.

Marceline is introduced as someone who deeply shaped Ismay’s lack of self‑confidence, but for the emotional weight she carries, their relationship isn’t explored enough. It leaves her feeling like a character added mainly to tie a neat bow on Paterson Williams, the schoolmaster in Glennmaidens, at the end.

Which brings me to Mr. Williams. He’s introduced as an antagonist, and Pritzker succeeds in making me loathe him, but his storyline fizzles. He appears for dramatic effect here and there, only to be whisked away. The potential was immense, but the payoff wasn’t.

Final verdict Despite the shortcomings, I’d absolutely recommend this book to anyone who enjoys cozy fantasy. The characters are lovable, and following each of them as they find themselves is a quiet, steady joy.

Had I only been able to rate in full stars, I would have rounded up.

Thank you for the ARC to Poisoned Pen Press and Netgalley. The thoughts above are my own.