Who’s this Carl?

One random day – I’ll say it was a Tuesday because this sort of thing would absolutely happen on a Tuesday – aliens attacked Earth. Every single person who was inside a building or structure died. Every single person who wasn’t in a building or structure lived. The people who lived were forced underground to participate in a game show that’s televised across our galaxy and beyond. Carl, fortunately or unfortunately, was outside that Tuesday along with his ex-girlfriend’s cat, Princess Donut. And there Carl and Donut’s adventure begins, as contestants on this twisted and deadly game show.

Welcome, Crawler. Welcome to the Dungeon. Survival is optional. Keeping the viewers entertained is not.

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Lovers Are Loving It

At some point last year, Syd started reading the Dungeon Crawler Carl series. She raved about them and devoured the first five books in one year. She loves this series hard. Now, something I know about Syd is she’s a gamer. That’s why, as fun as she made it sound, I knew from the first book that I wasn’t the target audience, as a gamer, I am not. Then she’d go on about Princess Donut the Queen Anne Chonk. I’m thinking – there’s a sentient cat with sass. Maybe I can suffer through all the fantasy RPG mumbo jumbo just for the cat. I mean, a talking cat. Say less.

By the end of 2025 Carl and Donut were everywhere. I decided around Christmas to use an Audible credit. It was done. Carl and Donut advanced from the It Sounds Kinda Good holding pen to a spot on my actual TBR. They’re in good company.

Haters Gonna Hate

It was some time after I used my precious Audible credit, that Emily read DCC. Everyone was telling Emily that she HAD to read this book. Two things I know about Emily, she loves fantasy and is not a gamer. I wasn’t sure how she’d react. Emily was torn. She enjoyed it, but there were a couple of scenes she had a problem with. Specifically, how some of the female characters were described. Emily is pretty sensitive to misogyny when she sees it. I am not so much. She did make some good points and put up some excerpts. Not a good look.

Then Elizabeth entered the chat. Elizabeth is known for her detailed reading vlogs. It was at this point that I decided I needed to listen to Carl myself and then hear what Elizabeth had to say. It was the push I needed to pick it up now rather than later. I’m not going to go into detail about what the specific problems were. (I’m putting the link below.) Bottomline, both Elizabeth and Emily had the same problem, Elizabeth more so. They didn’t care for Dungeon Crawler Carl, and even Princess Donut couldn’t save him.

So, Do I Wanna Play?

In my old age I’ve come to realize that I have very little interest in action scenes. It doesn’t matter if it is on TV or in a book. When people start running around hitting and shooting each other, I completely detach from what’s going on. So, when Elizabeth broke down what she had a problem with, I realized it all happened during one of the action scenes. I had tuned it out. I didn’t even hear the horrible part. It was just blah blah blah to me. Seriously, I knew the scene she was talking about, but I completely missed the details. She’s right it was horrible. It was just buried under all the action and I completely missed it.

And that’s where I come down – I just didn’t care. I knew I wasn’t the target audience. I knew the RPG part was going to go over my head, which it absolutely did. Carl wasn’t an interesting enough character to make me care. What I did like, tho, was the audio production. Much has been said about the performance Jeff Hays gives and they are 100% correct. The audiobook deserves all the praise, but even with all that razzle dazzle I still don’t care enough to continue. I also get it. I get why people love it. It is escapist fun, if you shove aside the objectionable bits. It is a world people can get lost in.

The best part of the story is that this is another one of those self-published turned mega sellers. You gotta love it when a regular Joe hits the jackpot. Good for you, Matt. He also happens to be a local boy. Shout out Gig Harbor!

Join Me on a Little Side Quest

I’m including all the covers because I love the art design for the series. I wanted to love these books just so I could buy them. I desperately want them on my shelves. In writing this I found out it was Will Staehle who did them. Boom!!! That was my mind being blown. I had no idea who Will Staehle was. Apparently, I’ve unknowingly been in love with him for years. His designs are all over my shelves!

I’m including a link to his Covers page.

Will Staehle Book Covers

I’m also going to put his “out-take” of Fairy Tale. I liked Fairy Tale, but if this was its cover it would absolutely be on my shelf.

Then I saw that Penguin Random House is putting out a delux edition in November. OMG! It is gorgeous. Victo Ngai designed it. She did a stunning job. How fun is this? I’m putting a link to her page, too.

Victo Ngai

I also wanted to do this because it was an excuse to link a couple of my favorite BookTubers. I love Syd’s vlogs and getting to keep up with her life and family along with all the book talk. Elizabeth does these epic deep dives, which is just insane. I totally love them, and I love that she’s found her people. >me😊They both continue to inspire me.

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Nonfiction

America, USA by Eddie Glaude Jr

Professor Glaude takes a look at how the US has celebrated its birthday throughout our 250-year history. Honestly, I listened to it super-fast to get in in by the Fourth of July. I think I finished it that day. I need to reread it and take it in properly. I am consistently impressed with Professor Glaude’s mastery of US history, and it is on full display here. It did lead me to find a book about the history of the FBI, which I found and now have checked out. It is Enemies by Tim Weiner.

London Falling by Patrick Radden Keefe

This time Radden Keefe takes a look at the mystery surrounding the death of a 19-year-old young man. It is a wild series of events and cast of characters. This is my first book from him. I’ve wanted to read Empire of Pain for ages, and I kept seeing Say Nothing on everyone’s favorites lists. I put them both on hold. I got Say Nothing first. I think my main takeaway is that Radden Keefe is an excellent writer. I’m excited to read more from him.

The Finest Hotel in Kabul by Lyse Doucet

The Finest Hotel in Kabul won the Women’s Prize for Nonfiction this year. This book takes a look at the history of Afghanistan from the vantage point of the Hotel Inter-Continental Kabul starting from its opening in 1969. I learned SO much from this book. It was a great primer for Afghanistan history. I could have done with less of the hotel stuff, but the general history was presented in an easily digestible way. I am so happy I read it. Oddly enough, shortly after finishing Doucet’s book I came across Svetlana Aleksievich’s Boys in Zinc (or Zinky Boys), which looks at the Soviet-Afghan war from the Russian perspective. I have a couple of her other books and really need to read them. I’ve wanted to for so long. I also have My Dear Kabul which is a collection of writings from women in Kabul since the American evacuation in 2021. I fear it is going to be too upsetting, but I do want to read it.

Didn’t Love it to Death

Aurora by David Koepp

This one I found through scrolling BookOutlet. I was intrigued by the premise and that it was written by screenwriter David Koepp. Koepp has adapted many books to the screen, most notably Jurassic Park. His original story was about what happens when something like a powerful sun flare wipes out the earth’s ability to produce electricity. (Yes, the people with solar panels were spared.) It follows this family as they acclimate themselves to this post-apocalyptic USA. It was fine. I finished it. I’m glad I got it from Libby.

Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman

I’ve been debating whether or not to write a post about this. Only because my BookTube world had such strong opinions about it. I wanted to see what I thought … honestly, not much. I now know for sure that this isn’t my jam.

Last One Out by Jane Harper

This is the latest book by Jane Harper. I really like Harper but was disappointed in this one. I was looking forward to it, too. In this outing she follows a woman, Ro, who returns to Carralon Ridge for her son’s birthday and the five-year anniversary of the day he went missing. She retraces her son’s final known steps, trying one last time to find him or some closure. Again, it was fine. I just know she can do so much better.

The Ending Writes Itself by Evelyn Clarke

I went into this one not expecting a whole lot and got basically that. Evelyn Clarke is actually two writers, the prolific VE Schwab and her good friend and screenwriter Cat Clarke. I’ve read only one of Schwab’s books The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. Usually Schwab writes fantasy, which I’m not super into. This joint venture is a murder mystery in the vein of And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. A handful of writers are invited to a Scottish island and home of a famous writer to compete for the opportunity to take over his book series. This book kept me thinking of Yellowface by RF Kuang, in that it had a lot to say about writers and the book industry. Honestly, tho, I think one of my faves, Anthony Horowitz, does the meta look at writers wrapped in a mystery so much better with his Susan Ryland trilogy (Magpie Murders, etc.).

I May Have Cried

One Yellow Eye by Leigh Radford

This was one I hadn’t heard of until Fern @cozyplantlady11 read it. It sounded so good, and it was. This is a zombie story with a twist. The story takes place in London as it is recovering from a zombie outbreak. It appears to have been handled by the systematic killing of every last zombie. Only our main character, a scientist, has one locked in a room in her flat. It happens to be her husband. She isn’t ready to accept the fact that she can’t find a cure and a way to get her husband back. This was such an interesting way to explore grief and loss. I thought it was really powerful … and might have cried.

Sublimation by Isabel J Kim

I had been waiting months to get my hands on this one. The idea sounded so cool. Isabel Kim creates an alternate world, a very complicated one, where when people emigrate, they have the option to leave an alternate version of themselves in their original country. This was a lot to take in, as she explores what leaving your country and life behind means and how in this version you might get the best of both worlds. I liked it a lot, but honestly not as much as I had expected to. Like The Radiant Dark by Alexandra Oliva, I had my expectations a bit too high.

Held by Anne Michaels

I got Held because it was one of the shortlisted books for the Booker Prize in 2024. I’ve now read four of the six shortlisted books of that year. This was an interesting book, which really felt more like a string of short stories. There were some I really liked, like the first one about a soldier who lays in a field in 1917 while his mind drifts and is carried away to reunite him with his love. It was beautiful. I just didn’t connect with everywhere Michaels went. I’m glad I read it, tho.

Land by Maggie O’Farrell

I got Land! Have I read Hamnet? Nope. Honestly, I’m afraid to. But I did read The Marriage Portrait and really liked it. It was so different. I have been super excited to get Land, and if you read my Books of 2026 post, I will say that I did get it on July 17^th and was the last book I read that month. So … I thought this book was going to be about a father and son mapping the country of Ireland in the 1800s. It ended up being a far-reaching story about the whole family. I did like it, once I got over it, not being what I thought it was going to be. I did like The Marriage Portrait way better. Did I cry? Yup.

Best and the Last

Transcription by Ben Lerner

Funny how things come to you. I was watching Bren’s @brenboothjones personal list of the 100 Greatest Books of All Time, when he mentioned Ben Lerner. Bren is a big fan of Lerner’s and got me interested in trying him out. Then it just so happened that Lerner had a new book come out this past April. Perfect! I’m not going to even attempt to try and explain this one, and, you know, I think it is one of those to go in without knowing anything about it. Let’s just say that it was trippy and one you can reread. Also, Lerner is a fantastic writer, and I will definitely be reading more from him. Ben @benreadsgood also thought Transcription would be on the Booker longlist, and I’m bummed it didn’t make it.

Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield

This was a long time coming. I’ve wanted to read this book for years, and for whatever reason I never got around to reading it. It is also one of those books you regret not reading sooner. One of the best of the year? Definitely. I cried. I loved it. This book … oh my goodness, I could go on and on. It is a story about a woman whose wife goes on a deep-sea mission that ended with her wife being gone six months. When she gets back, she’s not the same. You get a dual timeline as you see what happened on the mission and when she gets back. Again, like Lerner, Armfield’s writing is just amazing. I was sucked in and carried along with every sentence. Interestingly, I read this right after Dungeon Crawler Carl. Needless to say, I went from not caring about anything that happened to Carl, to Armfield making me ugly cry. It was so, so good.

You Are Here by David Nicholls

I literally just did a happy sigh. I have also had this one on my TBR for ages, it is my first David Nicholls book. (Spoiler: I will be reading more. I’m going back to Starter for Ten and reading them all.) I went in thinking that I’d like it but was not expecting to love it so much. I am a picky romance reader. I don’t like the formula, specifically the third act miscommunication. This was such a beautiful love story. It’s about a group of people who do the Coast-to-Coast Walk, which goes across England from the Irish Sea to the North Sea, through the Lake District, the Yorkshire Dales and the North York Moors. This had the added fun of me opening up Google maps and following them as they made their journey. Michael and Marnie make this trek through the stunning countryside, walking, talking and slowly falling in love. Then last week I heard they are doing an adaptation with Matthew Macfadyen and Claire Foy. I mean, come on.

July felt like it went by in a blink, but then I look at all these books. I read so many!! It is crazy. I also found a couple of all time faves. We are a week into August and I’m already finding myself dreaming of Fall. That usually happens to me. Fall is my favorite season, and I’ve got some good books on the horizon.

Hope y’all enjoy these final weeks of summer. ✌️☀️

This week’s vibes:

Number of books read (at the end of June): 82

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Best book(s) you’ve read so far in 2026

I can’t pick just one book. I’m also not going to summarize these, as they’re all on previous recaps.

The Caretaker by Marcus Kliewer

This story was a) super hyped and my expectations were high b) had me gripped to the last page. It did not disappoint.

The Eights by Joanna Miller

This is historical fiction done to perfection. Joanna Miller combined fictional characters with historical figures in a story that was fun, touching and still educational.

The Midnight Train by Matt Haig

The Midnight Library is one of my all-time favorite books, and Matt was able to give us more of the same and yet something completely different. It was so well done. Thank you, Matt!

I debated on putting these two on here twice. I really loved them and they are favorites of the year.

A Box Full of Darkness by Simone St. James

Impossible by Sarah Lotz

My two nonfiction picks. I loved these two so, so much. The way they were structured, with an unbelievable amount of knowledge jammed onto every page was brilliant.

Motherland by Julia Ioffe

Murderland by Caroline Fraser

Best sequel you’ve read so far in 2026

Clown Town by Mick Herron

I have devoured the Slow Horses series. Mick Herron has given us the best characters and time and again puts them through the ringer. The cliffhanger on this one … Ooof!

New release you haven’t read yet but want to

A Private Man by Stephanie Sy-Quia

I am desperate to get this one. I was waiting for it to come to Libby, but I think I’m going to end up breaking down and get it on Audible

These two I’m saving for Fall.

The Keeper by Tana French

House of Splinters by Laura Purcell

Most anticipated release for the second half of 2026

I’ve ranked these in the order of my excitement.

Said the Dead by Doireann Ni Ghriofa

Make Strange by Niamh Campbell

The Hill in the Dark Grove by Liam Higginson

Off the Reservation by Stephen Graham Jones

Calamities by Chuck Wendig

Life Out of Order by Audrey Niffenegger

Exit Party by Emily St. John Mandel

Scion by James Islington

Biggest disappointment

Nowhere Burning by Catriona Ward

Yeah, this one hurt because I love Catriona so much. I just didn’t like that it was inspired by Peter Pan and the ending didn’t go where I would have liked. I’m bummed.

Biggest surprise(s)

Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad

Probably my biggest surprise of the year is Lord Jim, which I haven’t even written about yet. I read it for part of my 1900s project. I wasn’t even going to but decided to give it a go. I was honestly taken aback by how good it was. I have a lot of thoughts and feelings that need to go into a post.

Favorite new author(s) or new to you

Jess Walter – I read both So Far Gone and Beautiful Ruins this year. Jess is so funny and also creates flawed lovable characters. He has 11 more books I can read. I’m definitely going to work my way through them.

Thomas King – I got Medicine River after Katie Lumsden read it last Christmas. I thought it sounded good but was not prepared for how much I would love this little book. What a gem. Like with Jess Walter, King has an impressive back list. Including an eight-part mystery/crime series that follows ex-cop Thumps DreadfulWater. I’m so down for that.

Lea Ypi – I want to say I found Lea through BookOutlet, but honestly, I can’t remember when or how she popped into my consciousness. Lea is a professor of political theory at London School of Economics. She’s written two books, Free: A Child and a Country at the End of History and Indignity: A Life Reimagined. She writes about history and politics through the lens of her family and her own personal history. She’s a fantastic writer and I am so happy I found her.

Newest fictional crush

Owen Mallory – The Everlasting by Alix E. Harrow

I don’t really do crushes, but I will say that Owen and more specifically Sid Sagar’s performance, had me swooning. I like nice guys and Owen was even better goofball nice or bookish goofball nice. Harrow flips the roles in this romance. The hero, Sir Una Everlasting, is very Brienne of Tarth and Owen is more Rory Pond (née Williams).

Side note: The Ponds from Doctor Who are one of my favorite couples ever. Love them!

Newest favorite character

Harlen Bigbear – Medicine River by Thomas King

Last year my answer to this question was Cress from Still Life by Sarah Winman. Harlen Bigbear has Cress energy. He’s the quirky sidekick to our main character, Will. Wesley French did the narration for this one and captured Harlen perfectly, kind of annoying but affable enough you’ll keep him around. Also, like Still Life, I think about this book and these characters all the time.

Book that made you cry

The Midnight Train by Matt Haig

Oh, man, I cried. So good.

Book(s) that made you happy

A Box Full of Darkness by Simone St. James

I know people aren’t meant to be “happy” reading A Box Full of Darkness, but that’s exactly how I felt. Simone gave me all my favorite tropes, atmosphere and wrapped it in a mystery. I am so into the world around this town, Fell, New York, she’s creating. Dare I say Fell is my happy place.

Impossible by Sarah Lotz

This one took a romance into multiple dimensions, and I was there for it. It gave me The Husbands by Holly Gramazio energy but did it way better. It was fun and satisfying.

What books do you need to read before the end of the year

I will be seriously disappointed in myself if I don’t get these done this year.

The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

East of Eden by John Steinbeck

The Go-Between by L. P. Hartley

Tana French’s Cal Hooper trilogy

The Searcher

The Hunter

The Keeper

Most beautiful book you’ve bought so far this year

There’s a story here. I had an edition of Bleak House on my Blackwells wish list for years. It was a Macmillan and had this painting on the cover I really liked. Now, I never bought it because I lowkey don’t like the Macmillan editions. I mean, they’re gorgeous, but they are tiny and have bible thin pages. They just don’t work for me. Still, I kept it on my list because I liked the painting and seeing it as I scrolled by. In the meantime, I’d also gotten a couple of Elizabeth Bowen’s books The House in Paris and The Hotel. Then I was watching one of Ann Patchett’s book recs and nearly fell off my couch when she pulled out Elizabeth Bowen’s The Death of the Heart with the same painting on it. Thank you, Ann for solving my problem.

The Death of the Heart by Elizabeth Bowen

I feel so seen with how Ann describes her journey to The Death of the Heart,

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Okay, Bada Bing Bada Boom! I’m going to keep using my vacation wisely and get June done and dusted. Like with May, I’m going to put a link to the new releases I already reviewed below. That leaves me with nine books for this recap.

Reading Around the World

Assembling Alice by Mookie Katigbak-Lacuesta

This is my pick for the Philippines and like with Algeria it was perfect in that it taught me a lot. Mookie Katigbak-Lacuesta tells the story of her grandmother who was in turns a housewife, concert pianist, spy and journalist. Katigbak-Lacuesta creates a mosaic through vignettes voiced by her grandmother’s, mother, husband, friends and distant admirers. It starts in the interwar period and carries through WWII and into the Philippines’ postwar independence. I learned so much. I’m so happy I read it.

Personal Writings by Albert Camus

I really wanted to read Camus’ first work, Nuptials, after reading about its publication in A Bookshop in Algiers. I was able to find it in his collection of personal writings. I loved A Bookshop in Algiers, but where I felt it lacked was giving me a sense of the country of Algeria. This collection filled that void perfectly. It was a love letter to Algeria and gave me the ability to picture it in my mind’s eye. It was gorgeous.

Inspired by Other People’s TBRs

Of course, one of the main purposes of watching BookTube is getting book recs. These three were books I got from a couple of my BookTubers. Both Fern and Syd are working through their physical TBRs. They are using a random number generator and a spinner wheel respectively. Fern landed on Lightbreakers, which I hadn’t heard of, but sounded cool. Nothing to See Hear came up for Syd. I’d been curious about that one and decided to give it ago. Fern gets a couple of book subscription boxes. A while ago she got Tilt. It sounded good, too.

Lightbreakers by Aja Gabel

Lightbreakers is a time travel book, which is why I picked it up. It was funny to me that the method of time travel was the same as Dissolution by Nicholas Binge. These books couldn’t be more different even though they both use memories as a portal into the past. Unfortunately for Lightbreakers, I loved Dissolution, and the comparison left me unimpressed. I didn’t connect with the characters and ultimately didn’t care either way about the decisions they had to make in the end. I am glad I read it, tho. It was an interesting exercise in the use of a plot device and the choices different writers make.

Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson

Syd said she didn’t like Nothing to See Here, but I still decided to give it a go. I got it from Libby and gave myself the space to DNF it. I didn’t and I liked it. First, it was narrated by one of my faves Marin Ireland. I don’t know if I would have enjoyed it as much if someone else had read it. Her voice and tone were perfect for the story, which was … well weird. Nothing to See Here is about a down on her luck woman who reconnects with a childhood friend. This friend hires her to watch after her husband’s children from his first marriage. The catch is these kids have the ability to spontaneously burst into flames. It is an excessive form of temper tantrum that, thank God, doesn’t exist in reality. I think Marin’s narration and the short length of the book made this enjoyable. If it had gone on too long, I might have felt different. I did really like Kevin Wilson’s writing style and am interested in reading more from him.

Tilt by Emma Pattee

Yeah, I wish I could remember why I picked Tilt up when I did. It was interesting that these three books all dealt heavily with parenting. Tilt tells the story of a woman, Annie, who is 9 months pregnant. She lives in Portland and is shopping at IKEA when the Big One hits. Living in the NW (well the West Coast in general) we have the ever-present threat of the next big earthquake. Emma Pattee puts Annie through the test of what would you do if the Big One hits. As it turns out, she makes Annie walk across a destroyed Portland in an effort to find her husband. While Annie walks, she talks to the daughter she’s carrying in her belly, a mixture of history and confessional. Like Kevin Wilson, I really liked Emma Pattee’s writing voice. I will definitely read more from her.

Tilt was the last in a run of books I unintentionally chose that had parenting themes and parent-child relationships at their core. That’s not my usual jam and was very happy to be done with it. I will say that it was a funny coincidence that both My Abandonment, which I read in May, and Tilt both took place in Portland. In both cases I pulled out Google Maps to look at exactly where the characters were. I also wanted to add that I liked how Annie was talking directly to her unborn child. Ian McEwan does the opposite in his book Nutshell, which is narrated by a woman’s unborn son and witness to her crimes. The fantastic Rory Kinnear gives voice to the omniscient fetus in the audiobook. It was a fun one.

The Booker Made Me Do It

A couple of months ago I started to follow The Booker Prizes on Substack and one of the things they do is highlight a book/author each month. In June they picked Roddy Doyle’s 1991 shortlisted The Van. The Van was a perfect pick as it centers around the 1990 World Cup. However, since I am neither a fan of the world’s football or America’s football, I chose something different from Doyle’s catalog. I also picked up my second title from Charlotte Wood who was shortlisted in 2024 with Stone Yard Devotional.

Smile by Roddy Doyle

Smile is a tricky one to talk about. It could maybe be considered a novella, as it comes in at a mere 160 pages. Doyle’s Victor, newly divorced, looks back at his life and how he got to where he is, sitting alone at the local pub. I enjoyed it until the gut punch ending. Ooof! I’m still recovering. I’ve never had an ending hit me so hard.

Doyle wrote The Commitments, which I totally didn’t know was based on a book and would love to read. His book Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, did win the Booker in 1993 and sounds good, too.

The Natural Way of Things by Charlotte Wood

Earlier this year I read Stone Yard Confessional, which was a rather hard read. It wasn’t big on plot and delt heavily with the themes of loss and regret. The Natural Way of Things was originally published in Australia in 2015 but was just released worldwide this year.

They had me with this one sentence:

Two women awaken from a drugged sleep to find themselves imprisoned in a broken-down property in the middle of a desert.

I was prepared for darkness based on that one sentence and my experience with Stone Yard Confessional and The Natural Way of Things absolutely took me there. The thing is that it was darker but there was more plot going on. I genuinely liked it more. Charlotte Wood has another book called The Weekend. I’m tempted to give it a go … maybe.

Unsettling and Satisfying

The Between by Tananarive Due

I’ve been on a bit of a journey with Tananarive Due. I read The Good House back in 2024, although it was originally published in 2003. I loved it. 5 stars. I had The Good House on my Audible TBR for quite a while. It was only after The Reformatory came out in 2023 and was wildly popular that I decided to read it first. TBH, I have been afraid to read The Reformatory and have been putting it off. Then I was scrolling through BookOutlet and saw The Between. I immediately wanted to read it, but Libby didn’t have it. Then Audible had this ridiculous sale and I snatched The Between up for a couple of dollars. In the meantime, Fern read The Reformatory earlier this year and told me I needed to read it. I put it on hold with Libby. I was 110^th in line and I’m now 42^nd. I’m going to get it soon and will have to put my big girl pants on. Eeek! I’m scared.

The Between was a trip.

When Hilton was just a boy, his aged grandmother saved him from drowning by pulling him out of a treacherous ocean current, sacrificing her life for his. Now, thirty years later, Hilton begins to think his borrowed time is running out. His wife, the only elected African American judge in Dade County, Florida, has begun receiving racist hate mail from a man she once prosecuted, and Hilton’s sleep is plagued by nightmares more horrible than any he has ever experienced.

As he battles both the psychotic stalking of his family and the unseen enemy that haunts his sleep, Hilton’s sense of reality is slipping away.

Yeah, it was fun except it was hard because Hilton’s choices and reactions to things were bad. It was one of those where I was literally yelling at him out loud. “No, no, no don’t do that!” Which is the sign of a great writer. Yeah, a totally trippy and unsettling read.

The Eights by Joanna Miller

So, last year I put The Eights on my Blackwells TBR. It was weird because the UK cover tells you nothing about the story and The Eights as a title doesn’t tell you anything either. It was on my list for so long I totally forgot why I put it there to begin with. I decided to have fun with it and not refresh my memory and jump in completely blind.

It turns out I did have a good reason for putting this one on my TBR. OMG! I loved it so much. The Eights is actually about four young women who are part of the first female class at Oxford in 1920. Joanna Miller weaves the story of this very diverse group of young women in with all kinds of historical characters. It was so much fun to read. This is a period I’ve read a fair bit about, especially Vera Brittain’s Testament to Youth. Vera and her good friend Winifred Holtby (she wrote South Riding, which is really good) make an appearance in the book. This is one of my favorites of the year for sure.

I’m closing my eyes and focusing my energy on manifesting a TV adaptation of this book. This book needs to be a TV series. The setting. The clothes. Oh my God. It has to be done.

I mean, does this cover tell you anything?

The five other books I read in June are included in my New Releases post.

Nowhere Burning by Catriona Ward

The Midnight Train by Matt Haig

American Fantasy by Emma Straub

The Radiant Dark by Alexandra Oliva

The Typing Lady by Ruth Ozeki

This gets me caught up with my recaps. I’m going to do the mid-year freakout tag next. It’s been a crazy year for me, and I definitely need to take stock on where I’ve been.

Hope you’re keeping cool. ✌️

June Vibes

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I can’t believe it is almost August and I am just doing my May recap! I’ve been working too much and haven’t had a single day off in ages. I finally have a moment where I can engage my brain in something that’s not related to the job. I am grateful, tho, to have the extra work. It is better to have them begging for all the hours I can stand to do, then the opposite. Yes, I’m truly grateful.

Okay, about the books. This is going to be a bit of a challenge, since it has been so long since I read these, or at least it feels like ages. We will see what I can shake loose here.

BookOutlet Finds

I’ve gotten into the habit of scrolling BookOutlet every week, looking at their recently added titles. There were so many that jumped out at me. These four were titles I was able to get on Libby.

Better Luck Next Time by Julia Claiborne Johnson

Julia Claiborne Johnson wrote Be Frank with Me, which I read back in 2018. It is a weird one because I gave it 5 stars, but don’t remember a thing about it. Be Frank with Me and Paul Tremblay’s A Head Full of Ghosts are two books I need to reread because my notes say I loved both of them, and my brain doesn’t pull up a damn thing.

Anyway, I picked up Better Luck Next Time because 2018 me loved Julia Claiborne Johnson’s writing. I was drawn to its quirky setup.

It’s 1938 and women seeking a quick, no-questions split from their husbands head to the “divorce capital of the world,” Reno, Nevada. There’s one catch: they have to wait six weeks to become “residents.” Many of these wealthy, soon-to-be divorcees flock to the Flying Leap, a dude ranch that caters to their every need.

It was a cute story, but unfortunately one of those audiobooks that hurt it more than helped. The story is told by an old guy telling a reporter about his time working at the dude ranch when he was a young buck. That’s all fine and good, except you hear Robert Duvall while picturing Glen Powell. It messed up my head. The book was cute, sexy and something completely different.

My Abandonment by Peter Rock

The cover of this one caught my eye, and then the story sounded really interesting. It’s about a father and daughter living rough in Forest Park in Portland, Oregon. It was really good. The story is told through the perspective of the daughter, Caroline, which made it extra harrowing and heartbreaking. There were so many times I wanted to give her a huge hug. The ending, as crazy as it was, did not upset me, but I think there are probably people out there that would find it unsatisfying if not distressing.

Listen by Sacha Bronwasser

The tag line: A twisty, slow-burn mystery set in Paris and the Netherlands that has become a Dutch sensation.

I didn’t know what to expect from this one. It is twisty, like they say, which makes it kind of hard to talk about. It centers around a young Dutch woman who becomes an au pair to this French family in Paris. It does jump around in time, from the 1980s to 2015. It is a bit of a pretzel. My main take away is that revenge can be passive aggressive.

I’m failing on this one. It was weird and complicated, and I’ve also read 35 books since I finished it. LOL My brain isn’t pulling up anything useful.

The Secrets of Hartwood Hall by Katie Lumsden

This one was fun. Katie is a YouTuber, who I’ve watched for years. She’s also a book editor and Victorian Era scholar, whose been able to use her talents and knowledge as a novelist. She’s already working on her third novel. I was excited to read this, and when I saw it on BookOutlet I grabbed it.

It is a by the numbers, and I mean that as a compliment, gothic mystery. A young widow takes a position as a governess in a mysterious country manor. The atmosphere was spot on. What made it extra fun were all the Easter eggs. Like there’s a character named Mrs. Pulley, and one of Katie’s favorite authors is Natasha Pulley. There were all kinds of little nods like that. Her second book is The Trouble with Mrs. Montgomery Hurst, which I will also be reading.

The Booker Prize

So many of my BookTubers read at the very least the various prize shortlists and some even the longlists. I realized that I’ve sort of stumbled into reading them, too. I’ve now read two of the Booker’s 2025 shortlist – The Rest of Our Lives and Audition. I do want to read Flashlight and The Land in Winter. I’ve also read (and loved) the 2024 winner Orbital, along with Held, Stone Yard Devotional and now Creation Lake. I am planning on reading James but want to read Percival Everett in chronological order. The Safekeep would round out the shortlist for 2024, so I’ll probably read that one, too. This year’s longlist will be announced on Tuesday, 28^th of July. Exciting.

The Rest of Our Lives by Ben Markovits

I didn’t realize that this one was on the shortlist. I went to see Lily King speak earlier this year. She was asked for a book recommendation, the lady wanted a “propulsive” book. Lily said The Rest of Our Lives. Done. I’m gonna get it. Only later did I see it was a finalist.

When Tom Layward’s wife had an affair, he resolved to leave her as soon as his youngest daughter turned eighteen. Twelve years later, while driving her to Pittsburgh to start university, he remembers his pact and keeps driving West.

I’m not one who generally finds trigger warnings useful, but this one did actually trigger me. Ooof! Markovits did a really good job with the vague physical symptoms Tom had while he traveled down memory lane. I got so worked up and anxious as he physically broke down while he worked out his emotional baggage. It was not an enjoyable read for me. I found it to be very stressful. Was it “propulsive?” I didn’t think so. I wasn’t wondering what would happen next, I was hoping he’d stop his foolery and go see a doctor!

Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner

False advertising at its best.

Creation Lake is a novel about a secret agent, a thirty-four-year-old American woman of ruthless tactics, bold opinions, and clean beauty, who is sent to do dirty work in France.

I had read that Rachel Kushner had been inspired by John le Carré to write her version of espionage. I thought that sounded interesting. Like with Listen, I was in the mood for that. Creation Lake is nowhere close to anything John le Carré. I say having read like three chapters of The Russia House. Now, I wasn’t cranky reading this book that had little to no spy craft because Kushner is a really good writer. This book was 90% Virginia Woolf stream of consciousness and 10% plot. I genuinely liked following her brain as it jumped, seemingly randomly, from subject to subject. It wasn’t what I was expecting going in. I would, and probably will, read more from her. Next time I’ll avoid the description and go in blind.

This, that and a Banger

Indignity by Lea Ypi

I wish I could remember where I found Lea Ypi. It may have been BookOutlet, but it also may have been Blackwells. I have two of Lea’s books, Indignity and Free. I’m going to get to Free this month, and I am beyond excited. I’m getting ahead of myself. First, Indignity.

When Lea Ypi discovers that a photo of her grandmother, Leman, honeymooning in the Italian Alps in 1941 has been posted by a stranger on social media, she is faced with deeply unsettling questions. Growing up, she had been told all records of her grandmother’s youth were destroyed “when the police came and took everything” in the early days of communism in Albania.

What Lea does here is part investigation and part novelization of her grandmother’s life. She paints a picture as she fills in the pieces of her family’s history. Lea narrates the introduction of the book, but then it is handed over to a British narrator. I wish she had continued to do all of it. I loved hearing her tell the story in her own voice. I loved this book and I learned SO much. It is a fascinating vantage point into WWII. Albania is one of those countries you may know the name but couldn’t point it out on a map. I’m going to do a Reading Around the World post on it after I read Free. Yeah, I’m thrilled I picked this one up.

Knots and Crosses by Ian Rankin

I’ve wanted to read the Inspector Rebus books for a long time and decided it was time after all the Denise Mina books I read earlier this year. Also, because I am a completist I had to start with book one.

In 1987 Ian Rankin introduced the world to Inspector Rebus, and over the next 40 odd years he’s written 25 Rebus mysteries. The latest coming out in 2024. Will I read all 25? Maybe. I enjoyed Knots and Crosses enough to keep going. I like a good mystery thriller as a palate cleanser. I expect the books will get better as they go. This was only his second novel. The next book is Hide and Seek, which I may pick up before the end of the year.

The Everlasting by Alix E. Harrow

I had the most incredible weekend in May. I read three fantastic books back-to-back. First was Japanese Gothic, then The Caretaker and finally The Everlasting. I did a post going through all the new releases I’ve read so far this year. I’ve linked it below. In that post I talked about both Japanese Gothic and The Caretaker. The Everlasting came out at the end of last year, so I’m putting it here.

I generally don’t like fantasy novels, but I hear about them all the time because most of my BookTubers read fantasy. This year three (Syd, Emily & Elizabeth) of them raved about The Everlasting. They were all exuberant about it and then said the one thing that would make me overlook the fantasy part … time travel. I was like, okay, you got me. I’ll try it.

From Alix E. Harrow, the New York Times bestselling author of Starling House, comes a moving and genre-defying quest about the lady-knight whose legend built a nation, and the cowardly historian sent back through time to make sure she plays her part–even if it breaks his heart.

It is a beautiful love story. Sid Sagar, who did the historian’s part, was excellent. The time travel was really well done. I loved that it was relatively short, not a 900 pager like most fantasy books. I am also very happy it was a stand-alone. It was also a perfect ending to the streak of three 5-star books. I will say I was in a bit of a slump for a few days after finishing it. Great books will do that to ya.

The four other books I read in May are included in my New Releases post.

Midnight, at the War by Devi S. Laskar

Handle with Care by Marybeth Mayhew Whalen

Japanese Gothic by Kylie Lee Baker

The Caretaker by Marcus Kliewer

I’m not gonna lie, these books felt like I read them ages ago. I need to start doing the summaries right when I finish them, when everything is all fresh. Starting the June recap now, which will be nice to have done before we start August. 😛

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Last year was kinda freaky because I ended up reading 25 books that were released in 2025. I read 104 books, so that’s a good quarter of my total books. I thought this year I would do a mid-year check-in on what new releases I’ve managed to get my hands on. I’ve read 13, including my last read of June, which I finished just in time to be counted.

Go-To Authors

It is also very freaky that four of my go-to authors have had releases this year. I need a catchy name for these gals: Simone St. James, Rachel Hawkins, Catriona Ward, Laura Purcell, and Julia Haeberlin. I’ve read almost everything these ladies have written. I’d say they are comfort reads for me, completely my vibe. Laura Purcell’s House of Splinters came out in February, but I haven’t read it yet. I missed the winter window, so now I am saving it for autumn. I’m including one outlier here, which is Emma Straub. Emma wrote one of my favorite books of 2024, This Time Tomorrow. I jumped to read American Fantasy. It is only my second book from her, but I’m definitely going to read more.

A Box Full of Darkness by Simone St James

I’ve read 6 of Simone’s 10 books – 4 to go. This is one of my favorites of the year. I read it in March. I think it is getting mixed reviews, but I loved it. I can’t wait to read it again.

Siblings return to the house they fled eighteen years before, called back by the ghost of their long-missing brother and his haunting request to come home.

The Storm by Rachel Hawkins

I’ve read all five of Rachel’s books. This one wasn’t my favorite. It is funny because it is out of character for me, I wanted this book to be wilder. I don’t like mystery thrillers that become ridiculous, but what I like about Rachel’s books is that there’s just a dash of absurdity. This one was missing that little something extra for me. It was still a fun read.

St. Medard’s Bay, Alabama is famous for three things: the deadly hurricanes that regularly sweep into town, the Rosalie Inn, a century-old hotel that’s survived every one of those storms, and Lo Bailey, the local girl infamously accused of the murder of her lover, political scion Landon Fitzroy, during Hurricane Marie in 1984.

Nowhere Burning by Catriona Ward

I’ve read five of Catriona’s six books. I think I’m going to get Sundial this summer, since I honestly didn’t care for Nowhere Burning. The thing is, Catriona is an amazing writer, so it is hard to say it wasn’t enjoyable because she’s always going to take you on a ride. This book is a play on Peter Pan. I’m fine with Peter Pan, but it isn’t one of my favorite classics. I need to check Reddit and see if there are people who landed where I did with the ending. I wanted it to go a different way. This is a tough one for me. I think if the ending had landed in a slightly different way I would have loved it. As for now, it is a like not love.

This one has three timelines, one that follows a movie star who built a home in this remote mountain valley. The second finds a brother and sister trying to find the now abandoned home of the movie star, which is foretold to be a sanctuary for runaways. A two-member documentary crew are exploring the area investigating a spate of mysterious kidnappings.

American Fantasy by Emma Straub

I put this one on hold blind. I had no idea what it was about. So, it was a surprise to me to find out that it is about an aged boy band who do a yearly cruise for their die-hard fans. I was not the audience for this one, as I have never fanned out over any boy band and cruises are not my jam. The nostalgia was lost on me, but ultimately, I thought it was a sweet story about middle age and new chapters in life. I hate the third act miscommunication in romance stories, and this didn’t have one. I know I’m in the minority, but it worked for me.

NetGalley Reads

I took the leap and started a NetGalley account. It is a little stressful because you have a time constraint with what you’re given. The idea is to build up a good score with how many reviews you do. I have one more book to read and review, and I’ve missed one.

Handle with Care by Marybeth Mayhew Whalen

I didn’t do a full review on this one. I just put it on Goodreads. It wasn’t really my jam. It’s about these women who get caught in a hostage situation in their town’s post office. I thought it was going to be a thriller situation, but it turned out to be more like a Hallmark movie. It wasn’t very high stakes, and she spent more time exploring the personal drama the women had in their lives.

I’ve linked my reviews of the other three below.

Odessa by Gabriella Sher

Midnight, at the War by Devi S Laskar

The Typing Lady by Ruth Ozeki

Fern Reads

BookTube can be hard to navigate. There are a lot of people who review the same books from the same genres, same writers. It is rare to find someone who matches your flavor of books. Of all the BookTubers I watch, Fern comes the closest to matching me. I’ve read so many books she’s read and hauled. She also gets Book of the Month and Aardvark, so she’s always getting new releases. These are two 2026 titles I got from her.

This House Will Feed by Maria Tureaud

I read this one in March. Honestly, I had no idea it was a new release when I grabbed it. It was really different, and I liked it a lot. Especially because it took place during the Great Famine, which I really knew nothing about. I loved that I learned something while being entertained.

Amidst the devastation of Ireland’s Great Famine, a young woman is salvaged from certain death when offered a mysterious position at a remote manor house haunted by a strange power and the horror of her own memories in this chillingly evocative historical novel braided with gothic horror and supernatural suspense.

The Radiant Dark by Alexandra Oliva

Fern got this in a Book of the Month box. It is one of those situations where the blurb can send you astray. It said it was a mix of Arrival and Wild Dark Shore. I mean, say less. The problem was my brain took that and filled in a story that was not what The Radiant Dark ended up being. This was a really good book, but it was not what I had hoped it would be. I wanted something darker with more questions and discovery. This book followed a very dysfunctional family in an alternate timeline where earth has contact with aliens and Jimmy Carter gets two terms. It was definitely less Arrival and more heavy family drama. There are a few books that tempt me to do spoiler reviews, and this is one of them. I definitely liked it enough because I do want to check out Oliva’s back catalogue.

The Gift of Libby

When I started listening to audiobooks it was mainly through Audible. My Audible wish list was and still is 100s of titles deep. Then a year or so ago I stopped adding books to my Audible wish list and went straight to putting new releases on hold on Libby. This changed everything and is how I read 25 new releases in 2025. It is deceiving when Libby says that it will be “several months” for you to get your copy of, say Yesteryear, because the more popular the title the more copies they will get. The line ends up moving pretty quickly. For example, I put Japanese Gothic on hold on April 4^th, it was released on the 14^th, it became available for me on May 9^th, and I finished it on May 16^th. I put Maggie O’Farrell’s Land on hold on June 8^th. I started 262^nd in line and am now 145^th. Libby says I’m four weeks out. I bet I will get it before August. My advice, put things on hold instead of on a wish list.

Oh friends, I saved the best for last.

Japanese Gothic by Kylie Lee Baker

I had such high hopes/expectations for Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng, which is another book by Kylie. For whatever reason I didn’t connect with it. I liked it a lot, but I just didn’t love it like so many people did. So, when I first heard about Japanese Gothic, I thought, this is the one. I’m gonna love it, and I did. Whew! Japanese Gothic is about a house in Japan with a door that somehow allows a connection between a young man in 2026 and a young woman in 1877. It was fun and heartbreaking at the same time. Kylie explores a lot in this one. I’m so happy I loved it.

The Caretaker by Marcus Kliewer

Emily got an ACR of this and did a reading vlog. That vlog got me SO excited about this book. I did really like Kliewer’s We Used to Live Here and want to read it again. I think The Caretaker might be one of my favorites of the year so far. It was so much fun, and I was on the edge of my seat until the very end. Loved it.

This one is about a very down on her luck gal, Macy, and a job opportunity that’s too good to be true.

EXCITING OPPORTUNITY:
Caretaker urgently needed. Three days of work. Competitive pay. Serious applicants ONLY.

What could go wrong?

The Midnight Train by Matt Haig

The Midnight Library was one of those rare books where I was ahead of the curve. It was released on 8/13/20 and I finished it on 10/20/20. I loved it. One of my all-time favorite books. Understandably, I freaked out when I saw Matt was doing a sequel. Well, sort of a sequel.

The Midnight Train is more about looking back at your life rather than exploring other possible versions of your life. Our main guy, Wilbur, dies and gets to revisit his life as an observer. Matt tells a beautiful story about how Wilbur comes face to face with all the love, success, beauty, loss, pain, shame and regret that filled his life. In the end it was a love story not just the love Wilbur has for his wife Maggie, but for books, too. It is a beautiful story, a little sappy in spots, but I loved it. It is a perfect companion to The Midnight Library.

That was a lot! It is hard to believe there’s been so many fantastic books out this year. I have more on my stack to get to, and so many I’m still super excited for.

The Touchstone by Edith Wharton

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The Touchstone was a thought-provoking story for me. The plot centers on a young man who had a previous relationship with a woman of some renown who has since passed away. He is presented with an opportunity to sell the love letters he received from her. When the book containing the collection of letters is released, people are scandalized by what it contains and becomes the talk of the town. The young man is unknown to the public. However, he begins to regret his decision as the discussion around the book grows.

Wharton’s book looks at two sides of the publishing of the book. First, the money that the young man makes off the deal and his subsequent guilt. Second, the idea that this book was put out at a time when the woman’s contemporaries were all still very much alive.

For whatever reason, I kept thinking of Alan Rickman who died in January of 2016, and how Madly, Deeply: The Diaries of Alan Rickman was published in October of the same year. I don’t want to think the book was a cash grab, and it certainly didn’t contain anything scandalous. I also don’t know if he did or didn’t give his approval for its release. It is just weird to me that your diaries would become not just public consumption but also read by people you knew.

I read The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larsen not long after finishing The Touchstone. Splendid takes a deep look into the lives of Winston Churchill and his family from 1940 to 1941, his first year as Prime Minister. The book takes excerpts from many diaries and correspondences of the people around and including Churchill. These too were personal but historically significant and helpful in capturing the details of the decisions made surrounding Dunkirk, the Blitz through to Pearl Harbor, as well as Churchill’s continued pleas for help to Roosevelt and the Americans. There were also Brits who were tasked to keep diaries during the war specifically meant to be chronicles of their daily lives during those extraordinary times. It is amazing to think that they had the foresight to ask people to do that.

Of course, nowadays we have bloggers and vloggers. Everyone is posting about the minutiae of their daily lives. We are a generation of over-sharers, me included. Ian McEwan took this idea even further in his 2025 speculative novel, What We Can Know. The book takes part in two timelines, one of which is in 2119. By that time, the chap that’s doing research on a poet’s last work produced in 2014 has access to every email and text sent between the poet and his wife, as well as all their friends and family.

McEwan says in one passage from the future:

“Messages sent by end-to-end encryption have been laid bare. As our dean once said in a speech, we have robbed the past of its privacy.”

On one hand we have been living in a world where companies won’t unlock a criminal’s phone to help law enforcement, but I can absolutely see a future where our texts, which are really only once removed from a tweet, are free game.

The other aspect of the story that got me thinking was the idea that this young man used the money he made from the sale of the letters to set up a life for himself and his new wife. Here the young couple begin their lives together at the dawn of a new century with unlimited possibilities laid out before them. Of course, my mind immediately says, “You poor kids have no idea what’s coming.”

I thought of another book I read years ago, Time and Again by Jack Finney. It is a time travel story where at one point a woman arrives in 1970 from 1882. Her visit is short, as pretty quickly after her arrival she sees a history book covering the atrocities of WWI and WWII, among other events, and decides she wants to go back to 1882. Of course, some of us can think back to our own quaint days leading up to Y2K, and how unaware we were that 9/11, Iraq, the 2008 world financial crisis, COVID and our current fresh hell was on our horizon. Did we really have hope for the future?

Discovering The Touchstone was such a gift, as I am also working my way through Edith Wharton’s works, and this one was a satisfying tick off the list.

Below is my first book in the series.

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The Typing Lady by Ruth Ozeki

This is my fourth book from NetGalley, and I was thrilled Viking Penguin approved my ARC.

The Typing Lady is a collection of short stories by Ruth Ozeki. As with any collection, not all of them hit me in the heart, but I genuinely loved the ones that did. There were five that will stick with me.

The Typing Lady: An Author’s Note – This first entry starts with a woman who becomes fascinated with another woman she sees in a library, who she christens the Typing Lady. Our narrator gives this woman the moniker because she sits at a typewriter, not a laptop, and taps away, in somewhat of a trance, capturing what she sees. This encounter sends the narrator on a journey and is also the beginning of typewriter sightings throughout the assembled stories.

Leafblower – This story is about a down on her luck young woman who rents a room over a garage from an older couple who are struggling to hold on to their independence. I think this might be my favorite of the bunch. This one really could have gone in any number of directions but landed in a place that made me very happy.

Dead Beat Poet – I love how the blurb describes this one:

A long-deceased Beat poet hijacks the mind of a young publishing assistant during a sales meeting, railing against the state of modern literature.

Honestly, this one was way too short. I would have loved to see this one go on and on. Yes, more please.

Where Ambition Goes to Die – I loved the concept of this one. The idea that one’s ambition can be lost like a family pet. It’s a change in perspective and gave me a good think.

The Problem of the Body – Is the last story and a solid anchor for the collection.

The blurb says:

A curious grandmother creates a fake online dating profile to spy on her granddaughter’s romantic life—and sets in motion a deception she can’t control.

But it is so much more than that. I loved the complexity of the deep family love Ozeki paints.

I’m going to say it again, I was thrilled when I got the email from Viking Penguin, and so grateful I had the opportunity to read this.

I’m going to go shortest to longest

The Veil by Rachel Harrison

This was a “free” short story in Audible about a young woman who works at a living history museum – sounds cool – when she falls asleep on the job and wakes up back in time and experiences the period she’s been describing to tourist. It was fun. I liked the way it ended.

Fire in the Blood by Irène Némirovsky

How I came to read this one was a bit complicated. Irène’s Suite Française is one of my 12 for 2026 books. I’ve been participating in Sarah Freshly’s (@freshlyreadbooks) TBR Spin Storygraph Challenge. She does these spins that help you pick which one of your 12 books of the year you’ll read next. The thing is she has this replacement option. Where it prompts you to swap one of your books. I don’t want to swap my book, so I decided to pick a short story to read with Suite Française. Audible had Fire in the Blood, so I picked it to satisfy the spin. TBH, I was a little nervous because Némirovsky wrote a lot, and I wanted to read as many as I could. I wanted to without having read any of her work. So, I was very pleased/relieved that I liked Fire in the Blood. It takes place in the interwar period in France, when this guy Silvio comes back to his hometown. He reconnects with people from his past and we see the town’s complicated present and learn about its history that makes it even more complicated. I didn’t see the end coming.

The Singularity by Balsam Karam

I’ve read two Iranian authors who were able to flee Iran. Balsam Karam went to Sweden and Shokoofeh Azar went to Australia, both were born in Tehran. The Singularity was a heavy read. It deals deeply with grief and loss. Its starts in an unnamed country’s oceanside town, where a woman is wandering around calling out for her daughter whose gone missing and ends with a family processing their arrival in Sweden from the unnamed country. Karam packs a lot in this short book. It reminded me a bit of Stone Yard Devotional. It was a quiet book that dug deep into one’s separation from people and places. I have Karam’s newest book Event Horizon and am excited to read it, too.

The Ascent of Rum Doodle by W.E. Bowman

This was a result of another reading list I haven’t talked about. I buy most of my books from Blackwells, and my wish list with them currently has 230 books on it. Now, I don’t intend to buy all those books, it is more a list of books I’m interested in reading. If I like them, then maybe I’ll buy them. I started creating this list back in 2021. The books at the bottom have been there for years. So, I decided to start working my way up from the bottom and read what I can get my hands on or decide if I really want to keep it on my list. The Ascent of Rum Doodle is one of two books from my Blackwells list I read in April. The reason why it was on my list is because it was one of the Vintage Voyages collection. I have a few of them and thought maybe I could add it. I decided I didn’t need it. The Ascent of Rum Doodle is meant for a very specific audience, which I am not one of. That audience is mountaineers. It is a farce about a group who tries to ascend Rum Doodle, which is located in the Himalayas. I can appreciate why mountaineers would love this book, which they do. It was written in 1956 and definitely has that feel to it. The group goes up and down and around the peak and drink a lot of champagne along the way. I’m glad I listened to it (got it on Libby) and glad it was as short as it was.

How to Disappear: Notes on Invisibility in a Time of Transparency by Akiko Busch

Have I mentioned I have a rather big problem with my discovery of BookOutlet? Not good, not good. This site has been a test of temptation that I am losing, but not all the time. There have been some books that I’ve been interested in and have been able to get on Libby. This was one of them. I was going to write a post about why and how I DNF books because sometimes I don’t DNF books I just listen at 2x or higher. This was one of those. It wasn’t great, but I was interested enough to get the gist of it. I thought this was going to be more tech based and how to be online without being visible. This felt more like a dissertation, having never read one, where Busch talks about all the ways things can be invisible. It covered a lot. Obviously, I can’t remember much. I was bummed it wasn’t what I thought it was going to be. Oh well.

Medicine River by Thomas King

One of my BookTubers Katie (@katiejlumsden) did this project for the 12 days of Christmas where she read a short book a day for 12 days. One of them was Medicine River, and she made it sound so good. I added it to my TBR. I’m going to say that this might be one of my favorites of the year. It has hung with me since reading it. It is about this guy, Will, who goes to Medicine River (I want to say in Alberta) for his mother’s funeral. He doesn’t leave and befriends Harlen Bigbear. This is loosely connected short stories about the characters in the town. Wesley French did the narration, and he did an excellent job. He made me love all the characters even more. I highly recommend this one and am so glad I got it.

Odessa by Gabrielle Sher

This was kind of a big deal for me. I have been jealous for years that my BookTubers get Advance Reader Copies (ARCs). I thought two things: One, that you have to have a big, well-established audience to get them. Two, they don’t do audiobooks. Then I found out that NetGalley lets anyone join AND they do Advance Audio Copies (AACs). I decided to give it a go. Now, the deal with them is that if you ask for a book you need to do a review. You get a score based on how well you keep up with what you’re given. It is a little nerve-wracking. I’ve asked for 5 books, and I’ve done three of them. I lost one, due to it timing out, and I have one more. You send a request to the publisher, and they decide if they want to send it to you. I’m lowkey shocked I’ve already read three books.

Here’s my review:

Severance by Ling Ma

Read it or Unhaul it videos are getting really popular on BookTube. Emily (@BookswithEmilyFox) was the first one I saw do it – she’s done it for years. Elizabeth (@plantbasedbride) and Syd (@bysydsyd) are now doing it, and I decided to kind of play along. By that, I mean, that if they hit upon a book that is either on my shelf or one of my TBR lists, (My aforementioned Blackwells (230) and my Audible (270) wish lists) I will read it. Severance has been in my Audible wish list for years. So, when Elizabeth’s spinner wheel landed on it, I decided it was time for me to read it, too. Okay, Severance blew my mind. It is a story about a woman in NYC whose dealing with a pandemic that has wiped out most of the population. The thing is, she wrote it before COVID. I didn’t realize that. Everyone started reading it after COVID, and I assumed it was a new release. Nope. It is crazy how much of the book mirrors what happened to us all during COVID. In Severance the illness makes people zombies, so it is a bit different. I’m really happy I finally got to it.

Play Nice by Rachel Harrison

So, my girl Fern (@cozyplantlady11) has read a couple of Rachel Harrison books and liked them. The one she liked the most was Play Nice. I’m just gonna paste the blurb from Goodreads.

A woman must confront the demons of her past when she attempts to fix up her childhood home in this devilishly clever take on the haunted house.

I love a haunted house story and this one was fun. Mostly because of the characters, specifically our main girl, Clio. I’m sold on Harrison. Her writing voice is fun. I’m definitely going to read more. I gave The Veil three stars, mainly because it was so short. Sometimes short stories just leave you wanting more. It was a great introduction to Harrison’s writing style. Play Nice was so much fun. Black Sheep is the one I’m going to get next.

Goldilocks by Laura Lam

This was another one I got because of BookOutlet. The cover caught my eye, I loved it. The name, tho, no. Goldilocks is the stupidest name for this book. I honestly think if they renamed it and it was released again it would do so much better. I hadn’t ever heard of it, and it was such a good book. Again, the blurb says just enough.

The Earth is in environmental collapse. The future of humanity hangs in the balance. But a team of women are preparing to save it. Even if they’ll need to steal a spaceship to do it.

This book covers a lot of ground and light years. It was a great female centered book. I want Emily to read it. I think she’d love it. So, happy Libby had it.

What the Wind Knows by Amy Harmon

I wanted to love this one. Sometimes, like Wesley French did with Medicine River, the narration makes a book even better. Then sometime, thankfully rarely, a narrator ruins a book. That was the case with What the Wind Knows. Luckily for me there were two perspectives, so I only had to suffer through part of the book. This was also a book I got from Katie. It is a time travel story, which I do love. This story is about a woman whose beloved grandfather dies, and she returns to Ireland to spread his ashes. When she does she slips through time to 1921 and is reunited with her grandfather as a little boy. This book and This House Will Feed introduced me to two different periods in Irish history I knew little to nothing about. This House Will Feed took place during the Great Famine and this one around Ireland’s civil war and independence from Great Britain. Michael Collins, along with other real historical figures, are characters in the story. I was frequently dipping into Wikipedia to look things up. I learned a lot. As for the story, it was good, but not totally to my taste. The gal who read the main character’s part didn’t match the character. Her voice was soft and breathy, where the character was strong. It was unfortunate. Oh well.

The Little Friend by Donna Tartt

Donna Tartt’s The Little Friend was my first tome of 2026. It will not be the last. I’m already doing better than last year, where Vanity Fair was the only one I got to, and it took me all year to read it. I got to this because it had been on my Blackwells list for years and that was why I started to work on that list. Then Sarah read it, and I got a bit of FOMO. It was time. I read The Secret History back in 2018 and have plans to reread it. I also have The Goldfinch, which I might get to this year. We will see. The Little Friend clocked in at 25 hours and 53 minutes (555 pages). Did I love it? Eh, not “love,” but I did really like it. I am truly impressed with what Tartt accomplished with this book. It felt like To Kill a Mockingbird, a very, very long To Kill a Mockingbird without a trial. The story centers on a spitfire of a girl, Harriett, who felt very much like Scout to me, and her friend Hely, filling the Jem character’s spot. Who spent a summer (I think) running wild in Alexandria, Mississippi in the early 70s. I say I think, because I had trouble with the timeline. It felt like one really long summer, but she dropped some details that confused me. She said they were watching Dark Shadows, which ran from 1966 to 1971, but also The Price is Right, which premiered in 1972. She also mentioned Star Wars action figures, and they weren’t at thing until 1977. I’m sure there’s a subreddit on it. I just need to look for it. Anyway, the book was hard to listen to because of the overt racism, but that was the point. The language and attitudes were just awful. Tartt didn’t hold back. I think the biggest difference with this one compared to The Secret History, was that I liked these characters. The Secret History is notoriously about awful people doing awful things. I read These Violent Delights by Micah Nemerever in 2024. I am interested in how I’ll feel about The Secret History having Nemerever’s characters in my head. Sorry, off topic. Again, I am really happy I finally got to The Little Friend. I’m not sure it is a book I’d tell everyone to read. I don’t know if people would have the patience for it. I liked the characters enough that it didn’t feel like a slog to me. I have no idea how I’ll feel about The Goldfinch. We will see.

Okay, that was a lot. I started this, hours ago, thinking it was going to be short. Nope. May has been a banger. I’m definitely going to have tons to say.

Starting to feel summer vibes ✌️🏖️

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Midnight, at the War by Devi S. Laskar

The cover caught my eye first, then the title, and they got me with female reporter. Midnight, at the War follows this female reporter in an undisclosed region of the Middle East as she tries to balance the demands of her male-dominated job with the strain it places on her romantic life and family relationships, all against the backdrop of both old and emerging wars.

This is one of the few times the Goodreads description reveals more than I would have liked. I started the book knowing only that it followed a reporter in a war zone, and I’m glad I knew so little. That let me experience events alongside Rita, the protagonist. As the story begins in early 2001, she faces a series of challenges under the shadow of a looming event she does not yet see. As a reader, that darkness on the horizon adds an extra level of anxiety to everything Rita navigates.

For me, as a bit of a news junkie, the element I enjoyed in particular was watching Rita find her story. Usually, we get a reporter’s POV when they are trying to solve some kind of crime or uncover a conspiracy. Here Laskar let us watch Rita work. We got to see how she found her stories in the streets of this undisclosed city and all the random people she came in contact with. I got to see how a reporter sniffs out a story.

There’s more to this story than the war. Rita’s life is messy, she’s not a perfect woman, and Laskar lays it all out for us to see, which I appreciated. Sneha Mathan did the narration, and I think captured Rita perfectly. Not all narrators’ voices fit the characters they read. Here Mathan matched Rita’s maturity and intelligence. It was cool to see she does the narration for The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny.

Midnight, at the War was a satisfying surprise. I am thrilled I was able to get the AAC from Mariner Books.

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I am excited that Algeria is the starting point for my Reading Around the World tour. It is perfect because I knew nothing of Algeria’s history that reaches back through the French occupation, the Ottoman Empire, and even to the Romans. To have such a history that goes even further back to its original formation, Numidia in 202 BC. Numidia was a North African kingdom that came and went like many others in the area over the next centuries until 1516, when the Regency of Algiers was formed and existed under the reach of the Ottoman Empire. It was in 1830 that the French invaded and established French Algeria which held the region until the Algerian War of Independence (1954 to 1962). In 1962 the People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria was established in the wake of the people’s victory over France.

Full disclosure, I had already read The Stranger by French Algerian Albert Camus, but when I saw A Bookshop in Algiers by Kaouther Adimi, I decided to make it, what I’ll call my spotlight book for Algeria. The award-winning Kaouther Adimi was born in Algeria in 1986. She lived in Algeria until 2009, and at that time she moved to Paris. Fun fact, she splits her time as a writer with working for the L’Oreal Foundation. I think she’s one of the rare people in the world with a double major (modern literature and human resource management) who has managed to have careers in both areas. Impressive, to say the least.

Kaouther Adimi

Adimi’s A Bookshop in Algiers (pub. 2017) weaves together three different narratives. The first is the perspective of a young man, Ryad, who is tasked with cleaning out Les Vraies Richesses (Our True Wealth) bookshop. Les Vraies Richesses was a real bookshop opened by French Algerian publisher Edmond Charlot (1915-2004) whose journal excerpts make up the second thread of the book. The third is a fictionalized narrative Adimi created from interviews she conducted with some of Charlot’s contemporaries. The result gives us a glimpse at the beginning and the end of this historic bookshop.

The book follows Charlot from the days leading up to his first publications in 1936, through his trials during WWII and into the Algerian War of Independence. Through his journals we got to see the stress he was under. Publishing is a tough business. Even more so, when you’re a small imprint working in a closet trying to get the work out. In our world of ones and zeros it is hard to imagine paper being an extravagance and its acquisition the challenge of the day. Toss in some big literary personalities, and the Nazis and Vichy regime. Demanding to say the least.

It was in the wake of the war that Algerians became understandably bitter having given up their lives to fight on behalf of France, only to be kept second-class citizens in their own country. (sounds familiar) Charlot’s publishing career began to wane during Algeria’s war against France, and it was at this fracture point that Charlot handed over the running of the bookshop to his sister-in-law and left Algeria permanently for France. That’s where we leave the bookshop to pick it up again in 2017 with Ryad’s story.

This book explored two things I love, history and writing, even better writers in history. What it didn’t do was give me much of a sense of the Algerian culture. It did open the door to a country through the sharing of its history which made me want to know more. Specifically, I am interested in learning more about the Ottoman Empire. I just read The Great Fortune by Olivia Manning which takes place in Bucharest, Romania. Romania also spent time under the Ottoman Empire. Another road has been opened to me, but I’m not done with Algeria yet.

Charlot was instrumental in getting many authors writing into the world, not the least of which was Albert Camus. There are so many names dropped in this book, and only a few I heard of. This is one of the few books I’ve read recently that has introduced me to new writers, which is so much fun. I have picked up a couple new books inspired by A Bookshop in Algiers. Camus’ Personal Writings, which includes the first stories Charlot published. The other book I got is The Immoralist by the French author André Gide who Charlot also worked with. Both Gide and Camus went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.

And because the internet is creepy, I’m adding this painting that came through my feed while I was reading the book.

Anders Zorn — "Man and boy in Algiers"

This was so much fun and satisfying. I’ve already left Algeria for my next destination, but I’ll be back. I’m tagging along with Elizabeth @plantbasedbride on her travels. She has a spinner wheel that landed on the Philippines. I’m about halfway through my choice and hope to have another post up next month. ✌️

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Odessa by Gabrielle Sher

Off the bat, I’ll say I really liked this and gave it 4 stars. This book came to me at just the right time. Mostly because I had just read a book that was an excellent primer for this read, which was Motherland by Julia Ioffe. Gabrielle Sher’s story takes place in pre-WWII Odessa, Ukraine at a time where Jewish people were being murdered by Cossacks in a series of pogroms. Why Julia Ioffe’s book was so helpful to me is that she had explained some of Ukraine’s history, so I had a general understanding of this specific time. As someone who is not Jewish, I needed to know going in who the Cossacks were and what a pogrom was. I was grateful for that. Although it might be enough to know that Cossacks were bad and pogroms were when Cossacks murdered people. For me, knowing the history made this story even more terrifying because it happened in our real world.

What Gabrielle does is take this horrific history and uses a golem from Jewish folklore to, let’s say, even the battlefield a bit. She layers the history, the tragedy of the events inflicted on this Jewish community, with folklore and focuses in on a family struggling through all of it. It is a nightmare scenario, and I was desperate for this family to make it out whole. She also did an excellent job with the atmosphere and her descriptions of the physical world and how it was mutated by the mysticism used to create the golem.

I mostly appreciated that this historical horror was set in a time and place that we haven’t heard from. It was a fresh setting. It was full of emotional horror and physical descriptions that gave me the ick. I appreciate NetGalley giving me the opportunity to listen and review this terrific book.

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Denise Mina

I finished up the last two books in the Alex Morrow series, so that’s done. Then I was able to get her latest book, The Good Liar. She has two other series, Anna & Fin and Garnett Hill, which I also want to read.

The Red Road

This was the penultimate book in the series. The subject matter was a bit hard to read but it was timely in this age of Epstein.

Blood Salt Water

This one was more fun, but I will say that it had an abrupt ending that was in no way satisfying for Alex, our main character. Truth be told, this series is more about the crimes than any one character. Alex just happens to be a thread that runs through all of the books. Still, I was left wanting some kind of sendoff for her. Oh, well.

The Good Liar

This one was released last year, and unfortunately, I didn’t get on with it. I’ve had a couple, including the book I am listening to now, where the narrator has been a bit off for me. There were some voices, like the main character’s sister, that she did a really good job with, but others took me out of the story. It doesn’t happen very often where the narrator ruins the book for me. I was thinking of maybe doing a post listing my least favorite audiobooks. Anyway, I was disappointed and gave it three stars.

Some 2026 releases

A Box Full of Darkness by Simone St. James

The Storm by Rachel Hawkins

This House Will Feed by Maria Tureaud

Both Simone St. James and Rachel Hawkins are automatic reads for me, and I was not expecting books from them this year. I was very excited to read both of these and back-to-back no less. A Box Full of Darkness is probably going to be on my favorite list of the year. It was all my favorite things. When people talk about a cozy read, this was a cozy read for me. It was a ghost story that people who liked the Netflix House on Haunted Hill would love. Lots of family drama, so good. Simone thanked Stephen King in her acknowledgements, which I think was perfect. She’s starting to build a world around the town of Fell she’s created, which is very much like King’s Derry.

Rachel Hawkins is a different situation for me. Her books can be a bit much. The funny thing about The Storm was I think it lacked the ridiculousness that a couple of her other books had. I understand that it is a fine line to tread and some, like Riley Sager, can push it way too far for my taste. I think The Storm was just fine. It wasn’t bad it just didn’t have that special sauce that Rachel normally has. I want to do an author’s spotlight on her since I’ve read all her books.

This House Will Feed was an unexpected read. Fern read it and made it sound intriguing. It was really good. It takes place during the Irish Potato Famine and is both gothic and a bit of Irish folklore. I also learned some things about Irish history, which is always fun. I didn’t know it was a 2026 release and was surprised to get my hands on it so quickly.

Two very different books set during COVID

Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood

I picked this up because she has a book coming out this year, The Natural Way of Things, that I want to read and am waiting for on Libby. I remembered that this one was on the Booker Short List in 2024, so I grabbed it.

I was going to try and explain it but this is way better than anything I could say.

A woman abandons her city life and marriage to return to the place of her childhood, holing up in a small religious community hidden away on the stark plains of the Monaro. She does not believe in God, doesn’t know what prayer is, and finds herself living this strange, reclusive life almost by accident.

It was good, but not a fun read by any stretch. She presents very real emotions and personal history and explores them in a way that isn’t tidy. The book also takes place in the Australian Outback, which is prime for isolation. COVID lockdown doesn’t feel restrictive when you’re already self-isolating.

Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker

I feel so bad. I wanted to love this. I really did. The story was really good, but for whatever reason I just didn’t gel with it. It had all the elements to be a favorite. I just didn’t love it. I’m going to leave the description to Goodreads.

Cora Zeng is a crime scene cleaner, washing away the remains of brutal murders and suicides in Chinatown. The bloody messes don’t bother her, not when she’s already witnessed the most horrific thing possible: her sister being pushed in front of a train.

Cora’s crazy job and the loss of her sister happen against the backdrop of COVID and the Asian hate that was unleashed at that time. I appreciate what Kylie was saying and genuinely enjoyed the book. I just didn’t love it like it was hyped. That said, I am extremely excited for her new book coming out this month, Japanese Gothic. I’m already on Libby’s waiting list, #58 in line. I’m ready!

Murderland by Caroline Fraser

So, last month I read Motherland by Julia Ioffe. This month it was Murderland. OMG. These two are the best non-fiction books I’ve read in ages. The bar has been raised. I do not know how anything will come close to being as satisfying as these two books. In fact, I’ve started (just barely) 1929 by Andrew Ross Sorkin and I’m low key worried that it isn’t going to hold my attention. I hadn’t heard of Murderland until last year’s Goodreads Choice Awards. Caroline Fraser looks at what might link the serial killers that hunted in the Pacific Northwest. What made this extra special for me is that Caroline is from the Northwest, as am I. She grew up on Mercer Island. Caroline takes the time to also tell the history of the area. She talked about things I knew, but also a lot I didn’t know.

Trigger Warning: I really appreciated how Caroline handled the subject matter of this book. Serial killers have been romanticized in our culture for decades. I thought she found the right balance of being honest about what happened to victims without dwelling on it.

12 for 26 TBR Challenge

The Great Fortune by Olivia Manning

I’m not doing a super great job of keeping this challenge to one a month, but I am getting through them. My first book was A Bookshop in Algiers. I was able to finish The Great Fortune, my second book on the list just last week. Yay! This book is actually the first in a trilogy. I only put the first book on my 12 for 26 TBR, but my intention is to read all three this year.

The trilogy is loosely based on Olivia’s own experiences during WWII. Olivia and her husband were British expats in Romania at the start of the war. I learned a lot from this book. Not only because the characters were based on real people, but it was set in a corner of Europe that I was unfamiliar with. The war felt far from Budapest until it wasn’t. Their story will eventually take them from Romania to Greece. I’m enjoying it. It has also been on my bookshelf for a couple of years. It feels good to get it off the list.

Project 1900s

I’m doing a separate post on these, so I will just say that I wasn’t even going to include Lord Jim on my 1900 list, and now it has spawned this whole side project. Lord Jim totally shocked me with how good it was. It was so good, I immediately read Heart of Darkness. It was not as good as Lord Jim, but it surpassed my expectations. I also got The Wager, which I’ve had on my TBR for a couple of years. It was a crazy true story set at sea that also taught me a ton.

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad

The Wager by David Grann

Time has been so crazy. March felt like it went by in a blink. Yet when I look at this list some of the books felt like I read them months ago. My TBR is bursting at the moment. I’m trying not to feel overwhelmed. The point is not to go as fast as you can, but to enjoy them.

Slow and steady. ✌️

March vibes - this was on repeat

Note: My original idea was to do one post including everything I read for each year of Project 1900. Turns out things have expanded a bit with the other titles for this first year of the 20^th Century, so I’m going to do it book by book instead.

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L Frank Baum

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It is funny to think that there was a time before we, as in the collective consciousness we all share, knew of the Land of Oz. It is just one of those things that’s always been there. Just like there are adults now who’ve only ever lived in a world with Hogwarts. I often think of something Kevin Feige, the head of Marvel Studios, said when asked what his definition of success was. The question suggested that there was a dollar amount that would indicate if one of the films was a success. Feige said that true success would be determined with time, if the movie is watched by future generations. L. Frank Baum achieved that level of success. Oz lives on, and 126 years later it is as popular as ever.

Honestly, it surprised me to see that the book had been released in 1900. I couldn’t imagine what the children in 1900 thought of this magical place called Oz. We have lived in a world filled with magical lands like Middle Earth and Narnia. I can only think of the Lilliputians in Gulliver’s Travels that predate Oz, but there may be more than that. The 20th century was definitely an age of magic and the expansion of creativity that got us all the way to the moon.

When I first started to think about what I wanted to research about this book the question that popped into my head was – What did the children think of the flying monkeys? Were children traumatized like I was? LOL It turns out that the scary Winged Monkeys were a creation of the filmmakers. Not the Winged Monkeys themselves, but the idea that the Wicked Witch had these creatures, these minions, that could snatch you where you stood and carry you away. This was terrifying to me. The grabbing of Dorothy and her friends was the scariest scene in the movie. I thought for sure this scene would have been just as scary in the book. Yeah, no.

The Winged Monkeys in the book were completely different. The book explains how the Wicked Witch of the West had possession of a gold cap. This cap granted her three wishes, if you will, that allowed her to call upon the Winged Monkeys. Three times she could ask them to do her bidding. Collecting Dorothy and her friends was the last wish the Wicked Witch of the West used. This changed the whole dynamic. In the end, the Winged Monkeys were there to help Dorothy get home. They weren’t scary at all. So silly.

Baum’s intro to Oz said that he purposefully omitted the darkness of the Grimm Brother’s fairy tales, as he felt the “modern” child had enough to fear. Yeah, but it was still pretty dark even without the scary flying monkeys. Dorothy and her friends had to deal with beasts, real and imagined. In one scene the Tin Man chopped the head off a wolf the Wicked Witch has sent to kill the group. My old ass cringed at that.

As always, Wikipedia came through with info that I truly didn’t know. Like the gem I’m going to drop right here.

In 1986, seven Fundamentalist Christian families in Tennessee opposed the novel’s inclusion in the public school syllabus and filed a lawsuit.^[49] They based their opposition to the novel on its depicting benevolent witches and promoting the belief that integral human attributes were “individually developed rather than God-given”.^[49] One parent said: “I do not want my children seduced into godless supernaturalism.”^[50] Other reasons included the novel’s teaching that females are equal to males and that animals are personified and can speak. The judge ruled that when the novel was being discussed in class, the parents were allowed to have their children leave the classroom.^[51]

I’m sorry, you’re objecting to the idea that women are equal to men?!! WT actual F! These are the same type of people who had a problem with Harry Potter and would probably be beside themselves at the spectacle surrounding Wicked. What I personally had a problem with – besides a wolf’s head being chopped off - was the end. Not only did the Scarecrow get his diploma, but he takes the place as the “ruler” of The Emerald City. The Tin Man got his heart and became the “ruler” over Winkie County, a place that didn’t make it into the film. The Cowardly Lion got his crown and became the “ruler” of all the forest animals. Why did they all need to be rewarded with subjects to rule over? I thought that was weird and I didn’t like it.

Circling back to the Avengers and Harry Potter, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was hot IP back in its day. The book was a success when it came out in 1900, was followed by a Broadway musical in 1902 and then our beloved Wizard of Oz in 1939. I want to hold here for a second because what also freaked me out was seeing the movie came out in 1939. Why is that blowing my mind? For whatever reason, I would have guessed it came out post WWII. – Anyway, Baum went on to write 13 more Oz books. The world Baum created is the gift that keeps on giving from The Wiz to Wicked.

Lastly, I will say that the other books I’ve read for 1900 have inspired further reading. I bought Gregory Maguire’s Wicked back in the 1990s and it sat unread on my shelf for, I think I can say, decades. I finally unhauled it a few years ago. I was glad I listened to the Anne Hathaway version of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz on Audible. Honestly, tho, I don’t have any desire to read Wicked or see the films. I’m good.

I have two more books for the year 1900, which I have already read. I hope to have them up in April.

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The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

The Thirteenth Tale has been on my TBR for years. Setterfield has written a story for all of us Gothic story lovers. It centers around Angelfield House and the Mercer family who have lived in it for generations. I should have loved it but for whatever reason I didn’t get emotionally invested in the family. She was able to deliver all the Gothic vibes. She just didn’t hit it out of the park for me.

There is a movie adaptation, tho. Christopher Hampton, who did the Dangerous Liaisons stage and film adaptation of Le Liaisons Dangereuses, did one for The Thirteenth Tale. I really want to watch it, but unfortunately it isn’t available anywhere at the moment.

Trouble With Lichen by John Wyndham

Trouble With Lichen is about two different scientists (a man and a woman) that independently discover a property in lichen that creates a drug that slows down the aging process. It looks at what the two scientists do with their findings, how the people around them react and then eventually the world. It looks at the ethics surrounding a drug like this. Both scientists have different priorities when it comes to how the drug is distributed. Wyndham asks big questions and gives the reader a lot to think about.

Chocky is the last book I need to read of his novels, but I also have The Outward Urge, which he wrote under a pseudonym. I’m almost done with this project. Yay!

The Missing Half by Ashley Flowers

I had this suspended (I’m kinda diggin’ this new feature) in Libby and decided to give it a try. I had heard a few people say they liked it. I guess Ashley Flowers does a true crime podcast called Crime Junkie. I haven’t listened to it. The Missing Half is her second novel and is about two women who both have missing sisters. One approaches the other with hopes that their cases might be connected. It was fine. Mostly because I had seen a UK series that had the same twist at the end. I kind of saw it coming. The TV show was so good. I feel bad comparing them, they weren’t anywhere close to the same level of storytelling. I’m glad I got to this one and can have my own opinion.

The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe

I picked this up because I was so impressed with Ruth Wilson’s reading of Madeline Miller’s Galatea. It was short and “free” on Audible. No joke, I was shook. She did an amazing job with this. I mean, I love her as an actress, but what she does with her voice is … stunning. I am so impressed. I love her. It was a short and perfectly chilling tale.

A Bookshop in Algiers by Kaouther Adimi

This was my first Reading Around the World book. I don’t want to say too much about it because I am going to write up a whole thing. There’s so much to say about this book and where this book has led me. I will just say that it is a dual timeline book that’s about, you guessed it, a bookshop in Algiers. A young man is tasked with closing it down, but we see through the time jumps the history of the man, Edmond Charlot, who opened it. It combines the fictional young man’s story and the true story of Edmond Charlot. Adimi combines the history of Algeria, excerpts from Charlot’s journals and stories she obtained from interviews she did with his contemporaries. I loved it so much. I want to read more from Kaouther Adimi.

The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson

Splendid and the Vile looks at the first year of Winston Churchill’s time as Prime Minister. It was an insane year that spanned Dunkirk, the Battle of Brittain, the Blitz and ended with Pearl Harbor. This was such a good book! I could go on and on about it, but I’ll stick to two things. First, I had always heard of the Battle of Britain but never knew what it was. Now I do and understand why the Germans weren’t able to invade Britain. Secondly, Larson goes into detail how Churchill had spent a year begging Roosevelt and the Americans for help. It was upsetting to read, and I couldn’t help but compare Churchill to Zelenskyy. Terrible.

I am working my way through Erik Larson’s books. I’ve read In the Garden of Beasts, Dead Wake and Thunderstruck. It is silly that the one I was the most anxious to read, The Devil in the White City, is the one I haven’t read yet. I’m going to do it next.

Motherland by Julia Ioffe

Motherland is Julia Ioffe’s masterpiece. No need to under hype this book. I’d known Julia from her punditry on MSNBC and other places and always liked her. I got excited when I heard about her new book. OMG, I was not prepared for what she delivered. Julia was born in the Soviet Union and came to the US after the curtain fell. What she does in this book is tell two stories. One centered on the women in her family and the other of the “First Ladies” of Russia/USSR. I’m not gonna lie, it is a brutal read but an important one. She takes us from the Russian Revolution through to Putin. What women went through. She packs so much into this book. Not a page is wasted. A stunning achievement.

Jess Walter

I have a confession to make. When Beautiful Ruins was all the rage and I saw the cover everywhere – I totally thought Jess Walter was a woman. I also thought Beautiful Ruins was a Shirley Valentine … woman goes to Italy and has an adventure story. LOL Not even close!!!

But my journey with Jess Walter started with his latest book, So Far Gone.

So Far Gone

It was the cover that drew me in. I liked it and then saw it was written by Jess. I thought, “Oh, this might actually be good.” You know, “she” had a lot of success with Beautiful Ruins. Turns out, Jess, the man, wrote a hell of a yarn that was quite entertaining. So Far Gone is about a guy who’s living alone in a cabin in the woods because the world has gone crazy. I’m sure you can relate. Then one day his two grandkids are dropped off at his door because their mom, his daughter, is kind of missing. What ensues is a crazy hunt for his daughter. It is funny and a bit of a nailbiter. I got anxious. I loved it. The fantastic Edoardo Ballerini did the narration and captured the humor perfectly. The book is filled with such great characters. I went into it blind, well, blinder then blind, and got such a surprise. So good. Loved it.

Beautiful Ruins

So, of course I had to listen to Beautiful Ruins. LOL I had no clue what this book was about. This one was also narrated by Edoardo Ballerini. He’s truly one of the best. Oh man, this one is hard to even explain it covers so much time, territory and characters.

I’ll let Audible do it.

The acclaimed, award-winning author of the national bestseller The Financial Lives of the Poets returns with his funniest, most romantic, and most purely enjoyable novel yet: the story of an almost-love affair that begins on the Italian coast in 1962 . . . and is rekindled in Hollywood fifty years later.

It was romantic and I cried. It’s a lot. You know, books come to you when they do. I’m happy I now know everything that was packed into Beautiful Ruins. It was a bestseller for a reason. So good.

Denise Mina

There’s also a bit of a story with Denise Mina. Back in 2011 a trilogy that Mina had written was made into a TV show. It was called The Field of Blood. It was really good, only it got cancelled before they did the third book. I was left hanging, but I was able to get my hands on the third book, Slip of the Knife. Happily, ever after. Last month I was clicking around Book Outlet and saw her name and now I’ve listened to six of her books in about a month.

You might have figured out from the titles; she does crime thriller type books. I got Still Midnight, which was the first in her Alex Morrow series, from Libby. I got through the first three in February and have already finished the last two. Alex Morrow (a woman, mother, wife) is a detective inspector in Glasgow. The first two were my favorites, but they were all really good.

Still Midnight

The End of Wasp Season

Gods and Beasts

Then for something completely different, I saw Audible had a short story she did for “free” and I grabbed it.

Rizzio

This recounts the night where Lord Darnley, the husband of Mary Queen of Scots, took part in the assassination of David Rizzio, the queen’s private secretary. This is a true story. I saw the Saoirse Ronan Mary Queen of Scots movie and the scene was brutal. That said, I thought Mina upped her game on this. I was impressed with how she captured the viciousness of the event.

That’s it for February, now that we’re halfway through March. I’m ready for Spring. Hopefully things will calm down, and I can get my routine back. My March reading has been epic so far. I need to sort out my thoughts. My reading has been a bit scattered.

Just when we thought things couldn’t get worse … ✌️

I might be biased, but I don’t think I am. The list speaks for itself.

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I’m Batman

1989 will forever be the year of Batman. There’s what came before Batman and everything that came after. Tim Burton created this strange mix of camp and noir. Batman was nostalgic as far as comics and 60s TV, but Burton gave us something we hadn’t seen before. It blew everything open, not the least of which was box office potential. I understand that the numbers don’t seem that big of a deal compared to our current world market, but its $251,188,924 ($656,579,487 today) gross was a huge deal at the time.

The Last Crusade & Lethal Weapon 2

It is funny because when I think of 89 as a year it is always Batman, but when I think of the summer of 89 it is Last Crusade and Lethal Weapon 2, especially Last Crusade. I didn’t like Temple of Doom, so getting the gift of Last Crusade still makes my insides all warm and fuzzy. It was as perfect as Raiders. Okay, Mel Gibson’s face and soul haven’t aged well, but back in the day the Lethal Weapon movies were so much fun. The addition of Joe “they fuck you at the drive-thru” Pesci was the tabasco sauce the sequel needed. These movies are quintessential summer blockbusters.

The above are the trifecta, but this, friends, is just the beginning of what 1989 gave us.

Wait, was that really a summer movie?

There are some movies that have that fun summer vibe and will always remind you of the hours you were able to escape the heat of the day in a dark, perfectly chilled movie theater. Then there are movies that you associate with fall, escaping the rain, that warm cozy feeling. Come to find out these were, in fact, originally summer movies. WTF?!! When Harry Met Sally (RIP Reiner) was a summer movie?!!! Yep, it came out on July 21, 1989. That is insane to me. Also, Dead Poets Society, which is the movie equivalent of The Secret History in Dark Academia world came out on June 2, 1989. Also, shockingly the 10^th highest grossing movie of the year.

Oh, Keanu

1989 was also the year I fell so very, very hard for Keanu. We got both Bill & Ted’s (Most) Excellent Adventure and Parenthood. I have so many lines running through my head – “Strange things are afoot at the Circle K.” Bill & Ted were such a gift. It also makes me think about how 1989 was a shifting point for teen films. It was the year we got Heathers and Say Anything, which broke from the John Hughes formula we’d had for so many years. John Hughes was even done with John Hughes films and gave us Uncle Buck in 89.

Sex, Lies & Sundance

This was also the year we got the beginning of the indie film as we know it today. Sex, Lies & Videotape with its $1.2 million budget broke through to the mainstream. Me, a card-carrying movie nerd, had never heard of the Sundance Festival (it was pre-internet, tho) before 1989. We didn’t just get Soderberg that year, but we also got Gus van Sant’s Drugstore Cowboy AND Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing. We also got our introduction to Daniel Day Lewis with My Left Foot. I mean, really? This was definitely the dawn of a new age in film.

Sequels and then more sequels

I’m just going to put this here because I was shook by the number of sequels that came out this year beyond Last Crusade and Lethal Weapon II.

Back to the Future II

Ghostbusters II

Star Trek V

License to Kill

National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation

There were more than these, but I totally forgot about Ghostbusters II and Star Trek. I remembered Back to the Future II being a Christmas movie but not that particular Christmas.

Feel goodies

The Fabulous Baker Boys, Field of Dreams, and Always were a few I wanted to mention because they were movies that still give me those warm and fuzzy feelings. I loved Fabulous Baker Boys. Jeff Bridges and Michelle Pfieffer sizzled. So good. Field of Dreams is what America thinks America is like – baseball and apple pie. Always was the last we got of Audrey Hepburn and has one of my favorite film quotes of all time. “Something smells fishy and I don’t think it’s the chicken.”

WTF? That came out in 1989?!!!

These last two actually SHOCKED me because I wouldn’t have ever guessed they were 1989 films. I may have actually gasped when I saw them on the list. Cameron’s The Abyss. I LOVED The Abyss. Out of all of the movies I’ve mentioned here it is the one I think I am going to watch – maybe this week. I might also do Last Crusade. Somehow, The Abyss got lost in the shadow of Batman and everything else and I feel bad about it. It’s a classic.

The Little Mermaid …. (mic drop)

I think I’ve made my point.

There are movies you are reminded of where you go, oh yeah, that was good, but you hadn’t thought of it in years/decades. Then there are movies that are part of our collective consciousness, that are foundational to movie history, and beloved by generations. 1989 was bursting with all of the above. I couldn’t do a film retrospective without including it.

Here’s the year by the numbers and the link to Wikipedia’s full list of the movies of 1989.

American Films of 1989

A link to my first post in this series:

Remembering 1990: The movie

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Euphoria published in 2014 and read in 2016

I think it was the cover that first grabbed my eye, all the colors, but it was the blurb that pulled me in. “In 1933 three young, gifted anthropologists are thrown together in the jungle of New Guinea.” Done, sold. It has been 10 years since I read it, and there are three things that have managed to hold on in my memory. First, I have an image of their encampment in my mind and a strong sense of the setting in New Guinea. Second, I remember a long exchange between two of the characters. It was a whole, deep conversation. It impressed me. The third thing is just an anecdote. The New Guinea women that the anthropologists were staying with had to sequester themselves in a hut when they were mensurating. The men in the village didn’t want to acknowledge that the female body did such a thing.

I discovered I had written a review in Goodreads.

Let’s face it love stories can be superficial. Two people meet, and they “fall in love”. What is the basis of that love? Do they even know? There’s an attraction, sure, but is there something more than that? The center of Euphoria is a love story and one that has struck me as rather unique. Two people fall in love, and you get to see why they love each other, not just how. It is utterly romantic in a way we don’t get to see very often. Two people falling in love with each other’s minds, who have an intellectual connection as much as a physical one, perhaps even more.

I understand that not everyone will think it’s as great as I do, and there’s something elusive to me that keeps me from giving it a full five stars. Still, I enjoyed it immensely and am taking a lot away with me. For me, this is a book that won’t be read and forgotten.

I didn’t forget the book, but I totally forgot about my review. Anyway, that was my introduction to Lily King.

Five Tuesdays in Winter published in 2021 and read in 2023

It was seven years later when I listened to Lily’s collection of short stories, Five Tuesdays in Winter. Short story collections are always difficult because you rarely get one that you love all the stories. This was the case here. My memory is fragmented at best. I gave it three stars and also wrote a review. Side note: I have 267 reviews in Goodreads and can’t remember any of them. Weird. I’d say with this collection that it is diverse and people will find at least one they connect with.

Heart the Lover published in 2025 and read in 2025

Before I got Heart the Lover, I had actually purchased The English Teacher and Writers & Lovers on Audible. I created a TBR in Audible to remind myself of the books I have that I want to read most, both of which are on that list. Yet, I hadn’t gotten to them yet. That said, when I saw she had a new book out last year I jumped on it and got to it right away. I am so happy I did because I loved it so much and it was one of my top three favorite books of 2025.

The first line: You knew I’d write a book about you someday.

Two of my BookTubers, Syd and Sarah, have been sharing their experiences going to author talks and I started to question my life choices. Why am I not doing this? Third Place Books, which is 15 minutes away from my house, do a lot of them, and I saw back in December that they were going to host Lily King. I went.

To prepare for her talk I decided I needed to read both the Audible titles that were sitting there waiting for me.

The English Teacher published in 2005 and read in 2026

I picked The English Teacher first. OMG!! This book wrecked me. What a rollercoaster of emotions. It is about a, you guessed it, English teacher, whose never been married but has a teenage son who goes to the school she teaches at. The book starts with her marrying a widower with children and the blending of their two families. It flows out from there to look at loss and the gaps they have in their lives. I think this is a book that might polarize people. I had strong emotions, but I think other people might have different potentially strong emotions. I’m kind of afraid to read the comments. I like my feelings and don’t really want to hear people hate on it.

Writers & Lovers published in 2020 and read in 2026

Writers & Lovers could have easily been titled Love & Loss because that’s what our main girl, Casey, is dealing with. Love in a multitude of forms and loss that changes that love. This was a five-star read. I am more than a little disappointed in myself that I got to it so late. I should have read it years ago, but here we are.

I’ll leave the blurbing to the professionals:

Funny and heartbreaking, Writers & Lovers by Lily King is the bitingly clever story of Casey, a young writer who has lost her direction in life, until two men step into her world and offer her two very different futures.

I felt well prepared to go see Lily’s talk. It wasn’t a Q&A situation, which Lily seemed a little dismayed at. She started with a reading from Heart the Lover and then shared some anecdotes about the writing process. She decided beforehand that spending the bulk of the time on audience questions was the way to go. I, being me, had a question. While she was talking, I thought about what I would ask. What came to mind was how nostalgic The English Teacher and Writers & Lovers made me feel. I’m not a nostalgic person, so I found it weird that I had that reaction. The English Teacher took place during the Iran Hostage Crisis in the early 80s. I think things are so crazy now, we are all nostalgic for simpler times. Writers & Lovers was a 90s story. I also wondered if her feelings towards her books changed at all. Lastly, I reread The Great Gatsby because of Heart the Lover. The main character is called Daisy and then Jordan in reference to the two main female characters in Gatsby. So, I raised my hand.

I didn’t think I’d get selected, but a lady who was sitting a couple of rows behind me got the gal with the microphone to pick me. It was so weird. First, I thanked her for getting me to reread Gatsby. She perked up at this and asked me what I thought. OMG! On the spot in front of somewhere around 100 people. Another lady had asked her about propulsion in stories because she felt Heart the Lover was hard to put down. It made me think, on the spot, about how I felt that Fitzgerald’s writing pulled you along, like sentence to sentence. I mean, what do you say? I asked about nostalgia and her feelings about her own work. She gave short but telling answers. She said that she’s heard people refer to her work as nostalgic but doesn’t feel that when she’s writing. Later I thought that nostalgia is so personal and something rather large to unpack. Then she said, because I had brought up The English Teacher, she had written it in the early 2000s and hadn’t thought about it since. This was kind of a throw away answer, but it really struck me. A writer puts so much into a book to then never really think about it again. She’s on to the next one. I find that extraordinary. Lily was so sweet. I am thrilled I went. I now know this is something I can do and do easily.

The best part of the talk was it got me to read those two other books. They were both so good. I also want to reread Heart the Lover. I think about another author spotlight I did on Charlotte McConaghy and how Charlotte’s writing gives me the same emotional response. They both create such well-drawn characters and then put them through the ringer. I guess I have a type.

Lily does have two more books I can read - The Pleasing Hour (1999) and Father of the Rain (2010). I am a completist, so I will get to them hopefully sooner rather than later.

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I’m trying something a little different.

Galatea by Madeline Miller

Galatea is a short story Madeline Miller put out in 2013. I have a physical copy that I totally could have read, but instead I listened to the Audible version. Mainly because it was performed by Ruth Wilson. Ruth is one of my favorite actresses, and she did an amazing job. I liked the story. It was too short to gush too much about it. I will say that in the last year or so I’ve listened to four books narrated by Jessie Buckley, and she also does a really good job. Ruth also read the latest incarnation of His Dark Materials. I’m tempted to listen. It really isn’t my jam, tho.

Further Readings:

Circe by Madeline Miller – I loved Circe when I read it back in 2020. I am desperate to reread it along with The Secret History.

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller – BookTube LOVES Song of Achilles. I need to get on it.

Clytemnestra by Costanza Casati – I have this on my shelf. I got it in a subscription box. It’s on my TBR.

Haunting of Paynes Hollow by Kelley Armstrong

This one was alright. I gave it a generous four-stars. It was one of the nominees for the Goodreads Readers’ Favorite Horror category. I think the thing I appreciated the most was that the romance in the story was realistic. The trope of a couple getting together when people are dying around them is absurd. I liked how she handled the romance aspect of the story.

Further Reading: It turns out there are a few more nominees I want to read.

Play Nice by Rachel Harrison – Already on hold for me.

Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker – Also already on hold

The Lamb by Lucy Rose – OMG I don’t know what to do with this one. So many people love it, but I just don’t know if I’m up for it. IFYKYK

Blood on her Tongue by Johanna van Veen – This one is also on hold.

Immaculate Conception by Ling Ling Huang – You guessed it – also on hold.

The Good Father by Noah Hawley

I checked this out on Libby back in August when Alien:Earth came out. It was a blind pick. I had no idea what it was about. I just knew Hawley had written some books and was interested in picking one up. I then renewed it and renewed it for almost six months. I wasn’t going to carry it over into 2026! Wow, this book was a lot. Turns out it is about a father whose son assassinates a Senator running for President, or does he? The father can’t believe his son would do such a thing and sets out to prove his innocence. It is a lot. Hawley does this really interesting thing where he has these breaks from the story and does a little history lesson on various shooters. It was fascinating. The book came out in 2012, so it is timely but also predates our current hellscape.

Further Reading:

Before the Fall by Noah Hawley – This was the book that made me aware of Hawley as a writer. It was popular when it came out.

Anthem by Noah Hawley – I have no idea what this is about. It is his latest book, which came out in 2022.

Notes on an Execution by Danya Kukafka – This has been on my TBR for a long time. Fern - @cozyplantlady11 loves this book. A Ted Bundy type is up for execution. His story is told by the women in his life.

Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll – This has also been on hold forever. I will get to it this year. I have to add it since I mentioned Notes on an Execution.

Pet Sematary by Stephen King

Elizabeth - @plantbasedbride got me to read this. I’ve read fourteen books by King. So, I can’t say I’m a superfan. That said, I am really happy I did get to this. First, they released a new edition of it read by Michael C. Hall. Ooof!! He did an amazing job. I loved it. Second, I was totally surprised by the ending. I think it was a solid ending. I saw the movie back in the day but couldn’t remember much about it. King also had an author’s note where he explained that the worst part of the story (I say as a cat lover) was true and happened to his daughter’s cat.

Further Reading:

Graveyard Shift by ML Rio – Elizabeth read Pet Sematary as part of a video she did for Halloween. She read seven books. Graveyard Shift was the other book I hadn’t read. I need to get to this. It is also a book I have a physical copy of and need to read.

If It Bleeds by Stephen King – I’m just going to put this here because it was one of my favorite books of 2025. Like Pet Sematary it totally surprised me. I wasn’t expecting to like it let alone love it.

Sweet Bean Paste by Durian Skegawa

I low key hated this book. I haven’t had much luck with Japanese authors. I would have DNFd it if it wasn’t so short. I know people really like this book. It was even made into a movie. It felt YA to me. There was no subtlety.

Further Reading:

I’m not giving up on Japan. I’ve got three of Mieko Kawakami’s books checked out.

All the Lovers in the Night

Heaven

Breasts and Eggs

I also want to read Sayaka Murata.

Convenience Store Woman

Earthlings

Playing Dead by Julia Heaberlin

I love Julia Heaberlin. She’s one of my go-to authors. I won’t go too deep into her here because I am going to do an author spotlight on her. I will say that mystery/thriller books are a tough category. There’s a lot out there and not all of it is good. I like my thrillers dark with well written characters. Julia ticks those boxes for me, but she might not be everyone’s cup of tea.

Paper Ghosts by Julia Haeberlin – The next one I’ll read

The Missing Half by Ashley Flowers – I have this one currently checked out. I am optimistic. I’ve heard good things from my BookTubers.

Still Midnight by Denise Mina – Mina is a Scottish author, and this is the first in her DIC Alex Morrow series. I have this one on Libby, too. There are five books in this series. We will see how it goes.

Checkout 19 by Claire-Louise Bennett

Last fall I learned about BookOutlet.com. Yeah, not great for a person who needs to not buy so many books. However, I have found some good books scrolling through their site. Books I’ve gotten from Libby. Checkout 19 is one of those books. It is hard to explain what it is, and probably not everyone’s jam. I really liked it, tho. I have an idea for a separate post forming in my head. We will see.

The adventures of a young woman discovering her own genius, through the people she meets--and dreams up--along the way.

Further Reading:

Drifts by Kate Zambreno – This book has the same vibe, and I want to say that both of these books are in the style of Virginia Woolf.

Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf – I need to read some Woolf and find out if I am right.

The Touchstone by Edith Wharton

This book is part of my 1900s series, and I’ll be writing more about it later. It wasn’t a favorite, but it did spark some deeper thought. Glad I was able to get it so easily.

Further Reading:

The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton – This is a Wharton that I’ve had on my TBR for a long time. I have it in Audible. I feel like there’s going to be a lot of Wharton this year.

The Reef by Edith Wharton – This is one I read and really liked. It isn’t as wrenching as her major works.

I Will Write to Avenge My People by Annie Ernaux

This was a journey. I saw the title of this Fitzcarraldo edition and was immediately intrigued and saved it on my Blackwells wish list. I hadn’t heard of Ernaux, it was all about the title. Then at the end of last year I discovered BookTuber, Kate Lee - @KateLee3, and she had Ernaux’s The Years as one of her favorites of 2025. Kate got me to purchase I Will Write to Avenge My People. It turned out that this was a slim volume that was a combination of her Nobel Lecture and a general biography. It was so good. I am now torn between jumping straight to The Years or reading her chronologically. I’m excited to experience her work.

Further Reading:

The Years by Annie Ernaux – I’m so tempted.

A Man’s Place by Annie Ernaux – It is only 90 pages. I could easily start with this one. Hmm.

Every Anxious Wave by Mo Daviau

Dissolution by Nicholas Binge

Impossible by Sarah Lotz

I’m going to talk about these three together because I went on a little kick. I can’t remember where I heard of Every Anxious Wave, but like The Good Father it was one I kept renewing and not listening to. It is about a guy who discovers a time portal of sorts in his closet. It was fun. I liked what Daviau was talking about. Wayne was my favorite character. It was a pretty good time travel story. Then I got Dissolution from scrolling through Book Outlet and was also able to get it on Libby. This one was trippy. A technology has been developed that allows people to access other people’s memories and there by sort of time travel. What I liked most was the main character was an older woman. Impossible was one I had picked up on an Audible sale, I think. It is about two people who meet via an email glitch and fall in love while trading emails. However, when they try to meet IRL they find out they are living in different dimensions. OMG! Quite possibly my new favorite romance of all time. Loved it!

Further Reading:

Ascension by Nicholas Binge – I liked Dissolution enough to want to try more from him. This one sounded interesting.

Sleeping Giants by Sylvian Neuvel – This has been in my Audible library for years. I think it has the same vibes. It is the first in a trilogy. I want to say that the people I know who have read the series liked the first two but didn’t love the final one. IDK, we’ll see.

Bad Actors & Clown Town by Mick Herron

Oh, Mick, God love ya. I am going to do an Author Spotlight on Mick Herron because I’ve had quite a ride with him. Mick is the creator of the books the show Slow Horses is based on. Clown Town is the ninth installment in the series, which came out last year. I wasn’t able to get to it. Mostly because I wanted to listen to Bad Actors first, which came out in 2023. It had been too long and I needed a refresher. I love this series. I have a hot take – I think I love the books more than the show. OMG!! Do I? I think I might. The books move so fast, and the show feels slow to me in comparison. Also, the books are way funnier.

Further Reading:

Read all the Slough House books. They are such a fun ride.

The English Teacher by Lily King

Writers & Lovers by Lily King

I am going to do an Author Spotlight on Lily King for my next post. I will have lots to say about both of these books. This post is pretty long so I’ll save it.

Further Reading:

Heart the Lover by Lily King – One of my top three favorites of last year. Love it!

Tom Lake by Ann Patchett – This is one I’ve been dancing around but hadn’t officially put on my TBR. Lily made me add it, so it is now officially on the list.

I’ve read over 800 books and am inching my way to 1000. There are so many books I’ve read and still want to read. I thought I would share what those books are. I also struggle with describing books. There are some people, like Reagan - @PeruseProject, who have a gift for punchy short book summaries. I don’t. So, I’ve made each title a link to the Goodreads page where you can get a summary. Let me know what you think.

The (summer) vibes are back. ✌️

📍Hey, you might want to remember this.

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We came into January talking about Epstein and we left it talking about Epstein and a shit ton happened in between.

Operation Venezuela

On January 3^rd the US went in and abducted President Maduro and his wife. I thought the bombing of the boats was bad! There are two things I want to say about this. First, nothing has changed for the people of Venezuela. It is as corrupt as ever. Second, according to Reuters (I’ve put the link below) 100 people died. A 100 people died for no reason. The whole thing was so dangerously stupid.

Venezuela’s interior minister says 100 people died in U.S. attack | Reuters

Cutting the Vax Schedule

On January 5^th the CDC announced the new vaccine schedule for children. I am a medical coder and see parents making the decision whether or not to vaccinate their children every day. I am heartened that most parents still fully vaccinate their children, but I continually see parents opting out. As a fully vaccinated adult with no children, this really doesn’t affect me personally. It does, however, break my heart that there will be children struck by unnecessary illness solely because their parents were blessed to live through a period where these illnesses weren’t ravaging people and didn’t know better.

CDC Acts on Presidential Memorandum to Update Childhood Immunization Schedule | CDC Newsroom

I also wanted to include this fantastic Bulwark video. Dr. Paul Offit goes into detail about how vaccines are vetted. It is good to have this kind of info in your back pocket if you ever find yourself talking to someone about vaccines. Share the video.

Renee Good

On January 7^th Renee Good was shot and killed by ICE. (big sigh) Awful, but not unexpected. I think the administration was disappointed one of theirs weren’t killed first. That would be the ideal scenario for them. They are desperately waiting for their opportunity to use the Insurrection Act. As someone who is terrified of guns, this tragedy fuels my fear. The bigger picture here is that Renee Good is dead, and Kristi Noem and JD Vance lied to us about it. Double the same.

Also, thank God for the people out there armed with their phones. I am deeply grateful for their bravery.

Threatening the Fed Chair

On January 11^th Fed Chair Jerome Powell did an extraordinary thing. He posted a direct to camera video explaining how he was being threatened by the Justice Department for not lowering interest rates. Absolutely, stunning. He isn’t the first to be attacked with a lawsuit and won’t be the last.

Invading Greenland

On January 15^th Operation Arctic Endurance was launched. I am proud of the Scandinavian, Baltic, and European countries for making this move. It’s all a joke until it isn’t. Tariffs were threatened but not realized. I don’t think he’s done with Greenland. It’ll keep coming back.

On the tariff issue, I thought I would include this video where JVL and Catherine Rampell talked about Bloomberg’s report on what tariffs have been enforced versus merely threatened.

Jack Smith Testimony

On January 22^nd Jack Smith went before Congress to give his testimony regarding his investigation into the 2020 election. (another big sigh) This is painful, truly painful. To think there’s another timeline out there where Smith was able to see his investigation through. I am not one to dwell on woulda, coulda, shouldas – but damn. I only saw a few clips that were mostly Republicans screaming at the poor man.

Takeaways from Jack Smith’s testimony on his case against Trump | AP News

Jared’s Davos speech

On January 22^nd Jared Kushner spoke at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. In this speech he laid out his “plans” for Gaza. I’m going to tell you right here that people with dimples can be evil. I think it is important for people to know what the Board of Peace, aka The Legion of Doom, is out there doing.

I’m linking Tommy and Ben’s discussion from Pod Save the World and an article from NPR that includes the slide presentation.

What to know about Jared Kushner’s ‘New Gaza’ plan: NPR

Alex Pretti

On January 24^th Alex Pretti was murdered. Watching the Renee Good video was really hard and sad. What happened to Alex Pretti is a nightmare I haven’t been able to shake off. The idea that there are people out there who are cheering this on is sickening. This is not a right or left thing. This is Nazi bullshit. It is inhumane.

Don Lemon

On January 30^th journalist Don Lemon was arrested. WTF! It isn’t enough to ban journalists from briefings and sue a news outlet’s parent company, but now they’re arresting individual journalists. They were out there doing their jobs. The whole thing is stupid and scary.

Epstein Files

We ended the month with a dump of 3 million more Epstein files. People are still digging through them, but I get the sense that they are still holding things back from us. We have seen some accountability. CBS fired a guy and the Brits are bringing charges against someone. I wish we would bring charges against someone here. This is far from over.

That’s my summary of January. Of course, there was a lot more that happened, but these are the things I want to remember happening. Also, I apologize for the thumbnails. 🤮

Stay warm and enjoy your moments of calm when you find them. ✌️

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2026 Physical TBR

I am doing the challenge with Sarah @freshlyreadbooks. She does a monthly prompt that helps to choose the next book you’re going to read from your stack of 12. January’s prompt was to pick a book that includes one of the letters TBR. I picked A Bookshop in Algiers, which I am about a quarter of the way through.

A Bookshop in Algiers by Kaouther Adimi (Algeria)

A Rediscovery of America by Ned Blackhawk (USA)

Black Beauty by Anna Sewell (England)

In Praise of Shadows by Jun’ichirō Tanizaki (Japan)

Suite Francaise by Irène Némirovsky (Ukraine)

The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield (New Zealand)

The Great Fortune by Olivia Manning (England)

The History of Bees by Maja Lunde (Norway)

The Overstory by Richard Powers (USA)

The Rooftop by Fernanda Trías (Uruguay)

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell (England)

These Truths by Jill Lepore (USA)

24 in 2024

These are the books I read from my list of 24 books for 2024.

A Red Herring Without Mustard by Alan Bradley

Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson

House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende

I Shall Be Near to You by Erin Lindsay McCabe

Jill by Philip Larkin

Miss Benson’s Beetle by Rachel Joyce

Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz

Silas Marner by George Eliot

Sleep No More by P. D. James

Strange Weather in Tokyo by Hiromi Kawakami

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova

The House on the Strand by Rebecca du Maurier

The Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

The Witness for the Prosecution by Agatha Christy

These are the books I didn’t read in 2024 or 2025.

A Place for Us by Fatima Farheen Mirza

A Dowry of Blood by S.T. Gibson

Beautiful Star by Yukio Mishima

Blindness by Jose Saramago

Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead

On Beauty by Zadie Smith

The Great Fortune by Olivia Manning

The Long Song by Andrea Levy

The Overstory by Richard Powers

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

I was kinda bummed to see that I hadn’t read any of the last 10 in 2025 either. These are all books I do want to get to. The Great Fortune is the one I want to read most. It is the first book in a trilogy. I want to get to all three of those. We will see.

It just so happened that Sarah had up her video picking February’s book this morning. The prompt we got was - An author you haven’t read from before. Well, that’s pretty much all of them except David Mitchell. I think I am going to pick The Great Fortune. Getting to it early will give me ample time to read the other two books this year.

My mindset at the start of this year is to relax around my reading. I want to let things flow organically, which is kind of what I did last year, with only the unread tomes stressing me out. I feel really good about my projects, but I did want to try again to read some of the unread books on my shelves. I got some good ones on my list and some of them have been sitting there for quite a while. The Historian and I Shall be Near to You were two that had been on my shelves for decades. It felt so good to finally get to them in 2024.

I hope everyone is staying warm, keeping calm and finding moments of peace. ✌️