Rosh's Reviews

AUTHOR: Kim Cho-yeop TRANSLATOR: Anton Hur GENRE: Short Story Collection PUBLICATION DATE: April 28, 2026 RATING: 4.45 stars. In a Nutshell: A literary collection of science-fiction short stories. Gripping and imaginative narratives. More focussed on characters and human emotions than on tech and futurism. An exceptional debut. Much recommended. Would work well even for those not keen on sci-fi. This debut collection of short stories supposedly created a huge stir when it was first published in S. Korea in 2019. We are lucky to finally have an English edition, and that too translated by the talented Anton Hur. His introductory note contains this memorable sentence; “Unlike American or British SF traditions, Korean science fiction isn't rooted in imperialist concerns like colonising outer space or managing interstellar empires.” I immediately knew this was my type of sci-fi. The book contains only seven stories, and each one is distinct from the rest. Some of the stories are inter-g...

AUTHOR: Joanne Joseph NARRATOR: Roshina Ratnam GENRE: Historical Fiction PUBLICATION DATE: September 1, 2021 RATING: 3.75 stars. In a Nutshell: A historical fiction novel focusing on Indian indentured labourers in Port Natal. Compelling lead character, interesting story, decent writing, great research. Does well to focus on a history not often told. A good debut novel. Recommended. Not for sensitive readers. Plot Preview: 1860. Fourteen-year-old Shanti lives with her parents in a small village near Madras Province in South India. When she is faced with the prospect of a forced arranged marriage, Shanti decides to contact the local agent who sends people to a better future in Port Natal by working on sugarcane farms. But once she arrives in Natal after a harrowing sea journey, she realises that the stories she had heard were nothing but myth. Now all that lies ahead for Shanti is hard labour at a pittance and no way of going back home. Can she somehow make her dreams come true in this u...

AUTHOR: Gennifer Choldenko NARRATOR: Javier Prusky GENRE: Middle-grade Fiction PUBLICATION DATE: June 11, 2024 RATING: 4 stars. In a Nutshell: A middle-grade contemporary fiction about a young boy doing his best and yet making mistakes. Excellent eponymous character, nice mix of secondary characters, interesting plot, bittersweet emotions, fab ending. Too many themes. Loads of discussion-worthy points. Definitely recommended to older middle-graders. Plot Preview: It's been more than a week since eleven-year-old Hank's mother has not come home. Hank tries his best to take care of his three-years-old sister Boo, but when the money and food runs out, he has no choice but to approach the stranger whom his mom listed as an emergency contact on his school picnic form. But such actions come with consequences, and Hank now has to deal with a new temporary home, a new school, and maybe even social workers who might separate him from Boo. He knows that if he wants to reunite with his mom...

AUTHOR: Guadalupe Nettel TRANSLATOR: Rosalind Harvey GENRE: Short Story Collection PUBLICATION DATE: September 6, 2023 RATING: 3.75 stars. A collection of eight literary short stories, dominated by accidental events that change their lead character’s fate. Good stories, interesting characters, impeccable translation. Stays true to the central theme. Some are realistic, some have an element of magical realism. I liked all the stories but some of them would have earned more stars if their endings had satisfied me better. These were my favourites earning 4+ stars: 🌷 Imprinting: A bittersweet story that doesn't answer much and yet leaves a solid impression. - ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 🌷 The Fellowship of Orphans: Takes the broken to recognise the broken, or does it? Yet another story I'd have loved to read a longer version of. - ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 🌷 The Pink Door: I absolutely didn't expect this story to go the way it did. Really clever and highly surprising. - ⭐⭐⭐⭐✨ 🌷 A Forest Under the Earth: The titl...

AUTHOR: Ezra Palmer NARRATOR: Marilyn Downey GENRE: Literary Fiction PUBLICATION DATE: July 13, 2026 RATING: 4.5 stars. In a Nutshell: A contemporary fiction novel that grew on me with every subsequent chapter. Interesting character and story development. Great depiction of Alzheimer’s. Stream of consciousness in approach, but used very well. Definitely recommended. Plot Preview: Evvie Hurtz remembers everything, especially when it comes to her husband Jack who has had multiple affairs and lied throughout their marriage. She wants him to move out. Evvie Hurtz has Alzheimers’. But she doesn’t remember this. The story comes to us in Evvie’s first-person perspective. As soon as you learn that a character has Alzheimer’s, you can expect certain traits in their behaviour, one of which is that their memory cannot be trusted. But when you don’t know that a character has Alzheimer’s and they claim that they remember everything, you will believe them. This is the inherent and fascinating contra...

AUTHOR: Denise Gallagher GENRE: Folktale Anthology PUBLICATION DATE: September 22, 2026 RATING: 4.5 stars. In a Nutshell: A compilation of folktales from around the world, all related to seasons and weather-related phenomena. Excellent stories with great diversity. Much recommended. This collection begins with an introduction talking about the art of oral storytelling and how it was used to pass down stories across generations and cultures. Next, it introduces the concept of ‘myth’ and its subtypes. The entire content is fascinating, though some of it might be a bit too complex for younger readers. We then have twenty-four stories, each a folktale connected to the changing seasons from around the world. The themes also include natural events such as storms, wildfires, and even solstices. The stories are taken from diverse indigenous cultures, so there is a good variety in the characters as well as the approach. Every tale highlights how imaginative our ancestors were about trying to fi...

AUTHOR: Máire Roche GENRE: Middle-Grade Fantasy PUBLICATION DATE: August 18, 2026 RATING: 2 stars. In a Nutshell: A middle-grade fantasy retelling Louisa May Alcott’s ‘Little Women’ in a modern-day setting and a supernatural twist. The concept had tremendous potential but the execution doesn’t deliver. Slow and repetitive. All the characters are from the classic, but to middle-graders unfamiliar with the story, this feature is useless. Just an average read for me. Plot Preview: Fourteen-year-old Meg March has been living in foster care with her sisters since a decade. As the eldest, she considers it her duty to protect her sisters and keep their dangerous secret: all four of them are monsters. Their latest foster parent Marmee seems sweet but Meg isn't sure if Marmee will continue to love them if their secret comes out. Things become worse when a beast is spotted in the forest outside their little town. Farmer Bhaer is sure the beast is responsible for his missing chickens. And Meg...

AUTHOR: Anthony Wacholtz ILLUSTRATOR: George Ermos GENRE: Middle-grade Horror Story Collection PUBLICATION DATE: January 1, 2027 RATING: 3.75 stars. In a Nutshell: A collection of seven horror stories aimed at middle-graders. Contains an eclectic set of scary stories and scary characters. No story offers closure, so the horror quotient stays high. A good Halloween read for the target age group. The title of this book might seem a bit in-your-face, but the book stays true to the promise. It contains seven stories, each of which has a heart-pounding situation and can be read in a few minutes flat. The stories cover a variety of horrifying situations and a variety of horrifying creatures as well. The pacing is quite fast, which makes some of the tales feel a bit rushed. The target audience is middle-graders who enjoy proper horror books such as Goosebumps. The central characters in each story are always middle-graders caught in a scary situation. Those who look for closure or relatively s...

AUTHOR: Gabrielle Meyer SERIES: Dollar Princess, #3.5 GENRE: Historical Romance PUBLICATION DATE: November 3, 2026 RATING: 4 stars. In a Nutshell: A historical romance novella retelling the classic Christmas musical ‘White Christmas’ in a Gilded Age setting. Nice, loveable characters and a heartwarming storyline. Straightforward and predictable, but it suits the genre. Christian fiction, though the religious content is quite diluted. Recommended. Part of the ‘Dollar Princess’ series but can be read as a standalone. Plot Preview: 1886. Ava Whitmore, a celebrated artist, is in London for her upcoming exhibition. But during her stay, she wishes to visit Waverly Hall, the estate her late grandmother grew up in. However, she discovers that the grandeur of Waverly Hall is much reduced because of the changing circumstances of its owners – the elderly Baron Waverly and his two sons Edward and Henry – and the tenant farmers. Determined to save the manor, Ava proposes a daring plan: to exhibit h...

AUTHOR: Stefanie Parks SERIES: Butterflies of Meadow Hill, #2 GENRE: Middle-grade Fantasy. PUBLICATION DATE: October 28, 2026 RATING: 4 stars. In a Nutshell: A middle-grade magical realism novel continuing the story of the magical butterflies at Meadow Hill Manor. Continues in plot and theme from Book One but goes much deeper thanks to the increased length. Good to see all key characters returning in expanded roles. Gets a little slow and repetitive in the first half but the second half is wonderful. Recommended. Better if read in series order. Plot Preview: Six months after the events of Book One, Amethyst has settled in at Meadow Hill Manor, the house that now feels like a haven. With her paternal Aunt Mina, her earlier governess Ingrid, her best friend Gillian, and all her butterflies, Amethyst has finally been able to move on from her sister’s death. However, when she gets a call from her parents that it’s time for her to return home, Amethyst is devastated. Determined to stay at t...

AUTHOR & NARRATOR: Julie T. Kinn GENRE: Contemporary Fiction PUBLICATION DATE: July 1, 2026 RATING: 4 stars. In a Nutshell: A contemporary fiction novel about a picky eater who still wants to embrace life. Character-driven and medium-paced. This didn’t go the way I expected, and in a very good way. The main character is amazing and not typical of picky leads. Loved the other characters and the story development as well. A debut worth reading. Plot Preview: Twenty-three-year-old Zillah lives with her mother, eats a diet of ten toddler-approved foods, and is in a relationship with a man-child. She wants to move out of her childhood home, but she first needs to prove to her mother that she can survive on her own. When Zillah secretly overhears her new neighbour’s therapy session, she decides to implement some of the suggestions for her own benefit. She starts questioning some of her life choices, and soon needs to decide how much she is willing to risk in order to embrace life better....

AUTHOR: Andrés J. Colmenares GENRE: Children's Graphic Novel PUBLICATION DATE: September 1, 2026 RATING: 4 stars. In a Nutshell: A graphical story collection featuring some familiar cosmic entities in not-so-familiar roles. Nice stories with excellent messages. Recommended for children. Andrés J. Colmenares is a Colombian illustrator popular for Wawawiwa comics featuring adorable anthropomorphised animals and natural objects. His comics are always suffused with warmth and heart, perfect to read on days we need to escape online hatred and poison. This book isn't a comic strip collection like his other works but a collection of three stories featuring the titular Earth and Moonie in the lead. Unlike what you would expect, Earth and Moonie are siblings in this interpretation, and the Sun is their Mom. 😄 The three stories are titled ‘I don’t like being small’, ‘I don’t like being bored’, and ‘I don’t like being sick’, which pretty much tells us their main theme. While all three ta...

AUTHOR: Sarah Anderson GENRE: Tough to say! PUBLICATION DATE: September 15, 2026 RATING: 2.7 stars. In a Nutshell: A somewhat-dark genre-defying fictional novel that combines satire, humour, and literary elements. An unusual plot with an interesting lead character. The first half is much stronger than the second half, which feels like a different story altogether. The ending left me dissatisfied. Regardless, it is an interesting read and I mostly had a good time with it. Not sure why it is labelled as horror and dystopian in some reviews; it is neither. Plot Preview: Natalie has a call centre job, student loans and an increasingly painful jaw. Also, Natalie has no dental insurance or ambitions or exceptional skills. So when she finds a flyer advertising a mysterious new position at “The Company”, she ends up hired as an in-house surrogate for their pilot project: offering surrogate parenting options for their top executives. The Company promotes it as an opportunity to help women seek ...

AUTHOR: Helen H. Wu GENRE: Children's Picture Book PUBLICATION DATE: February 8, 2026 RATING: 3 stars. A picture book about a parent’s love for their little one through all seasons. The first half of the book focusses on the capybara’s love for their child through all seasons. The second half offers motivational wisdom to the child across the challenges of life. The two halves aren’t really connected except by way of the common characters. The content is written in lyrical verses, with simple two-line couplets. The rhymes are in proper meter, though some of the lines felt a bit forced to me. The illustrations are digitally created. I am sure kids will enjoy looking at the colourful graphics and the cute little capybara’s antics. The book serves its purpose, but other than the capybara, I cannot think of anything that makes it stand apart from other books in the same category. The dual approach also splits the core content between parental love and parental motivation, which somewha...

AUTHOR: Clara van Houten GENRE: Psychological Drama PUBLICATION DATE: October 6, 2026 RATING: 3.75 stars. In a Nutshell: A psychological drama about a writer caught in a trap of her own making. Innovative premise, interesting execution. The kind of book where you want the protagonist to win even as you want to shake some sense into her. The last quarter is a bit weak and has a couple of logical loopholes, but on the whole, this is a good indie read. Definitely recommended. Be prepared to suspend disbelief as it goes quite extreme in certain developments. Plot Preview: 1997. London. Aspiring novelist Debra Cowdrey is tired of getting rejection after rejection for her manuscript. So when her best friend jokingly suggests that she submit it under a male pen name, Debra does so. To her surprise, her manuscript immediately gets picked up by an agent. Thus begins a series of deceptive actions, which soon spirals out of Debra’s control as the publishing world and the public clamour to know wh...

EDITOR: James Owen GENRE: Trivia PUBLICATION DATE: January 26, 2027 RATING: 3.5 stars. In a Nutshell: A book that does exactly what is promised by the title and the cover. The book begins with an interesting introductory note, highlighting the significance of history but not as taught in textbooks. Keeping this intent in mind, the content of the book serves as an insight into some known and not-so-known historical occurrences, providing an impetus to begin googling more about the included trivia. As declared on the cover, the book contains “facts and trivia for every day of the year”. Organised in chronological order of dates and secondary-sorted by years, each date entry contains between 4-10 facts/trivia about key events that took place on that date in various years. These could be something straightforward such as births, deaths, ascensions, wars, and natural disasters, or something more unusual or revolutionary such as gamechanger poll results, noteworthy thefts, first-ever inventi...

AUTHOR: A.M. Kvita SERIES: Green Witch Cycle #2 GENRE: Urban Fantasy PUBLICATION DATE: October 27, 2026 RATING: 4.25 stars. In a Nutshell: A contemporary urban (not cozy!) fantasy featuring witches and vampires and gods and more. The second book in the Green Witch Cycle series and a wonderful sequel in every way. Delivers even better than the first in terms of plot, characters, humour, thrills, and ending. The romance wasn’t my cup of tea (as always), but it will click better with those who enjoy love stories of yearning. Definitely recommended. Must be read in series order. Plot Preview: ( Contains a couple of very minor spoilers from Book One. ) After all that happened in New York, Joan has settled into her job away from her family – the powerful Greenwoods who govern over the NY witches. Things are going decently except for her one-sided crush on Astoria Wardwell, the heir of the California witches who refused her two years ago. Then out of nowhere, Joan’s best friend CZ becomes pos...