So, July is officially over?! I honestly cannot comprehend where the summer has gone. We're over here getting ready for school now and I'm shocked. What did we do this summer? We went camping. Once. We went to the pool. Once. Ummmm.... that's all I can remember. I mean, surely we did more than that? Surely. I'll remember at some point. What did you do this summer? Something memorable? Or did you have a chill summer at home? It's been really hot here the past month and we've just been trying to stay cool. My water bill is shameful. Did you read any good books over the summer? Let me know in the comments what you've been getting up to. I put away four books this past month and I can't wait to tell you about them.
"My Sister, the Serial Killer" by Oyinkan Braithwaite
Korede's been helping her younger sister in the most interesting way; helping her hide the bodies of her boyfriends. Three to be exact. But if it's self defense is it really murder? Korede likes to think not, but would rather not turn her baby sister into the authorities. But when Ayoola starts blurring her life with Korede's, and dating a doctor that she works with and has a crush on, Korede has to make some hard decisions. Is she really going to let this man end up dead like all the rest? Is she going to get to the bottom of Ayoola's killing? Is it all really self defense?
This book held so much promise. And, in the beginning, Braithwaite really went in hard with the dark humor and sucked me in, but honestly, this book was bland. I really couldn't understand the dynamic between Ayoola and Korede and that made me question everything. There was also a lot of trauma that Braithwait kept skirting, but never gave us. There were a lot of flashbacks to childhood memories and talk about "the bad thing that happened that brought them together", but we never get the story. And I mean never. That was extremely disappointing. After the first few chapters the dark humor was no longer on the page, there was nothing driving the story except the possibility that Ayoola might kill again, but with no apparent motive or concern from her sister. And the ending was extremely disappointing. Overall, I finished this in one day because I was afraid once I put it down I'd never pick it back up again.
"Sharp Teeth" by Toby Barlow
L.A. is teaming with strays. But are they strays? An ancient race of lycanthropes still maintain packs and are growing in numbers. Hell bent on dominance and being the pack at the top, there's a quiet war raging in plain sight. Caught in the middle is Anthony, a love struck dog catcher just trying to make ends meet when he falls for a female werewolf that's abandoned her pack.
This book was insanely interesting. The writing style of this book is extremely unique, but can also be a challenge to get comfortable. It's written in short paragraph bursts, but every paragraph could potentially be a character point-of-view change. It took me a while to get settled into this story, but I really enjoyed it. Imagine mob bosses but with dogs, that's the whole story line here. Everyone's vying to be on top and will stop at nothing to tear each other apart in the process. But underneath all that we have this love story between Anthony and the female were. And the ending was absolutely perfect. The last three lines of the story were brilliant. If you're up for something a little different, check this one out.
"The Shadow House" by Anna Downes
Alex, a single mother of two, just wants a fresh start. And when she hurriedly decides to move into a rural community, she hopes it's the right decision. And at first, things seem fine. But then, rumors start to spread, strange things begin to happen, and soon Alex can't figure out what's real and what's in her head and whether or not this new community is safe for her and her children. What she does know? There's something not quite right about Pine Ridge.
This book really blew me away. I couldn't quite put my finger on the genre of this and that just made it even more interesting. Was it a psychological thriller, murder mystery, paranormal thriller? Yes! It was all of them! I thought the pace was excellent and we were jumping back and forth between a tragedy that happened before Pine Ridge was developed and what was happening with Alex and her family. The only thing I didn't like was there were lots of backstory for Alex that was heavily hinted at but was never fully explored. I found myself really wanting to know all of Alex's story, and sadly we just didn't get it. But, other than that, I really enjoyed this one.
"Unraveling Oliver" by Liz Nugent
Oliver Ryan is talented, famous, charming, and married to a wonderful wife named Alice. They've built a beautiful life together writing children's stories, what could possibly go wrong? That's what everyone wants to know when Alice ends up in the hospital beaten within an inch of her life. What happened between Oliver and Alice? And is Oliver really the man everyone thinks he is? As the story unfolds, friends and neighbors begin to dissect their encounters with Oliver and try to determine the truth. But the only person who holds all the answers is Oliver.
The way this book is set up is brilliant. A reviewer said that this book is like a psychological character study and I couldn't agree more. We hear from basically everyone that was either in Oliver's life or in Alice's life about what they experienced pertaining to Oliver on his own or Alice and Oliver together. It was extremely interesting to peel back the layers of the stories and to piece together who Oliver actually was; in a nutshell, I don't think anyone knew the real Oliver. Despite liking the story line and characters and the whole psychotic-ness of this story I gave it a low rating, and I'll tell you why. So, this book was published in 2014, but it was set in Ireland and France in the 1970s and a really big part of this book focuses on racism and homophobia in that time. Which I can get on board with, but the way it was written was, just, honestly odd. Characters would be sure to mention that other people were racist but made sure to say that they weren't. They went out of their way to make sure the reader (or interviewer) understood that it wasn't them that were racist and/or homophobic but that *most people* were. I really found this to be off-putting and I really didn't understand why it was so necessary for Nugent to make this a point in her novel, unless Nugent herself is a person of color and this was personal for her (on this I cannot speculate). There was also a mentally handicapped character (in the time setting there probably wouldn't have been an accurate diagnosis beyond mentally retarded and they do not discuss the diagnosis in the novel) but, again, it was made clear that certain people did not like disabled people *but it wasn't me* and this type of theme just didn't sit well with me. I didn't understand the purpose of it. It was like she wrote it just to be inclusive? Like I said, I can't speculate on whether or not any of this was personal for Nugent, I just didn't understand the blatant addition of it for apparently no reason other than to be racist, ableist, and/or homophobic but then immediately writing all of her characters to say, "I wasn't those things, mind you, it was just other people." So... yeah. I liked it but also didn't.
Ok, that's all the books I read this month! A special shout out to Ella Stone! She just recently released a new book that she's asked me to read and review for her. If you'd like to check it out, I'll leave a link to her newest book here. If you'd like to listen to me highlight this author, you can find that here on my YouTube channel, where I post every week. Let me know what you've been reading in the comment section! I hope you've all had an amazing summer. Happy reading, book nerds!
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