Annnd… here’s the list of the OTHER books I’ve been reading the last 6 weeks or so! Whew!
–Marissa
Joy Moody is Out of Time by Kerryn Mayne is a quirky mix of mystery, thriller, family drama, mothers and daughters, and wishing and wishing for things to be different. Joy Moody has told her twin daughters since they were little that on their 21st birthday, they will be transported through time to the year 2050 as “daughters of the future revolution”, and has kept their world very small their whole lives, for reasons of her own. I liked the premise of this book, the supporting characters, the mother and daughters aspect, but at times it rushed, and at times it… didn’t. A solid read, though!
Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by VE Schwab was the first book I picked up on our recent reading reading, because it’s a DOORSTOPPER of a story. This 535-page story is at its core a vampire story, but told across three time periods – 1532, 1827, and 2019 – with three women as the protagonists, sometimes working together, sometimes not. As someone in my bookclub summed it up “500 pages of lesbians and vampires, lesbian vampires”. This was all vibes, toxic relationships and solid writing, but it was… slow. Long. Dark. This is not your sparkly vampire story – I liked it, but I didn’t *love* it.
Swept Away by Beth O’Leary was a nice palate cleanser after the loooong vampire book above, and it was a sheer delight from start to finish. The whole summary in the book flap is: “What if you were lost at sea…with your one-night stand?”. And it’s just that… Zeke and Lexi are stranded at sea and have to figure out how to get home… and to have a lot of time to get to know each other. This was saucy, funny, fraught, swoony, scary, and just… exactly what I want from my romance novels. I loved this!
The Ghostwriter by Julie Clark is a “then and now” novel – in the “now”, our protagonist (the ghostwriter) is booked for a job with her Stephen King-esque writer father, from who she is estranged. He finally wants to tell the story (the “then”) of the murder of his two siblings when he was a teenager, of which he’s always been suspected. I liked the Ojai 1970s setting, the father and daughter dynamics, and the unpicking of the mystery. Solid!
Wreck by Catherine Newman is the continuation of the story Rocky and her family that we met in the amazing Sandwich (a fave read of 2024!). This time, Rocky is home with her husband, her father, a weird medical thing, a daughter who visits often, and all her assorted neuroses and middle life thoughts and feelings. This is just laugh out loud funny at points, tender, warm, amazing, and makes me soul sing – again. I devoured this… after getting it from Catherine herself at ALA! *squee*
The Burning Library by Gilly Macmillan is a thriller set in academia, featuring a medieval manuscript, secret societies of women, murder, and a race to see who can decode things first. If you like a gothic-ish, British, dark academia tale, this is for you – I enjoyed it!
Bug Hollow by Michelle Huneven was an audiobook listen, and I sank right into this story of one family throughout the decades, navigating a sudden loss, a new baby, family tensions, disease, secrets, and all the things. This is a hard one to summarize, but I really enjoyed this family story, told in sections from different family members, spanning several decades. Recommended!
Destroy This House by Amanda Uhle is one of those memoirs can combines humor and horror as Amanda details growing up with dysfunctional parents who tended to hoarding, get-rich-quick schemes, skipping out on homes and bills, and at times, living the high life. I especially loved that this took place in Indiana, and that Amanda never loses her love for her parents, despite her challenging life. I found this fascinating and speedy to read, much in the vein of Educated or The Glass Castle.
I also read The Pleasures of Wintering by Erin Niimi Longhurst and The Little Book of Winter by Brittany Viklund – both short, cozy books about celebrating and leaning into winter, though both paled wildly in comparison to my favorite annual re-read, Wintering by Katherine May.
Paper Doll by Dylan Mulvaney is a memoir written about her journey from coming out as a woman online, and all the hilarity and vitriol she faced during her 365 days of transition. This is obviously written for a MUCH younger, hipper audience than me, but an interesting insight into transitioning throughout the journey.
A Killer Wedding by Joan O’Leary was one of those books with a great hook (a wedding! In an Irish castle! with murder!) that just… man, I got bogged down in it. It was… fine, just wasn’t scratching my itch, had too many characters and timeline jumps for my scattered brain, so it was just the wrong book at the wrong time.
The Housemaid by Freida McFadden was an “okay, the movie trailer dropped, I should probably get around to reading the book of this author who’s other books have MADE ME INSANE WITH THE BAD WRITING” read. So, I did. LOL The plot of this is bananapants, but the chapters fly along, the writing is SUPER easy, there are only like four characters to keep track of, and I can see why Freida is such an easy entry point to reading for some reluctant or slower readers. She’s not my fave, but I did appreciate the bananapants-ness and quick read time of this one!
Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara was a recommended read from my business women’s organization, and though it is VERY heavily geared to the restaurant industry, I did find some good nuggets of serving the public, was inspired by some things, and Will is an engaging storyteller. It even made me start my own “library unreasonable hospitality” playbook for myself…
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