January 2020 books
My freelance copyediting is picking up a little bit in February and March though, so no promises that I'll keep up with this standard but one can only hope and cut out sleep to a certain extent!
Book titles below are affiliate links so you know exactly what book I read, but as always I'm a big proponent of your local library. Also, if you didn't know, you can request books to be bought by your library! Most nowadays have a form on their website you can fill out, easy-peasy. Worth a shot if there's a book you're dying to read but don't want to invest in!
A Better Man (Inspector Gamache #15)
by Louise Penny
★★★/5
A very appropriate winter-into-spring read! A very good Gamache, but I wouldn't qualify it as one of my favorites of the whole series. I'm never going to quit this series, though, so honestly Penny could release a very trash version and I'd still read it because I just love the location and the aura too much of these novels. (Also realizing that I've read 15 of this series is making me chuckle, because WOW that is a long series.)
The Buried Giant
by Kazuo Ishiguro
★★★★★/5
By now, I should know not to expect anything standard or "normal" when I pick up an Ishiguro, but I continue to be surprised and enthralled at the twists and turns he takes in his novels. This one is a fantasy-retelling of post-Arthurian Britain, and it's just incredible. I don't want to say much about the plot because truly, the surprises are worth it, but if you haven't read an Ishiguro I highly recommend it.
The Final Empire (Mistborn #1)
by Brandon Sanderson
★★★/5
I read a LOT of Sanderson in 2019, and I couldn't help trying one of his other series for 2020 to kick-start my fiction again, and this didn't disappoint. I heard from Rosie that this one was written for a youth audience, which makes sense, but it was still a very good (and long!) read. I waffled between giving this 3 and 4 stars, so let's call it 3.5 because I really liked the characters and the arc of the story but I felt the Stormlight Archive a better story all around.
The Westing Game
by Ellen Raskin
★★★/5
This is apparently a childhood classic I'd never heard of or read, but with the release of the movie Knives Out a bunch of people were talking about it on Twitter, so I had to check it out. I can imagine becoming thoroughly obsessed with this book at age 10 or so, so if you've got a 10 year old that needs a mystery, hand them this one. (Only $5 on Amazon right now!)
Lincoln in the Bardo
by George Saunders
★★★★★/5
I listened to this as an audiobook while walking on our treadmill, and wow was it an incredible audiobook (hence why the link above is to the audiobook instead of a print!). I rented it from the library kind of not knowing the plot or what was going on, and it took me a couple chapters to figure it out but there is a really good reason this was so popular a couple years ago when it came out. I'm one of those people who feels smug avoiding super popular books because I'm a vain English major who likes to read real literature and then it always comes back to bite me in the butt when I break down and read the popular ones because they're good and popular for a REASON, Hannah.
Digression aside, this is a heart-wrenching story of Willy Lincoln's death, told through historical documents and narrative sections mixed amongst one another. The audiobook is narrated by Nick Offerman and David Sedaris, among many other famous people (Bill Hader! Rainn Wilson! Megan Mulally! Keegan Michael Key!) and there's a reason they could get so many famous people because the storytelling is incredible. I can't wait for Saunders to write something else since this was his first novel (the standard is SO high). Worth waiting for the audiobook if you're into those.
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| Felix needs to work on his literature choices |
Currently reading:
The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander (nonfic about the criminal justice system, v good)
Middlemarch by George Eliot (I love this but it's SO long, wow)
Out of the Silent Planet by C. S. Lewis (listening to this while I walk, so I'm not very far in yet)
Tell me, what else should I read in 2020? I'm all ears.
HG
Monthly reading updates is an excellent idea! I never did a 2019 summary because I could barely remember the books I read at the beginning of the year... I'm going to copy you now!
ReplyDeleteI keep hearing things about Out of the Silent Planet! But I just started another series so C.S. Lewis will have to wait. Can't wait to hear what you think about Middlemarch! I didn't realize how long it is either when I said I would read it, ha.
ReplyDeleteThe audiobook is recorded by a man with a very old-timey English accent which makes it even better, because it feels like what Lewis probably sounded like in real life when he wrote it hahah! And yes I looove what I've read in Middlemarch so far but it's so long!
DeleteThe Westing Game is on my list to eventually read too! I have been halfway through Middlemarch for about a year, ha! It's a long one, for sure.
ReplyDeleteSomehow I missed it growing up, which is hilarious because I was a child who would have LOVED that book! Right up my alley.
DeleteLincoln in the Bardo and The Buried Giant are both so good! I've read the former two times, and think I'm due for a reread on the latter.
ReplyDeleteAfter listening to the audiobook, I did want to immediately reread Lincoln in the Bardo on print so I'm sure I will someday!!
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