May 2020 Wrap-Up

I read 16 book this month! (This was my last hurrah before I start my clinicals in June and have zero time for reading.) I read 6588 pages, more than 2000 more than in April, and my average rating was much higher than normal at a solid 4.0. All of these high statistics might be due to the fact that I reread the Percy Jackson and Heroes of Olympus series this month, which are both easy to fly through and amazing. I did read a number of other books this month though, mainly through audiobook. Without further ado, the books of May 2020:

1. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

Rating: ★★☆☆☆
Yeah no I did not like this. Perhaps it is a self-fulfilling prophecy, but I knew I wouldn't like this book, and I did not. I didn't hate it, but I was bored. The writing style is not for me. It's a lot of telling of actions that happen. "They went to the hut. The woman was in the hut. They grabbed the woman. The woman yelled." Simple sentences, not captivating. The story did start getting interesting when the missionaries came in, and I feel like that was supposed to be the main plot of the story, but that happened super late in the book. Either there were two plots going on, or there was way too much exposition.

2. Foul Is Fair by Hannah Capin

Rating: ★★★☆☆
WTF was that ending? This book was creepy and dark, which was cool, but nothing was realistic. I appreciated the premise of the book, but I did not buy into any of the characters. Everything was just too easy for the main character, and apparently no adults in this town cares about kids just randomly dying/disappearing.

3. The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #1) by Rick Riordan

Rating: No rating
Yes, in fact, I do have hundreds of books on my TBR that I need to read but instead I am rereading a ten-book MG/YA series. I justify it based on the fact that I never actually finished the series (I only read the first 9 books). So yes, I'm reading this, and I'm loving it. Because this is a reread for me, I will not be rating these book nor putting them into my end-of-the-year ranking of all the books I read in 2020.

4. Sea of Monsters (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #2) by Rick Riordan

Rating: No rating
This book is, in my opinion, the weak link of the series, but I am still very much enjoying my reintroduction into this world.

4. City of Girls by Elizabeth Gilbert

Rating: ★★★★★
I loved this one. Check out my full review HERE.

5. The Titan's Curse (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #3) by Rick Riordan

Rating: No rating
Nico was such a pure soul, and he turned dark and twisty so fast. I love him.

6. The Battle of the Labyrinth (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #4) by Rick Riordan

Rating: No rating
So, the entirety of this series holds a lot of nostalgia for me, but if I'm think about it objectively, this is the book where the series gets really good. Compared to the first book, you can tell how much better the writing and character development is in the fourth and fifth books of this series.

7. The Wives by Tarryn Fisher

Rating: ★★★★☆
So here’s the thing. I understand why/how this book is problematic. I know that it reinforces harmful social stigmas and stereotypes. However... I still enjoyed it. So it is what it is. Looking back on it, this might deserve only 3 stars, but I'm too lazy to think enough about whether I want to actually change my rating.

8. The Last Olympian (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #5) by Rick Riordan

Rating: No rating
That finale gets me every time. The battle, the redemption arc, the tense romance that's been building since the first book, it's just.. *chef's kiss*

9. Eight Perfect Murders by Peter Swanson

Rating: ★★★★☆
This story grabbed me from the beginning (I mean, what kind of reader doesn't love a story about a fellow avid reader?), and it never really let go. The twist at the ending was really good too, and I like how as the story progresses you question the reliability of the narrator more and more.

10. The Lost Hero (The Heroes of Olympus #1)

Rating: ★★★★★
Out of the ten books in this (Percy Jackson's) world, this book is, to me, the hump. Meaning that this is the book you have to get through for continuity's sake, but on its own it doesn't hold much importance. Still, you can see I enjoyed it very much as I gave it five stars. I just love Percy so much, and I MISS HIM when he's gone. The issue I have, looking back on this book, is that the characters are fake-developed. The characters seem to be built up to be really important, but then in the rest of the series that character development disappears. Case in point: Jason doesn't have a single chapter in the third book. My theory is that Jason only exists as a foil for Percy, which is fine, but I wish that he hadn't been presented as the new/Roman Percy Jackson when he was just going to fall into the background in two books' time.

11. The Honey-Don't List by Christina Lauren

Rating: ★★★★☆
This was real cute, and it rekindled my love for HGTV. Check out my review HERE.

12. The Son of Neptune (Heroes of Olympus #2) by Rick Riordan

Rating: ★★★★★
I LOVE PERCY JACKSON!!!!

13. The Mark of Athena (Heroes of Olympus #3) by Rick Riordan

Rating: ★★★★☆
That ending gets me SHOOK every single time. Also, and I can't stress this enough, Percy and Annabeth are my OTP. Still, for some reason (which may very well be my own life and things going on outside of reading), I did not devour this one quite as enthusiastically as the last seven books, except for the last 50-100 pages of course.

14. A Heart So Fierce and Broken (Cursebreakers #2) by Brigid Kemmerer.

Rating: ★★★★☆
I normally don't like it when authors switch up who the main characters are in between books in a series, but I must say I really enjoyed this. I think I like Grey and Lia Mara, as people and as characters, even more than Harper and Rhen. The next book will be interesting because we will see both Rhen/Harper and Grey/Lia Mara as the enemy and the good guys. I read the first book when it came out, so I wasn't expecting to jump right back into this and be really entertained, but I was.

15. The Gravity of Us by Phil Stamper

Rating: ★★★☆☆
This really could've been 2 or 3 stars, but I'm feeling generous. The romance in this book was... so cringey, so cliche, so instalovey... I was truly appalled. The thing is, I don't actually think the book is bad other than the romance. The premise was interesting, and I liked the themes on family, fame, and learning to be okay with not being okay. The unfortunate thing is that a large portion of the book is about the romance. I actually did like Cal and Leon together by the end of the book, I just wish the way they'd first gotten together didn't make me wince so much at the corny awkwardness. It is disappointing though because I was really hyped for this book, and it just did not live up to my expectations.

16. The House of Hades (Heroes of Olympus #4) by Rick Riordan

Rating: ★★★★★
The ending... so beautiful... so sad... this series is ruining my life. Chapters 29-32, 36, 45, 52, 54, 57, 67-68, 70-71, and 78 were some of my faves though. 

Review for "The Honey-Don't List" by Christina Lauren

Rating: ★★★★☆

I should preface this by saying I love HGTV shows, and I know that a new trend in home improvement entertainment is the designer wife-builder husband dynamic duo. This book specifically refers to Chip and Joanna Gaines (from Fixer Upper), but my personal favorite is Hometown. We can’t forget about Tarek and Christina from Flip or Flop, whose drama scandal a few years ago is not far from the press that Melissa and Rusty were getting in this story. So yes, I love home improvement shows, and I live for drama, so this book had me engaged just based on the premise.

I don’t have a lot of specific notes on why I liked this; I just really enjoyed it. It is not quite as explicit as some of Christina Lauren’s other novels which I appreciated, and I think the characters are so interesting because of their moral greyness. This isn’t to say the plot wasn’t a bit cliche, but since the premise was unlike any other that I’ve read and was something I’m genuinely interested in, this did not bother me.

While Carey and James were pretty basic, the real stars of the novel are Melissa and Rusty. They are so toxic, so melodramatic, so insane, so morally grey... I was enraptured. I spent most of the book wanting both of them to get hit by the big tour bus, but I lived for their horrible moments like I was watching a car crash in slow motion. Obviously it’s problematic that they don’t completely address the toxic parts of their relationship like infidelity, violence, and manipulation, but I don’t find this unrealistic. I think many real-life marriages are just as enigmatic and terrible, yet they stay together.

The reason this isn’t five stars is because there are just two things that bothered me that I can’t stop thinking about. First of all, it includes possibly my least favorite toxic trope in romance novels. Basically, the woman gets upset over something that’s a really big deal, it’s basically her cathartic moment of clarity and fury. Then, in her passions, she impulsively decides to have sex with the male love interest, even though they really aren’t at that point in their relationship yet. Then the man goes “whoa, we shouldn’t do this when you’re upset” and the woman convinced him that either she doesn’t care or that that’s not the reason they’re doing it (even though it totally is), and they end up doing it anyway. It ends with the characters waking up in the morning either in love or super awkward, in this case it’s a bit of both. I know that is a super specific thing, but it happens in so many romance novels and it’s gross and I wish authors would stop doing it.

The other thing that I just really didn’t like is this one line James says (in his internal monologue) that was like “I want to make her life better by being the best thing in it.” I don’t think we need an explanation of why this is a terrible line that totally taints my entire view of James’s character.

So other than these two specific complaints, I thought the book was good. It was funny, touching, diverse, and as an HGTV super fan I just really liked it.

Review for "City of Girls" by Elizabeth Gilbert

"Here is the solidarity of good theatre people, Vivian. We try not to ruin each other's shows, and we try not to ruin each other's lives."



Rating: ★★★★★

This story was beautiful, and fun, and so interesting. What is it exactly? An old woman's biography, a war story told from the very periphery of the largest war ever fought, and a letter of love and contentment.

"That's how the theatre works too, Vivian. Just like a war."

The closest book I can think of that comes close to the marvel that is this story (in set-up, progression, and mood) is The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, which, not surprisingly, I also gave 5 stars. I love this kind of story: the slow walk through the entirety of a woman's life, the life of a woman who is far beyond the prime of her life and knows it. In fact, I made several internal comparison between this book and The Seven Husbands, and while the latter had more a twist, this book was more fully satisfying in a way.

"It's just the way things are, Frank. And it means nothing.

At first I thought that this book would reveal that Vivian had become some famous wedding dress designer, but after realizing that wasn't the case, I found I preferred it the way it was. I like that Vivian is an anonymous face in a sea of millions who lived in 1940's New York City; it makes her story even more meaningful than if she was someone famous and important. I also just loved the atmosphere of this story. Just from reading Vivian's account, of going from a stranger to the city to living there for 60 years, I feel like I know 20th century New York City better than I know my own neighborhood.

I adored the the second act of this book. I should lay out the five main acts of this book (don't read if you want to go into the book pretty blind): First, there's the exposition of Vivian's life in Clinton, and what led her to be sent away from her parents. The second act is after she arrives in New York, gets to know everyone at the theater, and is part of the City of Girls production. The third act recounts Vivian going back to her parents in Clinton. The fourth act is Vivian moving back to New York and what the city was like during wartime, and the fifth and final act is when Vivian meets and becomes special friends Frank in New York.

So as I mentioned, I loved the second act. The characters were so colorful and interesting, and there was not a dull moment. This is especially impressive considering how long the book is. I even understood that a lot of what I was reading was exposition, and not entirely essential to the main storyline. But I loved it. It was just so fun. Besides the second act, I also really loved the fifth act. I knew from the first chapter that the entire story was going to get around to some guy that was Angela's father, but the way Vivian and Frank interact was beautiful. The way Vivian describes were feelings for Frank, and how she interacted with him, was so wonderful. Frank wasn't even introduced (formally) until 85% through the book, but his and Vivian's relationship was so pure, I was tearing up by the end of it.

One of the greatest aspects of this book is that it doesn't try too hard. Nothing particularly remarkable happens to Vivian. Sure, she got plastered on the front page of a newspaper in a huge show-business scandal, and sure, she was far beyond her time in terms of feminism and sexual liberation. But honestly, her life didn't have crazy twists and turns. I didn't keep reading because I was intrigued to see how a crazy plot point turned out, I simply wanted to keep reading because I enjoyed it. The fact that the author was able to make some truly spectacular out of the mundane was thrilling to me.

One last thing I want to mention: the war aspect of this book was also fantastic to me. For once, here's a book set in America in the 1940's that is not completely about the war. I liked seeing how the war affected those mundane aspects of life and the everyday person, but I think the war was sparse enough in the story to not be off-putting to people who don't like WWII stories.

Overall, this book was thrilling, engaging, hilarious, and beautiful, and I think everyone should read it.

April 2020 Wrap Up

12 books this month, not as many as normal, but some of them were BIG (@ House of Earth and Blood, you 800-page monster). My average book size was 365 pages; a lot of these books were required readings for my Victorian Sexuality class. This was a good reading month, with only one book below 3 stars (although the average rating of 3.33 is kind of low). Anyway, here are the books:

1. Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

Rating: ★★★☆☆
This book is a really important perspective on Rochester and the Madwoman in the Attic. The reason it isn't rated higher for me is because it was extremely hard to read. It is intentionally written in a stream of consciousness so the inner monologue jumps around a lot and is overall really messy. For me, it was really frustrating and impeded me from enjoying/appreciating the story as I think it deserved based on the premise.

2. Tweet Cute by Emma Lord

Rating: ★★★☆☆
This is really a feel-good story, super cute, and it deals with some really important issues especially about family relations, etc. The only thing holding it back from being four stars was how unbearably cliche and predictable every twist was. The only cheesy cliche I appreciated was the couple name at the end, that was actually super cute. But everything from the blind date app, to the parental connections, to the way Pepper finds out who Wolf is... it has been done sooooo many times.

3. A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn

Rating: ★★★★☆
This is the version of history that I never got in my history classes, which were white-washed and watered down. I think it's an extremely important, if biased, perspective. It did inspire me to pick up another book on U.S. history, which is impressive.

4. All the Stars and Teeth by Adalyn Grade

Rating: ★★★☆☆
This was a good fantasy book; I just didn't find it super memorable. The magic system is interesting, and I always love when protagonists find out that everything they've been told/taught is a lie to cover up dark secrets. So it's good, just not phenomenal, not amazing.

5. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Rating: ★★★☆☆
I really actually love the last chapter of this book, and how Jekyll talks so much about the dark and light side of human nature constantly warring for control. For me personally though, it is hard to find a classic that gets over 3 stars just because I feel like they are written more impersonally by virtue of the time. I didn't connect to the characters so I didn't feel much of anything while reading, but again that's just how classic tend to go for me.

6. Every Heart A Doorway by Seanan McGuire

Rating: ★★☆☆☆
This book felt like a joke to me. The concept of the different fantasy worlds was really interesting, but I hated all the characters (except for maybe Kade and Jack), and nothing was plausible. I believe that, even in a fantasy novel, the story must be believable. The fact that Eleanor West has this school to help and reacclimate "wayward children" but she literally tells them to CLEAN UP DEAD BODIES? Using extremely sketchy acid techniques that these children are just allowed to keep in their rooms? To me, the premise of this story was reminiscent of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, with all several children that are from different backgrounds that are in a refuge for children overseen by a headmistress. But this story was so much worse in quality. Where Miss Peregrine is matronly yet stern and shows she really cares, Eleanor West is uninvolved to the point of neglect, and also she told the children to CLEAN UP DEAD BODIES because she just couldn't handle it? And then kept all this from the police? Girl bye.

7. Darling Rose Gold by Stephanie Wrobel

Rating: ★★★★★
This book hit all the right spots - it was intriguing, creepy, nasty, and empathy-inspiring all at the right moments. I liked how morally gray the characters are (mainly Rose Gold), and how they don't present the victim of the MBP as solely a victim but also as a person with her own story and strength and anger. I feel like this was a good balance between showing the MBP as it was happening, but then also directing the story to be focused on how Rose Gold was moving on with her life, and likewise how Patty was moving on with hers. Additionally, I thought the transitions between the present and the past were really well done, not at all choppy or strange. The present actually is two different presents; the chapters with Rose Gold's perspective take place while Patty is in jail as Rose Gold tries to cope and move on from her abuse, and the chapters with Patty's perspective take place right after Patty is released from prison. I felt that this made a lot of sense, and it helped to shed more light on both of the characters. It also added to the creepy atmosphere because both of the narrators were unreliable so you had to read things and constantly understand that they might not be the full truth, and just understand that by the ending you would get the full story. I don't really know why this average rating is so low, considering how many overwhelmingly positive reviews I've seen for this book. I know the average is an average for a reason, but I am honestly shocked that this book doesn't have over a 4.0 average rating on Goodreads.

8. Starsight (Skyward #2) by Brandon Sanderson

Rating: ★★★☆☆
This one did not quite exceed by expectations. Check out my full review HERE.

9. The Hand On The Wall (Truly Devious #3) by Maureen Johnson

Rating: ★★★☆☆
This whole series has been good. Not a wild ride like some people say it is (this is my personal opinion, no hate), but still really enjoyable. One of the main things that just cannot allow me to rate this higher than three stars is the characters. Specifically Stevie and David. Stevie was alright, not extremely compelling and annoying at times. DAVID THOUGH. I hated him. In a way that I don't think was intended by the author. I hated him in all the books, and I never ever ever thought that his romance with Stevie made any sense at all. It completely taints my overall view on the series. If David had just disappeared after the second book, liked he faked, it would have been so much better. Although I will admit, the thing with taking down Senator King was pretty cool.

10. House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1) by Sarah J. Maas

Rating: ★★★★☆
This one was a WOW. It both did and did not exceed my expectations. Find out why HERE.

11. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Rating: ★★★★☆
This is the first of Oscar Wilde that I have read, and it definitely lives up to the hype! This book is just as dark as it is whimsical, in a strange oxymoronic way. I enjoyed it thoroughly. Lord Henry is one of the most interesting characters from Victorian literature that I have ever read.

12. The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks

Rating: ★★★☆☆
I always knew I was going to read this book, since it is part of my 100 Greatest Books Reading Challenge, and just a classic. Honestly though, I didn't know what to expect going into it. I've never seen the movie, but I will probably watch it now that I've read the book. To me, the book was good but underwhelming. I understand that it was a pioneer in a lot of the tropes here, so the cliches weren't cliche at the time, but I just felt sort of meh about everything. The last chapter (which is like 30% of the book) is by far the saving grace of the book. I just wish that the 1940's story went deeper and we got to know the characters and their relationship better, which totally could have been done because as it was the book was only 200 pages.