The flowers are from the June 2019 trip to France. The books...ah the books. Do I have a goal for this year? I'm going to go with 100 again. I continue to read a ton of YA so sometimes I will count 2 or 3 as a single book. I'm also going to make more of an effort to read diverse writers. I won't exclude anyone, but the books that stuck with me from last year are ones where the story is different. No specific goal this year, partly because my to-be-read list is already extra long.
Tween/YA
-by Lois Lowry
Gathering Blue, Messenger, Son: Three more books set in the universe of The Giver and ties back to them. You don't have to read them all, or in order, for them to be lovely, but the set is wonderful. Gentle stories, I can absolutely picture her settings.
-by Louis Sachar
Fuzzy Mud: Holes was amazing, but this has a similar feel, though the drama is future sci-fi instead of history.
-Gennifer Choldenko
Al Capone Does My Shirts: Set in 1935 when the guards' families lived on Alcatraz. Trials of Moose and his sister Natalie adjusting to life on the island. Natalie is autistic before it was understood and this causes extra drama. I listened to the audiobook which was very good!
Next four are Rick Riordan presents
-by Yoon Ha Lee
Dragon Pearl: Korean mythology meets sci-fi in space. Not enough myth for me, but ok.
-by Roshani Chokshi
Aru Shah and the Song of Death: Second in the series, looking forward to the third. I love the pop culture references. Everything from Despacito to Lord of the Rings.
-by Carlos Hernandez
Sal and Gabi Break the Universe: All the action crammed into a short time period is a bit much. But the story is fun, none of the mythology I expected, but sci-fi instead. Love the characters though every single one is a delightful oddball. The writing throws in Spanish that you can usually figure out-like it!
-by Kwame Mbalia
Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky: The stories/myths are front and center, the world building is really great, I got really clear pictures of this place. I did get tired of some of the characters, the 'friendships' are mostly being snippy with each other.
-by Shannon Hale:
Once Upon a Time A Story Collection from Ever After High: Super short intros to the kids of the heroes/villains of fairy tales. Super imaginative, wish I thought of them.
The Storybook of Legends: The daughter of The Evil Queen, Raven, is supposed to follow in her mother's footsteps, but she doesn't want to. She breaks the rules and shakes up the order.
The Unfairest of Them All: There are consequences to breaking the rules and shaking up the order.
A Wonderlandiful World: More consequences and some resolution.
River Secrets: From the Bayern world, focus is on the spy character.
Forest Born: Also Bayern, sister of the spy. These were okay. Not as fun as the other stuff she has written, but a lovely world.
-by Rebecca Stead
Goodbye Stranger: Love her. I fly right through them. I have a weirdly hard time remembering what happened in any particular title. The titles just don't evoke the story for me? But set in the same New York city middle school area as her other books. Love that she has this world built.
Graphic Novels
-by Kit and Emma Steinkelner
Quince: Girl gets her superpowers at her quinceanera. Super fast and cute.
-by Mariko Tamaki
Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up with Me: High school romance about a person who is careless with her girlfriends heart. I read this on my phone which made the pictures not awesome but totally fine. I learned that a previous book was one of the most challenged (requested to be banned) books of 2017. So then I checked out the list and I have read almost half of the books/authors on that list. Yeah for me!!
-by Raina Telgemeier
Guts: Love her so much! This one is about upset stomachs from anxiety. Basically laying out the mind/body connection in a super accessible way.
-by Nick Tapalanski and Ennisa Espinosa
Cast No Shadow: A boy who crushes on a ghost and who helps him work on his complicated feelings.
-by Isobel Harris and Andre Francois
Little Boy Brown: To be read aloud to the very young. Labeled "A vintage ode to childhood loneliness". Originally published in 1949, so very old-e timey. We have no idea how the book ended up in our house!
-by George Takei (with Justin Eisinger, Steven Scott, and Harmony Becker
They Called Us Enemy: George was only 6 when the US forced all Japanese-Americans into internment camps. It was not a good spot in history and I just saw a headline that California is just about to consider apologizing. sheesh The book is excellent. It is mainly his point of view, but he does a great job unpicking his parents feelings and reactions in retrospect. I would require this in middle school history class if I could.
Teen/YA books
-by Rainbow Rowell
Wayward Son: A sequel to Carry On Simon, one of my favorites! It is a very good sequel! Some of the people are annoying...were they that annoying the first time around? Maybe I have to re-read. Must read if you loved the first, no reason to read it if you haven't read the first.
-by Tillie Walden
Spinning: Coming of age and coming out all tied up in the world of middle-school and high-school figure skating.
-by Benjamin Alire Saenz
Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe: Coming of age and coming out story. One point of view with lots of internal thoughts. Great depth to the characters.
The Beauty that Remains: Teenagers affected by the deaths of someone close to them. Lots of descriptions of painful times. Stories come together in a way that I really like at the end.
-by Tamora Pierce
Trickster's Choice and Trickster's Queen: More adventures in the world of Tortall. From a whole new character and area of the world, so you don't really have to have read anything else. These are all about the spy character. Totally fun.
-by Linda Holmes
Evvie Drake Starts Over: I love Linda! She was with Television Without Pity and host of the Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast. She branched out to writing and it is a lovely rom com, but more realistic and less silly than most. I would totally read more by her.
-by Tara Westover
Educated: Holy cow. Autobiography, youngest of 6 in a conspiracy-theory household where they didn't even try to home-school anything other the bible. Multiple abusive family members. And yet she somehow made it out into the wider world and discovered it was not anything like the terrible place she had been told it was.
-by Frances E. Jensen
The Teenage Brain: Short version is that a teenage brain is not done yet and so they do a lot of stuff without thinking it through. The book is filled with accessible science, which is a good read for me, but not as much practical advice as I would like.
-by Bessel van der Kolk
The Body Keeps Score: Most important book of the year. Deep dive into how traumatic events leave physical traces on the body. Must read if you are working with/living with traumatized people. The first four parts are all the science and are nice to read, but not necessary. Part five is therapies/structures/methods that have helped folks recover from trauma. There is no one size fits all and it takes time and patience. So worth it to get an overview of so many helpful ideas. All thoroughly documented.
On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous: This won a ton of awards in 2019 so it took a long time to get from the library. Worth it for interest, but likely I won't be able to tell you anything else about it in a month. The author is a poet and I can tell. No plot, lots of stories. Check out the NPR review for details that are better than I can write up.
-by Michael Hyatt
Your Best Year: Self help, follow on from the last one. meh, a bit too much rah rah for me. Best bit I got out of it was the law of diminishing intent. As soon as you figure out a big thing you need to do (quit a group, take a class, etc) do something on that path ASAP. The longer you think about it, the more you can talk yourself out of doing it.
Sci-fi
-by Blake Crouch
Recursion: Sci-fi, fabric of time, time travel. Highly recommended if you like the genre. I have a terrible time remembering the title. Call it False Memory Syndrome and I'm all over it.
by Mary Robinette Kowal
The Calculating Stars: Alternate history. What if an asteroid hits just before space flight and pushes us in that direction faster. Super readable.
Mystery
-by Dorothy Sayers
Whose Body: I became a big fan of the Lord Peter Wimsey books back in college and read them all. Listened to this one on audio book and hated the voicing. I do want to go back and re-read all the one with Harriet Vane.
-by Carolyn Keene
The Mystery of Lilac Inn: We have been watching the new Nancy Drew and it is so good! Made me want to read some of the originals. I have a few on my shelf, but listened to this audiobook which was very fun.
-by Janet Evanovich
Twisted Twenty-Six: Just reading my way through the series.
-by Laurie R King
Island of the Mad: My favorite author of alternate Sherlock Holmes. The series remains fresh and I love the world.
Continuing the idea that I don't have to finish every book I start, here are the ones that I quit!
The David Foster Wallace Reader: A collection of his writings. I checked out the audiobook because I have a long drive at least once a week and I've loved a lot of his writing. Unfortunately the very first reading is from his college days and is about a wound hallucination he had while in high school. It is graphic, disturbingly graphic. If I were reading it, I would skim it and be okay, but hearing it was just too much for me, so I returned it after only a few minutes.
-by Rainbow Rowell and Faith Hicks
Pumpkinheads-need a paper copy, tried to read online and didn't get the pics, which is a huge part of the story. I've seen this in a couple of local libraries.
-by Jenny Han
P.S. I Still Love You: Sequel that I just wasn't feeling, maybe in the future. And maybe I'll just watch the movie version!
-by Lisa Jackson
Whispers: random rec. Not as 'trashy' as my Evanovitch reading and not as compelling as Lianne Moriarty. Would be willing to finish if I run out of other ebooks, or pick up in an airport.
-by Jack Gantos
Dead End in Norvelt: Recommended from a couple places and it seems fine, but it is way too much like Al Capone does my shirts. Young boy from back in the day having adventures.
No comments:
Post a Comment