reading lately: July roundup

My July reads are a bit lopsided in genre, with so much mystery/thriller (could even put one of my literary/contemporary fiction books partly in that category) - partly as these can be good beach reading, and partly as library holds came in all in a row. Might have affected my opinion of a couple to have read them so close together, as they were a bit hit-or-miss, but a couple of them are worth adding to your beach bag... Best books of the month though are all about England - a novella about the Queen getting into reading, and a Pride & Prejudice retelling centered on the overlooked sister, Mary.

Literary/contemporary fiction

The Uncommon Reader: Chasing down her misbehaving corgis on a walk around the Buckingham Palace grounds one day, the Queen encounters a mobile library parked nearby, and when she steps aboard to apologize for the dogs' barking, she feels obliged to check out a book, despite not being much of a reader. This starts a whole new relationship with literature as she discovers the joys of reading, both for pleasure and for educating herself in new ways. But much as she loves her new hobby, the way it takes her attention (not to mention the way it changes her outlook on her role as monarch and develops a new sort of empathy she hadn't known before given her rarified role) starts to be rather a nuisance for the palace staff, the Prime Minister, and her husband... This is a book (novella, actually) for bookish people - people who would delight in coming across a mobile library, people who enjoy the various real-world figure literary references and nods (both classic and contemporary) sprinkled throughout a narrative, people who buy into the power of reading. These are people who will also be amused by the premise of the Queen starting to shirk her duties because all she wants to do is get back to her book - and these are people who will be completely charmed by this version of the queen and will close the book with a little chuckle after that most *excellent* final line. In terms of wit and charm and observations about the power of literature and the impetus to share it, this reading experience reminded me a lot of Parnassus on Wheels, the little volume that inspired the name of Ann Patchett's Nashville bookstore. It is also a delight, and also short enough to read in one sitting like this one, so pick that up too if you haven't yet! Alan Bennett is a well-known literary figure in England, I'm sure, but I was not really familiar with him until reading the delightful memoir-in-letters Love, Nina, in which the author recounts her time working as a nanny for the deputy editor of the London Review of Books - which puts her into such interesting literary circles (my review here). One of their neighbors is Alan Bennett, and she often mentions his coming over for dinner or other occasions, and he comes off as such an interesting figure. I pictured a bit of David Sedaris in my head (whether that is anywhere remotely true) with his droll comments and diverting observations and various quirks. So when I came across this little novella with his name on it while browsing Blackwell's during a work trip to England earlier this summer, I had to bring it home - and what a perfect little souvenir it turned out to be! Will be passing along to all of my bookish life loving friends and family now. ★★★★★

Night Objects: I went into this book pretty blind – I had put it on my to-read list as a mystery, but I didn’t know much beyond that. In some ways a book like this is best without knowing too much, so you can see how it will unfold, but I will pass along two crucial things that would have set my expectations appropriately: (1) Lenny, the main character, who narrates the story looking back as an adult on this time during her teens, is a girl. This somehow took me a good 10% of the book to realize (I must have missed something), and that threw me off. (2) There is a mystery element, but this is not the driver of the plot. I’d characterize this as dark academia, as the main setting is a boarding school where Lenny starts in her junior year of high school, and though she is a “nobody” with none of the wealth and family connections of most of her classmates, and one of the few brown students at that, she is tapped to join the school’s chapter of a secret society. We know through the occasional chapters labeled as “after” that are interspersed throughout the book that something tragic has occurred, and in the “before” we gradually build up to this throughout the first semester and a half of the school year. The dark academia part and secret society definitely gave me If We Were Villains and Secret History vibes, but there’s also a strong coming-of-age thread as well as a fish-out-of-water element with how Lenny doesn’t fit in well at the school, which made me think of Curtis Sittenfeld’s Prep. Overall well written and definitely engaging, though maybe a better moody fall read than a beach read when you go on vibes. The decisions of these teenagers made me crazy at times; I think that’s kind of the point, seeing how lack of experience, wanting to fit in, social pressures, grief, adults turning blind eyes, etc. can wreak havoc. But still it made me a bit squirmy at times that stuff they were getting into, and the initiation type stuff, so even though well written I just couldn’t quite connect with the characters and fully immerse – that’s a me thing, and I think people who like the above mentioned books should definitely check this one out. ★★★.75

Mystery/thriller

Three Reasons for Revenge: Sydney detective Judith Lee usually works on murder cases, but a young woman who comes into the station to report an assault requests to speak with Judith specifically, and Judith is brought back to years earlier when she interviewed a young woman with an extremely similar accusation. Judith feels compelled to bring the perpetrator to justice, but when she goes to follow up, the young woman has disappeared without a trace. Meanwhile, 3 different people, apparently unconnected, receive identical unmarked packages to their homes - a psychologist married to a prominent television presenter, a wealthy socialite designer, and a struggling single father - each with a cryptic note and contents that will blow up their lives and relationships. Judith has to use all of her smarts, and convince the powers-that-be of her seemingly wild theories, to connect all the dots among all of these things and make sure that the right person is brought to justice. I first came to Dervla McTiernan through her Cormac Reilly detective series, which I would say are good comps for fans of Jane Harper and Tana French; her more recent books have read as more psychological mysteries/thrillers, still with that depth of character, not a run-of-the-mill thriller, so this new release feels like a bit of a departure, going more toward that standard thriller category. Not a category that often works great for me - but this one did, because it combines detective procedural with psychological thriller. I really like the structure and investigative aspect that a detective book brings, and drawing me in even more, this one had a sympathetic main female detective, who is dealing with the prejudices of her workplace along with some baggage from her past - not to mention a secret she's keeping from her boss about her past experience with someone involved in the current case. Classic self-destructive streak for a fictional detective... and though the characterization in this way, along with the descriptive writing style, can feel pretty "genre", McTiernan mixes it up with chapters that look at the various regular people who are drawn into this case and the psychological effects on them. They are seemingly unconnected at first, but the threads start to come together for Judith and the reader at the same time. The twist comes a bit early as Judith figures out the culprit, but then it gets a bit more page turner-y as she has to figure out how to actually track that person down. Going into it with the right genre expectations, I came out quite satisfied with my reading experience - good summer selection! ★★★★

The Secret Lives of Murderers' Wives: I'd call this a (fictional) true-crime + historical fiction mashup: In 1960s California, Beverley, Elsie, and Margot are not women who likely would have crossed paths and become friends, but they are united by their particular life experiences - all were married to now-convicted serial killers. They all have their own ways of dealing with the public + personal life fallout and the feelings of betrayal/self-doubt that come with finding out such horrible things about their husbands, but they figure out a way to channel it: when they hear news of multiple young women ending up as murder victims, in ways that seem to indicate different MOs, their lived experience and understanding of the mind of a serial killer leads them to connect the dots before the police do. The police of course won't listen to a trio of housewives, so they decide that it's time to do some amateur sleuthing... Reading this reminded me a bit of Meet the Newmans - albeit not my favorite read, and doesn't have the crime element, but it has the setting similarity, and the plot/theme similarities of a woman finding her way in a man's world when her husband is no longer there as the one "in charge", along with the theme of the power of female friendship and/or cooperation to empower and make stuff happen. And though I wouldn't compare it in terms of overall quality, I made similar mental comparisons to Lessons in Chemistry for those reasons, and also for how it dealt with a serious issue in a tone that overall made the reading feel light. I'd say if you liked those reads, this could be a good fit. I definitely had some quibbles - some of the attitudes/comments seemed a bit anachronistic, and I'm not sure there was a single male character who was portrayed as a normal human (if not murderers, the rest are sleazes or misogynists, etc.) But if you want to lean into a bit of feminine rage in women taking matters into their own hands to keep themselves safe from both predators and society's restrictions on their abilities and autonomy - and if you're willing to go along with the idea of soooo many serial killers operating at ones, and the idea of 3 housewives coming up with criminal profiling several years before this was a real FBI thing, I found overall it was an enjoyable, easy reading experience for something a bit different in terms of the era and the framing of a crime novel, centering on the families of the killers. ★★★.25

Someone Else's Husband: I've enjoyed Kimberly McCreight's previous work for the legal procedural aspects (she's a former lawyer); she has scratched that itch I sometimes have for a smart mystery/thriller, so I'm always interested to see what she has out next. This latest one was a great read to breeze through on a long flight and pass the time quite satisfactorily, but admittedly not super memorable in that when I arrived home and went to write this review I had to look back at what the book is actually about... so if you're in the market for vacation reading, this could be it, but if you're in the mood for legal thriller that feels like it has a bit more depth/makes you really think about issues like marriages/relationships, I'd go back to earlier work by McCreight, especially A Good Marriage. In this book, we have Gretchen, a wealthy New Yorker in her 50s who devoted her life to raising her family and supporting her husband's investment banker career; in contrast, we have Frankie, an artist in her 30s who is about to launch a career-making exhibition. The "someone else's husband" is Gretchen's husband of decades, Richard, who by all accounts seemed devoted and loyal, until shockingly the police show up at his door with questions and accusations related to Frankie's murder. Richard and Frankie met on a recent climbing expedition to Mt. Kilimanjaro, where the group bonded over a tragedy that occurred - but did something more than bonding happen between the two of them? And in the midst of all of this, can Gretchen maintain her belief that she's the only woman Richard has ever loved, and that he would never hurt anyone? I appreciated that the wealthy "good wife" scenario, the "good old boys" scenario and the "other, younger woman" scenario weren't entirely same-old, but were used to look a bit at these types of situations and assumptions that come with them. It's not super fast-paced, though it has some domestic thriller elements, but relies a bit more on the character development, as well as the mystery of what exactly was the tragedy that occurred on the Kilimanjaro climb and how that relates to what might have happened to Frankie after arriving home. It has some nuance, but it's still pretty commercial type fiction, more about the suspense and possible love triangle tension than real depth in characters and themes. Still, a good thriller-lite type of beach read that has some twists but nothing bonkers that will give you the ick or the eye-rolls. ★★★.5

Summer's Never Over: A dual-timeline thriller set at a summer camp where secrets are being peeled back sounded promising for beach reading - like a more fast-paced God of the Woods, one would hope. But unfortunately it turned out to be one of those books that I was kind of mad I finished... If you see this new release around, you should know going in: the pacing is a bit spotty, none of the characters feel very real or sympathetic, and one of the twists relies on a total personality about-face in one of the peripheral characters, which feels a bit of a cheat to me. But what was even more of a struggle is that the main character is around 21 years old when tragedy strikes at the well-regarded Georgia summer camp that her family runs, leading to the death of a fellow counselor and close friend - so she is unsurprisingly kind of immature and selfish in her actions and decisions in this timeline. But then the "now" timeline is only 5 years later, when the camp is about to re-open and she comes back to her old home for the first time for the kickoff weekend. - and she comes off as just as immature and selfish. I found it hard to care about the twists and turns as I had no investment in the protagonist. ★★

Historical fiction

The Other Bennet Sister: I have read quite a variety of Pride & Prejudice retellings/adaptations - with a  modern rom-com setting, with a mystery element, an Afro-Latino YA twist, and more. The only one I've read before with a new framework for the same Austen-ian setting was Longbourn by Jo Baker, which retells the story with a focus on the household staff; while I liked it, I admit that I've been a bit partial to the "fun" versions, until my mom handed me this selection. The first section of The Other Bennet Sister reframes Mary's story within the well-known P&P plot, showing how being the "ugly duckling" compared to her sisters might have affected her confidence and self-regard, and how the lonely life of being constantly verbally torn down by her mother and virtually ignored by her father, of being in the middle of two peas-in-a-pod sets of sisters, could have led her to trying to find her place in music practice or in books, leading to our perceptions of her as pedantic and a total social-misfit. Mary knows her prospects for marriage are slim to none, while her sisters are all in the process of achieving their mother's and society's definition of life success in this regard, and she has an understandably low estimation of her own worth in this world. With a new, more empathetic perspective on Mary in place for the reader, the next sections of the book occur in the years after P&P, when the oft-discussed but never quite expected death of Mr. Bennet arrives and the estate is indeed entailed away to Mr. Collins. Mary has to contend with her status in a world where a woman can only make her own way via marriage; without a parental home to live in, her situation feels precarious and dependent on others. As she spends time in the households of various sisters and relations, she sees varying examples of married relationships and for the first time as an adult disconnects from the rational side she has forced herself into and examines her feeling side, imagining a life and a relationship that she yearns for. It's so very human - this desire to be seen and known and valued - and portrayed compellingly through this usually overlooked character. Another thing this reframing made me think about was how in stories written both past and present, we expect our heroines to be beautiful, or if not, have charm and wit to make them shine; I appreciated putting Mary at the center without trying to "improve" her in either of these ways, but instead to help the reader consider how we make our own happiness, and how we can use the "story" we tell ourselves about our worth to build a life (even in the constraints of society). Mary feels like such a real and nuanced character, with the conflicting feelings and behaviors we all have, and I rooted hard for her. Naturally this book best suited for fans of P&P given the setting and the pace of the narrative, and of course the references to the original; the characters we know well feel like the Austen ones, even when they're given new lines/scenarios, and since we don't know Mary as well from the original, her character development in this book doesn't feel incongruous. Could be quite enjoyable for people who like historical fiction though even if they don't know P&P well - the setting feels really rich. It's fairly slow-paced and quite character driven, and I sometimes felt the length of the almost 500 pages, but overall what an enjoyable read. ★★★★.5

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, vol. 2: Vol. 2 of this historical fiction/diary/period rom-com/quirky magical realism mashup series was even more delightful than Vol. 1, now that I am fully immersed in this world - the returning characters are like old friends now (even if some of them are Emma's nemeses, like ridiculous cousin Archibald and drill sergeant Aunt Eugenia), and I loved the new characters too. For someone who is trying to figure out how to make it in life as an independent woman in 1883, Emma sure has some potential love interests, from the slightly enigmatic local vicar to the broody lodger who moves into Lapus Lazuli Minor to the young duke who has an unexpectedly interesting personality (and some friction with Emma that sure could turn out to be flirtation) to the gentleman who was a childhood tormenter but who in adulthood has turned out to be devastatingly handsome and a real friend. Can't wait to see how things develop with all of them, not to mention Emma's finances after cousin Archibald frittered away her inheritance, and Emma now has to scheme how to keep the household afloat if she doesn't want to get stuck living with dreadful relations for the rest of her life. This series is for fans of Bridgerton and/or Masterpiece period dramedies, but think the *cozy* version of these (cozy as in being complete comfort reading/listening and quite PG; however, they've still got enough cheek and charm and even emotional depth to keep from being too light or pedestrian). Admittedly, the covers put me off when I first saw the books showing up in my Goodreads feed - even if they do fit the Victorian era setting, they don't scream "quality writing" to me, so I'm so glad I heard a couple of specific recommendations for these and decided to try. Dove right into Vol. 3 after finishing, and still going with audio as the most delightful method. The narrator is great. ★★★★★

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, vol. 3: Again, these (fictional) journals of a young lady living in a quirky neighborhood in 1880s London prove to be delightful. In this two months of her life, Emma writes about some comedically frustrating things in her neighborhood (a hunt, in which she has to pair up with her horrible old cousin Archibald, for clues to win exclusive tickets to the neighborhood’s annual Julius Caesar production), she shows her bookish side even more (the whole caper to rescue a bootleg copy of Jane Eyre from the locked desk of the headmistress at Emma’s alma mater, so that the girls at the school can continue to have clandestine access to it, plus discussions of Emerson with the “tenant”), she continues to attract the attention of several young men, to the chagrin of crochety Aunt Eugenia, who see her for who she is in all of her clever and cheeky and charming personality. And we even get more depth of character, as she reveals more about her love who was lost to war, and learns more about the realities of war from the war photography of her tenant, leading to some truly poignant moments. I found a couple of the plots a little mad-cap, but overall am still so charmed that I didn’t mind, especially because the author did a good job of mixing up the emotions from the capers and witticisms to the developing emotional depth of Emma’s friendships. ★★★★.5

Young Adult

The Hazel Wood: Somewhere along the way this book ended up on my to-read list, I think because I had heard it suggested as a good fantasy selection for someone who doesn't typically read fantasy (?) - and I was intrigued because of the bookish angle, being about a young woman, Alice, whose mother is the estranged daughter of reclusive author who published a cult-classic book of dark fairytales that's so difficult to find a copy of now that Alice hasn't even read it. And I liked that it was grounded in a real-world setting, with a fantasy element hidden in the real world that the protagonist discovers and learns about right along with the reader - that's the way for me to read fantasy. However, this book is really more for people who like fairy tales or fairy tale retellings. As someone who doesn't really care about fairy tales, I had trouble being interested in this story, and honestly I felt kind of lost with the "hinterland" supernatural world where the stories are set (but turns out to be a real thing). The style felt pretty YA, which is fine, but the teenage angst combined with the convoluted fairy tale world made this one not for me. Also, afterward I realized that it's kind of an Alice in Wonderland retelling; I don't know that much about the original, but it might have set a better expectation for me in knowing that. (Or maybe I wouldn't have picked it up at all... not exactly a devotee of Alice in Wonderland type settings or stories.) ★★.75

DNFs

The Adults: I picked up the debut novel from Alison Espach after loving her more recent two books. This looked to have elements that made me love her 2nd book - Notes on Your Sudden Disappearance - the coming of age of a teenage girl amidst family upheaval, written with wry, observational humor, with a nostalgic 90s setting. But after getting about 20% of the way into this one, all I could think is that I was glad I hadn't started my relationship with this author with this book, because then I might not have wanted to pick up her others... I just didn't find the warmth here that goes along with the sarcasm/depression/coping of the characters in Espach's other books. Teenager Emily's narrative voice is snarky and bored and does not match the whimsicality of the cover at all. Was liking, not loving it, and waiting for some improvement as Emily got older, but when when an inappropriate relationship started between her and her teacher, I was out. This was disappointing, but I definitely still stand by my recommendations of Notes on Your Sudden Disappearance and The Wedding People.

So Old, So Young: At first I thought it was kind of like the excellent Netflix series The Four Seasons in being a window into the life of a group of college friends at a few different points throughout their relationships (in the series, different trips they take together, in this book, different parties they are at throughout the years - a college party, a wedding, etc.). I guess it was kind of like it in format, but not at all in charm or humor. It was hard to keep track of the characters, for one thing - I think side characters got too much attention, so it was hard to keep track of who was actually the core group whose story I was supposed to be invested in - and there seemed to be so much animosity at times, or just veneer of friendship rather than actual relationship. Then the drinking and casual drug use. I could see it in their college and early 20s years, but when they didn't put it away as they aged it made characters I already didn't really like feel like they weren't maturing, and I couldn't bring myself to really care about them enough to continue beyond about 30% of the book.

The Lowe Job: this sounded like it would be a fun and fresh family dramedy satirizing the way people use social media and/or scandal to manufacture personal celebrity, and providing snappy social commentary on expectations of women, double standards, etc. The characters were maybe written to be dislikeable - they are taking an inappropriate sexual relationship and purposefully exploiting it to their own gain, so manipulation is built in to the premise, after all - but I did not like the voice at all. Cannot understand why it had a comparison to Margot's Got Money Troubles in the publisher's blurb (something that admittedly drew me in) because the characters here are all spikes and hard edges where the characters in Margo have quirk and warmth. That lack of heart to offset the snark meant I didn't make it far in. Another Book-of-the-Month selection that was a total miss, in my opinion - really glad I tried it from the library rather than making it my June choice!

reading lately: June roundup

My June reading roundup includes some treasures! First and foremost, my highly anticipated pre-order of Ann Patchett's new book came, and it did not let me down. Spoiler alert: it's my current #1 read for the year. And then there are several recommendations that came to me via podcasts that turned out to be great, especially my two audio book selections for the month. 

Contemporary/literary fiction

Whistler: I'm sure I've said it before, but Ann Patchett is a master at compelling character-driven fiction. I could not put down this beauty of a book, in which Daphne, a teacher in her 50s, and her husband notice an older man seeming to follow them around the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It turns out to be Eddie Triplett, who was Daphne's beloved stepfather for about 2 years when she was in elementary school. She hadn't had any contact with him in the 40-some years since her mother divorced Eddie, but this chance encounter rekindles their father-daughter relationship, and it also leads Daphne to reflect back on her childhood and reexamine it in a new light now that she knows Eddie in an adult capacity. This was one of those books that made me want to hug it when I finished, but to be honest I also wanted to hug it throughout. I was SO charmed by Eddie. All of the dialogue was perfection - the kind of back and forths that make you feel like these are real people talking except better because real people don't actually have such everyday conversations that manage to be so spot-on and entertaining - especially between Eddie and Daphne, and between Daphne and her sister, Leda. The characters, the ebbs and growths in their relationships, and the writing are moving and poignant and real. To me the book just glows. The themes encompass parent/child relationships and their many facets, love and how being known/seen by someone can be so consequential in a life, and how our lives are affected by the nature of memory and small moments/decisions and the stories we tell ourselves about our experiences. I found especially interesting the exploration of how our childhood experiences can shape our whole perspective, but how limited that perspective actually is due to the nature of childhood understanding of the world and the nuances of adults' relationships, etc. being so limited. In terms of Ann Patchett reads, I found this to encompass elements of Tom Lake (my fave!) and Commonwealth in combination. It's also a great pick for someone with a The Correspondent-sized hole in their reading life; the style/story isn't particularly similar, but the overall feel-good but not saccharine experience will give you a similar satisfaction when you finish. ★★★★★

This Is Not About Us: Opening with the final weeks of their sister's life, this book is about the myriad of everyday dramas in the lives of Helen and Sylvia Rubenstein, as well as their children and grandchildren (or notable lack thereof, to the chagrin of one of these Jewish mothers...) - and how their family is shaped by the overarching big drama, a feud between the sisters that starts at Jeanne's funeral over a family apple cake recipe and leads to them not speaking for years. The publisher tagline feels apt, in describing this as a "kaleidoscopic portrait of a modern American family". It's a family drama in terms of the everyday kinds of drama, of living through divorce and dating, planning bar mitzvahs and attending ballet recitals, navigating through college applications and family holiday traditions. And it's about the common foibles that come with family relationships - the ways we fall back on "our" roles even as adult children/siblings and how that can lead to friction, the evolution of a marriage from fresh in love to growing stale in all the distractions of careers and kids, the expectations parents have of their adult kids and how those can chafe or create distance, the sadness of aging in knowing that those who knew you as "you" (your younger years) are fewer and far between. Some of the characters really annoyed me at times, but they all felt real, like people I could identify in my life, and the way they are portrayed is both wry and poignant. The book reads as a collection of connected short stories (though there was one right in the middle that seemed unrelated and I was really distracted the whole time wondering why none of the familiar characters were in it - seemed like an odd choice to include just that one that turned out to be very tangentially related). I'm not much of a short story reader (too short! I want to be more immersed in a character's life), so I as I was reading I thought I was liking it a bit less than I would have liked a novel version; however, as a way to read short stories I did really like it - much better than reading a random collection of short stories - as I got to continue with the same characters and remain in their world throughout. In the end the reading experience really grew on me, seeing all of these snippets of the various family members, in multiple generations, from various angles and perspectives as they went about their lives and minor family dramas - and I had to admit that I think this format was the way to go for this book. A novel wouldn't have left me with the same feeling of satisfaction - might have ended up seeming like a same-old family drama, rather than something that stood out from the pack and immersed me in the fabric of the family. It reminded me a bit of shorter fiction from writers like Curtis Sittenfeld in terms of topics and tone, so that's a good comp author here. ★★★★.25

Alan Opts Out: Alan Anderson is the exec of an advertising firm who has won awards for his campaigns and fully expects to be back on the podium at the industry's awards when he nails his pitch to "big milk" (whose sales have been flagging no thanks to trendy oat milk). Meanwhile, his wife Vivian, whose chief concern in life is fitting herself and her family into the socialite mold of their exclusive Connecticut town has already pre-spent the bonus that winning the pitch will net Alan, putting down a deposit for the backyard swimming pool she is sure they *need* to improve their standing among the ladies of the town. But things completely start to fall apart for the Anderson family when Alan bombs the pitch, and he goes a bit off the deep end, going in a mental about-face about consumerism and materialism, things that he made his career off of; he takes up residence in the backyard playhouse and eschews worldly things... internet and phones, wearing shoes, taking showers. Meanwhile, their eldest daughter goes rogue and rebellious, their younger daughter starts talking to animals, and Vivan is frantic that her application to the Bellport ladies' social society is in jeopardy. You've got to be in the mood for a satire here because that's absolutely what this is. At first the characters don't seem to have any redeeming qualities as they are the most extreme versions of their respective roles in order to make a point about materialism, consumerism, ambition, social comparison, capitalism, our attempts to buy happiness. But as the characters actually start to grow and develop a bit (Vivian takes the longest, be warned, and certain ladies of the town remain caricatures) the points are illustrated with wit and heart and some hope for all of us in turning out okay despite the craziness of living in the modern world, even as the plot of the book gets a bit less real-life like and zany. The reading experience reminded me a bit of Lost Lambs - though more satire and a bit less madcap, and I was endeared a bit less to the characters in Alan Opts Out - so I'd recommend Alan if you enjoyed Lost Lambs, but maybe just give a bit of space in between them or you might get tired of the farce of it all and not fully appreciate both. The publisher blurb mentions that it's for fans of Rufi Thorpe; the only book I've read of hers is Margot's Got Money Troubles, and I didn't find Alan Opts Out to have as much heart and warmth in addition to the quirkiness. But I can see how it could get a comparison to her, and maybe also Kevin Wilson and Annie Hartnett (though again, those lean less pure farcical feeling), and I was quite engrossed the whole way through. A fun/comedic yet timely/thought-provoking read. ★★★★

Life, & Death, & Giants: Gabriel is a complete anomaly - born in small-town Wisconsin to a woman who has been banished by her Amish community for refusing to reveal the parentage of either of her sons, he's 18 pounds as an infant, starts walking at 8 months, crushing all of the upper Little League as about a 7 year old, and eventually growing to be the tallest living person on Earth. He's an orphan and has an uncanny ability to soothe and communicate with animals. His community is not one that is interested in a lot of attention, but with someone of such size and athletic prowess, the public eye and media frenzy is coming their way no matter what... Through the eyes of several of the people who know him best - his Amish grandmother, the high school football coach, the local bar owner, the veterinarian Gabriel assists with his work - this book tells the story of Gabriel's life, his (literal and figurative) larger-than-life presence, and how it changed others' lives and his community in indelible ways. It's a feel-good read in that it is clear that these characters see and feel redemption in spite of (or even because of) the sorrows and tragedies they endure. It's perhaps a bit unsubtle about the lessons learned in the end, which maybe borders on schmaltzy, so I didn't leave feeling like I had read the most elegant and moving of books, but it was an engaging and easy read that I did appreciate - and I can see how it would definitely be a crowd pleaser. There's found family, the strength of community and acceptance, and forgiveness at its heart. Part of what really got me into the book was that the reading experience felt like William Kent Kreuger or Leif Enger, both authors I love. It has the general tone, the coming of age story, the small Midwest town setting, the timeless feel (William Kent Kreuger's books are sometimes set in the 50s/60s; while this book is modern day it has the feel of an older time like those because of the Amish lifestyle), the slightly mystical/spiritual elements, and the exploration of themes like grace and faith and redemption. It was hard for me to track some of the characters at first (I needed a family tree for Gabriel's family to get acclimated, maybe), but still I found interesting author's choice to tell the story from the perspective of a few townspeople/relatives, so we are always learning about Gabriel from the perspective of others, rather than his own voice. That seems well-suited to the story because he's such a figure of renown and intrigue due to his size and skills, so he's always in a bit of a fishbowl - but I do wonder a bit if I would have felt a bit more emotionally connected to him if I'd had more insight into the real him instead of others' experiences of him. Overall, I liked a lot the elements that reminded me of William Kent Kreuger and Leif Enger, even if it was a little less subtle in how it wrapped things up. ★★★.75

Mystery/thriller

Heather: Callie Hauser has returned to her small, costal New Jersey town to serve as chief of police, with all of the complications that running the department as a young-ish woman entails, not least having to arrest her own mother for a DUI. This run-in with her estranged mother and some revelations that come along with it lead Callie to re-open a cold case in which a baby's body was found in the woods, and a local teenage girl who was presumably the mother was never seen again. In the dual-timeline narrative, with Callie's investigation in the present, and a pair of teenage twins navigating a changing/conflicted sister relationship, neglectful parents, and predatory men in the 1990s, it's a slow-burn procedural plus a look at mothers/daughters and re-understanding people through the lens of their trauma. This was the kind of cold case, atmospheric, small-town mystery I was looking for (after the disappointment of Murder Town described below), and it kept me turning the pages on a long flight. It didn't quite have the top-tier narrative tension/character development/payoff of my favorite books in this genre, but definitely a solid entry, and I'd read more from this author. I'd say it's for fans of Long Bright River and similar, with the grittiness, the sister relationship. ★★★★ 

A Double Life: Talk about psychological suspense... Claire lives with two identities, which creates a constant tension between wanting to exist in her quiet life as a hardworking doctor in London where nobody knows her past as the daughter of Colin Spenser, the accused killer in Britain's most notorious cold case, and between being unable to escape that past in her own mind, as she goes through periods of obsessive personal investigation, tracking her father's friends online and even following them around in person, as she tries to figure out where her father is now, decades later. Then comes the extreme version of the double life - the police and Claire have always assumed that Colin's rich and powerful friends helped him to escape abroad, though they have always maintained their (and his) innocence. But when Claire runs into the adult daughter of her father's closest friend, who is catering an event, Claire can't resist the chance to get closer to, maybe even in the home of, her father's friends and get any possible nugget of information about Colin's whereabouts. She pretends that she is in need of a caterer for an event and hires the daughter. This soon develops into an actual friendship, where the double life gets even more dicey... This sort of deception in a story often makes me really uncomfortable in that I'm waiting for the lie to be uncovered at any moment and for major fallout to happen, but Flynn Berry handled it quite masterfully even if it did make me squirmy at times. It's a literary, character-driven story, so it's not fast-paced or filled with bonkers twists; instead, it's about the psychology of it all, which is quite gripping, and the tension is low-grade but constant. As a reader I kept wondering whether Claire was simply traumatized, totally deranged in her need for some sort of revenge, completely mistaken about what happened to her father/the crime she believes he committed - or all of the above. Definitely kept me turning the pages even if it's not a page-turner of a book per se. Then actually what Berry does with the uncovering of Claire's deception was more interesting than I expected, even if I'm not sure I 100% liked how she ended the book. Overall a solid read especially if you like true crime stories, especially about their affects on victims/families, and a slow-burn/psychological approach to telling this type of story. And actually, the crime is indeed based on a true story of a British aristocrat who tried to murder his wife, but accidently murdered the nanny, while his young children slept upstairs, in the 1970s; Berry's extrapolation on what the fallout from this might have been like is quite evocative. ★★★★

Murder Town: Though admittedly I wouldn’t be able to tell you anything about the plot 4 years later, when I happened upon a 2nd book written by Shelley Burr I remembered that I really liked her first book, Wake, as a Jane Harper-readalike. So what a fortuitous find, since I’m always in the mood for this kind of mystery, but there’s not always a new one available to me (write faster, Jane Harper?). I dove in pronto to this book about a small town that is infamous for a serial killer who struck there almost 20 years earlier, where a tour company is now trying to set up a “Ranier Ripper” walking tour to capitalize on society’s ghoulish true crime obsession. I liked the idea of this true crime angle: considering the effects of being someone who still lives in this community, the trauma and stigma and difficulty in moving on (down to how the notoriety and crimes could affect individual property values). Unfortunately, while it could have been an intriguing look if taken a more psychological/literary route, this book just felt completely basic. It had the small-town Australia atmosphere, but none of the atmospheric feel that led me to compare Wake to Jane Harper. It felt weak on writing, plot, (total lack of) character development; I’m usually willing to suspend disbelief for a mystery, but with the amateur sleuth nature of this one, the twists that sometimes were predictable and sometimes super convoluted, the unrealistic feeling relationships and interactions among family members and townspeople, and the characters acting in ways that didn’t seem at all consistent with how their characters had been written. I was quite disappointed here, but Wake was worth a read if you want a satisfying (if not entirely memorable) atmospheric mystery. ★★.5

Historical fiction

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, Vol. 1: It's March 1883, and Emma Lion has returned to Lapus Lazuli House in the very quirky London neighborhood of St. Crispian's, but due to inheritance complications she's not actually able to take full possession of it until she turns 21. Meanwhile, she's at the whims of fussy Cousin Archibald, along with her formidable and bossy Aunt Eugenia, and she records all of her witty observations, social foibles, nagging frustrations, and lonely moments in life as a young lady who society won't really allow to be as educated or independent or outspoken as she'd like to be. It's extremely rare for me to consider reading fiction on audio, but I heard a recommendation on Sarah's Bookshelves Live that these are great in audio form, thanks in part to the short-form journal entry format, as well as the overall short form of the books. This one was only 3 hours on audio, and it was delightful. It was basically a Masterpiece miniseries in my ears, and I loved the narrator and her voices for the various characters. I really could have used a character sheet for reference as it's definitely hard to keep them straight at first, but beyond the occasional confusion it was so charming and cheeky, and I dove right into the next one when I finished (each one covers about 2 months at a time, so it's fun little snippets of Emma's life, not a lot of plot but still quite engaging even in the most mundane entries). ★★★★.5  

Non-fiction/memoir

This American Woman: Zarna Garg is an unlikely comedian - first generation immigrant from India who grew up more outspoken than her culture would prefer, mom-of-three who gave up personal aspirations to completely manage her family's needs. She never quite felt like she belonged anywhere, after running away from home and couch surfing for several years after her father tried to arrange a marriage for her at age 14, and when trying to navigate the world of New York private schools for her kids as an outsider - until she found her footing in midlife in comedy, where she could get paid to talk and make people laugh, things that went entirely unappreciated where/how she was raised. What a delightful memoir to listen to on audio, as you definitely need to hear her story in her voice, but in addition there are fun extras like some snippets from some of her actual early shows, and some brief essays written/read by her family members. Sometimes comedians' memoirs fall a little flat if they have a lot of stories that you've already heard in their acts or specials, but as I somehow hadn't encountered her before, it was all fresh and new to me. And I loved how it weaved in some really poignant and difficult things (you can even hear it in her breaking voice as she reads those sections) about Zarna's life and how she managed through them and became who she is despite them. It's a fascinating story about a childhood in India made wild (no) thanks to not good family members, and hilariously told. And then in addition it's a great behind-the-scenes peek at making it in comedy, especially as someone who is "different" and coming at it later in life - so clear how much hustle and grind is required to get there, and Zarna is clearly a formidable woman in addition to being a hoot. The middle portion about her stay-at-home tiger mom era was a little dip for me in enjoyment of listening because her actions and attitude felt so extreme, but in the telling I could see how cultural attitudes and being an immigrant etc. fed into that. She's a singular act thanks to the life and cultural experience she brings to being a comedian, but I'd also recommend for fans of Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Leanne Morgan, especially for the aspect of being a (late) middle-aged mom and how that factors in to their comedy. ★★★★

loving lately: summer sun

Happy June! Kicking off the summer with one of my recent favorite colors, as I get to pull out the items I've acquired over the last year (with one new notable addition) and put them back into regular rotation. Here's what's bringing some extra sunshine to sartorial life lately, along with one of my very favorite warm-weather activities: reading outdoors!

1. Espadrilles: finally decided to try the mesh flat trend with these too cute espadrilles, because how could I resist this color, not to mention the comfort soles. Excited to take them for their first spin soon, and I know I'm going to be wearing them all summer with my sun dresses, and to dress up shorts.

2. Lightweight blouse: a casual, lightweight blouse is great for limiting over-exposure to the sun... mine from last year actually looks more like this, but I kind of still want this cropped button-down version. How many yellow shirts is too many yellow shirts?

3. Athletic dress: I could live in these for daytime, so easy to wear and look put together but stay cool and be ready for anything with kids - going for a scooter-walk, playing at the park, you name it. I have a variety of cuts (including high-neck, v-neck) and colors but am of course partial to the yellow.

4. Unseen sunscreen: goes without saying that sunscreen is the central component of any sunny day outfit! This is my fave - goes on super smooth and no weird color cast, plus on your face it serves as such a great primer that helps any foundation go on nicely for a barely-there look.

5. Bombas socks: admittedly I'm just coveting this particular summery pair and don't actually have them (it is my birthday month though!!), but I am wearing a lot of these quarter height socks so I can look hip and young to my college-aged babysitters.

6. Tank: love a simple tank tucked in to high waisted jeans or a cute little skirt/skort, and you can't beat the price of this one.

reading lately: May roundup

When I sat down to compile my May reads, I was surprised at how many books I got through this month - almost forgot about some of them! The numbers were upped by having done 3 audiobooks (a huge number for me in this span of time), and maybe a couple of books that I wasn't super loving, so I read them kinda fast. I had a mix of new books from top-favorite authors - though not my favorite from them for the most part, unfortunately - and some exciting new finds too.

Literary/contemporary fiction

How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder: 1986 was a big year - the Challenger disaster, the return of Halley's Comet, the Chernobyl disaster, the televised wedding of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson. And as she experiences these things from her home in small-town Wyoming, Georgie also experiences major upheaval in her life: her uncle, aunt, and cousin come from India to move in with Georgie, her parents, and her older sister Agatha. They try to be welcoming, as family does, until Agatha decides that it is time for her uncle to go - and she and Georgie are going to take care of it. We soon learn that the reason for this is incredibly sad and difficult: they see no other way to escape his abuse. But Georgie's narration, making their "case" and telling about the months leading up to/following their uncle's death, is both cheeky and sardonic, sometimes directly addressing the (white) reader and confronting their assumptions about immigrants and Indians (vs the other "Indians" - Native Americans) and their experience, and also interspersed with teen magazine-like quizzes that bring up all of the conflicting emotions Georgie faces regarding her crumbling relationship with her sister and her guilt about her uncle. I feel like the end of the blurb captures really well the genre mash-up, the themes, the darkly comedic approach, and Georgie's general tone/voice: "At its heart, the tale she weaves is: a) a vivid portrait of an extended family; b) a moving story of sisterhood; c) a playful ode to the 80s; d) a murder mystery (of sorts); e) an unexpected and unwaveringly powerful meditation on history and language, trauma and healing, and the meaning of independence. Or maybe it’s really: f) all of the above." There were some parts where the timeline felt a tad confusing, but overall I found this such a refreshing read, dealing with something really sad and difficult but in a unique way, involving both dark humor and deep empathy. The way Georgie talks about sexual abuse by a family member is not graphic, but it is heart-wrenching in the emotional and physical pain, and in how terrible it must be to feel that silence is the only option - until Agatha comes up with a permanent solution, that is. It's a short read and worth it if you can read it in that spirit (I've seen other reviews on Goodreads that maybe tried to read it more "straight", and those readers didn't like it...). There are tons of themes to ponder beyond this too - racism, prejudice/bias, colonialism, privilege, family bonds, healing, and more... Made me think of some of the themes in Good People as well, though this is much more of a dark comedy approach. ★★★★.25

Evensong: In this character driven, quiet, and quotidian novel, Stewart O'Nan revisits some characters from earlier works (most notably Emily Maxwell and her sister-in-law Arlene from Emily, Alone and Wish You Were Here) in the post-covid years. This group of women-of-a-certain-age who attend the same Pittsburgh church are also part of a group they call the Humpty Dumpty Club, which is organized around helping other aging people with whatever care/tasks they might need, like rides to a doctor's office, picking up prescriptions, etc. Four of the most prominent members have to pick up some slack when their indominable leader, Joan, has a fall and requires rehab in a nursing home, and the book follows them through a year as they care for others in their community, as they become closer as friends, and as they also face their own challenges with aging The book has an intimate feel because of how it portrays the minutia of their lives as aging/widowed/divorced women, but also how well it evokes the real feelings that can come with that stage of life, from regrets about rifts with their children to fear/denial about the onset of dementia, to the indignities of how loss of abilities requires relying on others and the feeling of being at the margin of society and perhaps not having anything useful to offer. This gives it a bit of a melancholy feel, but the women and their foibles and idiosyncrasies still give it levity, and overall there is a feeling of hope and warmth thanks to community and care, both of which give meaning to life in spite of its difficulties (whether major or minor). If you are looking for a book/a fastidious character that feels like The Correspondent, I definitely suggest Emily, Alone (a 5-star read as well) - but also Evensong has similar themes and considerations and overall episodic and so very human feel to it. Also would suggest for fans of Elizabeth Strout, especially her Olive Kitteridge character. It was sometimes a bit confusing which character was being referenced as each chapter often jumped among them rather than focusing on one character, and having several protagonists doesn't allow you such a close feeling to any one character, so that maybe prevented me from loving it 100%, but overall it was still a book that I wanted to give a melancholy yet contented hug when I finished. The end is so poignant and overall it is just so human, and I loved the use of Evensong as the title/metaphor for this twilight time of life, in parallel to the evensong services of certain church traditions, which provide a reflective and meditative end-of-day worship time (and of course the church-going ladies in this book attend these services too). ★★★★.5

American Fantasy: With the bubble-gum cover and the tagline about "what happens when your teenage fantasy becomes reality as an adult", Emma Straub's newest book, about a 50-year-old woman who goes on a cruise featuring performances by and meet-and-greets with the 1990s boyband obsession of her youth, sure seems like it should be frothy fun... but I think the marketing of this one leads to disappointment in the reading experience. It's not a rom-com by any means, nor is it simply a romp about a woman finding herself via her past as I was led to believe in the blurb. Instead, it's more of a character study of 3 different people - Annie, the divorcee who reluctantly goes on this cruise full of rabid fans; Keith, one of the Boy Talk members, who loves the singing but is super drained by the whole being "on" part of fame, especially when it comes to a cruise where he can't escape the fawning fans; and Sarah, a 30-year-old cruise line employee tasked with wrangling the band members and making sure all of the planned performances and appearances go smoothly yet preoccupied with following the social media accounts of the girl she just got dumped for - and of how these people face a kind of "how did my life turn out to be this" situation. At different ages/stages all three of them are confronted on this cruise, sometimes in a bit comedic of ways (which is how the overall tone stays light), with how their regular lives are not working for them, and figuring out how to take back the reins in their lives and pursue their own happiness. I love Emma Straub's writing and the way she captures an ensemble cast and makes such wry and true observations about the foibles and flaws of modern life/humanity/relationships - but also infuses it all with big-heartedness - but this one just did not work as well for me as her previous books. I think it's partly because the ensemble cast in this case is a bit disparate - unlike in something like All Adults Here, where it's a group of grown siblings who all have their own lives and concerns but converge in the family home, this book's protagonists are 3 different characters who barely intersect in terms of plot/interactions, so it just feels like there's too much going on... yet at the same time, nothing's happening. (Seriously, especially the beginning - so slow!) A bit disappointing, but still worth a read if you are interested in tapping into some feelings of nostalgia, or exploring a bit what it would be like to be a 50-something whose heyday was as a teen idol, and what that does to the psyche. I did like the themes/reflections on youth and aging, fame and fandom, nostalgia and starting anew - but the delivery just fell a bit flat with how slow things moved and how many characters were involved. (Such as the advertised "befriending of a band member" from the blurb - there isn't even a hint of anything along these lines happening until more than halfway through the book.) ★★★.25

Porcupines: Sonia is a single mom who stays at a remove from other parents (while having plenty of internal sassy commentary about suburban PTA moms); she is always prickly and vague about her personal life/family history and instructs her tween daughter, Mila, to act the same - until Sonia is forced into proximity with parents and students alike when Mila surreptitiously signs her up to chaperone a school orchestra trip to San Francisco. The orchestra trip, the follies that happen along the way, and Sonia's snarky attitude about it all are interspersed with chapters about Sonia's upbringing in Cold War-era Budapest, to her immigration to the US as a teen, and her unexpected pregnancy. These chapters slowly reveal the reasons Sonia has for concealing her past, all while the walls she has built are coming crashing down thanks to some "who is my dad?" sleuthing by Mila. I like a snarky and singular narrative voice, but at times this one felt like it was trying a little *too* hard - sometimes I had to go back and re-read sentences because the actual meaning of it could get lost within the snarky observational comparison. And I think the way Sonia's character is developed is done in part to demonstrate the lack of connection that can come from being an immigrant (especially an undocumented one), but that doesn't really make for an enjoyable reading experience for me as I feel completely held at remove from the characters too. To add to that, while the sections set in Sonia's past felt like a character exploration that included delving into soviet-era upbringing and Jewish family history, the present-day ones felt more like a madcap comedy of errors slash PTA mom send-up. That type of zaniness can make me feel disconnected from characters sometimes, and also it just didn't mesh with the rest of the book in some ways. After finishing, I was reading through some Goodreads reviews to try to make sense of the ambivalence I was feeling - appreciating parts of the message but finding that the reading experience was meh. I saw these comments in a review from user Greg and thought they were very helpful/illustrative: "Rather than driving forward on an engaging plot, Fabriczki seems to build a kind of emotional anthropology. Viewed this way, one can be more generous. Its slowness can be viewed as a reflection of Sonia’s own dislocation: immigration, generational tension, and identity aren’t experienced as neat arcs but as long stretches of uncertainty punctuated by small, often ambiguous encounters. It may seem to cohere more if one approaches it as a study of friction—between cultures, and between mothers and daughters.... Her struggles with her daughter, mother, and sister aren’t framed as problems to be solved but as tensions she must endure. This has an unsatisfying feel, but it also resists the kind of tidy resolutions the novel seems to want to avoid." ★★★

Mystery/thriller

Last One Out: Five years ago, Ro's son Sam went out to interview some fellow townspeople for his oral history thesis project, preserving memories of their rural Australian town that had been slowly crumbling away as a mining company set up operations and took over land, but that evening he didn't show up at home for his 21st birthday dinner, and he was never seen again. In the years since, Ro and her husband, Griff, have separated, and the town has become essentially a ghost town, with very few but the most loyal/entrenched families left, and almost all businesses, even the health clinic where Ro worked, shut down. On this 5-year anniversary of when Sam went missing, Ro has returned to the town for a memorial with Griff and their daughter, Della, and as she is back in the place where it all happened and is going over Sam's notes and final movements for the millionth time, there are finally some hints to what might have happened, and as Della pulls at those threads, what's remaining of the old friends/families in town starts to unravel... I really like when a mystery involves real-feeling people who I can relate to, so Ro and Griff's grief as parents, along with the relationship struggles that come with grieving differently feel true to life and worth exploring, as does the psychology of this dying town and how the loyalty to it or readiness to move on from it affects both Ro and Griff's story and the rest of the people in the town - but that's pretty much all this book is until about 200 pages in. Clearly it's a mystery what happened to Sam, but the focus is more on the grieving process, with little flashbacks/memories of Sam and other friends/family members from before his disappearance that you assume will play a part in solving this mystery but feel much more reflective than anything else. I like Jane Harper's sense of place as a character unto itself + her slow build of suspense, but while this one has the sense of place, it has very little suspense overall. Really none of the feeling of tension that I'd usually expect to pull me along, with the overall mood being much more about grief and longing for the "before". Also, I really like a mystery that peels back layers of the story and slowly reveals what characters know or remember, but there's a fine line between that and feeling like the author is deliberately withholding information as kind of an easy out. This sometimes felt a bit borderline. Overall a solid read if you are in the mood for a family drama that has a bit of procedural mystery solving to it, but not my favorite Jane Harper book by any stretch - and she has some really excellent mysteries, if you haven't tried her yet! ★★★.75

Dissection of a Murder: Leila is a barrister who has received her first murder case - but there are a couple of twists: the victim is a well-known judge, the client is someone she worked with before and has always felt guilt about not getting him out of jail time, and, in the biggest twist of all ... the prosecutor? Her professional mentor. And her husband. The plotting was interesting and intriguing at first, though I found the plot generally slow moving. I did like the courtroom scenes, especially learning about the British system, but when a book ends up hinging on things like deliberately withheld information, unreliable narrator, and/or total personality about-face, I end up feeling so annoyed at the end. Feels like a cop out? Perhaps mea culpa for wishing it would be a legal drama a la Defending Jacob or Presumed Innocent. Instead it was a legal thriller, and I did not enjoy the thriller aspects at all. In fact hated the "Witness X" interludes; from the get-go it was clear to me that a big twist was going to hinge on them, and it was deliberately obfuscating who this person was in order to make the twist - meanwhile, they felt like they had nothing to do with the actual plot. This one is getting buzz and lots of 5-star ratings on Goodreads, but based on how it ended, I honestly felt annoyed that I had finished it. Might have liked as a Netflix series, not as a book unfortunately. ★★.75

Romance/rom-com

The MASH Up: If you're looking for something a bit unique and a lot nostalgic to read by the pool this summer, here's an idea for you: a rom-com in which a rule-following, routine-abiding accountant celebrating her 35th birthday is reminded by her best friend of a M.A.S.H. game from seventh grade in which her results predicted growing up to live in a mansion, driving a tie-dye jeep, running a roller-disco restaurant and living with 13 pet goldfish... plus her romantic match, Penn. Ruby is amused in the moment, aside from the whole Penn part. He's her twin brother's best friend from childhood, and Penn and Ruby have always had a bit of a frictional and sarcastic relationship, especially as she sees his adult lifestyle as a bit wild and irresponsible compared to her life of long-term goals and plans. But then it becomes far less amusing when she wakes up actually IN that MASH world. Experiencing a different adulthood than her real life teaches her a lot - especially as she examines how she became so much less carefree and willing to dream or try new things than she had been - and of course as her eyes are opened to these things, she also becomes more open to who Penn really is underneath their sparring. The nostalgia factor continues as Ruby reminisces with her best friend as well as Penn about their growing up years, a timeframe that aligns with my age, and the unique factor of course comes from the magical realism but also the "breakup" portion not revolving around some dumb miscommunication but instead this alternate universe situation. I appreciated that there was just as much personal growth as romantic growth in the story, but sometimes the about-face felt a little unrealistic. I found that it lagged a bit in the middle, especially the physically flirty scenes - for me, coulda skipped some of that and still gotten the same effect of the relationship build - and the writing/characters didn't capture and charm me quite as much as my very favorite rom-coms (I often struggle with a enemies to lovers trope as the animosity can feel a little tiresome), but it was overall a fun ride and will be a great beach read when it publishes in July (I read an advance copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review). ★★★.5

Nonfiction/memoir

The Anxious Generation: Though it won't by any means make you feel good about the mental health of our teens/twenty-somethings, or about the social media landscape in general, the information in this book is invaluable and compellingly presented. The bottom line in Jonathan Haidt's argument, after he presents all of the hard data and studies that prove it in various ways: we are overprotecting our children in the real world, and we are underprotecting them in the virtual world. And as a result, the kids are not okay - in terms of anxiety/depression, as well as capacity to take on relationships and risks and new things in the real world (basically, capacity to become a full-fledged adult, I'd say), today's teens are suffering as their hours are more and more filled with phone/internet use and social media. If I'm honest, I found the book a tad long, but that's partly because right before I read it I attended a presentation in which a local psychology professor (who has actually worked with Haidt and even more so with Jean Twenge, who is also working in this space related to teens/social media) succinctly presented the data-driven portions of the argument. And as I trusted that, I didn't need allll of the nitty gritty. But I really appreciated the concrete suggestions that Haidt brings from the data - especially no smartphones before high school and no social media before age 16 - and even more appreciated all of the insights into the importance of a play-based childhood (versus a phone/screen-based one) and the importance of giving kids more real-world freedom to roam, to have unstructured (no parent/teacher direction) time with other kids, and things like that. I also appreciated the concrete suggestions around making this happen, and especially around how we can act collectively as society and, what feels even more doable, by banding as parents of kids in a particular school/city. For starters, if we agree on some restrictions, fewer kids will have phones/social media, then our kids won't feel left out/FOMO when they're not allowed to... In our family we already had planned to wait on these things, so an even bigger take-home for me was the portions about play-based childhood and about extending freedoms and making sure to leave plenty of time/space for unstructured in-person hangouts with peers for our middle schooler, and about thinking of the age-appropriate equivalents we can give to our preschooler. It seems like our collective mentality has moved away from these things, but individual families and schools can start the process of correcting them! Along these lines, next we're picking up Free Range Kids (which somewhat inspired the play-based childhood portions of this book) as well as Jean Twenge's 10 Rules for Raising Kids in a High-Tech World, which has additional concrete suggestions. ★★★★★

London Falling: In late 2019, Rachelle and Matthew Brettler's 19-year-old son Zac went to stay with a friend, and when he didn't come back the next day they grew concerned and filed a police report. A few days later his body was pulled from the Thames river, and building surveillance footage was identified that showed him jumping from the balcony of the riverside luxury apartment building he had been staying in. It was an apparent suicide, but as they learned more about the life Zac had been hiding from them - that he was pretending to be the son of a Russian oligarch to these wealthy (and potentially dangerous) men was just the tip of the iceberg. This so wild it feels like it should be a movie story is then fully fleshed out with an economic history of London and how it has led to the current situation, where it is a haven to displaced oligarchs who seem to face no repercussions for any law breaking, along with a who's who in the underworld of gangsters, fraudsters, money launderers, etc. Though I have followed his work via The New Yorker and associated podcasts, this is the first of Patrick Radden Keefe's books that I have read, and as a typical non nonfiction reader, this is the kind of nonfiction that can get me interested! Super well researched and engaging in terms of a story arc, really well written too - but what I liked even more was the personal touch and empathy he adds. It's not just a stranger-than-fiction true crime story; it also honors the parents' confusion and grief about their son and their (rightful) frustration and anger with the police force for not thoroughly investigating, and makes them feel like the real people that they are, rather than characters to gawk at in a true crime story. And my very favorite part of the book, the final section, actually brought Patrick himself into it, as he described how he came to meet the Brettlers and how he researched for the book. It's fascinating but also has a really human and personal side that grounds this super detailed in the research yet also super big picture in the exploration of socioeconomic/crime history. Good on audio, though hard to keep track of some of the gangster people and their connections to the story - so many names and in-depth details! ★★★★

No One's Coming: This fascinating and at times jaw-dropping book tells the story of two American volunteer medical workers caught up in the incredibly deadly 2014 Ebola epidemic in Liberia, and the history and ingenuity of the aviation company that was contracted to evacuate them after they test positive for the virus and are at death's door within days. The account of the illness is harrowing, and the hurdles surmounted and red tape surmounted by the eccentric and maverick types working for Phoenix Air to plan and pull off this rescue within a matter of days is pretty amazing. I think the author of this book set out to write page-turning narrative nonfiction, and I think he absolutely achieved it with the way he writes in short chapters, alternates between the two storylines - the health declines of Kent and Nancy in Liberia, and the rush to get an evacuation plan in place with the Phoenix crew - and keeps to just the necessary details (in contrast to the Patrick Radden Keefe book I just read, which had soooo many names to keep track of!). And he makes the main players in the story feel like quite the characters (probably not that hard to do with some of the Phoenix Air people especially, with their unique individual backgrounds). What comes along with this though is that sometimes it feels a tad melodramatic and feels like it's bordering on hero worship. Having a spouse who is a doctor, I got the sense that he found some of the medical stuff, written in a way that keeps a lay audience feeling like it's a page turner, a tad overblown, and that he thought his former pilot colleague would find some of the aviation stuff to be the same way. But there's no denying it's an engaging read and a unique topic. And even more timely in a world where epidemics/pandemics are much more in our consciousness and experience versus when this story was happening in 2014, where there's currently an active Ebola outbreak again, and where (horrifyingly, for the people who are suffering and dying because of it, and for our own health and safety in light of possible pandemic) US-AID has been dismantled and the CDC/US public health approach is a joke. As for who I'd recommend this to - a pretty broad audience! Totally a dad book recommendation as father's day approaches, or for anyone who is into narrative nonfiction or even someone who is into medical dramas. Also probably of interest for fans of books like Everything Is Tuberculosis or Mountains Beyond Mountains that take an epidemiology or public health topic and give the history but also personalize it in terms of introducing us to some of the people dedicating their lives to making a difference in this area. Definitely held my attention on audio too. ★★★★.25

I've got more books from beloved authors on the docket this month - most notably Ann Patchett and David Sedaris, and I'm counting on them being more successful than this month's new releases by some of my go to authors... you know I'll report back!