Book Review: All the Ice Cream in the Land by Emmy Kastner

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All the Ice Cream in the Land  by Emmy Kastner  is about a princess, the kingdom she lives in, and her loyal subjects. Full of twists and turns, children will surely delight in this story about ice cream. When I saw the title and cover art of this kid's book, it made me instantly think of my childhood and how I would've loved a book like this one. A huge shout out and thank you to NetGalley and Simon and Schuster Children's Publishing for approving my request to read this book. I received a copy for free in exchange for my honest review. The storyline is very easy to follow, making it especially suitable for toddlers, preschoolers, and early readers, particularly children between the ages of two and six. Its straightforward narrative and clear structure make it an excellent choice for read-aloud sessions at home, bedtime stories, or classroom story time. While there is limited character development, which is typical for a picture book format, the princess is still an intere...
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Book Review: The Hunter (The Forbidden Game, #1) by L.J. Smith

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When Jenny Thorns original plan for her boyfriend Tom's birthday party had to change, she has to scramble to come up with something that will interest every one in their small group. Coming across a store called "More Games", she's not sure she'll be able to find something that will please the entire group. When the store clerk Julian suggests a game in a white, unmarked box, Jenny decides to buy it, and the entire group is in for a huge surprise.
See you at nine . . .
Not sure she heard Julian correctly, Jenny has second thoughts about the game once she gets home. However, she's overruled by the group. Part Jumanji and part Nightmare on Elm Street, the friends are in for the ride of a lifetime. 

I stumbled across The Hunter (The Forbidden Game, #1) by L.J. Smith while I was in high school. Ecstatic that one of my favorite authors had another book out, I immediately bought this book. I loved this book as a teenager and read this book and the other two books in the series multiple times. I was obsessed with it. However, sometime in college, the trilogy was boxed up and put in storage. In my mid-twenties, I moved into my first apartment and had the urge to read the trilogy again, especially the first book in the series. Unfortunately, I forgot what had happened to the books, and I tracked down copies and bought them again. Several years later, my parents found the box of books in storage, and I was reunited with the original books.

L.J. Smith is such a talented reader, that at almost forty years old, I still enjoy reading her books, especially The Forbidden Game trilogy. I recently picked up The Hunter (The Forbidden Game, #1) to reread, and I was not disappointed in the least. In my opinion, I think that tweens and teens today would enjoy it just as much as I did at their age as it has stood the test of time.
What I loved about this book is that it has a lot of the creepy and supernatural factor. It has scenes that remind me of the television shows The X-Files and Grimm. The X-Files was out on television, I believe, when this book was published, but Grimm definitely was not on television at the time. The characters are great too. We have pet loving, mothering Jenny Thorn; artistic Zach, who is cousins with Jenny; athletic, brave Dee; military brat Audrey; lovable, teddy bear Michael; sweet, rich Summer; and arrogant jock Tom.  That's the main characters other than Julian, who I totally had a book crush on when I was a teenager.
The reason I loved the character descriptions was I could clearly picture the way each of them looked in my mind. An example of this was that I had always pictured Zach looking a bit like a young Isaac Hanson from the music group Hanson. Please keep in mind that I originally read this book before the music group Hanson was famous, so I had no idea what he looked like. (And, no, I didn't listen to their music, lol.)
The Hunter (The Forbidden Game, #1) was written in a different era and is much different than YA Books are today, but I definitely think tweens and teens would appreciate it. If you're reading this book as an adult, you definitely need to read all three of the books in the trilogy to appreciate it all. I gave this book five out of five stars.


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