Archive for September 24, 2026

Miya’s Mooncakes By Crystal Z. Lee ~ My Review

Posted: September 24, 2026 in Children's books, reviews
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Book Details:

  Miya’s Mooncakes

By Crystal Z. Lee

Category: Children’s Fiction (Ages 3-7),  40 pages
Genre: Children’s Picture Book
Publisher: Balestier Press
​Publication Date: June, 2026.
Tour dates: Sep 8 to Sep 28
Content Rating: G

Book Description:

It’s almost time for Miya’s favorite holiday, the Mid-Autumn Festival. She loves all the holiday traditions: moon gazing, lighting lanterns, and best of all, baking and eating mooncakes! Miya notices that many in her town seem to have lost the holiday spirit lately, including those in her school and in her family. Miya has an idea to celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival in a more meaningful manner this year. It will involve some extra special mooncakes and the entire neighborhood. Can Miya pull it off in time for the festival?

​This is a story of ingenuity, empathy, creating new traditions while honoring old ones. It’s also an ode to neighbors, immigrants, and all those that make up a community!

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MY REVIEW
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I enjoy reading children’s books. They bring back memories of going to the library and bringing home as many books as I could carry. I’d spread them out on my bed, randomly grab one, and instantly be transported.
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Miya’s Mooncakes transported me.  The Mid-Autumn Festival was coming soon. Miya wants it to be special, to bring back the true meaning. It’s going to require something special… mooncakes, her secret weapon. And the neighborhood’s cooperation. She’s worried no one will come to her celebration.
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This story was a delight. There were some worries but that added to Miya’s ingenuity. And it was fun to learn about another tradition. My focus was engaged in another fun thing too. Finding the hidden cat that was included in the illustrations. Illustrations that drew my eye back again and again. So much to see, and feel.
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5 STARS
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Meet Author Crystal Z. Lee:

Crystal Z. Lee is a writer who divides her time between the U.S. and Asia. She is an avid traveler. Her favorite travel memories include island hopping in Italy, hiking the Ever White Mountain near the border of North Korea, sipping afternoon tea in Portuguese palaces and Irish castles, admiring Peranakan tiles in Singapore, sailing in the Aegean Sea, trekking on a biblical archaeological expedition in Türkiye, voyaging to UNESCO World Heritage Sites, and making mooncakes and pineapple cakes in Taiwan. Her stories are often inspired by her journeys. Besides children’s books, Crystal’s other published works consist of poetry and a novel. She is also the author of Pei’s Pineapple Cakes, Mei’s Mermaid Mission, Kai the Dancing Butterfly, A Unicorn Named Rin, and Love and Other Moods.

​connect with the author: website ~  instagram ~ goodreads

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Meet the Illustrator:

Allie Su grew up in Yunlin county, Taiwan. She often finds her illustration inspiration from the great outdoors. One of her favorite places to hike in Taiwan is Sun-Link-Sea Forest in Nantou. She adores Taiwanese cuisine and night market foods, such as stinky tofu, vegetarian noodles and taro pastries from Taichung. Allie also illustrated Mei’s Mermaid Mission and Kai the Dancing Butterfly.

 

 

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Peek Inside And Giveaway ~ Hidden Words By Christine Roy

Posted: September 24, 2026 in Excerpt, giveaways, Mystery
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Hidden Words

By Christine Roy

 

Publication date: September 22nd 2026
Genres: Adult, Gothic, Mystery

A Novel by Award-Winning Author Christine Roy

Some secrets don’t stay buried. They wait for the right mind to hear them.

In 1994, on the rocky shores of Cape Ann, Massachusetts, Ben Barrows begins his senior year at Masters’ Preparatory like a dead man walking, half his friendships already over, just not yet buried. Then Dana Kirkland arrives: a new student, a rival dancer to his powerful ex-girlfriend, and the one person who might save him. Together, Ben and Dana try to hold on to love against a tidal wave of pain and treachery neither of them saw coming.

In the present, Joey Barrows is drowning in grief. As he crosses the graduation stage, a terrifying gift awakens, the unspoken words of everyone around him, pouring uninvited into his mind. When Joey discovers his distant, unstable father shares this same curse, the door to a devastating past swings open, releasing secrets, obsession, and ghosts that refuse to stay silent.

Told across two timelines, Hidden Words is a gothic, speculative mystery about the inheritance of trauma — and the terrible cost of truths left unspoken.

Perfect for fans of We Were Liars, Black Swan, and The Turnout.

Hidden Words deals with mature themes including trauma, family abuse, and sensitive interpersonal relationships. Recommended for mature young adult and adult readers.

Goodreads / Amazon

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Enjoy this peek inside:

Raising his head, he approached the distinguished, black-gowned dean. The ringing in his ears pitched higher. With cold dread sluicing through his veins, he shook the dean’s hand. His mind crackling with a storm of energy, he looked the man straight in the eyes and took his diploma.

Guess scholarship kid didn’t waste our money.

“I’m sorry, Sir. What?” He squinted up at the unsmiling man. A distorted hum circled around him as the man’s words echoed in his head—clear, yet unspoken, not the shadowy wisps of noise he’d experienced before.

“Keep it moving, Barrows.”

“It’s just that I…” Joey stammered, his breath ragged. Shame bubbled up through the scars on his body like oil from the ground. He gaped at the dean’s stone face. “I heard you.” The words slipped from his lips.

“Christ, just move Barrows.”

I’ve had enough of your pathetic sad-boy act.

Joey nodded, stomach twisting. His thoughts raced and twisted in his head. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be. He wasn’t psychic; nobody was. Withering beneath the dean’s glare, he flicked his tassel to the left and stumbled to the end of the stage. Desperate, he scanned the crowd, fairytale hope rising in his mind.

Maybe he was there.

Not likely.

Ben Barrows worked and hid. A son’s graduation didn’t fall into either of those categories, especially since these were the halls of Ben’s past. Traces of that Ben, shining and connected, existed in pictures behind glass cases like an extinct museum specimen.

They looked so similar, with their dark hair, wide-set green eyes, and lanky frames.

But that Ben was a ghost.

 

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Hidden Words Blitz

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For a list of my reviews go HERE.

To see all of my giveaways go HERE.