KJK Reads

Rating:  4 Stars Themes: Non-Fiction, Psychology, Parenting Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This is a great concise guide that provides parents with some important and reassuring information without overwhelming parents with jargon or references. 

Rating: 5 Stars Themes: Non-Fiction, Children, Grief, Parenting Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This is an amazing little book, it contains a lot of great ideas to help children work their way through their own grief and the adults around them understand how grief is affecting them. There is also a lot in the back of the book to help with the activities such as paper bag pinata and poetry scramble words which is a great help since it's easy for our minds to go blank when put on the spot.  Favourite Quote: "You may feel sad, lonely, hurt, angry, worried, happy, or upset. All of those emotions are part of grief, and all of them are welcome. There is no right or wrong way to grieve, and you will experience your own unique grief journey."

Rating: 4 Stars Themes: Non-Fiction, Manga, LGBTQ+ Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This is a great small book to help teens get their heads around the idea of coming out to those around them. It is handled in a great way being able to stay lighthearted while giving the gravity necessary when necessary.  Favourite Quote: "There are people who came before us who never got to know that. Never got to be who they are. I feel like I owe it to them to live as I am, you know? To honour their lies by really living mine."

Rating: 5 Stars Themes: Fiction, History, Children's  Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. I loved this book. The concept of having a spirit of justice supporting black people through their struggles throughout history. The book goes right from the beginnings of history to the more recent Black Lives Matter protests in a sensitive but important way.  Favourite Quote: "I am here. Even in the midst of horrifying brutality. Reminding the world that my loved ones still matter."

Rating: 5 Stars Themes: Parenting, Non-Fiction, Children, Self-Help Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This is an amazing little resource for anyone who spends a significant amount of time with children. The beginning discusses general emotions and the importance of developing children’s understanding od their emotions and how to handle them. The following chapters look into specific important emotions for children such as happiness and bravery. Overall the book provides many different exercises to do with your child for the different emotions and when identifying emotions and it is definitely something will be referring to again in the future.  Favourite Quote: "Sometimes it can be hard to know exactly how you feel. You might be grumpy or feel worried but don’t know why, and that can be confusing. Talking about feelings makes them easier to understand."

Rating: 3 Stars Themes: Non-Fiction, Exercise Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This is a brief and concise guide to Nauli and abdominal muscle strength. As a disabled individual who often has to follow adapted exercises/routines I appreciated the modified and lead up exercises since it means I can join in too. I also liked the technique tips alongside the regimes since it can often be difficult to get technique correct from text instructions alone and the accompanying video links were great. I also thought the attention notes at the end were a great touch. 

Rating: 3 Stars Themes: Children's Fiction, Educational, Psychology Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This is a great book to teach children a new relaxation technique that they can use, or as Molly calls it put in their relaxing toolbox. Molly and Omari teaching their school friends how to do deep breathing had a real and cute feel. I liked the quotes sprinkled throughout, giving it a fun element that many children’s books don’t have and the last one was a really cute way to end their story. I also loved the presence of Chapter 10 for new readers.  Favourite Quote: "No one even knew what she was doing. Something about that felt very powerful. She was taking care of herself"

Rating: 4 Stars Themes: Children's Fiction, Self-Help Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This is my second Licate book and she really seems to know her stuff. This book is a great way to encourage organisation and personal responsibility to your kids without seemingly blaming them for failing to stay organised. The dedicated homework corner, timesheet and colour coded stationary are great ideas (and I myself used colour coded stuff right the way through to university). I also appreciate the way that different races were portrayed in the illustrations although to be really inclusive there could have been a disabled individual or two.  Favourite Quote: "I’ve taken a lot of small steps the past few weeks, and I'm seeing big changes."

Rating: 4 Stars Themes: Fiction, Education, Children's, Ojibwe Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This was a really educational book that I enjoyed learning from even as an adult. I liked the pronunciations and translations throughout the book and thought the icon to hear the words being spoken was a great touch. It was also great to have 2 pages a the end with other words not yet covered in the book to further my learning. Overall, I loved the concept of explaining the cultural importance and reasons behind the dream catcher to the Ojibwe people but also included a how to make one at the end which to me felt like we could be included in dream catchers now that we know the importance without seeming like we’re just appropriating another culture.  Favourite Quote: "It symbolises our spiritual connection with the Ojibwe people and all of our relatives, from now and in the past."

Rating: 4 Stars Themes: Family, Children's Fiction, Food, Inclusion Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. I thought this was a cute little book and a great way to show adaptability and inclusion to young children through something they likely think about a lot (at least the little children I know do), food. I also loved the fact Russell put in a recipe for Hana’s Kimchi Gumbo at the end so we can try it if we wish and it may also help the young readers to try something new. Favourite Quote: "I have one big, happy family with two different cultures from two different parts of the world … and love is the ingredients that brings us all together."

Rating: 5 Stars Themes: Children's, Fiction, Morale Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This is an amazing book to read to young children. It seems at first to be a sweet story about finding and rebuilding home. However, taking a more indepth look at the story, it can be used to help young children understand migration, especially immigration in a way they can understand and develop compassion and empathy for those who may have joined their classrooms after the start of the recent wars. Favourite Quote: "On the way, Flora discovered they were not alone. There were those who had journeys of their own to make and those who had stories of their own to tell. Then there were those who couldn’t understand at all."

Rating: 4 Stars Themes: Non-Fiction, Childrens, Medical Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. This is a great book and I really wish it was around when I was younger. Scelfo is able to assess the situation from a child’s point of view such as shouting at a policeman and pressing on granddads chest. They are then able to explain it all in child appropriate language to help explain what actually went on and teach those we read it to not to get scared but to look at the steps. The more about CPR at the end is great to help reinforce the lessons taught throughout the story and help keep the steps to take in the children's minds at the end of the book.  Favourite Quote: "Now that we understand what is happening, when someone is doing CPR, we won’t get the heebie-jeebies next time."

Rating:  DNF Themes: Magical Realism, Tiem Travel, Romance Thoughts: I was struggling to get along with this book but pages 108-110 really sent me over the edge and made it a DNF for me. I don’t care what they called it back in 1951 or how acceptable they believed it was but Bertie raping Lettie to try and ‘fix’ her after all his behaviours to hurt her was a step too far for me. Especially after when it caused her to become pregnant and suddenly he could part with his nearly mistress and be better, that’a almost worse because Letty should have been enough for loyalty and respect on her own. Favourite Quote: "People spoke about war being a great leveller, but while serving in Italy, Bertie had been clear-eyed enough to see it wasn’t really; despite his inexperience, he was the one giving orders. Why? Because some distant relative had once pleased a royal and been given land and a title. It seemed a fatally foolish way to organise things."

Rating: 2 Stars Themes: Mystery, Thriller Thoughts: I’m so conflicted on this book, I was really enjoying the mystery and it kept me guessing almost right to the end (I saw the second twist coming a chapter or 2 early) and thought the story made sense. However, the last chapter really irritated me. I was happy for a less understood condition such as BPD being involved without it being used to explain the incident, especially since those with mental illnesses are  8.2% more likely to be the victims of violent crime and not more likely to commit it. So the last chapter making her randomly extremely violent especially with then ending it on a cliffhanger was lazy writing and also unnecessary.  Favourite Quote: "Everyone is faking it, all of them pretending to be something they’re not. The whole world is built on lies and deceit."

Rating: 3 Stars Themes: Non-Fiction, Self-Help, Psychology Thoughts: I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. I thought this was a great short and simple guide to the practice of manifesting. I wanted to look into manifesting to see if its something I would like to do myself and this was a helpful introduction with helpful mini exercises and affirmations sprinkled throughout the book. Some of the thinks I will use such as the journaling and meditations but some such as lucid dreaming I’m not so sure about. I also really liked the illustrations, especially making a whole child from 1 single line.