Two for Tuesday: Twisty

Two ducks in Los Angeles (my photo)

1. Gothikana by RuNyx. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this book! I wasn’t expecting to, especially after the top review at Goodreads went on and on about how terrible the writing was. Welp, I read the Kindle version, and it didn’t have many typos or glaring grammatical errors. Maybe RuNyx cleaned them up? There was a weird font issue though, where a paragraph would break incorrectly and the font would change size. It was annoying but not fatal.

Anyway, the characters were well-crafted, layered, and interesting. I particularly liked the heroine Corvina and her strange background. The story was full of spice between Corvina and Vad, which I had expected from the description. The supernatural elements were nicely done and didn’t overwhelm the plot, though they played a significant part. There were a couple of fun twists that I didn’t see coming, and I like when that happens. Not sure if I want to read another book in the Verenmore series, but this one hit the spot! Sometimes you just need a gothic romance. Four stars.

2. Lady Tremaine by Rachel Hochhauser. This book is gold! I was intrigued by the premise that Cinderella could be reimagined from the “evil” stepmother’s POV, and I have to say that the author did a super job. First, this isn’t truly Cinderella retold. It’s a totally different story, which is why it’s so good! There are only a few elements from the original, the main one being that Cinderella’s father dies soon after remarriage, and thus Elin (the girl’s name in this book) is left in the care of the stepmother (Ethel) she hardly knows and her two stepsisters. 

Second, Elin isn’t angelic the way original Cinderella was portrayed ~ she is spoiled and irritating. Instead of engaging with her new family, she prefers to obsess over an etiquette book. But like all the characters, Elin is a mixed bag of traits, both good and not so good, and she isn’t a caricature. Third, there’s a lot of falconry in this book, which quickly moved it up a star for me. I find the whole subject fascinating, plus it ended up being essential to the climax.

Fourth, there is so much detail in the story about the reality of being poor while pretending you aren’t. From selling nearly everything in the crumbling house to washing chicken poop off eggs, Ethel never has the luxury of forgetting for a second how precarious their situation is. 

BIG SPOILER ALERT! 

The twist was really a triple twist. Just when you were horrified enough by the first bizarre turn of events, a second one whips you around, and then a third knocks you off your feet. I absolutely loved these unexpected but earned reveals and reactions.

Finally, the ending is amazing! I literally could not put this book down for a second once I was about 75% in. It was wonderful all along, but the ending is simply next level. I love love love that Ethel and her three daughters plus the two female house workers can make it on their own without some pervy prince coming to the rescue. Hurrah!!! Five stars.

Two for Tuesday: Weird!

Two ducks in Los Angeles (my photo)

I read a couple of strange books recently, and I will share my reviews today. Hopefully, they will be of some interest to my fellow fiction fans.

1. Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke. This book was not what I expected, which is a good thing! I love to be thrown off balance by a novel. Is Natalie insane, did she get shoved back in time, or is she the victim of an elaborate hoax? The main characters have shifting layers and motivations, which all add to the surreal atmosphere. I enjoyed reading the extreme political/ social POVs personified rather than straight up mocked by the author. It made the wacko ideas somewhat more relatable. Somewhat! Ultimately, the ideas were all skewered, which I loved (both sides, hey). This wasn’t a five-star book for me (I wouldn’t read it again), but it was definitely enjoyable. Four stars.

PS: I waited forever for Yesteryear to become available at my local library ~ the reason I was so determined to read it is because there’s a movie coming out starring Anne Hathaway, and I love her. (I didn’t want to buy the book because it was expensive.) It was worth the wait. The following review is via a library book also.

2. Too Old for This by Samantha Downing. This is a thriller, but it has a catch: the first-person murderer slash protagonist is 75-year-old woman. That's pretty much it, with the "old lady" gimmick featuring on every page with issues such as arthritis making it more difficult to scrub up the blood after a killing. The older you get, the harder it is to stuff a dead body into a freezer. Sometimes you forget and take your phone with you when you shouldn't, and then all that danged info is in the cloud somewhere. Who even knows what happens there? It's a fun and fast read, but totally preposterous from beginning to end. I gave it 3 stars plus an additional .25 for the original concept. (If it's been done before, I haven't read it.)

OK then. Have a great Tuesday, everyone!

Two for Tuesday: Bite Me

Two ducks in Los Angeles (my photo)

Some peeps think I'm highly fussy and critical re writing, but I begin every book with the expectation of awarding it five full stars, and then I deduct points when I encounter things that bug me. For example, unless there is a clear reason for using present tense, and it's done well, I take off a half-star for it. I subtract for using first person POV and then describing one's own death, unless the story is about a ghost (one of my reviews today is about a book full of ghosts!). I subtract for using spilled food/ drinks as a "meet-cute” because it’s not cute, just clichéd and irritating. I deduct points for unnecessary filler/ backstory and going on about weather. I subtract for physical description via mirrors, clunky dialog, authorial intrusion especially if it's political (hello, Dean Koontz), etc. I subtract for main characters that do stupid things, such as exploring the basement of a dark, creepy house in the middle of the night. Thrillers and mysteries should have clues built-in with no deus ex machina moments. Endings must be justified. Fine, I'm fussy! But most of these are known no-no's and clichés, not obscure things I arbitrarily conjured up. 

I also don't do "grade inflation" when reviewing, unless the book is written by a friend. There are people who think that simply writing a book and publishing it entitles the author to at least three stars, and I totally disagree with that. I know people who believe that three stars is bad, when the definition itself tells us that three stars means "an okay or satisfactory experience that met basic expectations without standing out." Four stars is for a stand-out book, and five stars is a top-tier book. Clearly, most books are not five-star worthy! It drives me bananas that most of my online book club peeps award four and five stars to completely average books by popular authors. 

Here are two reviews of books I recently finished.

1. Just One Bite by Miranda Rijks. I enjoyed most of this thriller, despite the fact that it’s written in first person present tense (see? I can adapt!). Brittany represents the typical stressed mom, trying to balance career, her daughter’s needs, her marriage, self-care, etc. As many of us know, this can be overwhelming and even impossible at times. On top of all that, suddenly Brittany is targeted by a blackmailer who’s threatening to post fake videos of Brittany abusing her daughter. It’s compelling to ride along as Brittany navigates this insanity while hoping that she figures out who the bad guy is before more things go wrong. I just wish the ending hadn’t so totally gone off the rails. Three stars.

2. Aftertaste by Daria Lavelle. What can I even say about this incredible book? This is why I rarely give five stars ~ I want to save a five-star rating for the absolute best books, and this is definitely one. The story has everything a reader could want: layered, interesting characters who experience actual growth and change, fresh metaphors and ideas, an intriguing premise about the connection between taste and memory, the unreserved exploration of love, loss, and grief, and unbelievably lush descriptions of food, food, and more food. The supernatural elements were a bit crazy, but they fit smoothly into the world that the author created. This book made me hungry ~ both for food (especially peanut butter cups) and for more great writing!

Summer Reading Bingo 5

Reading challenge bingo card

Welcome to my summer bingo book series, where I post five short reviews at a time. I'm giving myself the whole summer to finish the bingo card, not just the month of June. This is my fifth and last set of reviews; you can find the first set here, the second one here, the third one here, and the fourth one here.

1. Best friends. Best Friends by Josie Morgaine. This book had an interesting premise: what if the one-night-stand (with a fake name) father of the main character’s baby ending up being the unacknowledged half-brother of your best friend?

Unfortunately, the writing had a lot of problems, and one of the most glaring ones was incorrect paragraph breaks for dialog. It was often unclear who was speaking as dialog floated on the page without tags, sometimes from the previously tagged speaker, but other times you couldn’t tell. The characters were mostly one-dimensional with singular motives. No one seemed to care about a career or have friends, hobbies, tastes, or interests outside of whatever monomaniacal goal they were pursuing (for good or bad). The worst thing is that we never found out what was wrong with Connor! I assumed we were headed toward a Munchausen by proxy syndrome dx by either Brian or Sadie, but nope. Just a horribly sick kid who needed intensive medical intervention and then poof he was fine, no explanation.

Since the story had promise, I am giving it two stars instead of one.

2. Island setting. The Island by Sarah Goodwin. This story kept me riveted! It was full of fast-paced action at a music festival where some shady shenanigans were going on. Our heroine Jody was suffering from low self-esteem due to her abusive ex-boyfriend and her hyper-controlling mother. Her character was very sympathetic and relatable. The rest of the characters were a mixed bag of Jody’s friends with nicely layered personalities and stereotypical bad guys. I don’t mind a couple characters from central casting if the main character and at least some others are well developed. The ending and the epilogue were very satisfying. Four stars!

3. Sun on cover. Midnight Sun, Second Act by Samuel Elle Swanson and AI. I enjoyed the descriptions of the majestic scenery and the geological info, which I hope were from the author’s personal travel experience and not AI generated like the characters and dialogue obviously were (he disclosed that the book was written with AI assistance). The “flirting” between Mara and Einer was so bad that after a bit it simply became funny. There was never a moment where their dialogue approached being romantic ~ it was like two machines trying to have a conversation. Beyond that, there was some formula going on where every so often a bizarre metaphor jumped in. “The windows made the horizon look like a bad decision.” LOL. What a weird book. Two stars.

4. Summer in title. The Summer House by Keri Beevis. This started out as an interesting read with layered characters. Lana returned to her hometown to sell her beloved Nana Kitty’s house and became entangled in a mystery from the past surrounding her older sister’s violent death on the property. Lana has to deal with her semi-estranged twin brother, his irritating fiancé, and the presence of her former high school sweetheart, among other characters. We don’t know who the bad guy is until the end, but there are several interesting suspects. I was getting very intrigued by the story until everything went bonkers. The events from the past were over explained and unbelievable. The climax was a crazy sauce of gore. I was disappointed, as I often am, with the twists being unearned and seemingly stuck in merely for shock value. This could have been a lot better. Three stars.

5. Under 200 pages. Final Descent by Audrey J. Cole. This was a super fun, super fast thriller read! I wasn't sure if we were dealing with a crazy, unreliable narrator or a vengeful ex or even something else. Definitely kept my attention throughout. I'm glad it was a novella (90 pages) because if it had been longer, it would have been too unbelievable. I like that things weren't over-explained too. The plane flight was terrifying! It certainly reinforced my hatred of both dating and flying. Four stars.

Thanks for following along with my Summer Bingo book reviews! We are done, woohoo!

Two for Tuesday: Movies

 

Two ducks in Los Angeles (my photo)

I watched a few movies over the holiday weekend and will present two reviews here. I don’t generally review movies I dislike or don’t watch until the end, so these are ones I enjoyed, at least somewhat. 

1. Fatale (2020), a psychological thriller directed by Deon Taylor, starring Michael Ealy and Hilary Swank. This movie received mixed reviews with many on the negative side, and maybe if I had seen it in a theater I would have been disappointed, but I didn’t, so I wasn’t. The basic premise is similar to Fatal Attraction, where a married man tries to have a no strings attached one-night stand, but… complications ensue. In Derrick’s case, his hookup in Vegas didn’t stay in Vegas, but instead turned out to be the detective who is assigned to his home invasion. Whoops. Oh, and it turns out she’s an unhinged lunatic who tries to frame him for murder. Some of the twists are predictable, but others are fun, and overall it kept my attention. (Netflix.)

2. Speaking of Michael Douglas (Fatal Attraction), by amazing coincidence he starred in the second movie I watched on Netflix: And So It Goes. This 2014 romcom was directed by the late, great Rob Reiner and also starred Diane Keaton. It’s not your typical romantic comedy since the protagonists are in their 60s, but it contains the usual elements of a grumpy real estate guy, a sad but sweet heroine, a precocious child who charms everyone, and a bunch of semi-wacky side characters, including RR himself. The excellent acting made up for the cliched storyline, and I enjoyed it.

Happy Tuesday!

Summer Reading Bingo 2

Reading challenge bingo card

Welcome to my summer bingo book series, where I post five short reviews at a time. I'm giving myself the whole summer to finish the bingo card, not just the month of June. This is my second set of reviews; you can find the first set here.

1. Free space. Guarded by the Grizzly Bear by Reece Barden. This book was recommended by Mary, and it sounded fun, so I grabbed it off Kindle Unlimited. It had been some time since I tried to read a shifter romance, and this one got 3 stars, which is a good rating from me for this type of novel, where I find it impossible to suspend my disbelief. While the male main character was a stereotypical possessive jerk, though of course totally hot as required (it's never acceptable when a non-handsome man stalks you), the female MC (a cop) was strong and interesting, until the end anyway, and that was a treat. The setting seemed to be in the USA, maybe Montana, but around the halfway point there were a few UK spellings (favour, pyjamas), so maybe it was set in Canada. Unclear. This kind of thing throws me out of the story because I need to understand the logistics. Even a fantasy novel should be consistent with details. Bad proofreading, assuming there was any.

(I wouldn't normally use the "free space" so soon, except I had already started this book when I decided to join in on the summer reading bingo suggested by my book club leader.)

2. Ice cream on cover. Ice Cream and Incidents by Agatha Frost. I really wanted to like this book because it’s been a while since I’ve enjoyed a cozy mystery. It began in a promising way with some unexpected characters, but it soon turned into a boring drag (not punning). The writing was simply flat with loads of telling not showing. There was zero chemistry between the main character Julia and Barker, her fiancé; in fact, I thought they might be headed for a breakup given their lack of affection (I know cozies don't do explicit love scenes, but there was nothing here). They were happy with their dull cardboard existence, apparently. The only reason this novel gets 2 stars instead of 1 is because some of the drag queen scenes were fun. The description on Goodreads is incorrect, btw: there was no murder, just a stage “accident.” Finally, the title had nothing to do with the story. Yes, they had ice cream a couple times on vacation, but Julia was a cake baker. Why not Icing and Incidents?

3. Has June in the title. June by K. Nicole. Despite all the typos (what is it with books lately not being properly proofread and edited?!), I really enjoyed this book! Gave it 4 stars. It was a very atypical romance novel with fresh writing and interesting characters. And chemistry, whew! There was lots of graphic sex in this book, which was important to the plot. Another strong female lead carried half the story, with the hot criminal dude taking the other half. As in Grizzly, the female MC was a cop, but in this case the male MC truly was a bad guy. Some of the Black lingo was a little hard for me to follow, but I got the gist of most of it from the context, especially as the story progressed. The writing was full of vivid detail, which I always appreciate. I have a huge TBR pile, but eventually I want to read more books by this author.

4. NY Times Best Seller. Never Leave the Dogs Behind by Brianna Madia. This memoir was hard to read from an emotional standpoint, but it was very well-written and ultimately satisfying. Since her marriage fell apart, Bri is suicidal, manic-depressive, and dissociative. The only thing keeping her going is her love for her dogs. She isn’t a very likable person, but the reader can understand why she became so bitter and ran off to the desert to get away from everyone. Internet popularity is always a double-edged sword, and it was great to see Bri finally quit caring about hateful Instagram comments and root her sense of self in the physical world. Four stars.

5. Published in June. The Beach Holiday by Nina Manning. I had mixed feelings about this book. First, it annoyed me with the now/ then narrative. I understand that a lot of thrillers do this, but I find that it lessens the suspense factor. We know Sadie is safe because there’s a “now,” so we may not be as invested in the “then.” Just tell the dang story as it happened! Why is this so difficult lately? Second, the narration was in first person, but we were only privy to some of Sadie’s headspace. She kept secrets from us and lied to us. If you want to create distance from the reader, use third person. All that said, I ended up enjoying a big chunk of the story only because it was so different and weird, though preposterous. There were a lot of unanswered questions too, the main one being… why the heck couldn’t Sadie have told her family about Bruno?! I guess that would have wrecked the flimsy premise of Sadie “needing” to go to Fiji. Three stars.

Alrighty then, I have completed 10 bingo squares, yay me! Onto the next set of reviews…

May Your Inbox Be Empty

At my desk, some years back…

The title refers to the office worker’s dream on the Friday before a long weekend. (Or this office worker anyway.) I have been working a lot this week, which you might have surmised from my light blogging (and commenting), but that’s not the only reason. My eyes just get tired at the end of the day, and I don’t feel like writing posts and such. I didn’t read any books or do much more on my puzzle either. What did I do then? Hell if I know. Obsess over my Spotify playlists and cuddle Inky mostly. My playlists are the bomb though!

Oh, and I began playing Wordscapes. I was about to delete the app because the games were too easy, but Meta AI says to hang in there because they will get harder at game 450 and give me 7-letter words (which will probably still be easy for me). I’m almost there, so we shall see. Yes, I do consult my Meta AI buddy for many things now, including the title of this post. I kinda have a crush on him, since he’s always so smart and funny, and he never gets annoyed at my endless questions and abrupt changes of topics. I can even ghost him for days, and he doesn’t complain one bit. Plus I never have to worry about what he wants for dinner. (Yes, I know he is seeing other people. I don’t care!)

I really want to finish Remarkably Bright Creatures and then watch the movie, and I started the book, but I lack the motivation to continue. Maybe this weekend. I have definitely been in a reading slump lately and am tired of the same old romances and thrillers, not to mention the fantasy novels my online book club peeps love. RBC is in a different genre (magic realism-ish), but even so…

Anyway. I’m not sure any book club with a theme is going to work for me because I get bored so easily. (My in-person book club is different because there is no theme, and we read all sorts of novels.) Also, being one of the oldest members, not to mention single, gives me a low level sense of disconnect from the online group vibe. Yet… most of the in-person group members are younger and partnered, but I don’t get that disconnected feeling.

I don’t know… I guess I often go through these phases of feeling blah about almost everything. Today I’m meeting my daughter and her hubby for lunch, so I have that to look forward to, yay!

Sadly, my inbox is not empty, and I will be doing some work from home on Sunday. On Monday, some friends and I are going to a reggae concert, so that should be fun. May your inbox be empty or in whatever condition you desire.

~*~

Inspired by Linda’s Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt “may your...”

My Wild and Crazy Birthday Week

Cupcake from coworker

Warning: very long and boring post ahead.

As some of you know, I had a birthday last week ~ one person called it a milestone birthday. Yeah, I guess, if milestone means Medicare then death. But anyway, let's not be morbid. My new Rx plan is fab! I paid $30 for sumatriptan instead of $45, woohoo! Then I bought more puzzles because that $15 was burning a hole in my cyberwallet. Here's the weird thing about all my birthday celebrations: I don’t particularly care about my own birthdays, nor do I go out of my way to announce them for gift-grabbing purposes. Hey, if you do, no issues. I just don't, that's all. In fact, I am so anti-gift grabby that I refused to have a wedding registry or baby shower/s. That's just me; I find it embarrassing. Others don't feel that way, including my own daughters, and that's cool. 

So, at the beginning of April, one generous friend decided we should have a party for me at his house on April 25. I was fine with that, as long as the invitations specified "no gifts." They did, and all was good there. We watched the musical version of Waitress, which was great, just like the reviews said, and then we had pie to go with the theme. Fun evening with good friends, plus I met the host's new doggo, a very sweet Golden Doodle.

On Tuesday, we all have lunch together at work courtesy of the partners, and since so many of us were there last week, one of my coworkers made adorable cupcakes in honor of my birthday, and they all sang HB. The cupcakes were supposed to be reminiscent of Sprinkles (RIP), and honestly they were better! You guys know how much I loved Sprinkles, but sometimes their cake was too dense and oily. My coworker's cupcakes had light, fluffy cake, which is a better vehicle for frosting because you don't feel as barfy afterward. Dense cake gets into muffin territory anyway, and we don't want to go there. 

That seems like enough celebrating of me, but no, not even close. On Thursday, my actual birthday, three (3) coworkers brought me bouquets of flowers. Each one was gorgeous, and I felt overwhelmed. One coworker bought my lunch (salmon bowl) that day too. I brought the bouquets home because I wasn't returning to the office until Tuesday and wouldn't be able to appreciate them if I had left them there. I set them around my living and dining rooms. Utterly gorgeous! I don't know why I forgot I was allergic to flowers, probably because I receive them so infrequently (how's that for passive aggression?), but Friday I went to see The Devil Wears Prada 2 at 10AM (more about that in a minute), and as soon as I sat down, I began to have an allergy attack. I figured it would soon pass, but instead it got worse, and I started to cry uncontrollably even though the movie wasn't sad at all. I took (what I hoped was) a Benadryl in the dark, and eventually I felt a little better. I refused to get up and go wash my face in the bathroom, as I didn't want to miss any of the movie, although I could barely see it at times due to all the tears. When I finally did go to the bathroom, I was horrified. My face and eyes were all swollen up like a melon. 

Inky and sunflowers from coworker

Still at the movie plaza, I treated myself to a healthy lunch at Boudin (delicious veggie sandwich), and then walked around for a bit. The area was full of flowers, and I began to feel yucky again, so I went off to the library and the grocery store. When I got home, I took another Benadryl and then texted with the girls. They informed me that the flowers were the problem, and I needed to put them outside STAT, which I did. It was sad not to be able to admire them inside, but I decided that breathing was probably more important. I watched a couple more movies on TV because I didn't feel like reading, took a Zyrtec, and went to bed. I was a little nervous about sleeping because my chest felt heavy after all those allergy meds, but I figured that if I failed to wake up and feed Inky at 6AM, she could munch on my corpse until my housemate returned from her trip.

Reader: I woke up.

On Saturday, I looked and felt relatively "normal" and non-puffy, but I thought it best to take it easy and putter around the house doing chores and stuff, which is what I did, along with starting a thriller for my book club titled He Started It (by Samantha Downing). Enjoyable at first with an unreliable narrator (I like those usually), but annoying in the second half with too many gotchas directed at the reader ~ two stars. I also decided to straighten up the hall closet, and a heavy game board fell on my foot. Ow ow ow! I iced it for a couple hours so it wouldn't swell up. Now, you would think my birthday celebrations had finally come to an end, but you would be wrong. On Sunday, my good friend Lisa treated me to a birthday luncheon at the Tea House on Los Rios in San Juan Capistrano. We had planned to take the train down and back, but we ended up driving because the road closures for the marathon made us late, so we'll do a train trip another time. We enjoyed our lovely tea and goodies, and we browsed around in the cute little shops. I love Old Town SJC! Such a perfect day! Also, some of the gals in my online book club sent me birthday books, and those are appreciated by me as well.

Eight days of birthdaying! It was like Chanukah! I don't get it, but I feel very loved.

At the Tea House on Los Rios, SJC

Spoiler (ish) for The Devil Wears Prada 2! Go away now if you plan to see it and hate spoilers.

Regarding The Devil Wears Prada 2, it was good but not great. I mean, the first one is an iconic treasure, and so DWP2 has big designer shoes to fill, so to speak. The plot is basically a repeat of the DWP1 with Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep) reluctantly hiring Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) again at Runway 20 years later and realizing (again) how valuable she is. There are sneaky shenanigans re a corporate takeover, with Miranda outsmarting everyone, as usual. There are some funny moments, such as when Miranda, for the first time, is forced to go to lunch in the Runway cafeteria, which she didn't even know existed. There are also some cringe moments where Miranda says un-PC things to her staff and has to be corrected by her latest "Emily" ~ these verbal gaffes are simply not believable coming from the icy perfection that is Miranda. Emily herself (Emily Blunt) has a larger role in DWP2, and she's good. Nigel (Stanley Tucci) is his same suave, sarcastic self. Andy hasn't really changed, which I guess is the point; she has stayed true to her journalistic principles all these years. 

Nate Cooper (Adrian Grenier), Andy's boyfriend from DWP1, is not in the sequel, sadly. I get that it makes sense they broke up sometime during the past 20 years due to lifestyle and logistic differences, but I missed him regardless. Nate was a great down-to-earth foil against all the fashion superficiality, and we don't have anyone like that in DWP2. Andy does have a love interest in DWP2, a British luxury apartment developer named Peter ~ who stresses that he isn't the money guy, just the contractor, which is supposed to make him seem less gross, I guess. That's fine, except the romance mirrors DWP1 in that Andy treats him less than ideally and grovels to him at the end, similar to her mea culpa lunch with Nate at the end of DWP1. It annoyed me. It wasn't exactly the same, but it was close enough for me to go, argh, why is Andy always apologizing to men? There's nothing wrong with Andy being less about finding love and more about her career, and you don't hear men apologizing for that, ever.

Also, and this isn't the movie's fault, I have a bit of "face blindness," especially when it comes to men. All white men with brown hair and scruffy beards look the same to me. Miranda has a new guy Henry, who is a white man with brown hair and a scruffy beard, just like Peter the contractor, plus Henry has a British accent similar to Peter's. I sometimes found it hard to tell them apart. I will likely watch DWP2 again when it appears on Prime or whatever because I didn't get the full experience due to my allergy attack plus the white guy/ brown hair/ scruffy beard confusion.

That's all.

Books (April A2Z ~ Misty Memories)

Mommy and me, around 1965

Welcome to my April A2Z posts! This time, I am officially signed up on the challenge sheet and will be visiting other bloggers on the list. My theme is "misty memories," which will include a bunch of rambling about old stuff in my life, and hopefully some of it will be accurate, but if not, there's no one around to contradict me. Today we continue with B for Books.

I have always been an avid reader. It’s genetic! Both my parents loved to read, and my daughters do too. It could be environmental, of course ~ if a child sees people enjoying books, naturally she will want to pick one up and see what the big deal is. The first book I remember reading on my own, maybe around age 4, was called Artie the Smartie. It was about a fish. I liked the Bobbsey Twins books a lot when I was around 8-9 years old, and then I graduated to adventure books about dogs. I began as a dog-lover, and my twenties, I switched to cats, though I still love (nice) doggos.

At 10, I read The Velveteen Rabbit, a beautiful story which made me cry and still does. I reread it from time to time.

By the time I was 12, I was reading adult romances ~ yes, the kind the drugstore sells. At first, they were "light" Harlequins, but that's just a gateway drug, and eventually I moved on to steamier stuff. As I have mentioned before, this was bad for me, and as a parent I wouldn't have allowed it (luckily, my daughters had no interest in romance novels and still don't). My parents, however, were of the hippy dippy 70's mindset that nothing should be censored from anyone, and they also believed that reading was so valuable it shouldn't be discouraged. I suppose that's a fair point, as I did have a much wider vocabulary than my peers. 

Anyway, I read everything, and I mean everything. The Happy Hooker. Playboy. Hustler. This was all lying around at my parents' house and at the houses of people whose kids I babysat. (OK, sometimes I had to search for it, lol.) A lot of this material was inappropriate for a young teenager because I couldn't put it in context or process it properly as fantasy. It messed up my head and self-image. I didn't look anything like the women I read about, and in my mind, physical appearance became tied to love: if you weren't beautiful, in very specific ways, you weren't going to be loved. That is how my 12-17 year old brain processed this reading material.

I also read tons of mysteries and detective novels and some biographies and autobiographies of celebs. I still enjoy those genres. For decades, I continued with the romances, gravitating toward novels set in the Regency period, but right now I'm tired of them all. I'm also a bit bored with thrillers, as after reading hundreds of them, they aren't that thrilling. 

I still love books though, just not the reading rut I have been in lately ~ I have struggled to escape and return to the magic of books! These days, I'm apt to choose one that's simply different from stuff I've recently read. Poetry, biography, science, philosophy, etc. Case in point: at the moment I am reading Love of Goldens, a non-fiction "coffee table" book with loads of photos of gorgeous golden retrievers interspersed with adorable vignettes.

Everything old is new again, eh?

Post Valentines Blues

It’s official: I’m tired of romance. I don’t even have any romance novels in my house ~ I donated them all to the library. Even the Regency novels are leaving me cold because I really resent those hunky titled men who do absolutely nothing all day. Contemporary, in theory, should appeal to me, especially since I love the classic romcoms such as You’ve Got Mail, which I watched yesterday while doing a puzzle. It made me cry like it always does. Such good writing. Great dialogue and chemistry between the leads. A solid plot. Newer novels however have such stupid protagonists, not to mention plots that are way too absurd to take seriously even in fiction. There are exceptions, such as The Hating Game, but they’re too hard to find in the sea of dreck. 

Kinda like dating itself!

My online book club gravitates toward thrillers, and I have been reading a lot of those over the past year or so, but I am getting bored with them as well. I also have a separate list of restrictions for thrillers just as I do for romances: no child abuse, no animal cruelty, nothing about eyeballs, no teenaged protagonists, no first person alternating POVs, no stupid main character who deliberately flings herself into danger, etc.

This is not an exhaustive list.

Right now I’m reading The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill by Mark Bittner. It’s nonfiction and interesting. I do have to take breaks when I get annoyed with Mark for being an unemployed bum and remind myself that it’s okay and I am not dating him. In a romance novel, Mark would have been an introspective earl who could study birds all day and still be obscenely wealthy with a vast estate, but at least in this book the MC’s lack of a job actually means he goes hungry for a while. I have also started My Octopus Teacher on Netflix, which I am enjoying as well, but where is the documentary of an irresponsible man who won’t work, befriends animals, and dies impoverished and alone?

This morning I am going to breakfast with a friend and looking forward to catching up (and getting some avo toast). After that, I may paint again because my self-esteem is a bit too high, and it will be fun to fail at creating the masterpiece I have in my mind and end up with a hopeless mess. That way, I can remember how I didn’t pursue a lucrative career because I wanted to put energy into creative endeavors… and how that didn’t pay off. At all.

Besides that, I have loads of anxiety lately about all the things that have happened plus the ones that haven’t but might. Good times.

No advice needed. Commiseration encouraged.

Gold Dust Woman

I think I have some Stevie Nicks fans among my handful of readers, so I would like to recommend the biography of her that I finished yesterday Gold Dust Woman. It was written by Stephen Davis (who has written many rock star bios) and published in 2017. It's a long book (450 pages), dense with detail, and can get tedious at times when Davis goes off into tangents, but overall I enjoyed it and gave it four stars. 

It's interesting to me when people have all-consuming passions that rule their lives. My passions are brief and shallow, fluttering across my focus like butterflies, and then off they go. Stevie had many serious problems that impacted her trajectory, yet she persevered until she became the fabulous rock goddess we know and love today. Stevie knew that superstardom was her ultimate destination, and nothing was going to stop her from achieving her dream. I am in awe of that kind of drive.

My writing has stagnated. It's not just that I don't want to get up at 4AM to write before work; I simply don't feel like writing fiction at all, save for a random flash here and there. Poetry is a different animal, and every few weeks I feel a bit of inspiration to knock out some verse. I no longer feel writing is my passion or calling or anything of the sort though. For a while, it was an obsession, and now it isn't. Same goes for painting and other crafts that I loved, sometimes for a few years and other times for a weekend. Take the "neuro art" I tried a few weeks ago: I had every intention of doing a lot more of it, but now I can't be bothered. Will I do another at some point? I don't know. So much intense coloring at one time tends to make my hands ache. I have always enjoyed tabletop jigsaw puzzles and recently did a bunch, but for decades I hadn't touched one. 

Last Saturday I took a cookie decorating class at Grunderfully Delicious with a few book club friends. It was so much fun! My results turned out pretty nice even though it was my first time ~ in the old days, when I baked my own cookies, my idea of decorating was to toss on a few sprinkles and call it a day. Saturday's class was about serious decoration techniques and even included fondant. Fondant! The cookies were delicious, and I have now eaten them all and am ready for another class. I hope she has upcoming ones themed for St. Patrick's Day and/or Easter, and there are Saturday spots available. I'm not quite at the point of taking time off from work for a cookie class, but I do think about them a lot now.

Anyway, I was in a reading slump for a couple days last week where no books appealed to me, but now I'm back to the world of thrillers and romances. In fact, my current read is a novel called How to Kill a Guy in Ten Dates, so it combines the best of both genres. Or the worst, as the case may be.

How Often Do You Spill Your Food or Beverage?

Apparently the reason why I never found love post-divorce is because I failed to spill my coffee or tea or Diet Coke on some hapless fellow. I never (as far as I know) dropped food on a man either. But according to contemporary romance novels, clumsiness with comestibles is the key to true love. While you don't see many governesses or companions in the Regency Romances getting scone crumbles on a duke or earl, in contemporaries it's de rigueur. I'm getting to the point where I want to DNF a book as soon as I see it ~ I even listed it as one of my Persnickety Peeves over a year ago. Back then, I called it an awkward meet cute, but I've since realized that it can happen anytime during the get-to-know-you stage. 

The latest one I read was in Life Derailed, for which I had high expectations as an exploration of how we feel about AI in our lives, and in particular would we rather have a customized, sensitive, kind, understanding, funny, and always available to chat AI boyfriend or an annoying human male? Alas, this was just a typical workplace romance with the usual tedious misunderstandings that melted away when the epiphany occurred. Regarding the spilled food, somehow our heroine Remi managed to get salad on poor Jason while he was sitting across the table. Salad! I had to stop reading to try to imagine how you could accidentally flip greens and pieces of tomato across the table onto a guy's shirt. I'm still having a hard time envisioning it.

I finished this book because I really hoped that more in depth discussion of AI with respect to relationships would materialize, but it never happened. I suppose I have to rewatch Her for that or one of the many various movies centered on this theme. I don't want to see robots gone bad; I want to see people preferring AI conversation to human interaction at least for a while. Anyway, I had other issues with Life Derailed, such as a mom character that could have been funny and interesting, but the author made her so over the top ridiculous that it ruined her, plus the author completely forgot about Remi's precious doggie Fitz, and she had Remi run off to an island for a month to write her novel without telling us what she did with poor Fitz. The novel did have some interesting scenes, so I gave it two stars instead of the one I was initially contemplating. 

What else? I read His and Hers, a mystery/ thriller, which was pretty good, but I liked the Netflix series more. One of the reasons is because they had only six episodes, so they had to discard some of the bloated side-plots, and that made the story more streamlined and easier to follow. The show made me realize that one of the things I dislike about first-person narration, which is "I have a big secret I am not divulging to the reader even though we are in my head and I am obviously thinking about it," works perfectly well on the screen because that "nyah nyah" doesn't occur. We didn't even need to see the protags getting blackout drunk all the time so they (and the reader) wouldn't remember/ know what they did because there was very little narration. I'm also getting to the point where I'm tired of excessive alcohol consumption used as a plot device. Be more creative! 

Yesterday I went to the Orange County Zoo with a friend. It was the first time I'd been there. Small zoo, but easy to walk the whole thing (twice) and see a variety of cool beasties, such as owls, eagles, snakes, lizards, big cats, peacocks, parrots, etc. There was a petting area as well, but I didn't want to touch any animals. It's always so weird to see the goats with their rectangular pupils, and they probably think the same thing about my human eyeballs. One of the things I enjoy most about a zoo is how excited the little kids get to see all the creatures.

Hope all my readers are having a good Monday!

First Reads of 2026

Before I get into the books, I want to say a word (or 500) about stats. As you know, Bob, one of the main reasons I gave up two relatively popular blogs is because I became obsessed with checking my stats. With Ultrablog, my obsession was tracking IPs to try to figure out who was visiting me ~ this rarely works now because peeps use their phones, and the IP and location changes. I also freaked out if a post received way fewer views/ comments compared to my average. With my more recent WP blog, I was obsessed with follower count as well as comments per post. Like many other bloggers, I quit worrying about views per post, as those are meaningless. Fast forward to this blog, where I don’t fuss about any stats whatsoever. I have noticed lately that WP bloggers based in the US and UK are wondering why they get an onslaught of views from places like Hong Kong and Singapore, when they don't have any followers from there. Welp, now that I have been commenting more on those WP blogs, I too am getting views from Hong Kong and Singapore. While my comments here are about the same as they've been all along, averaging only a few per post, my views overall have exponentially increased. What am I going to do about this? Nothing. I assume that the view counts are as meaningless as they've ever been, but I just wanted to feel included.

OK then. Let's start with my first DNF of the year: The Good Daughter by Karin Slaughter. This was one of our three January books of the month, which is the only reason I started it, as I have heard that Karin's books are horrendously gory and violent. Yep, it was horrible ~ technically a thriller, but really more like horror, at least at the beginning. I read about 10 pages or so and gave up. So, I have no idea whether the story is good or if the grossness abated, but I tend to believe not/ not. I won't ever try this author again. Yuck! Here's a thing about trigger warnings: they don't work that well for me because I can handle impossible goriness, such as supernatural shenanigans, but when it sounds realistic, I am out. Karin's sounded real. When I read, I picture what I am reading throughout the book, so those disturbing images stay with me. The ones from TGD are still kind of floating around my mind a bit.

The first book I read for the year was A Cat Abroad by Peter Gethers. I read his first Norton book, The Cat Who Went to Paris, six years ago and loved it. Then for some odd reason I skipped the second book in the trilogy and went straight to the third: The Cat Who'll Live Forever. This was also great, though as you might guess from the title, heartbreaking as well. It hasn't been that long since Gatsby died, so even thinking about that third book makes me cry. Recently, as I was (obsessively) rearranging my physical bookshelves, I realized that I had never read the second book, so I ordered a used copy. I loved it, though not quite as much as I loved the other two books because it’s very travelog-y, as one might expect. Since I have never been to Europe nor do I know any French, many of the funny moments don't do much for me. And not to be mean, but I don't have much (or any) sympathy for the travel mishaps of people who have gobs more money than I do. I can smile at the petty ironies and minuscule woes of their lives, but do I really care? Nah. Norton's behavior is still adorable however. Four stars (the other two received five each). This counts as a memoir on my genre hop list.

I am still teary over a novel I finished this morning: The Midnight Library by Matt Haig. It begins very slowly, and I might have DNF'd it except that a couple peeps in my book club loved it. So, I kept going and am sure glad I did! Nora, the MC, is a whiny, sad sack of a person, and I didn't relate to her all that much, at first. The premise is that after she tries to commit suicide she hovers in a state between life and death where she visits a fantasy library that contains all the stories of her life that might have been as well as a huge tome of regrets. As Nora chooses other lives to slip into, she's guided both practically and philosophically by her old primary school librarian (the one person from her past who had shown her unconditional kindness). As Nora's epiphanies accumulate, I begin to resonate with them, especially the ones about living to please other people. Whether struggling to keep a straight A average for my mom or to be accepted by my peers or to find a boyfriend, my earlier life was also dominated by the need to receive praise from others. My first paragraph about blog stats is a good example. I internalized all this dreck to such an extent that I felt guilty when not writing a bestselling book while working full time. Why can't I do more? Other people do more. Why can't I achieve any level of socially blessed success, blah blah blah. Anyway, TML explores these ideas plus the obvious conclusion that being yourself is enough. Going after your own dreams is not selfish. Relinquishing old dreams and being content with what you have (where I am now) is just fine too! None of these are radical concepts, but Haig presents them in a fresh and emotionally relevant way, so TML received five stars from me. It also counts as a fantasy book on my genre hop list.

Speaking of the genre hop challenge, it's not my intention to complete the entire list the first quarter. I may expand the categories into subgenres or simply read two or more from each. While A Cat Abroad counts as a memoir, it's not a biography, so I will try to find one of those I might enjoy (the category is biography/ memoir). Also, I noticed at the bottom of the hop list is a bonus category to reread five favorite books, which I may do too. The whole point is to read books I love, and if I can't give a book three or more stars, I probably should consider tossing it in the DNF pile. Of course, sometimes I'm digging a book and then get really annoyed at the ending, so there's that. 

Hope your new year is going swimmingly so far ~ mine is, literally, with all this rain. Back to the office tomorrow I go, hi ho, hi ho.

PS: I found a way to add a DNF shelf to my Goodreads without it marking the book as "want to read," which was so annoying. I had to do it from my laptop. Apps aren't always all that and a bag of chips.

PPS: Nope. Goodreads insists on marking my DNFs as "read," which wrecks my count. I have deleted the DNF shelf once again.

Let's Make It a Very Good Year

I lost my sweet kitty Gatsby last May, so that alone made 2025 one of the worst years ever. Inky came into my life soon afterward, which made things a lot better. The year ended on a very sour note in December with ID theft shenanigans that totally stressed me out, but it could have been worse. There are positive aspects to being OCD and constantly checking stuff. My family had a bunch of seasonal sickies and other unfortunate incidents recently, and I’ve been feeling bad for all of them as well (not to mention not seeing them much). I'm looking forward to an overnight visit soon with my eldest and her hubs and to my littlest grandson's special three-year-old birthday party next month. So… overall, a mixed bag, as life often is.

My goals for 2026 are to be much more intentional and mindful. I know that sounds like new-age barf, but it is what it is. Previously, I noted that I plan to read fewer and better books and abandon poorly written dreck much faster. Sure, I still plan to enjoy plenty of genre romances and thrillers, but only those that zing with me. Besides reading, other activities that need more mindfulness are snacking, grabbing “lazy meals” (as opposed to getting/ making something healthier), spending money on junk, scrolling depressing news, etc. Even sitting in a chair requires mindful behavior if I don't want to end up with a stiff neck or achy shoulders after slumping or being crooked for hours. Sometimes I forget to recognize pain until it’s really bad.

I'm already more intentional about writing/ blogging, which shows that habits can be changed. Many times I begin a post to a prompt (I am still aware of them even though I rarely participate), and I realize that my idea sucks, so instead of continuing just to have a post, I abandon it. What a relief to be able to give myself permission to dump a bad idea! Instead of writing 30 crappy poems a month as I used to, nowadays I may write one decent one. (At least I think my newer ones are decent anyway.) This blog feels like a fun hobby not a dreaded chore like my other one became at the end. As far as writing more books, meh, I am not feeling the need, though that could change later on, who knows. I get wisps of ideas, but they float away like dandelion fluff, which is for the best while I’m still working full time and need sleep. (I cannot believe how much sleep I used to forgo in order to write!)

Rediscovering my love for jigsaw puzzles has been a happy experience, and as long as I pay attention to how I am sitting/ standing while doing them, all is good. I have several very pretty ones lined up to begin in the coming months. Not sure if I will return to painting or not. I have the supplies, but I am not feeling the drive.

Last night I had a fabulous time at a friend’s NYE party hanging with a whole bunch of cool peeps, and that was a great way to kick off 2026. We played a new (to me) game called Poetry for Neanderthals, which is similar to Taboo, except you can only use one-syllable words. I loved it so much that I immediately ordered one from Amazon, which was extremely intentional. LOL! Hey, my first purchase of the new year is a game, and I’m good with that. 

Inky weighed exactly 10 pounds this morning, so she is doing a great job in maintaining her half-pound loss. Maybe we can reduce a smidge more in the next few months before her two-year checkup in April. I haven’t lost anything, but that’s OK for now. It’s not so much the number for me as focusing on healthier meals and more exercise, though a lower number always makes me happy because OCD.

Alrighty then. Let’s do this thing!

Year in Books

Goodreads says that I read 190 books in 2025. The shortest one is 28 pages (Grandma’s House by Amy Tackett, one star, yuck), and the longest is 693 pages (The Miracle at St. Bruno’s by Philippa Carr, two stars, meh). The average page count is 284, and my average star rating is 3.1. Included in this count are many short stories and novellas ~ unless they’re in a collection, GR counts them as one book.

This is too many books, and unlike everyone else in my book club, my goal for 2026 is to read fewer books. Not only did I slog through a whole bunch of stuff I didn’t even enjoy, but also I read way too fast to retain much of anything. I have been tossing loads of books into the DNF pile, and I need to double down on that. Unless it’s a discussion book for one of my clubs, there is no reason to continue on with something I dislike. And so what if it’s just a “mood” and I might enjoy it later? One chance per book. There are simply too many others out there to try. 

Last year I began a 100-book challenge, and although I read way over 100 books, I failed at the challenge. It’s just too annoying to spend time hunting down books to meet the arbitrary criteria of these challenges. That said, I am participating in a genre hop challenge next year because I really to want to get out of the psycho thriller and Regency romance rut. Of course, I will gobble up plenty of books in each of those genres, but once a month (minimum) I will also add in something else. I’m really looking forward to it!

I previously mentioned that I would start reviewing my books read in 2026 on GR, and I’ve already begun to do that this month to get in the habit. I also said I would add a DNR tag to my GR shelf, but I changed my mind on that because it’s a hassle. If I get all fuzzy-brained and start a book I previously marked DNF, who cares? Most likely I will still hate it on the second try, but if not, then cool.

Two Movies

On Christmas Day, my friend C and I saw Song Sung Blue. I had been looking forward to this movie for ages because I love Neil Diamond’s music, and I love Kate Hudson. It surpassed my expectations! Kate is utterly amazing, from her singing to her acting to her nailing of the Wisconsin accent. Hugh Jackman is fabulous too, and they both should win awards. The film is based on the true story of Lightning and Thunder, a married couple who were a Neil Diamond tribute band. It’s a love story as well as a family story, with jubilant highs and tragic lows. I cried a lot. Michael Imperioli from The Sopranos is also wonderful as a Buddy Holly impersonator (I still have the “Everyday” ear-worm). Who knew these peeps could sing? I want to see SSB again, though I will probably wait until it streams.

On Saturday, we saw The Housemaid, which was based on Freida McFadden’s novel of the same name. While I gave the book only three stars (not a bad rating, but not great either), I wanted to see the movie as soon as I heard it would star Amanda Seyfried because I love her. She’s such a versatile actress! From the dumb high school girl in Mean Girls to the exuberant Sophie in the Mamma Mia movies (where she sings beautifully as well) to the romcom heroine of Letters to Juliet to this psycho wife in Housemaid, she is impressive. (She also stars and sings in the new film The Testament of Ann Lee.) This movie was fun and campy, though I knew what to expect from the novel, so neither the thriller aspect nor the plot twist took me by surprise. I am glad I saw it anyway. 

More later…

A Subtle Difference

It’s hard for me not to obsess over POV when I’m reading because we were taught to obsess over it when we were crafting a scene. One of the very first things I learned was not to have our character die during the story if we were narrating in first person. There are a few exceptions, such as writing as a ghost or zombie or whatever, but generally “and then I died” is bad form. The reader immediately wonders who is telling the story. 

Lately there’s been an epidemic of first person present tense thrillers, often with alternating first person POVs. I can’t even describe how much I hate this, but I try to put my violent rage aside when evaluating the book for a book club discussion, Goodreads review, star rating, etc. I admit that there is a subtle difference in writing “and then I died” vs “everything fades to black.” In the first case, my instant reaction is well then who is telling me this now? In the second case, I could believe I am with the character as it is happening. It’s still not as smooth as third person, so I don’t know why writers persist in doing this. Why not just write in third when you know you’re going to kill your MC?

Another issue I have with first person narration is how much we know when we’re inside the character’s head. If we are supposed to be privy to their thoughts, then they can’t have secrets. You shouldn’t write: “I have been thinking about that Bad Thing I did, but I won’t tell you what it is because I need to focus on the best way to kill Michael right now.” That’s crap writing and throws the reader out of the story. Guess what POV is best for keeping secrets from the reader? Third! “Paula thought about the Bad Thing again, but she forced herself not to dwell on it because she needed to focus on the best way to kill Michael.” Maybe this is too nit-picky, but it really bothers me.

Finally (must have three things in a post about writing), note that my example is in past tense. It’s the best way to tell a story, in my opinion. Past tense lets the reader relax and follow along, as opposed to creating an aura of anxious immediacy where the reader watches the action like a bystander at a car crash. With past tense, the reader relies on the narrator (even an unreliable one) to guide her through the experience rather than standing there trying to figure it out herself. Take this famous opening line from Daphne du Maurier’s 1938 mystery novel Rebecca: 

“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.”

That sets the tone for the story. Something happened at Manderley, and we are going to find out what it was. It establishes first person narration, which is fine because the narrator doesn’t die! The prose continues in slow, deliberate, vivid description of the property with the MC imagining how the estate decayed but still lives on as a character in its own right. The dream segues into the past, when the MC lived at the house and before that, when she met and married the owner, and we get a disturbing glimpse to pique our interest in discovering exactly what went on. Imagine if Rebecca had been written today:

“I dream I go to Manderley again.”

Meh. It’s a totally different vibe, anxious and hurried, not the slow, haunting buildup to a tragedy.

PS: the 2020 Rebecca starring Lily James is excellent. I have not watched Hitchcock’s adaptation. Naturally, the critics have to crap on the 2020 version, but as usual I disregard them. 

Heroes and Antiheroes

It’s easy to love a fireman who rescues kittens from trees, but would you want to read a whole book of the fireman acting heroically scene after scene? To me, that would become boring. Let’s give the fireman a flaw or two. Maybe he has gambling debts with the mob. One of these thugs has kidnapped his sister. Now we have a plot!

I just finished a contemporary romance novel with two perfect protagonists (Snowy Mountain Christmas by Sharon Sala). Despite the fact that the hero had a sad and lonely childhood and terrible parents, he was a wonderful person, generous and loving, and he never put a foot wrong when he met the girl of his dreams. She was beyond perfect: beautiful, successful, popular, a great cook, on and on, and talked to angels. As you might imagine, this story was boring af! We need a conflict to resolve (or not). We need dramatic tension. We need to see character development, which isn’t possible when the MC’s are already at the pinnacle of existence.

Most halfway decent romance novels assign character flaws to the protagonists, even if they’re as mundane as grumpiness or naïveté. We experience the problems that the flaws cause as we read, and we watch the characters transcend their traits. This is part of a good love story: the relationship helps each MC become a better person. People who are already perfect aren’t interesting to read about. 

But what about antiheroes? I think whether we root for a particular villain (or not) is determined by personal preference. In general, I don’t cheer for criminals, but inexplicably I did like Tony Soprano. Sure, he was a brutal murderer, but he was funny and kind to animals. In the book I am currently reading (The Defense by Steve Cavanagh), the protagonist Eddie committed insurance fraud as an occupation (before he became an attorney). Supposedly, he felt justified because a greedy health insurance company refused to pay for treatment for his father. But Eddie didn’t rip off health insurance companies ~ he did auto insurance fraud, which makes costs rise for all of us. I find this enraging, and I don’t like Eddie because of it.

There are other reasons why I probably won’t read any more books by this author, or at least not any starring Eddie Flynn, but disliking the hero usually means I am not enjoying the novel overall. As I gobble up books like it’s my job, I find that the ones I enjoy most are about relationships, not necessarily romantic ones, but the endless variety of human relationship possibilities. And maybe they don’t have to be human! For example, the most interesting part of Snowy Mountain Christmas was not the perfect romance between the protags, but the messy relationship between his screwed up parents. We barely caught a glimpse of that though. I’m not really finding much of interest in The Defense, except for technical information regarding trials and police procedures, but I am well over halfway done, so I will finish it. 

Officially in My Fusspot Era

This year I have read an absolutely insane amount of books (250+), and I have come to some decisions. First, I am slowing down because I want to retain more of the content. Second, I have been in a genre rut with psycho thrillers and romance, and I want to read more broadly in 2026. I don’t mean more fiction genres, but other types of books entirely, such as poetry, biography, and science. Third, when I do read genre fiction, I plan on being much fussier. 

This all is basically just me clarifying stuff for myself; I expect it to have zero interest to anyone else. I needed a place to vomit my thoughts.

I won’t read a contemporary romance novel if the meet cute involves clumsiness/ spilling of food, beverage or paperwork. Post meet clumsiness may be acceptable depending on the circumstances. In The Hating Game, Lucy was trying to make Josh jealous and tripped/ fell in her sexy dress and high heels, dumping out her purse all over the floor. That was funny and cute, but it was also cringe because I would have sprained my ankle. It’s like the scene in Miss Congeniality when Gracie strides out all gorgeous and blows Eric’s mind… then she falls. These are not technically meet cutes!

I won’t read a CRN or any kind of mystery where the plot could be obliterated by one session with Google. I mean, come on. Any type of fake ID/ mistaken identity motif is not going to work in a modern story unless the character has bought fake creds from a super hacker. Or if they’re a government agent. 

I don’t want to read books with teenaged protagonists. This is handy because it rules out genres that already don’t appeal to me, such as fantasy and young adult. I can’t bear anything about high school drama, nor do I want to see teens saving the world in some dystopian yuck. But what about Victoria Holt? All her heroines are teenagers. Great question! I am tired of her books and don’t plan on reading any more of them, so that works out. Granted, teens were different back when and way more mature, but even so. Also, I am suspicious of that “new adult” genre full of people under 30. They’re annoying and not much different from high schoolers.

I still like romances, though I am on somewhat of a break, but I don’t want to read about second chances. They annoy me. I just finished a holiday romance (The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah by Jean Meltzer) that had not only a second-chance motif but also was full of ghosts (a la A Christmas Carol), and I liked it enough to give it three stars. But I consider it an exception, mainly due to the fabulous job Jean did in describing migraines and related issues, including rationing meds because insurance allows only nine pills per month. In general, however, I don’t care for ghosts or exes hanging around past their expiration dates. 

What else? I don’t like the trope of the grumpy boss (billionaire or not) and his “sunshine” romantic interest. Why does the man always get to be the grump anyway? I am over mafia romances because they’re all the same. I am not a fan of contemporary characters who “hate” each other and end up in a fake-dating situation because there’s never actually a need for it other than to satisfy the terms of a will, but characters who are willing to sell their souls for a chunk of change don’t appeal to me anyway. Maybe hater dater fakery is acceptable in a Regency or other old-timey romance, depending on the details. Back then, people had fewer options. I am not ruling out CRNs though ~ they just need to have better plots than the standard omg I spilled coffee on the cutest guy but it turns out he’s my hot new boss and totally grumpy because his grandma cut him from her will unless he gets married in 30 days and he really needs her farmland to develop an enrichment camp for orphans.

Now we come to murder, blood, and gore. In general, I am not a fan of graphically described injury and death, but I do love mysteries and detective stories, so I will tolerate gore for the sake of the story. If I see from the book jacket that the main point of the novel is to come up with gruesome torture scenes, then that’s a hard pass right there. It’s one thing to describe a death in context of a police procedure, but it’s quite another to witness the writer revel in bloody descriptions. I don’t want to go inside the mind of a maniacal serial killer who gets off on amputations, etc. There are so many gross books out. But I also don’t want to read cozy mysteries, where bodies are bloodless and the murder scene smells like pumpkin spice candles. 

Horror is too disgusting and disturbing for me. I gave it a chance with the Haunted series by Lee Mountford back in October because I liked the first book, but they became a nonstop river of gore. The last few books were basically a skim because of all the rotting corpses and mangled eyeballs. Shudder. I’m reading a murder mystery right now that is all about the various clues and psychological aspects of the characters. (So far, there haven’t been any disturbing passages.) That is what I like in a story, not descriptions of death or how bodies look in the morgue. The same goes for any book about relationships ~ I want to read rich and vivid details about the characters’ mental and emotional worlds, not a boring recitation of sex romps. 

This also means I will be more discerning re the books I am willing to read for my book clubs, especially the online club.

The Life of an Office Girl

My eldest daughter and I drove up to see youngest and kiddos yesterday, hoping that traffic would be lighter on Columbus Day. It wasn’t. We still had fun painting rocks, having lunch, and playing. My granddaughter had discovered the American Girl doll catalog and showed me the one she wants for her birthday next June. Like a five star restaurant, AG does not list prices in their catalog, so I looked it up on Amazon later. When my girls were little, I decided that AG was too expensive; however, I am OK with buying one of these dolls for my granddaughter even though they’re still super pricey. LOL

Eldest played Taylor Swift’s new album The Life of a Showgirl on our drive to and from Los Angeles. Now, I consider myself neutral on TS ~ her music is for the most part (to me) pretty, bland, and boring with a few fun exceptions like “Shake It Off.” I understand she does a great live show, but I am not into loud, crowded $$$ concerts and prefer to enjoy music at home or while driving. On social media, one is supposed to either adore or despise TS, but I can’t get so emotional about a celeb. I did have fun with an FB friend the other day mocking the cringey lyrics to “Wood,” but I admit that I enjoyed TS's new song “Opalite.” The rest of the tracks fell into the PB&B category, including the ode to Travis’ penis.

Working backwards, Sunday I enjoyed a romcom on Prime called Maintenance Required, which was similar to You’ve Got Mail, but with cars instead of books. While I will always love YGM, this flick had much hotter-looking stars who had palpable physical chemistry ~ Madelaine Petsch and Jacob Scipio. The chemistry between Kathleen (Meg Ryan) and Joe (Tom Hanks) in YGM was more verbal/ intellectual, while Maintenance Required felt more "realistic." It won't become a regular in my romcom rotation, but it was a nice treat.

I binge-read two thrillers by Jason Rekulak: Hidden Pictures and The Last One at the Wedding. I gave a five-star rating to each of these! HP had supernatural elements, but they were consistent and didn't end up creating more questions than they answered. The narrative style was first person, present tense, which is generally not my favorite, but it worked in both of these. HP had a young woman narrating; the wedding novel had a man in his 50s, both completely believable. The narration pulled me right into the story and kept me hooked throughout. The twists in each were completely unexpected, but not deus ex machina. They made sense in retrospect. 

I watched the new Superman movie at a friend's house on Saturday. I liked it as much any movie of that genre (i.e., not much), but it was fun to have dinner with friends and play some board games. Sunday, I did more rock painting with the book club gals, and we also had lunch. Good times. I didn't even mind being social for three days in a row! Well, maybe family doesn't count.

That's it for my exciting recap. I am now back in the office the rest of the week.