Catching Up, Pt. 2

Recent reads + unpopular opinions

Skipping the preamble today and jumping straight to the books!

Recent Five-Star Reads

[A big thank you to Doubleday, Riverhead, William Morrow, Knopf, LibroFM, and Netgalley for my free copies.]

📖 Shark Heart by Emily Habeck

*I would give this a million stars if I could.

After a drought of excellent books, a number of followers suggested Shark Heart as a potential five-star read, and wow, they were correct! I absolutely adored this one. The premise – a man begins to turn into a shark during his first year of marriage – sounds a little out there, but Habeck made it work. The ways she used this unusual concept to explore themes of grief, relationships, chronic illness, and memory were heart wrenching and deeply relatable. This will be a forever favorite.
|Buy via Bookshop.org|

If you’re still unsure, here are a few quotes to convince you give it a try:

“Through the music’s swells, they swayed, and they knew, and they held each other, and they knew, and they melted, and they knew, and they knew, and they knew: Everything would be different and difficult soon.”

“Wren saw now how passion was delicate and temporary, a visitor, a feeling that would come and go. Feelings fled under pressure; feelings did not light the darkness. What remained strong in the deep, the hard times, was love as an effort, a doing, a conscious act of will. Soulmates, like her and Lewis, were not theoretical and found. They were tangible, built.”

“Afterward, Wren realizes she herself is the mountain she’s been climbing all along.”

📖 Funny Story by Emily Henry

This was an absolute delight from start to finish (shocking, I know). As usual, her characters are well crafted (maybe my favorite yet?), the town is one I now want to move to, and the chemistry was palpable. This might be my favorite of hers so far, and solidified that reading them in print is the way to go for me (for some reason her books don’t work as well for me on audio). I know I don’t even need to tell you to read it because most of you probably already have, but if you like small-town, swoonworthy romances, this is it.
|Buy via Bookshop.org|

📖/🎧 Good Material by Dolly Alderton

Even though this was recommended to me multiple times, I kept putting it off. Probably because I LIKED Ghosts but I didn't love it like many seemed to. Plus, what are the odds I'd like a male perspective on a similar subject more than a female’s? Apparently odds are good because I absolutely adored this. While cringey at times, Andy's experience over the six months after his girlfriend dumps him feels highly realistic (I mean, we've all been there). And I loved that the characters were in their mid-30s rather than 20s like many breakup stories are. The end is a bit controversial, but for me the last 50 pages solidified Good Material as a five-star read. I love love loved it. (I alternated print and audio, which was the way to go because the Irish narrator was perfection and there was lots I underlined.) For fans of Normal People by Sally Rooney and Writers and Lovers by Lily King.
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📖/🎧 The Last Animal by Ramona Ausubel

This novel left me a little conflicted about how I felt by the final page. Ausubel’s prose is captivating, drawing readers into a world where humanity's relationship with the natural world is deeply explored. The unique perspectives on themes of extinction, loss, and resilience, crafting deeply human characters really drove the story forward. But it was the mother/daughter/sister relationships that kept me invested; Ausubel has a talent for exploring the dynamics within these often complicated bonds. However, it occasionally felt disjointed, with certain plotlines feeling underdeveloped and the pacing a bit off. This is a poignant tribute to the resilience of familial love and the enduring power of human connection, with an important tie to our impact on the world we live in. Would pair well with Disappearing Earth by Julia Phillips.
|Buy via Bookshop.org|

📖 I Hope This Finds You Well by Natalie Sue

I Hope This Finds You Well exceeded my expectations in every way. What I expected was a light comedy, similar to “The Office” but what Sue gave us is so much more. Her characters quirky and relatable, and the story is heartfelt and smart. This was a compassionate, touching gem of a novel that I was unable to put down. For fans of Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine, All the Lonely People, and “Fleabag”. A contender for one of my favorite books of the year. [Free copy thanks to William Morrow.]
|Buy via Bookshop.org|

Leave a comment to let me know your most recent five-star reads!

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Unpopular Opinions

While these books weren’t for me, they might be for you!

🎧 Listen for the Lie by Amy Tintera

I'm a sucker for a thriller on audio, especially one about a woman coming back to her hometown after years of being gone – in this one, Lucy left after being accused of murdering her best friend. January LaVoy and Will Damron are two of my favorite narrators, so I knew the audio of this would be good. And it was! Like I do with most thrillers on audio, I blew through it in 24 hours. I feel for thriller writers these days because I think it's increasingly harder to surprise the reader, especially one who reads a lot of the genre. And so while I didn't guess how this one would turn out, it somehow still wasn't terribly satisfying. It felt a little predictable,a little unrealistic, and a little out of left field. This one has gotten a lot of buzz but it just wasn’t for me.

📖/🎧 The Husbands by Holly Gramazio

This premise sounded SO interesting, and it was in the beginning. But about halfway through I got bored and started wondering what the point of it was – was she going to find a husband she wanted to keep? Will we find out why husbands were coming out of the attic? And I just no longer cared, so I set this down at 50%. But once it was picked for Read With Jenna, I decided to finish it on audio. My overall feeling was still very meh, and I’m still not quite sure I understand what all the hype was about. If it had been about 100 pages shorter and with about 50 fewer husbands, that might have helped. But it dragged on and on and the ending still had be asking, “what was the point?”

📖 All Fours by Miranda July

Oh gosh, where to start. The premise of this one grabbed me immediately, especially as I am a woman about to turn 40 – I'm all for books that feature women in midlife having a period of self (re)discovery. Unfortunately, this one just wasn't for me. I don't think of myself as prudish, but so much of the main character's thoughts were taken up by explicit sexual desires (that I found very unsexy) that I was unable to relate to, and at times found distasteful. I liked that it was a story immersed in female-centric desires, but that alone wasn't enough for me so I put it down at 50%. This will definitely be a polarizing book and if you read it, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

And that’s it! Check your inbox tomorrow for the upcoming releases I’m excited about!