Robot

Daryl M.

Librarian


Posts by Daryl M.

  • Astronomy professor, Emily Levesque and her first popular science book, The Last Stargazers

    Interview With an Author: Emily Levesque

    Emily Levesque is an astronomy professor at the University of Washington. She has observed for upward of fifty nights on many of the planet’s largest telescopes and flown over the Antarctic…

  • Author Victoria “V. E.” Schwab and her latest book, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

    Interview With an Author: V.E. Schwab

    Victoria “V. E.” Schwab is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of more than twenty books, including the acclaimed Shades of Magic series (A Darker Shade of Magic, A Gathering of Shadows, A…

  • Author Alex Pavesi and his first novel, The Eighth Detective

    Interview With an Author: Alex Pavesi

    Alex Pavesi is a former bookseller for Waterstones. He holds a Ph.D. in mathematics and is currently a software engineer for Microsoft in London. The Eighth Detective is his first novel and he…

  • Author David J. Skal and his latest book, Fright Favorites: 31 Movies to Haunt Your Halloween and Beyond

    Interview With an Author: David J. Skal

    David J. Skal is the author of numerous books, including Hollywood Gothic, The Monster Show, Screams of Reason and Something in the Blood. Skal lives in Glendale, CA. His latest book is Fright…

  • Author Lindsay Ellis and her debut novel, Axiom's End

    Interview With an Author: Lindsay Ellis

    Lindsay Ellis is an author, Hugo finalist, and video essayist who creates online content about media, narrative, and film theory. After earning her bachelor's in Cinema Studies from NYU's Tisch School…

  • Author Elsa Hart and her latest book, The Cabinets of Barnaby Mayne

    Interview With an Author: Elsa Hart

    Elsa Hart is the author of several acclaimed mystery novels set in eighteenth-century China, including City of Ink, one of Publishers Weekly’s Best Books of 2018. She was born in Rome, but her…


Reviews by Daryl M.

  • Cover image for The Picture Bride

    The Picture Bride

    The year is 1917 and a seventeen-year-old girl named Willow, who lives with her widowed mother and two younger brothers in a small, rural village in southeastern Korea, is asked by a traveling matchmaker if she wants to get married. The older woman shows Willow a photo of a young...
  • Cover image for Darling Girl: A Novel of Peter Pan

    Darling Girl: A Novel of Peter Pan

    • By: Michalski, Liz
    • Reviewed By: Daryl M.
    We all know the story of Peter Pan, the boy who refuses to grow up. J.M. Barrie wrote and published a play and two books about Peter and his adventures in the early 20th century, recounting how Peter visited the Darling children: Wendy, John, and Michael, and spirited them away...
  • Cover image for Acts of Violet

    Acts of Violet

    • By: Montimore, Margarita
    • Reviewed By: Daryl M.
    In early 2020, Margarita Montimore published her debut novel, Oona Out of Order. It followed a woman who awakes every January 1st at a different point in her life. She lives in that year, and in that body, until December 31st, only to awaken the following morning beginning a different...
  • Cover image for Hawk Mountain

    Hawk Mountain

    • By: Habib, Conner
    • Reviewed By: Daryl M.
    In the late afternoon, Todd sits on the beach watching 6-year-old Anthony, his son, play in the surf. A man approaches Todd, and, after a minute, he recognizes him. It is Jack, who bullied Todd relentlessly during their senior year in high school. In spite of their shared history, Jack...
  • Cover image for The Kaiju Preservation Society

    The Kaiju Preservation Society

    • By: Scalzi, John
    • Reviewed By: Daryl M.
    In early March of 2020, Jamie Gray is unceremoniously demoted from marketing executive to “deliverator” at füdmüd, an internet startup company in New York City. As the COVID pandemic worsens, Jamie struggles to get by until a chance delivery happens to be to Tom Stevens. Tom tells Jamie that he...
  • Cover image for A Prayer for the Crown-Shy

    A Prayer for the Crown-Shy

    • By: Chambers, Becky
    • Reviewed By: Daryl M.
    In 2021, Becky Chambers introduced readers to the moon of Panga, where, centuries ago, the civilization’s robots gained consciousness and, en masse, walked off into the surrounding wilderness and were never heard from again. Until the day a robot named Splendid Speckled Mosscap walked up to Sibling Dex, a tea...
  • Cover image for Remarkably Bright Creatures

    Remarkably Bright Creatures

    • By: Van Pelt, Shelby
    • Reviewed By: Daryl M.
    After her husband’s death, Tova Sullivan took a job cleaning the Sowell Bay Aquarium. She works evenings after the aquarium has closed to the public, mopping the floors, clearing the trash cans, and cleaning the glass walls of the exhibition tanks until they shine. As she works her way around...
  • Cover image for The Children on the Hill

    The Children on the Hill

    • By: McMahon, Jennifer
    • Reviewed By: Daryl M.
    Monster. The word brings to mind ugly, misshapen creatures wreaking havoc wherever they go. Perhaps the most famous monster is Frankenstein’s monster from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. It’s been over 200 years since the teenaged Shelley created one of the most enduring tales of all time. And over the last two...
  • Cover image for Siren Queen

    Siren Queen

    On a whim, a young Chinese-American girl pays with an inch of her hair so that she and he sister can see Romeo and Juliet at the new nickelodeon in their neighborhood. From that moment on, she has a single desire: to be a motion picture star. Not simply an...
  • Cover image for Never Been Kissed

    Never Been Kissed

    • By: Janovsky, Timothy
    • Reviewed By: Daryl M.
    As Wren Roland celebrates his 22nd birthday with his best friends and roommates, Mateo and Avery, he begins to lament the fact that he has never been kissed. He’s been close, but has yet to experience what his degree in film studies has convinced him will be a life-altering and...