I kicked off my reading year in a stellar way this month by reading my NEW FAVORITE BOOK OF ALL TIME. Yes, I’m serious. I was in this sort of dazed, I-don’t-know-what-to-feel-anymore state for a good 24 hours after I finished it; I know it may not work for everyone, but it was the perfect book for me, and I know I’ll be revisiting it in the future and saving my favorite passages. I also read a bunch more books from a variety of genres, including the first book in a great new paranormal romance series and the 5th book in a portal fantasy series I love.

Stats:

Total books read: 10

ARCs: 2

#readmyowndamnbooks: 6

Audiobooks: 2

Reviews:

Bunny by Mona Awad (5 stars) – It’s a quarter to two in the morning, and I think I just read my favorite book. 5 stars. A million stars. All the stars. How, exactly, is this book so good? How did Mona Awad manage to write a book that speaks to me on such an intellectual level, a visceral level? How did she fit so much into just 300 pages? (and HOW is it possible that this book has less than 3.5 stars on Goodreads???)

Bunny is a dark feminist horror novel, a fabulist story about writer’s block, a meditation on loneliness and outsiderness, a story that continuously analyzes itself even as you analyze it, and it’s perfect. It’s exactly the book I want to read.

I don’t know what else to say. Read it.

Come Tumbling Down by Seanan McGuire (4.5 stars) – I’ve enjoyed every installment of McGuire’s Wayward Children series, and this one may be one of my favorites. The focus is back on Jack and Jill, twins sent to a horror-movie-monster world populated by vampires, mad scientists, and sea-monster-worshipping cults (one of the strongest and most fascinating worlds McGuire creates in this series) and in a way, it’s about their struggles to become the right kind of monster for that world. Jack enlists the help of several more Wayward Children for a quest (even though they’re banned at their school!) that lets us see the unique perspectives and personalities they each bring to the table. I can’t wait for the next book in this series.

Unravel Me by Tahereh Mafi (4.5 stars) (re-read) – The Shatter Me series is one of my all-time favorite YA series, which I partially attribute to the fact that it acted as a form of escapism and stress relief when I was studying for my board exams during grad school. Its escapist qualities hold up well with re-reads, and this was a fun one for me to revisit.

Wolf Gone Wild by Juliette Cross (4 stars) – I absolutely loved this paranormal romance featuring witches and werewolves; you can check out my full review here. I received an eARC of Wolf Gone Wild via NetGalley.

Catch and Kill by Ronan Farrow (4 stars) – fascinating, horrifying, powerful. I thought Ronan Farrow did an excellent job with this account of his reporting on Harvey Weinstein and other related crimes; he’s detailed without being boring, and informative yet personal. He handles a difficult topic extremely well, by letting the gravity of the situation speak for itself, and also interjects a few bright spots of humor, and a few heartbreakingly poignant moments,  with his interactions with his now-fiance (who’s one of the Pod Save America guys!) and his sister Dylan. I think fans of John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood will also enjoy Catch and Kill, as it seems a similar, journalistic narrative style of nonfiction.

Life of the Party by Olivia Gatwood (4 stars) – a poetry collection centered around violence against women, ranging from true-crime obsessions with serial killers to violence we horrifyingly come to think of as everyday, mundane. Several of the poems in this collection gave me goosebumps or brought me to tears; it’s somehow simultaneously intimate and universal, always powerful. I’m trying to read more poetry this year and am still finding out what exactly my taste is; this collection, with its clarity but not starkness, is very much it.

Unclean Jobs for Women and Girls by Alissa Nutting (3.5 stars) – Alissa Nutting has a very strange, unsettlingly funny writing style that I find works really well for me in some circumstances, and less so in others. I overall really enjoyed her novel Made for Love and several of the stories in this collection; two that stood out for me were “Hellion,” about a woman becoming acquainted with Hell, and dating the devil, after murdering her husband, and “Porn Star,” about a reality show where men compete to have sex with porn stars, but in this circumstance it’s in space.  But not all of the stories straddled the line between uncomfortable and meaningful quite as well, although her creativity throughout was extremely impressive.

My Fake Rake by Eva Leigh (3.5 stars) – a cute, fun story about two very nerdy friends who fall in love, My Fake Rake also happens to be only the second historical romance I’ve ever enjoyed. (Is this becoming a trend? A new genre for me? Maybe?) Grace, a herpetologist and a nobleman’s daughter, is pushed toward marriage by her ill father, but the man she’s long admired from afar isn’t showing any interest in her. Undaunted, she turns to her friend Sebastian, an anthropolgist and the son of a wealthy businessman who nevertheless lacks any personal wealth, and asks him to feign interest in her to catch the attention of her crush. Unbeknownst to Grace, Sebastian has long harbored feelings for her, and their experiment forces her to realize that she may have feelings for him as well. I loved both main characters equally, and thought the writing style, as well as the makeover/fake rake storyline (supposedly this author is focusing on turning 80’s rom-coms into historical romances with this series, called the Union of the Rakes–I definitely got Breakfast Club vibes from an introductory flashback scene to Sebastian and his friend group) was a lot of fun. I’ll definitely be looking to pick up the next books in this series.

Followers by Megan Angelo (3 stars) – Although I thought this book had a really interesting premise (and a very relevant one), I was ultimately let down by the flatness of its characters. A full review will be up soon; I received an ARC of Followers from the publisher at BookExpo.

The A. I. Who Loved Me by Alyssa Cole (3 stars) – I love Alyssa Cole’s contemporary romances (the Reluctant Royals series is so much fun!) but I wasn’t as big a fan of this science fiction romance that’s an Audible exclusive. I’m not the biggest fan of Audible or Amazon in general, and generally don’t subscribe, but I did a free trial just to listen to this one; unfortunately, I didn’t feel it was quite worth it for me. It’s near-future SF featuring a romance between a former programmer and the A.I. who moves in across the hall, and although I liked the main character, overall I needed more worldbuilding and action to move the book along.