Thank you for joining me here!   I hope you enjoy this series and I’d love to hear from you about what you are reading these days.

Book #1:

I Feel Bad About My Neck by Nora Ephron (Length: 160 pages).  This is a book of essay about middle-age, geared toward women (obviously, because what man ever worries about neck wrinkles?!). I feel like I read this about 10 years ago and it didn’t hit the same as it does today. This is way funnier and more meaningful now that I’m in the target audience. I adore her writing (of screenplays mostly) and it makes me want to re-watch all of her movies again. This collection focuses on aging, but also on friendship and the joys of living in New York City. Worth a library checkout and would be a great gift for any female friend of a certain age. 😉

Book #2:

The Royal Treatment by Melanie Summers (Length: 281 pages).  I’ve had this on my Kindle for a while and turned to it because I was in the mood for something light after a difficult week. This is the first in a trilogy and is billed as a romantic comedy. Better written than most in this genre in terms of dialogue and plot, I really enjoyed reading about how an anti-Royals blogger is invited to stay at the castle by Prince Arthur of “Avonia” for a 2-month period. Prince Arthur wants to change the blogger’s mind so his family can keep the throne against the changing tide of public opinion. The Kindle editing sucks so be forewarned if that sort of thing bugs you, but it’s absolutely worth a read if you’re in the mood for a well-written, light-hearted romance.

Book #3:

State of Terror by Hillary Rodham Clinton and Louise Penny (Length: 506 pages).  I was VERY nervous to start this book as Louise Penny is my all-time favorite literary mystery author, and I was afraid it wouldn’t live up to the hype. I’ve never been so glad to be wrong. I ADORED this book. The plot is incredibly fast-paced and very exciting, and of course, it’s very well-written (how could it not be?). The subject matter seems to be very insider baseball regarding the Secretary of State position, so it’s obvious Hillary was drawing very heavily on her past experiences. The main character in this novel reminds me of the TV Madam Secretary and that’s a good thing. This novel sets it up for a sequel or series and I’m here for it. Do NOT miss the Acknowledgments in the end. (I shouldn’t have to say this but Trumpers will HATE this book as the “former” President in this book is clearly modeled after a similarly intellectually challenged leader.)

Book #4:

The Letter Keeper by Charles Martin (Length: 313 pages). Ugh. I got sucked into this sequel to Martin’s previous novel, The Water Keeper, which I’ve reviewed here previously. Murphy Shepherd is a vigilante commando/tracker of trafficked kids, and this sequel delves more into his (unbelievable) back story as well as his attempts to settle down with his new wife and their three “daughters”. I do think Martin is a great writer as his plots are fast-moving and his writing produces some beautiful gems, but man, I hate feeling like my emotions are being manipulated, and he does that here for sure. The plot is as fast driven as the last one, so you HAVE to keep reading, but don’t fall into any of the plot holes. (For example, why aren’t there surveillance cameras in the delivery bay?) This novel ends on a cliffhanger as well, which is super-annoying. Someone stop me before I get sucked into reading another Charles Martin (I’ve read almost a dozen so there’s a sucker born every minute). 😉

Book #5:

The Christmas Book Shop by Jenny Colgan (Length: 335 pages).  I adore Jenny Colgan’s writing and will read anything she writes. This novel is a book about books and a bookshop so sign me right up! Colgan’s trademark witty banter, deeper than is typical for the genre character development, and fun plots are all present in this novel. When Carmen is laid off from her dead-end retail job in a smaller town in Scotland, her bossy lawyer sister finds her a job in her client’s bookshop in Edinburgh. As the shop is about to go under thanks to decades of mismanagement by the absent-minded elderly owner, Carmen has to put her organizational skills and her book-selling charm to use. Will she rescue this failing business, meet a handsome suitor and mend ties with her sister? A must read to find out!

Thank you for joining me here!   I hope you enjoy this series and I’d love to hear from you about what you are reading these days.

Book #1:

The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow (Length: 385 pages).  What a story! This is a fantasy/mystery that’s beautifully written. It’s about a girl named January Scaller who is an almost-orphan as her father Yule Ian (Julian) travels the world obtaining treasures for his boss, the ultra-wealthy Cornelius Locke. January lives with Mr. Locke in his sprawling Vermont estate. This book contains tales within the main story about magical doors to magical worlds. The novel lags a bit in the middle but overall, it’s a fantastic read with lots of twists and turns, that will transport you to magical places. Absolutely worth a read!

Book #2:

Beneath a Scarlet Sky by Mark Sullivan (Length: 525 pages).  This is my book club’s January pick, and boy, am I disappointed! This is a fictionalized account based on the true story of an Italian boy, Pino Lella, who becomes a spy for the Italian Resistance during World War II, and personally helped several Jewish citizens escape over the border to Switzerland, and then as a personal driver for General Lerner (a Nazi), passed on German secrets to the Allies. The story is very captivating, and the plot of this book is an absolute page-turner. But the writing . . . ugh. The writing is very stilted and juvenile, as if a high schooler wrote this, which is odd because the author is award-winning and is very prolific (at least 18 novels). Moreover, this novel had a bit of a Forrest Gump feel for me as the coincidences are entirely unbelievable at times (which I won’t enumerate here as they’d spoil the plot). Overall, it’s worth a read for the story, but perhaps lower your expectations regarding the quality of writing. A movie based on this book and Pino’s story is currently in development, and I’ll absolutely watch that.

Book #3:

Applied Electro-Magnetism by Susannah Nix (Length: 256 pages). This is a romance and is the perfect palate-cleanser between heavier books. It’s one of six books in a series entitled Chemistry Lessons which features women in science as the protagonists, which I love. Nix is a good writer, with better-than-usual character development for romance novels, and she definitely can write a strong female lead with nerdy tendencies (my favorite type as I’m the same). This particular novel features a business road trip with two co-workers who don’t care for each other, so it’s the enemies to lovers trope. The author writes about their travelling from buying snacks at the airport, to stopping at the famous Buccee’s convenience store in Texas, and I always enjoy reading those types of real-life details. Again, the author’s writing is strong enough that I’ll definitely continue to read more of this series. (The books seem to end up in the daily Kindle deals too, so watch out for those if you can’t find these at your library.)

In no particular order, here are my top favorite books (out of 114 total) that I read in 2021. (The hyperlinks will take you to my reviews).

Book #1:

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi

Book #2:

House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune

Book #3:

Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane Buxton

Book #4:

The Opposite of Love by Julie Buxbaum

Book #5:

The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt

Book #6:

Caste by Isabel Wilkerson

Book #7:

The Nothing Man by Catherine Ryan Howard

Book #8:

What Comes After by Joanne Tompkins

Book #9:

The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris

Book #10:

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

Book #11:

All the Lonely People by Mike Gayle

Book #12:

The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles

Thank you for joining me here!   I hope you enjoy this series and I’d love to hear from you about what you are reading these days.

Book #1:

Notes from a Young Black Chef by Kwame Onwuachi (Length: 280 pages).   I listened to this book and I definitely recommend it as an audibook, as it’s read by the author himself. This is a memoir written by one of the first black fine dining chefs in America, who also happened to be on Top Chef. I’m a fan of chef memoirs anyway, but this particular book showcases a very engaging writing style, and I found Kwame’s journey from the Bronx, to Nigeria, to drug dealing at a private school, to the Culinary Institute of America, then to Top Chef and opening a high-end restaurant in Washington DC to be truly captivating. This book held my interest every minute, and for an audibook and my particular sensibilities, that’s tough to do.

Book #2:

The Madness of Crowds by Louise Penny (Length: 440 pages).  This is Book 17 in the Inspector Gamache series (my favorite mystery series of all time!), and I really enjoyed this one. This novel is about a controversial doctor who preaches eugenics/mandatory euthanasia of the elderly and those with genetic defects as a means of controlling disease in a pandemic. So, the author’s focus here is a bit heavier than usual, but it’s still set in charming Three Pines, Canada, with all of our favorite characters. And Penny’s writing is as gorgeous as usual, with gems like these: “It’s about what happens when gullibility and fear meet greed and power . . . People will believe anything. Doesn’t make them stupid, just desperate.” This is another winner for Louise Penny, and I hope you check out this series if you haven’t already.

Book #3:

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi (Length: 231 pages).  I LOVED this book. This was another audiobook that I listened to on my super-fun (!) commute, and it’s absolutely incredible. Written by a neuroscientist/surgeon who is finishing up his 7-year residency when he’s diagnosed with lung cancer. The author writes about his life and his journey so lyrically which must be due to his also earning a Master’s degree in English literature . . . he’s talented in both his right and left brain spheres. Don’t miss the foreword by Dr Abraham Verghese (another talented dr/author who wrote the beautiful Cutting for Stone), as well as the epilogue by the author’s wife Lucy. Yes, this book will make you cry but it’s so beautifully written that it’s a must-read.

Book #4:

The Paper Palace by Miranda Cowley Heller (Length: 397 pages).   This book was rejected by my book club as it has some heavier topics, but I went ahead and read it anyway, and I’m so glad I did. This is a sweeping, well-written family drama about Eleanor who is still in love with her husband Peter, but starts having an affair with Jonas, her childhood best friend. The book alternates between a few days in the present immediately after the affair begins at the family lakehouse, to Eleanor’s childhood and Eleanor’s mother’s childhood and adult life. There are some tough parts (sexual assault and incest) but none of it is gratuitous, and the novel is so beautifully written while also being a total page turner. The ending is a bit ambiguous, so definitely Google it like I did and you’ll hopefully read the author’s hints as to what really happens at the end.

Book #5:

Rabbit by Patricia Williams (Length: 243 pages).  This memoir came highly recommended by several Bookstagrammers so I listened to it on audio. It’s insanely good! Miss Pat is a comedian, who tells stories about her colorful childhood growing up poorer than poor in Atlanta, Georgia. She had her first child at age 13, sold crack to support her little family, and tried to separate from her own devastating childhood. This is incredibly eye-opening as to what’s happening in America, and I couldn’t stop listening to a minute of this memoir. I give it two thumbs up!

Book #6::

Everything Happens for a Reason by Kate Bowler (Length: 210 pages).  This is another audiobook I listened to and it’s written by (and narrated by) a Christian prosperity gospel scholar who is diagnosed with Stage 4 colon cancer. She chronicles her journey (both medical and spiritual) while analyzing gems from her faith such as “Misfortune is a mark of God’s disapproval” and what that means for cancer patients. The author doesn’t ever tell us how she reconciles the prosperity gospel with her own journey, ultimately, which I found interesting (and a bit frustrating). While the content is definitely interesting and worth a read, I will say that the audiobook is NOT the way to go, in my opinion, as the narration is annoying and super-whiny in parts. I do appreciate the author’s dry humor, but probably would’ve enjoyed it more if read in my own voice. 😉

Book #7:

Love at First by Kate Clayborn (Length: 322 pages).  A light and fluffy, yet well-written romance by the author of the wonderful Love Lettering novel. An ER doctor renovates his late uncle’s condo in a small Chicago building full of long-time elderly residents, with the intention to run it as an AirB&B, and sparks fly between him and Nora, the granddaughter of one such resident who has been living in the condo for a few years. Nora wants to keep everything the same, in memory of her grandmother, so this inherent conflict sets the stage for their inevitable romance. The conflict is a bit silly but since the writing is engaging and the character development is sufficiently deep, I allowed it. This is a good choice for anyone wanting a lighter, closed door romance.

Thank you for joining me here!   I hope you enjoy this series and I’d love to hear from you about what you are reading these days.

Book #1:

All the Lonely People by Mike Gayle (Length: 385 pages).   Kaytee Cobb of the Currently Reading podcast raved about this book, saying it was very similar to A Man Called Ove, which is one of my all-time favorite novels, so of course I had to pick this one up as I love a grouchy elderly protagonist. In this book the main character Hubert Bird is a Jamaican immigrant who is navigating racism and everyday life in London in the late 1950s and 1960s. This novel is extremely well-written, and Hubert has incredible depth as a protagonist. The novel flip-flops between the past and present in mostly alternating chapters (but very smoothly), and Hubert’s interactions with various neighbors and friends are so heartwarming and real. This book is definitely in the top 3 of this year for me, and I hope everyone is able to read and enjoy this gem of a novel.

Book #2:

Don’t Make Me Turn This Life Around by Camille Pagan (Length: 251 pages).  This light novel is about a woman in mid-life crisis (due to her job at a non-profit being not as fulfilling as it has been previously, a husband who is emotionally distant for unknown reasons, one twin daughter who is navigating a recent diagnosis of type 1 diabetes, her father who recently died and her own twin brother divorcing his husband). With all of that happening, one would think this would be a novel with some depth, but it really isn’t. The writing quality is decent here, but the protagonist is entirely too whiny for me. Also, again, if the characters would just TALK to one another when they are bothered by something, the conflict would be resolved much more quickly. There has to be a better way to create drama in novels methinks. I finished this one because it’s a fast read, but I’d pass on it if I were you.

Book #3:

The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell by Robert Dugoni (Length: 449 pages).  I LOVED this book and literally read it in one day. This is a very moving novel about a boy with ocular albinism (red eyes) growing up in northern California in the 1970s. The story covers his birth to about 40 years old, and is about him growing up in a very Catholic household (thanks to his very devoted mother), and attending a Catholic school with an abusive nun and schoolyard bullies. His friendships with the school’s sole Black student and a girl named Mickie form the heart of the novel, as well as his relationship with his mother. I will say I found the tone to be a touch manipulative and the religious imagery can be a bit much but I really liked this overall and the story will be one I remember for a long time.