“Our brains are hardwired to want resolution, to want the answer. The bigger and broader the mystery, the deeper the satisfaction when it’s resolved (a variation on Dad’s low baseline theory). They turn the pages and join the search party, to accelerate the process of solving the puzzle, of turning it into a different kind of story.”
Why did I wait so long to read this?!
One day Eugene, a non speaking teen with Angelman Syndrome, shows up at home, agitated and without his dad. Told in first person from 20 year old Mia’s point of view, this mystery has many layers of mystery. Where is Adam and who is this mystery woman who left messages on his phone? And why are the police interested in Eugene? Mia, her twin John, her Mom, and Eugene are thrown into a world with more questions than answers and more turmoil than it first seemed. Who is this dad they are learning about it? Did they know him at all?
This is set during Covid lockdown time. Personally, learning more about Angelman Syndrome and the risks and dangers of how it’s perceived in the world outside the home spoke to me. The whole question of how much nonspeaking individuals know and if alternate ways of communicating can be found was something worth reflection. There is not enough autistic representation in stories and Kim tied Eugene into the mystery flawlessly.
The end left some questions and I loved that. It felt real.
“There’s an old saying: The first lie wins. It’s not referring to the little white kind that tumble out with no thought; it refers to the big one. The one that changes the game. The one that is deliberate. The lie that sets the stage for everything that comes after it. And once the lie is told, it’s what most people believe to be true. The first lie has to be the strongest. The most important. The one that has to be told.” Chapter 5
Evie makes her living lying and she’s good at it. She makes her way through the world conning people into believing she is someone that she’s not. Her name isn’t even Evie. She left her real name behind long ago. Until. Until the day that someone shows up while she’s deep into a con using the name she was born with.
This was a twisty one. I liked ‘Evie’ and the confident way she handled herself. She had been working on her shady skills since high school and I was a little jealous at how well she could read people!
As much as I liked ‘Evie’ the plot became overly complicated by the end and it stretched how far I was willing to suspend disbelief. But, it was fun, fast, and had a satisfying ending, so I’d still say it’s a win for thriller lovers.
It was a Reece’s Book Club Pick last year and I received it in my Book Club Christmas exchange.
I read 164 books this year, a total of 45,312 pages. On Goodreads my average rating was 4.1.
The longest book was The Running Grave by Robert Galbraith at 950 pages.
I read 49 books as a judge for the first round of the Cybils Awards. I switched from nonfiction to middle school fiction this year. So many great books!
To keep this short I’m letting my Top Ten stand for themselves.
I caught up with some of my favorite series. Robert Galbraith’s Cormoran Strike series is one of the best and the latest was excellent, yet again. I also love John Sandford’s Prey series and caught up by reading #30, 33&34. I read two more in Tana French’s Dublin Murder Squad, so good.
I also went and heard one of my faves Harlan Coben talk and sign his latest book for me. They are always quick and twisty and this one had Myron and gang!
Three new to me authors, also write some of my favorites this year. Amy Tintera has been on many favorites lists this year with Listen for the Lie. If you like podcasts, check this one out. Anthony Horowitz’s Magpie Murders is a miniseries. I haven’t watched it, but the book was good. And Karen McManus’s One of Us is Lying was a very fun YA closed room kind of murder mystery.
The rest were good too. I always love a good thriller! Any other thriller lovers? Any great series that I should jump into?
I read 20 modern romances this year. My friend Karen @cover.to.bookcover runs a monthly online romance book club so at least handful were from that. I have my ongoing faves and new authors too.
YA Romance
I will read anything Nicola Yoon writes. Everything, Everything was great. Ali Hazelwood is another author I’ve enjoyed over the last few years and Check & Mate felt older than most teen books. Still a girl owning the chess circuit was pretty cool.
My Romance Go Tos
My old faithfuls came through for me this year. Funny Story by Emily Henry was, by far, my favorite romance of the year. If you don’t like romances, give this a try and tell me what you think. Katherine Center and Susan Elizabeth Phillips both had new books I loved. I read two Ashley Poston and I really liked The Seven Year Slip. Kristan Higgins has some fantastic backlist romances and I love both of the Gideon’s Cove books I read. Jasmine Guillory is a newer fave and I really liked By the Book, I guess a take on Beauty and the Beast but it didn’t quite read that way for me. Still good!
New To Me
And I read these authors for the first time and I’m already excited about reading more from them in 2025…Christina Lauren, Denise Williams, Mariana Zapata, and Tessa Bailey.
Better late than never? October reads minus two. 12 middle school fiction titles for Cybils, 1 fiction, 1 nonfiction. Some of these middle school titles are so good!
My one adult fiction book this month was perfect for the spooky season. Louise goes back to Charleston after her parents died and finds her relationship with her brother as rocky as ever and the house they grew up in full of the creepy puppets she remembered. But the longer she’s there more memories and secrets come to life.
Are puppets creepy? YES! Are they more creepy when they’re haunted? Again, YES!
Thich Nhat Hanh and I had the same birthday. Maybe that’s why his books connect with me so much. He was a Buddhist monk from the age of 16 and involved himself in engaged Buddhism to speak out against social issues. For his efforts to help end the war in Vietnam, where he was born and then exiled, Martin Luther King Jr. nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize.
He wrote over 100 books, for me this is book 11 I think. His books on mindfulness will be an asset to anyone who reads them.
This book, No Death, No Fear: Comforting Wisdom for Life, focuses on how to look at death and even how to ease the passing of those you love. This has been a part of my morning reading the past few months and I finally finished it today. Powerful and thoughtful.
“We think of our body as our self or belonging to our self. We think of our body as me or mine. But if you look deeply, you see that your body is also the body of your ancestors, of your parents, of your children, and of their children.”
“If you live without awareness it is the same as being dead.”
Middle School Fiction for first round of Cybils reading.
My favorites
Rise of the Spider by Michael Spradlin. If there is ever the perfect book to read at the exact right time, this is one. This is the first of a series and should be read in middle school history classes everywhere.
How did Hitler rise to power? Who are the people that followed him and spread hate and violence? This tells the story of 11 year old Rolf whose brother joins the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, otherwise known as Hitler Youth. Hitler isn’t in power, yet, but he is collecting people more loyal to him than to their country. The next book is titled Threat of the Spider.
This book is only 138 pages and I have at least 12 pages marked with notes and tags. Read your history to avoid repeating it.
Coyote Lost and Found by Dan Gemeinhart. My notes have these descriptive words.. charmingly enchanting, found family, unconventional, quest, mature. This book is deals with grief head on since it focuses on finding a book where her mother wrote where she wanted to be scattered. I fell in love with all of these people and I think you will too. 278 pages.
The Wrong Way Home by Kate O’Shaughnessy. A girl and her mother escape a cult, only the girl doesn’t realize that’s what it was and wants to go back. Heartbreakingly good.
The Luminous Life of Lucy Landry by Anna Rose Johnson. My notes have these descriptive words…tries so hard, loss, so much beautiful energy, imagination, belief in traditions, hero. Lucy is sent to live on a tiny island with a family who mans the lighthouse. Grief is fresh, but it’s about learning to move on and fit it with new family. 172 pages
Carter Avery’s Tricky Fourth Grade Year by Rob Buyea. My notes have these descriptive words…ADHD, special teacher, first friendships, self advocacy, feeling left out. Carter and his sister live with their grandma and the parents died when they were young, so that’s not the focus, but it’s there. 344 pages
These others were really good too
The Mystery of Locked Rooms by Lindsay Currie. Three friends try to go into an old fun house to find treasure. Sure to thrill any escape room enthusiast.
Painting the Game by Patricia MacLachlan. A sweet story of a young girl trying to become a baseball player just like her minor league pitching dad. It has a rural throwback feel with a big ending. 134 pages
The Bletchley Riddle by Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin. Two storylines, one of Jakob who works at Bletchley to crack the Nazi’s Enigma cipher and one of his little sister Lizzie who believes her mother is still alive and is trying to stay off a boat to America so she can prove it. There was lots of adventure and mystery along with some legit wartime scariness. 392 pages.
The Misfits by Lisa Yee and Dan Santant. Kids with powers at a school being trained together in teams. If a kid likes superheroes, they’ll like this, the first of series.
Safiyyah’s War by Hiba Noor Khan. The story of young Safiyyah who loves the library and whose father is in charge of the Grand Mosque of Paris who joins the Nazi Resistance and saves hundreds of Jewish people. So much love for books in this one. 329 pages
Amil and the After by Veera Hiranandani. 1948 India after Amil’s family had to move from the new Pakistan to Bombay. Shows the hardship of moving to a new place.
Faker by Gordon Korman. His dad is a conman and his sister is his competition to become his number two. What happens when Trey finally wants to put down some roots? This was my first Gordon Korman and I’m not sure he’s for me.
It was a good, not remarkable, reading month. A total of 12 books, but half of those were kids.
4.5 Stars
The Paradise Problem by Christina Lauren I will be adding more Christina Lauren books to my TBR list. Fun and sexy with a bonafide hot multi millionaire as a fake husband. Sign me up (just don’t tell Jason). Did I totally buy the Cinderella-like transformation? No, but it was still fun.
The Rom-Commers by Katherine Center Charlie is a very successful screenwriter who has just written his first romcom. Emma is a Texas girl caring for her father round the clock while teaching writing classes at a local community college. They have something in common, their agent.
Emma goes to LA to help Charlie rewrite and ends up staying in his house. This brought a memory of By the Book that I read this summer that had an editor living with a writer to help write a book. I liked both books so this is a scenario that works for me. I didn’t always get Emma, but I really liked Charlie and the story hit all of the happily-ever-after requirements.
5th book in the A Court of Thorns and Roses series. (technically book #4)
What a fun ride this series is. Adventure, love, magic, lots of magic, death, battles, friendship, family, wings, winnowing, and a large cast of characters. This last one was from only two perspectives, Nesta and Cassian. I know after 751 pages I’m supposed to like Nesta, but I’m still not her biggest fan. I don’t dislike her but she’s got a lot of sharp edges that are willfully sharpened to slice. She did have a nice story progression in this one, but every few chapters she kept finding new miraculous powers and it seemed a bit much.
Happy Place by Emily Henry The six friends meet once a year in Maine for a week at the cottage, but this year will be the last since the cottage has been sold. Harriet and Wyn are there, pretending to still be engaged, even though they broke up six months ago.
There’s more than just a broken romance. Friends who are family can break your heart just as easily and a week spent nursing lies and resentment can cause fireworks.
I’ve now read all five Emily Henry books. The few that I haven’t loved as much (still loved though) have had something in the end that felt unfinished. This felt a little rushed with some issues that needed more attention in the end, but I will still read everything she writes because she’s just that good.
Giant Island by Jane Yolen and Doug Keith This is a sweet picture book. Isn’t the cover great?! Two siblings go with their grandpa and his dog to an island for fishing and exploring. They found out why it was called Giant Island. The pictures of the giant/island were so fun. And I loved the detail of the end pages. The ones in front showing the islands and the ones in back showing those same islands with their giants showing. Kids will love comparing the two.
Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz. 4.25/5 stars, mystery, 477 pages, 2016
Alan Conway is a bestselling crime writer. His editor, Susan Ryeland, has worked with him for years, and she’s intimately familiar with his detective, Atticus Pünd, who solves mysteries disturbing sleepy English villages. Alan’s traditional formula pays homage to queens of classic British crime such as Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers. It’s proved hugely successful. So successful that Susan must continue to put up with his troubling behavior if she wants to keep her job.
When Susan receives Alan’s latest manuscript, in which Atticus Pünd investigates a murder at Pye Hall, an English manor house, she has no reason to think it will be any different from the others. There will be dead bodies, a cast of intriguing suspects, and plenty of red herrings and clues. But the more Susan reads, the more she realizes that there’s another story hidden in the pages of the manuscript—one of ambition, jealousy, and greed—and that soon it will lead to murder. from Goodreads
It’s a gray, rainy day here, easy to cozy up for fall. Magpie Murders is a murder mystery wrapped in a murder mystery, perfect for the changing of the seasons. I’m told it’s also a miniseries on PBS Masterpiece.
Susan is a book editor and she’s just been given a book by her most famous author, only the last chapter is missing. When her author is also found dead she tries to track down the last chapter only to become convinced that her author, like the main detective in his novel, was also murdered.
I listened to this one and almost gave up on it because after the first hour I was still not invested with the myriad of characters. I’m glad I stuck with it because I ended up really liking both mysteries and moving between the two became easier the more I listened.
English mystery lovers will love it. I know there are more in this series about Susan Ryland, and I’m looking forward to checking them out.
This has been a very bookish week. It started with a Friends of the Library beard meeting. If you aren’t involved with your library Friends group (or they don’t have one) I encourage to check it out. We hosted our annual meeting event on Thursday night, a family poetry jam and it was so much fun.
On Wednesday I volunteered at the Cleveland Kids Book Bank with friends. A great nonprofit that takes used books in good condition and distributes them to the Cleveland area to schools or organizations that would like to send books home with kids who might not otherwise own books. We spent a few hours sorting.
I’ve been to library almost every day doing some prepping for our upcoming big fall book sale next week. After I get done with this post I’ll emailing all of the volunteers reminding them of their shifts. I have always loved library book sales and love coordinating these big ones. It takes a village for sure.
This week has been particularly bookish!
Posts you may have missed over the last few weeks…
The Paradise Problem by Christina Lauren. 4.25/5 stars. romance, 352 pages, 2024
I will be adding more Christina Lauren books to my TBR list. Fun and sexy with a bonafide hot multi millionaire as a fake husband. Sign me up (just don’t tell Jason). Did I totally buy the Cinderella-like transformation? No, but it was still fun.
Happy Place by Emily Henry. 4/5 stars, romance, 400 pages, 2023
The six friends meet once a year in Maine for a week at the cottage, but this year will be the last since the cottage has been sold. Harriet and Wyn are there, pretending to still be engaged, even though they broke up six months ago.
There’s more than just a broken romance. Friends who are family can break your heart just as easily and a week spent nursing lies and resentment can cause fireworks.
I’ve now read all five Emily Henry books. The few that I haven’t loved as much (still loved though) have had something in the end that felt unfinished. This felt a little rushed with some issues that needed more attention in the end, but I will still read everything she writes because she’s just that good.
5th book in the A Court of Thorns and Roses series. (technically book #4)
What a fun ride this series is. Adventure, love, magic, lots of magic, death, battles, friendship, family, wings, winnowing, and a large cast of characters. This last one was from only two perspectives, Nesta and Cassian. I know after 751 pages I’m supposed to like Nesta, but I’m still not her biggest fan 🤷🏻♀️ I don’t dislike her but she’s got a lot of sharp edges that are willfully sharpened to slice. She did have a nice story progression in this one, but every few chapters she kept finding new miraculous powers and it seemed a bit much.
On the Screen…
We watched the 6 episode miniseries on Netflix. The Perfect Couple was a frilly, fun whodunit. Great cast and a beautiful Nantucket setting.
We watched season 1 of The Boys on Amazon. What a crazy, messed up ride this show is! Superheroes among us, only idolized and accepted without a check on their powers.
Plans for the weekend
We’re headed to the Guardians baseball game this afternoon. The last time I attended a game they were still the Indians so I’m excited!
I read this book at the end of 2022 and was apparently so busy at the time that I didn’t write a review of any sort. On Goodreads I said, “Perfect book to end the year on a high note.” On Instagram I included it in a post of 5 star reads. I took my mom to see the movie last week and we both liked it. Yes, I know some about the controversies surrounded the film, but they didn’t ruin my enjoyment at all. I think it’s best knowing that while there is a love story there is also a more serious theme. I think it’s fantastic that young women have a story like this as a cautionary, yet hopeful, tale.
So, now you know that I liked them both. But which did I like better? Let’s find out!
I’ll try to keep it spoiler free but read at your own risk.
The Story/Plot
We begin with Lily ‘delivering’ her father’s eulogy. When she returns back to Boston she has a rooftop encounter with Ryle, a very attractive neurosurgeon. Lily opens up her own flower shop and, unaware of the connection, hires Ryle’s sister to work for her.
We also see flashbacks to her teen years in Maine. Her parents have a violent relationship. Lily befriends Atlas, a boy from school who’s been kicked out of his house.
So as the story moves forward I feel that they are both fairly true to each other. The book features Lily’s diaries written to Ellen DeGeneres as a way to move the story forward, the movie doesn’t. I think that was a missed opportunity to enrich the story.
Thumbs up – Book
The Visual
So, I loved seeing Lily’s flower shop come to life onscreen. But, spoiler alert, the hot neurosurgeon was also fun to see come to life onscreen. It was steamy in all the right places.
Thumbs up – Movie
Characters vs. Actors
I thought Blake Lively was a good Lily and Brandon Sklenar was a good Atlas. Isabela Ferrer was a fantastic young Lily. I thought Justin Baldoni shined as Ryle and Jenny Slate sparkled as Allysa.
Thumbs Up – Both/Neither. I’m calling it a draw
The Ending
Most movies muck things up by changing an ending too much. In this case there were a few details changed, but it mostly got it right. But I didn’t like them leaving out visitation issues near the end. It may be a small thing, but it still missed an opportunity to show the story more truthfully.
Thumbs Up – Book
And the winner is…the BOOK! This was a close call because I really liked them both.
Stacy's Books 