emma's bookshelf: read en-US Thu, 07 Aug 2025 12:22:26 -0700 60 emma's bookshelf: read 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Just Mercy 20342617
Bryan Stevenson was a young lawyer when he founded the Equal Justice Initiative, a nonprofit law office in Montgomery, Alabama, dedicated to defending the poor, the incarcerated, and the wrongly condemned.

Just Mercy tells the story of EJI, from the early days with a small staff facing the nation’s highest death sentencing and execution rates, through a successful campaign to challenge the cruel practice of sentencing children to die in prison, to revolutionary projects designed to confront Americans with our history of racial injustice.

One of EJI’s first clients was Walter McMillian, a young Black man who was sentenced to die for the murder of a young white woman that he didn’t commit. The case exemplifies how the death penalty in America is a direct descendant of lynching — a system that treats the rich and guilty better than the poor and innocent.]]> 336 Bryan Stevenson emma 5
this was also my first-ever college assignment, and it set the stage for my entire post-mandatory education, and it was a blessing and a gift.

if all that didn't convince you of this book's must-read status, i don't know what to tell you.

i have never forgotten it, and i never will.

part of a series i'm doing in which i review books i read a long time ago and embarrass myself on multiple levels in the process]]> 4.62 2014 Just Mercy
author: Bryan Stevenson
name: emma
average rating: 4.62
book published: 2014
rating: 5
read at: 2016/08/02
date added: 2025/08/07
shelves: owned, nonfiction, non-ya, favorites-2016, recommend, slump-worthy, school, 5-stars, memoir, authors-of-color, reviewed, favorites
review:
this is a compelling, important, and well-written story. it is my go-to recommendation for writing on race, on the justice system, on systemic bigotry, and on the death penalty. i read this when i was somewhat undecided on the latter, and it set me on a decidedly anti- path. i have never looked back or doubted it. the equal justice initiative is still my go-to charity.

this was also my first-ever college assignment, and it set the stage for my entire post-mandatory education, and it was a blessing and a gift.

if all that didn't convince you of this book's must-read status, i don't know what to tell you.

i have never forgotten it, and i never will.

part of a series i'm doing in which i review books i read a long time ago and embarrass myself on multiple levels in the process
]]> The Age of Innocence 58046803
Newland Archer, an eligible young man of the establishment is about to announce his engagement to May Welland, a pretty ingénue, when May's cousin, Countess Olenska, is introduced into their circle. The Countess brings with her an aura of European sophistication and a hint of scandal, having left her husband and claimed her independence.

Her sorrowful eyes, her tragic worldliness and her air of unapproachability attract the sensitive Newland and, almost against their will, a passionate bond develops between them. But Archer's life has no place for passion and, with society on the side of May and all she stands for, he finds himself drawn into a bitter conflict between love and duty.]]> 333 Edith Wharton emma 0
and welcome to another installment of project long classics, in which i find a classic, make a horrible pun, and read it over the course of a month.

i've decided all the cool girls read wharton, and i need to be a cool girl. so here we are.


CHAPTER ONE
hot girls always fall in love with opera. first julia roberts in pretty woman, now this...who wants to support my fancy-box-seats-where-they-give-you-the-little-glasses gofundme.


CHAPTER TWO
a hot girl who returns to society at the opera wearing too shoulder-baring of an outfit and making misplaced flippant comments...i only want to be her more and more.


CHAPTER THREE
congratulations to archer (a guy) on his newly announced fiancédom. i liked my declaration better, but i guess immediately post-opera works too.


CHAPTER FOUR
fun to read a book from old times in which saying "thank god i'm a new yorker" means "i'm grateful i'm from a buttoned-up society with morals and rules." can you imagine the reaction if you tried that in a crowd of manhattanites these days.


CHAPTER FIVE
newland just got mad at a dinner party because women should be allowed to divorce their horrible rich noble husbands and take up with the secretary. ally!


CHAPTER SIX
i regret to inform you that our guy newland has no idea what he's getting himself into with this whole marriage thing.


CHAPTER SEVEN
i love a scheme.]]> 4.17 1920 The Age of Innocence
author: Edith Wharton
name: emma
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1920
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/07
shelves: non-ya, classics, library, currently-reading, project-long-classics
review:
welcome to...THE AUGUST OF INNOCENCE.

and welcome to another installment of project long classics, in which i find a classic, make a horrible pun, and read it over the course of a month.

i've decided all the cool girls read wharton, and i need to be a cool girl. so here we are.


CHAPTER ONE
hot girls always fall in love with opera. first julia roberts in pretty woman, now this...who wants to support my fancy-box-seats-where-they-give-you-the-little-glasses gofundme.


CHAPTER TWO
a hot girl who returns to society at the opera wearing too shoulder-baring of an outfit and making misplaced flippant comments...i only want to be her more and more.


CHAPTER THREE
congratulations to archer (a guy) on his newly announced fiancédom. i liked my declaration better, but i guess immediately post-opera works too.


CHAPTER FOUR
fun to read a book from old times in which saying "thank god i'm a new yorker" means "i'm grateful i'm from a buttoned-up society with morals and rules." can you imagine the reaction if you tried that in a crowd of manhattanites these days.


CHAPTER FIVE
newland just got mad at a dinner party because women should be allowed to divorce their horrible rich noble husbands and take up with the secretary. ally!


CHAPTER SIX
i regret to inform you that our guy newland has no idea what he's getting himself into with this whole marriage thing.


CHAPTER SEVEN
i love a scheme.
]]> Patricia Wants to Cuddle 59093587 The contestants of a reality television dating show compete for love—and their lives—in this pulse-pounding and viciously funny fiction debut from the GLAAD Award-winning author of Real Queer America.

When the final four women in competition for an aloof, if somewhat sleazy, bachelor's heart arrive on a mysterious island in the Pacific Northwest, they mentally prepare themselves for another week of extreme sleep deprivation, invasive interviews, and of course, the salacious drama that viewers nationwide tune in to eagerly devour. Each woman came on 'The Catch' for her own reasons—brand sponsorships, followers, and yes, even love—and they've all got their eyes steadfastly trained on their respective prizes.

Enter Patricia, a temperamental, but woefully misunderstood local, living alone in the dark, verdant woods and desperate to forge a connection of her own. As the contestants perform for the cameras that surround them, Patricia watches from her place in the shadows, a queer specter haunting the bombastic display of heterosexuality before her. But when the cast and crew at last make her acquaintance atop the island's tallest and most desolate peak, they soon realize that if they're to have any hope of making it to the next Elimination Event, they'll first have to survive the night.

A whirlwind romp careening toward a last-girl-standing conclusion and a scathing indictment of contemporary American media culture, Patricia Wants to Cuddle is also a love story: between star-crossed lesbians who rise above their intolerant town, a deeply ambivalent woman and her budding self-actualization, and a chosen family of misfit islanders forging community against all odds.]]> 256 Samantha Allen 163893004X emma 3
and this book was weird, but...not weird enough for me.



90% of it is, unfortunately, boring cast members on a bachelorette-like show having boring crises of various degrees of existentialism.

not a lot of funny dialogue.

no one to really remember.

and not nearly enough violent forest creatures.

the end was fun, but it didn't make up for how disappointed i was by most of this. i thought it'd be stranger, sillier, more memorable!

oh well.

bottom line: i should've known this synopsis was too much to live up to.]]> 3.50 2022 Patricia Wants to Cuddle
author: Samantha Allen
name: emma
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2025/05/22
date added: 2025/08/07
shelves: lgbt-plus, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, non-ya, 3-stars, eh, owned, reviewed
review:
i want to read everything that's like nothing i've ever read.

and this book was weird, but...not weird enough for me.



90% of it is, unfortunately, boring cast members on a bachelorette-like show having boring crises of various degrees of existentialism.

not a lot of funny dialogue.

no one to really remember.

and not nearly enough violent forest creatures.

the end was fun, but it didn't make up for how disappointed i was by most of this. i thought it'd be stranger, sillier, more memorable!

oh well.

bottom line: i should've known this synopsis was too much to live up to.
]]> Madwoman 204593567 A gripping story of motherhood and motherloss and the brutal, mighty things women do to keep themselves and each other alive, MADWOMAN marks the arrival of a major fiction talent.

The world is not made for mothers.
Yet mothers made the world…

Clove has gone to extremes to keep her past a secret. Thanks to her lies, she’s landed the life of her dreams, complete with a safe husband and two adoring children who will never know the terror that was routine in her own childhood. If her buried anxiety threatens to breach the surface, Clove (if that is really her name) focuses on finding the right supplement, the right gratitude meditation. 

But when she receives a letter from a women’s prison in California, her past comes screeching into the present, entangling her in a dangerous game with memory and the people she thought she had outrun. As we race between her precarious present-day life in Portland, Oregon and her childhood in a Waikiki high-rise with her mother and father, Clove is forced to finally unravel the defining day of her life. How did she survive that day, and what will it take to end the cycle of violence? Will the truth undo her, or could it ultimately save her?]]> 336 Chelsea Bieker 0316573299 emma 3
reading this book felt like itching a mosquito bite.

you know what's going to happen, and you're not excited about that outcome, but at the same time it's the only thing that staves off the ever-present itching that would otherwise drive you insane.

in other words, it was annoying and predictable, but i enjoyed the process anyway.

bottom line: a good beach read type book for people who hate gwyneth paltrow.

(3.5 / rthanks to the publisher for the copy)]]> 3.69 2024 Madwoman
author: Chelsea Bieker
name: emma
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/12/13
date added: 2025/08/07
shelves: owned, non-ya, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, from-publisher-author, arc, 3-and-a-half-stars, unpopular-opinion, recommend, reviewed
review:
it's so important to see yourself represented on page

reading this book felt like itching a mosquito bite.

you know what's going to happen, and you're not excited about that outcome, but at the same time it's the only thing that staves off the ever-present itching that would otherwise drive you insane.

in other words, it was annoying and predictable, but i enjoyed the process anyway.

bottom line: a good beach read type book for people who hate gwyneth paltrow.

(3.5 / rthanks to the publisher for the copy)
]]> <![CDATA[If You're Seeing This, It's Meant for You]]> 223120442 Fates collide after a tarot influencer disappears from a decaying Hollywood mansion in this unnerving gothic mystery and audacious social comedy from the acclaimed author of Self Care.

After her boyfriend dumps her in a Reddit post, unemployed thirty-nine-year-old Dayna accepts an unusual opportunity from a man she stopped speaking to twenty years If Dayna can help Craig transform his crumbling mansion into a successful hype house of influencers, he can restore his birthright to its former glory, and she can bring her career back from the dead.

But missing from the mansion is Becca, an enigmatic tarot card reader who built a rabid fandom with her cryptic, soul-touching videos . . .  and then vanished. With nineteen-year-old Olivia, the newest member of the hype house (and one of Becca’s biggest fans), Dayna begins to build a social media campaign around Becca’s disappearance that will catapult the creators to new heights of success. Too bad Craig forbids Dayna from pursuing the mystery at its heart.

As Olivia searches for traces of Becca in a labyrinthine house that seems intent on hiding its secrets, and Dayna becomes entangled with both Craig and Jake, the resident heartthrob and the last person to see Becca, the two women make a shocking discovery that will upend everything.

The You may think you’re inhabiting it, but is it really inhabiting you? ]]> 320 Leigh Stein 0593983645 emma 0 3.82 2025 If You're Seeing This, It's Meant for You
author: Leigh Stein
name: emma
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/07
shelves: to-read, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, owned, non-ya, literary-fiction, from-publisher-author, arc, mystery-thriller-horror-etc
review:
i guess reading this book is my destiny then
]]> <![CDATA[Where Are You Really From: Stories]]> 221739723 *A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF 2025 BY VULTURE, LITHUB, THE MILLIONS, THE OC REGISTER AND MORE*

"Scintillating . . . These expressive and atmospheric tales mesmerize.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Chou is gifted at storytelling with a surrealistic bent . . . Sharp storytelling that bends and blurs genre expectations.” —Kirkus (starred review)

From the critically-acclaimed author of Disorientation, a multi-genre story collection that explores the limits and possibilities of storytelling

A mail order bride from Taiwan is packed up in a cardboard box and sent via express shipping to California, where her much older husband awaits her. Two teenage girls meticulously plan how to kill and cook their downstairs neighbor. An American au pair moves to Paris to find herself, only to find her actual French doppelgänger. A father reunites with his estranged daughter in unusual circumstances: as a background actor on the set of her film. A writer’s affair with a married artist tests the line between fact and fiction, self-victimization and the victimization of others.

In these six singular stories and a novella that pivot from the terrible to the beautiful to the surreal, Elaine Hsieh Chou confronts the slipperiness of truth in storytelling. With razor-sharp precision and psychological acuity, she peels back the tales we tell ourselves to peer beneath them: at our treacherous desires, our self-deceptions and our capacity for cruelty, both to ourselves and each other. Expansive and provocative, Where Are You Really From is a visionary achievement.]]> 350 Elaine Hsieh Chou 059329839X emma 0
(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 4.26 2025 Where Are You Really From: Stories
author: Elaine Hsieh Chou
name: emma
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/07
shelves: tbr-arc, tbr-owned, literary-fiction, non-ya, diverse, arc, authors-of-color, currently-reading
review:
all the authors i like should drop short story collections

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Talking at Night 62583508
They’re opposites in every way. She overthinks everything; he is her twin brother’s wild and unpredictable friend. But over secret walks home and late-night phone calls, they become closer—destined to be one another’s great love story.

Until, one day, tragedy strikes, and their future together is shattered.

But as the years roll on, Will and Rosie can’t help but find their way back to each other. Time and again, they come close to rekindling what might have been.

What do you do when the one person you should forget is the one you just can’t let go?]]> 400 Claire Daverley 0593653483 emma 2
honestly, though...i love rooney so much that i never understood the complaints about her books.

the only way this one reminded me of her is that now i do.

(review to come)]]> 3.90 2023 Talking at Night
author: Claire Daverley
name: emma
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2023
rating: 2
read at: 2025/08/06
date added: 2025/08/06
shelves: library, literary-fiction, non-ya, 2-and-a-half-stars, to-review, unpopular-opinion, eh
review:
constantly chasing sally rooney comparisons.

honestly, though...i love rooney so much that i never understood the complaints about her books.

the only way this one reminded me of her is that now i do.

(review to come)
]]> The Road Through the Wall 17349744
Exposing the murderous cruelty of children, and the blindness and selfishness of adults, Shirley Jackson reveals the ugly truth behind a 'perfect' world.]]> 194 Shirley Jackson emma 3
much of the delight in shirley jackson is the way she sees right through the world, to a creepy core few of us can perceive. in her books, she holds all of these cards, slowly granting the reader one strange and unexplained card at the time until, in the climax, she drops them all.

it seems like jackson has a huge hand in this book, but she never quite let the reader see it.

90% of this book is made up of almost vignettes, moments in the lives of a number of households living on one street in california. there are ominous-feeling moments to be sure (no one writes children like shirley jackson), but they never seem to build on each other.

although maybe i just missed something. if there are roughly 80 characters and all of them have similar names (hallie and harriet, marilyn and mary), there's not a snowball's chance in hell i'm going to keep track of them.

bottom line: even shirley jackson's meh is good to me.

3.5]]> 3.53 1948 The Road Through the Wall
author: Shirley Jackson
name: emma
average rating: 3.53
book published: 1948
rating: 3
read at: 2024/12/09
date added: 2025/08/06
shelves: non-ya, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, classics, owned, 3-and-a-half-stars, recommend, reviewed
review:
one of history's scariest writers, shirley jackson, writing about one of the world's scariest subjects: children.

much of the delight in shirley jackson is the way she sees right through the world, to a creepy core few of us can perceive. in her books, she holds all of these cards, slowly granting the reader one strange and unexplained card at the time until, in the climax, she drops them all.

it seems like jackson has a huge hand in this book, but she never quite let the reader see it.

90% of this book is made up of almost vignettes, moments in the lives of a number of households living on one street in california. there are ominous-feeling moments to be sure (no one writes children like shirley jackson), but they never seem to build on each other.

although maybe i just missed something. if there are roughly 80 characters and all of them have similar names (hallie and harriet, marilyn and mary), there's not a snowball's chance in hell i'm going to keep track of them.

bottom line: even shirley jackson's meh is good to me.

3.5
]]> My Name Is Emilia del Valle 217263798 In this spellbinding historical novel from the New York Times bestselling author of A Long Petal of the Sea and The Wind Knows My Name, a young writer journeys to South America to uncover the truth about her father—and herself.

In San Francisco 1866, an Irish nun, left pregnant and abandoned following a torrid relationship with a Chilean aristocrat, gives birth to a daughter named Emilia Del Valle. Raised by a loving stepfather, Emilia grows into an independent thinker and a self-sufficient young woman.

To pursue her passion for writing, she is willing to defy societal norms. At the age of sixteen, she begins to publish pulp fiction under a man’s pen name. When these fictional worlds can't contain her sense of adventure any longer, she turns to journalism, convincing an editor at the San Francisco Examiner to hire her. There she is paired with another talented reporter, Eric Whelan.

As she proves herself, her restlessness returns, until an opportunity arises to cover a brewing civil war in Chile. She seizes it, along with Eric, and while there, begins to uncover the truth about her father and the country that represents her roots. But as the war escalates, Emilia finds herself in danger and at a crossroads, questioning both her identity and her destiny.

A riveting tale of self-discovery and love from one of the most masterful storytellers of our time, My Name is Emilia del Valle introduces a character who will never let hold of your heart.]]> 289 Isabel Allende 0593975103 emma 3
i probably shouldn't have.

the History aspect of this was cool, but i think this would have been better as a young adult book.

if that were the case, i wouldn't have had to read these tough sex scenes, and the romance would have been glossed over, and the focus could have been more on the empowering nature of a female journalist in the 19th century, and i may have been able to ignore the lack of full characterization here.

in other words it would've solved all my problems.

i liked this at first, but after a while emilia's belief that she's always right got on my nerves. i felt bad for her mom, who has been through a lot more than emilia has and yet still has to deal with her condescendingly forgiving the villains of her life on her behalf. i hated reading about her stupid biological dad, when her stepdad is perfect. and i was most irritated of all by the unnecessary, sudden romance thrown in.

it also just kept...going...

bottom line: always trust your gut.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 4.22 2025 My Name Is Emilia del Valle
author: Isabel Allende
name: emma
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/05/21
date added: 2025/08/06
shelves: authors-of-color, arc, diverse, from-publisher-author, non-ya, historical, 2-and-a-half-stars, unpopular-opinion, eh, reviewed
review:
i came across this book 3 times, and each time i told myself it does not sound like my cup of tea. and then the 4th time i picked it up anyway.

i probably shouldn't have.

the History aspect of this was cool, but i think this would have been better as a young adult book.

if that were the case, i wouldn't have had to read these tough sex scenes, and the romance would have been glossed over, and the focus could have been more on the empowering nature of a female journalist in the 19th century, and i may have been able to ignore the lack of full characterization here.

in other words it would've solved all my problems.

i liked this at first, but after a while emilia's belief that she's always right got on my nerves. i felt bad for her mom, who has been through a lot more than emilia has and yet still has to deal with her condescendingly forgiving the villains of her life on her behalf. i hated reading about her stupid biological dad, when her stepdad is perfect. and i was most irritated of all by the unnecessary, sudden romance thrown in.

it also just kept...going...

bottom line: always trust your gut.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Mother Mary Comes to Me 224004055 A raw and deeply moving memoir from the legendary author of The God of Small Things and The Ministry of Utmost Happiness that traces the complex relationship with her mother, Mary Roy, a fierce and formidable force who shaped Arundhati’s life both as a woman and a writer.

Mother Mary Comes to Me, Arundhati Roy’s first work of memoir, is a soaring account, both intimate and inspirational, of how the author became the person and the writer she is, shaped by circumstance, but above all by her complex relationship to the extraordinary, singular mother she describes as “my shelter and my storm.”

“Heart-smashed” by her mother Mary’s death in September 2022 yet puzzled and “more than a little ashamed” by the intensity of her response, Roy began to write, to make sense of her feelings about the mother she ran from at age eighteen, “not because I didn’t love her, but in order to be able to continue to love her.” And so begins this astonishing, sometimes disturbing, and surprisingly funny memoir of the author’s journey from her childhood in Kerala, India, where her single mother founded a school, to the writing of her prizewinning novels and essays, through today.

With the scale, sweep, and depth of her novels, The God of Small Things and The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, and the passion, political clarity, and warmth of her essays, Mother Mary Comes to Me is an ode to freedom, a tribute to thorny love and savage grace—a memoir like no other.]]> 352 Arundhati Roy 1668094711 emma 0 4.45 2025 Mother Mary Comes to Me
author: Arundhati Roy
name: emma
average rating: 4.45
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/06
shelves: to-read, memoir, nonfiction, non-ya, owned, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, arc, authors-of-color, diverse
review:
when i conquer the world, every author i like will have to write a memoir
]]> Ruins 221473220 A simmering, provocative novel about a couple whose affair with a young Greek woman over the course of a summer in Athens threatens to crack their relationship wide open.

At a crossroads in their lives, a couple arrives in Greece to house-sit for a friend. Emma is searching for a meaningful next step beyond work or motherhood, and Julian is struggling to come to terms with the failure of his academic career. Their visions for the future seem to be pulling them in different directions, and they hope that this summer away will help them to mend their frayed connection.

But Emma and Julian’s plans take an unexpected turn when they meet Lena, an enigmatic young Greek woman,  who presents an opportunity for them to explore their relationship in uncharted and excitingly risky ways. However, as sultry nights turn to oppressive days, Emma and Julian become far more entangled in Lena’s life than they’d bargained for.  Engaged in a struggle for control, the three of them are suddenly faced with consequences far greater—and far more explosive—than they could have predicted.

Voyeuristic and thrilling, Ruins delivers the drama of a modern Greek tragedy as it exposes the tensions between privilege and power, desire and intimacy.]]> 320 Amy Taylor 0593595602 emma 0
(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.63 2025 Ruins
author: Amy Taylor
name: emma
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/06
shelves: arc, non-ya, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, literary-fiction, currently-reading
review:
i like when a book seems like vacation

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> War and Peace 28010569
At a glittering society party in St Petersburg in 1805, conversations are dominated by the prospect of war. Terror swiftly engulfs the country as Napoleon's army marches on Russia, and the lives of three young people are changed forever. The stories of quixotic Pierre, cynical Andrey and impetuous Natasha interweave with a huge cast, from aristocrats and peasants to soldiers and Napoleon himself. In War and Peace, Tolstoy entwines grand themes - conflict and love, birth and death, free will and faith - with unforgettable scenes of nineteenth-century Russia, to create a magnificent epic of human life in all its imperfection and grandeur.

Anthony Briggs's superb translation combines stirring, accessible prose with fidelity to Tolstoy's original, while Orlando Figes's afterword discusses the novel's vast scope and depiction of Russian identity. This edition also contains appendices, notes, a list of prominent characters and maps.]]> 1440 Leo Tolstoy 0241265541 emma 0
folks. it's with great sadness that i inform you that when you're asked "when did you know you were seeing emma's downfall" you can tell them september 1, 2024.

today i begin the project that will surely bring about my mortal end.

on this day, elle and i will read one chapter of tolstoy's war and peace, and then we will do that again tomorrow, and the next day, and the next day, and so on and so forth for the following 357 days, shaking our heads to show we disagree with war and nodding to show we agree with peace.

it's project long classics like you've never seen it before.

(because this book has 361 chapters, and because goodreads has a character limit, i'll only be updating this periodically. don't worry. you'll see me daily in other places annoying the sh*t out of you.)



VOLUME I, PART I
hello again. we're 25 days and a hundred pages into this project and essentially haven't made a dent.

how to summarize...there's war, there's peace. there are a lot of descriptions of mouths and beautiful princesses. people have died, people have been disinherited, people have inherited. guys are shipped off and girls are knocked up. eventful, and yet this has been 99% people going to each other's houses.


VOLUME I, PART II
coming to you live from 6 weeks and 200 pages into this to tell you: we have stopped going to people's houses and we have gone to war. it's bad vibes here. no one seems to be having much fun at this point. even people who get to ride on top of a tank (fun) are only doing so because they're severely wounded and being dragged out of battle (bad vibes).


VOLUME I, PART III
i thought we might get a complex look at the psychology behind war in this book, but i didn't expect the insight would be "all the soldier guys have huge crushes on the tsar and are showing off for him."


VOLUME II, PART I
it's pretty nice that in this version of war, you get to go home for as long as you want to hang out and lose your family fortune at cards and make impromptu rejected proposals of marriage. the war parts are really boring so i'm happy to mix it up.


VOLUME II, PART II
another thing about war i didn't expect: these guys are seeing napoleon and tsar alexander all the time. if i'm either of them i'm eating grapes in a tent somewhere and having people give me live updates, not sharing some dialogue on the front lines.


VOLUME II, PART III
532 pages in. four months have passed. we've spent so much time in these pages that a character has abandoned one wife, lost her to "death," mourned, become an asshole, healed himself spiritually, met a much younger woman, determined that he has never felt like this before and it's totally not because she's young and hot, and gotten re-engaged. and we're not even close to halfway done.


VOLUME II, PART IV
i really didn't expect engagements would be such a bad vibe in this book. i don't think we've come across a single grand declaration of love that was treated like "oh, nice! good news!"


VOLUME II, PART V
"With every fibre of his being he was convinced of what his instincts told him: there was no other way to live than the way he was living, and he had never done anything wrong in his life." okay me af!


VOLUME III, PART I
we're over halfway done this book both in pages read (755) and in time elapsed (more than 6 months), and i'm ready to call it. this is tsar fanfiction.


VOLUME III, PART II
if you are a historian who has ever once dared to weigh in on whether or not napoleon and the tsar and their groups of war-planning friends were smart...you are ON NOTICE. we just spent 150 pages (and, for me, a month and a half) being told how wrong you are.


VOLUME III, PART III
can you imagine moving with your family and you find out you're dragging the guy who dumped you along because he's wounded. and meanwhile the guy in love with you is getting arrested for beating the sh*t out of a soldier immediately after saving an ugly baby from a fire.

that's war, my friend.


VOLUME IV, PART I
just read perhaps the most disturbing description of what it feels like to die ever. and it took place, like, in a room. in a house. no battlefields in sight. maybe the real war is peace.


VOLUME IV, PART II
napoleon, you look so stupid right now.


VOLUME IV, PART III
i can have the occasional small mercy of a natasha chapter, as a treat.


VOLUME IV, PART IV
oh thank god. we're back in my classics comfort level: a slow-burn, highly arranged romance between two people in a similar social class. those war parts were horrible...like war or something.]]> 4.37 1869 War and Peace
author: Leo Tolstoy
name: emma
average rating: 4.37
book published: 1869
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/05
shelves: to-buy, non-ya, classics, currently-reading, project-long-classics, owned
review:
welcome to...YEAR AND PEACE.

folks. it's with great sadness that i inform you that when you're asked "when did you know you were seeing emma's downfall" you can tell them september 1, 2024.

today i begin the project that will surely bring about my mortal end.

on this day, elle and i will read one chapter of tolstoy's war and peace, and then we will do that again tomorrow, and the next day, and the next day, and so on and so forth for the following 357 days, shaking our heads to show we disagree with war and nodding to show we agree with peace.

it's project long classics like you've never seen it before.

(because this book has 361 chapters, and because goodreads has a character limit, i'll only be updating this periodically. don't worry. you'll see me daily in other places annoying the sh*t out of you.)



VOLUME I, PART I
hello again. we're 25 days and a hundred pages into this project and essentially haven't made a dent.

how to summarize...there's war, there's peace. there are a lot of descriptions of mouths and beautiful princesses. people have died, people have been disinherited, people have inherited. guys are shipped off and girls are knocked up. eventful, and yet this has been 99% people going to each other's houses.


VOLUME I, PART II
coming to you live from 6 weeks and 200 pages into this to tell you: we have stopped going to people's houses and we have gone to war. it's bad vibes here. no one seems to be having much fun at this point. even people who get to ride on top of a tank (fun) are only doing so because they're severely wounded and being dragged out of battle (bad vibes).


VOLUME I, PART III
i thought we might get a complex look at the psychology behind war in this book, but i didn't expect the insight would be "all the soldier guys have huge crushes on the tsar and are showing off for him."


VOLUME II, PART I
it's pretty nice that in this version of war, you get to go home for as long as you want to hang out and lose your family fortune at cards and make impromptu rejected proposals of marriage. the war parts are really boring so i'm happy to mix it up.


VOLUME II, PART II
another thing about war i didn't expect: these guys are seeing napoleon and tsar alexander all the time. if i'm either of them i'm eating grapes in a tent somewhere and having people give me live updates, not sharing some dialogue on the front lines.


VOLUME II, PART III
532 pages in. four months have passed. we've spent so much time in these pages that a character has abandoned one wife, lost her to "death," mourned, become an asshole, healed himself spiritually, met a much younger woman, determined that he has never felt like this before and it's totally not because she's young and hot, and gotten re-engaged. and we're not even close to halfway done.


VOLUME II, PART IV
i really didn't expect engagements would be such a bad vibe in this book. i don't think we've come across a single grand declaration of love that was treated like "oh, nice! good news!"


VOLUME II, PART V
"With every fibre of his being he was convinced of what his instincts told him: there was no other way to live than the way he was living, and he had never done anything wrong in his life." okay me af!


VOLUME III, PART I
we're over halfway done this book both in pages read (755) and in time elapsed (more than 6 months), and i'm ready to call it. this is tsar fanfiction.


VOLUME III, PART II
if you are a historian who has ever once dared to weigh in on whether or not napoleon and the tsar and their groups of war-planning friends were smart...you are ON NOTICE. we just spent 150 pages (and, for me, a month and a half) being told how wrong you are.


VOLUME III, PART III
can you imagine moving with your family and you find out you're dragging the guy who dumped you along because he's wounded. and meanwhile the guy in love with you is getting arrested for beating the sh*t out of a soldier immediately after saving an ugly baby from a fire.

that's war, my friend.


VOLUME IV, PART I
just read perhaps the most disturbing description of what it feels like to die ever. and it took place, like, in a room. in a house. no battlefields in sight. maybe the real war is peace.


VOLUME IV, PART II
napoleon, you look so stupid right now.


VOLUME IV, PART III
i can have the occasional small mercy of a natasha chapter, as a treat.


VOLUME IV, PART IV
oh thank god. we're back in my classics comfort level: a slow-burn, highly arranged romance between two people in a similar social class. those war parts were horrible...like war or something.
]]> The Bee Sting 62039166 From the author of Skippy Dies comes Paul Murray's The Bee Sting, an irresistibly funny, wise, and thought-provoking tour de force about family, fortune, and the struggle to be a good person when the world is falling apart.

The Barnes family is in trouble. Dickie’s once-lucrative car business is going under―but rather than face the music, he’s spending his days in the woods, building an apocalypse-proof bunker with a renegade handyman. His wife Imelda is selling off her jewelry on eBay, while their teenage daughter Cass, formerly top of her class, seems determined to binge-drink her way through her final exams. And twelve-year-old PJ is putting the final touches to his grand plan to run away from home.

Where did it all go wrong? A patch of ice on the tarmac, a casual favor to a charming stranger, a bee caught beneath a bridal veil―can a single moment of bad luck change the direction of a life? And if the story has already been written―is there still time to find a happy ending?]]> 645 Paul Murray 0374600309 emma 4
i physically couldn't put this book down.

not in the can't get enough way you say when you mean "i loved this book so much." i couldn't put it down because when i did i got so overwhelmed with anxiety that i felt ill.

my animal brain responded to the unrelenting series of tiny cuts presented in this book with an actual fight or flight response. ultimately i had to give into the agoraphobia and stay inside my house for a full day (canceling plans, rescheduling errands, missing myriad notifications) to knock out the final 400 pages. it was too debilitating. 

people talk a lot about hanya yanagihara's a little life as maybe the most upsetting book of all time. to me, this one was worse.

we follow dickie, inheritor of his father's car dealership in a small country town in ireland; his wife, imelda, the most beautiful woman around; their daughter, cass, navigating a toxic and intoxicating friendship with the coolest girl in school; and their son, pj, who is texting a stranger from the internet a lot.

each of them is so lonely, too sensitive for the world and the paltry, mundane wounds it gives us. from climate change to doomsday prep, academics to bereavement, sexuality to solitude, every burden life has to offer found its way to this family, and each and every one hit its mark.

i found myself so miserable while reading that i tried to belatedly bargain with the book: if this story has a happy ending, i'll love it. if these characters have a moment of familial connection and contentment, i'll five star it. if any of the characters tells a single one of their secrets to any of the others, it'll be my favorite book ever.

i'm not a big fan of sad books, not because i chafe at the idea of being unhappy for even a moment (that too) but because i find myself less impressed with stories that exist on a narrow emotional scale. even the moments of happiness in this book are told reflectively, a now-suffering character casting their eye back on a perfected past. 

while i wanted more than anything for these people to find happiness, that wasn't (solely) because they were so incredible and i was so invested in them. i wanted a change to the one-note narrative i'd been immersed in for 650 pages.

the fact that it didn't come and i'm still impressed with this book is high praise. 

it doesn't seem like hope appears on page, but i had it anyway. in spite of it all, this book is brilliantly, hilariously written, with unique style and consuming story.

bottom line: i hated it and i loved it and it infuriated and devastated me and i craved being done and never wanted it to end and isn't that just life.]]> 3.91 2023 The Bee Sting
author: Paul Murray
name: emma
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/07
date added: 2025/08/05
shelves: non-ya, literary-fiction, historical, owned, recommend, reviewed, 3-and-a-half-stars
review:
no one talk to me. i need to lay facedown with fairytale of new york on repeat and think about this book until i feel better.

i physically couldn't put this book down.

not in the can't get enough way you say when you mean "i loved this book so much." i couldn't put it down because when i did i got so overwhelmed with anxiety that i felt ill.

my animal brain responded to the unrelenting series of tiny cuts presented in this book with an actual fight or flight response. ultimately i had to give into the agoraphobia and stay inside my house for a full day (canceling plans, rescheduling errands, missing myriad notifications) to knock out the final 400 pages. it was too debilitating. 

people talk a lot about hanya yanagihara's a little life as maybe the most upsetting book of all time. to me, this one was worse.

we follow dickie, inheritor of his father's car dealership in a small country town in ireland; his wife, imelda, the most beautiful woman around; their daughter, cass, navigating a toxic and intoxicating friendship with the coolest girl in school; and their son, pj, who is texting a stranger from the internet a lot.

each of them is so lonely, too sensitive for the world and the paltry, mundane wounds it gives us. from climate change to doomsday prep, academics to bereavement, sexuality to solitude, every burden life has to offer found its way to this family, and each and every one hit its mark.

i found myself so miserable while reading that i tried to belatedly bargain with the book: if this story has a happy ending, i'll love it. if these characters have a moment of familial connection and contentment, i'll five star it. if any of the characters tells a single one of their secrets to any of the others, it'll be my favorite book ever.

i'm not a big fan of sad books, not because i chafe at the idea of being unhappy for even a moment (that too) but because i find myself less impressed with stories that exist on a narrow emotional scale. even the moments of happiness in this book are told reflectively, a now-suffering character casting their eye back on a perfected past. 

while i wanted more than anything for these people to find happiness, that wasn't (solely) because they were so incredible and i was so invested in them. i wanted a change to the one-note narrative i'd been immersed in for 650 pages.

the fact that it didn't come and i'm still impressed with this book is high praise. 

it doesn't seem like hope appears on page, but i had it anyway. in spite of it all, this book is brilliantly, hilariously written, with unique style and consuming story.

bottom line: i hated it and i loved it and it infuriated and devastated me and i craved being done and never wanted it to end and isn't that just life.
]]> The End of Loneliness 35456277
A kaleidoscopic family saga told through the fractured lives of the three Moreau siblings alongside a faltering, recovering love story, The End of Loneliness is a stunning meditation on the power of our memories, of what can be lost and what can never be let go. With inimitable compassion and luminous, affecting prose, Benedict Wells contends with what it means to find a way through life, while never giving up hope you will find someone to go with you.]]> 274 Benedict Wells emma 2
this...this was like a beautifully written soap opera.

i think this book is pretty dishonest — it depicts a protagonist who has suffered many losses and therefore chooses to live in a dream world, a lot of the time, except that's mostly used as a device to trick the reader for maximum tragedy.

too many bad and absurd things happen in this book. truly, some of the quote-unquote painful events are roughly as ridiculous as a love interest revealing himself as a murderous evil twin. 

i never felt like i got to know any characters besides our gloomy main character, jules. not his manic pixie dream girl, alva. not his flighty troubled sister liz. not his dorky brother marty. definitely not any of the other interchangeable women in his life.

there were moments that this did get to me, but they were outnumbered by the ones that made me let out an audible "really?"

forgive me, but spending hundreds of pages in the head of a fairly unsympathetic man who gets bogged down in all the bad he's seen without ever really caring for the good was too annoying.

bottom line: i know this is an unpopular opinion. it's unpopular for me too.

(picked this up for a in which i let you guys choose my reads)]]> 4.17 2016 The End of Loneliness
author: Benedict Wells
name: emma
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2016
rating: 2
read at: 2025/05/20
date added: 2025/08/05
shelves: literary-fiction, non-ya, unpopular-opinion, eh, 2-stars, reviewed
review:
nothing impresses me more than pure character-driven writing.

this...this was like a beautifully written soap opera.

i think this book is pretty dishonest — it depicts a protagonist who has suffered many losses and therefore chooses to live in a dream world, a lot of the time, except that's mostly used as a device to trick the reader for maximum tragedy.

too many bad and absurd things happen in this book. truly, some of the quote-unquote painful events are roughly as ridiculous as a love interest revealing himself as a murderous evil twin. 

i never felt like i got to know any characters besides our gloomy main character, jules. not his manic pixie dream girl, alva. not his flighty troubled sister liz. not his dorky brother marty. definitely not any of the other interchangeable women in his life.

there were moments that this did get to me, but they were outnumbered by the ones that made me let out an audible "really?"

forgive me, but spending hundreds of pages in the head of a fairly unsympathetic man who gets bogged down in all the bad he's seen without ever really caring for the good was too annoying.

bottom line: i know this is an unpopular opinion. it's unpopular for me too.

(picked this up for a in which i let you guys choose my reads)
]]> <![CDATA[La Vie et les Opinions de Tristram Shandy, Gentleman]]> 15991355 1048 Laurence Sterne 2070436500 emma 0 3.50 1767 La Vie et les Opinions de Tristram Shandy, Gentleman
author: Laurence Sterne
name: emma
average rating: 3.50
book published: 1767
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/05
shelves: to-read, to-buy, non-ya, classics, library
review:
how do i get a book written about MY life and opinions
]]> <![CDATA[Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland]]> 40163119
Patrick Radden Keefe's mesmerizing book on the bitter conflict in Northern Ireland and its aftermath uses the McConville case as a starting point for the tale of a society wracked by a violent guerrilla war, a war whose consequences have never been reckoned with. The brutal violence seared not only people like the McConville children, but also I.R.A. members embittered by a peace that fell far short of the goal of a united Ireland, and left them wondering whether the killings they committed were not justified acts of war, but simple murders.

Patrick Radden Keefe writes an intricate narrative about a notorious killing in Northern Ireland and its devastating repercussions.]]> 441 Patrick Radden Keefe 0385521316 emma 0 4.47 2018 Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland
author: Patrick Radden Keefe
name: emma
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/05
shelves: to-read, nonfiction, non-ya, library
review:
it took 7 years, but fine. everybody reading and loving this book has convinced me
]]> Atmosphere 220817728 From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones & The Six comes an epic new novel set against the backdrop of the 1980s Space Shuttle program about the extraordinary lengths we go to live and love beyond our limits.

Joan Goodwin has been obsessed with the stars for as long as she can remember. Thoughtful and reserved, Joan is content with her life as a professor of physics and astronomy at Rice University and as aunt to her precocious niece, Frances. That is, until she comes across an advertisement seeking the first women scientists to join NASA’s Space Shuttle program. Suddenly, Joan burns to be one of the few people to go to space.

Selected from a pool of thousands of applicants in the summer of 1980, Joan begins training at Houston’s Johnson Space Center, alongside an exceptional group of fellow candidates: Top Gun pilot Hank Redmond and scientist John Griffin, who are kind and easy-going even when the stakes are highest; mission specialist Lydia Danes, who has worked too hard to play nice; warm-hearted Donna Fitzgerald, who is navigating her own secrets; and Vanessa Ford, the magnetic and mysterious aeronautical engineer, who can fix any engine and fly any plane.

As the new astronauts become unlikely friends and prepare for their first flights, Joan finds a passion and a love she never imagined. In this new light, Joan begins to question everything she thinks she knows about her place in the observable universe.

Then, in December of 1984, on mission STS-LR9, everything changes in an instant.

Fast-paced, thrilling, and emotional, Atmosphere is Taylor Jenkins Reid at her best: transporting readers to iconic times and places, with complex protagonists, telling a passionate and soaring story about the transformative power of love, this time among the stars.]]> 352 Taylor Jenkins Reid emma 0 4.39 2025 Atmosphere
author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
name: emma
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/05
shelves: non-ya, historical, library, currently-reading
review:
"by taylor jenkins reid" is all i need to know
]]> Je suis un chat 1790425 Le Pauvre coeur des hommes, l'un des derniers romans de Natsume Sôseki, paraît enfin, dans une excellente version due au japonologue Jean Cholley, l'ouvrage qui d'emblée lui valut la célébrité : Je suis un chat.
Mort en 1916 à quarante-neuf ans, il vécut aux confins de la psychose la déchirure dont pâtirent tous les intellectuels nés avec la révolution industrielle, politique et culturelle du Meiji.
Formé aux lettres classiques chinoises, au haïku, mais envoyé en Angleterre de 1900 à 1903 pour pouvoir enseigner ensuite la littérature anglaise, il s'imprégna si profondément du ton de Swift, de Sterne et de De Foe que, sans nuire à tout ce qu'il y a de japonais dans Je suis un chat, cette influence nous impose de penser au voyage de Gulliver chez les Houyhnhnms ; sans doute aussi d'évoquer Le chat Murr d'Hoffmann. C'est pourquoi le traducteur peut conclure sa préface en affirmant que Je suis un chat "suffit amplement à démentir l'opinion si répandue selon laquelle les Japonais manquent d'humour". Ni Hegel, ni Marx, ni Darwin, qu'il a lus, ne lui ont fait avaler son parapluie.
La gouaille, voire la désinvolture apparente, n'empêchent pas les chapitres de s'organiser, cependant que tous les styles (jargon des savants ou du zen, ou argot d'Edo, ancien nom de Tokyo) se mêlent pour présenter la satire désopilante d'une société en transition, et même en danger de perdition.
Kushami-Sôseki se demande parfois s'il n'est pas fou, mais c'est la société d'alors qui devient folle, elle qui déjà enferme en asile ceux qui la jugent. Le chat ne s'y trompe jamais, lui : aucun ridicule n'échappe à ce nyctalope. Alors que peut-être on en devrait pleurer, on rit follement. Si vous voulez comprendre le Japon, identifiez-vous au chat de Soseki. Sur un autre registre, vous retrouverez le Meiji de La Sumida, le chef-d'œuvre de Nagaï Kafû.]]> 439 Natsume Sōseki 2070706346 emma 3
(review to come)]]> 3.63 1906 Je suis un chat
author: Natsume Sōseki
name: emma
average rating: 3.63
book published: 1906
rating: 3
read at: 2025/06/23
date added: 2025/08/05
shelves: authors-of-color, diverse, literary-fiction, non-ya, japanese-cats, 2-and-a-half-stars, to-review, unpopular-opinion, eh, classics
review:
i wish

(review to come)
]]> Native Son 6609554 Native Son tells the story of this young black man caught in a downward spiral after he kills a young white woman in a brief moment of panic. Set in Chicago in the 1930s, Wright's powerful novel is an unsparing reflection on the poverty and feelings of hopelessness experienced by people in inner cities across the country and of what it means to be black in America.]]> 532 Richard Wright emma 0 4.07 1940 Native Son
author: Richard Wright
name: emma
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1940
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/05
shelves: to-read, authors-of-color, classics, diverse, library, non-ya
review:
i love a classic that never feels old
]]> James 173754979 A brilliant reimagining of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn—both harrowing and satirical—told from the enslaved Jim's point of view

When Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he runs away until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck has faked his own death to escape his violent father. As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond.

Brimming with nuanced humor and lacerating observations that have made Everett a literary icon, this brilliant and tender novel radically illuminates Jim's agency, intelligence, and compassion as never before. James is destined to be a major publishing event and a cornerstone of twenty-first-century American literature.

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780385550369.]]> 303 Percival Everett 0385550367 emma 4
even better: the award was deserved.

i've been seeing some negativity around this book lately. maybe backlash that it's been nominated for and/or won what feels like every award you've ever heard of and a few made-up sounding ones. maybe the innate human desire for an unpopular opinion (been there). or maybe the boldness of an author daring to retell a Great American Novel (read: a worse version of tom sawyer that bravely and half-heartedly takes on slavery 20 years after the emancipation proclamation).

i don't know what it is, because i think the hype is deserved.

i'm no huck finn fan, if you couldn't tell, and a percival everett retelling felt like exactly what that book needed.

it chillingly reconstructs the cruelty and inhumanity of slavery, using strategies ranging from excellent character construction to literary devices to style to basic empathy. it manages to use the framework of huck finn to build itself up, and to drift away from it when it would hold it back without detracting from its core concept. 

in fact, most of the ways it's limited (abrupt ending, overloaded beginning, overlong middle) feel like mark twain's fault. 

bottom line: call me a hater, but i really liked this book.]]> 4.44 2024 James
author: Percival Everett
name: emma
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/05
date added: 2025/08/04
shelves: authors-of-color, diverse, non-ya, 4-stars, to-buy, recommend, reviewed
review:
the library hold i've had on this book for 6 weeks coming in the same week it wins the national book award...i feel so alive.

even better: the award was deserved.

i've been seeing some negativity around this book lately. maybe backlash that it's been nominated for and/or won what feels like every award you've ever heard of and a few made-up sounding ones. maybe the innate human desire for an unpopular opinion (been there). or maybe the boldness of an author daring to retell a Great American Novel (read: a worse version of tom sawyer that bravely and half-heartedly takes on slavery 20 years after the emancipation proclamation).

i don't know what it is, because i think the hype is deserved.

i'm no huck finn fan, if you couldn't tell, and a percival everett retelling felt like exactly what that book needed.

it chillingly reconstructs the cruelty and inhumanity of slavery, using strategies ranging from excellent character construction to literary devices to style to basic empathy. it manages to use the framework of huck finn to build itself up, and to drift away from it when it would hold it back without detracting from its core concept. 

in fact, most of the ways it's limited (abrupt ending, overloaded beginning, overlong middle) feel like mark twain's fault. 

bottom line: call me a hater, but i really liked this book.
]]> <![CDATA[Can't Get Enough (Skyland, #3)]]> 218377955 “Kennedy Ryan pours her whole soul into everything she writes, and it makes for books that are heart-searing, sensual, and life affirming.” ―EMILY HENRY Hendrix Barry lives a fabulous life. She has phenomenal friends, a loving family, and a thriving business that places her in the entertainment industry's rarefied air. Your vision board? She’s probably living it.

She’s a woman with goals, dreams, ambitions—always striving upward. And in the midst of everything, she's facing her toughest challenge caring for an aging parent.

Who has time for romance? From her experience, there's a low ROI on relationships. She hasn't met the man who can keep up with her anyway. Until...him.

Tech mogul Maverick Bell is a dilemma wrapped in an exquisitely tailored suit and knee-melting charm. From their first charged glance at the summer's hottest party, Hendrix feels like she’s met her match. Only he can’t be. Mav may be the first to make her feel this seen and desired and appreciated, but he’s the last one she can have. Forbidden fruit is the juiciest, and this man is off limits if she plans to stay the course she’s set for herself.

But when Maverick gives chase—pursuing her, spoiling her, understanding her—is it time to let herself have something more?

“One of the finest romance writers of our age.” –Entertainment Weekly]]> 441 Kennedy Ryan 1538706873 emma 2
which is why i really don't want you to read this review. because i did not like much about it while actually, you know, reading it.

don't say i didn't warn you.

the problems start with the fact that i just don't really...think these characters are good people?

hendrix is a publicist / venture capitalist who invests in AI startups. maverick is the founder of a sports betting app (gag). they take private jets together to steal ideas for selling at extortionate rates. maverick mentally threatens to fire his employee for gratefully looking at hendrix as she brings him food and pours a $200K bottle of whiskey over hendrix before they have sex (?).

when i read romance, i like to pretend i live in a fantastical world where everyone is nice and no one has to have degraded morals in order to live in a pretty house and eat out for every meal and not let a job get in the way of a whirlwind love story. that's my prerogative.

i was already not rooting for them, but this is also just not a story that works for me. the dramatic obstacles involve hendrix saying no about 500 times while maverick ignores her. then they have a lot of sex. then hendrix says no 500 more times. then they live happily ever after.

it's not my preference.

bottom line: this is not my cup of tea, but it seems like it is everyone else's!

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 4.55 2025 Can't Get Enough (Skyland, #3)
author: Kennedy Ryan
name: emma
average rating: 4.55
book published: 2025
rating: 2
read at: 2025/05/19
date added: 2025/08/04
shelves: authors-of-color, romance, non-ya, diverse, unpopular-opinion, 2-stars, nope, reviewed
review:
this book had me giggling and kicking my feet in advance.

which is why i really don't want you to read this review. because i did not like much about it while actually, you know, reading it.

don't say i didn't warn you.

the problems start with the fact that i just don't really...think these characters are good people?

hendrix is a publicist / venture capitalist who invests in AI startups. maverick is the founder of a sports betting app (gag). they take private jets together to steal ideas for selling at extortionate rates. maverick mentally threatens to fire his employee for gratefully looking at hendrix as she brings him food and pours a $200K bottle of whiskey over hendrix before they have sex (?).

when i read romance, i like to pretend i live in a fantastical world where everyone is nice and no one has to have degraded morals in order to live in a pretty house and eat out for every meal and not let a job get in the way of a whirlwind love story. that's my prerogative.

i was already not rooting for them, but this is also just not a story that works for me. the dramatic obstacles involve hendrix saying no about 500 times while maverick ignores her. then they have a lot of sex. then hendrix says no 500 more times. then they live happily ever after.

it's not my preference.

bottom line: this is not my cup of tea, but it seems like it is everyone else's!

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Playworld 211025439
“In the fall of 1980, when I was fourteen, a friend of my parents named Naomi Shah fell in love with me. She was thirty-six, a mother of two, and married to a wealthy man. Like so many things that happened to me that year, it didn’t seem strange at the time.”

Griffin Hurt is in over his head. Between his role as Peter Proton on the hit TV show The Nuclear Family and the pressure of high school at New York's elite Boyd Prep—along with the increasingly compromising demands of his wrestling coach—he's teetering on the edge of collapse.

Then comes Naomi Shah, twenty-two years Griffin’s senior. Unwilling to lay his burdens on his shrink—whom he shares with his father, mother, and younger brother, Oren—Griffin soon finds himself in the back of Naomi’s Mercedes sedan, again and again, confessing all to the one person who might do him the most harm.

Less a bildungsroman than a story of miseducation, Playworld is a novel of epic proportions, bursting with laughter and heartache. Adam Ross immerses us in the life of Griffin and his loving (yet disintegrating) family while seeming to evoke the entirety of Manhattan and the ethos of an era—with Jimmy Carter on his way out and a B-list celebrity named Ronald Reagan on his way in. Surrounded by adults who embody the age’s excesses—and who seem to care little about what their children are up to—Griffin is left to himself to find the line between youth and maturity, dependence and love, acting and truly grappling with life.]]> 506 Adam Ross 0385351291 emma 0 to-read 3.73 2025 Playworld
author: Adam Ross
name: emma
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/04
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City]]> 62972517 An incandescent, exquisitely written memoir about family, food, girlhood, resistance, and growing up in a Chinese American restaurant on the Jersey shore.


In the late 1980s on the Jersey shore, Jane Wong watches her mother shake ants from an MSG bin behind the family’s Chinese restaurant. She is a hungry daughter frying crab rangoon for lunch, a child sneaking naps on bags of rice, a playful sister scheming to trap her brother in the freezer before he traps her first. Jane is part of a family staking their claim to the American dream, even as this dream crumbles. Beneath Atlantic City’s promise lies her father’s gambling addiction, an addiction that causes him to disappear for days and ultimately leads to the loss of the restaurant.

In her debut memoir, Jane Wong tells a new story about Atlantic City, one that resists a single identity, a single story as she writes about making do with what you have―and what you don’t. What does it mean, she asks, to be both tender and angry? What is strength without vulnerability―and humor? Filled with beauty found in unexpected places, Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City is a resounding love song of the Asian American working class, a portrait of how we become who we are, and a story of lyric wisdom to hold and to share.]]> 288 Jane Wong 1953534678 emma 0 4.05 2023 Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City
author: Jane Wong
name: emma
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/04
shelves: to-read, nonfiction, non-ya, memoir, library, diverse, authors-of-color
review:
time for me to come clean. i'm a new jersey apologist
]]> Make the Season Bright 206180603
It's been five years since Charlotte Donovan was ditched at the altar by her ex-fiancée, and she’s doing more than okay. Sure, her single mother never checks in, but she has her strings ensemble, the Rosalind Quartet, and her life in New York is a dream come true. As the holidays draw near, her ensemble mate Sloane persuades Charlotte and the rest of the quartet to spend Christmas with her family in Colorado—it is much cozier and quieter than Manhattan, and it would guarantee more practice time for the quartet’s upcoming tour. But when Charlotte arrives, she discovers that Sloane’s sister Adele also brought a friend home—and that friend is none other than her ex, Brighton. All Brighton Fairbrook wanted was to have the holliest, jolliest Christmas—and try to forget that her band kicked her out. But instead, she’s stuck pretending like she and her ex are strangers—which proves to be difficult when Sloane and Adele’s mom signs them all up for a series of Christmas dating events. Charlotte and Brighton are soon entrenched in horseback riding and cookie decorating, but Charlotte still won’t talk to her. Brighton can hardly blame her after what she did. After a few days, however, things start to slip through. Memories. Music. The way they used to play together—Brighton on guitar, Charlotte on her violin—and it all feels painfully familiar. But it’s all in the past and nothing can melt the ice in their hearts...right?]]> 342 Ashley Herring Blake 0593550595 emma 2
possibly it is not the fault of charlotte, one of our two dual-pov second chance romantics, that she sucks so hard. perhaps she has a life-threatening allergy to asking her alleged best friend a single question about her life. maybe she lost all of her non-hair-related characteristics in a tragic accident. there's a chance she was put through a now-debunked invasive psychological experiment that left her heart a la the grinch's at the beginning of the movie. she could have a genetic lineage made up solely of people who ride in sleds and yell at huskies to mush mixed with assistant managers who run fast-casual bowl restaurants like the navy.

but unless the answer is "all of the above, as related in a lengthy and disturbing prequel i somehow missed," she is just the worst without good reason.

she does have A reason, and that reason is the irritatingly named and alarmingly traitless brighton, her ex girlfriend who left her at the altar. sounds bad. but still not really checking all my boxes re: having a personality so bad i fear it's contagious.

this book was painful to get through. i didn't root for these two monsters to get together — far from it. i was hoping one of their wintertime activity fails or hangovers would have a more lasting impact so i could ride out a few pages of silence (or, god forbid, other characters), but no dice. just a who's who of tropes thrown at the wall to see what sticks. fake dating, enemies to lovers, second chance, miscommunication, forced proximity, friends to lovers, rescue romance: i'm sorry. all of you deserved better.

AND SO DID I.

all i wanted was some christmas cheer and instead i nearly lost everything. and by everything i mean "my mind for like 300 pages."

bottom line: to each their own. this book is not my own.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)

-------------------------
tbr review

it's actually never too early to begin christmastime]]> 3.59 2024 Make the Season Bright
author: Ashley Herring Blake
name: emma
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2024
rating: 2
read at: 2024/12/02
date added: 2025/08/03
shelves: romance, non-ya, lgbt-plus, diverse, unpopular-opinion, nope, reviewed, 2-stars
review:
the devil herself is in this book and she's a prematurely gray violinist.

possibly it is not the fault of charlotte, one of our two dual-pov second chance romantics, that she sucks so hard. perhaps she has a life-threatening allergy to asking her alleged best friend a single question about her life. maybe she lost all of her non-hair-related characteristics in a tragic accident. there's a chance she was put through a now-debunked invasive psychological experiment that left her heart a la the grinch's at the beginning of the movie. she could have a genetic lineage made up solely of people who ride in sleds and yell at huskies to mush mixed with assistant managers who run fast-casual bowl restaurants like the navy.

but unless the answer is "all of the above, as related in a lengthy and disturbing prequel i somehow missed," she is just the worst without good reason.

she does have A reason, and that reason is the irritatingly named and alarmingly traitless brighton, her ex girlfriend who left her at the altar. sounds bad. but still not really checking all my boxes re: having a personality so bad i fear it's contagious.

this book was painful to get through. i didn't root for these two monsters to get together — far from it. i was hoping one of their wintertime activity fails or hangovers would have a more lasting impact so i could ride out a few pages of silence (or, god forbid, other characters), but no dice. just a who's who of tropes thrown at the wall to see what sticks. fake dating, enemies to lovers, second chance, miscommunication, forced proximity, friends to lovers, rescue romance: i'm sorry. all of you deserved better.

AND SO DID I.

all i wanted was some christmas cheer and instead i nearly lost everything. and by everything i mean "my mind for like 300 pages."

bottom line: to each their own. this book is not my own.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)

-------------------------
tbr review

it's actually never too early to begin christmastime
]]> The Original Daughter 217245582 In this dazzling debut, Stegner Fellow Jemimah Wei explores the formation and dissolution of family bonds in a story of ambition and sisterhood in turn-of-the-millennium Singapore.

Before Arin, Genevieve Yang was an only child. Living with her parents and grandmother in a single-room flat in working-class Bedok, Genevieve is saddled with an unexpected sibling when Arin appears, the shameful legacy of a grandfather long believed to be dead. As the two girls grow closer, they must navigate the intensity of life in a place where the urgent insistence on achievement demands constant sacrifice. Knowing that failure is not an option, the sisters learn to depend entirely on one another as they spurn outside friendships, leisure, and any semblance of a social life in pursuit of academic perfection and passage to a better future.

When a stinging betrayal violently estranges Genevieve and Arin, Genevieve must weigh the value of ambition versus familial love, home versus the outside world, and allegiance to herself versus allegiance to the people who made her who she is.

In the story of a family and its contention with the roiling changes of our rapidly modernizing, winner-take-all world, The Original Daughter is a major literary debut, rife with emotional clarity and searing social insight.]]> 368 Jemimah Wei 0385551010 emma 4
and as sally rooney once said...we are all so stupid about each other. 

the characters in this book are so frustrating, as they test each other and push and shove and seek pointless success and prioritize the wrong things and make cruel mistakes and, in other words, spend 350 pages being so unbearably human. 

this is a slow and hurt and emotional story. it took me ages to read the first half and a matter of hours to consume the second. 

it f*cked me up. 

bottom line: STRONG debut.

(thank you to the publisher for the arc)]]> 3.68 2025 The Original Daughter
author: Jemimah Wei
name: emma
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/05/20
date added: 2025/08/03
shelves: arc, authors-of-color, diverse, literary-fiction, owned, from-publisher-author, 3-and-a-half-stars, recommend, reviewed
review:
i love to read about sisters.

and as sally rooney once said...we are all so stupid about each other. 

the characters in this book are so frustrating, as they test each other and push and shove and seek pointless success and prioritize the wrong things and make cruel mistakes and, in other words, spend 350 pages being so unbearably human. 

this is a slow and hurt and emotional story. it took me ages to read the first half and a matter of hours to consume the second. 

it f*cked me up. 

bottom line: STRONG debut.

(thank you to the publisher for the arc)
]]> Everything You Ever Wanted 42086151
Sometimes you don't get out of bed at all.

Then you hear about Life on Nyx, a programme that allows 100 lucky winners the chance to escape it all, move to another planet and establish a new way of life. One with meaning and purpose. One without Instagram and online dating. There's one caveat: if you go, you can never come back.

But you aren't worried about that.

After all, what on Earth could there possibly be to miss? ]]> 272 Luiza Sauma 0241363551 emma 3
(review to come)]]> 3.59 2019 Everything You Ever Wanted
author: Luiza Sauma
name: emma
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2025/08/03
date added: 2025/08/03
shelves: non-ya, literary-fiction, diverse, authors-of-color, 3-and-a-half-stars, to-review, eh
review:
dystopian books where our world is the dystopia >>>

(review to come)
]]> Loved One 221473262 336 Aisha Muharrar 0593655842 emma 0
(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.98 Loved One
author: Aisha Muharrar
name: emma
average rating: 3.98
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/03
shelves: arc, authors-of-color, diverse, literary-fiction, non-ya, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, currently-reading
review:
something about this cover is just telling me i'll like this book

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Soldier Sailor 220160234
Soldier Sailor is a tale of boundless love and relentless battle, a mother’s bedtime story to her son, Sailor, recounting their early years together. Caught in the grip of her toddler’s seemingly endless terrible twos, Soldier doesn’t know who she is anymore. She spends her days in baby groups, playgrounds, and supermarkets. She hardly sees her husband, who has taken to working late most nights. A chance encounter with a former colleague feels like a lifeline to the person she used to be.

Tender and harrowing, Kilroy’s modern masterpiece portrays parenthood in all its agony and ardent joy.]]> 240 Claire Kilroy 1668051818 emma 0 4.50 2023 Soldier Sailor
author: Claire Kilroy
name: emma
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/03
shelves: to-read, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, owned, non-ya, literary-fiction, from-publisher-author, arc
review:
nurse, she's reading lit fic about motherhood again
]]> Self-Help 90872
In these tales of loss and pleasure, lovers and family, a woman learns to conduct an affair, a child of divorce dances with her mother, and a woman with a terminal illness contemplates her exit. Filled with the sharp humor, emotional acuity, and joyful language Moore has become famous for, these nine glittering tales marked the introduction of an extravagantly gifted writer.]]> 163 Lorrie Moore 0307277291 emma 4 elle likes it, i read it

(review to come)]]> 4.13 1985 Self-Help
author: Lorrie Moore
name: emma
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1985
rating: 4
read at: 2025/08/03
date added: 2025/08/03
shelves: literary-fiction, non-ya, to-review, to-buy, recommend
review:
if elle likes it, i read it

(review to come)
]]> Sula 29226182 Alternate cover edition of 0099760010 / 9780099760016

In Sula, Toni Morrison, winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize for literature, tells the story of two women--friends since childhood, separated in young adulthood, and reunited as grown women. Nel Wright grows up to become a wife and mother, happy to remain in her hometown of Medallion, Ohio. Sula Peace leaves Medallion to experience college, men, and life in the big city, an exceptional choice for a black woman to make in the late 1920s.

As girls, Nel and Sula are the best of friends, only children who find in each other a kindred spirit to share in each girl's loneliness and imagination. When they meet again as adults, it's clear that Nel has chosen a life of acceptance and accommodation, while Sula must fight to defend her seemingly unconventional choices and beliefs. But regardless of the physical and emotional distance that threatens this extraordinary friendship, the bond between the women remains unbreakable: "Her old friend had come home.... Sula, whose past she had lived through and with whom the present was a constant sharing of perceptions. Talking to Sula had always been a conversation with herself."

Lyrical and gripping, Sula is an honest look at the power of friendship amid a backdrop of family, love, race, and the human condition. --Gisele Toueg

]]> 208 Toni Morrison emma 5
it was a year in which i read my first toni morrison book, and then i read 6 more of them.

there is nobody, absolutely nobody, like her.

morrison's writing is up in the clouds, filled with turns of phrase and plot that in any other narrative would be nonsensical, and yet it is unceasingly, unmercifully, constantly grounded in reality. the ways in which it moves toward the fantastical serve only to tell us in full detail of the pain of life — the selfish foolishness of people, the cruel machinations of an unequal society, the moving target of contentment. 

i'm writing having finished her most canonical works, having 5 starred her four most read masterpieces all in a row. i have never in my life encountered an author i feel this way about. 
my lesson of 2024 is that toni morrison is the great american author.

bottom line: all i can say is do what i did: read everything.]]> 4.03 1973 Sula
author: Toni Morrison
name: emma
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1973
rating: 5
read at: 2024/12/01
date added: 2025/08/02
shelves: non-ya, literary-fiction, authors-of-color, diverse, 5-stars, to-buy, favorites-2024, recommend, reviewed, favorite-authors
review:
every book i read this year that isn't by toni morrison is against my will.

it was a year in which i read my first toni morrison book, and then i read 6 more of them.

there is nobody, absolutely nobody, like her.

morrison's writing is up in the clouds, filled with turns of phrase and plot that in any other narrative would be nonsensical, and yet it is unceasingly, unmercifully, constantly grounded in reality. the ways in which it moves toward the fantastical serve only to tell us in full detail of the pain of life — the selfish foolishness of people, the cruel machinations of an unequal society, the moving target of contentment. 

i'm writing having finished her most canonical works, having 5 starred her four most read masterpieces all in a row. i have never in my life encountered an author i feel this way about. 
my lesson of 2024 is that toni morrison is the great american author.

bottom line: all i can say is do what i did: read everything.
]]> Circle of Friends 41977
On their first day at University College, Dublin, the inseparable pair are thrown together with fellow students Nan Mahon, beautiful but selfish, and handsome Jack Foley. But trouble is brewing for Benny and Eve's new circle of friends, and before long, they find passion, tragedy - and the independence they yearned for.]]> 722 Maeve Binchy 0099498596 emma 0 4.06 1990 Circle of Friends
author: Maeve Binchy
name: emma
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1990
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/02
shelves: to-read, library, non-ya, romance
review:
i love when books recommend me books
]]> The Safekeep 199798201
A house is a precious thing...

It is 1961 and the rural Dutch province of Overijssel is quiet. Bomb craters have been filled, buildings reconstructed, and the war is truly over. Living alone in her late mother’s country home, Isabel knows her life is as it should be—led by routine and discipline. But all is upended when her brother Louis brings his graceless new girlfriend Eva, leaving her at Isabel’s doorstep as a guest, to stay for the season.

Eva is Isabel’s antithesis: she sleeps late, walks loudly through the house, and touches things she shouldn’t. In response, Isabel develops a fury-fueled obsession, and when things start disappearing around the house—a spoon, a knife, a bowl—Isabel’s suspicions begin to spiral. In the sweltering peak of summer, Isabel’s paranoia gives way to infatuation—leading to a discovery that unravels all Isabel has ever known. The war might not be well and truly over after all, and neither Eva—nor the house in which they live—are what they seem.

Mysterious, sophisticated, sensual, and infused with intrigue, atmosphere, and sex, The Safekeep is a brilliantly plotted and provocative debut novel you won’t soon forget.]]> 272 Yael van der Wouden 1668034344 emma 4
good call.

someone in the comments told me that this book is best read in a day or two. unfortunately i was reading 6 other books at the time, as is my wont as an unhinged person, but.

they were right, and i did read it in three.

these characters, hard to like and complex, interested me right away, as did this breathlessly close writing and suffocating plot. but it wasn't until i got two-thirds of the way through (and on the third day) that i found myself unable to put this book down.

this manages to be that rare thing of an excellent, tight story and thematic riches.

that does mean its first half drags, lulling its reader, but it's a trade i'll take.

bottom line: you guys " me to read this one, and you were right.]]> 4.06 2024 The Safekeep
author: Yael van der Wouden
name: emma
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/05/20
date added: 2025/08/02
shelves: historical, non-ya, 4-stars, to-buy, recommend, reviewed
review:
i keep taking this off my tbr and then adding it back 2 months later until i finally decreed it there to stay.

good call.

someone in the comments told me that this book is best read in a day or two. unfortunately i was reading 6 other books at the time, as is my wont as an unhinged person, but.

they were right, and i did read it in three.

these characters, hard to like and complex, interested me right away, as did this breathlessly close writing and suffocating plot. but it wasn't until i got two-thirds of the way through (and on the third day) that i found myself unable to put this book down.

this manages to be that rare thing of an excellent, tight story and thematic riches.

that does mean its first half drags, lulling its reader, but it's a trade i'll take.

bottom line: you guys " me to read this one, and you were right.
]]> Dear Fang, With Love 26192644
Lucas and Katya were boarding school seniors when, blindingly in love, they decided to have a baby. Seventeen years later, after years of absence, Lucas is a weekend dad, newly involved in his daughter Vera's life. But after Vera suffers a terrifying psychotic break at a high school party, Lucas takes her to Lithuania, his grandmother's homeland, for the summer. Here, in the city of Vilnius, Lucas hopes to save Vera from the sorrow of her diagnosis. As he uncovers a secret about his grandmother, a Home Army rebel who escaped Stutthof, Vera searches for answers of her own. Why did Lucas abandon her as a baby? What really happened the night of her breakdown? And who can she trust with the truth?

Skillfully weaving family mythology and Lithuanian history with a story of mental illness, inheritance, young love, and adventure, Rufi Thorpe has written a wildly accomplished, stunningly emotional book.]]> 303 Rufi Thorpe 1101875771 emma 3
so at least i agree with the "this book is weird" part.

(review to come)]]> 3.83 2016 Dear Fang, With Love
author: Rufi Thorpe
name: emma
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2016
rating: 3
read at: 2025/08/02
date added: 2025/08/02
shelves: non-ya, contemporary, 3-stars, to-review, unpopular-opinion, eh
review:
my favorite words in the english language are "this book is weird. i think you'll love it."

so at least i agree with the "this book is weird" part.

(review to come)
]]> Acts of Service 58678518
If sex is a truth-teller, Eve--a young, queer woman in Brooklyn--is looking for answers. On an evening when she is feeling particularly impulsive, she posts some nude photos of herself online. This is how Eve meets Olivia, and through Olivia, the charismatic Nathan--and soon the three begin a relationship that disturbs Eve as much as it delights her. As each act of the affair unfolds, Eve is left to ask: to whom is she responsible? And to what extent do our desires determine who we are?

In the way that only great fiction can, Acts of Service takes between its teeth the contradictions written all over our ideas of sex and sexuality. As incisive as it is exhilarating, this novel asks us to face our ideas about desire and power: what sex means to us, the forces that shape it, and how we find--or lose--ourselves in intimacy. At once juicy and intellectually challenging, sacred and profane, it might be the most thought-provoking book you read all year.]]> 240 Lillian Fishman 0593243765 emma 5


i’m a longstanding opponent of the not like other girls trope (i’m on the record since like 2015, which means this hatred significantly outlives most of my opinions, relationships, and sweaters), but i do like to be unlike other people. i turn the average meal-to-dessert ratio on its head. i stan dunkin over starbucks. i am in the midst of a lifelong quest to have the single most disturbing sleep schedule i can.

and of course, above all, i am an appreciator of a good unpopular opinion.

however.

i don’t think my opinion of this book should be unique.

this book has a devastating 3.19, and this is in spite of being complete perfection from beginning to end.

i picked up a library ebook of this, and while several of my very favorites in the world loved this book, i kinda expected to 3.5 it and move on into my resting state of complete forgetting as soon as possible.

instead, i found myself highlighting swaths of text, almost buzzing with that oh my god is this is a five star this might be a five star feeling, resonating with the emotions depicted and stunned by how lovely and clear the writing was.

and then i finished it, bought a copy, and reread and annotated it barely a week after reading it for the first time.

it’s really an easy five star, filled with taboo topics and fascinating characters and revealing dynamics. it’s about love and sex, gender and power, and how to find yourself or even know what that would look like. it’s about searching for happiness and meaning while being unable to admit that’s what you’re doing.

it’s everything that i think about the most.

bottom line: read it!!!

--------------------
reread update

nothing says five star read like rereading after a week

--------------------
pre-review

never happier than when i love a book everyone hates :)

review to come / 4.5 or 5 stars

--------------------
tbr review

the best thing that can possibly happen to a person is when they get very into a subgenre that is also simultaneously the single most trendy and common subgenre there is.

i am going to live forever]]> 3.07 2022 Acts of Service
author: Lillian Fishman
name: emma
average rating: 3.07
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2022/08/27
date added: 2025/08/02
shelves: diverse, lgbt-plus, literary-fiction, non-ya, recommend, beautifully-written, 5-stars, reread, owned, favorites-2022, unpopular-opinion, reviewed
review:
i am never happier than when i feel special.



i’m a longstanding opponent of the not like other girls trope (i’m on the record since like 2015, which means this hatred significantly outlives most of my opinions, relationships, and sweaters), but i do like to be unlike other people. i turn the average meal-to-dessert ratio on its head. i stan dunkin over starbucks. i am in the midst of a lifelong quest to have the single most disturbing sleep schedule i can.

and of course, above all, i am an appreciator of a good unpopular opinion.

however.

i don’t think my opinion of this book should be unique.

this book has a devastating 3.19, and this is in spite of being complete perfection from beginning to end.

i picked up a library ebook of this, and while several of my very favorites in the world loved this book, i kinda expected to 3.5 it and move on into my resting state of complete forgetting as soon as possible.

instead, i found myself highlighting swaths of text, almost buzzing with that oh my god is this is a five star this might be a five star feeling, resonating with the emotions depicted and stunned by how lovely and clear the writing was.

and then i finished it, bought a copy, and reread and annotated it barely a week after reading it for the first time.

it’s really an easy five star, filled with taboo topics and fascinating characters and revealing dynamics. it’s about love and sex, gender and power, and how to find yourself or even know what that would look like. it’s about searching for happiness and meaning while being unable to admit that’s what you’re doing.

it’s everything that i think about the most.

bottom line: read it!!!

--------------------
reread update

nothing says five star read like rereading after a week

--------------------
pre-review

never happier than when i love a book everyone hates :)

review to come / 4.5 or 5 stars

--------------------
tbr review

the best thing that can possibly happen to a person is when they get very into a subgenre that is also simultaneously the single most trendy and common subgenre there is.

i am going to live forever
]]> First Time, Long Time 221179141 For readers of Emma Cline and Melissa Broder, the story of an adrift, sardonic young woman falling for an older radio host… and then for his daughter.

When aspiring writer Allison moved to L.A., she expected her life to finally take shape. After years of dwelling in grief over her brother's unexpected and untimely death, and allowing her mercurial parents' feelings and desires to infect her own, she almost feels ready become the main character in her own story again. Yet Allison continues to feel inextricably tied to both her parents, particularly her unpredictable father, and weighed down by her the loss of her brother. In L.A., as with anywhere else, she feels uninspired and lonely, unable to write and barely scraping by as an English teacher, while struggling to connect with her students and fellow instructors.

After a serendipitous run in with famed radio DJ Reid Steinman, an idol of her father’s, Allison is rapidly drawn under his spell, while also developing an unanticipated, tangled relationship with his adult daughter, Maddie. She’s forced to balance her romance with Reid with her gnawing desire for the intoxicatingly charming Maddie, as it becomes increasingly evident that she and Allison's late brother share more than a few qualities. As Allison's relationships with the equally self-possessed father and daughter deepens, she struggles to establish the boundaries of her own identity.

Through candid self-awareness, keen observations, and deliciously wry humor, FIRST TIME, LONG TIME asks, what happens to a young woman’s goals when she becomes involved with a famous man? And how might she move forward when so much in her past remains unresolved? ]]> 304 Amy Silverberg 1538726475 emma 3
(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.41 First Time, Long Time
author: Amy Silverberg
name: emma
average rating: 3.41
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2025/08/01
date added: 2025/08/01
shelves: non-ya, arc, 3-stars, to-review, eh
review:
it be like that sometimes

(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> A Novel Love Story 199261152 A professor of literature finds herself caught up in a work of fiction… literally.

Eileen Merriweather loves to get lost in a good happily-ever-after. The fictional kind, anyway. Because at least imaginary men don’t leave you at the altar. She feels safe in a book. At home. Which might be why she’s so set on going to her annual book club retreat this year—she needs good friends, cheap wine, and grand romantic gestures—no matter what.

But when her car unexpectedly breaks down on the way, she finds herself stranded in a quaint town that feels like it’s right out of a novel…

Because it is.

This place can’t be real, and yet… she’s here, in Eloraton, the town of her favorite romance series, where the candy store’s honey taffy is always sweet, the local bar’s burgers are always a little burnt, and rain always comes in the afternoon. It feels like home. It’s perfect—and perfectly frozen, trapped in the late author’s last unfinished story.

Elsy is sure that’s why she must be here: to help bring the town to its storybook ending.

Except there is a character in Eloraton that she can’t place—a grumpy bookstore owner with mint-green eyes, an irritatingly sexy mouth and impeccable taste in novels. And he does not want her finishing this book.

Which is a problem because Elsy is beginning to think the town’s happily-ever-after might just be intertwined with her own.]]> 368 Ashley Poston 0593640977 emma 3
so that has to count for something.

the problem with this book, which follows our (still) (unfortunately) heartbroken protagonist (who was dumped several years ago and is still being kind of a bad hang to her friends about it) as she somehow ends up in the fictional setting of her favorite romance series for a love story of her very own, is not what i thought it would be (that it makes less than no sense).

i'm willing to overlook the little things, like logic and things adding up in any way.

what i'm not as cool with is that the fake story was better than the real one.

the fake town: rocked. the fake characters: amazing. the fake love stories: dreamy.

the real romance, real characters, real setting, real setups, and oh man the real happily ever after ish ending...meh.

but if they open up an eloraton amusement park i'll be there for a honey surprise and a quirky side quest with my name on it.

until then, i wish ashley poston wrote the other story she made up for this one instead.

bottom line: i often don't love a frame story, but this was the first time i loved one too much.

---------------------
tbr review

i like one (1) romance and suddenly the author's whole backlist is on my tbr]]> 3.61 2024 A Novel Love Story
author: Ashley Poston
name: emma
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/11/30
date added: 2025/08/01
shelves: romance, non-ya, 3-stars, eh, unpopular-opinion, reviewed
review:
so this was not my favorite romance novel of all time, but it would've been a really, really good dream. i'm 100% giving this 3 stars, but i would've been, like, super bummed to wake up after spending a sleep in it.

so that has to count for something.

the problem with this book, which follows our (still) (unfortunately) heartbroken protagonist (who was dumped several years ago and is still being kind of a bad hang to her friends about it) as she somehow ends up in the fictional setting of her favorite romance series for a love story of her very own, is not what i thought it would be (that it makes less than no sense).

i'm willing to overlook the little things, like logic and things adding up in any way.

what i'm not as cool with is that the fake story was better than the real one.

the fake town: rocked. the fake characters: amazing. the fake love stories: dreamy.

the real romance, real characters, real setting, real setups, and oh man the real happily ever after ish ending...meh.

but if they open up an eloraton amusement park i'll be there for a honey surprise and a quirky side quest with my name on it.

until then, i wish ashley poston wrote the other story she made up for this one instead.

bottom line: i often don't love a frame story, but this was the first time i loved one too much.

---------------------
tbr review

i like one (1) romance and suddenly the author's whole backlist is on my tbr
]]> Little Movements 222175347 A sparkling debut novel about a woman who must figure out whether being creatively fulfilled is compatible with being happily married, and what it means to be a Black artist in one of the whitest parts of America.

Thirty-something Layla Smart was raised by her single mother to dream medium. But all Layla’s ever wanted was a career in dance, which requires dreaming big. So when she receives an offer to be the choreographer-in-residence at Briar House in rural Vermont, she temporarily leaves behind Brooklyn, her job, her friends, and her husband to pursue it.

Layla has nine months to navigate a complex institution and teach a career-defining dance to a group of Black dancers in a very small, very white town. She has help from a handsome composer, a neurotic costume designer, a witty communications director, and the austere program director who can only compare Layla to Black choreographers. It's an enormous feat, and that’s before Layla’s marriage buckles under the strain of distance, before Briar House’s problematic past comes to light, and before Layla finds out she's pregnant.

Little Movements is a poignant and insightful story that explores issues of race, class, art, and ambition. It is a novel about self-discovery, the pressures placed on certain bodies, and never giving up on your dream.]]> 256 Lauren Morrow 0593736753 emma 0 4.07 2025 Little Movements
author: Lauren Morrow
name: emma
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/08/01
shelves: to-read, arc, authors-of-color, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, non-ya, literary-fiction, diverse
review:
i love to read about artists. it's my replacement for creativity
]]> <![CDATA[Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters]]> 16200
*pangram: a sentence or phrase that includes all the letters of the alphabet]]> 208 Mark Dunn 0385722435 emma 2


to me, this met the standards for, maybe, a cool puzzle or thought experiment, but not a book. not even a short one. not even a short children's one.

it takes place in a fictional island off the US called nollop, where they worship the guy who came up with the sentence "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." when letters start falling off their big sign, they ban the letters, and exile the people who use them. the remaining residents have to use 7 year olds (who are allowed to use banned letters) to try to come up with a shorter sentence than that, which for some reason the evil town council accepts as an alternative.

it was a fun idea at first, but over time i got annoyed by everything falling by the wayside in order to support a novel in letters without letters. our characters were interchangeable, our romances were insta, our plot was largely non-present.

i would say this would have worked for me at age 11, but there are a bunch of weird deaths in this too so i don't even know if it's for children.

bottom line: this one outweirded me!]]> 3.93 2001 Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters
author: Mark Dunn
name: emma
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2001
rating: 2
read at: 2025/05/17
date added: 2025/08/01
shelves: children-s, fantasy, 2-and-a-half-stars, unpopular-opinion, eh, reviewed
review:
i see what you did there.



to me, this met the standards for, maybe, a cool puzzle or thought experiment, but not a book. not even a short one. not even a short children's one.

it takes place in a fictional island off the US called nollop, where they worship the guy who came up with the sentence "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." when letters start falling off their big sign, they ban the letters, and exile the people who use them. the remaining residents have to use 7 year olds (who are allowed to use banned letters) to try to come up with a shorter sentence than that, which for some reason the evil town council accepts as an alternative.

it was a fun idea at first, but over time i got annoyed by everything falling by the wayside in order to support a novel in letters without letters. our characters were interchangeable, our romances were insta, our plot was largely non-present.

i would say this would have worked for me at age 11, but there are a bunch of weird deaths in this too so i don't even know if it's for children.

bottom line: this one outweirded me!
]]> Death in Her Hands 52878453
While on her normal daily walk with her dog in the forest woods, our protagonist comes across a note, handwritten and carefully pinned to the ground with a frame of stones. "Her name was Magda. Nobody will ever know who killed her. It wasn't me. Here is her dead body". Our narrator is deeply shaken; she has no idea what to make of this. She is new to area, having moved her from her longtime home after the death of her husband, and she knows very few people. And she's a little shaky even on best days. Her brooding about this note quickly grows into a full-blown obsession, and she begins to devote herself to exploring the possibilities of her conjectures about who this woman was and how she met her fate. Her suppositions begin to find echoes in the real world, and with mounting excitement and dread, the fog of mystery starts to form into a concrete and menacing shape. But as we follow her in her investigation, strange dissonances start to accrue, and our faith in her grip on reality weakens, until finally, just as she seems be facing some of the darkness in her own past with her late husband, we are forced to face the prospect that there is either a more innocent explanation for all this or a much more sinister one - one that strikes closer to home.

A triumphant blend of horror, suspense, and pitch-black comedy, 'Death in Her Hands' asks us to consider how the stories we tell ourselves both guide us closer to the truth and keep us at bay from it. Once again, we are in the hands of a narrator whose unreliability is well earned, only this time the stakes have never been higher.]]> 259 Ottessa Moshfegh 1984879359 emma 4


i throw the term "one of a kind" out so often i don't even know how to handle myself when i'm confronted with something truly one of a kind.

let's give this process a try:
1) say sorry to ottessa moshfegh for the injustice i have done her by not saving a term for exclusive use on this book
2) four star this
3) tell all of you it's unlike anything else, and you may not like it but i can guarantee you haven't read it before in any way
4) move along and forget, as i do all my transgressions

bottom line: moshfegh hive wins again.]]> 3.25 2020 Death in Her Hands
author: Ottessa Moshfegh
name: emma
average rating: 3.25
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/09/16
date added: 2025/08/01
shelves: non-ya, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, literary-fiction, owned, unpopular-opinion, recommend, reviewed
review:
nothing says fall like cozying up with a completely unhinged novel. (it's unseasonably cool today, so let me pretend it's truly autumn.)



i throw the term "one of a kind" out so often i don't even know how to handle myself when i'm confronted with something truly one of a kind.

let's give this process a try:
1) say sorry to ottessa moshfegh for the injustice i have done her by not saving a term for exclusive use on this book
2) four star this
3) tell all of you it's unlike anything else, and you may not like it but i can guarantee you haven't read it before in any way
4) move along and forget, as i do all my transgressions

bottom line: moshfegh hive wins again.
]]> Mayra 220458596 An eerie, hypnotic literary debut about friendship, desire, and memory set against the sultry backdrop of Florida’s swamplands

It's been years since Ingrid has heard from her childhood best friend, Mayra, a fearless rebel who fled their hometown of Hialeah, a Cuban neighborhood just west of Miami, for college in the Northeast. But when Mayra calls out of the blue to invite Ingrid to a weekend getaway at a house in the Everglades, she impulsively accepts.

From the moment Ingrid sets out for the house, danger looms: The directions are difficult, she’s out of reach of cell service, and as she drives deeper into the Everglades, the wet maw of the swamp threatens to swallow her whole. But once Ingrid arrives, Mayra is, in many ways, just as she remembers—with her sharp tongue and effortless, seductive beauty, still thumbing her nose at the world.

Before they can fully settle into the familiar intimacy of each other's company, their reunion is spoiled by the reemergence of past disagreements and the unexpected presence of Mayra's new boyfriend, Benji. The trio spend their hours eating lavish meals and exploring the labyrinthine house, which holds as much mystery and danger as the swamp itself. Indoors and on the grounds, time itself seems to expand, and Ingrid begins to lose a sense of the outside world, and herself.

Against this disquieting setting, where lizards dart in and out of porches and alligators peek up from dark waters, Gonzalez weaves a surreal, unforgettable story about the dizzying power of early friendship and the lengths we'll go to earn love and acceptance—even at the risk of losing ourselves entirely.]]> 240 Nicky Gonzalez 0593731557 emma 3
(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.40 2025 Mayra
author: Nicky Gonzalez
name: emma
average rating: 3.40
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/07/31
date added: 2025/07/31
shelves: authors-of-color, arc, diverse, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, non-ya, 3-and-a-half-stars, to-review, eh, unpopular-opinion
review:
is there any creature more horrifying and powerful than an ex best friend

(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Love Forms 220999014 A heart-stirring novel about a mother's love, in all its forms, as a woman searches for the daughter she gave up for adoption when she was a teenager growing up in the Caribbean, from the prize-winning author of Golden Child

For much of her life, Dawn has felt as if something had been missing. Now, at the age of fifty-eight, with a divorce behind her and her two grown-up sons busy with their own lives, she should be trying to settle into a new future for herself. But she keeps returning to the past and to the secret she’s kept all these years. At just sixteen, Dawn found herself pregnant, and—as was common in Trinidad back then—her parents sent her away to have the baby and give her up for adoption.

More than forty years later, Dawn yearns to reconnect with her lost daughter. But tracking down her child is not as easy as she had thought. It’s an emotional journey that leads Dawn to retrace her steps back home and to question not only that fateful decision she’d made as a teenager but every turn in the road of her life since.

Love Forms is a powerfully moving story of a woman in search of herself—a novel that rings with heartfelt empathy through the passages of a mother’s life, depicting the enduring bonds of love, family, and home.]]> 288 Claire Adam 0593230922 emma 3
(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.74 2025 Love Forms
author: Claire Adam
name: emma
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/07/31
date added: 2025/07/31
shelves: arc, non-ya, literary-fiction, 3-stars, to-review, unpopular-opinion, eh
review:
i need to create a "book covers i would frame" shelf

(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Butter 200776812 The cult Japanese bestseller about a female gourmet cook and serial killer and the journalist intent on cracking her case, inspired by a true story.

There are two things that I can simply not tolerate: feminists and margarine.

Gourmet cook Manako Kajii sits in Tokyo Detention Center convicted of the serial murders of lonely businessmen, who she is said to have seduced with her delicious home cooking. The case has captured the nation’s imagination but Kajii refuses to speak with the press, entertaining no visitors. That is, until journalist Rika Machida writes a letter asking for her recipe for beef stew and Kajii can’t resist writing back.

Rika, the only woman in her news office, works late each night, rarely cooking more than ramen. As the visits unfold between her and the steely Kajii, they are closer to a masterclass in food than journalistic research. Rika hopes this gastronomic exchange will help her soften Kajii but it seems that she might be the one changing. With each meal she eats, something is awakening in her body, might she and Kaji have more in common than she once thought?

Inspired by the real case of the convicted con woman and serial killer, "The Konkatsu Killer," Asako Yuzuki’s Butter is a vivid, unsettling exploration of misogyny, obsession, romance and the transgressive pleasures of food in Japan.]]> 464 Asako Yuzuki 0063236400 emma 1
(can you tell i'm procrastinating writing my deeply negative review of this.)

i don't think my expectations were very high. all i wanted was interesting. it could've been slow. it could've been false advertising. it could've been character-driven, or plot-less, or even on occasion boring. but this was too far.

this is not a simple, subtle book about food and feminism and society. it's a tell-y-not-show-y over the top too-long diatribe in which nothing happens.

there's a difference, and this could have been half the length (if i'm being generous).

here are a few suggestions of what we could have removed to get there:
- the business history of fictional food brands
- 3-4 named characters with personalities and backstory who served no purpose
- two or three dozen check-ins on our protagonist's weight
- some truly unforgettable figurative language, such as the darkness of a turkey cavity compared to unfathomable eyes or applying a butter-based marinade being similar to a romantic massage
- the word "sticky"
- A COMPLETELY UNACTED UPON HOMOEROTIC SUBPLOT THAT FOR A TIME WAS SINGLE-HANDEDLY ALLOWING ME TO GO ON.

this is one of those books that makes me wish i DNFed. it was a painful slog to get through each and every one of these overwritten, under-significant pages. not a single one of the thoughts conveyed about gender, food, or Society is original or even interesting, and yet we are forced to hear them expressed verbatim again and again.

it felt like it moved in fits and starts. there's some level to which this book attempts to show a manipulated protagonist, but the transition into and out of it is not smooth.

it is, in short, not good.

bottom line: not even food descriptions — one of literature's greatest assets — could save this book.]]> 3.46 2017 Butter
author: Asako Yuzuki
name: emma
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2017
rating: 1
read at: 2024/11/25
date added: 2025/07/31
shelves: authors-of-color, diverse, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, non-ya, unpopular-opinion, 1-and-a-half-stars, reviewed, nope
review:
where my kerrygold stans at?

(can you tell i'm procrastinating writing my deeply negative review of this.)

i don't think my expectations were very high. all i wanted was interesting. it could've been slow. it could've been false advertising. it could've been character-driven, or plot-less, or even on occasion boring. but this was too far.

this is not a simple, subtle book about food and feminism and society. it's a tell-y-not-show-y over the top too-long diatribe in which nothing happens.

there's a difference, and this could have been half the length (if i'm being generous).

here are a few suggestions of what we could have removed to get there:
- the business history of fictional food brands
- 3-4 named characters with personalities and backstory who served no purpose
- two or three dozen check-ins on our protagonist's weight
- some truly unforgettable figurative language, such as the darkness of a turkey cavity compared to unfathomable eyes or applying a butter-based marinade being similar to a romantic massage
- the word "sticky"
- A COMPLETELY UNACTED UPON HOMOEROTIC SUBPLOT THAT FOR A TIME WAS SINGLE-HANDEDLY ALLOWING ME TO GO ON.

this is one of those books that makes me wish i DNFed. it was a painful slog to get through each and every one of these overwritten, under-significant pages. not a single one of the thoughts conveyed about gender, food, or Society is original or even interesting, and yet we are forced to hear them expressed verbatim again and again.

it felt like it moved in fits and starts. there's some level to which this book attempts to show a manipulated protagonist, but the transition into and out of it is not smooth.

it is, in short, not good.

bottom line: not even food descriptions — one of literature's greatest assets — could save this book.
]]> Negative Space 150778873 176 Gillian Linden 1324065540 emma 4
and this was kind of that, but what it mostly was was very, very good.



it's a brilliant exploration of womanhood, of what it means to mother and to work and to try to do your moral best and look around at everyone else and be unconvinced they're doing any of it — and for that worry to extend so far you wonder if you're actually doing any of it yourself.

this encapsulation of a few days in one ordinary life totally riveted me. i loved the protagonist's children, and while i wish a few more things were fleshed out — the husband, the babysitter, the ending — all in all this felt like drinking a cool glass of water.

bottom line: so refreshing.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.22 2024 Negative Space
author: Gillian Linden
name: emma
average rating: 3.22
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/03/28
date added: 2025/07/31
shelves: non-ya, literary-fiction, arc, 4-stars, recommend, unpopular-opinion, reviewed, owned
review:
i love books about women having mental breakdowns.

and this was kind of that, but what it mostly was was very, very good.



it's a brilliant exploration of womanhood, of what it means to mother and to work and to try to do your moral best and look around at everyone else and be unconvinced they're doing any of it — and for that worry to extend so far you wonder if you're actually doing any of it yourself.

this encapsulation of a few days in one ordinary life totally riveted me. i loved the protagonist's children, and while i wish a few more things were fleshed out — the husband, the babysitter, the ending — all in all this felt like drinking a cool glass of water.

bottom line: so refreshing.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> When the Sky Fell on Splendor 40390513
In the wake of the tragedy, Franny found solace in a group of friends whose experiences mirrored her own. The group calls themselves The Ordinary, and they spend their free time investigating local ghost stories and legends, filming their exploits for their small following of YouTube fans. It's silly, it's fun, and it keeps them from dwelling on the sadness that surrounds them.

Until one evening, when the strange and dangerous thing they film isn't fiction--it's a bright light, something massive hurtling toward them from the sky. And when it crashes and the teens go to investigate...everything changes.]]> 384 Emily Henry emma 4


Typically, I have reservations about making love-based declarations about people I don’t know on the internet. Seems a lil weird. Like, how would Rami Malek feel if he knew I was writing sonnets about how he manages to be devastatingly attractive even with weird fake teeth? How would Bill Hader feel if he knew about how many clips of his interviews I’ve watched in a row on YouTube?

Both of those are, of course, completely made up examples.

In the case of Emily Henry, though, I’m willing to make an exception. This is for several reasons:
1) Because of the sheer volume of adoring things I’ve written about her and her books, in places like my blog and my reviews and, uh, the comments of her Instagram posts, I’m pretty sure Emily Henry already knows.
2) I love Emily Henry’s books with my whole heart.
3) Emily Henry and her books mean a lot to me.

One of my very favorite movies ever is pretty at odds with everything else I love. It is a movie called “About Time.” About Time is a cheesy British rom-com (brought to you by the mind behind every other cheesy British rom-com) about Domhnall Gleeson as a time traveler and Rachel McAdams as his charming and devastatingly lovely love interest.

I do not cry ever, and I have never seen that movie without full-on weeping.

The ending of About Time is Domhnall Gleeson’s realization that he doesn’t need to travel through time anymore, because the single most beautiful and valuable thing he can do is live through every day and really notice it. Really be present for it. That’s the best possible use of his time.

Granted, because of the specific rules of time travel in this movie, he can’t do much else, but still.

Emily Henry’s books are, in some ways, the equivalent of that movie. And I love them all in the same heart-swelling, out of body way that I love it.

Emily Henry writes characters who are flawed. They’re mean to the people around them, or bad students, or careless. They are human and imperfect, and I adore them all. I have never read an Emily Henry character I didn’t instantly feel and understand. I almost never love book characters, and I always love hers. They’re funny and messed up and lovely and I feel like I know them right away.

She also writes about our world as magical, as a place where we can find adventure and comfort, a place filled with hardship and pain and struggle and also people we can connect with. Her books have romances in them, but more than that, they have family and friends and BANTER. (God, the banter.)

I love About Time because it knows how beautiful the ordinary can be. How an ordinary life, doing what you love with people you love around you, is the loveliest possible kind. Emily Henry’s books know the same thing.

I can’t pretend I know why Emily Henry writes (or used to write, sob) magical realism and sci-fi, books in which the extraordinary coexists with the ordinary. But I bet it’s because Emily Henry knows the most extraordinary things often seem ordinary after all.

Because that’s what her books are all about.

This is not really a sci-fi book, and it's not really an action book, and it's not really contemporary or romance or magical realism or anything else, which is both its strength and its weakness. It has too many characters, and it's overly ambitious, and it has more it wants thematically than plot-wise.

And still, here is what I have to say: Emily Henry’s books make me laugh and tear up. They make me feel happy and excited and sad and in suspense, hopeful and satisfied and understood and known. When I read her work, I don’t just want to believe that we exist in the world that she’s created -- I believe that we do.

Bottom line: I hope everyone finds an author for them like that.

-----------------------
reread review

hello, masochism, my old friend.

it's another installment of project 5 star, in which i revisit all of my favorite books to see if they are still favorites or if my heart has shrunk even further like a reverse grinch.

today, we're taking on the forgotten emily henry book, which everyone is either unaware of or not a fan of except for me.

let's see what happens.

(updated review to come)

-----------------------
pre-review

it is with great joy and absolutely zero surprise that I must tell you: Emily Henry has done it again.

this was so f*cking good I can hardly stand it.

review to come (!!!!!!!!!!!!)

-----------------------
currently-reading updates

I GOT IT I GOT IT I GOT IT I GOT IT I GOT IT!!!!!!!!!!!!

and I'm reading it immediately.

thank you emily henry I love you

-----------------------
tbr review

THIS IS DESCRIBED AS THE SERPENT KING MEETS STRANGER THINGS.

AND IT'S BY EMILY HENRY.

the fact that it is not currently in my possession is my new least favorite thing about the world.]]> 3.22 2019 When the Sky Fell on Splendor
author: Emily Henry
name: emma
average rating: 3.22
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2024/06/10
date added: 2025/07/31
shelves: arc, from-publisher-author, ya, owned, recommend, favorites-2018, reviewed, unpopular-opinion, sci-fi, magical-realist-urban-whatever, 4-stars
review:
I love Emily Henry.



Typically, I have reservations about making love-based declarations about people I don’t know on the internet. Seems a lil weird. Like, how would Rami Malek feel if he knew I was writing sonnets about how he manages to be devastatingly attractive even with weird fake teeth? How would Bill Hader feel if he knew about how many clips of his interviews I’ve watched in a row on YouTube?

Both of those are, of course, completely made up examples.

In the case of Emily Henry, though, I’m willing to make an exception. This is for several reasons:
1) Because of the sheer volume of adoring things I’ve written about her and her books, in places like my blog and my reviews and, uh, the comments of her Instagram posts, I’m pretty sure Emily Henry already knows.
2) I love Emily Henry’s books with my whole heart.
3) Emily Henry and her books mean a lot to me.

One of my very favorite movies ever is pretty at odds with everything else I love. It is a movie called “About Time.” About Time is a cheesy British rom-com (brought to you by the mind behind every other cheesy British rom-com) about Domhnall Gleeson as a time traveler and Rachel McAdams as his charming and devastatingly lovely love interest.

I do not cry ever, and I have never seen that movie without full-on weeping.

The ending of About Time is Domhnall Gleeson’s realization that he doesn’t need to travel through time anymore, because the single most beautiful and valuable thing he can do is live through every day and really notice it. Really be present for it. That’s the best possible use of his time.

Granted, because of the specific rules of time travel in this movie, he can’t do much else, but still.

Emily Henry’s books are, in some ways, the equivalent of that movie. And I love them all in the same heart-swelling, out of body way that I love it.

Emily Henry writes characters who are flawed. They’re mean to the people around them, or bad students, or careless. They are human and imperfect, and I adore them all. I have never read an Emily Henry character I didn’t instantly feel and understand. I almost never love book characters, and I always love hers. They’re funny and messed up and lovely and I feel like I know them right away.

She also writes about our world as magical, as a place where we can find adventure and comfort, a place filled with hardship and pain and struggle and also people we can connect with. Her books have romances in them, but more than that, they have family and friends and BANTER. (God, the banter.)

I love About Time because it knows how beautiful the ordinary can be. How an ordinary life, doing what you love with people you love around you, is the loveliest possible kind. Emily Henry’s books know the same thing.

I can’t pretend I know why Emily Henry writes (or used to write, sob) magical realism and sci-fi, books in which the extraordinary coexists with the ordinary. But I bet it’s because Emily Henry knows the most extraordinary things often seem ordinary after all.

Because that’s what her books are all about.

This is not really a sci-fi book, and it's not really an action book, and it's not really contemporary or romance or magical realism or anything else, which is both its strength and its weakness. It has too many characters, and it's overly ambitious, and it has more it wants thematically than plot-wise.

And still, here is what I have to say: Emily Henry’s books make me laugh and tear up. They make me feel happy and excited and sad and in suspense, hopeful and satisfied and understood and known. When I read her work, I don’t just want to believe that we exist in the world that she’s created -- I believe that we do.

Bottom line: I hope everyone finds an author for them like that.

-----------------------
reread review

hello, masochism, my old friend.

it's another installment of project 5 star, in which i revisit all of my favorite books to see if they are still favorites or if my heart has shrunk even further like a reverse grinch.

today, we're taking on the forgotten emily henry book, which everyone is either unaware of or not a fan of except for me.

let's see what happens.

(updated review to come)

-----------------------
pre-review

it is with great joy and absolutely zero surprise that I must tell you: Emily Henry has done it again.

this was so f*cking good I can hardly stand it.

review to come (!!!!!!!!!!!!)

-----------------------
currently-reading updates

I GOT IT I GOT IT I GOT IT I GOT IT I GOT IT!!!!!!!!!!!!

and I'm reading it immediately.

thank you emily henry I love you

-----------------------
tbr review

THIS IS DESCRIBED AS THE SERPENT KING MEETS STRANGER THINGS.

AND IT'S BY EMILY HENRY.

the fact that it is not currently in my possession is my new least favorite thing about the world.
]]> Favorite Daughter 216970882 A darkly funny debut novel about two estranged sisters who are unknowingly thrown together by their problematic father’s dying wish

Mickey and Arlo are half sisters. But they’ve never spoken and never met. Arlo adored her father—but always lived in the shadow of his magnetic personality and burdensome vices. Meanwhile, their father abandoned ​Mickey and her mother years ago, and Mickey has hated him since. When she receives news of her father’s passing, Mickey is shocked to learn that he’s left her his not-inconsiderable fortune. The catch: Mickey must attend a series of therapy sessions before the money can be released.

Unbeknownst to either woman, the psychologist Mickey’s father has ensured she meets with is her half sister, Arlo. Having cared for her beloved father on his sickbed, Arlo is devastated to discover he’s cut her out of his will. She resolves to learn where the money went and why.

Working together as therapist and patient—with no idea that they’re in fact sisters—Arlo and Mickey soon get under each other’s skin. Arlo, eager to outrun a mistake in her professional past, is keen to redeem herself with her new client. But Mickey is far from the model patient. As Mickey’s personal and professional lives spiral out of control and Arlo uncovers the truth about who her new patient really is, the sisters find themselves on a crash course that will break—or save—them both.]]> 344 Morgan Dick 0593832264 emma 4
this was a delightful book about horrible people (so again: could be my personal story).

i read a lot of this with my shoulders at my ears, which included several points at which i physically made myself put this book down because it was elevating my blood pressure and culminated in me giving in and devouring half of it in one sitting.

i love books in which everything starts out horrible and ends wonderfully for their soothing properties, but rarely do they feel as razor sharp and complicated and unforgiving and real as this one. it was very funny, and very tough, and somehow overall a good time.

bottom line: all my fellow forgiveness stans get in on this.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.59 2025 Favorite Daughter
author: Morgan Dick
name: emma
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/05/07
date added: 2025/07/31
shelves: arc, from-publisher-author, non-ya, literary-fiction, 3-and-a-half-stars, recommend, reviewed
review:
i didn't even know my parents wrote a book about me

this was a delightful book about horrible people (so again: could be my personal story).

i read a lot of this with my shoulders at my ears, which included several points at which i physically made myself put this book down because it was elevating my blood pressure and culminated in me giving in and devouring half of it in one sitting.

i love books in which everything starts out horrible and ends wonderfully for their soothing properties, but rarely do they feel as razor sharp and complicated and unforgiving and real as this one. it was very funny, and very tough, and somehow overall a good time.

bottom line: all my fellow forgiveness stans get in on this.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> <![CDATA[Dirty Kitchen: A Memoir of Food and Family]]> 220160600

RAVES AND REVIEWS:


"Unblinking ... fierce...makes no effort to lull the reader into complicity...Damatac and her recipes are not here for your convenience..[they] serve as both escape and reminder, toggling between the ancient past of Indigenous myth, layers of colonial scarring, childhood, the present...This is not an easy memoir, nor should it be. Damatac writes, she says, 'to document myself into existence. And, as she says of some of her recipes, it will serve many."
- The New York Times Book Review


"Dirty Kitchen is not only an astonishing memoir—it is a bravura juggling act of genre, and a vivid testament to resilience. An absolute marvel."
—Jose Antonio Vargas, Pulitzer Prize winner and bestselling author of Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen


"Jill Damatac's fiery culinary memoir about growing up undocumented takes America to task...Dirty Kitchen is a fiercely honest, eye-opening view of one undocumented family's experiences trying to start over in a new world."
—The San Francisco Chronicle


“Part personal memoir, part cultural analysis, and all heart, Dirty Kitchen invites us into Jill Damatac's searing journey from decades of undocumented invisibility through the slow and recursive process of healing. Vulnerable and gripping, Damatac's debut explores what it means to reclaim one's life from the jaws of generational trauma and colonialism, while honoring the great ancestral gifts of Filipino heritage. Dirty Kitchen heralds the arrival of an unforgettable new talent.”
—Qian Julie Wang, New York Times bestselling author of Beautiful Country


“There's a blue fire to Jill Damatac's way with words. In Dirty Kitchen, history itself burns sapphire bright.”
—Saeed Jones, author of Alive at the End of the World and How We Fight For Our Lives


“Dirty Kitchen is a feast of many ingredients: at once a searing, heartfelt account of one undocumented family’s life, as well as a fierce, unflinching look at the indigenous and colonial history that seasons every meal. This is a book that knows that the root of the word ‘recipe’ is ‘to receive’—one that shows us, with profound resolve and tenderness, all the things we receive with every meal: every pleasure, every pain, every story, every ghost. A book to sate multiple hungers, that leaves its reader truly fed.”
—Elaine Castillo, author of America Is Not The Heart


“As nimble and bold as the dishes she describes, Jill Damatac confronts the intersectional cruelties of colonialism and patriarchy with an unflinching spirit. Damatac celebrates the resilience of Filipino food as an ingredient for healing passed down through the ancestors. Dirty Kitchen is a literary feast that sticks to your fingers like a sumptuous kamayan.”
—Albert Samaha, author of Concepcion: Conquest, Colonialism, and an Immigrant Family’s Fate


"Jill Damatac brings together myth and memory, history and hauntings, colonialism and catharsis and seats them around her table. Any reader of Dirty Kitchen is in for a feast when they pull up a chair."
—Alejandra Oliva, author of Rivermouth: A Chronicle of Language, Faith and Migration]]> 256 Jill Damatac 1668084635 emma 3
but be warned: this book is a lot. do not let the extremely adorable cover fool you...the author has been through more than any one person should reasonably go through and lets it all out on the page.

her story and her clear-eyed rendition of it are completely stunning.

she tells the story of her life through filipino recipes, so each chapter is a helter-skelter pile of memoir, cooking instruction, mythology, and analysis.

is it a bit much? yes. the chapters begin to feel very long, and all of these things are a lot to juggle with what is already an overwhelming story.

but still, i have more positive things to say about this book than negative.

bottom line: sheesh!

(3.5 / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 4.38 2025 Dirty Kitchen: A Memoir of Food and Family
author: Jill Damatac
name: emma
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/05/06
date added: 2025/07/31
shelves: arc, authors-of-color, diverse, nonfiction, non-ya, memoir, 3-and-a-half-stars, recommend, reviewed
review:
books about food >>>

but be warned: this book is a lot. do not let the extremely adorable cover fool you...the author has been through more than any one person should reasonably go through and lets it all out on the page.

her story and her clear-eyed rendition of it are completely stunning.

she tells the story of her life through filipino recipes, so each chapter is a helter-skelter pile of memoir, cooking instruction, mythology, and analysis.

is it a bit much? yes. the chapters begin to feel very long, and all of these things are a lot to juggle with what is already an overwhelming story.

but still, i have more positive things to say about this book than negative.

bottom line: sheesh!

(3.5 / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Women, Seated 221473259 From the award-winning author, an enthralling novel about the unravelling lives of a nanny and the family she works for following the downfall of its patriarch, a prominent Chinese politician

Enter the world of an elite Chinese a life of luxury, limitless power, and around-the-clock service, which includes their trusted nanny Yu Ling. Slipping in and out of the shadows, careful to speak deferentially, meticulous in her care of their only son Kuan Kuan, Yu has served the family for years and knows their secrets. But little do they suspect that Yu has secrets of her own.

In the pressure-cooker political environment of China, the fates of even the most powerful families can reverse overnight. When Kuan Kuan’s father and grandfather are arrested and his socialite mother goes on the run, Yu is left behind to make a series of life-changing choices. Will she be able to outrun her own past, and how far will she go to claim what she considers her due?]]> 208 Zhang Yueran 0593851927 emma 0 3.84 2025 Women, Seated
author: Zhang Yueran
name: emma
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/31
shelves: to-read, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, owned, non-ya, literary-fiction, from-publisher-author, diverse, authors-of-color
review:

]]> An Oral History of Atlantis 220998994 A deadpan, wildly imaginative collection of stories that slices clean through the mundanity and absurdity of modern life, from the author of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize–winner and Pulitzer Prize finalist Same Bed Different Dreams

In “Machine City,” a college student’s role in a friend’s movie causes lines to blur between his character and his true self. In “Slide to Unlock,” a man comes to terms with his life, via the passwords he struggles to remember in a moment of extremis. And in “Weird Menace,” a director and faded movie star discuss science fiction, memory, and lost loves on a commentary track for a film from the ’80s that neither seems to remember all that well. 

In Ed Park’s utterly original collection, An Oral History of Atlantis, characters question the fleetingness of youth and art, reckon with the consequences of the everyday, and find solace in the absurd, the beautiful, and the sublime. Throughout, Park deploys his trademark wit to create a world both strikingly recognizable and delightfully other. All together, these sixteen stories have much to say about the meaning—and transitory nature—of our lives. And they are proof positive that Ed Park is one of the most insightful and imaginative writers working today.]]> 224 Ed Park 0812998995 emma 2
(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.87 2025 An Oral History of Atlantis
author: Ed Park
name: emma
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2025
rating: 2
read at: 2025/07/30
date added: 2025/07/30
shelves: authors-of-color, diverse, literary-fiction, non-ya, 2-and-a-half-stars, to-review, unpopular-opinion, eh
review:
i also find solace in the absurd, the beautiful, and the sublime

(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> The Other Wife 220458624
The Other Wife is a brazen and heartfelt debut about love and regrets.
]]> 304 Jackie Thomas-Kennedy 0593851609 emma 4
(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the copy)]]> 3.33 The Other Wife
author: Jackie Thomas-Kennedy
name: emma
average rating: 3.33
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/07/30
date added: 2025/07/30
shelves: authors-of-color, diverse, owned, non-ya, literary-fiction, from-publisher-author, lgbt-plus, 3-and-a-half-stars, to-review, recommend, unpopular-opinion
review:
i support women's wrongs

(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the copy)
]]> The Guest 61986136 A young woman pretends to be someone she isn't in this stunning novel by the New York Times bestselling author of The Girls.

Summer is coming to a close on the East End of Long Island, and Alex is no longer welcome.

A misstep at a dinner party, and the older man she's been staying with dismisses her with a ride to the train station and a ticket back to the city.

With few resources and a waterlogged phone, but gifted with an ability to navigate the desires of others, Alex stays on Long Island and drifts like a ghost through the hedged lanes, gated driveways, and sun-blasted dunes of a rarified world that is, at first, closed to her. Propelled by desperation and a mutable sense of morality, she spends the week leading up to Labor Day moving from one place to the next, a cipher leaving destruction in her wake.

Taut, propulsive, and impossible to look away from, Emma Cline's The Guest is a spellbinding literary achievement.]]> 304 Emma Cline 0812998626 emma 4
and the thing about being me is that i'm always right. and this book completely ruled.



very soon into reading, i had to turn to a conveniently located nearby person and say the words "oh, i have a very good feeling about this one" aloud.

it was so consuming and intense that i often found myself physically putting it down and looking away from the page. not reading wasn't enough — i had to remove myself entirely.

i adored the beginning but wish it stayed as slow and eerie — the pace by the end was a little too thrillery for me but still excellently written and almost too real!!! and besides that, excellent on a literary level — like the little we know about our protagonist being mirrored in her life beside where it is on page.

i had a blast.

bottom line: the fun kind of unpopular opinion strikes again!

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.29 2023 The Guest
author: Emma Cline
name: emma
average rating: 3.29
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2023/05/26
date added: 2025/07/30
shelves: arc, literary-fiction, non-ya, from-publisher-author, 4-stars, recommend, to-buy, reviewed, unpopular-opinion
review:
every once in a while, you have to decide you're going to love a book based on literally no evidence.

and the thing about being me is that i'm always right. and this book completely ruled.



very soon into reading, i had to turn to a conveniently located nearby person and say the words "oh, i have a very good feeling about this one" aloud.

it was so consuming and intense that i often found myself physically putting it down and looking away from the page. not reading wasn't enough — i had to remove myself entirely.

i adored the beginning but wish it stayed as slow and eerie — the pace by the end was a little too thrillery for me but still excellently written and almost too real!!! and besides that, excellent on a literary level — like the little we know about our protagonist being mirrored in her life beside where it is on page.

i had a blast.

bottom line: the fun kind of unpopular opinion strikes again!

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Not Quite Dead Yet 220223963 The #1 New York Times bestselling author of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder—now a hit Netflix series—returns with her first novel for adults: a twisty thriller about a young woman trying to solve her own murder.

In seven days Jet Mason will be dead.

Jet is the daughter of one of the wealthiest families in Woodstock, Vermont. Twenty-seven years old, she’s still waiting for her life to begin. I’ll do it later, she always says. She has time.

Until Halloween night, when Jet is violently attacked by an unseen intruder.

She suffers a catastrophic head injury. The doctor is certain that within a week, the injury will trigger a deadly aneurysm.

Jet has never thought of herself as having enemies. But now she looks at everyone in a new light: her family, her former best friend turned sister-in-law, her ex-boyfriend.

She has at most seven days, and as her condition deteriorates she has only her childhood friend Billy for help. But nevertheless, she’s absolutely determined to finally finish something:

Jet is going to solve her own murder.]]> 392 Holly Jackson 059397705X emma 3
(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 4.30 2025 Not Quite Dead Yet
author: Holly Jackson
name: emma
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/07/29
date added: 2025/07/29
shelves: mystery-thriller-horror-etc, non-ya, arc, unpopular-opinion, eh, to-review
review:
holly jackson adult debut everybody freak out

(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> <![CDATA[Beautiful World, Where Are You]]> 56597885 356 Sally Rooney 0374602603 emma 5
Look what the cat dragged in.



My limited and rarely tested abilities to write a five star review, ever decaying and decreasing from lack of use. We meet again.

I will continue to make my own lack of skill the audience for this review, just for a moment, because this is a special occasion. This isn't just any five star book, although that would be a fairly once in a blue moon event as well.

You and I - you, of course, being my minimal talents - need to get it together.

This is a SALLY ROONEY book. And not just any Sally Rooney book, but possibly my FAVORITE Sally Rooney book. Could very well be my favorite book by who is likely my favorite author, in other words. Rooney has published one excerpt, one essay, three novels, and four short stories, and I have read her work 22 times, in total.

Also notably, there is a book I have called the following:
- my Bible
- the book of my heart
- my literal and figurative self, distilled into pages
- my most recommended book
- my favorite book of the last 150 years
- nearly my favorite book of all time, second only to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
- my comfort book
- the closest thing I have to a religion

It's a book called Conversations with Friends, it's also written by Sally Rooney, and it seems to have been dethroned by this one.

There's a reason I've put off writing this review for two and a half months. The stakes are f*cking high.

So where do I go from here?

I can tell you that, so long as I live, I expect never to encounter writing like this again. Writing so clear and lovely, writing that summons new images and thoughts and emotions you've never considered and acts as a kind acknowledgment of the scariest and deepest and truest ones you quietly have.

I can say that this book begins with a launch, a tossing into the pool, an unceremonious jumping in that's more like a continuation, an assumption you've been there all along. That though it begins suddenly it feels like coming home.

I can note that these are some of Rooney's best and worst love stories, the ones you root for the most with the most complicated and "bad" and problematic people populating them, and that it's so beautiful to have those two things coexist.

I can attempt to work out my feelings about these characters, that while I feel for them and am fascinated by them and may adore them, it's almost beside the point of everything else. That for me, a person who reads for characters, the characters are wonderfully done and the realest yet, and the least important part, for me.

I can add that this is also an incredible act of bravery by Rooney, that it serves a huge leap in scope and in style and in intention from her previous books, that she has been criticized for much of her still-nascent career in a way that feels mean-spirited by the aging totems of Literature, and that instead of ducking her head and conceding to the characterization of her work as vapid and millennial, she filled her third book with so much heart it's hard to fathom.

I can try to describe what this book means to me, what it's like to spend most of your life trying on cynicism like a Halloween costume, scratchy and seamy and not quite right, to indulge in pithy "I hate everyone" negativity when people seem to be the only real reason life is worth living, and then have your very favorite author - who, it may have been mentioned, holds a fairly outsize role in your heart and mind - tell you she thinks so, too.

I want you to know, and I can try to convey, that love and friendship are all that matters, and that this book is the loveliest way of giving yourself the gift of letting yourself believe that.

I will try to tell you so many things if they get you to read this book.

Bottom line: This is a once in a lifetime one, for me.

-----------------
note

as if i needed more reasons to find this book completely perfect:

-----------------
reread pre-review

the first time i read this, i finished it in a sitting.

the second time, i savored every word.

review to come / 5 stars / more if i could

-----------------
reread updates

decided to reread a perfect book about how even in the face of the end of the world, the meaning of life is loving people. no reason

-----------

i don't know how long i can go without rereading a sally rooney book. but i'm not willing to find out

-----------

i wish i could say this was as good the third time...but i can't.

it's better ]]> 3.53 2021 Beautiful World, Where Are You
author: Sally Rooney
name: emma
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2024/11/13
date added: 2025/07/29
shelves: favorite-authors, literary-fiction, non-ya, owned-multiple, owned, 5-stars, beautifully-written, favorites-2021, i-love-these-characters, recommend, lgbt-plus, reread, reviewed, favorites, project-5-star
review:
Well, well, well.

Look what the cat dragged in.



My limited and rarely tested abilities to write a five star review, ever decaying and decreasing from lack of use. We meet again.

I will continue to make my own lack of skill the audience for this review, just for a moment, because this is a special occasion. This isn't just any five star book, although that would be a fairly once in a blue moon event as well.

You and I - you, of course, being my minimal talents - need to get it together.

This is a SALLY ROONEY book. And not just any Sally Rooney book, but possibly my FAVORITE Sally Rooney book. Could very well be my favorite book by who is likely my favorite author, in other words. Rooney has published one excerpt, one essay, three novels, and four short stories, and I have read her work 22 times, in total.

Also notably, there is a book I have called the following:
- my Bible
- the book of my heart
- my literal and figurative self, distilled into pages
- my most recommended book
- my favorite book of the last 150 years
- nearly my favorite book of all time, second only to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
- my comfort book
- the closest thing I have to a religion

It's a book called Conversations with Friends, it's also written by Sally Rooney, and it seems to have been dethroned by this one.

There's a reason I've put off writing this review for two and a half months. The stakes are f*cking high.

So where do I go from here?

I can tell you that, so long as I live, I expect never to encounter writing like this again. Writing so clear and lovely, writing that summons new images and thoughts and emotions you've never considered and acts as a kind acknowledgment of the scariest and deepest and truest ones you quietly have.

I can say that this book begins with a launch, a tossing into the pool, an unceremonious jumping in that's more like a continuation, an assumption you've been there all along. That though it begins suddenly it feels like coming home.

I can note that these are some of Rooney's best and worst love stories, the ones you root for the most with the most complicated and "bad" and problematic people populating them, and that it's so beautiful to have those two things coexist.

I can attempt to work out my feelings about these characters, that while I feel for them and am fascinated by them and may adore them, it's almost beside the point of everything else. That for me, a person who reads for characters, the characters are wonderfully done and the realest yet, and the least important part, for me.

I can add that this is also an incredible act of bravery by Rooney, that it serves a huge leap in scope and in style and in intention from her previous books, that she has been criticized for much of her still-nascent career in a way that feels mean-spirited by the aging totems of Literature, and that instead of ducking her head and conceding to the characterization of her work as vapid and millennial, she filled her third book with so much heart it's hard to fathom.

I can try to describe what this book means to me, what it's like to spend most of your life trying on cynicism like a Halloween costume, scratchy and seamy and not quite right, to indulge in pithy "I hate everyone" negativity when people seem to be the only real reason life is worth living, and then have your very favorite author - who, it may have been mentioned, holds a fairly outsize role in your heart and mind - tell you she thinks so, too.

I want you to know, and I can try to convey, that love and friendship are all that matters, and that this book is the loveliest way of giving yourself the gift of letting yourself believe that.

I will try to tell you so many things if they get you to read this book.

Bottom line: This is a once in a lifetime one, for me.

-----------------
note

as if i needed more reasons to find this book completely perfect:

-----------------
reread pre-review

the first time i read this, i finished it in a sitting.

the second time, i savored every word.

review to come / 5 stars / more if i could

-----------------
reread updates

decided to reread a perfect book about how even in the face of the end of the world, the meaning of life is loving people. no reason

-----------

i don't know how long i can go without rereading a sally rooney book. but i'm not willing to find out

-----------

i wish i could say this was as good the third time...but i can't.

it's better
]]> Sugar, Baby 75720600 From the high-rises of Canary Wharf to the turquoise pools of Miami, Sugar, Baby is an intoxicating, darkly funny and shocking debut from an extraordinary new voice in fiction.

Agnes Green is turning 21 and her life is heading nowhere. Still living at home with her devoutly religious mother in a lifeless suburb, she works as a cleaner by day and spends her nights secretly going to clubs and dating Toby - who loves arthouse film, getting stoned, and ignoring her texts.

That is until she meets Emily, the daughter of one of her cleaning clients, who lives in London and works as a model - and a sugar baby. Emily's lifestyle is the escape Agnes has been longing tasting menus, private flights to Paris and Miami, rich older men who shower her with compliments and designer gifts.

Agnes' new life is beyond her wildest dreams, but it comes at a cost. As she begins to stray further from her mother's holy teachings, she must decide how far she is willing to go to be adored...]]> 329 Celine Saintclare 1838958193 emma 3
this book is just very silly. i can only imagine how funny it would be to any kind of actual sex worker to witness a girl whose crush took her to paris post a lengthy diatribe about what it means to be a sugar baby. (the same girl who just freaked out and destroyed the whole relationship because the guy said it was about appearances.)

i think the intention of this is to show the danger of sex work (the plot is certainly not what i assumed it would be, which is a bored and insecure girl learning how to be a sugar baby from a hottie. that would require that she ever actually learns when it's more a hilarious story of failing upward), but things always seem pretty good. our protagonist never gets hurt, she only does drugs when she asks for them, she gets taken on a lot of fun vacations and paid $50k a night sometimes, and nobody even gets mad at her when she throws tantrums.

all of those benefits are not offered by my job, for one thing.

bottom line: over the top and goofy and very melodramatic and filled with errors big and small but...not not fun.

(review to come)]]> 3.59 2023 Sugar, Baby
author: Celine Saintclare
name: emma
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2024/11/11
date added: 2025/07/29
shelves: literary-fiction, non-ya, diverse, authors-of-color, 3-stars, eh, reviewed
review:
why do i always think i'm going to like books with low ratings.

this book is just very silly. i can only imagine how funny it would be to any kind of actual sex worker to witness a girl whose crush took her to paris post a lengthy diatribe about what it means to be a sugar baby. (the same girl who just freaked out and destroyed the whole relationship because the guy said it was about appearances.)

i think the intention of this is to show the danger of sex work (the plot is certainly not what i assumed it would be, which is a bored and insecure girl learning how to be a sugar baby from a hottie. that would require that she ever actually learns when it's more a hilarious story of failing upward), but things always seem pretty good. our protagonist never gets hurt, she only does drugs when she asks for them, she gets taken on a lot of fun vacations and paid $50k a night sometimes, and nobody even gets mad at her when she throws tantrums.

all of those benefits are not offered by my job, for one thing.

bottom line: over the top and goofy and very melodramatic and filled with errors big and small but...not not fun.

(review to come)
]]> <![CDATA[The Book of Everlasting Things]]> 59808042
Lush, sensuous, and deeply romantic, The Book of Everlasting Things is the story of two lovers and two nations, split apart by forces beyond their control, yet bound by love and memory. Filled with exquisite descriptions of perfume and calligraphy, spanning continents and generations, Aanchal Malhotra’s debut novel is a feast for the senses and the heart.]]> 480 Aanchal Malhotra 1250802024 emma 2
but it turns out that's not the same as actually liking it.

this is just not my type of book, sorry. (i guess unsurprising, since i didn't pick it — it was for a in which i let you guys choose my reads.)

sweeping dramas tend to frustrate me. i don't even understand why the crush two teenagers had on each other had the staying power it takes to last 70 years, let alone why these two had to dedicate their lives to making not only themselves but everyone around them miserable over it.

sorry but...we have agency. pick up a pen. send a text.

i know i'm being cavalier, but i struggled with the way emotions are conveyed in this book, and that is a core issue. two unrelated characters have the exact same reaction to parallel situations, for example. we are told, "he was sad," for another, more often than we are shown sadness.

there are things i liked about this — the things i learned about this history, and about, randomly, perfume (even if both were through info-dumps) — but they weren't what i would have needed to fall in love with it.

and the ending killed any chance of that anyway.

bottom line: i could not have tried harder to like this book i would have never read by my own choosing.]]> 4.13 2022 The Book of Everlasting Things
author: Aanchal Malhotra
name: emma
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2022
rating: 2
read at: 2025/05/02
date added: 2025/07/29
shelves: non-ya, historical, authors-of-color, diverse, 2-stars, unpopular-opinion, nope, reviewed
review:
no one can say i haven't tried to like historical fiction.

but it turns out that's not the same as actually liking it.

this is just not my type of book, sorry. (i guess unsurprising, since i didn't pick it — it was for a in which i let you guys choose my reads.)

sweeping dramas tend to frustrate me. i don't even understand why the crush two teenagers had on each other had the staying power it takes to last 70 years, let alone why these two had to dedicate their lives to making not only themselves but everyone around them miserable over it.

sorry but...we have agency. pick up a pen. send a text.

i know i'm being cavalier, but i struggled with the way emotions are conveyed in this book, and that is a core issue. two unrelated characters have the exact same reaction to parallel situations, for example. we are told, "he was sad," for another, more often than we are shown sadness.

there are things i liked about this — the things i learned about this history, and about, randomly, perfume (even if both were through info-dumps) — but they weren't what i would have needed to fall in love with it.

and the ending killed any chance of that anyway.

bottom line: i could not have tried harder to like this book i would have never read by my own choosing.
]]> Rental House 208583869 From the award-winning author of Chemistry, a sharp-witted, insightful novel about a marriage as seen through the lens of two family vacations

Keru and Nate first meet in college, brought together by a joke at a Halloween party (would a “great white” costume mean dressing like a shark or a privileged Ivy League student?) and marrying a few years later. Misfits in their own families, they find in each other a feeling of home.

Keru is the only child of strict, well-educated Chinese immigrant parents who hold her to impossible standards even as an adult (“To use a dishwasher is to admit defeat,” says her father). Nate is from a rural, white, working class family that has never trusted his intellectual ambitions or – now – the citizenship status of his “foreign” wife. Nevertheless, some years into their marriage, Keru and Nate find themselves incorporating their families into two carefully planned vacations. The results are disastrous and revealing.

First in a cozy beach house on Cape Cod, and later in a luxury bungalow in the Catskills, the couple is forced to confront the hidden truths at the core of their relationship. Alongside their giant sheepdog Mantou, Keru and Nate navigate visits from in-laws, a sibling, and surprising new friends, all while trying to determine if they have what it takes to make themselves and each other happy. How do you cope when your spouse and your family of origin clash? How many people (and dogs) are needed to make a family?  And when the pack starts to disintegrate, what does it take to shepherd everyone back together?

Told in wry, gimlet-eyed prose, Rental House is a concentrated gem of a novel about the seen and unforeseen forces like in-laws, careers, dreams, and fears, that shake up a marriage over time.]]> 218 Weike Wang 0593545567 emma 4


i love weike wang: her sharp and clean writing, her deft incorporation of grand-scale themes and commentary, her very weird and very real characters. this leaned much more into that middle one, and i really enjoyed it — it felt like equal parts hearing gossip about a couple you kind of know, or catching up with a good friend at a coffee shop, and reading a long and clever article.

bottom line: one of my favorite writers currently writing!

(thank you to the publisher for the arc)]]> 3.38 2024 Rental House
author: Weike Wang
name: emma
average rating: 3.38
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/11/20
date added: 2025/07/29
shelves: non-ya, literary-fiction, diverse, authors-of-color, arc, 4-stars, recommend, reviewed
review:
i'll never get tired of reading lit fic about weirdos.



i love weike wang: her sharp and clean writing, her deft incorporation of grand-scale themes and commentary, her very weird and very real characters. this leaned much more into that middle one, and i really enjoyed it — it felt like equal parts hearing gossip about a couple you kind of know, or catching up with a good friend at a coffee shop, and reading a long and clever article.

bottom line: one of my favorite writers currently writing!

(thank you to the publisher for the arc)
]]> <![CDATA[A Witch's Guide to Magical Innkeeping]]> 123029113 A whimsical and heartwarming novel about a witch who has a second chance to get her magical powers—and her life—back on track, from the national bestselling author of The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches.

Sera Swan used to be one of the most powerful witches in Britain. Then she resurrected her great-aunt Jasmine from the (very recently) dead, lost most of her magic, befriended a semi-villainous talking fox, and was exiled from her Guild. Now she (slightly reluctantly and just a bit grumpily) helps her aunt run an enchanted inn in Lancashire, where she deals with her quirky guests' shenanigans, tries to keep said talking fox in check, and longs for the future that seems lost to her. But then she finds out about an old spell that could hold the key to restoring her power…

Enter Luke Larsen, handsome and icy magical historian, who arrives on a dark winter evening and might just know how to unlock the spell’s secrets. Luke has absolutely no interest in getting involved in the madcap goings-on of the inn and is definitely not about to let a certain bewitching innkeeper past his walls, so no one is more surprised than he is when he agrees to help Sera with her spell. Worse, he might actually be thawing.

Running an inn, reclaiming lost magic, and staying one step ahead of the watchful Guild is a lot for anyone, but Sera Swan is about to discover that she doesn’t have to do it alone...and that the weird, wonderful family she’s made might be the best magic of all.]]> 336 Sangu Mandanna emma 3
(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 4.17 2025 A Witch's Guide to Magical Innkeeping
author: Sangu Mandanna
name: emma
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/07/28
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: non-ya, magical-realist-urban-whatever, diverse, authors-of-color, fantasy, 3-and-a-half-stars, to-review, unpopular-opinion, eh
review:
new dream job alert

(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Didion and Babitz 207293782 Joan Didion is revealed at last in this outrageously provocative and profoundly moving new work on the mutual attractions—and mutual antipathies—of Didion and Didion’s fellow literary titan, Eve Babitz. “Could you write what you write if you weren’t so tiny, Joan?” —Eve Babitz, in a letter to Joan Didion, 1972 Eve Babitz died on December 17, 2021. Found in a closet in the back of an apartment full of wrack, ruin, and filth was a stack of boxes packed by her mother decades before. These boxes were pristine, the seals of duct tape unbroken. journals, photos, scrapbooks, manuscripts, letters. inside a lost world. This world turned for a certain number of years in the late sixties and early seventies, and was centered on a two-story house rented by Joan Didion and her husband, writer John Gregory Dunne, in a down-at-heel section of Hollywood. 7406 Franklin Avenue, a combination salon-hotbed-living end where writers and artists mixed with movie stars, rock n’ rollers, drug trash. 7406 Franklin Avenue was the making of one great American Joan Didion, cool and reserved behind her oversized sunglasses and storied marriage, a union as tortured as it was enduring. 7406 Franklin Avenue was the breaking and then the remaking—and thus the true making—of another great American Eve Babitz, goddaughter of Igor Stravinsky, nude of Marcel Duchamp, consort of Jim Morrison (among many, many others), who burned so hot she finally almost burned herself alive. The two formed a complicated a friendship that went bad, amity turning to enmity; a friendship that was as rare as true love, as rare as true hate. Didion, in spite of her confessional style, her widespread fame, is so little known or understood. She’s remained opaque, elusive. Until now. With deftness and skill, journalist Lili Anolik uses Babitz—Babitz’s brilliance of observation, Babitz’s incisive intelligence, and, most of all, Babitz’s diary-like letters—as the key to unlocking the mighty and mysterious Didion.]]> 352 Lili Anolik 1668065487 emma 2 bad" over a martini like a 1960s housewife. 

what it's not: very serious.



it's the kind of book that seems like it might set feminism back a decade or two, tossing two of the best writers of the 20th century (or at least the back half of it) together, shaking them up, objectifying them, and calling it a feud. somebody call ryan murphy.

i felt a low-level guilt while reading this, but not much pleasure. maybe i'm the kind of buttoned-up joan acolyte the author rolls her eyes at in early pages (she's an eve girl and it shows constantly, in the way that girls who smoked cigarettes in the bathroom tried to out-cool the popular groups without showing their effort).

i especially don't like defining eve by her body and those in or near it and joan by her cold calculations. those are components of them both, but god, after this many pages, how lazy!

some of the things in this book are unforgivable — say, that joan was never all that interested in her husband or her daughter (and to hell with those two career-defining books about their world-destroying losses, they don't fit with the narrative, we'll discuss them only to cherry-pick quotes we can use to call her unfeeling). or diagnosing joan with an eating disorder out of an also author-diagnosed fixation on being diminutive. or admitting to editing (without in-quote notation) many excerpts of eve's writing.

ultimately i think allowing a 98 year old man a few months out from death ramble unchecked about how he "made joan didion" tells you everything you need to know about the seriousness of the work here.

bottom line: i love these two enough i'd read anything about them. i just wish i didn't have to hit myself on the head with a rock until i forgot feminism in order to enjoy it here.

(thanks to the publisher for the copy)]]> 3.21 2024 Didion and Babitz
author: Lili Anolik
name: emma
average rating: 3.21
book published: 2024
rating: 2
read at: 2024/11/05
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: nonfiction, non-ya, arc, 2-stars, owned, eh, unpopular-opinion, reviewed
review:
what this book is: fun, wildly catty, gossipy in a way that makes you want to say "you're bad" over a martini like a 1960s housewife. 

what it's not: very serious.



it's the kind of book that seems like it might set feminism back a decade or two, tossing two of the best writers of the 20th century (or at least the back half of it) together, shaking them up, objectifying them, and calling it a feud. somebody call ryan murphy.

i felt a low-level guilt while reading this, but not much pleasure. maybe i'm the kind of buttoned-up joan acolyte the author rolls her eyes at in early pages (she's an eve girl and it shows constantly, in the way that girls who smoked cigarettes in the bathroom tried to out-cool the popular groups without showing their effort).

i especially don't like defining eve by her body and those in or near it and joan by her cold calculations. those are components of them both, but god, after this many pages, how lazy!

some of the things in this book are unforgivable — say, that joan was never all that interested in her husband or her daughter (and to hell with those two career-defining books about their world-destroying losses, they don't fit with the narrative, we'll discuss them only to cherry-pick quotes we can use to call her unfeeling). or diagnosing joan with an eating disorder out of an also author-diagnosed fixation on being diminutive. or admitting to editing (without in-quote notation) many excerpts of eve's writing.

ultimately i think allowing a 98 year old man a few months out from death ramble unchecked about how he "made joan didion" tells you everything you need to know about the seriousness of the work here.

bottom line: i love these two enough i'd read anything about them. i just wish i didn't have to hit myself on the head with a rock until i forgot feminism in order to enjoy it here.

(thanks to the publisher for the copy)
]]> Before I Let Go (Skyland, #1) 60568471
It couldn’t save their marriage.

Yasmen wasn’t prepared for how her life fell apart, but she is finally starting to find joy again. She and Josiah have found a new rhythm, co-parenting their two kids and running a thriving business together. Yet like magnets, they’re always drawn back to each other, and now they’re beginning to wonder if they’re truly ready to let go of everything they once had.

Soon, one stolen kiss leads to another…and then more. It's hot. It's illicit. It's all good—until old wounds reopen. Is it too late for them to find forever? Or could they even be better, the second time around?

Award-winning and bestselling "powerhouse" author Kennedy Ryan is at her absolute best in this compelling, scorching novel about hope and healing, and what it truly means to love for a lifetime (USA Today).]]> 391 Kennedy Ryan 1538706792 emma 4
FINALLY, SOME GOOD F*CKING ROMANCE!



this book has everything: yearning.

that's the end of the list. the only requirement for a good romance is yearning, and this has that in spades. between this and you deserve each other (the greatest romance of all time, sorry), i'm starting to think second-chance romance between two soulmates who have started hating each other is the perfect formula.

in addition to all the yearning (how many times can i use one word in this), this has the most delicious food descriptions, great parenting, fun friendships. it's such a blast. 

yes, it had too much smut for me and my 18th-century-lady sensibilities, but that's not enough to make this anything other than a great time.

bottom line: thank god this is just the beginning of a series.

4.5]]> 4.31 2022 Before I Let Go (Skyland, #1)
author: Kennedy Ryan
name: emma
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2024/10/28
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: romance, non-ya, authors-of-color, diverse, recommend, 4-and-a-half-stars, reviewed, owned
review:
a girl never forgets her first (kennedy ryan book)

FINALLY, SOME GOOD F*CKING ROMANCE!



this book has everything: yearning.

that's the end of the list. the only requirement for a good romance is yearning, and this has that in spades. between this and you deserve each other (the greatest romance of all time, sorry), i'm starting to think second-chance romance between two soulmates who have started hating each other is the perfect formula.

in addition to all the yearning (how many times can i use one word in this), this has the most delicious food descriptions, great parenting, fun friendships. it's such a blast. 

yes, it had too much smut for me and my 18th-century-lady sensibilities, but that's not enough to make this anything other than a great time.

bottom line: thank god this is just the beginning of a series.

4.5
]]> Jamaica Road 219302228 A transformative love story about two best friends who fall for each other, fall apart, and try to find their way back together in their tight-knit British-Jamaican community.

South London, 1981: Daphne is the only Black girl in her class. All she wants is to keep her head down, preferably in a book. The easiest way to survive is to go unnoticed. 

Daphne’s attempts at invisibility are upended when a boy named Connie Small arrives from Jamaica. Connie is the opposite of small in every lanky, outgoing, and unapologetically himself. Daphne tries to keep her distance, but Connie is magnetic, and they form an intense bond. As they navigate growing up in a volatile, rapidly changing city, their families become close, and their friendship begins to shift into something more complicated. When Connie reveals that he and his mother “nuh land”—meaning they’re in England illegally—Daphne realizes that she is dangerously entangled in Connie’s fragile home life. Soon, long-buried secrets in both families threaten to tear them apart permanently.

Spanning one tumultuous decade, from the industrial docklands of the Thames to the sandy beaches of Calabash Bay, Jamaica Road is a deftly plotted and emotionally expansive debut novel about race and class, the family you’re born with and the family you choose, and the limits of what true love can really conquer.]]> 448 Lisa Smith 0593537661 emma 3
(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 4.12 Jamaica Road
author: Lisa Smith
name: emma
average rating: 4.12
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2025/07/28
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: non-ya, literary-fiction, arc, authors-of-color, diverse, 3-and-a-half-stars, to-review, eh, unpopular-opinion
review:
once a year i allow myself to read a heart-wrenching devastating love story and then promise i'll never do it again

(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> <![CDATA[The Odd Woman and the City: A Memoir]]> 22929524 The Odd Woman and the City explores the rhythms, chance encounters, and ever-changing friendships of urban life that forge the sensibility of a fiercely independent woman who has lived out her conflicts, not her fantasies, in a city (New York) that has done the same. Running steadily through the book is Vivian Gornick's exchange of more than twenty years with Leonard, a gay man who is sophisticated about his own unhappiness, whose friendship has "shed more light on the mysterious nature of ordinary human relations than has any other intimacy" she has known. The exchange between Gornick and Leonard acts as a Greek chorus to the main action of the narrator's continual engagement on the street with grocers, derelicts, and doormen; people on the bus, cross-dressers on the corner, and acquaintances by the handful. In Leonard she sees herself reflected plain; out on the street she makes sense of what she sees.

Written as a narrative collage that includes meditative pieces on the making of a modern feminist, the role of the flaneur in urban literature, and the evolution of friendship over the past two centuries, The Odd Woman and the City beautifully bookends Gornick's acclaimed Fierce Attachments, in which we first encountered her rich relationship with the ultimate metropolis.]]> 192 Vivian Gornick 0374298602 emma 0 to-read 3.89 2015 The Odd Woman and the City: A Memoir
author: Vivian Gornick
name: emma
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Summer 269528
With its frank treatment of a woman's sexual awakening, Summer created a sensation upon its 1917 publication. Edith Wharton — the author of Ethan Frome and a peerless observer and chronicler of society — completely shattered the standards of conventional love stories with this novel's candor and realism. The Pulitzer Prize-winning author declared Summer a personal favorite among her works, and liked to refer to it as "the Hot Ethan." Over a century later, it remains fresh and relevant.]]> 127 Edith Wharton emma 0 to-read 3.68 1917 Summer
author: Edith Wharton
name: emma
average rating: 3.68
book published: 1917
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Cat's People 215805897 A stray cat brings together five strangers over the course of one fateful summer in this heartwarming novel about love, found family, and the power of connection.

Núria, a single-by-choice barista with a resentment for the “crazy cat lady” label, is a member of The Meow-Yorkers, a group in Brooklyn who takes care of the neighborhood’s stray cats. On one of her volunteering days, she starts finding Post-It notes from a secret admirer at the spot where her favorite stray lives—a black cat named Cat. Like most cats, he is rather curious and sly, so of course he knows who the notes are from. Núria, however, is clueless.

Are the notes from Collin, a bestselling author and self-professed hermit with a weakness for good coffee? Are they from Lily, a fresh-out-of-high school Georgia native searching for her long-lost half-sister? Are they from Omar, the beloved neighborhood mailman going through an early mid-life crisis? Or are they from Bong, the grieving widower who owns her favorite bodega? When Cat suddenly falls ill, these five strangers find themselves connected in their desire to care for him and discover that chance encounters can lead to the meaningful connections they've been searching for.]]> 304 Tanya Guerrero 059387384X emma 0 to-read 4.20 2025 Cat's People
author: Tanya Guerrero
name: emma
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[After Midnight: Thirteen Tales for the Dark Hours]]> 224003539 Introduced by international bestseller Stephen King, a stunning new hardback collection of Daphne du Maurier's darkest stories

Amid the reflections and twisting alleyways of Venice, a grieving couple are haunted by the past. On a sharp December day, the wind changes - and the birds begin to gather. A group of wartime scientists attempt to capture the power of death, an eye operation reveals a monstrous reality, and a woman returns home to find she doesn't exist. From murderous desires to supernatural forces, du Maurier's masterful short stories stare into the dark heart of our between men and women, humanity and nature, love and obsession, the future and the past. Whatever you do, don't look now . . .

This brand new collection brings together thirteen of du Maurier's greatest uncanny stories for the first time - including 'The Birds' and 'Don't Look Now'.]]> 528 Daphne du Maurier 1668204266 emma 0 4.50 2025 After Midnight: Thirteen Tales for the Dark Hours
author: Daphne du Maurier
name: emma
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: to-read, arc, from-publisher-author, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, non-ya, owned, tbr-arc, tbr-owned
review:
i don't know how we're getting a new daphne du maurier release in 2025, but i'm going to call it magic and move on
]]> <![CDATA[Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Order of Life]]> 50887097 A wondrous debut from an extraordinary new voice in nonfiction, Why Fish Don’t Exist is a dark and astonishing tale of love, chaos, scientific obsession, and—possibly—even murder.

David Starr Jordan was a taxonomist, a man possessed with bringing order to the natural world. In time, he would be credited with discovering nearly a fifth of the fish known to humans in his day. But the more of the hidden blueprint of life he uncovered, the harder the universe seemed to try to thwart him. His specimen collections were demolished by lightning, by fire, and eventually by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake—which sent more than a thousand of his discoveries, housed in fragile glass jars, plummeting to the floor. In an instant, his life’s work was shattered.

Many might have given up, given in to despair. But Jordan? He surveyed the wreckage at his feet, found the first fish he recognized, and confidently began to rebuild his collection. And this time, he introduced one clever innovation that he believed would at last protect his work against the chaos of the world.

When NPR reporter Lulu Miller first heard this anecdote in passing, she took Jordan for a fool—a cautionary tale in hubris, or denial. But as her own life slowly unraveled, she began to wonder about him. Perhaps instead he was a model for how to go on when all seemed lost. What she would unearth about his life would transform her understanding of history, morality, and the world beneath her feet.

Part biography, part memoir, part scientific adventure, Why Fish Don’t Exist reads like a fable about how to persevere in a world where chaos will always prevail.]]> 225 Lulu Miller emma 4
i picked this up for a in which i let you guys choose my reads, having absolutely never heard of it.

i would know if i had, because this is not the kind of title you forget.

i had, therefore, 0 expectations, beyond the fact that once i started and found this to appear to be a book about a fish science guy from the olden days, i knew it had to be more than it appeared. you guys know me better than that.

i was right on that front.

this is at times definitely a book about an old man, but mostly it is about the world we live in, in all its cruelties and hopes. which is my favorite thing for a book to be about.

that mostly made up for the fish stuff.

bottom line: a pleasant surprise in so many ways!]]> 4.14 2020 Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Order of Life
author: Lulu Miller
name: emma
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2025/05/01
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: non-ya, nonfiction, lgbt-plus, recommend, owned, reviewed, 3-and-a-half-stars, to-buy
review:
you learn something new every day.

i picked this up for a in which i let you guys choose my reads, having absolutely never heard of it.

i would know if i had, because this is not the kind of title you forget.

i had, therefore, 0 expectations, beyond the fact that once i started and found this to appear to be a book about a fish science guy from the olden days, i knew it had to be more than it appeared. you guys know me better than that.

i was right on that front.

this is at times definitely a book about an old man, but mostly it is about the world we live in, in all its cruelties and hopes. which is my favorite thing for a book to be about.

that mostly made up for the fish stuff.

bottom line: a pleasant surprise in so many ways!
]]> My Education 16158566 An intimately charged novel of desire and disaster from the author of American Woman and A Person of Interest

Regina Gottlieb had been warned about Professor Nicholas Brodeur long before arriving as a graduate student at his prestigious university high on a pastoral hill. He’s said to lie in the dark in his office while undergraduate women read couplets to him. He’s condemned on the walls of the women’s restroom, and enjoys films by Roman Polanski. But no one has warned Regina about his exceptional physical beauty—or his charismatic, volatile wife.

My Education is the story of Regina’s mistakes, which only begin in the bedroom, and end—if they do—fifteen years in the future and thousands of miles away. By turns erotic and completely catastrophic, Regina’s misadventures demonstrate what can happen when the chasm between desire and duty is too wide to bridge.]]> 304 Susan Choi 0670024902 emma 4
and baby, we got there.



i found this riveting and powerful! parts of it were stupid (like...writing so tryhard-y that it contained consistent errors in referencing itself; lit fic sex scenes, a noted crime against humanity, abounding) but i couldn't ever really put this down.

and that's good enough for me!

bottom line: i love an unpopular opinion.]]> 3.28 2013 My Education
author: Susan Choi
name: emma
average rating: 3.28
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2023/01/10
date added: 2025/07/28
shelves: authors-of-color, diverse, lgbt-plus, literary-fiction, non-ya, unpopular-opinion, recommend, 3-and-a-half-stars, reviewed
review:
you see literary fiction with a low average rating. i see an opportunity to be unique.

and baby, we got there.



i found this riveting and powerful! parts of it were stupid (like...writing so tryhard-y that it contained consistent errors in referencing itself; lit fic sex scenes, a noted crime against humanity, abounding) but i couldn't ever really put this down.

and that's good enough for me!

bottom line: i love an unpopular opinion.
]]> The Influencers 216522650 A social media influencer's empire is burned to the ground—literally. The top suspects? The five daughters who made her famous.

"Mother May I" Iverson has spent the past twenty years building a massively successful influencer empire with endearing videos featuring her five mixed-race daughters. But the girls are all grown up now, and the ramifications of having their entire childhoods commodified start to spill over into public view, especially in light of the pivotal Who killed May’s newlywed husband and then torched her mansion to cover it up?

April is a businesswoman feuding with her mother over IP; twins June and July are influencers themselves, threatening to overtake May’s spotlight; January is a theater tech who steers clear of her mother and the limelight; and the youngest…well, March has somehow completely disappeared. As the days pass post-murder, everyone has an opinion—the sisters, May, a mysterious "friend of the family," and the collective voice of the online audience watching the family’s every move—with suspicion flying every direction.

A campy and escapist exploration of race, gender, sexuality, and class, The Influencers is an evisceration of influencer culture and how alienating traditional expectations can be, ripe for the current moment when the first generation of children made famous by their parents are, now, all grown up—and looking for retribution.]]> 448 Anna-Marie McLemore 059372917X emma 2
this is a book about how mommy influencers are evil (an opinion i shared going in) in a way that will turn their daughters into traumatized girlbosses (sure).

as i waited for a couple hundred pages to get into this, i realized the problem: everything about it was over the top.

our mommy's username is mother may i, so she's called may. her children are named april, june, july, january, and march. her husband's name is august. this is liberally sprinkled with brand names that feel like pinterest search results for "rich people stuff."

it makes some interesting choices (the perspective is that of the audience watching; there's a solid twist or two) but its characters, story, style, and...everything else were so out there i couldn't ever settle in.

bottom line: ridiculous to the point of annoying.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.22 The Influencers
author: Anna-Marie McLemore
name: emma
average rating: 3.22
book published:
rating: 2
read at: 2025/04/30
date added: 2025/07/27
shelves: arc, from-publisher-author, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, authors-of-color, diverse, unpopular-opinion, reviewed, nope, 2-stars
review:
what could be more horrifying.

this is a book about how mommy influencers are evil (an opinion i shared going in) in a way that will turn their daughters into traumatized girlbosses (sure).

as i waited for a couple hundred pages to get into this, i realized the problem: everything about it was over the top.

our mommy's username is mother may i, so she's called may. her children are named april, june, july, january, and march. her husband's name is august. this is liberally sprinkled with brand names that feel like pinterest search results for "rich people stuff."

it makes some interesting choices (the perspective is that of the audience watching; there's a solid twist or two) but its characters, story, style, and...everything else were so out there i couldn't ever settle in.

bottom line: ridiculous to the point of annoying.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> The Factory 43862305 The English-language debut of Hiroko Oyamada—one of the most powerfully strange young voices in Japan.

In an unnamed Japanese city, three seemingly normal and unrelated characters find work at a sprawling industrial factory. They each focus intently on their specific jobs: one studies moss, one shreds paper, and the other proofreads incomprehensible documents. Life in the factory has its own logic and momentum, and, eventually, the factory slowly expands and begins to take over everything, enveloping these poor workers. The very margins of reality seem to be dissolving: all forms of life capriciously evolve, strange creatures begin to appear… After a while—it could be weeks or years—the workers don’t even have the ability to ask themselves: where does the factory end and the rest of the world begin?

Told in three alternating first-person narratives, The Factory casts a vivid—if sometimes surreal—portrait of the absurdity and meaninglessness of modern life. With hints of Kafka and unexpected moments of creeping humor, Hiroko Oyamada is one of the boldest writers of her generation.]]> 116 Hiroko Oyamada 0811228851 emma 4


this is a very short book but it felt arduous to get to, which i suppose is the point??

modern and corporate life really do feel this surreal and pointless. do i love reading about it? no, baby, i live it. but it was well done as hell.

bottom line: oh me! oh life!]]> 3.34 2010 The Factory
author: Hiroko Oyamada
name: emma
average rating: 3.34
book published: 2010
rating: 4
read at: 2022/10/14
date added: 2025/07/27
shelves: non-ya, literary-fiction, diverse, authors-of-color, recommend, to-buy, unpopular-opinion, 3-and-a-half-stars, reviewed
review:
"a powerfully strange portrait of the absurdity and meaninglessness of modern life"...sounds like my average tuesday.



this is a very short book but it felt arduous to get to, which i suppose is the point??

modern and corporate life really do feel this surreal and pointless. do i love reading about it? no, baby, i live it. but it was well done as hell.

bottom line: oh me! oh life!
]]> The Jungle Books 20888207 448 Rudyard Kipling 0141394625 emma 3
this is another installment of project long classics, a campaign in which, in theory, i read a chapter a day of a scary old book over a month to make it approachable, and in execution i fuel my penguin clothbound addiction and make puns.

i love feeling smart while reading a book written for 6 year olds. that's what children's classics are for.


MOWGLI'S BROTHERS
little baby mowgli arrived amongst the jungle creatures, who have called a town hall meeting to see whether he's going to be homeschooled or lunch. then 10 years passed and they called another town hall meeting to kick him the hell out.


KAA'S HUNTING
backtracking in order to talk about how monkeys kidnapped mowgli so he could teach them architecture and then kaa put the fear of god in them.


TIGER TIGER
back to present day. mowgli got a human job as a cowherd and immediately lateraled his cattle into the killing of a tiger.


THE WHITE SEAL
if you're wondering what the through-line is of these stories, i can officially tell you it is neither mowgli nor the jungle. we just spent 20 pages hanging out with a seal who lost his wig and formed a 10,000 creature army.


RIKKI-TIKKI-TAVI
this is about a verbosely named mongoose who becomes some kid's pet and kills an entire family of cobras to secure his position. kind of a metaphor for pulling the ladder up after you.


TOOMAI OF THE ELEPHANTS
i don't believe elephants should have to have jobs beyond being elephants. and you can quote me on that.


SERVANTS OF THE QUEEN
i wasn't having a ton of fun with this book even before we brought the word servants into it. (it's a conversation between various animals made to carry stuff.) thus concludes Book I.


HOW FEAR CAME
for me, it was "when i realized i'm not even halfway done." but for mowgli (because we have turned back in time and space to hang out with him when he was still in the jungle) it's mostly tiger-related.


THE MIRACLE OF PURUN BHAGAT
this is really bringing out the high-school-english-class siddhartha-hater contrarian in me.


LETTING IN THE JUNGLE
this has that good old fashioned children's classic violence. and also a ragtag group of animals destroying the annual agricultural output of an entire village.


THE UNDERTAKERS
i haven't read anything from this book in days, but i can explain. it's because i didn't want to.

there is a character in this called "the mugger," but he is not a city-based petty thief. he's a crocodile who has been shot with a gun.


THE KING'S ANKUS
mowgli's back. he found treasure and poison snakes and scenes of hunt-related murder.


QUIQUERN
took another few days off from this only to return to this story about starving dogs killing seals in the arctic circle. and they don't even talk. not to sarcastically quote from the classic seasonal hit SANTA BABY, but...think of all the fun i've missed.


RED DOG
mowgli has killed stuff now and all the original animals are old / dead. this is possibly the least whimsical children's classic ever.


THE SPRING RUNNING
family reunion <3


OVERALL
if i was an english child in the world's dreariest town like 100 years ago, i feel like these would hit. but i'm not, so...i'll just say i'm not a rudyard kipling girl.
rating: 2.5]]> 3.65 1895 The Jungle Books
author: Rudyard Kipling
name: emma
average rating: 3.65
book published: 1895
rating: 3
read at: 2025/07/27
date added: 2025/07/27
shelves: classics, children-s, project-long-classics, 2-and-a-half-stars, unpopular-opinion, to-buy, reviewed, nope
review:
welcome to...THE JU(LY)NGLE BOOKS.

this is another installment of project long classics, a campaign in which, in theory, i read a chapter a day of a scary old book over a month to make it approachable, and in execution i fuel my penguin clothbound addiction and make puns.

i love feeling smart while reading a book written for 6 year olds. that's what children's classics are for.


MOWGLI'S BROTHERS
little baby mowgli arrived amongst the jungle creatures, who have called a town hall meeting to see whether he's going to be homeschooled or lunch. then 10 years passed and they called another town hall meeting to kick him the hell out.


KAA'S HUNTING
backtracking in order to talk about how monkeys kidnapped mowgli so he could teach them architecture and then kaa put the fear of god in them.


TIGER TIGER
back to present day. mowgli got a human job as a cowherd and immediately lateraled his cattle into the killing of a tiger.


THE WHITE SEAL
if you're wondering what the through-line is of these stories, i can officially tell you it is neither mowgli nor the jungle. we just spent 20 pages hanging out with a seal who lost his wig and formed a 10,000 creature army.


RIKKI-TIKKI-TAVI
this is about a verbosely named mongoose who becomes some kid's pet and kills an entire family of cobras to secure his position. kind of a metaphor for pulling the ladder up after you.


TOOMAI OF THE ELEPHANTS
i don't believe elephants should have to have jobs beyond being elephants. and you can quote me on that.


SERVANTS OF THE QUEEN
i wasn't having a ton of fun with this book even before we brought the word servants into it. (it's a conversation between various animals made to carry stuff.) thus concludes Book I.


HOW FEAR CAME
for me, it was "when i realized i'm not even halfway done." but for mowgli (because we have turned back in time and space to hang out with him when he was still in the jungle) it's mostly tiger-related.


THE MIRACLE OF PURUN BHAGAT
this is really bringing out the high-school-english-class siddhartha-hater contrarian in me.


LETTING IN THE JUNGLE
this has that good old fashioned children's classic violence. and also a ragtag group of animals destroying the annual agricultural output of an entire village.


THE UNDERTAKERS
i haven't read anything from this book in days, but i can explain. it's because i didn't want to.

there is a character in this called "the mugger," but he is not a city-based petty thief. he's a crocodile who has been shot with a gun.


THE KING'S ANKUS
mowgli's back. he found treasure and poison snakes and scenes of hunt-related murder.


QUIQUERN
took another few days off from this only to return to this story about starving dogs killing seals in the arctic circle. and they don't even talk. not to sarcastically quote from the classic seasonal hit SANTA BABY, but...think of all the fun i've missed.


RED DOG
mowgli has killed stuff now and all the original animals are old / dead. this is possibly the least whimsical children's classic ever.


THE SPRING RUNNING
family reunion <3


OVERALL
if i was an english child in the world's dreariest town like 100 years ago, i feel like these would hit. but i'm not, so...i'll just say i'm not a rudyard kipling girl.
rating: 2.5
]]> Audition 216247518 One woman, the performance of a lifetime. Or two. A mesmerizing Mobius strip of a novel that asks who we are to the people we love.

Two people meet for lunch in a Manhattan restaurant. She’s an elegant and accomplished actress in rehearsals for an upcoming premiere. He’s attractive, troubling, and young—young enough to be her son. Who is he to her, and who is she to him? In Audition, two competing narratives unspool, rewriting our understanding of the roles we play every day—partner, parent, creator, muse—and the truths every performance masks, especially from those who think they know us best.]]> 200 Katie Kitamura 059385232X emma 4


i began reading this book on a train, and as the trip progressed two contradictory feelings built in me until i felt almost frenzied. the first impulse, as i tore through the pages, was that seeing as it was the only book i had brought with me for a weekend i should pause and look out the window or listen to music for the rest of the journey, in order to preserve it. 

the second was to find some means to ensure that neither the ride nor the book ever ended. 

from the moment i picked this up, and in truth even before, i had a feeling about it. as i read it i found myself revisiting sentences and paragraphs and even pages again and again, that if my focus wasn’t absolute and even if it was that i needed to immediately reread it.

bottom line: i’ve read this book once and yet i’ve read it many times. 

(thank you to the publisher for the arc)]]> 3.33 2025 Audition
author: Katie Kitamura
name: emma
average rating: 3.33
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/17
date added: 2025/07/27
shelves: non-ya, literary-fiction, diverse, authors-of-color, owned, from-publisher-author, arc, 4-stars, recommend, reviewed
review:
everybody needs to read this book immediately. i don't want to talk about anything else.



i began reading this book on a train, and as the trip progressed two contradictory feelings built in me until i felt almost frenzied. the first impulse, as i tore through the pages, was that seeing as it was the only book i had brought with me for a weekend i should pause and look out the window or listen to music for the rest of the journey, in order to preserve it. 

the second was to find some means to ensure that neither the ride nor the book ever ended. 

from the moment i picked this up, and in truth even before, i had a feeling about it. as i read it i found myself revisiting sentences and paragraphs and even pages again and again, that if my focus wasn’t absolute and even if it was that i needed to immediately reread it.

bottom line: i’ve read this book once and yet i’ve read it many times. 

(thank you to the publisher for the arc)
]]> Pizza Girl 44088751 In the tradition of audacious and wryly funny novels like The Idiot and Convenience Store Woman comes the wildly original coming-of-age story of a pregnant pizza delivery girl who becomes obsessed with one of her customers.

Eighteen years old, pregnant, and working as a pizza delivery girl in suburban Los Angeles, our charmingly dysfunctional heroine is deeply lost and in complete denial about it all. She's grieving the death of her father (who she has more in common with than she'd like to admit), avoiding her supportive mom and loving boyfriend, and flagrantly ignoring her future.

Her world is further upended when she becomes obsessed with Jenny, a stay-at-home mother new to the neighborhood, who comes to depend on weekly deliveries of pickled covered pizzas for her son's happiness. As one woman looks toward motherhood and the other towards middle age, the relationship between the two begins to blur in strange, complicated, and ultimately heartbreaking ways.

Bold, tender, propulsive, and unexpected in countless ways, Jean Kyoung Frazier's Pizza Girl is a moving and funny portrait of a flawed, unforgettable young woman as she tries to find her place in the world.]]> 208 Jean Kyoung Frazier 038554572X emma 4


This is like if that realization were 200 pages long and funnier.

And made me want to eat pizza.

So very much up my alley.

Bottom line: People are great and so is pizza! This has evidence of both.]]> 3.35 2020 Pizza Girl
author: Jean Kyoung Frazier
name: emma
average rating: 3.35
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2022/03/07
date added: 2025/07/27
shelves: authors-of-color, diverse, non-ya, lgbt-plus, literary-fiction, to-buy, recommend, reviewed, 3-and-a-half-stars
review:
You know that recurrent realization that every single person you have ever seen in your life is a human being with a complex worldview and internal monologue, relationship dynamics and trials and tribulations and a favorite flavor of popsicle?



This is like if that realization were 200 pages long and funnier.

And made me want to eat pizza.

So very much up my alley.

Bottom line: People are great and so is pizza! This has evidence of both.
]]> Pure Colour 57693639 Pure Colour is a galaxy of a novel: explosive, celestially bright, huge, and streaked with beauty. It is a contemporary bible, an atlas of feeling, and an absurdly funny guide to the great (and terrible) things about being alive. Sheila Heti is a philosopher of modern experience, and she has reimagined what a book can hold.

Here we are, just living in the first draft of Creation, which was made by some great artist, who is now getting ready to tear it apart.

In this first draft of the world, a woman named Mira leaves home to study. There, she meets Annie, whose tremendous power opens Mira’s chest like a portal—to what, she doesn’t know. When Mira is older, her beloved father dies, and his spirit passes into her. Together, they become a leaf on a tree. But photosynthesis gets boring, and being alive is a problem that cannot be solved, even by a leaf. Eventually, Mira must remember the human world she’s left behind, including Annie, and choose whether or not to return.]]> 224 Sheila Heti 0374603944 emma 4


much like a galaxy, this contained some good stuff (like being beautifully written) and some bad stuff (like being weird).

the beautifully written bit is of the Sentences That Will Change Your Whole Perspective While Being Poetic And Lovely On A Page By Page Basis, and the weird bit is content that will make you question where the line is re: incest.

overall, it turns out it's a trade i'll take.

or maybe not, but regardless, the ending was so stunning and wonderful it balanced everything.

bottom line: weird forever!!!]]> 3.45 2022 Pure Colour
author: Sheila Heti
name: emma
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2023/01/13
date added: 2025/07/27
shelves: literary-fiction, non-ya, owned, 4-stars, unpopular-opinion, recommend, reviewed
review:
anything described as "a galaxy of a novel" is something i want to read.



much like a galaxy, this contained some good stuff (like being beautifully written) and some bad stuff (like being weird).

the beautifully written bit is of the Sentences That Will Change Your Whole Perspective While Being Poetic And Lovely On A Page By Page Basis, and the weird bit is content that will make you question where the line is re: incest.

overall, it turns out it's a trade i'll take.

or maybe not, but regardless, the ending was so stunning and wonderful it balanced everything.

bottom line: weird forever!!!
]]> <![CDATA[The People's Project: Poems, Essays, and Art for Looking Forward]]> 228062204 A liberatory anthology of twenty-six writers—a community in book form—charting paths ahead for action and care in the face of political uncertainty, curated by Maggie Smith and Saeed Jones.

Inspired by Saeed Jones and Maggie Smith’s conversations in the wake of the 2024 election, this is a collection of poems, essays, and visual art on what we—individually and collectively—can hold onto, and what we can work towards.

In times of difficulty, with a government working against its own people, we must turn to our friends and loved ones to provide context, language, energy, and hope. The People’s Project offers a range of perspectives, drawing wisdom from their communities and from know-your-place aggression to crip time as a way forward, from finding strength in nature to how trans people provide a guide for the future, and how hope has everything to do with survival.

We hope these meditations and strategies will provide you with inspiration and fortitude for the years ahead.

Featuring original and selected work from Alexander Chee, Chase Strangio, Tiana Clark, Hala Alyan, Aubrey Hirsch, Imani Perry, Abi Maxwell, Victoria Chang, Koritha Mitchell, Jason Silverstein, Alice Wong, Mira Jacob, Aruni Kashyap, Sam Sax, Ashley C. Ford, Marlon James, Eula Biss, Randall Mann, Danez Smith, Ada Limon, Kiese Laymon, Joy Harjo, Jill Damatac, and Patricia Smith.]]> 128 Saeed Jones 1668207028 emma 0 4.52 The People's Project: Poems, Essays, and Art for Looking Forward
author: Saeed Jones
name: emma
average rating: 4.52
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/27
shelves: to-read, arc, authors-of-color, diverse, from-publisher-author, non-ya, owned, nonfiction, tbr-arc, tbr-owned
review:

]]> Cursed Daughters 223955096 No man will call your house his home. And if they try, they will not have peace...

So goes the family curse, long handed down from generation to generation, ruining families and breaking hearts. And now it's Eniiyi's turn - who, due to her uncanny resemblance to her dead aunt, Monife, is already used to her family's strange beliefs, as well as their insistence that she is a reincarnation. Still, when she falls in love with the handsome boy she saves from drowning, she can no longer run from her family's history. Is she destined to live out the habitual story of love and heartbreak, or can she escape the family curse and the mysterious fate that befell her aunt?]]> Oyinkan Braithwaite 1805463373 emma 0 i wish my family had a curse 4.42 2025 Cursed Daughters
author: Oyinkan Braithwaite
name: emma
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/27
shelves: to-read, authors-of-color, diverse, literary-fiction, non-ya, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, owned, from-publisher-author
review:
i wish my family had a curse
]]> Bestiary 43297216
One evening, Mother tells Daughter a story about a tiger spirit who lived in a woman’s body. She was called Hu Gu Po, and she hungered to eat children, especially their toes. Soon afterwards, Daughter awakes with a tiger tail. And more mysterious events follow: Holes in the backyard spit up letters penned by her grandmother; a visiting aunt arrives with snakes in her belly; a brother tests the possibility of flight. All the while, Daughter is falling for Ben, a neighborhood girl with strange powers of her own. As the two young lovers translate the grandmother’s letters, Daughter begins to understand that each woman in her family embodies a myth–and that she will have to bring her family’s secrets to light in order to change their destiny.

With a poetic voice of crackling electricity, K-Ming Chang is an explosive young writer who combines the wit and fabulism of Helen Oyeyemi with the subversive storytelling of Maxine Hong Kingston. Tracing one family’s history from Taiwan to America, from Arkansas to California, Bestiary is a novel of migration, queer lineages, and girlhood.]]> 259 K-Ming Chang 0593132580 emma 4


the creepy crawly gross surreal way that three generations of mothers and daughters are haunted by generations of violence and gendered expectation...how it's presented through entwined mythology and magic...the cruelty and the forgiveness and the anger and the love it shows without ever ever directly telling...

why does this book have a 3.44 average rating??

besides the egregious grossness, i suppose.

bottom line: this is why i can't stop reading low-rated books.]]> 3.46 2020 Bestiary
author: K-Ming Chang
name: emma
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/11
date added: 2025/07/27
shelves: non-ya, magical-realist-urban-whatever, diverse, authors-of-color, owned, 4-stars, recommend, reviewed, unpopular-opinion
review:
books about the violence of womanhood <3



the creepy crawly gross surreal way that three generations of mothers and daughters are haunted by generations of violence and gendered expectation...how it's presented through entwined mythology and magic...the cruelty and the forgiveness and the anger and the love it shows without ever ever directly telling...

why does this book have a 3.44 average rating??

besides the egregious grossness, i suppose.

bottom line: this is why i can't stop reading low-rated books.
]]> Vladivostok Circus 198164651
Nathalie arrives at the circus in Vladivostok, Russia, fresh out of art college in Geneva. She is there to design the costumes for a trio of artists who are due to perform one of the most dangerous acts of all: the Russian Bar.

As winter approaches, the season at Vladivostok winds down, the windy port city deserted as performers head home; all except the Russian bar trio and their manager. They are scheduled to perform at a festival in Ulan Ude, just before Christmas.

What ensues is an intimate and beguiling account of four people learning to work with and trust one another. This is a book about the delicate balance that must be achieved when flirting with death in such spectacular fashion. Set against the backdrop of a cloudy ocean, Vladivostok Circus explores collaboration, creativity and belonging, all the while immersing the reader in Dusapin’s trademark dreamlike prose.

‘Dusapin’s beautiful prose, with imagery both metallic and mineral, insinuates its way towards a delicate empathy between the generations, as well as examining the confusion that comes with dual nationality, and the lifetime loss that is exile.’ Irish Times

‘Fragmentation, recurring imagery and a flair for evoking atmosphere so effective that lassitude seems to seep through the pages recalls Deborah Levy’s writing.’ Guardian]]> 224 Elisa Shua Dusapin 191419831X emma 4 me about circuses in books: :)



dusapin's books are atmospheric, immersive, but unlike many books that carry those descriptors, there's nothing fantastical about their settings. they're often mundane, populated by drudgery and disappointment, and we're left frantically wondering the same question that haunts each of her protagonists: why am i here?

in spite of its unusual setup — a costume designer in nowheresville russia attempting to put together looks for a trio of gravity-defying gymnasts in an off-season circus — this book has the same query at its core.

nathalie doesn't know why she's found herself in any place she's ever been, least of all this random-ass one. and yet, just as the artists have to trust each other not to fall, she has to learn how to trust where she is and where she's going.

nothing much happens in this book, as with all of dusapin's, but it's a subtle, clarifying novel about so many of the weirdest parts of being alive: relationships that feel all-important but are snuffed out by time, the haunting desire for purpose, the phenomenon of people eating absurd foods on public transit. that is not nothing.

bottom line: not her strongest, but i enjoyed a lot here.]]> 3.43 2024 Vladivostok Circus
author: Elisa Shua Dusapin
name: emma
average rating: 3.43
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/28
date added: 2025/07/26
shelves: literary-fiction, non-ya, diverse, authors-of-color, 3-and-a-half-stars, recommend, to-buy, reviewed
review:
me about circuses in real life: :/
me about circuses in books: :)



dusapin's books are atmospheric, immersive, but unlike many books that carry those descriptors, there's nothing fantastical about their settings. they're often mundane, populated by drudgery and disappointment, and we're left frantically wondering the same question that haunts each of her protagonists: why am i here?

in spite of its unusual setup — a costume designer in nowheresville russia attempting to put together looks for a trio of gravity-defying gymnasts in an off-season circus — this book has the same query at its core.

nathalie doesn't know why she's found herself in any place she's ever been, least of all this random-ass one. and yet, just as the artists have to trust each other not to fall, she has to learn how to trust where she is and where she's going.

nothing much happens in this book, as with all of dusapin's, but it's a subtle, clarifying novel about so many of the weirdest parts of being alive: relationships that feel all-important but are snuffed out by time, the haunting desire for purpose, the phenomenon of people eating absurd foods on public transit. that is not nothing.

bottom line: not her strongest, but i enjoyed a lot here.
]]> The Book of Love 157981682 The Book of Love showcases Kelly Link at the height of her powers, channeling potent magic and attuned to all varieties of love—from friendship to romance to abiding family ties—with her trademark compassion, wit, and literary derring-do. Readers will find joy (and a little terror) and an affirmation that love goes on, even when we cannot.

Late one night, Laura, Daniel, and Mo find themselves beneath the fluorescent lights of a high school classroom, almost a year after disappearing from their hometown, the small seaside community of Lovesend, Massachusetts, having long been presumed dead. Which, in fact, they are.

With them in the room is their previously unremarkable high school music teacher, who seems to know something about their disappearance—and what has brought them back again. Desperate to reclaim their lives, the three agree to the terms of the bargain their music teacher proposes. They will be given a series of magical tasks; while they undertake them, they may return to their families and friends, but they can tell no one where they’ve been. In the end, there will be winners and there will be losers.

But their resurrection has attracted the notice of other supernatural figures, all with their own agendas. As Laura, Daniel, and Mo grapple with the pieces of the lives they left behind, and Laura’s sister, Susannah, attempts to reconcile what she remembers with what she fears, these mysterious others begin to arrive, engulfing their community in danger and chaos, and it becomes imperative that the teens solve the mystery of their deaths to avert a looming disaster.]]> 628 Kelly Link 0812996585 emma 4
why do we not like this book?



the average rating is 3.5. and i totally get it. but for argument's sake, or just for laughs or whatever...explain it to me like i enjoyed it.

as if, for example, this was so funny and weird and magical and emotional. 

i will admit that for the first, like, 200 pages, it was an absolute chore to pick up. i dreaded it. i could only make myself do it by sandwiching chapters between chapters of other books i wasn't really enjoying (otherwise there was no way i was returning to it).

matters were made worse by the fact that i was reading an ebook with a tiny font, meaning i had to read 4 normal-sized pages for what counted as 1 page, and by the end my laptop was so overwhelmed it required 10 seconds to turn those pages, and 10 seconds is actually a long time if you think about it in that context, the context being that this book is 637 pages long. so, to me, 2,548 pages.

i now understand sisyphus completely.

but at some point, my feelings did a 180. even when i was reading books i liked, or listening to enjoyable audiobooks, or picking up my most anticipated read of the year, or even - gasp - watching tiktoks...i kind of always low level wanted to be reading this.

it's that good.

it's very one of a kind: three kids die and come back, and there's a death-like figurehead and a magical music teacher and a cursed splinter and a moon woman and a haunting carousel and a child named carousel. there's an unforgettable unrealistic town. there's a series of weird annoying romances. there are twists and laughs and tragedies, and all of them made me actually feel something, which - to those of you who know my whole thing - is not nothing. (see: my cold dark chunk of christmas coal of a heart.)

when i got past the rock-pushing task of the page count and the brain-murdering task of the first third, i had a really good time.

that's not nothing, either.

bottom line: i'm having the fun kind of unpopular opinion again.

4.5

-------------------------
tbr review

me at a horror movie: :)
me at a haunted house: :)
me at a long book: AHHHHHHHHHH

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.44 2024 The Book of Love
author: Kelly Link
name: emma
average rating: 3.44
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/06/20
date added: 2025/07/26
shelves: non-ya, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, fantasy, magical-realist-urban-whatever, unpopular-opinion, to-buy, recommend, i-love-these-characters, funny, 4-and-a-half-stars, reviewed, that-setting-tho
review:
uh, guys...i'm definitely with you and everything...absolutely one of the cool kids, having the popular opinion, agreeing with the mainstream, etc...but um. just remind me.

why do we not like this book?



the average rating is 3.5. and i totally get it. but for argument's sake, or just for laughs or whatever...explain it to me like i enjoyed it.

as if, for example, this was so funny and weird and magical and emotional. 

i will admit that for the first, like, 200 pages, it was an absolute chore to pick up. i dreaded it. i could only make myself do it by sandwiching chapters between chapters of other books i wasn't really enjoying (otherwise there was no way i was returning to it).

matters were made worse by the fact that i was reading an ebook with a tiny font, meaning i had to read 4 normal-sized pages for what counted as 1 page, and by the end my laptop was so overwhelmed it required 10 seconds to turn those pages, and 10 seconds is actually a long time if you think about it in that context, the context being that this book is 637 pages long. so, to me, 2,548 pages.

i now understand sisyphus completely.

but at some point, my feelings did a 180. even when i was reading books i liked, or listening to enjoyable audiobooks, or picking up my most anticipated read of the year, or even - gasp - watching tiktoks...i kind of always low level wanted to be reading this.

it's that good.

it's very one of a kind: three kids die and come back, and there's a death-like figurehead and a magical music teacher and a cursed splinter and a moon woman and a haunting carousel and a child named carousel. there's an unforgettable unrealistic town. there's a series of weird annoying romances. there are twists and laughs and tragedies, and all of them made me actually feel something, which - to those of you who know my whole thing - is not nothing. (see: my cold dark chunk of christmas coal of a heart.)

when i got past the rock-pushing task of the page count and the brain-murdering task of the first third, i had a really good time.

that's not nothing, either.

bottom line: i'm having the fun kind of unpopular opinion again.

4.5

-------------------------
tbr review

me at a horror movie: :)
me at a haunted house: :)
me at a long book: AHHHHHHHHHH

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> <![CDATA[Lost Souls Meet Under a Full Moon (The Go-Between, #1)]]> 224003800 A suspenseful magical realism novel about a mysterious teenage “Go-Between” who arranges meetings between the living and the dead, from multimillion copy Japanese bestselling author Mizuki Tsujimura.

I bring together the living and the departed. I am the Go-Between.

When a young woman from Tokyo contacts the Go-Between to request a meeting with a deceased TV star who once helped her, she doesn’t expect a teenage boy to show up. Dressed in a designer duffel coat and carrying a tattered notebook, Ayumi Shibuya, our mysterious intermediary, offers an extraordinary he reunites the living with their dearly departed. Meeting his clients at a luxury hotel, Ayumi lays down the ground each reunion is a one-time arrangement that the dead can refuse; the service is entirely free, and the meeting must take place during a full moon.

As Ayumi arranges these reunions, we encounter a resentful eldest son who wants to ask his mother to unearth the deeds to a plot of land; a teenage girl who blames herself for her best friend’s death; and a weary businessman seeking answers about his fiancée’s disappearance days after he proposed. With each rendezvous, clues begin to surface, leading readers to unravel the mystery of the boy in the duffel coat, whose own story is eventually revealed.

A runaway, multimillion copy bestseller in Japan, Lost Souls Meet Under a Full Moon is storytelling at its finest, from an international sensation whose work has been hailed as “strange and beautiful” (The Guardian). With an artful balance of heart and mystery, Mizuki Tsujimura creates an unforgettable page-turner in which the living and the dead are given one last chance for closure.]]> 256 Mizuki Tsujimura 1668099837 emma 0 i'm in 3.92 2010 Lost Souls Meet Under a Full Moon (The Go-Between, #1)
author: Mizuki Tsujimura
name: emma
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/26
shelves: to-read, arc, authors-of-color, diverse, fantasy, from-publisher-author, magical-realist-urban-whatever, non-ya, owned, tbr-arc, tbr-owned
review:
i'm in
]]> The God of the Woods 199698485 When a teenager vanishes from her Adirondack summer camp, two worlds collide

Early morning, August 1975: a camp counselor discovers an empty bunk. Its occupant, Barbara Van Laar, has gone missing. Barbara isn’t just any thirteen-year-old: she’s the daughter of the family that owns the summer camp and employs most of the region’s residents. And this isn’t the first time a Van Laar child has disappeared. Barbara’s older brother similarly vanished fourteen years ago, never to be found.

As a panicked search begins, a thrilling drama unfolds. Chasing down the layered secrets of the Van Laar family and the blue-collar community working in its shadow, Moore’s multi-threaded story invites readers into a rich and gripping dynasty of secrets and second chances. It is Liz Moore’s most ambitious and wide-reaching novel yet.]]> 490 Liz Moore emma 4


this one was a fun ride. (get it? because i finally managed to catch the wagon? so then i was riding on it? and also there's the expression of "fun ride"? whatever. i'm wasted on you people.)

i read this during a weekend in boston, a time i tend to spend in its entirety walking or eating or both, and still i managed to read this whole book.

on my phone.

i hate to read on my phone.

shoutout to my flight home for chilling on the tarmac for 3 hours, i assume exclusively to maximize my reading time.

i also read this for a in which i let people on goodreads and instagram choose what i read, at the same time that my long-held virtual library loan of it came through. presumably a sign from the universe.

ultimately i wasn't FULLY satisfied by its strange conclusion, but the camp vibes and the eerie questions and the rich freaks made for a good time.

bottom line: finally, a book everyone read and liked that i can say i've read and liked too.]]> 4.13 2024 The God of the Woods
author: Liz Moore
name: emma
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/28
date added: 2025/07/26
shelves: mystery-thriller-horror-etc, non-ya, 4-stars, to-buy, recommend, reviewed
review:
i'm constantly running behind bandwagons, approximately 4-12 months late.



this one was a fun ride. (get it? because i finally managed to catch the wagon? so then i was riding on it? and also there's the expression of "fun ride"? whatever. i'm wasted on you people.)

i read this during a weekend in boston, a time i tend to spend in its entirety walking or eating or both, and still i managed to read this whole book.

on my phone.

i hate to read on my phone.

shoutout to my flight home for chilling on the tarmac for 3 hours, i assume exclusively to maximize my reading time.

i also read this for a in which i let people on goodreads and instagram choose what i read, at the same time that my long-held virtual library loan of it came through. presumably a sign from the universe.

ultimately i wasn't FULLY satisfied by its strange conclusion, but the camp vibes and the eerie questions and the rich freaks made for a good time.

bottom line: finally, a book everyone read and liked that i can say i've read and liked too.
]]> <![CDATA[There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension]]> 181346634
There’s Always This Year is a triumph, brimming with joy, pain, solidarity, comfort, outrage, and hope. No matter the subject of his keen focus—whether it's basketball, or music, or performance—Hanif Abdurraqib’s exquisite writing is always poetry, always profound, and always a clarion call to radically reimagine how we think about our culture, our country, and ourselves.]]> 334 Hanif Abdurraqib 0593448790 emma 4
and i really, really liked this book.

this is much denser than i expected — the language is heavy and poetic. it's well written and demands your attention.

ostensibly this is a book about basketball, which rocks, but it's also about so much more: where we come from, what that means. invisibility. homelessness, the cycle prison gets you in.

i didn't know most of these stories, because i'm relatively new to admitting i like sports and because i was either a child or a twinkle in god's eye at the time they occurred, which was the best and worst part of reading it.

i think every reader should be a sports fan, because fundamentally both are about great stories, so there are few things like hearing the greatest sports moments for the first time from an eloquent voice. this book follows lebron's career in fits and starts, while telling the story of ohio neighborhoods and our author and so, so many other things.

it was nonlinear and rhythmic, leaving the reader discombobulated and primed for the heaviest emotional hits. some stories don't get endings. some don't get middles or ends. there are worse things.

anyway. i'm off to wikipedia.

bottom line: a book so interesting its only problem is that it can't possibly answer all the questions it makes the reader ask.

4.5]]> 4.30 2024 There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension
author: Hanif Abdurraqib
name: emma
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/10/25
date added: 2025/07/25
shelves: nonfiction, non-ya, diverse, authors-of-color, 4-and-a-half-stars, recommend, reviewed, owned
review:
fine. i'll admit it. i like sports.

and i really, really liked this book.

this is much denser than i expected — the language is heavy and poetic. it's well written and demands your attention.

ostensibly this is a book about basketball, which rocks, but it's also about so much more: where we come from, what that means. invisibility. homelessness, the cycle prison gets you in.

i didn't know most of these stories, because i'm relatively new to admitting i like sports and because i was either a child or a twinkle in god's eye at the time they occurred, which was the best and worst part of reading it.

i think every reader should be a sports fan, because fundamentally both are about great stories, so there are few things like hearing the greatest sports moments for the first time from an eloquent voice. this book follows lebron's career in fits and starts, while telling the story of ohio neighborhoods and our author and so, so many other things.

it was nonlinear and rhythmic, leaving the reader discombobulated and primed for the heaviest emotional hits. some stories don't get endings. some don't get middles or ends. there are worse things.

anyway. i'm off to wikipedia.

bottom line: a book so interesting its only problem is that it can't possibly answer all the questions it makes the reader ask.

4.5
]]> Creation Lake 207300960 From Rachel Kushner, two-time finalist for both the Booker Prize and National Book Award, a “vital” (The Washington Post) and “wickedly entertaining” (The Guardian) novel about a seductive and cunning American woman who infiltrates an anarchist collective in France—a propulsive page-turner filled with dark humor.

Creation Lake is a novel about a secret agent, a thirty-four-year-old American woman of ruthless tactics and clean beauty who is sent to do dirty work in France. “Sadie Smith” is how the narrator introduces herself to the rural commune of French subversives on whom she is keeping tabs, and to her lover, Lucien, a young and well-born Parisian she has met by “cold bump”—making him believe the encounter was accidental. Like everyone she targets, Lucien is useful to her and used by her. Sadie operates by strategy and dissimulation, based on what her “contacts”—shadowy figures in business and government—instruct. First, these contacts want her to incite provocation. Then they want more.

In this region of old farms and prehistoric caves, Sadie becomes entranced by a mysterious figure named Bruno Lacombe, a mentor to the young activists who believes that the path to emancipation is not revolt but a return to the ancient past. Just as Sadie is certain she’s the seductress and puppet master of those she surveils, Bruno is seducing her with his ingenious counter-histories, his artful laments, his own tragic story.


Written in short, vaulting sections, Rachel Kushner’s rendition of “noir” is taut and dazzling. Creation Lake is Kushner’s finest achievement yet—a work of high art, high comedy, and unforgettable pleasure.]]> 416 Rachel Kushner 1982116528 emma 4
so the whole time i read this was a high-stakes situation of really hoping i'd like the book so i could wear the hat.

my life is so hard.

fortunately, it's good news.

nothing much of anything happened in this book, which is a compliment. i plodded through it and felt immersed in a world of surveillance and clumsy dual motivations, unglamorous rural life and glamorous-on-paper jobs.

this is the kind of book that is full of things you google instead of action, which is my preference.

bottom line: my first rachel kushner but it won't be my last!

(thanks to the publisher for the copy)]]> 3.32 2024 Creation Lake
author: Rachel Kushner
name: emma
average rating: 3.32
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/10/22
date added: 2025/07/25
shelves: owned, non-ya, from-publisher-author, sci-fi, 3-and-a-half-stars, recommend, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, reviewed
review:
i was very kindly sent this book, and also a very cute that says CREATION LAKE on it.

so the whole time i read this was a high-stakes situation of really hoping i'd like the book so i could wear the hat.

my life is so hard.

fortunately, it's good news.

nothing much of anything happened in this book, which is a compliment. i plodded through it and felt immersed in a world of surveillance and clumsy dual motivations, unglamorous rural life and glamorous-on-paper jobs.

this is the kind of book that is full of things you google instead of action, which is my preference.

bottom line: my first rachel kushner but it won't be my last!

(thanks to the publisher for the copy)
]]> The Coin 199349912 A bold and unabashed novel about a young Palestinian woman's unraveling, far from home, as she gets caught up in a scheme reselling Birkin bags

The Coin follows a Palestinian woman as she pursues a dream that generations of her family have failed at: to live and thrive in America. She teaches at a school for underprivileged boys in New York, where her eccentric methods cross conventional boundaries. She befriends a homeless swindler and the two participate in a pyramid scheme reselling Birkin bags, the value of which "increases, year by year, regardless of poverty, of war, of famine." The juxtaposition of luxury and the abject engulfs her as she is able to con her way to bag after bag, preoccupied by the suffering she knows of the world.

Eventually, her body and mind go to war. America is stifling her—her willfulness, her sexuality, her ideology. In an attempt to regain control, she becomes preoccupied with purity, cleanliness and self-image, all while drawing her students into her obsessions. In an unforgettable denouement, her childhood memories converge with her feelings of existential statelessness, and the narrator unravels spectacularly.

Enthralling, sensory, and uncanny, The Coin explores materiality, nature and civilization, class, homelessness, sexuality, beauty—and how oppression and inherited trauma manifest in every area of our lives—all while resisting easy moralizing. Provocative and original, humorous and inviting, The Coin marks the arrival of a major new literary voice.]]> 240 Yasmin Zaher 1646222105 emma 4


i think so often in modern literary fiction, books either underestimate the intelligence of the reader or overestimate the intelligence of themselves.

i've read lots of books that overexplain themselves, making every theme and symbol and intention very obvious and taking all the fun out of analyzing on your own. and i've read lots of books that fall apart under pressure, revealing that their various choices, in spite of (usually) heavy style or pretension, don't coalesce into anything.

this, finally, balanced each perfectly. a striking, disturbing, intense, complex read with something to say. i'd say it was a treat to read, but it wasn't — and that was the point.

bottom line: the sweet spot.

(thank you to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.49 2024 The Coin
author: Yasmin Zaher
name: emma
average rating: 3.49
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/24
date added: 2025/07/25
shelves: authors-of-color, diverse, literary-fiction, non-ya, from-publisher-author, owned, recommend, reviewed, 4-and-a-half-stars
review:
i love books about women unraveling.



i think so often in modern literary fiction, books either underestimate the intelligence of the reader or overestimate the intelligence of themselves.

i've read lots of books that overexplain themselves, making every theme and symbol and intention very obvious and taking all the fun out of analyzing on your own. and i've read lots of books that fall apart under pressure, revealing that their various choices, in spite of (usually) heavy style or pretension, don't coalesce into anything.

this, finally, balanced each perfectly. a striking, disturbing, intense, complex read with something to say. i'd say it was a treat to read, but it wasn't — and that was the point.

bottom line: the sweet spot.

(thank you to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> <![CDATA[The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism]]> 1237300 The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia, and Iraq. At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. By capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, Klein argues that the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years.]]> 558 Naomi Klein 0805079831 emma 0 4.28 2007 The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
author: Naomi Klein
name: emma
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/25
shelves: to-read, nonfiction, non-ya, library
review:
getting to this one just 18 years late or so
]]> <![CDATA[Biting the Hand: Growing Up Asian in Black and White America]]> 60741783 Julia Lee is angry. And she has questions.
What does it mean to be Asian in America? What does it look like to be an ally or an accomplice? How can we shatter the structures of white supremacy that fuel racial stratification?

When Julia was fifteen, her hometown went up in smoke during the 1992 Los Angeles riots. The daughter of Korean immigrant store owners in a predominantly Black neighborhood, Julia was taught to be grateful for the privilege afforded to her. However, the acquittal of four white police officers in the beating of Rodney King, following the murder of Latasha Harlins by a Korean shopkeeper, forced Julia to question her racial identity and complicity. She was neither Black nor white. So who was she?

This question would follow Julia for years to come, resurfacing as she traded in her tumultuous childhood for the white upper echelon of elite academia. It was only when she began a PhD in English that she found answers―not through studying Victorian literature, as Julia had planned, but rather in the brilliant prose of writers like James Baldwin and Toni Morrison. Their works gave Julia the vocabulary and, more important, the permission to critically examine her own tortured position as an Asian American, setting off a powerful journey of racial reckoning, atonement, and self-discovery.

With prose by turns scathing and heart-wrenching, Julia lays bare the complex disorientation and shame that stem from this country’s imposed racial hierarchy. And she argues that Asian Americans must work toward lasting social change alongside Black and brown communities in order to combat the scarcity culture of white supremacy through abundance and joy. In this passionate, no-holds-barred memoir, Julia interrogates her own experiences of marginality and resistance, and ultimately asks what may be the biggest question of all―what can we do?]]> 248 Julia Lee 1250824672 emma 5
(reading till i find a five star on substack)
(review to come)]]> 4.34 2023 Biting the Hand: Growing Up Asian in Black and White America
author: Julia Lee
name: emma
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2025/07/09
date added: 2025/07/25
shelves: non-ya, nonfiction, authors-of-color, diverse, to-review, to-buy, recommend, 5-stars, favorites-2025
review:
entering my nonfiction era

(reading till i find a five star on substack)
(review to come)
]]> A Family Matter 220161203 A young wife following her heart. A husband with the law on his side. Their daughter, caught in the middle. Forty years later, a family secret changes everything.

1982. Dawn is a young mother, still adjusting to life with her husband, when Hazel lights up her world like a torch in the dark. Theirs is the kind of connection that’s impossible to resist, and suddenly life is more complicated, and more joyful, than Dawn ever expected. But she has responsibilities and commitments. She has a daughter.

2022. Heron has just received news from his doctor that turns everything upside down. He’s an older man, stuck in the habits of a quiet existence. Telling Maggie, his only child—the person around whom his life has revolved—seems impossible. Heron can’t tell her about his diagnosis, just as he can’t reveal all the other secrets he’s been keeping from her for so many years.

A Family Matter is an exploration of love and loss, intimacy and injustice, custody and care, and whether it is possible to heal from the wounds of the past in the changed world of today.]]> 240 Claire Lynch 1668078899 emma 4
this is a spare novel in both writing and page count, and it left me wanting MORE. i came to love these characters, or at least care about them, even as they were hurting each other and making life-changing mistakes and giving up and seeming unfeeling while feeling so much.

the two stories it tells, separated by 40 years, carry that as their through-line.

that, and a sobering reminder that things, especially cruelties, that feel very far from us, in time and in distance and in thought, can be troublingly close.

bottom line: timely and substantive and NOT ENOUGH!

(thanks to the publisher for the arc)]]> 3.72 2025 A Family Matter
author: Claire Lynch
name: emma
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/29
date added: 2025/07/25
shelves: arc, from-publisher-author, literary-fiction, non-ya, owned, 4-stars, recommend, historical, diverse, lgbt-plus, reviewed
review:
it's a good sign when my only complaint about a short book is wishing it was longer.

this is a spare novel in both writing and page count, and it left me wanting MORE. i came to love these characters, or at least care about them, even as they were hurting each other and making life-changing mistakes and giving up and seeming unfeeling while feeling so much.

the two stories it tells, separated by 40 years, carry that as their through-line.

that, and a sobering reminder that things, especially cruelties, that feel very far from us, in time and in distance and in thought, can be troublingly close.

bottom line: timely and substantive and NOT ENOUGH!

(thanks to the publisher for the arc)
]]> <![CDATA[You Are the Detective: The Creeping Hand Murder]]> 222683984 November 1933. London. Seven people receive mysterious letters. Someone knows their terrible secrets. They are summoned to a posh townhouse where one is stabbed right in front of the others, but somehow no one saw a thing. Can you help Scotland Yard solve the mystery?

An interactive murder mystery from the bestselling author and illustrator of Your Guide to Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village

Dear Detective,

Surely you have seen the papers and read about the murder of the American novelist Roy Peterson—stabbed while in a room with six other people, and yet no one went near him or saw the murder occur. The crime is so devious, so logistically impossible, that it seems to have been committed not by a person but by a disembodied hand.

I must confess that we are at a loss. Who wrote the poison pen letters that lured these seven people to this deadly gathering? What do a poet, an Earl, an actress, a cook, a telephone operator, and a lothario have in common? And how can a man be stabbed in a room full of suspects when none of them could have done it?

We have had our best people on the case, Detective, and we still can’t make heads or tails of it. We are giving this case file to you. Can you decipher the clues, decode the witness statements, and identify the murderer? You are our last hope. Can you help us crack the Case of the Creeping Hand?

Yours truly,

Detective Chief Inspector of the Metropolitan Police]]> 128 Maureen Johnson 0593836014 emma 0 3.86 2025 You Are the Detective: The Creeping Hand Murder
author: Maureen Johnson
name: emma
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/24
shelves: to-read, ya, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, arc, mystery-thriller-horror-etc
review:
if i'm the detective...folks, we are not in good hands
]]> The Bluest Eye 28807242 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780099759911

Toni Morrison's debut novel immerses us in the tragic, torn lives of a poor black family – Pauline, Cholly, Sam and Pecola – in post-Depression 1940s Ohio. Unlovely and unloved, Pecola prays each night for blue eyes like those of her privileged white schoolfellows. At once intimate and expansive, unsparing in its truth-telling, The Bluest Eye shows how the past savagely defines the present.]]> 212 Toni Morrison emma 5
there's no one like her on race, beauty, the cruelty of society, the way we carry past wounds with us, the attempt to love selflessly by people. 

the fact that this is a debut is unbelievable. possibly the best first book i've ever read.

pecola is an unforgettable character, and the way this manages to tell her story even when it's through the perspective of others is masterful. everything in this book is thoughtful, everything down to the blue shirley temple cup contributing to the story of an unloved little girl, victim to the tragedy that befell her parents before her. 

i feel at a loss for words. i desperately want to convince you to read this painful and upsetting and brilliant book — likely my favorite of the year.

bottom line: my 2000th read was a perfect one.]]> 4.12 1970 The Bluest Eye
author: Toni Morrison
name: emma
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1970
rating: 5
read at: 2024/10/18
date added: 2025/07/24
shelves: authors-of-color, diverse, non-ya, literary-fiction, 5-stars, to-buy, recommend, favorites-2024, reviewed
review:
i'm scared of who i'll become when i don't have any more toni morrison to read.

there's no one like her on race, beauty, the cruelty of society, the way we carry past wounds with us, the attempt to love selflessly by people. 

the fact that this is a debut is unbelievable. possibly the best first book i've ever read.

pecola is an unforgettable character, and the way this manages to tell her story even when it's through the perspective of others is masterful. everything in this book is thoughtful, everything down to the blue shirley temple cup contributing to the story of an unloved little girl, victim to the tragedy that befell her parents before her. 

i feel at a loss for words. i desperately want to convince you to read this painful and upsetting and brilliant book — likely my favorite of the year.

bottom line: my 2000th read was a perfect one.
]]> <![CDATA[South of the Border, West of the Sun]]> 33263 beginning in Japanese - has arrived at middle age wanting for almost nothing. The postwar years have brought him a fine marriage, two daughters, and an enviable career as the proprietor of two jazz clubs. Yet a nagging sense of inauthenticity about his success threatens Hajime's happiness. And a boyhood memory of a wise, lonely girl named Shimamoto clouds his heart.

In South of the Border, West of the Sun, the simple arc of a man's life - with its attendant rhythms of success and disappointment - becomes the exquisite literary tableau of Haruki Murakami's most haunting work. When Shimamoto shows up one rainy night, now a breathtaking beauty with a secret from which she is unable to escape, the fault lines of doubt in Hajime's quotidian existence begin to give way. And the details of stolen moments past and present - a Nat King Cole melody, a face pressed against a window, a handful of ashes drifting downriver to the sea - threaten to undo him completely. Rich, mysterious, quietly dazzling, South of the Border, West of the Sun is Haruki Murakami's wisest and most compelling work.

]]> 213 Haruki Murakami 0679767398 emma 2
but that must've been a cruel prank.

reading murakami books is always a balancing act between how weird and cool his brain is and how much he hates women. 

i will let you guess where this one, which is not magical and centers around infidelity, lands.

so many completely insane things happen in this book: two guys in a bar who can't even speak about how a woman aged because it's too horrifying and disgusting; a guy who thinks it goes without saying that he would cheat on his wife whenever she's pregnant; a father-in-law being like "actually i'd prefer it if you would cheat on my daughter"; a motif of women with leg disabilities that is handled about as well as you would expect.

and then there are the normal misogyny tropes: a woman who doesn't know she's beautiful and that's what makes her beautiful. a woman who is despised by other women because she's simply too hot. women who are supposed to be attractive being continually described as teenagers.

it's so bad.

bottom line: as always, i am praying for haruki's wife.]]> 3.78 1992 South of the Border, West of the Sun
author: Haruki Murakami
name: emma
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1992
rating: 2
read at: 2024/10/17
date added: 2025/07/24
shelves: literary-fiction, non-ya, authors-of-color, diverse, 1-and-a-half-stars, unpopular-opinion, nope, reviewed
review:
pretty sure this was on my to-read list because someone said it's the best murakami.

but that must've been a cruel prank.

reading murakami books is always a balancing act between how weird and cool his brain is and how much he hates women. 

i will let you guess where this one, which is not magical and centers around infidelity, lands.

so many completely insane things happen in this book: two guys in a bar who can't even speak about how a woman aged because it's too horrifying and disgusting; a guy who thinks it goes without saying that he would cheat on his wife whenever she's pregnant; a father-in-law being like "actually i'd prefer it if you would cheat on my daughter"; a motif of women with leg disabilities that is handled about as well as you would expect.

and then there are the normal misogyny tropes: a woman who doesn't know she's beautiful and that's what makes her beautiful. a woman who is despised by other women because she's simply too hot. women who are supposed to be attractive being continually described as teenagers.

it's so bad.

bottom line: as always, i am praying for haruki's wife.
]]> Love by the Book 231127042 Two women. A chance meeting.

Friendship is the love story you can count on.

Remy is lucky. Her three best friends have always been there for her - until the day that they're not. One of them is moving to New York. One of them is pregnant. And one is busy with her (awful) boyfriend. Suddenly, their foursome is splitting - and it feels like a break-up.

Simone doesn't need friends. The only people she needs are her family - but when they cut her off, she realises how alone she is.

When Simone and Remy meet in a bookshop, it doesn't go well. But they might just have bumped into exactly what they need...

This isn't a romance. But it is about love.]]> 336 Jessica George 1250282543 emma 0 4.00 2026 Love by the Book
author: Jessica George
name: emma
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2026
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/24
shelves: to-read, contemporary, authors-of-color, arc, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, non-ya
review:

]]> Westward Women 231127467 For fans of Emma Cline and Emily St. John Mandel, Westward Women is a hypnotic and hopeful debut—part fever dream, part dystopian road trip.

"An audacious first novel to set beside Margaret Atwood." - Joyce Carol Oates

It starts with an itch.

In homes across the country, women ages eighteen to thirty-five begin to slow down.

Tired. Blank. Restless.

Drawn to the Pacific Ocean like it’s calling them home. They abandon their lives—jobs, families, their very selves. And once they reach the West, they vanish forever.

At the center of the story are three young women caught in the pull of something unstoppable.

Aimee follows the trail of her missing best friend to a man called the Piper—known for leading infected women West.

Teenie, afflicted and unraveling, clings to a single memory as she looks out the window of the Piper’s van.

And Eve, a former journalist, is chasing the story that might just consume her.

Each on the edge of transformation. Drawn toward the unknown. In search of a way forward.]]> 304 Alice Martin 1250375304 emma 0 3.46 Westward Women
author: Alice Martin
name: emma
average rating: 3.46
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/24
shelves: to-read, arc, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, non-ya, literary-fiction, dystopian, historical, sci-fi
review:

]]> I Leave It Up to You 214269353 From the award-winning author of Flux comes a dazzling novel about love, family, and the art of sushi that asks: What if you could return to the point of a fateful choice, wiser than before, and find the courage to forge a new path?

A coma can change a man, but the world Jack Jr. awakens to is one he barely recognizes. His advertising job is history, his Manhattan apartment is gone, and the love of his life has left him behind. He’s been asleep for two years; with no one to turn to, he realizes it’s been ten years since he last saw his family. 

Lost and disoriented, he makes a reluctant homecoming back to the bustling Korean American enclave of Fort Lee, New Jersey; back into the waiting arms of his parents, who are operating under the illusion he never left; and back to Joja, their ever-struggling sushi restaurant that he was set to inherit before he ran away from it all. As he steps back into the life he abandoned—learning his Appa’s life lessons over crates of tuna on bleary-eyed 4 AM fish runs, doling out amberjack behind the omakase counter while his Umma tallies the night's pitiful number of customers, and sparring with his recovering alcoholic brother, James—he embraces new roles, That of romantic interest to the male nurse who took care of him throughout, and that of sage (but underqualified) uncle to his gangly teenage nephew.

There is value in the joyous rhythms of this once-abandoned life. But second chances are an even messier business than running a restaurant, and the lure of a self-determined path might, once again, prove too hard to resist.

Why do we run from those we love, and why do we still love those who run from us? A highly entertaining and poignant story about second chances and self-discovery, I Leave It Up to You pilots through the loss, love, and absurdity of finding one’s footing after the ground gives way.]]> 311 Jinwoo Chong 0593727053 emma 4
i'm down to live in a world where, when you come out of a coma, you realize the meaning of life is hanging out with your family and working in your dad's sushi restaurant and falling in love with a hot male nurse. it sounds pretty spot-on.

the author's last book didn't work for me because it had so much going on. this one, in spite of also still having maybe too much going on, all at least stands to reason.

there are a lot of characters and a lot of secrets and a lot of family drama and a lot of problems to solve, but all of it feels nice.

and made me really crave omakase.

bottom line: currently i would like to eat raw fish and recommend you this book. in that order of importance.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.83 2025 I Leave It Up to You
author: Jinwoo Chong
name: emma
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/28
date added: 2025/07/24
shelves: arc, authors-of-color, diverse, non-ya, 3-and-a-half-stars, recommend, contemporary, reviewed
review:
i'm ready to take my love of sushi to the next level (reading about it).

i'm down to live in a world where, when you come out of a coma, you realize the meaning of life is hanging out with your family and working in your dad's sushi restaurant and falling in love with a hot male nurse. it sounds pretty spot-on.

the author's last book didn't work for me because it had so much going on. this one, in spite of also still having maybe too much going on, all at least stands to reason.

there are a lot of characters and a lot of secrets and a lot of family drama and a lot of problems to solve, but all of it feels nice.

and made me really crave omakase.

bottom line: currently i would like to eat raw fish and recommend you this book. in that order of importance.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Betty 48564330 A stunning, lyrical novel set in the rolling foothills of the Appalachians in which a young girl discovers stark truths that will haunt her for the rest of her life.

"A girl comes of age against the knife."

So begins the story of Betty Carpenter. Born in a bathtub in 1954 to a Cherokee father and white mother, Betty is the sixth of eight siblings. The world they inhabit is one of poverty and violence--both from outside the family, and also, devastatingly, from within. The lush landscape, rich with birdsong, wild fruit, and blazing stars, becomes a kind of refuge for Betty, but when her family's darkest secrets are brought to light, she has no choice but to reckon with the brutal history hiding in the hills, as well as the heart-wrenching cruelties and incredible characters she encounters in her rural town of Breathed, Ohio.

But despite the hardship she faces, Betty is resilient. Her curiosity about the natural world, her fierce love for her sisters, and her father's brilliant stories are kindling for the fire of her own imagination, and in the face of all she bears witness to, Betty discovers an escape: she begins to write. She recounts the horrors of her family's past and present with pen and paper and buries them deep in the dirt--moments that has stung her so deeply, she could not tell them, until now.

Inspired by the life of her own mother, Tiffany McDaniel sets out to free the past by telling this heartbreaking yet magical story--a remarkable novel that establishes her as one of the freshest and most important voices in American fiction.]]> 480 Tiffany McDaniel 052565707X emma 5
and now i need to lay on the floor until my heart mends from this book.

(review to come)]]> 4.40 2020 Betty
author: Tiffany McDaniel
name: emma
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2025/07/24
date added: 2025/07/24
shelves: historical, literary-fiction, non-ya, owned, to-review, recommend
review:
help, i'm addicted to family dramas and i can't get up.

and now i need to lay on the floor until my heart mends from this book.

(review to come)
]]> <![CDATA[The Summer that Melted Everything]]> 26114523 Fielding Bliss has never forgotten the summer of 1984:
the year a heatwave scorched the small town of Breathed, Ohio.
The year he became friends with the devil.


When local prosecutor Autopsy Bliss publishes an invitation to the devil to come to the country town of Breathed, Ohio, nobody quite expected that he would turn up. They especially didn't expect him to turn up a tattered and bruised thirteen-year-old boy.


Fielding, the son of Autopsy, finds the boy outside the courthouse and brings him home, and he is welcomed into the Bliss family. The Blisses believe the boy, who calls himself Sal, is a runaway from a nearby farm town. Then, as a series of strange incidents implicate Sal — and riled by the feverish heatwave baking the town from the inside out — there are some around town who start to believe that maybe Sal is exactly who he claims to be.


But whether he's a traumatised child or the devil incarnate, Sal is certainly one strange fruit: he talks in riddles, his uncanny knowledge and understanding reaches far outside the realm of a normal child — and ultimately his eerily affecting stories of Heaven, Hell, and earth will mesmerise and enflame the entire town.


Devastatingly beautiful, The Summer That Melted Everything is a captivating story about community, redemption, and the dark places where evil really lies.

]]> 320 Tiffany McDaniel 1250078067 emma 0 to-read 3.97 2016 The Summer that Melted Everything
author: Tiffany McDaniel
name: emma
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Hot Wax 224103430 The new novel from the bestselling author of If We Were Villains and Graveyard Shift—a vivid and immersive tale of one woman’s reckless mission to make sense of the events that shattered her childhood, and made her who she is

Summer, 1989: ten-year-old Suzanne is drawn like a magnet to her father’s forbidden world of electric guitars and tricked-out cars. When her mother remarries, she jumps at the chance to tag along on the concert tour that just might be Gil and the Kills’ wild ride to glory. But fame has sharper fangs than anybody realized, and as the band blazes up the charts, internal power struggles set Gil and his group on a collision course destined for a bloody reckoning—one shrouded in mystery and lore for decades to come.

The only witness to a desperate act of violence, Suzanne spends the next twenty-nine years trying to disappear. She trades the music and mayhem of her youth for the quiet of the suburbs and the company of her mild-mannered husband Rob. But when her father’s sudden death resurrects the troubled past she tried so hard to bury, she leaves it all behind and hits the road in search of answers. Hitching her fate and Gil’s beloved car to two vagabonds who call an old Airstream trailer home, she finds everything she thought she’d lost desire, adventure, and the woman she once wanted to be. But Rob refuses to let her go. Determined to bring her back where she belongs, he chases her across the country—and drives her to a desperation all her own.

Drenched in knock-down drag-out rock and roll, Hot Wax is a raucous, breakneck ride to hell and back—where getting lost might be the only way to find yourself and save your soul.]]> 400 M.L. Rio 1668070022 emma 0
Merged review:

oh thank god

Merged review:

oh thank god]]> 3.83 2025 Hot Wax
author: M.L. Rio
name: emma
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/24
shelves: to-read, non-ya, mystery-thriller-horror-etc, arc, tbr-arc, tbr-owned
review:
oh thank god

Merged review:

oh thank god

Merged review:

oh thank god
]]> Friends of the Museum 214152164 Coworkers at a legendary but troubled New York City museum struggle with issues large and small over the course of one extraordinary day in this whip-smart “marvel” (Mona Awad, bestselling author of Bunny) of a novel in the vein of The White Lotus.

When Diane Schwebe, the director of a major New York museum, is awakened in the early morning by a text message from the museum’s lawyer, it is the start of a twenty-four hour roller-coaster ride.

Diane has sacrificed many things in her life to help the fading institution stave off irrelevance and financial ruin. In this battle, she’s surrounded by her stalwart her enigmatic and tireless personal assistant, Chris; the museum’s trusty head of security, Shay; and its general counsel, Henry—a man whose ability to weasel his way out of a jam is matched only by his capacity to avoid learning anything from the experience.

Orbiting Diane is a motley assortment of museum employees, each on the precipice of collapse or among them a line cook staring down a huge opportunity he’s not sure he wants; a costume curator stuck in an inescapable rut; and the ambivalent curator of the museum’s film program, whose first day on the job might very well be his last.

On this day of the museum’s annual gala, every plate that Diane has kept spinning will fall and by daybreak, someone will be dead.

Wise, surprising, and darkly funny, Friends of the Museum is a kaleidoscopic tragicomedy that surges along to the unstoppable tick of the clock, leaving you on the edge of your seat until the final second.]]> 496 Heather McGowan 1668031272 emma 1
just not like this.

this book has the same pretentious confidence that its story warrants a dozen characters telling it (and never you mind that they are, in both novels and all cases, unrelentingly boring, one-note, and - inexplicably - fatphobic) as the seven deaths of evelyn hardcastle.

and, i suppose, the same threadbare belief that dangling the promise of a murder before the reader will make our dumb carrot-motivated minds forgive myriad sins.

all these years later, and in spite of many very mean comments trying to convince me to move to the contrary, i vividly hate evelyn hardcastle. now this book can join that exclusive club.

if i was feeling generous i would say this book set out to make a million points alongside its million characters, populating the book with as many themes about class and success and happiness as it does em dashes to indicate dialogue (seriously, who signed off on that) and perspectives changing based on time jumps ranging from 1 to 11 minutes. 

but i'm not feeling generous, and this book says so much that i can't make sense of any of it anyway.

bottom line: a waste of characters, and themes, and em dashes, and above all time.

(thanks to the publisher for the arc)]]> 3.05 2025 Friends of the Museum
author: Heather McGowan
name: emma
average rating: 3.05
book published: 2025
rating: 1
read at: 2025/04/25
date added: 2025/07/23
shelves: non-ya, literary-fiction, arc, nope, owned, 1-and-a-half-stars, reviewed
review:
i want to be friends with a museum.

just not like this.

this book has the same pretentious confidence that its story warrants a dozen characters telling it (and never you mind that they are, in both novels and all cases, unrelentingly boring, one-note, and - inexplicably - fatphobic) as the seven deaths of evelyn hardcastle.

and, i suppose, the same threadbare belief that dangling the promise of a murder before the reader will make our dumb carrot-motivated minds forgive myriad sins.

all these years later, and in spite of many very mean comments trying to convince me to move to the contrary, i vividly hate evelyn hardcastle. now this book can join that exclusive club.

if i was feeling generous i would say this book set out to make a million points alongside its million characters, populating the book with as many themes about class and success and happiness as it does em dashes to indicate dialogue (seriously, who signed off on that) and perspectives changing based on time jumps ranging from 1 to 11 minutes. 

but i'm not feeling generous, and this book says so much that i can't make sense of any of it anyway.

bottom line: a waste of characters, and themes, and em dashes, and above all time.

(thanks to the publisher for the arc)
]]> Bitter Sweet 220239023 When a young book publicist finds herself in an all-consuming workplace affair with her literary idol, she learns that the things you love most can sometimes be the very things that tear you apart in this intoxicating and moving debut novel.

Charlie hasn’t always had high hopes for herself. But now at twenty-three, she’s landed her dream job as an assistant at a historic London publishing house, moved into a stunning townhome with two of the most glamorous, kind and generous people she’s ever met, and her favorite author, the award-winning, generation-defining, charming Richard Aveling, is about to publish his magnum opus—and Charlie is going to be working with him.

She couldn’t be more excited to help publish the man whose writing has inspired her since she was a teenager. When Charlie bumps into Richard while having a smoke in the rain, the attraction is immediate, and the moment feels nothing short of cinematic.

So when the Richard Aveling begins to take her advice over that of more senior staff, Charlie finds herself drawn to him despite their thirty-year age gap, his marriage, and the disparity in their power at the publishing house. Once Richard makes it clear that he’s drawn to her as well, they begin an affair that Charlie never saw coming; it is a relationship founded in control and silence.

Too soon, she can’t imagine her life without Richard, and too late, she understands that losing him will unravel more than just their relationship…it might also unravel her.

Tender and poignant, Bitter Sweet is an intimate exploration of power, of vulnerability, of what it means to love another person, and of what it means to love yourself.]]> 304 Hattie Williams 059387420X emma 4
(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 4.02 2025 Bitter Sweet
author: Hattie Williams
name: emma
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/07/23
date added: 2025/07/23
shelves: arc, non-ya, literary-fiction, 3-and-a-half-stars, to-review, to-buy, recommend
review:
i always enjoy reading books about girls making terrible decisions. it's important to see yourself represented on page

(review to come / thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> Glyph 227876134 It sounds like Gliff?
Well, it's something else altogether.

Glyph follows Ali Smith's 2024 novel Gliff and tells a story hidden in the first novel.]]> Ali Smith 1405959487 emma 0 5.00 2026 Glyph
author: Ali Smith
name: emma
average rating: 5.00
book published: 2026
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/23
shelves: to-read, unreleased, non-ya, literary-fiction
review:
more literary novels should have sequels
]]> The Ten Year Affair 224003127 “The best book about adultery since Madame Bovary.” —Tony Tulathimutte, author of Rejection

A hilariously acerbic sliding doors novel about a chance meeting between two young parents, both happily married (just not to each other) that sparks a will-they-won’t-they romance—perfect for fans of Big Swiss and Acts of Service.

When Cora meets Sam at a baby group in their small town, the chemistry between them is undeniable. Both are happily married young parents with two kids, and neither sees themselves as the type to engage in an affair. Yet their connection grows stronger, and as their lives continue to intertwine, the romantic tension between them becomes all-consuming—until their worlds unravel into two parallel timelines. In one, they pursue their feelings. In the other, they resist.

As reality splits, the everyday details of Cora’s life—her depressing marketing job, her daughter’s new fascination with the afterlife, her husband’s obsession with podcasts about the history of rope—gain fresh perspective. The intersecting and diverging timelines blur the boundaries of reality and fantasy, questioning what might have been and what truly matters.

The Ten Year Affair is a witty, emotionally-charged exploration of marriage, family life, and the roads not taken, that ultimately do we really want our fantasies to come true?]]> 304 Erin Somers 166808144X emma 0 4.13 2025 The Ten Year Affair
author: Erin Somers
name: emma
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/22
shelves: to-read, tbr-arc, tbr-owned, non-ya, literary-fiction, arc
review:

]]> Middle Spoon 224198827 A whipsmart, blazingly funny novel about heartbreak, unconventional love, and the way society could be, from National Book Award finalist Alejandro Varela

The narrator of Middle Spoon appears to be living the He has a doting husband, two precocious children, all the comforts of a quiet bourgeois life—and a sexy younger boyfriend to accompany him to farmers markets and cocktail parties. But when his boyfriend abruptly dumps him, he spirals into heartbreak for the first time and must confront a world still struggling to understand polyamorous relationships. Faced with the judgment of friends and the sting of rejection, he’s left to wonder if sharing a life with both his family and his lover could ever truly be possible.

With a big heart and just the right dose of the anxieties that define the modern era, Middle Spoon reveals the rawness of infatuation while reimagining what relationships, marriage, and family life can look like. Alejandro Varela boldly probes the corners of society in desperate need of change—from taboos around intimacy to the shortcomings of Oscar season, pop culture, and gluten-free food—offering a surprising perspective on the tangled dynamics that shape our lives. Equal parts heart-wrenching and uproariously funny, Middle Spoon is for anyone who has longed, nursed a broken heart, or grappled with love at its messiest.]]> 336 Alejandro Varela emma 0 4.16 2025 Middle Spoon
author: Alejandro Varela
name: emma
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/07/22
shelves: to-read, arc, authors-of-color, diverse, literary-fiction, non-ya, tbr-arc, tbr-owned
review:

]]> Bitter Texas Honey 216522700 The Royal Tenenbaums meets Fleabag in this hilarious and dizzyingly smart debut about an over-the-top evangelical Texan family—and the daughter at its center racing to finish her very important novel before her ex-boyfriend finishes his.

It’s 2011, and twenty-three-year-old Joan West is not like the rest of her liberal peers in Austin, nor is she quite like her Tea Party Republican, God-loving family. Sure, she listens to conservative talk radio on her way to and from her internship at the Capitol. But she was once an America-hating leftist who kissed girls at parties, refused to shave, and had plenty of emotionless sex with jazz school friends—that is until a drug-induced mania forced her to return to her senses.

But above all Joan is a writer, an artist, or at least she desperately wants to be. Always in search of inspiration for her novel, she catalogs every detail of her relationships with men—including with her former muse slash current arch nemesis Roberto—and mines her very dysfunctional family for material. But when her beloved, credit card debt–racked cousin Wyatt finds himself in crisis, Joan’s worldview is cracked open and everything comes crashing down.

Funny, whip-smart, and often tender, Bitter Texas Honey introduces us to the unforgettable and indefatigable Joan West: ambitious, full of contradictions, utterly herself. As she wades through it all—addiction, politics, loss, and, notably, her father’s string of increasingly bizarre girlfriends—we witness her confront what it means to be a person, and an artist, in the world.]]> 336 Ashley Whitaker 0593476158 emma 2
but at one point in this book, our protagonist, a texas republican trust fund baby who's stylizing herself as a writer, receives a short story rejection on the premise that her work is lively, but without stakes.

a little more self awareness on display and i'd think the book was criticizing itself.

i'm a big fan of unlikable characters, unreliable narrators, and slow, plotless books, but throw all three together with a lack of character development and even i'm not sure what we're doing here. 

i feel suffocatingly present in the late-2000s conservative austin environment this traps us in, and just as punishingly locked into our corresponding main character, but i don't know why.

bottom line: neither change over 336 slogging pages, and my feelings didn't either. 

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)]]> 3.27 2025 Bitter Texas Honey
author: Ashley Whitaker
name: emma
average rating: 3.27
book published: 2025
rating: 2
read at: 2025/04/25
date added: 2025/07/22
shelves: literary-fiction, non-ya, arc, 2-stars, unpopular-opinion, eh, reviewed
review:
THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS meets FLEABAG??? i thought this must be for me specifically...

but at one point in this book, our protagonist, a texas republican trust fund baby who's stylizing herself as a writer, receives a short story rejection on the premise that her work is lively, but without stakes.

a little more self awareness on display and i'd think the book was criticizing itself.

i'm a big fan of unlikable characters, unreliable narrators, and slow, plotless books, but throw all three together with a lack of character development and even i'm not sure what we're doing here. 

i feel suffocatingly present in the late-2000s conservative austin environment this traps us in, and just as punishingly locked into our corresponding main character, but i don't know why.

bottom line: neither change over 336 slogging pages, and my feelings didn't either. 

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
]]> <![CDATA[Recognizing the Stranger: On Palestine and Narrative]]> 208580653 From the award-winning novelist of The Parisian and Enter Ghost comes an outstanding essay on the Palestinian struggle and the power of narrative.

Isabella Hammad delivered the Edward W. Said Memorial Lecture at Columbia University nine days before October 7th, 2023. The text of Hammad’s seminal speech and her afterword, written in the early weeks of 2024, together make up a searing appraisal of the war on Palestine during what seems a turning point in the narrative of human history. Profound and moving, Hammad writes from within the moment, giving voice to the Palestinian struggle for freedom. Recognizing the Stranger is a brilliant melding of literary and cultural analysis by one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists and a foremost writer of fiction in the world today.

"Extraordinary and amazingly erudite. Hammad shows how art and especially literature can be much, much more revealing than political writing.” — Rashid Khalidi, author of the New York Times bestseller The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine]]> 96 Isabella Hammad 0802163920 emma 5 4.66 2024 Recognizing the Stranger: On Palestine and Narrative
author: Isabella Hammad
name: emma
average rating: 4.66
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2025/07/21
date added: 2025/07/21
shelves: non-ya, nonfiction, 5-stars, favorites-2025, recommend, to-buy, to-review
review:
even the random quotes and passages i've encountered from this have made me catch my breath
]]>