Category — Book Reviews

As I say every month, I’m shamelessly stealing this idea from Jessica Lahey. She has a recurring monthly date where she reviews all the books she read that month. Book reviews are important for authors, and I want to get better about doing this.

So. I’m going to review them here and also online, but I’m going to do it a little differently. I’m only going to review the stuff I really liked. I don’t see a reason to spend my time writing about something I didn’t love; it’s just using up more of my energy. So only positive reviews.

These are the books I liked (or mostly liked) from February.

I had a great reading month.

Followers (Megan Angelo): I’ve written about this book a lot, and I have one more post that I’m waiting to write because it will have spoilers (I’ll warn you, I promise), and I want to give people time to read the book if they’re going to read the book. Contrasting an imagined future with a fictional now gave a deep look into how we use (or abuse) social media and reality television. Celebrity culture, in general. I liked her writing style; I found the whole thing engaging and enjoyable to read.

The Hand of the Wall (Maureen Johnson): It’s the third and final book in the Truly Devious series. It’s such a fantastic set of YA books. Loved, loved, loved them, but I’m a sucker for most books set at boarding schools. I didn’t guess the ending, even though I guessed tiny sub-mysteries along the way. I miss spending time with Stevie, but impressed that the whole series wrapped up nicely.

The Hunting Party (Lucy Foley): A solid four-star read. There were clunky moments in the book, and I didn’t love most of the characters… but somehow the whole thing worked? I know that doesn’t sound like the most generous review, but the story was engrossing. Or, I wanted to keep reading to see what happened next. I almost avoided this book because… not into hunting. But hunting plays a tiny role in the overall book.

The Sentence is Death (Anthony Horowitz): My all-time favourite book of the month. It’s the second in this series––the first was The Word is Murder. This book is just… fun. And funny. And moving. And I loved it so much that I felt sad when the book ended and then panicked when I couldn’t figure out if there was a third book in the works. I love everything Horowitz writes, so I’m not surprised that I liked this as much as I did. But he’s brilliant. Just brilliant.

What did you read last month?

As I say every month, I’m shamelessly stealing this idea from Jessica Lahey. She has a recurring monthly date where she reviews all the books she read that month. Book reviews are important for authors, and I want to get better about doing this.

So. I’m going to review them here and also online, but I’m going to do it a little differently. I’m only going to review the stuff I really liked. I don’t see a reason to spend my time writing about something I didn’t love; it’s just using up more of my energy. So only positive reviews.

These are the books I liked (or mostly liked) from January.

I read a lot of Parnell Hall’s Puzzle Lady books last month, but I’m not going to do a separate review for each one because I wrote about them in December. I still like the series. It’s mind candy.

Six of Crows (Leigh Bardugo): I spent years taking this book on and off my TBR list. I don’t know why I was so reluctant to commit to reading it because it’s FANTASTIC. It’s a book about a magical heist in a vaguely Scandinavian-like universe. I had to read the first chapter twice to figure out what was happening, but I quickly found my footing in the world. My cousin and I read it for our book-club-for-two, and we’re following it up soon with the sequel, Crooked Kingdom.

A Study in Scarlet (Arthur Conan Doyle) and Sign of the Four (Arthur Conan Doyle): I’m re-reading the Doyle canon. While I’m currently deep in the short stories, I wanted to go in chronological order, so I started with the two novella. I’ve always liked Doyle, but I’m getting so much more out of these stories since going on a Sherlock Holmes tour of Edinburgh. That tour was one of the best things we’ve done on a vacation. It has made me think about how much our tangential experiences affect the way we read a book.

What did you read last month?

As I said last month, I’m shamelessly stealing this idea from Jessica Lahey. She has a recurring monthly date where she reviews all the books she read that month. Book reviews are important for authors, and I want to get better about doing this.

So. I’m going to review them here and also online, but I’m going to do it a little differently. I’m only going to review the stuff I really liked. I don’t see a reason to spend my time writing about something I didn’t love; it’s just using up more of my energy. So only positive reviews.

These are the books I liked (or mostly liked) from December.

Tuesday Mooney Talks to Ghosts (Kate Racculia): I adored this book. It’s like a grown-up Westing Game in spirit. And I was more than willing to look past any plotline clunkiness because I loved all the characters and the mystery itself. This book is pure fun, but it goes deeper than that. It also made me wistful for old friends.

A Clue for the Puzzle Lady (Parnell Hall) and Last Puzzle and Testament (Parnell Hall): These are the first two books in a crossword cozy mystery series. As in, there are always crossword puzzles in the book, and crossword puzzles feature somewhat (or a lot) in the plot. Are they perfect? No. Are they brilliant? No. But are they so much fun that you will read the whole book in one sitting and not care at all if you guess the ending beforehand? Absolutely yes. I’ve been devouring these because they are the perfect escape.

Reverie (Ryan La Sala): The book is described as Inception meets The Magicians… which isn’t close at all. It’s about a teenaged boy who wakes up with no memories after an accident but quickly learns that he and a group of other teenagers in his school can enter daydreams. The daydreams themselves are so powerful that they suck everyone in the vicinity into the storyline, and terrible things sometimes happen as imaginations run wild. It’s a solid book and an impressive first novel.

Do You Mind If I Cancel (Gary Janetti): I almost didn’t include this because when we got home, ChickieNob found his mean-spirited Instagram account, which sort of spoiled the good feelings from the book. But in the moment, before we realized that, we listened to his essays in the car on the way home from Asheville and laughed the whole way. If you’re planning to read it, I would listen to him read the stories on the audio book version.

What did you read last month?

Shamelessly stealing this idea from Jessica Lahey. She has a recurring monthly date where she reviews all the books she read that month. Book reviews are important for authors, and I want to get better about doing this.

So. I’m going to review them here and also online, but I’m going to do it a little differently. I’m only going to review the stuff I really liked. I don’t see a reason to spend my time writing about something I didn’t love; it’s just using up more of my energy. So only positive reviews.

These are the four books I liked from November.

Amberlough (Lara Elena Donnelly): I’ve had a hard time putting my feelings about this book (and the others in the trilogy) into words, so maybe I’ll start with this: I was only a few pages into my library copy when I decided I needed to own all three books in the trilogy. It is that good. Think Isherwood meets Le Carré. It’s the tail end of a queer renaissance in a decadent fictional city, with a right-wing fascist waiting in the wings. Spies. Black market hustlers. Cabaret performers. Secret messages. It is fantastic.

Armistice (Lara Elena Donnelly): This is the second book in the trilogy above. It took me a few pages to get my bearings; some characters from the first book are back plus many new ones. We’re in a new setting with its own connected but distinct political situation. This feels like a middle book in a trilogy, but I mean that in a good way. It’s connective, taking us deeper into the world, and leaving the reader excited to start the third book.

American Royals (Katharine McGee): I liked her earlier series (The Thousandth Floor), so I sensed I would enjoy this alternate American history where we have a royal family, and I was right. It is such a fun book; the perfect piece of mind candy at the end of the day. Like her other series, the point-of-view switches from chapter to chapter. I think my highest compliment is that I enjoyed being in every character’s brain.

Diary of a Bookseller (Shaun Bythell): I’ve written about this book a lot on the blog, but it’s a fun read. It’s a diary of a year in the life of a Scottish bookseller. A lot of food for thought in the pages. Definitely recommend it for a light read.

What did you read last month?