kayathebookworm's reviews
212 reviews

I listened to Unplanned by Abby Johnson as an audiobook after watching the movie. Wow. Her story is so eye-opening. It reveals the true colors behind Planned Parenthood and helps educate others that a baby is a life from the point of conception — not a fetus or an embryo but a living baby. I am now hoping to get more involved in the pro-life movement as a Christian woman who wants to make other women, along with their babies, feel loved and seen.

God bless :).

I so underestimated this book going into it. Allie is a conservative Christian who has impacted me through her podcast, Relatable, and somehow she always knows how to perfectly articulate the things I think but can’t quite put into words. The book especially spoke to me because, like Allie, I am a type one perfectionist who feels the need to ‘be enough’, do it all, and overthink things until I just can’t think anymore.

I have wanted to read her book for a long time but have always put it off for later because I figured it wouldn’t apply to me since I don’t struggle with obsessing over self-care and self-love and every other selfish action that is so popular in our culture today. Or so I thought. As I was reading the book, I realized that, though I may not act on this selfishness in the extreme ways that others might, I have still let some of the lies of our society affect how I view certain things.

Throughout, Allie speaks of how this me-centered attitude effects one’s everyday attitudes, politics, parenting, and marriage, among other topics.

In parting, I’ll leave you with something the Lord has taught me through many seasons of my life and this book reminded me of it once again: I’m not enough. I was never meant to be and I never will be. Jesus was enough so that I don’t have to be.

4.5 stars.

God bless,
Kaya :)

I’m not totally sure how I feel about this book myself so I’m structuring this review a bit differently: what I liked first then what I didn’t.

What I liked:
- the author’s writing was very fluid
- some of the sentences were profound in a way that made you really think
… wow, I didn’t realize that was all

What I didn’t like:
- I didn’t really care for or connect to any of the characters (if anything, I disliked them)
- there are SO MANY questions that I still have about things that weren’t really explained or resolved in the book
- the plot twist didn’t really take me by a huge surprise


I don’t know, maybe it’s just me but something felt “off” about this book. I just can’t quite figure out what it is. What I can tell you, though, is that when I look back on reading this — rather than the happy and excited feeling I usually have when I read books I enjoy — I feel nothing. If someone came up to me and asked me how I feel about this book, I would simply say, “eh.” I think a lot of people would love it but it just wasn’t for me. 3 stars.


Content-
Language: 1.5/5, mild and rare
Spice: 1.5/5: only a few mentions of it, nothing descriptive


(Also, a note for fellow swifties: much of this book reminded me of “mad woman” from folklore.)

Rachel Linden has done it again. Though it took me forever to finish because of the crazy season of life I'm currently in, this book was worth the time. It contains one of the sweetest, yet most realistic love stories I've ever had the pleasure of reading, along with valuable life lessons and wonderful descriptions of scrumptious-sounding treats. 4.5 stars.

Good audiobook but I did feel like a lot of it could have been summarized in one chapter. 3.5 stars.

3 stars. Super quick short story.