Best of the Bunch (December 2021)

Today I'm sharing the best book I read in December.

Of the 7 books I read this month, I had no 5-star reads, and two 4.5-star reads:

Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty

Unicorns and Germs by Asia Citro

As much as I enjoy the Zoey and Sassafras books I'm reading with my older son, I'll stick with an adult rec for this end-of-month linkup.

I liked Apples Never Fall a lot better than Moriarty's last few. The mysteries (Where is Joy? Who is Savannah?) were compelling, but even more than that, what I like about Moriarty's writing is how brilliantly she captures the subtleties of being a person: the way that people have resentments they don't even realize are resentments, or how an individual's earnestness is sweet from one angle and cringeworthy from another. The main critique I have of the book is that the denouement is way too long. ("How the Delaneys dealt with COVID" could have been a bonus short on her website rather than the entire last act of the book.) This hasn't quite beat out my favorite Moriarty books, but I did really enjoy the read and look forward to her next one.

What is the best book you read this month? Let me know in comments, or write your own post and link up below!

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: Strangers from a Different Shore and Feminist, Queer, Crip
Five years ago I was reading: Death in the Clouds, Good-Bye to All That, and Dracula
Ten years ago I was reading: The Spirit Level

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Top Ten Books I Read in 2021

I'm linking up with That Artsy Reader Girl for another Top Ten Tuesday.

It's time to share my favorite reads of the year! I'm honestly not 100% confident I'm not going to finish another 5-star (or 4.5-star) read in the last few days of the year, but oh well, here we are! This year I'm not splitting by fiction and nonfiction because most of my 5-star reads this year were either rereads or chapter books, which I'm not including here, so I actually didn't have a lot to pick from. Here are my ten favorites of the year. To read more about why I liked them, you can search for them on the blog or check out my Goodreads! (Psst: To see my favorite read every month, I encourage you to check out — and link up with — the Best of the Bunch linkup.)

1. Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty

2. Girl Sex 101 by Allison Moon

3. Listen by Patty Wipfler and Tosha Schore

4. The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers

5. A Madness of Sunshine by Nalini Singh

6. Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson

7. On Juneteenth by Annette Gordon-Reed

8. A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers

9. Rick by Alex Gino

10. Wholehearted Faith by Rachel Held Evans

What were your top reads of 2021?

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: The Moving Finger and Feminist, Queer, Crip
Five years ago I was reading: Don Quixote, Good-Bye to All That, and The Wonder
Ten years ago I was reading: The Spirit Level

What I've Been Reading Lately (Quick Lit)

Today I'm linking up with Modern Mrs. Darcy's Quick Lit to bring you some short and sweet reviews of what I've read in the past month. For longer reviews, you can always find me on Goodreads.

Here's what I read this past month, including what I've been reading to my older son!

Merhorses and Bubbles by Asia Citro: This was slow to start, but my son and I enjoyed it. There are a lot of scenes with Zoey's dad (who can't see magical creatures) played for laughs, and the solution to the magical creatures' problem in this situation contains both an important lesson about ecology and encourages getting civically involved.

Wholehearted Faith by Rachel Held Evans with Jeff Chu: It was so good to experience Rachel's voice again after her sudden passing in 2019. Throughout this book, she reflects on what it means to live life and love God and one another with your whole heart, and why that includes making room for our doubts, our questions, our anger, and every facet of our identities.

Still Stace: My Gay Christian Coming-Of-Age Story: An Illustrated Memoir by Stacey Chomiak: This was my favorite read of November. I think it's so valuable for LGBTQ+ Christian teens to have this honest story of how Stace moved from a place of shame and numbness to a feeling of peace and wholeness after she started seeking God's voice instead of just the interpretations and beliefs of those around her.

Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe: I deeply enjoyed this graphic memoir. As Kobabe shared eir honest feelings about eir gender and sexuality, it was clear that e felt them in a profound way even during the times of eir life e didn't have language for them. I think Kobabe's memoir as it stands is an affirming mirror for a common queer journey, where identities don't just land overnight and then stick forever, but that doesn't mean that labels can't be helpful signposts along the way.

Saga, Vol. 3 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples: At this point in the series I started to struggle a little bit to keep all the different characters' relationships straight and remember who's chasing whom and for what reason, not to mention figuring out who's dead and who was just seriously wounded. But it's still enjoyable for the great action, humor, and overall storyline.

An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz: I was familiar with the long history of the U.S. government making and breaking treaties with the indigenous peoples of this land, but Dunbar-Ortiz added a new dimension to my understanding. As a comprehensive, thoroughly researched, and highly detailed work of history, the book is understandably a bit dry, but extremely well done and definitely worth a read.

Caterflies and Ice by Asia Citro: I really enjoyed this one! Zoey uses quick thinking to save the magical caterflies' eggs, but her solution has unintended consequences, and she must use additional scientific knowledge to fix it. I learned something new in this one!

Saga, Vol. 4 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples: This was a weird, dark set of chapters in this story. Both Marko and Alana take unnecessary risks, and there's lots more carnage left in a variety of places. This volume wasn't bad, it just felt like too much plot, not enough of the witty dialogue and deep character emotions that I've enjoyed in the series up to this point.

Saga, Vol. 5 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples: This one still had too many different story lines for me to fully keep track of them, but there was more snappy dialogue this time, and the plot made more sense, though I'm still tired of watching various people getting blasted and then having to wait several pages to find out if they're dead or not.

The Pod and the Bog by Asia Citro: This one didn't hold my son's attention quite as much as some previous books, possibly because it's about a magical plant rather than a magical creature, but I thought it was surprisingly engaging nonetheless. Through experimentation, Zoey has to figure out where this seed pod came from so she can replant the seeds in the right location. It's a good explanation of both research design and how plants work, set up as a mystery!

Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty: I liked this a lot better than Moriarty's last few. The mysteries within the story were compelling, but even more than that, what I like about Moriarty's writing is how brilliantly she captures the subtleties of being a person.

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: The Flatshare and Strangers from a Different Shore
Five years ago I was reading: Three Act Tragedy, Five on a Treasure Island, and Ficciones
Ten years ago I was reading: Liberated Parents, Liberated Children

Top Ten Books on My Winter TBR

I'm linking up with That Artsy Reader Girl for another Top Ten Tuesday.

I didn't get through as many of the books on my fall TBR list as I would have liked, probably because this past month has been bananas here, so three of them are showing up here again. But that's OK! Here are those and the rest of what I plan to read this quarter.

1. Aristotle and Dante Dive Into the Waters of the World by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
This is a carryover from fall.

2. Can I Recycle This? by Jennie Romer
I was very excited when I heard about this book because I seem to be perpetually baffled by how recycling works and how to know what I can put in the bin. Now that I'm going to be living in my own house, it seems like a good time to figure this out and be a responsible user of my recycling bin.

3. A Caribbean Mystery by Agatha Christie
This is next up in my quest to read all the Miss Marple books!

4. Drinking the Rain by Alix Kates Shulman
I don't remember how I heard about this book, but as I start my own new life chapter after a divorce it seemed like a good time to read this memoir about surviving divorce, embracing soltitude, and learning to be self-sufficient.

5. Good Talk by Mira Jacob
This is the pick for one of my book clubs for January, and it's one I've wanted to read for a long time now. I love the author, I've heard rave reviews about the book, and I could always use advice on handling different conversations with my kids.

6. Here's to Us by Becky Albertalli and Adam Silvera
I love Albertalli's writing (though I tend to prefer her standalones to her collaborations), and I enjoyed the first book in this series, so I'm definitely picking this one up.

7. The Natural Mother of the Child by Krys Malcolm Belc
This is a carryover from fall.

8. Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss
A ton of my Goodreads friends have given this book 5 stars, and it sounds fascinating! I'm always up for a good combination of practical advice and in-the-field stories from an author's professional work.

9. Out of Office by Charlie Warzel and Anne Helen Peterson
My cohort lead at work is a huge Anne Helen Peterson fan and as we're a fully remote organization, she posted about being excited to read this and a bunch of other people said they'd be interested in reading it too. It has a very long wait list at my library, though!

10. Rising from Ash by Jax Meyer
This is a carryover from fall.

What do you plan to read this winter?

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: A Promised Land and Strangers from a Different Shore
Five years ago I was reading: Three Act Tragedy, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, and Ficciones
Ten years ago I was reading: The Family Bed

Ten Things People Do More Often in Books Than in Real Life

I'm linking up with That Artsy Reader Girl for another Top Ten Tuesday.

It's a freebie week! I've compiled a top ten list of things that book people seem to do way more than actual people do.

1. Not know they're holding their breath
"I let out the breath I didn't know I was holding." Really? You weren't breathing through that entire page and your body wasn't like, "Hello, give me some air!"?

2. Bite their lip until they taste blood
These book characters all seem to be walking around with split lips! You were so nervous/scared/whatever that you literally bit so hard you drew blood? And then the "metallic/salty/bitter taste of blood" just filled your whole mouth? Yuck.

3. Bite the inside of their cheek
Usually when I hear people talk about biting their cheeks, it's something they do accidentally while eating, but people in books do it constantly, either as a nervous tic or to keep from laughing or for some other reason.

4. Smile with half their mouth
The pages of YA romances are filled with hot guys who are apparently experiencing an epidemic of Bell's palsy or else only know how to smirk at people, because they all have the same tendency to smile with half their mouths or are described as having a "lopsided smile." Seriously, where are the guys who just have a nice, typical smile? The kind that uses both sides of their mouth??

5. Not realize that the person screaming is them
I get that our beloved book characters go through some traumatic stuff, and so maybe that explains this phenomenon, but I feel like most of the time people know if they're screaming. And yet book characters are constantly experiencing something terrifying/shocking and then hearing a scream and only belatedly realizing it's coming from their own mouth.

6. Not realize they've been speaking their thoughts aloud
Look, I talk to myself out loud all day, but trust me, I'm very aware that I'm doing it. When I worked in an office and they put the summer intern desk in my office, I would warn the intern each summer that I may think out loud while they're in there. I have yet to have an experience where I thought I was having a conversation in my head and then suddenly realized that all of those thoughts had come out of my mouth without me noticing that I was speaking. But apparently many book characters have a hard time distinguishing between silent thinking and out-loud thinking and are shocked when they realize they've been talking!

7. Respond to someone as if in answer to that person's exact thoughts
On the flip side to #6, many times someone is actually thinking their thoughts silently to themselves in their head, and then some other character responds as if they heard those thoughts out loud. I have definitely had people guess my feelings from my facial expression, and sometimes people may anticipate what I want to say in response to them, but I haven't had the experience of, say, sitting silently in a car with someone and thinking a thought and then getting a coherent, out-loud response from the other person as if they'd heard an exact sentence in my brain. In books, though? Happens all the time.

8. Zone out so long that they don't realize someone's talking to them
This is a favorite technique of amateur memoirists who don't realize that you can just give the reader backstory without having to build a whole scene where you stand there staring off into space and remembering how you got to that moment until someone waves their hand in front of your face and asks if you're listening and you "snap back to the present." I certainly get lost in my thoughts at times, but it's usually because I'm worrying about something, not reflecting in narrative detail on all of my life choices up to that point.

9. Get pregnant the first time they have sex with someone
Except for romances — where you're most likely to get sex scenes for the sake of sex scenes — if a character with a uterus has sex with someone, then I'm going to estimate 80% of the time they end up pregnant. Especially if their lover dies or leaves forever afterwards. If first-time sex resulted in pregnancy in real life as often as it does in books, there would be a lot more pregnancies!

10. Have a best friend of a different gender (and both be straight)
With almost all of the people I know in real life who have an actual platonic best friend of another gender, at least one of the people in the friendship is not attracted to their friend's gender. But with all these friends-to-lovers YA romances, you'd think it was extremely common for straight people's very best friend to be someone of another gender. Oftentimes this is explained by them being neighbors or their moms being best friends or their friendship going back to elementary school, but when I was in high school, my best friend was not someone I'd known my whole life and it definitely wasn't a guy. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, I'm just saying it happens all the time in books!

What else would you put on this list?

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: A Promised Land and Strangers from a Different Shore
Five years ago I was reading: Lolita, Middlesex, and Murder on the Orient Express
Ten years ago I was reading: I Am the Messenger

Best of the Bunch (November 2021)

Today I'm sharing the best book I read in November.

Of the 12 books I read this month, I had two 5-star reads:

Still Stace: My Gay Christian Coming-Of-Age Story: An Illustrated Memoir by Stacey Chomiak

Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe

How the heck am I supposed to pick between these? I loved them both and read each in about two sittings. I guess I'll give some extra weight to the one written by a friend of mine, because it was very cool to get to hear more of her story (and her book is new so not as well known!).

Still Stace was originally going to be a much shorter children's book, but I'm glad that it evolved into this more detailed memoir for a young adult audience. I think it's so valuable for LGBTQ+ Christian teens to have this honest story of how Stace moved from a place of shame and numbness to a feeling of peace and wholeness after she started seeking God's voice instead of just the interpretations and beliefs of those around her. I read this book in two sittings; the writing was accessible and the story was compelling. Her voice throughout this book is honest and open as she shares the painful experiences of her past. And her illustrations add such a unique flavor to the story! Although I don't believe that there's a single book you can hand to a Christian loved one who has strong negative beliefs about LGBTQ+ identities that will change their minds overnight, I do believe that stories are far more powerful than proof-texting or logical arguments in opening people's hearts. And for anyone from any background who doesn't understand what it's like to struggle with reconciling faith and sexuality, I'd definitely recommend this book.

What is the best book you read this month? Let me know in comments, or write your own post and link up below!

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: A Promised Land and Strangers from a Different Shore
Five years ago I was reading: Interpreter of Maladies, Middlesex, and Murder on the Orient Express
Ten years ago I was reading: Reviving Ophelia

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Ten Characters I'd Love An Update On

I'm linking up with That Artsy Reader Girl for another Top Ten Tuesday.

This was a fun thought exercise. I'm not generally a fan of writers adding sequels for books that don't need them (especially since it often requires creating conflict where there was previously resolution and hope), but here we can just imagine all of these characters as real people and wonder what they'd be up to since the story ended!

1. Alba DeTamble (from The Time Traveler's Wife)
We only get a brief glimpse of Alba in this book, where she seems to be a pretty well-adjusted kid for having a time-traveling disorder. How does that affect her as she grows up and attempts to navigate long-term relationships?

2. Alex Claremont-Diaz (from Red, White & Royal Blue)
We leave Alex on a happy ending (it's a romance, after all), but he still has most of adulthood ahead of him and a whole international situation to navigate in the public eye. What is that like for him?

3. Alice Love (from What Alice Forgot)
Is Alice able to take the lessons from her period of amnesia and prevent any distance from creeping into her marriage again? How does this experience affect her parenting?

4. Blue Sargent (from The Raven Cycle series)
This universe has continued with the Dreamer Trilogy, but Blue gets barely a mention now that we're following Ronan. How is she navigating adulthood, and what do her family relationships look like now? How much is the supernatural still part of her day-to-day?

5. Claudia Kincaid (from The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler)
Claudia is a precocious, clever kid when she concocts a plan to live in a museum and solve a mystery in this book. How have those skills served her as she's grown up?

6 & 7. Crowley and Aziraphale (from Good Omens)
The TV series kindled in me a new love for these characters from a book I read over a decade ago. Given all they've been through together, what happens next for these two?

8. Dimple Shah (from When Dimple Met Rishi)
I'll admit, I know there's a short story about Dimple and Rishi that has come out since the original book, but I haven't read it, so this is on me! However, I think the story mostly focuses on their relationship, and I'm interested to know about Dimple's continued experience in programming. How does she navigate being a woman of color in web development at Stanford? What is her career after college?

9. Matilda Wormwood (from Matilda)
This is one where I'm glad there was never an actual sequel (because that poor girl went through enough already!), but I'd love just a glimpse of her adult life, where I imagine her having strong boundaries and a loving community and basically building the life she wants for herself.

10. Starr Carter (from The Hate U Give)
Starr has to make some difficult and brave decisions in this book, and we see some of the immediate consequences of that, but what does her life look like five or ten years out? Which relationships has she maintained? Has she continued to be an outspoken activist, or has that part of her life taken a backseat to all of her other ambitions for now?

Which characters would you like an update on?

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: The House of the Spirits and The Body in the Library
Five years ago I was reading: The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared, Middlesex, and The Girls
Ten years ago I was reading: Sundays in America

What I've Been Reading Lately (Quick Lit)

Today I'm linking up with Modern Mrs. Darcy's Quick Lit to bring you some short and sweet reviews of what I've read in the past month. For longer reviews, you can always find me on Goodreads.

Here's what I read this past month, including what I've been reading to my son!

Stars and Sparks on Stage by Sharon M. Draper: The Black Dinosaurs want to win the talent show, but they're forced to think about more serious things after meeting a new student who was made homeless by Hurricane Katrina. I thought it was handled in an age-appropriate way. My 6-year-old got bored with this one partway through, but I enjoyed it!

Girl Sex 101 by Allison Moon: This was billed as a fully inclusive sex-ed book, and it definitely delivered! Although addressed primarily to queer women, it covers all genders and genitals; the only people who aren't a focus are cis men, and it's not like there's a shortage of information out there about having sex with cis men. In addition to extensively covering trans bodies, it's inclusive of disabled bodies and fat bodies as well. The world would be a better place if everyone read this book before they had sex!

The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side by Agatha Christie: I actually figured one out! I'm so proud of myself, haha. It was fun seeing how all the pieces fit together once I had an idea of what the solution was going to be.

Honey Girl by Morgan Rogers: This book had potential, but it never really coalesced for me. Rogers did a lot of telling not showing, and we didn't get to see a lot of the relationship building between characters. Everyone in this book talked to each other very dramatically about pain and monsters and the universe, but that's not a substitute for the real ways that people care for each other.

Dragons and Marshmallows by Asia Citro: This was fun! My son wasn't quite as invested as he's been with some other books, but he enjoyed it and so did I. It's a basic introduction to the scientific method wrapped in a story about magical creatures. This was recommended to me by a lot of different people, and I'm glad it delivered!

Saga, Vol. 2 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples: This was an enjoyable continuation of the story from Volume 1. It's still a little heavy on the gore for my taste, but there are a lot of funny lines and the art makes it feel like you're watching a movie.

Solutions and Other Problems by Allie Brosh: This one was a mixed bag for me. Some chapters were as laugh-out-loud funny as her first book, but the overall question the book kept coming back to was "What do you do when you find out that nothing matters?" and she was still clearly in the middle of that nihilism and depression while trying to mine it for stories worth telling. I'm grateful for what her art has given to the world, and I hope that she can find her way to some more peace and meaning in her life.

Set Boundaries, Find Peace: A Guide to Reclaiming Yourself by Nedra Glover Tawwab: This was a good, if pretty basic, overview of why it's important to have boundaries and how you can implement them in your life. I think that for anyone who struggles with setting boundaries at all or who has a lot of unhealthy relationships or a toxic work environment, this would be an excellent first step.

Monsters and Mold by Asia Citro: This was a cute continuation of the series. I liked seeing how Zoey again used the scientific method to solve a magical creature's problem, and in this one there is some exploration of how what works in a laboratory may not be practical when applied outside of it! I was possibly more eager than my son to find out what the solution was going to be, haha.

Muse of Nightmares by Laini Taylor: This was a satisfying conclusion to the story started in Strange the Dreamer. Taylor is an incredibly skilled writer, both on a sentence level and in terms of plotting and character development. What I appreciate most about this story is how Taylor has given us a multitude of morally gray characters, all of whom have done terrible things, but their reasons for doing so are deeply understandable and sympathetic.

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: The House of the Spirits and Truth & Beauty
Five years ago I was reading: The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared, Friendship at the Margins, and The Girls
Ten years ago I was reading: Sundays in America

Ten Books I Would Hand to Someone Who Claims to Not Like Reading

I'm linking up with That Artsy Reader Girl for another Top Ten Tuesday.

I went with kind of a wide range for this topic because there are a variety of reasons someone might be turned off from reading and so different books will work to inspire different people!

1. An Absolutely Remarkable Thing by Hank Green
This book works on multiple levels: It's extremely action-packed, it includes puzzles that the characters have to solve, and it's also a meditation on fame in the Internet era. And it's excellent on audio, so it's a good one to introduce reluctant audiobook listeners to that format as well.

2. Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
This book is also best experienced as an audiobook, narrated by the author. For anyone who thinks memoirs are too heavy or boring or who thinks "celebrity memoirs" are trashy, this is a laugh-out-loud account of a serious topic — Noah's experience growing up as the illegal child of an interracial couple during apartheid South Africa. It's well loved by hundreds of thousands of readers.

3. The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict by Trenton Lee Stewart
I find the entire Mysterious Benedict Society series delightful, but the first book in the series might be a little too quirky for some people. This standalone prequel is a great example of how middle grade can be fun for adults to read too, as the writing is excellent and it's fun to read about the main character outsmarting those around him and trying to piece together clues to find a treasure.

4. Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
I'd encourage fans of the miniseries (or really anyone) to pick up the book that inspired it, as it's hilarious, fast-paced, and entertaining, and you can see how the print format allows for a different type of humor than the screen (though I loved both versions).

5. Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson
This absolutely compelling look at the U.S. criminal justice system — part memoir, part journalistic nonfiction — is important for everyone in the United States to read, and for anyone who associates nonfiction with dry history books, this will be a heartbreaking wake-up call about just how important it is to learn the realities of what's happening today.

6. The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers
Anyone who's been turned off from science fiction by reading too many "classics" by white men needs to give this book a try. The world-building is fascinating and inclusive, the characters jump off the page with their big personalities, and the plot includes a lot of high stakes for people just trying to do their best. It'll be an even easier sell for fans of Firefly, a frequent comp for this book.

7. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
This book is so action-packed that it's hard to put it down once you start. The references to video games and '80s pop culture also provide nostalgic hooks for certain reluctant readers as well. And so many people have read this (plus there's a movie) that they'll definitely have people to discuss it with.

8. Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston
This is a frequent recommendation for reluctant romance readers. For anyone who thinks romance is either staring longingly from wind-swept cliffs or erotica with a thinly strung-together plot, here is a hilarious, heartbreaking, inspiring, satisfying tale of love between the U.S. President's son and the Prince of Wales that also imagines a slightly more inclusive America where a divorced woman with a gay, Latino son can be president.

9. Saga, Vol. 1 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples
Graphic novels are a frequent recommendation for reluctant readers, and I think the best option will depend on the reader. Some are much more like comic strips, while some, like this series, are extremely cinematic, with lots of dialogue, sweeping shots, and text meant to convey a voiceover only at key moments. This is one I'd hand to movie buffs, especially those comfortable with a little bit of gore.

10. The Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay
Young adult is another genre that gets a bad rap, and it's partially deserved, as many YA novels focus more on capturing a certain tone or message over polishing the writing, and sometimes the characters feel more like sketches or caricatures. This one, though, has the readability of a young adult novel, and does feature teenagers at its center, but it has a gravity to it that you don't always find in this type of book, as the main character seeks her own stunted methods of coping with the traumatic event she endured (and you don't know what that event is at the beginning). It's a compelling story for teens and adults alike.

What books would you hand to someone in this situation?

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: Amazing Grace and To Kill a Mockingbird
Five years ago I was reading: Brideshead Revisited, Adoption Parenting, and Writing My Wrongs
Ten years ago I was reading: The Great Gatsby