Book Review: Lady Macbeth by Ava Reid
Lady Macbeth
Author: Ava Reid
Published: August 13, 2024
Hardback: 295 pages
Reviewed By: Kim
Kim’s Rating: 3 stars
Book Description:
The Lady knows the stories: how her eyes induce madness in men.
The Lady knows she will be wed to the Scottish brute, who does not leave his warrior ways behind when he comes to the marriage bed.
The Lady knows his hostile, suspicious court will be a game of strategy, requiring all of her wiles and hidden witchcraft to survive.
But the Lady does not know her husband has occult secrets of his own. She does not know that prophecy girds him like armor. She does not know that her magic is greater and more dangerous, and that it will threaten the order of the world.
She does not know this yet. But she will.
****Kim is guest reviewing today! She’s still around!!****
Kim’s Review:
Worst. Retelling. EVER.
You’d think by now I’d finally accept the old adage of “don’t judge a book by its cover” and quit buying books because they’re gorgeous. And it’s not like I even like retelling’s at all, especially retelling’s of my favorite stories. Macbeth is my favorite Shakespearean play. I did a monologue from it in one of my college drama classes and first fell in love back in 9th grade. Well, Reid ruined it. Murdered it. Mutilated it. And then didn’t even have the courtesy to go insane because of the guilt. Somehow, she managed to take a strong, independent, clever, ambitious, aspiring queen and turn her into an incompetent, petty victim who somehow fails at being a victim at all! The entire book was filled with feminist virtue signaling and man hating.
Lady Macbeth is only 17, forced into an arranged marriage with a man who is surprisingly gentle and patient with her, and while acting like she’s the smartest person in the room, manages to prove that she is in fact the dumbest person in the room. Then, a romance was added between the good lady and the king’s eldest son, in which she is reduced to a common YA stereotype. She is incapable of seeing the big picture and at her best is reactionary, always one step away from using her wits effectively. The one time she manages success is a simple and petty revenge story that just highlights her immaturity and short sightedness.
Reid managed to add some pretty cool fantasy elements to her story that lead me to wonder why she didn’t just write an original story that was “loosely inspired” by Macbeth and actually give us a good book. Nope. Instead, she reduced the complex and fascinating story of Macbeth to a yawning conflict between the genders with the woman showing herself to be a failure to herself and womankind at every turn. Lady Macbeth was a dynamic villainess whom you hated yet admired and obsessed over. This character was just a teenage eye roll.
Why then the three star review? Well, it kept me engaged and I even wrote a bunch of notes while reading it … so I’ll give it the extra star for at least being emotionally and intellectually stimulated, even it was was criticizing the whole time.
My conclusion is that Reid didn’t understand Macbeth to begin with and then went so far as to completely reduce one of the most famous Shakespearean characters to a weak and pedestrian cliche. And I’m still upset about it.
Purchase Links:
Amazon US
Amazon UK
Blog Tour: The Approval of Sheep by Karen Storey
Today I am taking part in the blog tour for The Approval of Sheep by Karen Storey! And if you are lucky enough to be in the UK, there is a giveaway going on!
Book Description:
Gordon Slee fears he was never meant to be born. Anxious since childhood after hearing he was an accident, the forty-two-year-old is still struggling to escape the shadow of his high-achieving family.
But a glimmer of hope is on the horizon – a huge promotion within his hotel group is up for grabs, and he is sure that his time has come to make a mark on the world.
However, within his own department, redundancies are afoot. He may lose his job before he gets the chance. Until he learns of a historic covenant that preserves the right for sheep to run through the company’s top London hotel. Could he convince his boss that he’s the man to save the hotel from catastrophe?
Up in Bryn Nefyn, North Wales, live the descendants of the covenant owner. The elderly sheep farmer and his aging hippy brother could use the money the hotel might offer. But along with their strong-willed American shepherdess, they laugh at Gordon’s attempts to negotiate a deal. Surely, they couldn’t use a covenant that’s been forgotten about for over a hundred years.
Or could they?
For lovers of upmarket commercial fiction with a touch of romance and comedy, The Approval of Sheep is an uplifting story about family and love, overcoming adversity and discovering our reason for our place in this world.
Buy Your Copy Here:
Amazon US
Amazon UK
About the Author:
Karen Storey is an award-winning fiction writer and has been featured on the acclaimed book podcast, The Bestseller Experiment. As well as a novelist, she is a prolific short story writer. Her stories have been published in various anthologies and placed in several international competitions. Her memoir pieces have also been published within the New York Times bestselling book series, Chicken Soup for the Soul.
Originally from New York City, Karen lives in Warwickshire, England and has written articles for American in Britain magazine. She lives with her husband, whose surname Storey was the perfect wedding gift. They share their home with a snarky cat who writes Karen’s monthly author newsletters and a crazy little Bichon Frise dog who barks at his own reflection. You can visit her website and subscribe to her newsletter at www.karenstoreyauthor.com
The Approval of Sheep is Karen’s first novel.
Contact Karen:
Instagram @karenstoreyauthor
Threads @karenstoreyauthor
X @StoreytellerK
Facebook Karen Storey
Blue Sky karenstoreyauthor
UK GIVEAWAY
Giveaway To Win a signed copy of The Approval of Sheep and a luxurious Welsh chocolate bar featuring a sheep by the award winning Welsh chocolatier, Sarah Bunton. (Open to UK Only)
Click here for the giveaway!
[Top]Audiobook Review: The Otherworld by Abbie Emmons
The Otherworld
Author: Abbie Emmons
Narrators:
Alex Picard
Edward Black
Eric Smies
Published: December 5, 2023
Audiobook: 13 hours 49 minutes
Reviewed By: Jessica
Dates Listened To: August 18-25, 2025
Jessica’s Rating: 2.5 stars
Book Description:
Orca Monroe wants only one thing for her eighteenth birthday: to experience the Otherworld—the mysterious “mainland” across the sea that her father has forbidden her from visiting.
Growing up in a lighthouse on a remote island, Orca has lived isolated from the world… until one day when she finds a cell phone washed up on the beach. Orca has her first conversation with Jack Stevenson, a young man whose older brother, Adam, has gone missing after crashing his seaplane off the coast. Orca becomes Jack’s lifeline and his reason to hope that Adam is still alive. While her father is away, she scours the island for the missing pilot—determined to help Jack find his brother and prove to her father that she’s strong enough to take on the world.
One stormy night, Orca finds Adam Stevenson collapsed on her doorstep. As she nurses him back to health, she finds herself spellbound by his inquiring mind and rugged good looks. Simultaneously, Adam is captivated by her wild beauty and pure heart. But with a ten-year age gap between them—and her father’s determination to keep Orca protected from outsiders—Adam knows they can never be together.
Resigned to give Orca up, Adam returns to the mainland—but Jack refuses to leave her trapped at the lighthouse. Blind to the fact that his brother is in love with her, Jack offers to show Orca the world she’s always dreamed of. But when she leaves her island for the first time, Orca begins to realize that the mainland may hold more dark secrets than she ever imagined… and the two brothers she helped bring back together may be the very people she tears apart.
Jessica’s Review:
**This review will have spoilers.**
The Otherworld is YA as the main character just turned 18, but deals with a love triangle with two brothers, one also 18 and the other being 28. I did not have a problem with the age difference between Orca and Adam, but her living on an island with just her father, she possesses an innocence and then her naiveté that made her come off younger. In some ways this novel reminded me of Disney’s The Little Mermaid with Ariel and Eric, but no villain.
I liked Adam, of the two brothers, he was the better choice. Some of that comes with age, which Adam has 10 years over his brother. Jack definitely acted like a much younger brother who still has a lot of maturing to do.
I did not agree with the ending. Despite being an adult, Orca needs more ‘growing up’ IE: She needs to actually experience more of the world and meeting more people before settling down with the first man she meets. She is thinking she is in love, when in essence it is just lust and her hormones starting for the first time. At times Adam tries to fight his feelings, but in the end, feelings win out over common sense. Jack is also a hormonal 18-year-old and it shows. He does have a bit of a redeeming arc towards the end.
I found the side story of Orca’s parents intriguing. It was a ‘side quest’ for Adam and Orca as she encounters ‘the otherworld’ for the first time. Orca’s mother was harsh. But being harsh was no reason to leave your infant daughter with just her father on an island with no one else. While in ‘the otherworld’ the listener gets to experience with Orca eating pizza and discovering a few other things. But for me, Orca needed to live and experience more of ‘the otherworld’.
Again, this is a YA novel and is for YA readers. I am far from the target audience and my opinion of this book shows that. This is a novel that just did not work for me.
All three narrators did a great job portraying Orca, Adam, and Jack. For me they captured the characters essence perfectly.
I read Emmons “Tessa and Weston books” (100 Days of Sunlight and Tessa and Weston: The Best Christmas Ever) several years ago and adored them. I remember Emmons saying on social media that she is working on another T&W book. I will need to re-read the other two again before reading that one once it is released.
Purchase Links:
Amazon US
Amazon UK