195 ratings | 23 reviews | avg rating:4.85

J.L.’s Year In Books

J.L.’s 2025 Year in Books

Take a look at J.L.’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.

Go to J.L.’s 2025 Year in Books

J.L. Pete’s Followers (5)

J.L.’s Bookshelves

to-read (30)
currently-reading (0)
read (205)
my-books (4)
reading (0)

J.L.’s Friends (9)

Brittany 'Olson' Prim

518 books | 114 friends

BaronVonPrim

179 books | 57 friends

Georgia Keilman

324 books | 8 friends

Danielle Scott-Ramirez

36 books | 2 friends

Dale Wilson

609 books | 800 friends

Cindy Lee

5 books | 22 friends

Gena Peterson

51 books | 59 friends

Dryden Peterson

1 book | 2 friends

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J.L. Pete

Goodreads Author

Born

in Phoenix, The United States

Website

http://jlpete.com/

Twitter

thenothinthatis

Genre

Romance, Humor and Comedy, Fantasy

Influences

Christopher Moore,Matt Haig, Emily Henry,T.J. Klune, Kevin Wilson, Ali ...more

Member Since

July 2016

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J.L. Pete writes poetry and fiction tangled in grief, ghosts, and the strange magic of surviving. Sometimes it’s a novel. Sometimes it’s a poem. Sometimes it's full-blown absurdity with Death Drives a Minivan.

Her work explores heartbreak, healing, and haunted emotional landscapes—with time travelers, Grim Reapers, and emotionally unavailable spirits making guest appearances.

She’s the author of Call It Magic, The Other Side of Nothing, Death Drives a Minivan, and the poetry collection Waiting for Gravity—a deeply personal book written through the voice of Olive, a fictional character first introduced in The Other Side of Nothing, now navigating real-feeling ghosts and grief.

When she’s not writing, she’s probably outside walking her anxious d ...more

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Combine Editions
J.L. Pete’s books

Average rating: 4.47 · 15 ratings · 4 reviews · 4 distinct works

	Call It Magic by J.L. Pete (Goodreads Author), Dustin Peterson (Goodreads Author) (Illustrator), Eliot Chavez (Editor) 4.13 avg rating — 8 ratings — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Death Drives A Minivan: A Love Story by J.L. Pete (Goodreads Author), Shannon Wheeler (Goodreads Author) (Illustrator), Chelsea Pullano (Editor) it was amazing 5.00 avg rating — 3 ratings — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Waiting for Gravity: poetry from the edge of the ledge it was amazing 5.00 avg rating — 2 ratings — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Other Side of Nothing 4.50 avg rating — 2 ratings — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

* Note: these are all the books on Goodreads for this author. To add more, click here.

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J.L.’s Recent Updates

J.L. Pete rated a book it was amazing Waiting for Gravity by J.L. Pete (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
May 14, 2025 01:02PM · like
J.L. Pete added a status update: Waiting for Gravity is officially out now! If you’re seeing a broken Amazon link here, don’t worry—the book is very real (and very haunted). 🖤 You can find it here: https://a.co/d/9NGGtTV For the haunted, the healing, and the halfway-there.
May 14, 2025 12:59PM · like · see status
J.L. Pete rated a book it was amazing Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma by Peter A. Levine	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
May 14, 2025 12:58PM · like · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of Waking the Tiger by Peter A. Levine. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — Waking the Tiger by Peter A. Levine <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
J.L. Pete finished reading A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
May 14, 2025 12:56PM · like · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
J.L. Pete joined the group Goodreads Librarians Group
May 14, 2025 12:52PM · like
J.L. Pete rated a book it was amazing The Other Side of Nothing by J.L. Pete (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
May 05, 2025 01:13PM · like
J.L. Pete finished reading Waiting for Gravity by J.L. Pete (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
May 05, 2025 01:12PM · like
J.L. Pete finished reading The Woman in Cabin 10 (Lo Blacklock, #1) by Ruth Ware (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Apr 22, 2025 08:19AM · like · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
J.L. Pete is currently reading The Woman in Cabin 10 (Lo Blacklock, #1) by Ruth Ware (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Oct 01, 2024 10:58AM · like · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
J.L. Pete rated a book it was amazing The Expectation Effect: How Your Mindset Can Change Your World by David Robson (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Oct 01, 2024 10:58AM · like · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of The Expectation Effect by David Robson. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — The Expectation Effect by David Robson <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">

More of J.L.'s books…

J.L.’s Quotes

“I do not believe that all books will or should migrate onto screens: as Douglas Adams once pointed out to me, more than 20 years before the Kindle showed up, a physical book is like a shark. Sharks are old: there were sharks in the ocean before the dinosaurs. And the reason there are still sharks around is that sharks are better at being sharks than anything else is. Physical books are tough, hard to destroy, bath-resistant, solar-operated, feel good in your hand: they are good at being books, and there wil always be a place for them.”
― Neil Gaiman

tags: books, e-readers, sharks, technology

41 likes

“Falling in love for the first time is a completely transcendent experience. It’s like eating pizza-flavored ice cream. Your brain can’t even process that level of joy. Love makes people do crazy things like kill other people or shop at Crate & Barrel. I think on some level it makes us all delusional. Deep down, our whole lives, no matter how low our self-esteem gets, we think, I have a special skill that no one knows about and if they knew they’d be amazed. And then eventually we meet someone who says, “You have a secret special skill.” And you’re like, “I know! So do you!” And they’re like, “I know!” And then you’re like, “We should eat pizza ice cream together.” And that’s what love is. It’s this giant mound of pizza-flavored ice cream and delusion”
― Mike Birbiglia

tags: friendship, ice-cream, love, pizza

30 likes

“If someone’s opinion of you goes from sky-high to rock bottom, this isn’t normal.”
― Jackson MacKenzie, Psychopath Free: Recovering from Emotionally Abusive Relationships With Narcissists, Sociopaths, and Other Toxic People

22 likes

“You cannot circle around the pain and discover the happiness you deserve. You must travel through the pain and embrace all of the challenging feelings and difficult ups and downs that are the essence of the grieving process. For a long time, it may seem as if you will always be hurting . . . until one day you will find that you turned a corner and found a lovely new world you never could have imagined.”
― Jackson MacKenzie, Psychopath Free: Recovering from Emotionally Abusive Relationships With Narcissists, Sociopaths, and Other Toxic People

16 likes

“Man is the most insane species. He worships an invisible God and destroys a visible Nature. Unaware that this Nature he’s destroying is this God he’s worshiping.”
― Hubert Reeves

tags: god, human, nature, worship

428 likes

More of J.L.’s quotes…

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J.L.’s Groups

¡ POETRY ! — 22566 members — last activity Jan 26, 2026 02:43PM
No pretensions: just poetry. Stop by, recommend books, offer up poems (excerpted), tempt us, taunt us, tell us what to read and where to go (to read No pretensions: just poetry. Stop by, recommend books, offer up poems (excerpted), tempt us, taunt us, tell us what to read and where to go (to read it!) Goodreads honors wordsmiths: poets and poetry promoted and prompted here. ~~~ "Poetry is the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits." -- Carl Sandburg “God has a brown voice, as soft and full as beer.” —Anne Sexton On Clouds – “…what primitive tastes the ancients must have had if their poets were inspired by those absurd, untidy clumps of mist, idiotically jostling one another about…” —Yevgeny Zamyatin “If the poet wants to be a poet, the poet must force the poet to revise. If the poet doesn’t wish to revise, let the poet abandon poetry and take up stamp-collecting or real estate.” —Donald Hall “Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild, Creation’s tears in shoulder blades.” —Boris Pasternak “Wanted: a needle swift enough to sew this poem into a blanket.” —Charles Simic “Language is a cracked kettle on which we beat out tunes for bears to dance to, while all the time we long to move the stars to pity.” —Gustave Flaubert “Poetry is not an expression of the party line. It’s that time of night, lying in bed, thinking what you really think, making the private world public, that’s what the poet does.” —Allen Ginsberg. ~~~~~ Amy King, Moderator Amy King is the recipient of the 2015 Winner of the WNBA Award (Women’s National Book Association). Her latest collection, The Missing Museum, is a winner of the 2015 Tarpaulin Sky Book Prize. She serves on the executive board of VIDA: Women in Literary Arts and is co-editing with Heidi Lynn Staples the anthology, Big Energy Poets of the Anthropocene: When Ecopoets Think Climate Change. She is also co-editing the anthology, Bettering American Poetry 2015, and is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at SUNY Nassau Community College. ...more

Goodreads Librarians Group — 310761 members — last activity 4 minutes ago
Goodreads Librarians are volunteers who help ensure the accuracy of information about books and authors in the Goodreads' catalog. The Goodreads Libra ...more