TBR etc.

TBR etc. Welcome! I’m Tina, a book reviewer and recommender with a special interest in new book releases.

TBRETC on IG and TT, BookTuber at Tina Books, & Book Talk, etc Podcast cohost!

Just a few books on TBR shortlist. Will I get to these soon? Who’s to say. But if you have something to share to sway me...
02/14/2025

Just a few books on TBR shortlist. Will I get to these soon? Who’s to say. But if you have something to share to sway me one way or another, let me know!

Book rec: The Inheritance by Trisha Saklecha! A locked-island mystery meets Succession-style family drama. The wealthy A...
02/12/2025

Book rec: The Inheritance by Trisha Saklecha! A locked-island mystery meets Succession-style family drama. The wealthy Agarwal family gathers on a private Scottish island for a high-stakes reunion, but with secrets, betrayals, and hidden agendas at play, not everyone will make it out unscathed.

This is a slow burn thriller with multiple POVs- it had me suspecting everyone!
The ending got me and the historical details (like the Highland Clearances) added an eerie depth.

If you love:
✔️ Family drama with wealth & betrayal
✔️ Locked-room mysteries in atmospheric settings
✔️ Messy, morally gray characters

This one’s for you! 📖✨

Have you read it?

Have you ever used the .storygraph recommendation feature to pick your next read? I used it a few weeks ago and it gave ...
02/10/2025

Have you ever used the .storygraph recommendation feature to pick your next read? I used it a few weeks ago and it gave me a ton of options to choose from. Some that have been on my TBR and others that I had never heard of but looked like I might like based on other books I enjoyed. I think this is a great way to get yourself out of a reading slump or to help with decision fatigue when thinking about your next read!

White Smoke is a book I picked up because I want to be a Tiffany D Jackson completionist, and this and it did not disappoint. It’s YA social horror about a family that moves to from California to a town in the Midwest that is filled with secrets and bad vibes. This one has good atmosphere and genuine spooks and scares!

The other book Storygraph recommended was Mad Honey by Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan. I’ve always been a Picoult fan, and this felt right in line with others I have enjoyed from her. Pick this up if you like books that have complicated character, characters or legal battle battles at the center. (It trivial to reduce all this book contains to just those two things, but there’s a pretty big reveal in this one and I don’t want to give anything away!) I very much enjoyed it, and now I’m tempted to read all of Picoults extensive backlist.

✨ Homeseeking by Karissa Chen is an epic yet deeply intimate story spanning 60 years, following Haiwen and Suchi as they...
02/06/2025

✨ Homeseeking by Karissa Chen is an epic yet deeply intimate story spanning 60 years, following Haiwen and Suchi as they navigate love, war, and the shifting landscapes of the Chinese diaspora. When they reunite by chance in Los Angeles decades after being separated by war, their past and present collide in a tale of sacrifice, resilience, and enduring love.
This book took me through so many emotions- grief, longing, hope. I loved that we got to see Haiwen and Suchi later in life instead of just a brief reunion. The dual timeline structure, moving forward and backward, made their journey even more powerful. And the reflections on language? So beautifully done. A bittersweet, sweeping story that lingers long after the last page!
📖 Read this if you love:
✔️ Multi-decade love stories (with actual time spent together!)
✔️ Historical fiction exploring Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Taiwan
✔️ Stories of immigration, identity, and resilience
✔️ Dual timelines that weave past and present beautifully

Have you read this yet? Special shout out to our Book Talk etc. patrons- as always, our community read chat really enriched this reading experience for me!

Book mail! TY  for the free copies. Publishing is really knocking it out of the park with covers these days. Get these l...
02/03/2025

Book mail! TY for the free copies.

Publishing is really knocking it out of the park with covers these days. Get these later in the year releases on your radar now.

✨FOOD PERSON Out 5.20.25 | A socially awkward writer who takes a job ghostwriting for a famous hollywood starlet. A romance with insider food world detail? Yes please!

✨THE GIRLS WHO GREW BIG Out 6.24.25 | From the author of NIGHTCRAWLING, a story of found family about a fierce group of teenager mothers in a small town in FL.

✨OUR LAST RESORT Out 7.8.25 | From the author of THE QUIET TENANT (a favorite of mine!), a reunion between estranged siblings is interrupted when a woman is found murdered at their luxury vacation resort.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again- 2025 reading is shaping up to be incredible!!

(*= gifted copy) January had some real highs and real lows- I’m thankful I was able to get through so many books!I finis...
02/01/2025

(*= gifted copy) January had some real highs and real lows- I’m thankful I was able to get through so many books!

I finished 15 books this month and posted 8 videos to YouTube.

Here they are, ranked from favorite to least favorite.

Best of the best:
*WILD DARK SHORE
*THE FAVORITES

Highly recommend:
THE STEPFORD WIVES
*HOMESEEKING
CROSS MY HEART

Recommend:
*THE THREE LIVES OF CATE KAY
BEAUTIFUL UGLY
MAD HONEY
WHITE SMOKE
*SKY FULL OF ELEPHANTS

It was fine:
*THE HOUSE OF MY MOTHER
*THE NOTE
*THE MARRIAGE ACT

Not for me:
DIAVOLA
I’M STARTING TO WORRY ABOUT THIS BLACK BOX OF DOOM

Want more info? Just ask!

Every year, I make a list of the best mystery, thriller, and suspense books I read that year. I thought it would be fun ...
01/26/2025

Every year, I make a list of the best mystery, thriller, and suspense books I read that year. I thought it would be fun to go back and look at my lists from 2018-2023 to see if I’d still recommend them! The full list/video is on YouTube now, but you can swipe to see some of my picks.

Do you ever go back and look at your best of lists? How well do they hold up?

(TY ) ✨ This is a Charlotte McConaghy appreciation post. Just finished WILD DARK SHORE (out March 4th), and can confiden...
01/24/2025

(TY ) ✨ This is a Charlotte McConaghy appreciation post. Just finished WILD DARK SHORE (out March 4th), and can confidently say I enjoyed this just as much as MIGRATIONS. It’s about a family desperately trying to keep it together as the island they live on is on the brink of going under due to rising sea levels. The writing is vivid, the plot kept me guessing, and i loved these characters. I highlighted something on damn near every page.

Highly, highly recommend… you know it’s special to me if I’m reviewing it here before I get a chance to on Book Talk, etc!!!

I hear we’re doing big long photos on instagram now? Weird. But what’s not weird is this weeks  podcast episode. We had ...
01/17/2025

I hear we’re doing big long photos on instagram now? Weird. But what’s not weird is this weeks podcast episode. We had the BEST time chatting with Nadia from .storygraph - if you’ve ever wanted to know more about how she started it or the features that they are working on, here it is!

I used their recommendation feature to pick my books for last week. One of the many recs it gave (based on what I was in the mood for) was WHITE SMOKE by Tiffany D. Jackson! I had this on my physical TBR shelf so it was a no-brainer.

This was YA psychological horror about a family that moves to a Midwestern town into a home that is owned by the organization their mother works for, only to find that the neighborhood is ✨strange✨ and so is their house. Things keep disappearing and it definitely gives haunted, which does nothing to help the MC’s anxiety. This is social horror with great commentary on gentrification and vilification of ma*****na use. If you liked Alyssa Cole’s WHEN NO ONE IS WATCHING, you’ll like this! 4⭐️.

Yesterday I posted a late night TT asking for dystopian book recommendations. Currently that throwaway video has 14,000 ...
01/12/2025

Yesterday I posted a late night TT asking for dystopian book recommendations. Currently that throwaway video has 14,000 views and 386 comments 😭 I’ll be sad to lose that app; Instagram would never.

It reminded me that I never posted an review on a dystopian book I read and enjoyed last year- BURN by Peter Heller. Two long time friends are on their annual trip to camp in the wilderness when s**t hits the fan for real. Maine is being wracked by bewildering violence and the friends have to fight to survive while figuring out how they’ll ever make it back home, or if there’s a home to return to. This is short and packs a punch, and I’m in need of a sequel.

If you need a dystopian rec, head to that post bc there’s a plethora!

So do you have any 2025 reading goals?Im a goals girl and I love setting them, whether I achieve them or not. I gave a f...
01/10/2025

So do you have any 2025 reading goals?

Im a goals girl and I love setting them, whether I achieve them or not. I gave a full breakdown of all of my 2025 goals in my last YouTube video- but here are my ones that are reading specific!

✨read 120 books (same as last year’s goal)
✨read 1 nonfiction book per month
✨complete my 12 books by 12 friends stack
✨keep my reading spreadsheet up in real time (bc going back later to do it suuucks)
✨No partially annotated books- I often start annotating but don’t finish, and that annoys me

It feels ludicrous to post business as usual when there’s so so much bad going on (especially thinking of the fires in CA), but posting brings me joy and you can pay attention to what’s going on in the real world and still play with your books.

Would love to hear any goals (bookish or not) that you’ve set for yourself!!

(ARC fm ) Yes, this is as good as everyone is saying it is. Its a story of competitive ice dancing, love, competition, r...
01/08/2025

(ARC fm ) Yes, this is as good as everyone is saying it is. Its a story of competitive ice dancing, love, competition, rivalry, belonging AND I LOVED IT. Definitely do the audio. 5 stars!! you deserve all the flowers! 💐

My 12 books recommended by 12 friends!!! There’s only 2 specific recs on here (my cohosts 🫶 and all the others got the m...
01/03/2025

My 12 books recommended by 12 friends!!! There’s only 2 specific recs on here (my cohosts 🫶 and all the others got the most votes from the collection of backlist books I posted. Here we go 2025!!

Backlist priority:
✨THE LIBRARY AT MOUNT CHAR (Im scared yall)
✨THE MESMERIST
✨ THE ONLY GOOD INDIANS
✨FANTASTICLAND ( rec)
✨THE CARETAKER
✨KNOW MY NAME (got the most votes)
✨THE PROPHETS
✨NORTH WOODS
✨THE RIVER AT NIGHT ( rec)
✨LONE WOMEN
✨THE LOVE SONGS OF W.E.B DUBOIS
✨MAD HONEY (not pictured bc I am the worst and forgot to add it)

What a fantastic stack!!! I’m ready 😊😊

I am READY for 2025 reading!! Thank you so much to the publishers for sending these beauties through- if 2024 was the ye...
01/02/2025

I am READY for 2025 reading!! Thank you so much to the publishers for sending these beauties through- if 2024 was the year of backist, 2025 is going to be the year of ARCs. Maybe. We’ll see ;) But these are ones I am prioritizing!!

✨1/14/25- THE FAVORITES, Layne Fargo
✨1/14/25- THE NOTE- Alafair Burke .burke
✨1/28/25- GOOD DIRT, Charmaine Wilkerson
✨THE BONES BENEATH MY SKIN, TJ Klune
✨2/4/25- THE EDGE OF WATER, Olufunke Grace Bankole .grace.bankole
✨2/25/25- CREEP: A LOVE STORY, Emma van Straaten
✨3/4/25- WILD DARK SHORE, Charlotte McConaghy

What’s high on your 2025 release list?

Thats a wrap on 2024 reading!! I’m spending the day working on my 2025 TBR and reading/new releases spreadsheets. Happy ...
01/01/2025

Thats a wrap on 2024 reading!! I’m spending the day working on my 2025 TBR and reading/new releases spreadsheets. Happy New Year indeed!!

What’s your most anticipated read for 2025?

(ARC from ) My FAVORITE book of 2024!!! 👑JAMES by Percival Everett. This has been in my number 1 spot since I read it in...
12/31/2024

(ARC from ) My FAVORITE book of 2024!!! 👑JAMES by Percival Everett. This has been in my number 1 spot since I read it in March, and I’m so happy to see it getting so much love.

It’s a re-imagining of Huckleberry Finn, told from the POV of the enslaved James. You don’t need to like/know the original to enjoy this. It’s so smart and layered while also being accessible, horrifying, and at times, funny. What a mind Everett has!!!

Vibes are ironic, subversive, clever, and enlightening.

Loved it!!! Happy new year all, cheers to 2025! 🥂

Book 2 of 2024!!! THE LIGHT PIRATE by Lily Brooks Dalton. This could have easily made my number 1 spot and I’m sooo glad...
12/30/2024

Book 2 of 2024!!! THE LIGHT PIRATE by Lily Brooks Dalton. This could have easily made my number 1 spot and I’m sooo glad I came back to it after DNFing a few years ago.

I read this for our climate fiction episode and it’s just perfect. It imagines a world where we’ve finally succumbed to climate change and tells the story through the eyes of Wanda, a remarkable girl who was born during a hurricane. The writing is immaculate and the story is both quiet and hard hitting. Loved it!!

Vibes are: contemplative, tense, and devastating yet somehow hopeful.

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