
The world building... I'm sorry but I can't excuse the world building. What is this?! I couldn't really grasp the environment here or picture any of the animals. Also, nothing required them to be animals except for the hand wavy storytelling where I guess we're asked not to look too closely at how anyone in Shady Hollow does anything or how society runs because Ha Ha Cute Animals. Are there 'wild' animals and 'society' animals?! The sheep Ruby was said to come from some kind of pasture where they did sheep thingsâwhat does that mean?! Am I to believe that Shakespeare and Steinbeck are animals in this universe as there were references to them? Do the birds have hands with which they drink their coffee? How does ANYTHING here work?!?!!
It was just a book. Fine enough to finish but the characters aren't very compelling, them being animals is not really relevant in any way I found fun, interesting, or engaging, and the mystery itself was bland. Admittedly wouldn't have picked it up if not for the quest. Might listen to the second just because I can throw it on and have something easy to follow while I knit.

goodgirl joined a quest
7h
The Cozy Crimes of Shady Hollow
đ˛đŚđ
Limited Time Quest âł // 1459 joined

Sponsored Limited Time Quest (Sep 1-Nov 30, 2026): Welcome to Shady Hollow! Itâs a small town populated by friendly animal folks, from birds to bears, where the calm is marred only by the occasional murder.

goodgirl commented...
7h
I'd say just okay for me! It's light and easy and some of the characters are cute but I don't feel like them being animals impacted the story as much as I hoped? The imagined world they're in was just hard for me to picture and nothing felt like they needed to be animals or that their world was shaped by it like in Watership Downâwhich I only bring up because it bills itself as sort of in the same vein!

goodgirl finished a book
15h

Shady Hollow
Juneau Black
The first book in the Shady Hollow series, in which we are introduced to the village of Shady Hollow, a place where woodland creatures live together in harmony--until a curmudgeonly toad turns up dead and the local reporter has to solve the case. Reporter Vera Vixen is a relative newcomer to Shady Hollow. The fox has a nose for news, so when she catches wind that the death might be a murder, she resolves to get to the bottom of the case, no matter where it leads. As she stirs up still waters, the fox exposes more than one mystery, and discovers that additional lives are in jeopardy. Vera finds more to this town than she ever suspected. It seems someone in the Hollow will do anything to keep her from solving the murder, and soon it will take all of Vera's cunning and quickness to crack the case.

goodgirl finished a book
15h

Shady Hollow
Juneau Black
The first book in the Shady Hollow series, in which we are introduced to the village of Shady Hollow, a place where woodland creatures live together in harmony--until a curmudgeonly toad turns up dead and the local reporter has to solve the case. Reporter Vera Vixen is a relative newcomer to Shady Hollow. The fox has a nose for news, so when she catches wind that the death might be a murder, she resolves to get to the bottom of the case, no matter where it leads. As she stirs up still waters, the fox exposes more than one mystery, and discovers that additional lives are in jeopardy. Vera finds more to this town than she ever suspected. It seems someone in the Hollow will do anything to keep her from solving the murder, and soon it will take all of Vera's cunning and quickness to crack the case.


Shady Hollow (Shady Hollow, #1)
Juneau Black


Shady Hollow (Shady Hollow, #1)
Juneau Black
canât figure out if i should envision them as bipedal anthropomorphic critters or regular, talking critters. is this fantastic mr. fox or paw patrol. based on the cover iâm guessing itâs not the latter but then vera talks about running and licking a bowl clean and i canât help but imagine a regular fox đđđ that happens to talk and solve mysteriesâŚ
how are yall envisioning the raven?!

goodgirl is interested in reading...
1d

The Pirate Queen
Ariel Lawhon
Grace O'Malley was born to be at sea. Raised alongside her brother by their father, chief of the name of clan O'Malley, Grace learns early that her dreams of the open water are not compatible with the life she's expected to lead as the daughter of a noble family. And when her father marries her to the wrong man, a neighbouring chief named Donhal, Grace's world shifts for the worse. Undaunted, Grace raises a family without abandoning her passion, aiding her hot-tempered husband in his campaigns against rival tribes. Eventually ousted from her husband's land in the wake of his death, Grace returns to her childhood home and begins her career as a pirate in earnest, claiming new territories and finding deeper love, only to see her livelihood threatened by English incursions into Ireland, and her family endangered in an attempt to check her power. Tenderly observed and fiercely written, Ariel Lawhon's gripping latest novel channels the natural beauty of sixteenth-century Ireland alongside the brutality of the period as seen through the eyes of an unforgettable heroine and defender of her people, who truly earned the title 'the Pirate Queen of Ireland.' A thrilling historical adventure inspired by the life of Grace O'Malley, an infamous Irish sea captain and folk heroine who risked everything to protect her people against the powerful Elizabethan regime

goodgirl commented...
1d
Such a wonderful way to hang out! đ Also, I love to see it, now we'll all get recommendations on our feed!


acidicchaos is interested in reading...
1d

The Orphan Collector
Ellen Marie Wiseman
In the fall of 1918, thirteen-year-old German immigrant Pia Lange longs to be far from Philadelphiaâs overcrowded slums and the anti-immigrant sentiment that compelled her father to enlist in the U.S. Army. But as her city celebrates the end of war, an even more urgent threat arrives: the Spanish flu. Funeral crepe and quarantine signs appear on doors as victims drop dead in the streets and desperate survivors wear white masks to ward off illness. When food runs out in the cramped tenement she calls home, Pia must venture alone into the quarantined city in search of supplies, leaving her baby brothers behind. Bernice Groves has become lost in grief and bitterness since her baby died from the Spanish flu. Watching Pia leave her brothers alone, Bernice makes a shocking, life-altering decision. It becomes her sinister mission to tear families apart when theyâre at their most vulnerable, planning to transform the cityâs orphans and immigrant children into what she feels are âtrue Americans.â Waking in a makeshift hospital days after collapsing in the street, Pia is frantic to return home. Instead, she is taken to St. Vincentâs Orphan Asylum â the first step in a long and arduous journey. As Bernice plots to keep the truth hidden at any cost in the months and years that follow, Pia must confront her own shame and fear, risking everything to see justice â and love â triumph at last. Powerful, harrowing, and ultimately exultant, The Orphan Collector is a story of love, resilience, and the lengths we will go to protect those who need us most.

goodgirl started reading...
1d

The Cartel (Power of the Dog, #2)
Don Winslow
From the internationally best-selling author of the acclaimed novel The Power of the Dog comes The Cartel, a gripping, true-to-life, ripped-from-the-headlines epic story of power, corruption, revenge, and justice spanning the past decade of the Mexican-American drug wars. Itâs 2004. DEA agent Art Keller has been fighting the war on drugs for thirty years in a blood feud against AdĂĄn Barrera, the head of El FederaciĂłn, the worldâs most powerful cartel, and the man who brutally murdered Kellerâs partner. Finally putting Barrera away cost Keller dearlyâthe woman he loves, the beliefs he cherishes, the life he wants to lead. Then Barrera gets out, determined to rebuild the empire that Keller shattered. Unwilling to live in a world with Barrera in it, Keller goes on a ten-year odyssey to take him down. His obsession with justiceâor is it revenge?âbecomes a ruthless struggle that stretches from the cities, mountains, and deserts of Mexico to Washingtonâs corridors of power to the streets of Berlin and Barcelona. Keller fights his personal battle against the devastated backdrop of Mexicoâs drug war, a conflict of unprecedented scale and viciousness, as cartels vie for power and he comes to the final reckoning with Barreraâand himselfâthat he always knew must happen. The Cartel is a story of revenge, honor, and sacrifice, as one man tries to face down the devil without losing his soul. It is the story of the war on drugs and the menâand womenâwho wage it.

goodgirl started reading...
1d

The Cartel (Power of the Dog, #2)
Don Winslow
From the internationally best-selling author of the acclaimed novel The Power of the Dog comes The Cartel, a gripping, true-to-life, ripped-from-the-headlines epic story of power, corruption, revenge, and justice spanning the past decade of the Mexican-American drug wars. Itâs 2004. DEA agent Art Keller has been fighting the war on drugs for thirty years in a blood feud against AdĂĄn Barrera, the head of El FederaciĂłn, the worldâs most powerful cartel, and the man who brutally murdered Kellerâs partner. Finally putting Barrera away cost Keller dearlyâthe woman he loves, the beliefs he cherishes, the life he wants to lead. Then Barrera gets out, determined to rebuild the empire that Keller shattered. Unwilling to live in a world with Barrera in it, Keller goes on a ten-year odyssey to take him down. His obsession with justiceâor is it revenge?âbecomes a ruthless struggle that stretches from the cities, mountains, and deserts of Mexico to Washingtonâs corridors of power to the streets of Berlin and Barcelona. Keller fights his personal battle against the devastated backdrop of Mexicoâs drug war, a conflict of unprecedented scale and viciousness, as cartels vie for power and he comes to the final reckoning with Barreraâand himselfâthat he always knew must happen. The Cartel is a story of revenge, honor, and sacrifice, as one man tries to face down the devil without losing his soul. It is the story of the war on drugs and the menâand womenâwho wage it.

goodgirl started reading...
2d

Shady Hollow
Juneau Black
The first book in the Shady Hollow series, in which we are introduced to the village of Shady Hollow, a place where woodland creatures live together in harmony--until a curmudgeonly toad turns up dead and the local reporter has to solve the case. Reporter Vera Vixen is a relative newcomer to Shady Hollow. The fox has a nose for news, so when she catches wind that the death might be a murder, she resolves to get to the bottom of the case, no matter where it leads. As she stirs up still waters, the fox exposes more than one mystery, and discovers that additional lives are in jeopardy. Vera finds more to this town than she ever suspected. It seems someone in the Hollow will do anything to keep her from solving the murder, and soon it will take all of Vera's cunning and quickness to crack the case.

goodgirl finished a book
2d

Heart of Darkness
Joseph Conrad
Heart of Darkness, a novel by Joseph Conrad, was originally a three-part series in Blackwood's Magazine in 1899. It is a story within a story, following a character named Charlie Marlow, who recounts his adventure to a group of men onboard an anchored ship. The story told is of his early life as a ferry boat captain. Although his job was to transport ivory downriver, Charlie develops an interest in investing an ivory procurement agent, Kurtz, who is employed by the government. Preceded by his reputation as a brilliant emissary of progress, Kurtz has now established himself as a god among the natives in âone of the darkest places on earth.â Marlow suspects something else of Kurtz: he has gone mad. A reflection on corruptive European colonialism and a journey into the nightmare psyche of one of the corrupted, Heart of Darkness is considered one of the most influential works ever written.

goodgirl is interested in reading...
2d

The Nerd Reich: Silicon Valley Fascism and the War on Democracy
Gil Duran
A fearless and urgent chronicle of the tech-authoritarian movement from its early days in San Francisco politics to its current moment on the international stage, exploring the wild and dystopian ambition of the technocrats at its center, and offering a road map to resistance.When Silicon Valley says it is ââmoving fast and breaking things,ââ the world interprets the chaos as a necessary cost of innovation. Gil DurĂĄn reveals something far more a decades-long campaign to replace elected governments with corporate rule. Drawing on insider political experience and new investigations, DurĂĄn traces this ideology from its philosophical roots in The Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson and Lord William Rees-Mogg. He introduces its modern apostlesâsome of Silicon Valleyâs biggest namesâand shows how the promise of technological liberation has transformed into a global movement for digital feudalism, powered by cryptocurrency, artificial intelligence, and the algorithmic propaganda of social media. The Nerd Reich explains the origins, strategies, and ambitions of Silicon Valleyâs war on democracy for the first time. From San Franciscoâs weaponized elections and secret billionaire projects to the White House, DurĂĄn exposes how the worldâs richest men are building a new political order. The Nerd Reich is more than a hidden history, itâs an urgent democracy is being dismantled not by coups or tanks, but by code, capital, and the illusion of innovation. DurĂĄn insists there is still time to fight backâif we act now.

goodgirl is re-reading...
3d

Heart of Darkness
Joseph Conrad
Heart of Darkness, a novel by Joseph Conrad, was originally a three-part series in Blackwood's Magazine in 1899. It is a story within a story, following a character named Charlie Marlow, who recounts his adventure to a group of men onboard an anchored ship. The story told is of his early life as a ferry boat captain. Although his job was to transport ivory downriver, Charlie develops an interest in investing an ivory procurement agent, Kurtz, who is employed by the government. Preceded by his reputation as a brilliant emissary of progress, Kurtz has now established himself as a god among the natives in âone of the darkest places on earth.â Marlow suspects something else of Kurtz: he has gone mad. A reflection on corruptive European colonialism and a journey into the nightmare psyche of one of the corrupted, Heart of Darkness is considered one of the most influential works ever written.
Conclave
Robert Harris
My friend told me it's more cinematic than the movie even and I've got to agree, it's so vivid!