fiction

Automatic Noodle Review

Book: Automatic Noodle
Author: Annalee Newitz
Publisher: Tor Publishing Group
Year: 2025
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Synopsis : “You don’t have to eat food to know the way to a city’s heart is through its stomach. So when a group of deactivated robots comes back online in an abandoned ghost kitchen, they decide to make their own way doing what they know : making food – the tastiest hand-pulled noodles around – for the humans of San Francisco, who are recovering from a devastating war.
But when their robot-run business starts causing a stir, a targeted wave of one-star reviews threatens to boil over into a crisis. To keep their doors open, they’ll have to call on their customers, their community, and each other – and find a way to survive and thrive in a world that wasn’t built for them.”

Review : Automatic Noodle is a sweet, quick, low-stakes read that I managed to get through in under a day. Weighing in at just 160 pages (in ARC form), when I tell you this is a quick read, I mean it; while Automatic Noodle tells one small story quickly, it isn’t without substance or a deeper meaning. Newitz has done what I have found happening with regularity these days, they’ve disguised within their robot novel a story with a greater meaning, taking a group of othered people and mirroring them to our current world, perhaps not in a perfectly seemless manner, but with dedication that pays off.

In a world where robots have been granted some, albeit small, level of rights (particularly if they’re of a sentient class of robot) following a brutal war between California and the rest of the United States, we enter this novel to find that the sentient robots don’t have much in the way of rights after all. Living either slaved or indentured to corporations or woken to find they’ve been created by a debt that’s strapped not to who created them but to the robot themselves, most sentient robots have little to no choice about the life they must live. They may also find themselves the subjects of hate speech, disgust, cancel culture, and worse due to the nature of their capitalistic society that created a thing to do a job that a human would otherwise have been hired to do. I’ll admit, it was hard for me to wrap my mind around the first layer of this novel, which is, at face value, robotphobia, given the horrific misuse and abuse of generative AI in our current world; destroying the planet, replacing jobs, and demolishing our creative abilities all in one fell trendy swoop. It feels as though Automatic Noodle might be a look through time at ourselves if we don’t get behind human beings pretty immediately. And that’s where our second layer comes in.

Automatic Noodle is a clever mask for a narrative driven by the gross inequities people of all creeds and backgrounds face even in 2025, particularly our queer, trans, neuro-spicy, and non-white friends. Empathy is the thread Newitz binds this story together with, putting the reader into the shoes of sentient robots who just want to live and thrive in a world where others are so able to live and thrive within. In a world where they are outcast and othered simply for being exactly who they are, they find a way to engage with each other, with their community, and to find their own personhood in the midst of everything. Without needing to ask their community for assistance, it’s freely given to them because in Newitz’ world, empathy exists in the majority of people and for those who seem incapable of seeing a person as a person, they appear to be the minority, enraged and bated by targeted online attacks from those with outdated ideas of what might make a country great. Uncanny, huh?

If you want to know how a society is functioning, simply look to the sci-fi and fantasy world to tell you. It’s no coincidence that the last two books I’ve read in this realm have emphasized the concept of empathy. In a world where we forget that people are people and our humanity makes us inherently more alike than different, it’s no surprise to find stories that allude to the hate and vitriol that’s being spewed with more and more vehemence and frequency. Automatic Noodle does an excellent job of relating a futuristic scenario to our present-day troubles, all while cultivating a narrative of joy, peace, friendship, and community despite and because of our differences. Love is a greater force than fear and hate and we see it time and time again in sweet novels such as this. And while I didn’t find the flow of robotic narration my favorite to follow (in fact, I enjoyed Newitz’ writing the best in their letter to the reader), Automatic Noodle is a book I’ll be recommending to friends in the future. It’s a joyous journey into the world of savory noodles, found family, and community support despite raging phobias and hate over a group of people who are simply trying to live their lives in peace. We are all deserving of a peaceful, joy-filled life. Full stop.

Advice : If you’re looking for a quick, cozy read in the vein of A Psalm for the Wild Built, I think you’ll really love Automatic Noodle. If you enjoy a reclamation story, found family, or how food gets made, this is definitely for you!

Don’t Let Him In Review

Book: Don’t Let Him In
Author: Lisa Jewell
Publisher: Atria Books
Year: 2025
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Review : “He’s the perfect man. He says he loves you. You think he might even be made for you. Before long he’s moved into your heart – and into your house. And then he leaves for days at a time. You don’t know where he’s gone or who he’s with. And you realize – if you looked back – you’d say to yourself : Don’t let him in.”

Review : Don’t Let Him In is, in some ways, the quintessential scam story – a man gives just enough details to be believed, but not enough to encourage questions and in doing so he scams women out of their life’s savings, their home, and their dignity. In other ways, Don’t Let Him In suffers from an image crisis, namely, it doesn’t seem to know what it is – or rather, it wants to be too many things. Jewell does an excellent job painting picture for the reader, jumping back and forth between the present and the past, changing point of view from the victim(s) to a man with many names, guiding us from victim to victim, broadening the scope as she simultaneously narrows the field of vision. It’s an enjoyable suspense thriller with multiple female characters, deviating from the excruciating norm of the unreliable female narrator that so many suspense/thriller writers seem to clutch to with all their might. Jewell, instead, weaves a winding narrative of a man who manipulates, targets, and attacks with precision and ease. By the time it’s all said and done, it doesn’t come down to one (or several) unreliable women, rather, they’re logical, grounded, down to earth women who are worn down over a period of years until they don’t even know themselves anymore.

Where I struggle with Don’t Let Him In, is that this story is far from unique. And while that’s a sad portrait of our modern times, it’s more than that. Jewell seemed to have trouble reigning in her plot, it became muddied and she let slip a few holes because of it. ** Spoilers Ahead ** Jewell wanted us to buy that her scam artist main character was manipulating women, conning his way into their lives, and stealing their money on a slow but steady basis – yes, that I can buy. Consider it sold! But wait, that’s not all – next we have to buy that our main character is also a street stalker, potentially even someone who derives in-the-moment sexual gratification from his street stalking, that this gratification may be his sole sexual drive; okay, I guess I can believe both aspects of this guy’s personality, but again, that’s not all. Now we need to believe he’s also insanely jealous, prone to fits of vengeance and extravagent plotting; next, he’s a murderer; next, he’s faked his own death; next, he’s got a god-complex and delusions of grandeur; he’s an escort; he’s running business scams as a life coach; wait, now he’s also a master of escape. No. It’s too much. Don’t Let Him In suffers from a lack of editing, the plot is a disaster, and the story struggles to keep itself afloat beneath the weight of so many incredible personality characteristics. Pick two from the above list and go hard, do them well, I’ll buy that. This? I’m not buying what you’re selling.

As someone who partakes in pop culture, it wasn’t a struggle to see what podcasts and tv shows Jewell might have consumed prior to writing this book – Dirty John (a true crime podcast by Christopher Goffard) and You (a Netflix adaptation of a book series by the same name) come immediately to mind, I’m sure with just a few additional minutes of thought you or I could come up with more than a handful of others. It’s a storyline in the mainstream, it’s not new or unique and Don’t Let Him In doesn’t offer an inventive perspective beyond trying to encompass every perspective. I didn’t find this book to be very interesting or compelling, but I will say the ending was exactly what you’d hope it would be, without giving anything away. It’s satisfying and thank god for that, because if you’ve plowed through this nearly 500 page book, you deserve an ending that makes you happy it’s over. I didn’t find myself thinking about this book when I wasn’t reading it, or chewing on it after it was over, I simply read it. That’s all. The twists are easily spotted, the plot holes are glaring, and the plot itself is a messy, muddled fiasco.

Advice : If you’re looking for a book that showcases every possible scam available in one character – woo! This is it! If you’re looking for some substance, something that doesn’t read like every podcast you’ve listened to in the last 10 years or every tv show you’ve watched on your fav streaming platform, this is not it. Keep looking. And listen, suspense / thrillers only get better if we, the reader, demand more.

Speedy Reviews

In an effort to continue reviewing every single ARC I receive (for the second year in a row) while simultaneously not burning out from the effort, I’ve decided to implement what I’m calling Speedy Reviews. Here I will briefly review more than one advanced copy received recently – largely books that I don’t feel necessitate a long-winded review. Without further ado, I give you : Speedy Reviews.

Book: All the Men I’ve Loved Again
Author: Christine Pride
Publisher: Atria Books
Year: 2025
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Synopsis : “It’s 1999 and Cora Belle has arrived at college ready to change her life. She’s determined to grow out of the shy, sheltered daddy’s girl who attended an all-white prep school in her all-white suburb. What she’s totally unprepared for is Lincoln, with his dark skin, charming southern drawl, and smile. Because how can you ever prepare yourself for the roller coaster of first love?
Just when Cora thinks she’s got everything figured out, a series of surprises, secrets, and a devastating tragedy sends her into a tailspin. In this wake of this tumult, a new man enters her life. Cora is once again thrown by the strength of her feelings, this time for Aaron, the enigmatic photographer who seems to understand her like no one else. With her whole heart at stake, Cora is pulled between two loves : one that’s comfortable and one that’s true.
Twenty years later, Cora is all grown up and has made it a point to avoid any serious relationships. Being alone can’t break your heart. But then an unexpected reconnection and a chance encounter put her right back where she started. The same two men the same agonizing decision. Finding herself in this position – again – will test everything Cora thought she knew about fate, love, and, most importantly, herself.”

Review : All the Men I’ve Loved Again is a well written read about the ups and downs of first love, particularly first love when one is so, so young and so, so naive about the world, like Cora, a first year college student (when we meet her). And while it was well written, I found it to be an incredibly slow read. I had a hard time connecting with the characters, perhaps because so much of the book is taken up by Cora’s relationship with Lincoln. There was a small attempt made at creating backstory and friendships with Cora’s roommates, but the vast majority of the plot is Cora’s relationship with Lincoln. And while you might think, based on the synopsis, that this story would bounce between Lincoln and Aaron…it really doesn’t. There are whole relationships formed, strange friendships made, hints dropped, and storylines that simply don’t play out, the synopsis tells us more about Cora’s background than the actual book does, and the time we spend between Cora and Aaron is minuscule. All the Men I’ve Loved Again feels disjointed and disconnected from the reader, but beyond that, by the time I’d finished I was left with the glaring question of whether this story needed to be told. And to answer that question, the best I can say is, I don’t think it did. It felt like a story that had nearly nowhere to go and I don’t feel like it ultimately ended up being worth my time. It was well written, I’ll say that. But it wasn’t something that kept me turning the pages.

Finally, if you choose to read All the Men I’ve Loved Again, know that there are mentions of abortion, miscarriage, stroke, hospitalization, loss of a parent, and cheating.

Book: Zom Rom Com
Author: Olivia Dade
Publisher: Berkley Romance
Year: 2025
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Synopsis : “When Edie Brandstrup attempts to save her seemingly harmless neighbor from the first major zombie breach in years, she’s stunned to be saved by him – and his ridiculously large sword – instead. As it turns out, Gaston “Max” Boucher is actually a super-old, super-surly vampire, and he’s unexpectedly protective.
The pair soon unravels a sinister conspiracy to set zombies loose on the world (again), and despite the awful timing, Edie finds herself falling for the vampire who’s helping her save humanity. As she and Max battle their foes side by side, Edie must decide whether having a love worth living for also meaning having a love you’d die for – and, in a world that grows deadlier by the minute, whether that’s a risk she’s willing to take.”

Review : Zom Rom Com is a surprise of a book, weighing in at just shy of 400 pages, with complex world-building and a cast of characters it’s hard not to love. As someone who isn’t the world’s biggest fan of zombie storylines, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this creative and exciting rom-com from Olivia Dade. In a world where humans, superhuman, and supernaturals coexist together, it’s perhaps not the biggest surprise that there might be zombies existing in this plane of existence, yet I found the concept of zombies to be funny and inventive within the world Dade’s created. Every aspect of this book could have taken a gristly or even bleak turn, but Dade managed to keep things light and fun all the way to the final page. The banter between Edie and her super hot vampire neighbor Max is enough to keep the pages turning, but the complex and well thought out plot behind a zombie outbreak, and even the reasoning behind why zombies exist in the first place, is really what kept me turning pages. There’s a good build up of will-they / won’t-they that lasts for at least the first 100 pages that adds to the building enjoyment, and while this is a romance novel, there’s an incredibly amount of plot creation and fantasy work involved in this novel, from start to finish. I did feel there were a few plot holes and inconsistencies, but nothing that detracted from how much I genuinely enjoyed this book. Without giving any spoilers away, the ending more than leaves room for at least one additional novel, though I suspect there could be more!

Before reading this book, if you choose, this novel discusses the loss of family members, romantic betrayal, and chronic illness. And – yay! – this book included plus-size inclusion!

Murder at Gulls Nest Review

Book: Murder at Gulls Nest
Author: Jess Kidd
Publisher: Atria books
Year: 2025
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Synopsis : “I believe every one of us at Gulls Nest is concealing some kind of secret.
1954: When letters from Frieda, her dependable former novice, stop arriving, Nora Been asks to be released from her vows. Haunted by a line in one of Frieda’s letters, Nora arrives at Gulls Nest, a boarding house filled with lively characters.
A seaside town, a place of fresh air and relaxed constraints, is the perfect place for a new start. Nora hides her identity and pries into the lives of her fellow guests. But when a series of bizarre murders rattles the occupants of Gulls Nest, it’s time to ask whether a dark past can ever really be left behind.”

Review : If ever there was a book (and book cover, for that matter) for me, Murder at Gulls Nest is it. As a lifetime lover of Agatha Christie and a familiar soul in the mystery section of the bookstore, Gulls Nest called to me immediately. It’s worth noting that this book is being marketed as the first in a series – I couldn’t be happier to hear it! And now that I’ve devoured this one, sadly, the wait begins for book two. Jess Kidd has crafted a perfectly cozy, wonderfully intriguing, and marvelously enjoyable whodunit, complete with an amateur sleuth hell bent on doing her own thing, potentially because she’s simply better at this than the actual detectives on the case; a small town filled with interesting characters and all manner of crime; and the back-and-forth, will they / won’t they banter between our protagonist and the town’s slightly cinematic, slightly heroic, slightly overworked detective inspector. What isn’t there to love?

Nora Breen, formerly Sister Agnes, has left her post at the convent, released her vows, and joined the outside world as a middle aged woman with a head for solving puzzles and an interest in what life outside the habit and wimple might actually entail. Kidd has created such whit within Nora’s character, rounding her out and giving depth to someone we’ll spend an entire book alongside – it made for a truly enjoyable and unputdownable book. Nora, following in the footsteps of her friend and former novice, Frieda, is bound and determined to find out what’s going on. Similarly to Nora, Frieda has recently entered the outside world as someone other than a nun, however unlike Nora, Frieda did so for medical reasons. Being afflicted with some kind of heart and lung condition, Frieda was advised to take to the sea, for the brisk and salty air were a balm for her condition. Upon arriving at Gulls Nest, a boardinghouse complete with mysterious long-term boarders and rife with gossip, Frieda begins to fulfill the singular promise she made to Nora when she left : she wrote a letter a week to tell of her new adventure. When Frieda’s letters stop arriving, Nora knows something has gone terribly wrong. Despite her best efforts to convince her Mother Superior that Frieda would never simply break a promise and stop writing, the consensus (among nearly every person she encounters throughout the book) is that Frieda is out living her life, no need to worry. Nora disagrees, and being someone who sees connections where others might not, she knows she cannot sit back and allow her friend to be in potential danger. So she leaves.

** Spoilers Ahead **

It would be difficult to review this book without giving SOME spoilers away, but don’t fret! I promise I won’t tell you who did it, you’ll have to read it for yourself to find out.

Nora arrives at Gulls Nest, under the guise of a former nurse (which, in fact, she was), with a small stipend, a few hand-me-down dresses, and all the gumption in the world. She begins to casually insert herself into the lives of her fellow boarders at Gulls Nest, having rented the room that once belonged to her friend. She reveals her mission to the local detective inspector, one Inspector Rideout, and causes much damage to the police station by way of a thrown shoe – or two. Something I loved immediately about how Nora was written was that not only did we find her grappling with life in the outside world after several decades of life in a convent, we immediately get to know her as so much more than a former nun and nurse. From making friends with the gull who likes to hang out on her windowsill (who she affectionately names Father Patrick Conway, after the priest who saw her through her own novice), to mild harassment of the local police force, to completely ignoring Inspector Rideout’s assessment of her missing friend, to smoking cigarettes just to do it, to riding in fast cars because it was purported to be an enjoyable aspect of life, there is no shortage of facets to our lively protagonist; Nora is a force all her own.

Unlike Sherlock Holmes or even Hercule Poirot, Nora Breen is not indescribably smarter than the average reader – something I enjoy a great deal in a murder mystery. We are given the chance, as readers, to take in just as much information as our protagonist does, meaning we have every opportunity to solve this murder for ourselves. Or maybe I should say murders. Once Nora arrives at Gulls Nest, believing she’s there to solve the case of her missing friend, two more boarders end up dead, most certainly murdered. I was grateful to find that while I did, in fact, solve the murder a little more quickly than our Nora, I didn’t solve it right away or even without much reading. I made it through a good portion of the book before I came to any kind of conclusion, having jumped between several theories at different times and that feels like the making of a good, classic whodunit. We get to be the amateur detective here and that’s something I’ll always appreciate – no missing or hidden clues from the reader, no information we couldn’t possibly have known, just pure and simple, straightforward sleuthing for clues, compiling information, and attention to detail.

Kidd has done an excellent job with her first installment in the Nora Breen Investigation series and I look forward to additional mysteries to come! This is clearly not her first rodeo, having written several book prior to this. The layout flowed well, the pacing made sense, and though it was written in the present tense, which is not my favorite, though the fact that this post is written largely in the present tense is not lost on me, it read easily and without confusion. The fact that I didn’t solve the mystery right off the bat, that I became invested in the whole cast of characters, and that I was sad when it ended and I wasn’t able to order book two immediately all make this a great read in my humble opinion.

Advice : If you enjoy a good mystery, this is going to be a must read for you! This book is for anyone who enjoys Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, Sherlock Holmes, or any of the classics. You’re going to love it, I just know it.