Stephany Writes

Categories: Books

What I’m Reading (7.1.19)

Happy Monday and happy JULY. (Whaaaat?!) I have a three-day workweek and then a five-day weekend, so I am feeling good. I did not mean to go MIA from my blog last week, but I just couldn’t find the time to write. Ah, well. It happens!

Even in the midst of my busy week, I still found lots of time to read! I finished four books last week, woop! I also abandoned not one but two books this week:

Here are the reviews for the books I did finish:

Daisy Jones & the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid (★★★★★)

I was worried I wasn’t going to like this book, even though it’s gotten rave reviews from many of my trusted sources. The 70s music scene of “sex, drugs, and rock and roll” isn’t really my thing, so I didn’t know if it would all feel a bit too much. However, when I went to Taylor Jenkins Reid’s author signing for this book, I got to hear her process of writing. I listened as she admitted she doesn’t know much about using drugs or music in general, and that made me more excited to read it because she was coming to this book from a truly honest place. And, you guys, this book is so good. I’m not even much of a music fan and I was completely captivated by the scenes of the band writing and performing. As I was reading the book, I wanted to download all of their music on Spotify. It’s a phenomenal story, written as an oral history, and definitely one of my favorite books of the year. I’m planning on rereading this book by listening to the audiobook because I hear it’s an incredible listening experience.

Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston (★★★★★)

The book was so delightful and worth every minute I spent with it. It follows the First Son of the United States falling in love with the Prince of England, and what could be better than that? The chemistry between Alex and Henry crackled on the pages and I found myself so completely charmed by them and their love story. I also loved this parallel universe that McQuiston created, in which the president is a woman (and a Democrat). The story is set during 2020, as the president is running for her second term, and just… how I wish this was our reality. Oof. It was a lovely story in all respects, although I should offer a warning that the sex scenes get a bit steamy. However, there aren’t a lot of them and you can easily skim over them. I would definitely recommend this book if you’re looking for an escape and just want to read a sweet, fun romance.

The Wicked Will Rise by Danielle Paige (★★★☆☆)

This book continues the story of Amy Gunn and her twisted journey in Oz. The first book ended on a cliffhanger and the second book jumped right into the action with very little explanation, so I’m glad I read these books back-to-back. While I didn’t find the second book as compelling as the first – and there were many more high fantasy elements that were hard to wrap my mind around – I still enjoyed my reading (er, listening) experience. Throughout the novel, Amy has to fight against her instinct for evil and I really loved the growth of her character from the first novel to this one. Excited to dive into the next one soon!

Lucky in Love by Jill Shalvis (★★★★☆)

Another winner from my tried-and-true romance author! This is the fourth novel in Shalvis’s Lucky Harbor series, following the love story of ER nurse Mallory and a character who made frequent appearances in the previous novels under the moniker Mysterious Cute Guy. Nobody really knows who he is or why he’s in Lucky Harbor, but Mallory and MCG (whose real name is Ty) make a connection during a snowstorm that grows deeper the more time they spend together. It was a sweet story that I flew through over the weekend.

I’m currently reading…

> Miracle Creek by Angie Kim, on audio. I’m so excited to dive into this novel that has gotten rave reviews from so many people.

> All We Ever Wanted by Emily Giffin. I recently picked up this novel at my library’s book sale, not realizing it was Giffin’s latest and I had yet to read it! I’m only about a chapter in so far.

> Once Ghosted, Twice Shy by Alyssa Cole. This quick novella is a F/F romance, a subgenre I’ve never read somehow. Looking forward to diving in this week.

What are you reading?

Categories: Books

What I’m Reading (6.24.19)

Happy Monday! I had a really busy week and equally busy weekend, and I was worried I wouldn’t finish any books to write this post. Thank God for audiobooks. 🙂 I finished Dorothy Must Die, my book club’s June selection, earlier in the week but that’s it! Then again, I finished four books last week so it makes sense that this week would be quieter on the reading front.

Here’s my one review, as well as details about what I’m reading now:

Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige (★★★★☆)

Fantasy isn’t a genre I typically find myself reading, so I was excited to pick up this novel when my book club picked it for our June read. It’s about a girl named Amy who finds herself in Oz (yes, that Oz), but this city is not the Oz she’s read about in books. Instead, it’s ruled by an evil Dorothy, the yellow brick road is crumbling, and there are angry witches and wizards intent on killing Dorothy. It’s a fascinating premise, and I thoroughly enjoyed this world the author created. I listened to the audiobook version (which has a fantastic narrator) and was gripped from beginning to end. I immediately downloaded the second book in the series to listen to when I finished it. It ended on such a cliffhanger – how could I not?!

What I’m reading this week…

> Daisy Jones and the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid. I have about 100 pages left in this novel and I am loving it. I can’t get over how vivid and descriptive this book is when it’s written as an oral history! Just fantastic.

> Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston. I’m nearly finished with this book, too, and I’m also loving it so much. My only gripe right now is how long the chapters are, which is probably more of a personal quirk.

> The Wicked Will Rise by Danielle Paige, on audio. This is the second book in the Dorothy Must Die series that I mentioned above. I’m really excited to dive back into Oz and find out what happens next!

> As Long As We Both Shall Live by JoAnn Chaney. I heard about this novel on the All the Books! podcast and the premise sounds really intriguing. Hopefully, it lives up to the hype!

What are you reading?

Categories: Books

What I’m Reading (6.10.19)

Happy Monday! I have a really busy week and weekend ahead of me (plans almost every night, ahh), so I’m trying to prepare myself. Ideally, I like to only have plans once during the workweek and once or twice during the weekend but every so often, schedules align so that everything happens in one week! Thankfully, I had a very low-key weekend so there’s that.

Let’s dive into the books I finished last week. There were three and I liked all of them:

The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker (★★★★☆)

A girl at a college in Southern California falls asleep… and stays asleep. For days and days and days. Nobody can rouse her. And then… another girl falls asleep and then another… until it’s become an epidemic. The local hospital is filled with sleeping patients, people in town are terrified that they’re going to be next. As the weeks go by and more people succumb to this contagion, the town is put on lockdown as doctors try to figure out what this is and why it’s happening. Throughout the story, we follow a handful of people: the college freshmen whose dorm saw the first cases of the disease, a man and his two young daughters, a young couple with a newborn, a college professor. I actually didn’t have too much difficulty keeping all the storylines straight, probably because each one was so different from the other, and I really loved Walker’s writing style and the way she really made you understand how pervasive hysteria can be.

Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams (★★★★☆)

Oh man, I both loved and was frustrated by this novel. Queenie is a 25-year-old black woman living in London who is dealing with a messy breakup with her boyfriend of three years. She’s living in a tiny flat with two other roommates, sleeping with men who aren’t good for her, and constantly wondering what more she could be doing with her life. Early reviews have said this book is like a mash-up of Bridget Jones’s Diary and Americanah and I wholly agree with that comparison. Queenie is such a well-written, complex character – someone who makes so many bad decisions that frustrated me, but even so, I was still rooting for her. Ultimately, I think this story is about mental health in the black community: what it looks like and how it’s evolving. This book was smart, funny, and refreshing, and the growth of Queenie from the beginning to the end of this novel was lovely to witness.

Jordan Reclaimed by Scarlett Cole (★★★☆☆)

For the most part, I really loved this novel. Jordan is in a successful heavy metal band called Preload, which is made up of the guys he met in a group home as a foster kid. All of the men have traumatic childhoods, and Jordan’s involves being locked in an attic for years as a child. It’s horrific to think of a young child suffering such abuse, and Jordan bears many scars from it to this day. And then he meets Lexi, a principal ballerina for the National Ballet of Canada. Lexi is beautiful and sweet and a breath of fresh air for Jordan, and they have a connection toward one another that cannot be denied, even though Jordan has a hard time believing someone as perfect as Lexi could have use for someone like him. However, Lexi is dealing with her own demons, such as an eating disorder and a volatile relationship with her father. I found Jordan and Lexi’s love story to be sweet and original and fun to read, but I was rather unimpressed with the way the author handled Lexi’s eating disorder and the way it was all wrapped up. It felt irresponsible to me.

What I’m reading this week…

> Bury Your Dead by Louise Penny. This is the sixth book in the Chief Inspector Armand Gamache series. I’m slowly making my way through the series, reading maybe one book a quarter. The ending of the last book was incredibly unsettling so I’m hoping the same does not hold true for this one.

> An Unconditional Freedom by Alyssa Cole. This book wraps up Cole’s The Loyal League historical romance series. These books are actually ones I would recommend to non-romance readers since they aren’t too explicit with the romance and provide a look into the Civil War era from the perspective of freed slaves, so they’re really interesting!

> Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige, on audio. This is my book club’s June selection from our resident sci-fi/fantasy lover. It’s completely out of the realm of what I normally read, but the premise sounds GREAT so I’m excited to start listening to it this week.

What are you reading this week?

Categories: Books

What I’m Reading (6.3.19)

Happy Monday! It’s hard to believe we’re already in June and the summer months are upon us. 2019 is just flying by, isn’t it?

I thought I would jump right back into my “What I’m Reading” posts without recapping the 16 books I read between my last reading post and this one. (That would be insane, haha.) So let’s get into it with the books I finished last week:

How Not to Die Alone by Richard Roper (★★★★☆)

For the first 60% of this novel, I was veering between a 2 and 3 star rating. There just wasn’t a lot happening and I wasn’t sure of the point. But oh. It turned itself around quickly and when I finished it, I closed the book, hugged it to my chest, and said to my cats, “That was a really great book!” And it was. Andrew is living a lie, one he accidentally told during his job interview four years ago. Even though he’s single and lives alone in a tiny flat, everyone at work thinks he has a wife of many years and two darling children. Then, a woman named Peggy is hired and Andrew starts working closely with her and as a friendship develops, he realizes he needs to come clean about the truth of his life. The book definitely has Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine vibes, so if you loved that novel, add this one to your list!

How to Find Love in a Bookshop by Veronica Henry (★★☆☆☆)

Oy. Unpopular opinion alert! I did not love this book, or even really like it. I thought it would be a fun, romantic read but it was actually really, really sad and a little frustrating at times. Emilia is devastated when her beloved father passes away and in the midst of her grief, she is also put in charge of his bookshop, Nightingale Books. Unbeknownst to her, the bookshop is in serious trouble and she’s going to need to do some creative marketing to get it back on its feet. The novel is interspersed with stories about other people who love Nightingale Books – like Thomasina, a single woman who is a chef and loves coming to the bookshop for cookery titles. The stories are sweet but there were too many characters and too many plotlines to keep track of. I think the novel would have worked better as a short story collection because the back-and-forth between characters and plots was disjointed and hard to follow at times.

Pretty Face by Lucy Parker (★★★★★)

Now let’s talk about a romance that did work. Oh, Lucy Parker. She has now become my #1 favorite romance novelist. Hands down. I loved this romance so much and had the biggest book hangover when I finished it – which very rarely happens for me when it comes to romances! Luc is directing a play in a legendary West End theater and Lily is cast in one of the lead female roles, which is just the break she’s been waiting for. What she didn’t expect was to fall head over heels for the director and have to deal with the media backlash that entails. It’s a sweet story with witty dialogue, a super sexy male lead, and a seriously fun female protagonist. Everyone needs to read Lucy Parker books!

I’m currently reading…

The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker, on audio. I have an hour left in the audiobook, so I should finish it on my morning commute tomorrow. I hear the ending is frustrating, though, so I’m preparing myself!

Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams. I picked this novel from Book of the Month some months ago and finally plucked it off my TBR bookshelf to read. I’m 100 pages in currently and it’s been such a delightful read so far.

What are you currently reading?

Categories: Books

What I’m Reading (4.22.19)

Happy Monday! I’ll be off to Ireland this time next week – ahhh! I am so excited and can’t believe our trip is finally here. A quick programming note, this will likely be my last What I’m Reading post until June. I’ll be taking the next two weeks off blogging as I travel and then will be spending a few weeks recapping my trip. But I plan to write a post reviewing some of my recent favorite reads in late May, so be on the lookout for that!

For now, let’s review the books I finished last week:

Hot Asset by Lauren Layne (★★★★☆)

This was a fun romance, although it made me extremely anxious at times. The novel is about Lara, who is an SEC investigator, and Ian, who is an investment broker and learns that he’s being investigated for insider trading (and this is after he hits on the woman who’s investigating him). Such an interesting premise, but I was so anxious that Ian would be arrested, even though I was positive he was innocent. I was also curious as to how the author would navigate the potential moral/legal complications of Lara and Ian being in a relationship since she was investigating him. Thankfully, it all turned out well in the end (not a spoiler; this is a romance, of course, it turns out well in the end!), although I found the reason why Ian was being investigated fairly hard to believe, but alas. Suspension of disbelief and all that.

The Gifts of Imperfection by Brené Brown (★★★★☆)

In The Gifts of Imperfection, Brown delves into her research about shame and vulnerability, and how to stop trying to live up to this ideal of being what we think people want. Part of that acceptance is honing in on our faults, our mistakes, and our perfectionist tendencies, and not beating ourselves up for any of it. One of the questions she asked early on in the book that really got the wheels spinning for me was this: “What’s the most courageous thing you could do for yourself when you feel small and hurt?” I’m a sensitive person, so feeling small and hurt is basically a daily occurrence for me. It’s made me sit back, recognize what I actually do when I feel hurt and vulnerable and ashamed, and how to have a healthier approach to it. Anyway, this book was great and I highly recommend it!

I’m currently reading…

> Echo by Pam Muñoz Ryan, on audio. This novel is so fantastic and listening to it was the right call. Music plays a big role in the book so they play music throughout the novel, and it adds something really special to the reading experience. Plus, the narrators are phenomenal. 

> So Over You by Kate Meader. I’m so close to finishing this hockey romance! I don’t know how I feel about the hero. There’s something about him that’s rubbing me the wrong way, so I hope he redeems himself by the end.

> All Fall Down by Jennifer Weiner. I am really enjoying this novel (I’m about 150 pages in). It’s about a woman who becomes addicted to painkillers in order to deal with her life (difficult daughter, absent husband, father with Alzheimer’s), and explores how pervasive addiction can be.

What are you reading?