A SPOONFUL OF 'TISM by Theresa Scovil 

     This book is year two of the Autie-Biographical comic collection. It was another fun, relatable, and educational set of comics. I really enjoyed it as I hadn’t seen them all on social media, so it was good to catch the ones I'd previously missed. I already have the year three collection and have year four on my to-buy list.

LIGHT YEARS FROM HOME (audiobook) by Mike Chen and Narrated by Emily Woo Zeller

     This is the first audiobook I have listened to in years, and at first I wasn't sure if I could get back into listening to them, but this story kept me engaged between the storyline by Mike Chen and the narration by Emily Woo Zeller. Light Years from Home is a story about a family who is dealing with the aftermath of one of their members having been abducted by aliens, and how life moves on regardless of what happened. One sibling is missing. One sibling believes her twin brother just took off and is backpacking somewhere while she is trying to take care of their mother with dementia. One sibling believes her brother was abducted by aliens and she is trying to continue the research her father started before he drowned in a lake. There is a lot of animosity between the siblings even though it seems they were much closer at one time. Light Years from Home brings them back together to work out their issues and find out what really happened to Jacob 15 years ago. 
     I really enjoyed this story and give praise to the author for showing growth in all the characters while keeping their distinct personalities. My only issue with the story was Jacob's knowledge of our current technology and social media when he had been missing for 15 years. Sure, he'd been on Earth at various times over that period, but only for a day at most. That just pulled me out of the story a bit, but otherwise, it's a fabulous read/listen!
     I also want to mention since I'm reading books for Pride this month, that one of the characters is hinted at not being straight throughout the story and especially at the end, but the focus of the book is never on that. She is too focused on her brother and what happened to him for most of the book until she is able to move on at the end and think about other things in her life.

THE STARS TOO FONDLY by Emily Hamilton 

   This is an original sci-fi/space opera with a cast of characters that remind me of my oldest child and their group of friends. It starts with a group of four young adults breaking into the headquarters and ship of a failed space mission that was supposed to take the 200+ crew to a planet in another galaxy. Everyone knew about the failed mission and the disappearance of the crew, but no one knows what happened to them. Cleo and her friends are about to find out as the ship suddenly powers up on its own and rockets them into space for an unknown mission. There is a dark matter entity, multiple dimensions, hologram love, an evil scientist who transcended his own world, and friends and family that help each other survive it all.

TO THE MOON by Edie Monte

When Edie first posted about this book, I was immediately intrigued. I enjoy sci-fi, shifters, and mpreg, but rarely see it all together. And Edie did it well! It may require some suspension of disbelief  when it comes to science and space, but the storyline made up for it. I really enjoyed the world building, especially the history of shifters and omegas. I'm not sure if Edie plans to write more in this world, but I would love to read more about the cougar shifters.

THE LUMINOUS DEAD by Caitlin Starling
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Although this book is considered a sci-fi horror, it was not exactly a horror in the way that I expected. The story is set on a faraway mining planet, and caver Gyre is anxious to take a new mission to earn money to find her mother who left when she was young. As she gets further into the mission, she learns that it is far from the usual mapping of mineral deposits that she expected. Her guide, Em, is not much older than herself, and has her skipping past all the usual significant discoveries for something beyond. 

I found this story to be good and it mostly kept my interest throughout, but I would have liked the fear of the Tunneler, a deadly creature that we don't meet until the end of the book, to be enhanced toward the beginning. As a reader, I knew it was nearby, but didn't understand the fear until the actual encounter. I also would have like to have seen the relationship between Gyre and Em develop a little deeper. I didn't understand Gyre's sudden feelings for Em. They seemed out of the blue. The first half of the story spent a lot of time on the specifics of cave diving. If this is your special interest, you will LOVE this book! To me, the horror came from Gyre being alone in the caves for so long and encountering dead bodies of previous divers along the way, that it drove her to madness. Also, the dangers of cave diving on its own. The ending was satisfying.

​COMPOUND FRACTURE by Andrew Joseph White

I can usually tell when an author who writes about a small town has never lived in a small town. I can also tell when an author has, and Andrew Joseph White obviously knows first-hand the nuances of living in a town very far removed from a big city. They're the same towns people avoid driving through and have horror stories written about. Compound Fracture isn't exactly a horror story, but a coming-of-age story about Miles who is just coming out as trans while also discovering he is autistic. It is also the story of friendship, hardship, class division, and revenge. This is not a sweet tale, but very gruesome and hard to read at times, but it is Miles' story that happened the summer before his senior year of high school.

The story is well-written, intense, emotional, shocking, realistic, and captivating to the very end. I never know what to expect from books by Andrew Joseph White, but I know it will be quite the ride. I already have his next book on my bookshelf.