September 2024 Book List

9/2: Before and After by Judy Christie and Lisa Wingate (library audiobook narrated by Emily Rankin, 2019) - True stories about people whose lives were impacted by the decades-long Georgia Tann baby market in Memphis. I sort of hoped this would be more powerful, but the way it kept skipping from story to story made it start to seem more like statistics and less like stories. 3/5 stars

9/6: The Sleeping Dragon (Guardians of the Flame #1) by Joel Rosenberg (library, 1983) - I read this as a teenager and the things I remembered were correct, but also the things I forgot were super traumatic. 3.5/5 stars

9/7: Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate (library audiobook narrated by Emily Rankin, 2017) - Reread of a book that was chosen for my book club. I still don't love it for many of the same reasons I wrote in my original review. The real historical facts this is based on should have made for a way more interesting story. 3/5 stars

9/8: The Face of a Stranger (William Monk #1) by Anne Perry (library ebook, 1990) - Real snooze, this one. Over four stars on Goodreads, though, so obviously I do not get it. 2/5 stars

9/11: Encore in Death (In Death #56) by JD Robb (library audiobook, 2023) - You know what? This was really good. There's a murder, but was the victim even the intended target? Super interesting. I do think Eve could have been a bit more reflective about how the circumstances of the couple reflected the circumstances of Eve and Roarke, but I thought this was a good entry in the series. 4.5/5 stars

9/11: The Sword and the Chain (Guardians of the Flame #2) by Joel Rosenberg (library, 1984) - So much violence against women in this series, but I am still enjoying it. 4/5 stars

9/13: The Longest Race: Inside the Secret World of Abuse, Doping, and Deception on Nike's Elite Running Team by Kara Goucher and Mary Pilon (library audiobook, 2023) - Ugh. So much running. So much whining. So many bad contracts. So much doping. So much someone else should have narrated this book.  2/5 stars

9/15: The Silver Crown (Guardians of the Flame #3) by Joel Rosenberg (library, 1985) - The weakest in the series, but I still read it. 3/5 stars

9/17: Desperation in Death (In Death #55) by JD Robb (library audiobook, 2022) - Yes, I did immediately listen to another In Death book. There's a bit too much cop worshipping in this book, but I did like it a lot. 4/5 stars

9/19: Black Beauty by Anna Sewell (Kindle book I own, 1877) - I loved this book when I was a child. I can see how its focus on animal rights had a subconscious impact on my adult thinking. 4/5 stars 

9/23: Side Effects May Vary by Julie Murphy (library, 2014) - You know what? Here's a YA book I can get behind. 4/5 stars

9/28: With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo (library ebook, 2019) - Single teenage parent Emoni Santiago is trying to finish high school. She is taking a class in culinary arts and loves being in the kitchen, but she's not sure how she's going to afford the class trip to Spain, let alone find childcare for her young daughter. I liked this book, but really did feel like it glamorized teen motherhood (everything wrapped up in a neat bow at the end!).  Eh. 3.5/5 stars

9/28: Summer Romance by Annabel Monaghan - Not as good as Nora Goes Off Script, but not as bad as Same Time Next Summer. Super inconsistent author. 3.5/5 stars

Total: 13 books

Average star rating: 3.38/5 stars

Did not finish:

The Seven Sisters (The Seven Sisters #1) by Lucinda Riley - An eccentric man adopts six young girls (as if) and when he dies, they don't even know what he did for a living (ahem), and the oldest daughter goes looking for clues about her biological family's background. Can I just say how very much I could not suspend my disbelief or care about any of these characters? DNF at 33%. 

Margo's Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe - I know people love this book and I tried to suspend my judgment. Just because Margo's an idiot who didn't actually think through the consequences of having a baby didn't mean I couldn't enjoy this novel. Just because she didn't think through the consequences of starting an OnlyFans didn't mean I couldn't hang. But the excessive drug usage? That's when I drew the line. DNF at page 128 (43%)  - it was specifically the line "After that they all puked, and then KC said she was a sea cucumber and lay down under the desk" that made me slam the book shut. You have a baby, MA'AM.

Amazing Grace Adams by Fran Littlewood - Similar to Margo, I just wanted Grace to get her shit together. I don't have time for adults acting like teenagers. DNF at page 65 (25.3%). 

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What's the last book you DNFed? Did you get mad and slam the book shut?

Summer Romance by Annabel Monaghan

Other books by Annabel Monaghan:
Nora Goes Off Script
Same Time Next Summer

I adored Nora Goes Off Script and despised Same Time Next Summer, so I did not know what to expect from Summer Romance by Annabel Monaghan. It really could have gone either way. 

Alice is in a rough spot. She's still grieving her mother who died two years ago, she's been separated from her husband for a year, and she's a professional organizer whose own pantry has four containers of cornstarch. She has three kids she really loves, a dog named Ferris, and she meets a nice, sexy guy named Ethan at the dog park. But then she learns who Ethan really is. 

Interesting characters: Well, they're characters with personality traits. Alice has allowed a marriage to take away key elements of her personality and she's trying to rediscover them. Ethan has some family baggage he's dealing with.  I liked the dogs. 

Believable conflict: Yeah, I mean, geography is a real thing. 

Emotional tension: This was done pretty well. Ethan doesn't want to get physical until Ali is all in and that takes a while. 

Happily ever after: These two are never going to make it. He is going to be resentful of all the sacrifices he needs to make and he's going to end up being a bad husband and even worse stepfather. He's a nice guy and he's going to hate himself for his resentfulness, but as soon as the oldest graduates from high school, these two are going to get divorced and he's going to move back to the town that made him happy. There's an HEA on page, but I am not convinced. 

Look, this just a worse version of Nora Goes Off Script. A single mother who is barely holding her life together meets a guy and geography should keep them apart, but eventually they get together. But while I think Nora and Leo are 100% going to make it, I do not think these two will. This wasn't as good as Nora Goes Off Script and not as terrible as Same Time Next Summer, but it's not an instant classic for me. Also, I 100% agree with Suzanne that having the word summer in two of your three titles is super confusing. This could have had so many other names!

3.5/5 stars

Line of note:

"If you actually fall for someone who's leaving, it's as crazy as getting a dog."

Phyllis looks confused.

I explain. "You get a dog and you know two things - you're going to fall in love with it and it's going to die one day. You knowingly walk headfirst into a heartbreak. That's the basic madness of dog ownership." (page 193)

I snorted out loud at this.

Hat mentions:

There are fourteen hats in this book, which is lot for a contemporary romance. A panama hat, baseball hat, bucket hat, two graduation hats, just lots of hats. That made it a little more fun for me!

Tuesday Thoughts

1) Today is the first day of Elisabeth's Cool Bloggers Walking Club. Go for a walk ten minutes each day in October and report back on your success. Who's in? (You don't have to be cool or a blogger to participate. We're an inclusive group and welcome all. But if you do it, you're cool.)

2) Speaking of Cool Bloggers, my friends Kyria and Birchie sent me a postcard from Buffalo, New York as a part of Cool Bloggers Postcard Club. I was very touched that they saw hat rack chairs (?) and thought of me. 

3) Let's talk about my dear dog. You all know Hannah. She's very, very cute. And lately, she's been sort of problematic.

Thing one: She started disregarding the invisible line to the bathroom and Dr. BB was frequently finding her sleeping in there. We don't want her in there because the cat's box is in there and we want the cat to have it as a safe spot from the dog. I suspect she was sleeping in there because the tile is cool. Our solution: put the baby gate up that we had removed. It has a hole at the bottom that the cat can get through, but Hannah cannot. 

Thing two: She had some GI issues a couple of weeks back and destroyed the mudroom where she is kept overnight. That's fine. We got her some anti-diarrhea medicine and cleaned up the mudroom. We keep her in the mudroom with a baby gate. Well, cut to last week when Zelda the Cat was being a terrific little shit and pulling things down off the dining room table in the early hours of the morning because she wanted to play. 

Hannah JUMPED THE BABY GATE and got out of the mudroom (we assume she did this to join in on the cat's fun times) and when we came down in the morning, she was just hanging out in the dining room wagging her tail. And then SHE DID IT THREE MORE NIGHTS IN A ROW. The little brat has decided that testing boundaries is what she's going to do. And she's having more GI distress and I do not want to clean up her sick all over the house.

And this is harder to fix than the bathroom thing because the doorway to the mudroom is wider than an average doorway and so we had to find one of those accordion gates and honestly I don't know if we can find one that is taller that would work in the door. 

On one hand, this is GREAT. Remember Hannah's issues with her back? Those issues have been resolved and the infection and treatment have obviously not left any damage that is preventing her from jumping. But on the other hand, I don't want another night of GI distress to destroy the entire floor of our house. 

4) Forget these issues. We decorated the house for Halloween last weekend. Yes, our house looks awesome between the hours of 7 and 10pm.

Happy October! What fun plans do you have for the spooky season? Are you joining CBWC? 

Side Effects May Vary by Julie Murphy

 

I had just DNFed two books (one rather forcefully with an actual slam of the pages) and had decided that maybe I just didn't like reading. Maybe books are not my thing anymore. Maybe I should just scroll reddit while pseudo watching television like other people in the world. Maybe my entire identity as a bookworm is false and I need to get a new hobby. Thankfully Side Effects May Vary by July Murphy was the next book in my stack or who knows what I would be doing right now. Possibly nothing good. 

Alice is a teenager. She discovers her mom is cheating on her dad and then she finds out she has cancer. The cancer goes into remission and then Alice is terrible, terrible to everyone in her life.

I recently learned the phrase "dirtying the nest" in a blog post about someone whose child was going off to college and was a real pill in the days leading up to dorm drop off. And that's what it seems like was going on with Alice in this book. She had a way she thought things were going to go (she would die) and then when that never  happened, she was just pushing everyone away. It makes sense and was an interesting look at that psychological impact of actually surviving a serious illness.

Also, my husband and I also have decided that asshat (page 204) does not count as a hat mention. This has come up before and I've never actually written about an intense discussion we had about it once. We concluded that it doesn't meet the spirit of the hat scavenger hunt. 

4/5 stars

Lines of note:

Our conversation ratio was a solid 10:1. Debora ten, me one. (page 191)

LOLOLOLOL. I think it's more like 25:1 in our house. 

I'm going to give thinks, I swear. But first, I want to tell you - whoever you are - that I barely graduated high school and completely bombed the SAT. I am telling you this be cause I want you to know that the path to dreams is flawed, and it is the beauty of flaws that makes you. (page 331, from the author's acknowledgements)

I thought this was a beautiful thing to write in a YA novel. Happenstance is life, right?

Hat mentions:

"Hey, guy!" I yelled through my still-open window. "The hat!" I said, motioning to my head. "Hand it over." Alice punched me in the thigh. "Now." He took his time walking to the car, trying to make a sad display of James Dean cool, and tossed the hat into my lap. (page 86)

I heard Eric moving behind me, and a minute later he appeared in front of me with his hat on and my hoodie in his hand. (page 142-3)

The four of us got out of the car, all bundled up in winter coats, hats, and scarves. (page 146)

...tugging down on her purple knit hat...(page 146)

Would You Rather: The Books Edition

For those of you who are super annoyed with this books mini-series, you'll be happy to know that this is the last post I'm doing on it!

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Would you rather read a book with terrible writing but a good story OR a book with a terrible story but good writing?

Do you know how many times I've reread Ready Player One? I would much rather have a good story than good writing. 

Would you rather not be able to read any new books OR not be able to reread any books ever again?

I would not rather not be able to reread books. I mean, I would really miss my old favorites, but there's so much excitement in every new book that it might become one of your new favorites!

Would you rather be able to only read the first page of a book OR only read the last page of a book?

Oh, this is a tough one. I guess I'd like to be able to read the first page of the book and imagine the story from there. But I guess you could do the same thing if you read the last page. The last page is usually full of names of characters you don't know, though, so I think I'd rather read the first page. 

Would you rather be able to read 1 book a year for the rest of your life OR be able to read 100 books this year but never touch a book again?

I mean, it would have be one book a year. But what would I spend all time doing if I weren't reading?!

Would you rather have a book’s ending spoiled for you OR never know the ending?

I'd rather never know the ending, I guess. I could imagine the ending myself. 

Would you rather read only one genre for the rest of your life OR read any and all genres except for your all-time favorite genre?

I'd rather give up my favorite genre. I'd have to decide what my favorite genre is, though. Romance? Fantasy? Sue Grafton and JD Robb mysteries?  

Would you rather be stuck on an island without a book OR be stuck in a room full of books you don’t like?

Stuck in a room full of books I don't like. Surely I can find something that's at least educational in there, right? To not have any books at all sounds like a worse nightmare than the whole stuck on an island thing. 

Would you rather never read a book again OR never watch a movie ever again?

I'd definitely never watch a movie again. I barely watch movies as it is! But to never read a book again!! Egads!!

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Sound off in the comments, friends. Which of these scenarios do you strongly disagree with me on? 

More Bookish Questions

Have you ever been part of a book club?

My IRL book club has been meeting 6-8 times a year since June 2015.  It's great fun.

I have done a couple of semester-long book clubs at my job. Those are interesting because you folks from all over campus and some of them say things they shouldn't say!

And, of course, I started CBBC last fall and am hoping to continue to do a couple books a year there.

I LOVE a good book club, although I understand that it's not for everybody. 

What's a deal breaker for you in a book that will make you stop reading?

Hmmm...I'm a bit of a prude. I don't like to read about teens having sex, rampant drug or alcohol usage, or white men complaining about how hard it is to be a white man. 

Can you name a book that kept you up at night? 

A Closed and Common Orbit (Wayfarers #2) by Becky Chambers. There was a scene were I cried so hard and I was trying to hide it so I didn't wake up my husband. Good stuff. 

Do you read multiple books at a time?

In my life right now, I usually have three books going at a time. I have a physical book that I read when I'm downstairs, a book I'm reading on my Kindle in bed, and a book I'm listening to as an audiobook while I'm walking the dog and doing chores. Oh, and I just got a book for a book club at work, so...that's actually a lot. 

What are you reading right now?

My physical book is Summer Romance by Annabel Monaghan. I'm reading With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo on my Kindle. I'm listening to The Reformatory by Tananarive Due on audio. I just got a copy of Disability Visibility edited by Alice Wong for the work book club, but that's pretty lowkey and we'll be reading it over the course of six weeks, so I think I can just read it while I'm eating lunch.

How do you make time for reading? 

Every day, no matter what, I read for at least ten to fifteen minutes right when I wake up and right before bed. And I frequently read if I have five or ten minutes to chill during the day. And I listen to audiobooks when I'm walking the dog, doing chores, showering, getting dressed, cooking, whatever. I mean, my earbuds are almost always in.  There's just no day that goes by that I don't read.

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What are you reading right now? Do you read multiple books at a time? Have you ever cried while reading a book?

Let's Talk About Books, Baby

I'm back with more questions and answers about books.

Do you prefer reading physical books, ebooks, or audiobooks?

I prefer ebooks. My Kindle is easier to hold than any other book, it's easier to flip pages, you can make the font whatever size you want, and it's easier to highlight things and take notes. If something has lots of images or maps or something like that, I still prefer a physical book, though. I mean, The Work of Art by Adam Moss is a work of art and you should seek out the actual artifact if you can!

But I end up reading more physical books than ebooks because my library has a more robust collection of physical books. One of my IRL book club members is president of our public library's board of directors and she has lots of explanations for why this is the case, but it boils down to the fact that ebooks are very expensive per loan and physical artifacts can be loaned out more times with less cost. 

Right now I'm listening to a lot of audiobooks because I'm finding it hard to find time to read books with my own eyes (TM Sarah). 

Do you prefer paperback books or hardcover books?

This is so complicated. If I'm reading in bed, I prefer a paperback because it's lighter. If I'm not reading in bed, I prefer a hardcover because the font is usually bigger and easier for me to read if I'm reading in less than ideal conditions, which is most likely going to be case. I tend to read in low light environments and I want to be able to see! I also like that taking notes is generally easier with a larger page size. 

Do your prefer used or new books?

Mostly I prefer books that don't smell. I don't mind a used book and I like to really think about the lives that my library books have lived. 

But I reallllllly don't like it when books smell or have stains. I want to be the person who can go to the used bookstore and buy books, but they always have that musty smell or remind me of stale cigarettes. I don't know. I just try not to buy books at all. 

How do you feel about used bookstores?

I think I stunned Jenny when I wrote in the comments on her blog that I do not care for used bookstores. They make me so sad. They're usually disorganized and the thought of all those books that have been discarded through no fault of their own. And there's always a smell. Ugh. I just don't like it.

Do you judge a book by its cover?

Yes, yes, I do. Doesn't everyone? The cover of Invisible Women is amazing and really reflects the content of the book. On the other side of things, I still think about how seriously ugly the cover of Royal Holiday is. 

What’s the last book you bought? Was it an ebook or physical book?

I bought an ebook of Black Beauty for a dime. I sort of want a physical copy of the illustrated version, but now that I have the basically version, I'm not sure I could convince myself to buy it. 

Bookmark or not?

I rarely use an actual bookmark. I mostly use a piece of paper (often the hold receipt from the library) as my bookmark so that I can jot down notes for a book review if I write one. Those notes include lines I think are interesting, things I need to look up, and hat mentions (of course). I love a bookmark as a physical artifact, but I rarely use it for its intended purpose. 

Deckled edges or not?

I despise deckled edges and feel actual anger when I get a book and it has them. The pages are so hard to turn!

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What's your hot take? Ebooks or physical books? Does listening to an audiobook count as reading it? What's the last book you bought? Have you ever purchased a super cheap classic for your ereader?