Books: Thriller

What I Read January 2021

January is statistically my biggest reading month of every year. Something about the long, cold, and dark days inspire many more excuses to skip other things and curl up with a book instead. While I didn’t read as many books as I have in January’s past, I did still finish 14 – and most of them were fantastic! (And some of them were quite long!) I even read three nonfiction books! I have a lot of great recommendations for you today.

The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune
Rating: 5* stars

This book has been on my radar since it first came out, mostly because I really loved the cover and it looked like a contending book for something Caden and I could both read. But because I don’t actually pick up middle grade almost ever (I just LOVE the covers!!) I never got around to starting it until the first of the year. It was on SO many top lists of 2020 that I just couldn’t justify ignoring it any longer. I could tell right from the start that this book was going to be very different from the type of book I normally read – or like. It was quirky and magical and just not my style. And to be honest, it probably took me 30% in before I was even sure I was interested. The only downside of this book is how slow the set up is. For this reason alone I’m not sure it’s a book Caden would read. He needs something to grab him from the first page. This wasn’t it. But I’m so glad I powered through because I ended up falling in love with it in the same way that so, so many other people did last year. This book truly is beautiful. It’s about an objective case worker who is in charge of checking on the orphanages filled with magical children that need to be monitored and kept away from regular society. He’s sent to a classified location to check in with the six most dangerous magical children and their mysterious caretaker. Throughout his month long stay, Linus, the caseworker, has many changes of heart as he learns that every child is worth loving and protecting, no matter the cost, no matter their challenges. The children were absolutely endearing and funny and I adored them all. This book just made my heart so happy. I loved it and all of the wonderful lessons it had to teach. I’m actually hoping to eventually get a hard copy so I can read it again and highlight all the passages that really spoke to me. It WAS beautiful and so worth the read.

The Year of Less by Cait Flanders
Rating: 5 stars

I’m determined to listen to more audiobooks this year. It’s a great thing to do while I work and a better option than watching tv because my eyes can just focus on my sewing and I’ll be much more productive! But I’ll also FEEL more productive by getting more books read! Win win. I picked this one first because it didn’t have a wait from the library and it’s a book I’ve kind of wanted to read for awhile, but hadn’t. It sounded like a book I needed, but also didn’t want to read because I love shopping. Why should I read a book that will make me feel guilty for it? Well, because maybe I NEED to feel guilty for it. This book is part memoir and part month by month accounting of how Cait was able to fulfill her year long shopping ban. I didn’t know who she was before, but she’s been a blogger for some time with a huge following and wanted to share some more personal accounts in the book that she never shared on her blog. Mainly how much she struggled with alcoholism. I definitely have never had that struggle, but I could still relate so well to everything she wrote about. An addiction is an addiction, no matter what it may be. Overall, I thought this was an excellent food for thought book to read, especially at the start of a new year. Am I inclined to start my own year long shopping ban? Well…no, not really. But am I inspired to make a whole lot of changes? Yes. Her story was inspirational and the audiobook was only about six hours long. Perfect for a day or two of pairing with all the mindless activities you have to do during the day!

What Kind of Woman by Kate Baer
Rating: 5 stars

I’m not usually a big fan of poetry, but every once in awhile a book is released that intrigues me enough to pick it up and give poetry another shot. And I’m usually surprised by how much I enjoy the different format. This book had so many rave reviews and it still managed to surprise me. Every poem is about different aspects of womanhood. And they’re all very abstract – another reason I rarely like poetry, but after awhile I was getting really into it. I felt a connection to so many of her words, which is always a pleasant surprise is this lonely life most of us our leading right now. I’ll definitely be picking this one up again and again in the future.

The Dating Plan by Sara Desai
Rating: 5 stars

This was my January BOTM pick mostly because I fell in love with the cover. (See a trend?) You don’t see many purple covers! I also didn’t realize that it was a pre-release so I read it two months before it came out. Exciting! 🙂 I didn’t realize that there was a book that technically came first, but this book does have all those little developed hints of side characters that have a story you should maybe already know. It’s definitely not necessary, but I enjoyed this book so much I plan on going back to read the first. Anyway, this was about Daisy, an Indian woman who stumbles across the boy she loved as a teenager but ghosted her at prom and disappeared for the next ten years. In a moment of haste she kisses him and calls him her fiance in order to avoid an awkward encounter with her ex-boyfriend and ex-boss. Right around the same time Liam finds out he’s come into an inheritance, but there are stipulations that he must be married by his next birthday in order to get the family business – and his birthday is in six weeks. The two of them concoct a plan to date for the next six weeks and then get married the day before his birthday to help each other out, no real feelings involved. Though of course there are plenty of feelings on both sides. Overall, I thought this book was really well developed and sweet. I loved all of the characters and felt their hesitations were well founded and realistic. The whole book was a joy to read.

A Court of Frost and Starlight by Sarah J. Maas
Rating: 4 stars

This was kind of an odd sort of interim book where we catch up with everyone who is staying in the Night Court over the Winter Solstice. For some reason this book went beyond my notice until now, so it’s been quite awhile since I read the first three books and I spent half of this one trying to remember who all the characters were and what their relationships were to each other. That was so distracting and the beginning of this book was so NORMAL I had a really hard time understanding the point. But as it went on I really appreciated how Feyre was coming into her own as an artist and finding ways to help rebuild her community through art because it IS valuable. It also seemed kind of weird to write about, but I loved how much of this book was devoted to what everybody was going to give everyone else for Solstice gifts. After all the action in the third book, it was deeply surprising how little happened in this one. But I’m glad I read it to get a refresher for the next book coming out next month!

This Close to Okay by Leesa Cross-Smith
Rating: 3 stars

Tallie is a therapist who is driving home from work and sees a man about to jump off a bridge. She pulls over and convinces him to come back home with her where they spend three days together, mostly just sitting around and talking. I was intrigued by the premise of this book, but ended up finding the whole thing kind of boring. Maybe I like plot driven books more than I thought, since it was really missing in this story. Both Tallie and Emmett have their own secrets that they keep from each other while also getting closer in other ways. And of course those secrets eventually come out. What bothered me about this book was that I just couldn’t see a therapist actually acting the way that Tallie did. I feel like no matter what the first thing she would have done would have gotten him to a hospital to help. Not bring him back home with her. It was just so odd to me. I didn’t hate the book or anything, it just was very slow.

Wintering by Katherine May
Rating: 4.5 stars

Wintering is the concept of understanding parts of your life are going to be cold and low and quiet and slow. It’s about more than the actual seasons, though that can be part of it as well. But it’s really about the ups and downs of life and learning to accept the bad along with the good and find ways to appropriately get yourself through them and find things to enjoy in the process. Of all years to hear this message, this is the one. It’s sort of a memoir and sort of an encouraging outlook on making the most of the hard parts of your life. It was also a little bit sad. I identified strongly with the author as most of her wintering seasons included mysterious physical ailments and losing herself to motherhood. I feel like those things are relatable to so many people. There were a few chapters that I just didn’t connect with as well, but for the most part I was greatly intrigued and couldn’t wait to keep picking this one up again.

Dear Rachel Maddow by Adrienne Kisner
Rating: 3.5 stars

Brynn is a 17 year old who is really struggling in both school and life after her brother OD’s, her mom and stepdad treat her like crap, and her girlfriend breaks up with her. As a school assignment she’s supposed to write to one of her heroes, so she chooses a news anchor that she strongly admires. She then spends the rest of the school year writing unsent emails to Rachel Maddow, using the talk to text feature to get all of her feelings out on the screen. I picked this book up because as you know I love epistolary novels. This one was a bit different since there was nobody ever responding, or even receiving her emails. But the whole thing still reads like a novel. I enjoyed Brynn and her spunk, but the story is honestly quite depressing. I thought it was a good read, but it wasn’t really what I emotionally needed this month that’s already been filled with enough doom and gloom.

The Star-Crossed Sisters of Tuscany by Lori Nelson Spielman
Rating: 4 stars

For two hundred years there has been a curse in the Fontana family where the second daughter of every family will never find love and marriage. Some second daughters have actively tried to fight the curse and have been met with sorrow. Other daughters, like Emilia, have used the curse as an excuse to not even try to find love and happily go about living on her own, even when her family walks all over her. This book is about a trio of second daughters who take a trip to Italy together in order to break the curse on Great Aunt Poppy’s 80th birthday. Overall, I enjoyed this book and found it pleasant. I liked it while I was reading it, but I wasn’t captivated by it. It did get better as it went along, but it was a pretty slow moving story. They didn’t even leave for Italy until about halfway through and that’s when things picked up. It was a good book, just perhaps a bit more literary than what I tend to pick up and was harder for me to really lose myself in.

The Invitation by Vi Keeland
Rating: 5 stars

Stella and her best friend Fisher decide to crash a swanky wedding pretending to be her no good ex-roommate. There she meets Hudson, who is intrigued by her – until he finds out she’s not who she says she is. Deciding to apologize to the bride, she ends up getting into business with Hudson and his sister as they help her grow her new perfumery business. And of course the two of them inevitably become closer. I really liked this book. This is maybe the third or fourth Vi Keeland I’ve read in the last few months and she’s quickly becoming a favorite. Stella and Hudson were both genuinely fantastic and kind characters who had a lot of depth and a believable and sweet love story. I had a hard time putting this one down.

The Wrong Family by Tarryn Fisher
Rating: 3 stars

This is marketed as a thriller, but I wouldn’t go into this book thinking you’re going to get a lot of action. It’s about a family of three with plenty of secrets and disdain for each other that live in a big house with too much room. Juno, an elderly homeless ex-therapist ends up living in their house with them – but they don’t know it. The story follows Juno and Winnie, the wife/mother of the family, as they go about their daily lives, striving to keep their own secrets. This book was interesting in the fact that it was amazing someone could live for so long in a house without three other people even knowing it. But also – not very much happens for the majority of the book. I was intrigued, but ultimately not that impressed.

Whiteout by Adriana Anders
Rating: 3.5 stars

I was in the mood for something that felt seasonally appropriate after weeks of very cold weather. Getting stuck in Antarctica with only a tent and barely any food? Seemed to fit the bill! My like for this book went up and down. The beginning? Kind of confusing and hard to understand what was going on. The middle? LOVED IT. The end? Rushed through with a pretty annoying cliffhanger. It felt like the middle of the story – when they were in the elements just trying to survive – was very well thought out and written perfectly. And then the author had to concoct a larger story around that wonderful middle. Overall, I had a hard time putting this down, I just wish parts of it felt more developed or explained. It could have been great with some extra polishing.

Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey
Rating: 4.5 stars

This is definitely a book you need to listen to on audio. Matthew McConaughey is VERY entertaining in the reading of his own book, giving the whole thing a bit of a theatrical element that would never come through on the page. It was a joy to listen to. One thing that struck me again and again while listening to this is that how much he loves LIFE. I listened to Bryan Cranston’s audiobook a few months ago and the biggest message I got out of that one is how much he loved acting. Matthew? He loves LIFE. It was a great message that pulled through the chapters as it’s inspirational to anyone, not just people who’d like to be actors themselves. The only reason I marked it down half a star is that many of the beginning chapters talk about some of the abusive behaviors his parents had, and how he totally agrees with how he was disciplined. It was off-putting how many times he brought this up and I had a hard time getting past it. But I did really enjoy everything else about the book! It’s a great listen.

Ex Talk by Rachel Lynn Solomon
Rating: 5 stars

Shay is going on her tenth year as a producer for a public radio station when high and mighty fresh from grad school Dominic shows up and starts getting air time right from the start – something she’s dreamed of since she was a kid. They immediately clash around the same time the station is desperate for a new show to up their ratings. They come up with a show where two exes will talk about what it’s like to stay friends after a breakup. And who better to play the part than Dominic and Shay? Despite how uncomfortable they both are with building a show on a lie, they reluctantly agree and begin hosting an immensely popular talk show while also finding some real feelings in the midst of it all. I really loved this book. It was an office romance, but with both partners on relatively equal footing and not one of the stereotypical tropes. Both characters had a lot of depth and fantastic chemistry. It did take me a couple of chapters to get into it, but I was hooked after that. Highly recommend!

What I Read December 2020

December was a pretty good reading month for me! Fifteen books, my second highest month of 2020. Of course most of them were pretty light and quick, but that’s exactly how I wanted and needed to end the year. Check them out!

Single Dad Seeks Juliet by Max Monroe
Rating: 4.5 stars

Holley is a journalist in charge of running a Bachelor Anonymous contest. Chloe is a teenager who enters her dad Jake into the contest unknowingly and of course he wins the vote for being the bachelor. It takes some convincing – and a whole lot of time together first – but Jake agrees to enter the contest as long as he gets to meet with Holley to plan each date ahead of time. To be honest, the premise of this whole book is pretty weak because the contest has very little to do with anything. But you won’t care because you’ll just want to see as much of Jake and Holley together as possible. I thought this book was hilarious. I loved both characters so much. It was heartfelt and intriguing and a really nice love story!

One Way or Another by Kara McDowell
Rating: 5 stars

Paige is a teenager who suffers from fairly extreme anxiety. When faced with the decision of spending Christmas with her best friend Fitz who she has secretly been in love with for years or visiting New York City for the very first time with her mom, she is paralyzed with indecision. Then she slips and knocks herself out and the story splits into parallel universes following Paige in each of her fates. I thought this was a really unique way to do a story. Don’t get caught up in the details of living in a multiverse, just think of it as two separate stories. I thought it was fascinating to see how differently Paige acted in each of her fates. And the conclusions she drew after her very different Christmas celebrations. I wasn’t sure if I’d like this book because of how strongly the anxiety presents itself. But I found myself getting quite teary by the end. It was a really great book.

The Christmas Pact by Vi Keeland and Penelope Ward
Rating: 4 stars

I read this book in an afternoon. It was delightful! Riley Kennedy keeps having email issues with her coworker from another branch, Kennedy Riley. The two meet at the Christmas party and end up making a pact to visit each other’s houses over Christmas to help deal with some of their family drama. This was definitely a quick read, but it was so much fun! Both characters were really entertaining to read. It’s also quite an innocent romance, if you’re looking for something tame! I loved it.

Secret Admirer by DJ Jamison
Rating: 3 stars

Benji is a quiet and inexperienced gay college freshman who has had a lifelong crush on his older brother’s best friend Ace. When Benji’s brother convinces him to come to the same college as them, but then takes a fellowship across the country, Ace wants to help Benji get more comfortable with the college life. Ace also finds himself bi-curious the more time he spends with Benji and concocts a way to help give him more confidence by pretending to be his secret admirer. Overall, this book was fine. There was a lot of angst on both sides with constant narration about their feelings. It got pretty repetitive. But overall, it was an okay book!

The Noel Letters by Richard Paul Evans
Rating: 3 stars

Noel is returning to her hometown to be with her estranged father in his dying days after 16 years away. Unfortunately, he has already passed by the time she gets there. A series of other unfortunate events keep her in town running his bookstore through the holidays while she decides what to do with herself. And of course she is destined to help get over her lifelong anger toward her father and find a way to move forward with her life. This book was kind of a downer. I’m not a big fan of stories that have no hope of reconciliation. Yes, a character can change going forward, but I hate when there is no chance to truly make amends. The story was really not that interesting to me. Honestly, the part I really loved the most is that each chapter started with a great quote about writing. I was recently trying to find a good writing quote to put on a journal’s cover and was having the hardest time coming up with anything that fit. This book was filled with ideas! Anyway, Richard Paul Evans is guaranteed to write a book that’ll pull at your heartstrings, but this one felt a bit too over the top and preachy to me.

Layla by Colleen Hoover
Rating: 4 stars

Colleen Hoover’s first paranormal book. Whew, I wasn’t sure what to expect going into this. I don’t do paranormal books. But I wasn’t going to skip a Colleen book! I’m going to tell you now that it’s only SCARY for like one page. So…if you don’t do paranormal either, this book won’t terrify you. It’s about Leeds, a struggling musician who meets Layla dancing at her sister’s wedding. They immediately hit it off and never go back to their regular lives. Then something happens that leaves Layla with a very different personality and Leeds trying to figure out how to bring back the girl he fell so instantly in love with. They go back to the now abandoned Bed and Breakfast where they met to try and rekindle their spark. And then things get weird. As always, this book was compulsively readable and interesting. But it didn’t really hit me in all the feels the way Colleen’s books normally do. But I still thoroughly enjoyed it and appreciate that she continues to churn out two great books every year for me to get really excited about!

Calm Christmas by Beth Kempton
Rating: 5 stars

I basically picked out this book because I loved the cover. Amazon has a different title (and publishing date of a year ago), but Target and independent bookstores have this gorgeous embossed cover that immediately made me feel like it was the perfect book for this holiday season. And – it was. I really loved it. The whole book feels like a warm cozy hug and the exact encouragement you need to let go of the busyness of the season and find a way to make this Christmas the best you could imagine. This book is meant to be started in late November and finished around the New Year. I finished halfway through December, but still really took my time going through it. It was a lot of great food for thought and gave me comfort, especially this year when so many of our celebrations won’t be happening. It helped me to see the possibilities of what we could do instead. Anyway, by the time you see this review it’ll be too late to really apply it to your Christmas season (obviously), but I still recommend picking up a copy for next year!

The Twelve Dates of Christmas by Jenny Bayliss
Rating: 4.5 stars

This is a delightfully festive and fun book about a woman in her mid-thirties trying to find a little romance in her small English town. She signs up for a twelve nights of Christmas event, going on dates with twelve separate men throughout the month of December. She meets a few winners and a few losers, but she also can’t seem to stay away from grumpy cafe owner Matt, her first love, but also the man who ignored her for a decade. Overall, this is probably one of the most developed Christmastime books I’ve ever read. It did take me awhile to get into it, mostly because there were SO many characters. It was hard to keep track of everyone and also confusing that the author named two of the main characters Mac and Matt. Why so similar?? But I loved Kate and found it quite delightful that she was a fabric designer, always out in nature trying to get new inspiration for her drawings. She was also a baker for Matt’s cafe, which is equally as exciting to me. 🙂 Anyway, I just really enjoyed all the festive little details that made this book feel so utterly perfect for reading right before Christmas!

Merry Inkmas by Talia Hibbert
Rating: 3 stars

I was a good chunk of the way into a more serious “Christmas” book and decided I wanted something lighter and this seemed like it would fit the bill. Annoyingly (lol), it was also pretty heavy. It felt a little too heavy at times for a book that falls somewhere between a novella and novel length story. Two characters with troubled pasts involving unhealthy relationships with their parents manage to fall for each other, but not without a lot of hesitation and fear. Other than the Christmas decorations in the tattoo shop where they both work, very little of this book is about Christmas. Overall, it was fine. Just not exactly what I was hoping for.

Best Friends Don’t Kiss by Max Monroe
Rating: 4 stars

Ava is in desperate need of a boyfriend by Christmas to take to her sister’s wedding and her high school reunion. After many failed internet dates, she manages to finally convince her best friend of fifteen years, Luke, to pretend to be her boyfriend for all of the events. This is my second Max Monroe book this month and I enjoyed it as much as the first. I really appreciate that the characters are actually kind and funny and good people. It’s so refreshing from the typical romance trope where the guy starts out as an absolute jerk. I thought this was a sweet and enjoyable Christmas book.

The Guest List by Lucy Foley
Rating: 4.5 stars

After reading mostly Christmas books all month, I actually found myself desperately needing a change in the few days before Christmas. I picked up this one because thrillers are always a great way to break the romance streaks I tend to find myself on (especially this year when I mostly just wanted light and happy predictable reads!). This one definitely held my attention! A wedding party is gathered on a cold and treacherous Irish island and everybody has their secrets. The chapters alternate between many of the guests and as the story progresses you begin to find out how many sinister ways they’re all linked to each other. While I definitely enjoyed trying to piece together the mysteries in the book, I did feel like it went a bit overboard on constantly pointing out all the things the reader did not know and wouldn’t find out until the end. It was minorly frustrating. But overall, I think this book certainly earned all of it’s amazing reviews this year!

Frostbite by Deborah Bladon
Rating: 2 stars

Calder is a jerky sculpture artist who crashes into timid painter Raelyn on the street and convinces her to “work with him” to create a custom sculpture for her sister’s husband before Christmas. This was a novella, which I typically don’t read, because they annoy me. This one annoyed me too. The characters had very little depth, everything was ridiculously easy and predictable, and the sex scenes were not earned. It was fine for a light read on Christmas, but I have no real appreciation for it.

Instant Karma by Melissa Meyer
Rating: 4 stars

Prudence and Quint are science lab partners but constantly butt heads. They find out on the last day of school that their final project that they worked all year on only garnered a C because they didn’t actually work together and it was very obvious. Prudence refuses to accept this grade and manages to convince both her teacher and Quint that they can redo it over the summer to raise their grade. This leads to the two of them working at an animal rescue center that Quint’s mom runs. They continue to constantly get on each other’s nerves, but also begin to understand why they each are the way that they are. In the meantime, there’s also this side story where Prudence slips on some beer, gets knocked out, and can now dole out “instant karma” punishments and rewards for people she observes doing good or bad things. Basically – there is a lot going on in this book. A lot. I enjoyed Quint. Prudence was really getting on my nerves at some points in the story. Type A personality to the extreme. I started to feel like part of the book was a lecture on taking care of sea wildlife and it lost me for a bit. But overall the book was still enjoyable. I just felt like it was maybe trying to do a bit too much. One thing I genuinely enjoyed was that this was an immensely clean book. No swearing, no hints of sexual endeavors. It was a really refreshing change from basically every book I ever read.

The Particulars of Peter by Kelly Conaboy
Rating: 5 stars

This book was an absolute delight. I saw it the day it came out and immediately ordered it because it sounded so perfect for me, but I also adored the cover. It’s probably the fastest I’ve ever read a nonfiction book because I loved it so much. The first half is absolutely hilarious. The author talks about her crazy love and devotion for her dog Peter and all the ways she’s tried to connect and bond with him. I could relate so much to her fascination with Peter as I’m equally as fascinated by Annie and could spend my entire day just watching her, except that it seems to make her uncomfortable at a certain point so I stop. My cats don’t seem to mind, though. The book did slow down a bit when Kelly started researching what felt like rather random things – like if Peter could see ghosts or if a pet psychic could communicate with him. This is the point in the book when I realized she might actually be a bit crazy lol. Not really, but – it was a lot. But overall this is a really sweet and genuinely funny book that is PERFECT for any dog lover. I highly, highly recommend it!

The Wife Upstairs by Rachel Hawkins
Rating: 4.5 stars

This is a modern southern reimagining of Jane Eyre. Jane is a poor dog walker with a load of secrets, working in a rich Alabama suburb. And then she meets Eddie Rochester, whose wife mysteriously disappeared – presumed dead – just six months earlier. She’s attracted to him, but also sees him as a target – an in for the lifestyle she’s always wanted. And then things get interesting. I enjoyed this book, though I didn’t particularly like any of the characters. You really need to keep in mind that it’s a reimagining, not exactly a retelling. Otherwise you might get hung up on the differences. Overall, this one really held my attention and it was a great book to finish out my year of reading!

What I Read October 2020

November 1st – I’m right on time this month! I was actually going to write this BEFORE the end of the month, but I had one last book to squeeze in last night. October turned out to be a pretty good reading month. After a pretty rough couple of months I finally got my groove back and reading once again became my favorite delight. I have a couple of great recommendations this time around!

Real Fake Love by Pippa Grant
Rating: 3.5 stars

Henri is fresh out of luck at her fifth unsuccessful wedding when she meets Luca, professional baseball player who has sworn off love. She concocts a plan to convince him to teach her how to not fall in love so she won’t have to go through the pain and embarrassment of another failed wedding. This book started out pretty wildly. I honestly couldn’t even get a grip on what was going on because every character was so off their rocker. I’ve never read a Pippa Grant book before, and this is listed as a standalone book, but felt VERY clearly like a book further along on a series and it would have helped to have known about some of the characters before diving into this. It was entertaining, laugh out loud funny at some points, but also utterly ridiculous. Everything did settle down as the book went on and I enjoyed it, I just really dislike reading books where I always feel like I’m missing something.

The Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Rating: 4.5 stars

This was a fresh and unique book – at least compared to most of the books I’ve been reading the last seven months! Seventeen year old Avery is living in her car after her sister’s abusive boyfriend moves back in when she finds out she has inherited a massive fortune from a man she’s never met. The only condition for keeping the inheritance is that she must live in the manor with the rest of his family for a year. That family includes four grandsons, all around the same age as Avery. The reading of the will leaves the grandsons and Avery with letters from the grandfather, each with clues to help solve a riddle – the reason why he chose to leave his fortune to Avery. This book is a series of puzzles to be solved while Avery tries to figure out which brothers to trust and which will turn on her for their own gain. I really loved the storyline because it felt so unique and intriguing. My only complaint is that it all got a bit repetitive at times and I wanted more from the Hawthorne brothers. I would have liked to have dug a little deeper into them so I felt more connected. But other than that, I truly enjoyed this book and am really excited to see that it will have a sequel!

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab
Rating: 3.5 stars

I was really intrigued by synopsis of this book and all the initial rave reviews I saw for it. Addie LaRue makes a deal with the devil to gain a little freedom from her small and predictable life and ends up becoming immortal. The catch being that nobody can remember her after they leave her sight, so she has all the freedom in the world but no ability to make long standing connections. Until around three hundred years later when somebody remembers her. This is the most literary book I’ve read in quite awhile. It started as a great change of pace, but I really lost my enthusiasm for the book about halfway through. It was very long and honestly, not a whole lot happens. Chapters switch back and forth from the present time and different parts of Addie’s life, mostly within the first few years after she gained her immortality. Later in the book I kept really wishing we’d just stick in the present since that’s really all I cared about. I’m pretty surprised by how many people continue to rave about this book being the best they’ve read all year. It just didn’t hit me with that same intensity. My favorite part of any book is character interaction and there isn’t a lot of interaction with a woman who spends over 300 years damned to loneliness. Anyway, it was a very well written book and a long and strung out story, if you’re into that kind of thing. I didn’t dislike it, I was just frustrated with how slow it seemed and how long it took me to finish it.

The Bribe by Willa Nash
Rating: 4.5 stars

Okay, let’s start by saying just how much I hate books with half naked ripped men on the cover when the story itself is not super sexual. It annoys me because it feels like it cheapens a story that was so much more than a gratuitous romance novel. And don’t get me wrong, I don’t have anything wrong with romance – I read quite a few, especially this year when it’s the easiest type of book to concentrate on. This book was a lot more than that, though. Country singer Lucy is on the run after a scary stalker situation in Nashville when she meets Sheriff Duke Evans who wants to know why she gave him a fake name and what she’s really doing in town. I really enjoyed this book. Duke and Lucy were both so NICE. It was really wonderful reading about such pleasant people. There was also a bit of mystery and suspense which made the book that much more readable. I read it very quickly and was so excited to keep picking it up.

The Lazy Genius Way by Kendra Adachi
Rating: 5 stars

Kendra Adachi is one of my favorite internet people. I don’t actually listen to her podcast The Lazy Genius very often, but I AM a patreon member of it so I have access to the exclusive Lazy Sisters podcast she does with her sister Hannah. It’s one of my favorite things to listen to every month. Anyway, I preordered Kendra’s book the second she announced it like last year and was really looking forward to reading it. It did take me quite awhile to get through it because I need a lot of time to process new ways to organize my life, but I really, really liked it. She makes great suggestions and strongly encourages you to only focus on what matters TO YOU. Don’t get bogged down with that you think you’re supposed to do, or what everyone else is doing. Stay in your own lane and make your schedule and your space and your choices be what is important to you. She gives plenty of practical tips throughout the book, but also just a lot of food for thought. I highly recommend this book!

Happily Letter After by Vi Keeland and Penelope Ward
Rating: 4.5 stars

Sadie is a newspaper columnist who also takes over fulfilling letters to Santa around the holidays. In early summer she receives a random Santa letter from a sweet 10 year old girl who only wants to bring some happiness to her widowed father. Sadie decides to fulfill her simplest wish and ends up very intrigued by Birdie and her dad. And what follows is a heartfelt and just a tiny bit cheesy love story between them all. I enjoyed this book because it was so heartwarming and sweet. It does also have a bit of a Christmas feel, so it would be a great book to read in December. Parts of this story were definitely a little far fetched, but it did make for a fun read. My only complaint is that 10 year old Birdie really read as like a six year old. I was having a hard time seeing her as the age she was supposed to be, which was very distracting.

The Honeysuckle Cookbook by Dzung Lewis
Rating: 3.5 stars

It’s been awhile since I’ve been intrigued by a newly released cookbook so I picked this one up for fresh inspiration. Dzung Lewis is – from what I can gather from her cookbook – a widely known youtube cook, though I have never heard of her or seen a single video. Perhaps if I had I would have enjoyed this cookbook a little more. It was fine, I enjoyed that each recipe had a story behind it. But only about half of the recipes had photos, which is always a disappointment. I’m guessing I marked maybe 25% of the recipes as something I’d be interested in making, but none of them really blew me away. Normally this would be grounds for not keeping the cookbook at all, but I think I’ll try a few of the recipes out before making my final decision.

The Girl in the Mirror by Rose Carlyle
Rating: 5 stars

I could not put this book down. It’s the first book in months that I was so intrigued by that I literally spent most of my day sitting my chair reading it. I guess it’s also the first psychological thriller I’ve read in quite some time, so the difference in my normal pandemic reading genre might be partially why I was so intrigued. But I thought it was fantastic. Twins set out on a voyage across the Indian Sea and only one of them survives. She is mistaken as the dead twin, the more favored twin, when she finally lands on shore and decides to play along in both her grief and her desperation to win her father’s inheritance by producing the first grandchild before her five remaining siblings. I really thought this whole story was so twisty and unique. I made the mistake of just looking at the amazon reviews and it seems half of the people loved it, half of the people hated it and were bored to tears. I certainly didn’t find this boring! Anyway, I highly recommend it for a fun and intriguing read!

Love to Hate You by Jo Watson
Rating: 5* stars

I think I’ve finally got my reading groove back! I LOVED this book. It begins with a very steamy scene between strangers – something that usually turns me off in a book. But it was already so intriguing and funny within the first chapter that I had to see what happened next. And then proceeded to read and read and read. I laughed out loud so many times while reading this. I fell completely in love with Ben. It does turn out to be an office romance type of book – but with a boss who is actually kind and wonderful, not a closed off jerk. There were certainly a few more serious underlying complications between their love story, but most of the book was just so cheerful and fun. I will definitely be picking up a copy for my shelves to re-read again and again in the future.

Conventionally Yours by Annabeth Albert
Rating: 3.5 stars

Conrad and Alden are rivals in a huge card game phenomenon. They play each other often for Gamer Grandpa’s youtube channel and end up with promotional tickets to a huge convention in Vegas. For separate reasons they decide to drive across the country rather than fly and after a series of events it ends up just being the two of them on the trip. As expected, they begin to get to know each other a little better and their rivalry turns into something much sweeter. Overall, this was a very predictable, yet cute book. Basically the two characters just talk and talk and figure out their own feelings. Which I’m fine with – I love character interaction above all else in a story. I didn’t really care about any of the card game stuff, but it didn’t interfere enough in the story to bother me.

What I Read August 2020

I’m so excited to write this post today because August was FINALLY a really great reading month for me! I read 14 books, and 12 of them I rated 4 stars or higher. I love that kind of data! I don’t think I even DNF’d more than one or two books this month either. I just finally picked out some good ones. Anyway, check them out!

Head Over Heels by Hannah Orenstein
Rating: 4 stars

Avery was an elite gymnast when an injury ended her career just before the Olympics. Over the next seven years she struggles to make a new life for herself after years of being emotionally abused by her coach. After breaking up with her boyfriend she decides to move back home and take a coaching job with another former gymnast, Ryan, who she of course had a big crush on as a teen. Ryan and Avery work together coaching Hallie, trying to get her to the Olympics as well. I wish going into this book I knew literally anything about gymnastics. I don’t, and I don’t particularly care, so the long descriptions of moves and routines were lost on me. I enjoyed how Avery took a much different approach to coaching than what she grew up with and how well the three of them worked together to coordinate her new routines. But I found Ryan to honestly be pretty boring. He was nice, but he didn’t stand out as being a very good leading man. Overall, it was an enjoyable book, it just could have been better.

My (Mostly) Secret Baby by Penelope Bloom
Rating: 3 stars

Damon and Chelsea meet on the street and have a fiery chemistry that leads them to sleeping together just minutes later in the first empty room they find. They walk away and don’t see each other for another five years when Chelsea goes to Damon’s company for a job as her last resort. The secret? She had his baby and never told him. This book was interesting enough to keep me reading, but still a pretty stereotypical boss/subordinate romance, which feels pretty boring to me at this point. The five years of denying Damon his rights as a parent for really no good reason was a bit unbelievable and brushed past rather quickly, but sometimes it’s nicer to just have a light hearted book without any of the heavy stuff weighing it down.

The Road Back to You by Ian Morgan Cron and Suzanne Stabile (counting this book twice because I both read it and listened to the audio this month!)
Rating: 5* stars

This is the most life changing book I’ve ever read. I don’t know why I put it off for so long! I’ve been deeply interested in the enneagram from the very first time I heard about it on a couple of podcasts many years ago. I took a bunch of assessments and followed a bunch of instagram accounts, but mostly focused on my own number. I finally decided it would be worth my while to learn more about all the numbers and see how they might connect to the people in my life. And honestly, this book just blew my mind. Not every person is a picture perfect example of their number. But SOME people are. And some of those people are part of my life and it was quite a revelation finally being able to understand how they tick. I simultaneously read a physical copy of this book while also listening to it on audio so I could get through all the chapters more quickly. The audio was great, but a physical copy is a must so you can highlight and refer back to each number and their traits. It starts to get a bit confusing if you’re going through them as quickly as I was. I wish I had read this book sooner, it might have helped me understand and relate to the people in my life a little better. But the obsession is truly peaked now and I’m anxious to find out even more. But pick this up first for a great introduction to the enneagram and how each type is determined. I don’t think you’ll regret it!

Always Only You by Chloe Liese
Rating: 4.5 stars

I really enjoyed this second book in the Bergman Brothers series. It’s a story about Frankie, an autistic woman who also suffers from rheumatoid arthritis. She’s the social media manager for a hockey team in which Ren Bergman is a player. Ren is a happy, playful, and modest guy who has always caught Frankie’s attention, but she’s sworn off relationships after disasters in the past when her partners got sick of dealing with her challenges. I’m fairly certain I’ve read books about autistic characters before, but this one especially intrigued because it definitely clued me in to how they are truly just regular people. The author herself mentions at the end how she is also autistic, which is how she felt qualified to write this story. I’m always up for reading a romance book, but it makes me SO much happier when they have a lot of depth and growth as part of the main plot. This book covered all the bases and I really enjoyed it, particularly later on in the book when it started to pick up pace.

All Things Reconsidered by Knox McCoy
Rating: 4 stars

As an enormous fan of all things related to The Popcast podcast, I will always be a supporter of Knox’s writing. He has such a wonderfully self deprecating and conversational writing style that is extremely personal, funny, and easy to connect with. He writes the way that he speaks which makes the whole experience that much more enjoyable to me. I also enjoy that Knox had a very similar upbringing to me, so it’s always interesting to hear stories of growing up in the church and youth group and an evangelical family because I can relate so well to them. A lot of this book is about those topics and how he’s grown to reconsider a lot of the black and white ideas he was presented with as a child. But there are other chapters thrown in that have nothing to do with his faith, but are absolutely hilarious. It’s definitely worth a read. Overall, I enjoyed the book, but it did take me two months to read because many of the topics while presented in a light and easy to understand way were still indeed heavy topics. It wasn’t the subject matter I was always that excited to pick up when I had a few spare minutes to read. But I’m glad I continued on because it was a really great book!

The Night Swim by Megan Goldin
Rating: 4 stars

Rachel is a true crime podcaster visiting a city for a couple of weeks to cover the current trial of a rape victim. On her way there she receives a mysterious letter about another crime that happened 25 years earlier – a drowning under mysterious circumstances.While Rachel is researching and interviewing about the rape case she can’t stop thinking about the drowning that she keeps getting letters about. She simultaneously starts looking into both cases and the connections are intriguing. This is definitely not a light read. The subject matter is heavy with rape, sexual assault, and violence. I did have a hard time keeping the two cases separate in my mind for the first half of the book. But it held my attention through the end. I kept expecting some sort of crazy twist, but this is just a thriller, not a psychological thriller which is apparently the only type of thriller I’m used to reading! I also thought this book was unique because it didn’t have ANY romantic components. I can’t remember the last time I read a fiction book without that being at least a small part of the story. And surprisingly, I didn’t miss it. I thought Rachel was a fantastic journalist and really loved the way she treated everyone as she researched the cases.

Today Tonight Tomorrow by Rachel Lynn Solomon
Rating: 5* stars

Rowan and Neil are neck and neck in the race for valedictorian after four years of academically besting each other again and again. Their rivalry is notorious and is known for going to extreme lengths to prove they are the best. It’s the last day of school and the two of them end up spending the majority of the day together during the traditional senior scavenger hunt around Seattle. As you probably know by now, I’m a huge fan of enemies to lovers romance and I’m obsessed with YA love stories. This book was PERFECTION. It had absolutely everything I wanted in a book. It’s the first book in ages that I was willing to give up sleep for because I couldn’t put it down. Then four hours later I woke up to read some more. (I gave up my bike ride too.) It had depth, it had wonderful character development and interactions, and it had such a delicious slow burn tension. I adored this book and definitely plan on reading it again!

What You Wish For by Katherine Center
Rating: 5 stars

I read most of this book sitting in my car at a cemetery because I desperately needed to get away from my house and couldn’t think of anywhere else to go. Needless to say, I wasn’t in a great place emotionally when I read this and I had some big reactions to the story. In the beginning there were parts that I hated it. By the end I was completely in love. This book started out light and finished being everything I needed it to be. A perfect reminder that there are always going to be good days and bad days, joyful moments and devastating ones. It’s up to you to choose to see the good and revel in the joy because that is what makes life worth living. This was a message I desperately needed and I’m so glad I picked this book up. I suppose I should actually tell you a little bit about the storyline… Sam is a epileptic school librarian who works at one of the most creative and unique elementary schools in Galveston, Texas. Duncan is a teacher that she had an extreme crush on at her last school, but was too reserved to act on it. She finds out Duncan is coming to be principal at her current school and is so thrilled yet terrified to have him in her life again because she knows the crush will come back. But then he arrives and it’s like his entire personality has been replaced. He is no longer the fun, adorable, exuberant person she once fell in love with. Duncan, when he arrives, is what I reacted most strongly to because it felt like one more blow to my day that I couldn’t handle. But it was worth it to charge on. Such a good book.

Heart Bones by Colleen Hoover
Rating: 4.5 stars

Colleen Hoover is (obviously) my favorite author, so I was of course really looking forward to this book even though she didn’t give us any kind of description on what to expect. Turns out it was a YA novel about two “damaged” people who were well versed in keeping their secrets close and never getting emotionally tied down to anyone. Until they of course get close to each other. I liked this book a lot, but I have pretty high standards for Colleen Hoover and this one fell a little bit flat to me. The romance seemed a little too immediate and the fact that the whole relationship is based on NOT telling each other things…that annoys me. I want characters to open up and connect in ways people rarely seem to in real life. But still, I really liked it!

Runaway Road by Devney Perry
Rating: 3 stars

Londyn is running away from her life for the third time after a nasty divorce. She’s taking her refinished Cadillac back to California to give it to the boy she lived in it with as a runaway teen. But her car breaks down along the way and she finds herself in an idyllic town with an irresistible mechanic. I enjoyed this book for what it was – a sweet escape into a guaranteed love story. It was definitely predictable without much tension in the plot, but I needed that this week. Overall a perfectly fine read.

Wild Highway by Devney Perry
Rating: 4 stars

This second book in the series picks up with Londyn’s childhood runaway friend Gemma selling her cosmetic company for twelve million dollars and taking the Cadillac on the second leg of the journey, stopping in Montana to make amends with her friend Katherine. But going back to Montana, where she briefly lived after leaving California, brings back a lot of old memories and she decides to stay awhile, much to her teenage crush Easton’s dismay. I really enjoyed this installment of the series and spending time on a Montana ranch and lodge. Gemma and Easton both felt much more complex and I enjoyed getting into their heads. So far my only beef with this series is the extreme abundance of wealth (as adults) that can clearly make their lives a lot easier. I’m looking forward to reading the next book in the series to see where the Cadillac heads next.

Quarter Miles by Devney Perry
Rating: 4 stars

Of the three books completed so far in this series, this has definitely been my favorite because it was the most swoon-worthy. Katherine is on her way to drop the Cadillac off with Aria in Oregon to try and clear her head and get over her secret crush on her best friend and roommate Cash. But Cash finagles his way onto the trip and they both realize just how deeply they feel about each other. I really liked this one – at first – because Cash was so much more easy going and lighthearted than his brother Easton in the previous book. But about halfway through it felt like he had a total personality change and turned just as broody and angry as Easton, maybe even more so. That’s what turned this from a 5 star into a 4 star rating to me. But other than that, I really enjoyed this one! Now to wait for the final two books in the series!

Eliza and Her Monsters by Francesca Zappia
Rating: 5* stars

Quiet and sullen teenagers that have rich inner lives as famous anonymous identities on the internet who happen to find each other both online and in real life? Sign me up! I adored this book. Eliza has created an amazing webcomic over the last several years and has millions of followers. But in real life she is very private, quiet, and friendless. Until she meets the new kid Wallace who is also very quiet, but is a fan of her comic and one of the major contributors to her fan forum. Paralyzed with fear of losing her anonymity, she chooses not to tell him who she is in return. The two of them slowly figure out how to be friends and maybe a little bit more over time. This book turned out to be a lot more serious than I was expecting with a lot of deeper issues popping up near the end. I was also a little perturbed at how much more I identified with Eliza’s parents and their frustration with how obsessed she was with her internet life and angry or quiet around them (too many parallels to my own life right now!). But I thought it ultimately had a really great message about finding your worth in the right ways and not getting too caught up in what people think you owe them. I honestly wasn’t all that interested in the comic itself and all the fan fiction related ties to this book, but it didn’t stop me from loving the story.

What I Read June 2020

June was a pretty terrible reading month for me. I didn’t DNF many books, but I probably should have! Everything was just okay. I did finish one really great nonfiction I had been reading for awhile and I had one highly rated thriller, but just three weeks after reading the book I couldn’t tell you a single thing about it before going back to read my review! I realize telling you none of these books were very good certainly doesn’t encourage you to finish reading the post (lol). But…most of these books probably just weren’t for me, or not for me at this time. So keep an open mind! And definitely pick up your own copy of Fierce, Free, and Full of Fire!!!

Flow by Kennedy Ryan
Rating: 2.5 stars

I read this short prequel because I wanted to read the original book, Grip, after it was highly recommended by an author I trust. And honestly, it just did not appeal to me. There was nothing really wrong with it, but I was bored. I read a decent amount of Grip afterward and felt the same way, finally DNFing it. It just wasn’t for me.

Rafe by Rebekah Weatherspoon
Rating: 3 stars

In this book super surgeon Sloan needs a nanny asap for her six year old twins. Rafe comes to her at just the right time and they immediately feel a connection. And things progress, naturally. I liked this book because Rafe was such a perfect guy for the role he was needed in. He had literally no flaws. So he was also a bit boring. I thought overall this was a cute story that kept my interest, but there was nothing spectacular about it.

Fierce, Free, and Full of Fire by Jen Hatmaker
Rating: 5* stars

Jen Hatmaker is an absolute delight. Her books are poignet yet so hilarious. She tells tons of personal stories to show how human she is and loves to laugh at things that definitely weren’t so funny at the time. I’ve enjoyed all the books of hers that I’ve read before, but this is by far my favorite. It really is a glorious guide on how to fully embrace being who you were meant to be. She talks about the different personalities people have and how it is totally okay to just live quietly in your own lane taking care of the people closest to you. It’s also okay to have huge dreams and want to change the world. We were all created differently but we were all created RIGHT. Each chapter delves into a different part of yourself and how you can learn to freely accept who you are, unapologetically. The whole book was uplifting and inspirational. I loved it!

Where the Blame Lies by Mia Sheridan
Rating: 4.5 stars

Josie is a college student who is abducted in the night and held captive in a warehouse for ten months where she becomes pregnant with and births her captor’s son before she manages to escape. Eight years later she is consulted by the police for information on a copycat case. I really enjoyed this book. It went back and forth between the current timeline and the ten months she was held captive, changing point of view between Josie and the detective on her case, Zach. Josie and Zach of course have a strong connection to each other, but unlike some other books that felt very unbelievable at how quickly you could go from being raped and tortured and then jumping into a sexual relationship, these characters went eight years between events so it felt a lot more believable. I was definitely kept guessing for most of the book and enjoyed the fast pace.

The Girl in the Love Song by Emma Scott
Rating: 4 stars

Thirteen year old Miller shows up one night in Violet’s backyard looking exhausted and in need of a good meal. The two instantly become best friends while fighting back a secret love for each other. Most of this book takes place when they’re seniors in high school and eventually jumps forward a bit at the end. Overall, I liked this novel, but I also felt it got a big bogged down with unnecessary plot points. I also had a hard time believing two teens were so desperately in love with each other when they didn’t spend any time together. I liked watching how their relationship changed over the years, but wish there was just more of the two of them. Emma Scott has a great knack for writing deeply emotional love stories so it’s worth a read.

One to Watch by Katy Stayman-London
Rating: 3 stars

This was a tough read for me. Bea is a plus size woman with a popular fashion writing career. After tweeting about the lack of body diversity on the tv show Main Squeeze (a Bachelor copycat) she is cast as the lead in the next season. The rest of the book is watching Bea compete on national tv for the love and happily ever after with one perfect man. Unfortunately, she is quite possibly even more obsessed with her size and shape than the men she is with. As a plus sized woman, I can totally relate to everything Bea was feeling. But does that make for a good book? Does it help that much of the book is composed of tweets, chats, podcasts, and articles either bashing her as a plus size woman or at least constantly talking about it? Can’t she just be A WOMAN? I understand the whole point of the book was to encourage body positivity, but for me it had the opposite effect. This book did not make me feel better about myself at all. But besides all that, it was interesting to “watch” a whole season play out, very much like it probably does in real life reality shows. I had just as hard a time picking out the right guy for her as I do when I’m watching it on tv!

Home Before Dark by Riley Sager
Rating: 3.5 stars

I usually steer very clear of ghost and supernatural stories, but I’ve read all of Riley Sager’s other books and decided to give this one a shot. And…it was okay. For something marketed as a thriller, this was incredibly slow. Maggie is a 30 year old woman whose entire life has been overshadowed by a book her father wrote about their twenty days of living in a haunted house when she was five. After her father’s death she finds out that he still owned the house and it now belongs to her. She goes back to the house determined to figure out why they really left after such a short period of time. The book alternates between chapters of her father’s book and her current situation. There were definitely some creepy moments. I didn’t read much of this at night because I’m easily spooked. I was intrigued enough to power through, but this was definitely the book I liked least by this author.

Lucky Caller by Emma Mills
Rating: 2.5 stars

The characters in this book really annoyed me. Honestly, what is the point of writing a book if you’re never going to let the main character have a voice? Nina has feelings for a boy, and it’s obvious there is some sort of past between them that went a bit beyond friendship. But she won’t talk to him. She won’t ever give him any of the thoughts she so desperately wants to say. It happened over and over and over again and it really ticked me off. There was ONE beautiful short little scene and the rest of this book was boring or frustrating. It could have been so much more. Not recommending this one!!

Our Stop by Laura Jane Williams
Rating: 2 stars

One day Daniel overhears Nadia (a stranger to him) talking to a coworker in a park and is intrigued by her. Soon after, he realizes she’s on the same train as him – at least on Mondays and sometimes Tuesdays. Not wanting to look like a creep he decides to leave her an ad in the Missed Connections portion of their newspaper and believing that she is that girl she writes him back. Spoilers ahead – this book infuriated me. It was missed opportunity after missed opportunity. They kept just missing each other by a minute or two for almost the entirety of the book. The book itself wasn’t bad, but the romance books I love are the ones where the main characters constantly interact. This does not happen in this book. I was so excited about the premise, but didn’t realize how ridiculously long the wait would be to even have them MEET. Not worth the read, in my opinion.

Hearts, Strings, and Other Breakable Things by Jacqueline Firkins
Rating: 3 stars

After her mom dies and three years of foster care (all of which is extremely glazed over as being unimportant), Edie finds herself living with her wealthy aunt, uncle, and cousins for the last six months before she starts college. Despite her full intention of only focusing on her education, she finds herself equally drawn to her childhood best friend Sebastian – who happens to have a girlfriend, and the charismatic player Henry who she’s convinced is only pursuing her as a personal challenge, not because he actually likes her. Edie’s feelings about each boy are all over the place. And honestly, it was pretty hard to root for either of them. I hate books where one of the characters needs to cheat because their chemistry with the new person is “that much truer.” I also hate books where the main guy is also a womanizer. I didn’t really want Edie with either of them. It took me awhile to get into this book at all because of those hangups, but about halfway through I started enjoying it. I still have a lot of mixed feelings all around, but it was an okay read.

Always Never Yours by Emily Wibberley and Austin Siegemund-Broka
Rating: 3.5 stars

Megan is an aspiring stage director who finds herself needing an acting credit to be admitted to her prospective college. She ends up being cast as Juliet in a class Romeo and Juliet play starring opposite her ex-boyfriend/best friend’s boyfriend/boy she lost her virginity to. Megan’s a huge flirt and goes through boyfriends left and right with the self made assumption she’s just a stopping ground before they find their better half. Then she meets Owen, someone who challenges that belief and makes her realize she deserves to be more than she’s given herself credit for. To be honest, I really didn’t like the first half of this book. It’s hard to imagine being as confident and flirty and ready to just dive right in physically with any hot boy as Megan is. I liked Owen, but I wanted more of him. Much like the book before this one, I took serious issue with the fact he also had a girlfriend (albeit one he never saw who lived in Italy) for most of the book. The second half got a little deeper into why Megan felt the way she did about herself and I was really invested by the end.

What I Read May 2020

My reading life in May was very much like it was in March. It was so hard to find anything that truly caught my attention. Though unlike in March when I was DNFing left and right after only a couple of pages, I kept trying to stick with the books this time not giving up until I was over half done and just couldn’t take it anymore. It did not make for a great month of reading – so much wasted time! But I definitely found a few winners that I did stick with to the end and am excited to share with you what I chose!

My Favorite Souvenir by Penelope Ward and Vi Keeland
Rating: 4 stars

This was a sweet story with a slow burn romance. After being dumped by her fiance, Hazel decides to go on her honeymoon by herself and finds herself stranded in Colorado in a snowstorm with no way back home. She happens across another stranded traveler and they hit it off and decide to travel by car around the country, picking up souvenirs at each stop. It was sweet and fun until the inevitable obstacle was thrown in her path when she arrived back home and had to face her ex-fiance and the truth about her traveling companion. I enjoyed this book, though got a bit irritated with Hazel and how confused she was about which guy to choose when the choice was so obvious. It seemed to drag on quite a bit near the end. But overall, it kept my attention and I liked it a lot.

The Happy Ever After Playlist by Abby Jimenez
Rating: 4.5 stars

This could be read as a standalone book, but I think you’d get a little bit more out of it if you read Abby’s other book, The Friend Zone, first. I really loved The Friend Zone and was excited to get this one in my hands. And believe it or not, I actually liked this one more. Maybe because the dog Tucker is a big character in the book! In this book, Sloan is still grieving the death of her fiance, two years after his motorcycle accident. She comes across a dog who doesn’t appear to have an owner and ends up loving his companionship only to have his owner, Jason, eventually call her back. Jason’s out of the country and they form a great friendship over the phone and when he comes back they figure out a way to share custody of Tucker and things progress from there. The thing about this book (and the other) is that Abby Jimenez isn’t afraid to touch hard topics and really get deep into them. This isn’t a quick fall in love and happily ever after story (despite the title!). You’re going to really get into why the couple will or won’t work. It’s not exactly light, but I still loved it.

The Best Mistake by Cookie O’Gorman
Rating: 3.5 stars

I made the mistake of waiting awhile after reading this to write my review. And…it wasn’t particularly memorable. Mistaken identity leads to a college senior propositioning the wrong brother into helping her have one wild night of fun before her college career is over. This book was fun because it was about a lot of brothers. The first in a series, I believe. I liked the characters, but this didn’t have the same swoon factor that other Cookie O’Gorman books seemed to have, maybe because the premise itself didn’t exactly appeal to me. I liked it enough, but definitely not a favorite.

The Lonely Heart of Maybelle Lane by Kate O’Shaughnessy
Rating: 4.5 stars

Halfway through May this is only the fourth book I managed to finish. I decided to drop yet another book I was halfway through to try out this middle grade I saw highly recommended from a trusted source. And – I really liked it. I guess I have a thing for lonely tween girls who go on quirky journeys across the country! In this one Maybelle is a precocious eleven year old who convinces his neighbor and temporary caretaker to drive her to Nashville for a singing competition where she’ll finally be able to meet her dad. As always, hijinks definitely ensue. I took this down half a star simply because it had a pretty slow beginning. Enjoyable, but nothing really intense to catch your interest. I plan on passing it along to Caden again, but I’m not sure there’s anything that’ll catch his interest in the first third of the story. Anyway, I really liked this book and the ending was fantastic.

The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix
Rating: 4 stars

This is one of the most bizarre books I’ve ever read. I’m still not quite sure what to make of it. A group of housewives decide one day to form a book club to discuss their favorite crime novels right around the time a stranger moves into the neighborhood. Over the years a couple of unexplained and mysterious things begin happening, but nobody will believe that Patricia, the main character, is telling the truth about something very disturbing she witnessed the neighbor doing. The group eventually comes up with a plan to involve their husbands but all of their husbands turn against them, and eventually they turn against Patricia. The original book club dissolves as more people come back together with their husbands as participants and everyone pretends life is fine. There are so many parts of this book where almost nothing is happening. You never get that close to the characters, which really bothers me. It occurred to me that this book is written by a man and I read very few novels by men, so maybe that’s why I wasn’t quite getting the depth of character I kept waiting for. But every once in awhile something absolutely insane would happen and then I’d be spurred back into action and didn’t want to put the book down. It was definitely a journey. Overall I really enjoyed the book, I just wish it felt a bit more personal.

Waiting for Tom Hanks by Kerry Winfrey
Rating: 3.5 stars

This was a sweet and highly predictable book about a woman who is obsessed with classic rom coms and has been waiting her whole life for her own Tom Hanks to show up. But when he does, she refuses to believe that he’s the one. I enjoyed the book, especially all the nostalgia for those movies I loved growing up as well. But the CONSTANT talking about them and her insistence of having her own Tom Hanks moments got to be a bit much. I wish she could have let some of it go and just lived her own story instead of obsessively trying to decide if he could be the one for her. Overall, it was a quick and cute read, I just didn’t love it.

100 Days of Sunlight by Abbie Emmons
Rating: 5 stars

This was a really beautiful book about a girl who loses her sight (temporarily) and a boy who has lost his legs. Tessa is a poetry blogger and having a really hard time dealing with the loss of her sight. Her grandparents decide to hire Weston to help her with her typing and he begs them not to tell her about his prosthetic legs so she can learn to accept him as a person, rather than immediately with sympathy the way most people do. The story flips between both characters’ points of view and between the present time and three years earlier when Weston lost his legs. I loved this book because it is so full of hope and optimism and learning to see past your imperfections or limitations and realizing that you still have the world at your fingertips. You still have your LIFE. And most importantly, you are still worth love. I loved this book and its message, though I did find it to be slightly unbelievable that a 13 year old boy could be so insightful. I have an 11 year old boy and he would most definitely not lose his legs and then fight with everything in him to still have a normal life. It felt like all the boy characters in the flashback chapters were crazy wise beyond their years. It made for great insight, but not necessarily believability. But besides all that, it was really wonderful.

What I Like About You by Marisa Kanter
Rating: 4.5 stars

As usual, I’ve searched out another great YA novel about a hidden/mistaken identity that takes place online while the characters also interact in person. Though in this circumstance the girl, Halle, is completely aware that Nash is HER online Nash from the very beginning. Which makes for a really lengthy book filled with teenage angst. While the constant deliberating on whether or not she should come clean got a bit old, I really enjoyed the rest of the book and the subject matter. Halle and Nash are both YA book bloggers and there is so much celebration for the YA world in this story – my favorite! (Though there is also a lot of criticism for adults that read YA, which was definitely off putting as an adult reader who ADORES YA.) Halle spends so much of the book trying to draw the lines between who she is in real life and the persona she puts on for her massive following. It was interesting to read about since I’ve SLIGHTLY dabbled in those feelings myself when I try to keep this blog’s instagram going (and am failing miserably). Anyway, it was exactly the kind of book I always love and I definitely really enjoyed it!

The Rural Diaries by Hilarie Burton Morgan
Rating: 5* stars

I picked this book up because I follow Hilarie Burton Morgan on instagram and really liked her in One Tree Hill and White Collar. (And I REALLY loved Jeffrey Dean Morgan in The Good Wife and was fascinated to learn only recently that they were married with kids!) The book sounded intriguing so I thought I’d give it a shot. And guys, I ADORED it. This is the first time I’ve ever read a memoir and couldn’t put it down. It was such a beautiful look at an imperfect relationship and the love that held them together while they fought for their dreams. It was also a really interesting look at famous actors that have no desire to live the Hollywood lifestyle. I was continually impressed by Hilarie and how hands on she was about creating the life she wanted. It was inspirational and beautiful and made me cry multiple times. My only grievance is that it ended fairly abruptly, before their wedding actually happened – although wedding pictures were shown in the photo section. It was just an odd missing component to their lengthy love story. But overall…I’m highly recommending this one, especially if you like one or both of the actors!

Fight or Flight by Samantha Young
Rating: 3.5 stars

In this book we meet Ava who is flying home from her friend’s funeral and comes across a very rude Scottish man at every turn. Her and Caleb immediately start bickering about everything and she is constantly lamenting how rude he is. I really wanted to love this book because the hate to love trope is one of my favorites. Unfortunately, this also followed the path of people who hate each other immediately jumping into bed together because their undeniable physical only attraction for each other. That annoys me. I like a love – both physical and emotional – that is hard won and deeply earned. I guess I won’t get too into the details, but these characters kept saying what they didn’t want in their significant other and then accepting those things anyway. It frustrated me. I definitely still enjoyed the book enough to keep reading it, but I wish it had fit a bit better with what I was hoping for.

What I Read April 2020

Well, it’s taken me almost another whole month to sit down and write this, but I wanted to share what I read in April! March was a terrible month for reading with everything going on in the world, but I was really able to settle in and pick some great books in April. (Everything got real tough again in May, unfortunately!) I was able to finish fourteen books and most of them were pretty fantastic! Light and good escapes from reality.

Ruthless by Deborah Bladon
Rating: 3 stars

First of all, I’m pretty over the boss and assistant trope in romance. I’m not sure how I keep ending up reading them, other than that I’m mostly picking random Kindle Unlimited choices with high ratings when I want a quick escape and SO MANY of them follow this trope. And while this started in a similar vein, I was actually impressed by how original the story felt comparatively. It’s not something that will stick with me, or even something I remember that well days later when I’m writing this review. But..I liked it.

Moment of Truth by Kasie West
Rating: 5* stars

I fell in love with Kasie West’s sweet YA storytelling in P.S. I Like You. I’ve read all of her books since then, but none of them have made the same impact on me – until this one. I’ll admit I was a bit baffled by the original premise – there is a movie star who has a recurring roll as a teenage spy named Heath Hall. And now there is a “fake Heath Hall” who shows up in random places at random times facing all of his fears. This starts as more of a background storyline to the main character Hadley, who is a focused and independent swimmer obsessed with trying to outshine the shadow of her dead brother. This leads to her desperately trying to sleuth out who Fake Heath Hall is after he messed up one of her last swim competitions. There is quite a bit of conjecture as she waffles between a couple of different suspects. And of course she has some wonderful anonymous messages with Fake Heath while also developing some interesting connections in her real life. It was really very reminiscent of P.S. I Like You, but with a different perspective that felt a lot more emotional. It did take me about halfway through the book before I was really into it and didn’t want to put it down. But the second half? It was fantastic. If you love a great YA love story, this one is a kicker. I loved it.

Only When It’s Us by Chloe Liese
Rating: 5 stars

This was a unique romance between a hot-headed college athlete and the silent “lumberjack” she’s paired up with for a school assignment. I picked it up blind on the recommendation of a friend and was blown away by how much I loved it. It started out as light and fun and developed into something much deeper. My only complaint is that it felt a bit too long. There was a lot of conflict to overcome later in the book and it felt a bit bogged down. But overall, this was a truly enjoyable read.

Beach Read by Emily Henry
Rating: 5 stars

A romance writer finds herself doubting the possibility of happily ever after when she finds out a disturbing secret at her father’s funeral. She picks up and moves to his secret house in Michigan and realizes she’s now living next door to her college nemesis, a grumpy writer as well. The two of them make a deal to try and break their writers’ block by writing in the opposite person’s genre while spending two days a week with each other doing research. I really enjoyed this book. It had such a quiet beauty about it. The love story was fantastic, but the characters were so REAL. Which isn’t always great in a novel – you want the leading man (or woman) to be everything you’d want a real person to ideally be. But – they have flaws too and you have to learn to accept them just as you would in real life. I do kind of wish this book had a different title because it felt decidedly NOT like a beach read to me. It was a bit more sullen than I anticipated, but I really adored it.

You Deserve Each Other by Sarah Hogle
Rating: 5 stars

This book was hilarious, sort of unbelievably over the top, a little bit sad, and all kinds of wonderful. I totally loved it. An engaged couple realizes that they’ve lost all desire to marry each other, but instead of mutually breaking apart, they both contrive all types of insane plans to try and drive the other person away. It’s crazy to think anybody would go to the lengths that they did to “win,” but it was wildly entertaining to read about. I had my doubts in the beginning because it all seemed so unbelievable, but I absolutely love how it all came together in the end!

One Moment Please by Amy Daws
Rating: 4 stars

So I came across Amy Daws at Book Bonanza last summer and thought she was hilarious. I’ve since been regularly following her on instagram stories and even though I don’t know her as a person, I think I have a pretty good grasp on her personality and humor. This is the first book of hers that I read and it was REALLY hard for me to not constantly be thinking of Amy saying all the lines that the characters were. I’m realizing this is the downside of getting to know authors – they’re no longer an anonymous presence behind the words and it’s pretty hard for me to disconnect the two and follow the story. But anyway, besides all of that, I really enjoyed this book! I was doubtful at the beginning, but it really grew on me. Two people, a one night stand, an unexpected pregnancy, and trying to make it work on their own terms.

Magnolia Table: Volume 2 by Joanna Gaines
Rating: 3 stars

I absolutely love Joanna Gaines’ first cookbook. While I haven’t made a ton of recipes out of it, the handful that I have made I’ve made again and again because they were so delicious. I adored that cookbook because she shared all of her favorite recipes and the stories behind them, something that I always think makes a cookbook rise above the ones that are basically just churned out for a profit. I expected this cookbook to be just like the first. And while they look the same, she basically says in the introduction that she used all her recipes in the first book and this was just a culmination of some new ideas she and her staff had. Most of the recipes don’t even have any description. Much like the first book I was really interested in some of the breakfast, snack, and dessert recipes, and had almost no interest in the meals and sides. They seem simple or boring or just not something my family would eat. I did make her french toast recipe and it was incredible, so I have high hopes for the rest, I just found the lack of heart in this one a glaring disappointment.

Untamed by Glennon Doyle
Rating: 5* stars

I was unprepared for how incredible this book was going to be. I haven’t read anything else by Glennon Doyle (and after reading this one it feels kind of pointless to read the earlier memoirs because her life has changed so much). But it was getting such great reviews that I picked it up for my morning reading time. And honestly, it’s just amazing. So empowering for women everywhere. I didn’t always necessarily agree with Glennon, but I also saw SO much of myself in her. Which isn’t always a good thing (lol). I LOVED the super short essay format, each chapter packing a pretty great punch. It gave me so much to think about and consider, especially in terms of family and what that word can mean. This book was amazing. I highly, highly recommend it to all women everywhere.

The Other Mrs. by Mary Kubica
Rating: 3 stars

Is it just me or do so many psychological thrillers seem to be almost carbon copies of each other? I picked this on a whim – the first intriguing thriller on my kindle when I wanted something in that genre. And it was…okay. None of the characters were likeable. There were plotlines that didn’t get enough attention. The twists were predictable. It just wasn’t that great. It took me forever to read and I didn’t get much satisfaction from it.

Trejo’s Tacos by Danny Trejo
Rating: 5 stars

Now THIS is my favorite kind of cookbook! Colorful and fun with a lot of gorgeous food photos, personalized reasons why the author/chef chose to put these items in his book, versatility and creative freedom with the recipes, and a lot of just really great sounding food. I loved this one! The bulk of this cookbook are master recipes for each kind of meat and then all the different ways he uses them. I definitely look forward to trying these out once I can get into a grocery store after this pandemic and pick out exactly what I need. There were plenty of other recipes that I’m anxious to try as well. The only part I wasn’t that interested in was the cocktail section at the end, just because I don’t drink or make them. Danny doesn’t drink either, so it seemed an odd chapter to add, but I understand the need for something a little different. Overall, I’m very excited about this one and expect to get a lot of use out of it.

The Wrong Bachelor by Alexandra Moody
Rating: 5 stars

I was so surprised to come across a YA book on kindle unlimited that sounded so promising! I needed an escape so I dropped everything to read this book and then proceeded to spend most of the night reading it. That hasn’t happened in forever! This book definitely hit my reading sweet spot. An adorable and swoony PG young adult romance with great dialog and genuinely likeable characters. I thought the storyline itself was really fun too – a high school Bachelor competition to raise money for charity. I was swept up in the story and didn’t want to put it down.

The Wrong Costar by Alexandra Moody
Rating: 4 stars

While I didn’t find this quite as swoonworthy as the first book in the series, I still really enjoyed it. A famous actor is required to join a real high school and their play to get authentic teenage experience. He’s made out to be a Hollywood bad boy, but is really just like everyone else. It was another great YA read!

The Wrong Prim Date by Alexandra Moody
Rating: 4.5 stars

Okay, of the three books in this series, Ethan in this one is by far my favorite love interest. The quiet nerdy singer? Totally who I would go for in high school (and did lol). I absolutely adored him. But this book also made me want to scream at the characters for being so ridiculously stupid for so long. It was really to the point where it was unbelievable. I know this is a common reason why so many people don’t like YA, but I’m normally okay with it. This one was just starting to annoy me. But Ethan.. He was great. 🙂

I Hate You More by Alexandra Moody
Rating: 3 stars

I may have just hit my limit of reading YA romances in a row, especially all by the same author, but I was not particularly fond of this one. Two sworn enemies end up living in the same house and have to come to some sort of truce to survive the year. Compared to the other three books by the author I read this month, this one felt very chaotic and unorganized. I didn’t like the characters very much and it was all very surface driven. Physical attributes always above anything else. But it was still a nice little escape and I was intrigued enough to keep reading.

What I Read March 2020

Well, we’re more than halfway through April so I thought maybe I should write about my March books! With all the crazy things happening it was a pretty terrible month for reading. I DNF-d more books last month than I have in my entire life. No apologies. I just needed to find books that could hold my attention and it was pretty hard to do. (Spoiler – I have NOT had this problem in April – my April reads are amazing!) Despite how many books I weeded through, I did read a couple of great ones, though. Check them out below!

The Right Swipe by Alisha Rai
Rating: 3.5 stars

Alisha Rai is usually a pretty reliable author for a good romance novel. After a couple more DNF’s (there were so many in February), I thought this would be the perfect choice to get me interested in a story again. And – it was okay. It was a lot less steamy than most of her books that I’ve read – which is fine. But all the character backstory was almost a bit boring to me. I didn’t like the main character, Rhiannon, that much, which made it hard to cheer for her. I’ve come across this in other contemporary books too – I have zero experience with dating apps, assume I’ll never need to use them, and therefore really don’t care about reading whole books centered around them. It’s a personal preference, no shade at the book itself. Overall, I enjoyed it and it kept my attention to read in two days over a weekend readathon when I was focused on reading and not much else. But it wasn’t one of my favorites.

Would Like to Meet by Rachel Winters
Rating: 4.5 stars

This was a really sweet, albeit very predictable, romantic comedy that plays on all the iconic rom com meet cute scenarios. I thought that it was a bit slow at the start, but I really got into it as the book went along. I did have a bit of a gripe about one of the characters, but I don’t want to give any big spoilers, so I’ll keep it to myself. But it’s the reason for knocking it down half a star. Overall, a really cute and laugh out loud funny book.

P.S. I Like You by Kasie West (re-read)
Rating: 5* stars

I’ve definitely been in the mood this year to reread some of my favorite books as a method of self care. I used to think it was crazy to re-read a book when there are always so many new and potentially great books out there. But I’ve really discovered how great it is to pick up something I know is going to be wonderful and bring me all the comforting feelings. This is one of those books. It’s been quite awhile since I read it the first time, but the story really stuck with me. It was fun to pick it up again. I still love the epistolary aspect of anonymous letters being exchanged while the characters are also building a relationship in person. It really brings me so much joy. If you love a sweet YA romance, this is a perfect one to pick up.

The Worst Best Man by Mia Sosa
Rating: 3 stars

Lina is a wedding planner who was left at the altar and three years later finds herself working a pitch to land a huge gig as the wedding planner for a large hotel chain. Surprise, surprise, she’s paired up with none other than her ex-fiance and his brother, the ex-best man. Lina chooses Max to be her partner and they are forced to work together to come up with the best pitch so they can both prove their worth and get better jobs. Overall, this book was just okay for me. I thought there was too much filler about the jobs and making a plan that was never even really talked about later on. I liked that Max was just a genuinely nice guy, rather than the stereotypical bad guy. But I was very distracted during this book and it took me a full week to read when it should have only taken a few days.

Play with Me by Alisha Rai
Rating: 3 stars

A short and steamy novella about a couple who reconnects after a very long span apart realizes their chemistry is just as intense as it was when they were teenagers. I chose this book right after all the coronavirus school closures when things started feeling very intense and I desperately needed a distraction in the form of a book that would actually hold my attention. This worked. The book itself wasn’t incredible, but it also has two more books after it that I may or may not ever get around to reading.

Thief River Falls by Brian Freeman
Rating: 3 stars

I was hoping a thriller would be the thing to catch my attention this month after so many dnf’s. And this was…okay. I’m writing this review a few weeks after finishing it (I usually write them immediately) and I can barely remember my thoughts.

Someday Someday by Emma Scott
Rating: 4 stars

This was an unexpectedly complex m/m romance that was a lot more heavy than I wanted this month. Not the book’s fault, just bad timing. The characters in this book are both dealing with issues of rejection by their families for being gay. Their stories are extreme with one of them being sent to a very intense and horrific conversion therapy camp and one being totally kicked out of his family. So much of the book is about the pain they both went through. It was an eye opener to me. But it also made the book just…heavy. Not a lot of fun.

Buy Yourself the Fucking Lilies by Tara Schuster
Rating: 5* stars

This is one of the best books I’ve ever read. It really helped that it found me at the perfect time in my life. SO much of what Tara writes about in this book are things I’ve also talked about in therapy – sometimes the chapters even coinciding with the topic I’d discuss each session. It was such a beautiful companion to really drive home the messages that I truly needed to hear. I savored this book slowly, only reading a chapter every morning so her words could really sink in. I loved every word of it so very much. HIGHLY RECOMMEND.

The Cake King by Rosie Chase
Rating: 2 stars

This book really irritated me. It had all the makings of being a great story, but the author rushed through all the potential areas of development. It felt like a book that was written very quickly to hit all the high and low points of a story without doing any of the hard work of filling in all the stuff that would make a reader actually care. I certainly didn’t. I try not to be too harsh in my reviews since writing a book in the first place is a pretty awesome accomplishment. But this one just made me mad because of all the missed potential.

Marked by Jenika Snow
Rating: 2.5 stars

Okay, this popped up as a free novella in one of my facebook groups and I thought the cover was so hilarious that I read it. But then I was annoyed when they used that cover photo and tagline when it really wasn’t part of the story at all. Anyway, for a short erotic story with relatively nice characters, this will do.

The Honey Don’t List by Christina Lauren
Rating: 5 stars

Finally! A book that actually kept my attention and stopped me from checking my phone every few minutes! Christina Lauren really know how to tell good stories. I thoroughly enjoyed this one. Though the underlying stress of secondary characters got a bit old, I loved the deepening connection between the main characters, two very competent assistants to a famous HGTV couple. I realized while reading this that I shouldn’t have been spending the last few weeks trying to distract myself with shallow erotic romances. What I really needed was REAL romance between two very likeable and kind characters. It was so much more hopeful and joyous than anything else I’ve read this month.

The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise by Dan Gemeinhart
Rating: 5 stars

I finally picked up another middle grade novel from my shelves! I buy these books because the covers are beautiful and the storylines are intriguing, but then I never get around to actually reading them because they feel too childish or boring to me. Not this one! I adored it. Coyote and her dad Rodeo are living in a converted school bus as they travel around the country with no rhyme or reason, trying to escape the pain of remembering the rest of their family that died five years ago. Coyote is a 12 year old who is precocious and smart beyond her years. They’ve both been happy to continue living the way that they have until Coyote’s grandma tells her that a park is about to be bulldozed where she and her mom and sisters once buried a memory box. Coyote’s mission is to get her dad to drive from where they currently are in Florida to where they need to be in Washington in the span of a week – without him realizing that’s the final destination because he’d never go for it. Of course this all turns into quite an adventure with a couple of unique characters joining them along the journey. I loved the book, but was unprepared for how emotionally triggering the end would be. I was literally sobbing through it. If a book can make me do that – it’s well worth reading. I passed it along to Caden and he loved it as well.

What I Read February 2020

February just might have been the worst reading month I’ve ever had. I couldn’t connect with anything I was picking up. I’m not normally one to DNF a book. I always have this niggling hope that SURELY it’s going to get better. This month? I just didn’t have the patience for it. I probably gave up on at least ten books, maybe more. When normally it’s maybe five a year?! And I gave up on them well into the story, wasting days and days of time I could have been reading something better. It was disappointing, to say the least! I only finished ten books and most of them were pretty middle of the road. I adored my reread of The Hating Game and was captivated by the last book I finished, In an Instant, and I had one great nonfiction read with Lost Connections. No cookbooks this month!

Bared to You by Sylvia Day
Rating: 3.5 stars

This was a random pick from my kindle when I decided I needed a romance to distract me from my life. And…it was pretty steamy. And somewhat problematic for a variety of reasons. But I was pretty interested in the characters, despite the red flags. And I was VERY annoyed to get to the end and realize there are not one or two, but FOUR more books in this series. I would not have read this at all if I had realized. I want some closure! But I’m not sure I want to read that many more books. So…I am left frustrated and annoyed!

Dirty Letters by Vi Keeland and Penelope Ward
Rating: 4 stars

First of all, I would let to object to whoever titled this book. The title led me to believe this would be more of an erotic novel, but it was actually a very well developed love story about two people who started writing to each other as seven year olds and reconnected 18 years later, after a 10 year silence. Which – believe me – I prefer to read about. I just wasn’t exactly expecting it, so it was a pleasant surprise. I really liked this book and the characters with their flaws and quirks. It was definitely a bit cheesy in parts, but overall it was just really sweet.

The Imaginaries by Emily Winfield Martin
Rating: 4 stars

I’m not sure where I first stumbled across Emily Winfield Martin, but her paintings fascinate me. The muted colors bring such a fantastic imaginary world to life and I can’t get enough of them. When I found out she was releasing a book just of images attached to random phrases that came to her over the years, I immediately preordered it. And it’s beautiful, just like all of her paintings. It’s just not very long. I’m confused when artists decide to make a book like this, before they’re prepared to stuff it full. Emily’s paintings of children are my favorite, but there aren’t many included in this collection – probably because they’re all in her children’s books! Which I’m seriously contemplating buying just so I can page through them whenever I need a few minutes of escape and imagination. Overall a lovely book, I just wish there was more to it.

Lost Connections by Johann Hari
Rating: 4.5 stars

This was a deeply fascinating look at all the reasons why depression is not “something wrong with your brain.” I read it during the last month when I’ve been having a lot of my own depressed feelings and found it to be immensely helpful in understanding my lost connections and what I could do to help myself. It’s written by a journalist who spent years researching the topic while trying to make sense of his own lifelong depression. It definitely comes across as a very long journalistic essay filled to the brim with different scientific studies and evidence to support their claims. I wish that the author had made it a bit more personal, rather than only very briefly commenting on his own struggles here and there. It would have made for a stronger and more relatable book, in my opinion, if he had expressed a bit more vulnerability in his writing. But overall, I thought this was a fantastic book that I would recommend to anyone and everyone, depressed or not.

Good Girls Lie by J.T. Ellison
Rating: 3 stars

This book was so bizarre. It’s a psychological YA thriller and you definitely get the sense right from the very beginning of an unreliable narrator. You’re never quite positive who is narrating each chapter. There were just so many ridiculous twists and turns that the whole story was crazy. I was intrigued enough to read the whole thing, but I didn’t like it.

Love Her or Lose Her by Tessa Bailey
Rating: 4 stars

Even though this was a different set of characters, I really wish I had realized it was the second book in a series before picking it up. There wasn’t a ton of overlap, but enough that I wish I had read the other couple’s story first. At any rate, I rather enjoyed this book. It was about a couple who has been together since middle school and whose marriage was feeling very empty – with the exception of their red hot once a week sex life. The couple temporarily separates while they each start working on their own issues to be able to come back together and give the other what they need to feel loved. This book comes in HARD on love language lectures. I’m a big believer in love languages, but also a little prickly about them for personal reasons. It’s a little hard to read a book where all of the couple’s problems can be solved if they just constantly remind themselves of the other’s love language. It felt pretty realistic to me, about two people who truly do love each other, but lost the communication and fun experiences that would keep their relationship alive. It was a good book.

The Hating Game by Sally Thorne (reread)
Rating: 5* stars

I’ve been saving this up for a reread for a really long time and decided Valentine’s Day would be the perfect day to pull it back out. I loved this book so much the first time and two years later I think I loved it even more. This whole office enemies to lovers romantic comedy is an absolute delight. It’s hilarious, sweet, and so full of heart. It’s so much more about building trust and understanding in the relationship than just jumping into bed together the way most romances go. I deeply adore this book. Josh and Lucy are just the best. I savored every word of this reread and look forward to reading it again and again in the future!

Cosy by Laura Weir
Rating: 2.5 stars

The first few chapters of this book gave me all the wonderful cozy feelings. It reinforced all the ideas I have about making my own spaces comfortable and colorful and exactly the way I want them to be. And then the book turned and became so British-centric that it no longer felt relevant. British brands of blankets to buy (I looked it up – they cost over $1000!), British places to visit, etc. Lots of name brands. Lots of things Americans really have no access too. Not that books need to always be geared toward us, but it felt so over the top that “cosy” can only be achieved if you live in Great Britain. There was also a lot of what I felt like was unnecessary Hygge shaming because it’s so commercialized now. I mean, who cares?! Get cozy and comfortable and happy in whatever way you want! Despite how happy the beginning made me feel, I was very disappointed with the rest and how utterly pretentious it came across.

Dear Edward by Ann Napolitano
Rating: 4 stars

The beginning of this book felt very much like another plane crash book I DNF’d last year. You know from the beginning that only one person – Edward – is going to survive this plane crash. So why is so much time devoted to the other passengers? Why should I care? I felt less irritated with the plane chapters as the book went on, but I was SO much more interested in Edward’s present situation. That being said, I enjoyed this book. Or as much as you can enjoy a book about a 12 year old boy who lost his whole family in a plane crash. It was heartbreaking, but he had such an amazing support system after the crash that you can’t help but love how it all turns out.

In an Instant by Suzanne Redfearn
Rating: 5 stars

You will feel the full range of human of emotions in this book. Whew. It’s a doozy. So a group of two families – four adults, five teenagers, a “slow minded” 13 year old, and a college student they pick up on the road, fall off the side of a cliff in their camper. One of the teens, Finn, dies instantly and the book is told from her perspective. She’s in kind of an in between world where she can still see everything that’s going on, but not interact. It’s not really important other than she provides an impartial narration to everything that happens between the rest of the characters as they try to survive and then move on with their lives. I’m going to tell you right off the bat that almost none of these characters are likeable or admirable. Their worst traits come out when it comes to trying to survive while injured in the midst of a blizzard fallen off the cliff in the middle of nowhere. You’ll be shocked by how some of them behave, heartbroken, and then strangely inspired. There are so many complicated twists of agony, yet the book is still so hopeful. It’s about love and moving on and cherishing your memories of those you have lost with joy, rather than pain. It really was a captivating read and I couldn’t put it down.

Here’s to a better reading month in March!

My Favorite Books of 2019

This has been a fantastic year for reading. It’s always been my favorite thing to do, but I think this year I really prioritized it as THE thing to do whenever I had a spare moment of time. I’ve also found extra joy in tracking a lot of new stats using Book Riot’s Reading Log. This may not interest anyone but me, but I’m definitely going to share all that with you in a minute. 🙂 I am SO happy to be a reader and have this chance to share all of my favorites with you each month! The bookish community is my favorite place to hang out online, researching and finding new books to read is almost as much of a hobby as reading itself, and diving into that perfect book is about the best feeling in the entire world. I pour over these end of the year lists each December, adding more books to my TBR list than I’ll ever have time to actually read. And I’m okay with that, as long as I always have options! Reading is simply THE BEST.

(I should mention that other than number of books read, my stats are SLIGHTLY skewed because I didn’t realize the spreadsheet was going to include my DNF’d books and I can’t delete them without messing up the numbering for everything else, so if you’re actually doing the math, there are 158 books included in my stats. I won’t be marking DNF’s on this tracker in 2020!)

THE STATS:

Books Read: 152

This actually surprised me as I have such a hard time FINISHING the nonfiction books I’m obsessed with buying. Though a large chunk of these are cookbooks, which I decided to start including in my reading this year because I DO read them word for word.

This is the year I became dedicated to actually reading a lot of the print books I already own and love to purchase. My Kindle is amazing, but there’s nothing like having an actual book in your hands. As for audio, I didn’t listen to many, but this is still more than ever before!

Full length novels are definitely my favorite! I had a hard time deciding which of my nonfiction were prose vs. essays, so they should probably be lumped in together since I normally just picked one or the other.

My only issue with this tracking system was how limited the genre classification seemed. I wish there had been a “Thriller” and “Cookbook” option. I definitely steer most toward contemporary fiction, though a lot of those could MAYBE have been also classified as “romance,” but I tried to only mark that if it was a full blown sexy town kind of book. I should also note that Book Riot only gives you lists of your stats, I created these pie charts separately for visual appeal. 🙂

I like normal fiction sized books. I don’t like huge books. Most of the short books were graphic novels and cookbooks.

Some people seem to take pride in how prudely they rate a book and seem happy that the year has come to an end and they’ve only had a handful of 5 star books. I feel like it’s much better to have MOSTLY 4 and 5 star books because it’s proof that you’ve had a great year of reading and you picked wonderful books! I tend to very rarely rate anything less than a 3 if I actually took the time to finish it. And on a separate spreadsheet where I’ve tracked books for the last ten years, I have an addition 5* rating, to indicate the best of the best.

I’m a pretty consistent reader no matter what time of the year it is. Probably always higher in January and December when I’m reading more cookbooks and short Christmas books.

The Books

Okay, okay, enough with the stats, let’s get to the books. I’m going to give you my top 5* fiction – the books that I ADORED, I can remember clearly long after I’ve finished them, they probably made me both laugh and cry, and I’m likely to want to read them again. And because I had so many 5 star fiction books in total, I’ll give you a bonus so they’re not left out! Then I’ll give you my top nonfiction of the year and my top cookbooks. Enjoy!