Hey. I started off the new year pretty strong. Let’s recap SHALL WE.

1. Parasol Against the Axe by Helen Oyeyemi

This wasn’t my FAVE Oyeyemi book but it was still brilliant enough to keep her firmly planted at the top of my favorite author list. I don’t know how she writes these things, they are so quirky, smart, brain-bending, full of WTF. This is a weird one because I love her bizarre and insane writing style so much but there was a book-within-the-book going on here and I didn’t like those parts at all. But the present-day narrative was chef’s kiss – unhinged, smart, and thoroughly confusing as always.

There was a line that went like “my skull was full of souffle” and that is exactly how this book (any of her books!) made me feel, like CrossFit for the brain.  You gotta be prepared to put in the work, this book isn’t going to read itself to you.

2. High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

I mean, you know this book, or the movie, or the TV show. It was a solid read.

3. How to Kill Men and Get Away With It by Katy Brent

This was fun, especially if you hate men and believe me, I do. But it also wasn’t very unique or revolutionary. I have read better “female serial killer” books but this one was still a fun and quick read.

4. Howl’s Moving Castle (Howl’s Moving Castle, #1) by Diana Wynne Jones

I mean I must be broken because I only thought this was just OK and there is an entire sector of society out there who probably want to string me up for not having a glowing review.

I tried reading this years ago and was bored. Then this time around, I listened to the audio and was still not entertained. I will say though that I have NOT watched the animated film adaptation but it’s Japanese so already I feel like it’s gotta be better than the book.

5. The Reappearance of Rachel Price by Holly Jackson

Actually kind of wild for a YA mystery. I didn’t LOVE it, but it was like, the fuck is going on this is so far-fetched, what??

6. Love Interest by Clare Gilmore

OK so hear me out. The man character was Korean American so there would be like, Korean words and references thrown about here and there which makes me hope that the author either has a vested interest in Korea or has some relation to Korea so I will give her that but the narrator was BOTCHING it up big time. I was cringing every time she fuck up a Korean word like it was his first run-through, no going back.

Also, she pronounced subsidiary as “SUB-si-dairy” instead of “sub-SID-iary” which got under my skin because in my job, we were talking about subs A LOT and everyone uses the latter pronunciation.

Also x2 this book was just boring and I was not having any feels whatsoever.

7. Shiver: Selected Stories by Junji Ito

HELL YEAH. This has been on my TBR for years and I finally picked it up from the library. I loved almost every story, they were so creepy and affective, but “greased” seriously almost made me throw up it was so disgusting. I loved it.

8. Graveyard Shift by M.L. Rio

No. This was just bad. Worse than mid.

9. The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley

OK I enjoyed this way more than I thought I would being sci-fi adjacent I guess and while it remains true that as with most books in that genre, I oftentimes had NO IDEA what was going on, I genuinely loved the characters, their development, their relationships. It was a wild and inventive premise too, Bill & Ted’ish in that random people from the past are brought to the present day. Hilarity ensues.

10. Bottled Goods by Sophie van Llewyn

We are planning a Romania trip later this summer (this is pathetic but we can’t officially book our flight until I know when G-Dragon is touring the US lol) so I have been trying to add some Romanian novels to my TBR to help aid me in getting stoked. I LOVED THIS ONE. It had a bit of magical realism in it but mostly portrayed life in Communist Romania which I admittedly do not know much about so it provided a great historical bent as well.

I really enjoyed this one!

11. Sky Full of Elephants by Cebo Campbell

OK wow another sci fi, who is she. Anyway, this was fascinating – one day, almost all of the white people walk to the nearest body of water and drown themselves and now POC are running a post-racial America. There aren’t any zombies in this but it did give me some The Walking Dead vibes where you have a group of people trying to get to “the Kingdom.”

I really enjoyed this but I couldn’t stand the main character’s 19yo daughter. She was such a fucking brat and her chapters were a drag.

12.Things Don’t Break on Their Own by Sarah Easter Collins

My friend Lindsey recommended this one to me and it was a solid 5 stars, brother. The mystery / thriller element was such a page-turner but the characters. Robyn’s parents. The old lady in the house. The shit Willa endured. The HOLY SHIT moment at the dinner party. This book was so rich with trauma and palpable pain, but also so much love between friends. I loved it so much, every page of it.

13. The Pairing by Casey McQuiston

But then I read this next and it was sooooo bad. I have loved her books in the past but this was just actual trash and I did not care about either person. The European food tour aspect of it wasn’t even enough to redeem it – usually books like that will poke at my wanderlust and it will make the rest of the shit tolerable but this was, as I said, trash. I didn’t care why these people broke up and I didn’t care if they were going to get back together. In fact, I was kind of hoping they would both die. At least Theo. I hated them so much. Wah wah wah.

14. The Third Gilmore Girl by Kelly Bishop

I mean…come on. It’s Kelly freaking Bishop. I admittedly did not know much about her outside of the Gilmore Girls realm but wow has she lived a life. I love memoirs.

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OK bye for now!