Bookish Thoughts

This was a very cute story about growing up and being brave and not missing your chance. Deja and Josiah are best friends who've been working at the local pumpkin patch for the last three years. But now they're seniors and it's the last night, and Josiah still hasn't even spoken to the girl he's been crushing on for the last three years. Deja is determined to make him take his chance, and they set off on a fun night of adventure, finding new things and revisiting old favorites. It's all the fluff I expect from Rainbow Rowell with very little of the angst.

People are always surprised that I haven't read much Stephen King. I read a ton, and he's incredibly prolific with a number of modern classics under his belt. But there are a lot of books out there, and no one can get to all of them. I didn't like The Dark Tower as much as I expected to, and I wasn't sure I'd ever give him another try. But some of his classics are not only classic; they're short. I picked up Carrie and got exactly what I wanted: a fast, spooky read, perfect for October. I enjoyed this story immensely, and I'm glad I finally got around to it. Maybe I'll try one of his longer books someday.

I really wish I could have made Kevin read this book. I would have liked to talk to him about it. I think it helped me understand a bit better what he went through at the end, all the things he lost during his months in the hospital. This book is about a privileged man losing a little bit of that privilege and learning that the world is a lot darker than he always thought. At the beginning of the book, he gets beat up by a couple of robbers and lands in the hospital. The experience shakes him to his core, and he has a really hard time figuring out how to move forward. Then a body is discovered at his family's house, and he ends up getting sucked into a mess as he tries to solve the mystery before the detectives. Like all of French's books, this one was dark and twisty and occasionally hard to read. The protagonist is insufferable and never quite gets his comeuppance. Although he does seem to learn his lesson in the end.

This was such a compelling little story. The premise is that every time Molly bleeds, the blood grows in to a clone of her that tries to kill her. There's no explanation for this, just a look at what would happen to a girl who grows up constantly having to kill herself. It's a weird story, but I really enjoyed reading it.

I read Silvia Moreno-Garcia's first book, Signal to Noise , years ago and loved it. She's been releasing new books steadily since then, with a slowly growing profile. I kept meaning to pick up another of her books, which are always interesting Mexican twists on western classics. Then Mexican Gothic came out to huge acclaim and everyone everywhere was excited about it. I actually got a bit lucky, getting it as early as I did. After my husband passed, a friend signed me up for The Bloggess's book club. She sends out a new book every month, and I was just under the wire to receive this one. It was a wonderful surprise in a not-so-great year. This book was fantastic. So good that I ended up staying up way too late to finish it. It was smart and creepy and it renewed my desire to read everything Moreno-Garcia has ever written. She's a fantastic author who keeps getting better, and I can't wait to see what she comes up with next.

This was my second time through Jane Eyre, and I liked it a whole lot better this time. Part of that is because I've grown as a person, and I understand the context of this book more now. But part of it is because I read The Eyre Affair , and it changed my mind about the ending. When I first read this book, I was upset that Eyre went back to Mr Rochester after everything. But then Fforde argues pretty effectively that any other ending would be unsatisfactory and anti-climactic. He made me appreciate Mr Rochester a bit more. So this time through I was rooting for them. And I was happy that they ended up together. I suppose my changing reaction is part of what makes this book such a classic.

This book is like a warm hug. It's about vampires, yes. But it's also about healing from trauma. And baking cinnamon rolls. It's a very, very slow book, and the narrator tends to babble. The plot doesn't really exist. It's just a cozy way to spend some time with a bunch of people who love each other a lot and don't want anything more than their quiet little life. I've read this book several times now. I'll probably read it several more. Every now and then, it's exactly what I need.

This book was absolutely delightful. It's a series of comics, charting the growing relationship between a vampire and a werewolf, from their meet-cute at a bar to happily ever after. It was a quick read. I read it in less than an hour (probably less than half an hour), and I had a huge smile on my face the entire time. This will be a good pick-me-up for years to come.

I adore Sarah MacLean, but this one took a while to grab me. Maybe it's just because I could see what was coming. Which is silly. I read romance for the predictability, and Sarah MacLean especially because I love what she does with the tropes. I guess I was just eager to get to the meat of it, and it started a bit slow. Mostly, though, I'm excited for what's coming next. MacLean has been laying the groundwork for her next series: Hell's Belles. I can hardly wait.

This was my second time reading The Bluest Eye , and I definitely got a lot more out of it this time through. It's a difficult book with a complicated structure. It's all about how envy and jealousy can turn into hatred and self-hatred. It's about generational trauma and how it propagates. It's about innocence and the loss of innocence and what happens when the people who are supposed to love you don't. Or when that love gets twisted. It's a really important book, and I'm glad that I read it with my book club because the conversation that followed gave me a lot of hope. When I started my neighborhood book club, we began with Tayari Jones' An American Marriage . It's about a black man who's been imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit. But roughly half the club was sure that he'd committed the crime. There's this naive trust in our justice system that privileged white people grow up with, and it's hard to start to question that. Bl...

I've been hearing about this series of books for years. It's not widely known, but those who read it always seem to love it wholly. I had to see for myself what could cause such deep devotion. Still, I wasn't quite prepared for this book to grab my heart the way it did. The story follows four boys who attend a local private high school and the girl who finds herself hanging out with them despite her better judgement. They're looking for the grave of a long-dead king. Legend says that whoever finds it gets a wish granted. But that's not the only reason they're looking. These children are all damaged in one way or another and this quest helps to give their life meaning. It binds them together in a found family and gives them something to dream about, hope for, pursue in every free hour. I fell in love with them, and I can only hope that they all find what they're looking for by the end of the series.

I wanted to love this book, or at least like it. One of my neighbors once said that it's one of her favorites, and that always gets my attention. If a book is special enough for someone to call it their favorite, there must be something special about it. But life is a rich tapestry, and what appeals to one person doesn't always appeal to another one. I found this book to be incredibly frustrating. The main character Eilis is the mot passive protagonist I've ever come across. I couldn't figure out what she wanted. I don't think she wanted anything. She never felt like a real person, just a construct floating through life and allowing things to happen to her.  I'm tempted to watch the movie and see what they make of Eilis and her woes. Surely she'll have a bit more life in that form. But I'm not sure I care enough to sit through it. 

I regard the Discworld the way other people regard the bible. That might be blasphemous, but there it is. When I need comfort, when I need to laugh, when I need to think deeply, when I need to be reminded of all the beauty of humanity, I turn to the Discworld. These books soothe me. They empower me. They provide surety that it will all be okay, but that I have to do my part to make it okay. Reaper Man is about Death. It has some incredible quotes that, in the wake of my husband's death, I needed to come back to. And in coming back to them I ended up re-reading the entire book.  Anyway, here are a few of my favorite bits of this particular book: Alone of all the creatures in the world, trolls believe that all living things go through Time backward. If the past is visible and the future is hidden, they say, then it means that you must be facing the wrong way. People get exactly the wrong idea about belief. They think it works back to front. They think the sequence is, first object, t...

JY Yang is an absolute master at spinning out an epic tale in a very short space. This book is barely 100 pages long, yet it covers so much ground. It was surprisingly sad and incredibly complicated and continued the series' pattern of refusing to conform to a pattern. The emperor has finally died and the one who has spent half her life working to bring it about finds herself alone in a bar, contemplating her life. Well, not quite alone. She has an audience of one, the reader, to whom she tells her tale over drinks. This story was deft and incredible and I wish Yang were planning to write anything more in this world. I'm eagerly awaiting their next book, which won't be out until 2022.

This book was a bit bloated, but I think it ended up being my favorite of the trilogy. It was a decent balance of familiar faces and new ones. The timeline was nice and linear. The science was interesting, as was the revolution storyline. Some of the prose is startlingly lovely, and I enjoyed most of the time I spent on this hypothetical Mars.

I've been wanting to read Courtney Milan for a while, though I'd been intending to start with her Brothers Sinister series. But then I came across this novel, her first, in a used book store, and I jumped at the chance. This was a cute historical romance. And while it does take place in London in the early 19th century like so much of the historical romances I read, it doesn't focus on the ton. The hero is rich, but the heroine is more middle class. She makes her living as a fortune teller, and it was nice to get a glimpse at how this other half lived back then. I liked this book, and I'll be keeping my eye out for more of Milan's work.

This was a fun adventure, though I was a little disappointed that we didn't get to spend as much time in the underworld. Rose spends the majority of the book in a living human body, trying to figure out how to get back to her ghostly state. It's a trick pulled by Bobby Cross that serves to mess up Rose's life without bringing them that much closer to a confrontation. I'm hoping that in the next book they finally face off against each other.

I'm still enjoying the Poldark novels, though it's been an adjustment switching the focus to the next generation. Still, the shift has highlighted the idea that the more things change the more they stay the same.  Ross and Demelza's kids go through a lot of the same things Ross and Demelza went through: new love and broken hearts, a taste for adventure and having to deal with the consequences, even opening a new mine and handling all the finances. But there are differences too. Clowance has opportunities Demelza never dreamed of and Jeremy has access to technology that still makes his father uncomfortable. Time keeps marching forward.  These books remain comforting. It's fun to go hang out in Cornwall for a few days. I'm starting to get sad that I'm getting so close to the end of the series.

Joan Didion's memoir of grief after losing her husband felt like something I should read after I lost my own husband. I wanted a book that I could see myself in, something that would feel familiar and let me know I'm not alone.  I wish I'd connected to this book more. There were a few small things that rang true, but there was also a lot that I just didn't connect with. Maybe that's a sign that everyone is different and every loss is different. Maybe it's just a difference between me and Didion. Either way I wanted something from this book that I didn't quite get. But I'm still glad I read it.

Seanan McGuire initially wrote a bunch of short stories about a ghost. Then she stitched them together into a book. Then she turned it into a series. I originally read this book several years ago, but I finally picked up the sequel (and saw that a third is forthcoming), so I had to go back and re-read this one. Since I first read this story, I've read the main Incryptid series, of which it's an offshoot. That meant that I picked up on a lot more this time through. The world where this takes place is incredibly rich, and I missed a lot of the references when I first encountered them. That contributed to me liking this story even more the second time around. I was also better able to appreciate the structure, since I knew where everything was headed. I didn't expect my re-read of this book to be quite so rewarding, but I'm glad it was. I'm definitely hooked on this series and Rose Marshall now, and I can't wait to see where her story goes. (especially after the ev...

I've been following Stevenson's career since she was an art student with a tumblr making fun of Lord of the Rings and The Hunger Games. I loved watching her get her big break and launch into the stratosphere. I watched her start to make the sort of stories she wished she'd read as a child. She accomplished a lot at a ridiculously young age. She's also had some struggles,and I've always been impressed by the way she's open about them while maintaining her privacy. Because I've been reading her blog for so long, I'd already read most of the comics in this book over the years. But it was nice to see it all pulled together in a single place. Stevenson has a long career ahead of her, and I'm excited to see what she does next.

I just adore Alisha Rai. She's become an insta-buy for me. Every time one of her books comes out, I have to get it because I know I'll love it. She writes wonderful, warm, smart romances with killer sex scenes.  This one kicks off a new series that I'm very excited about. It's adjacent to the Forbidden Hearts series that I finished earlier this year. The heroine's brother was in the last of those books. But now we get out of that stifling small town in upstate New York and out into huge, anonymous LA. I'm glad that there's still a little bit of crossover from the characters in those books, even as Rai's moving into a different series. Really I just love Alisha Rai and all her books. I'm always happy when I'm reading them.

This was an incredibly difficult book to read. I came very close to not finishing it. Not because it was bad. It was just so hard to see a family treat their children the way Tara and her siblings are treated. Tara was raised in an extremely fundamentalist Mormon family. Her father trusted almost no one, so the kids didn't go to school. They never went to the doctors. The family lived off the grid as much as they could, avoiding other people and preparing for the rapture. A large chunk of the book is about Tara's childhood, and particularly the various injuries she and her family members suffered. For a while it was like every chapter was detailing a horrific new injury, and I had to walk away from the book for a bit. But I did return to it, so I got to read about Tara's decision to go to college, where she blossomed and was finally able to cut ties with her abusive family. She goes into some detail about her ultimate decision to break with her parents and brother and the t...