Books I Read in April 2021 (short reviews)

Welcome back. 

I'm sorry that I took a break from blogging and that it ended up being way longer than I thought it would be. I hope I can make it up to you by posting two posts this week. My monthly reading wrap up and monthly my writing wrap up. 

Today we'll tackle my reading wrap up and then on Saturday I'll talk to you about my CampNanowrimo experience. 

April was a bit of a strange month. I had a lot to do for uni (at this point your probably sick of me talking about it) and yet I somehow managed to read 12 books. I do have to be honest and say that not all of them were great, and that I was generally not having a lot of fun reading this month, but let's stop talking about it. Next month will hopefully be more fun and that's what is most important. 

When seeing my numbers, please keep in mind that 1. I study Literature (so I read quite a bit for uni) and I generally spend most of my free time reading on top of that. 2. I'm a very fast reader (I actually timed myself, to be sure and I average around 100 pages per hour). What I want to say with that, is to not compare yourself to me, but to enjoy reading at your pace and have fun with it. It's a great hobby, not a competition. I think whenever wrap up time comes around, this toxic sense of comparing and being competitive stirs in all of us and we start feeling bad about "how little we read" or  about "making others feel bad because of how much we read".
Let's stop feeling bad and instead just talk about the books we read in a way to keep inventory for ourselves and not the page counts or amounts of books as a measurement for our worth as readers. Period.

Now, let's get into some reviews. (as always I will be quoting my goodreads reviews, so if you want to read those when they come out, head over and let's become friends:  https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/95108873-lena-fiala)

The Switch - Beth O'Leary (4/5)
You know by now that I'm a huge fan of The Flatshare and so reading The Switch was a no-brainer. I loved the premise of this (even if it wasn't as original as The Flatshare) and the characters were so much fun. While I didn't connect with Leena that well, I couldn't get enough of Eileen. The humour, the heartstrings, the quirkiness, it was so much fun. The ending was a bit too candy cotton sweet for me and the romance around Leena could've gotten a little more "screentime" (you know what I mean). One thing I have to say is that Beth O'Leary has one thing down and that is emotions. I laughed out loud,  I cried, I was on the edge of my seat and I was way more involved than I originally thought. If you want a book that warms the heart but still has quite some depth to it, then check this out (maybe look up content warnings, because dealing with grief is definitely a topic). 

Still Life - Joy Fielding (3.5/5)
A very interesting story of a woman trapped in her own head. It was a bit slow at first and the killer (?) was relatively easy to guess, but I was still so gripped because I wanted to know how the story ended and what would happen with Casey. I was expecting something a bit more fast paced and violent, given the cover, but overall I wasn't disappointed. 

Act Your Age, Eve Brown - Talia Hibbert (5/5)
Absolutely fantastic. If there was ever a series that completely won me on all points (steaminess, sweetness, mature communication, mental health and chronic illness representation, diversity and witty banter) then it was this series. All parts were great, the third was no exception. The autism representation and the conversations around self love/acceptance were so well done and so important, especially when mixed with such great romance. I'm kind of hoping there will be more novels with the Brown sisters, because I'm not ready to be done with this series. I need more. 

Where I Was From - Joan Didion (no rating)
I read this for uni and quite honestly I don't know that many details anymore, but I adore Joan Didion's style of writing and way of combining her personal experience with things that are happening around her. This was a very quick read and I can recommend it if you want to read some more niche Didion (I think a lot of people know her from The Year of Magical Thinking) 

Shatter Me - Tahereh Mafi (2.5/5)
Unravel Me - Tahereh Mafi (3/5)
I'm grouping these two together, because no one can stop me.
Sigh, for books with such pretty covers, they were disappointingly bad. 
I have to say, once I got used to the style of writing, which is like one big diary entry with crossed out sentences, A LOT of repetitions and lyrical imagery, I did enjoy it, but that was about everything I enjoyed. Juliet is a very, very annoying character. Her pain and trauma are incredibly well written and I liked that, but having her as the "heroine" of this story was a struggle. She's immature, incredibly whiny and a very weak MC. I'm not saying every fantasy/dystopian heroine has to be a badass, absolutely not, but to have a heroine be this ignorant and unwilling to do anything is hard to read. There was basically no world building in the first part (it got a tiny bit better later) and the romance is unbelievable at best. Kenji is a fun character (sadly only introduced in the second book) and once there's more world building there's a few more bits that are enjoyable to read, but unless the third part is miles better, I'm done with this series after the initial trilogy. 

Widow for One Year - John Irving (3/5)
This was a wild ride. I think I could honestly write pages and pages about this book, but no one has time for that. It felt like this book was trying to be so many things at once. It was very episodic and some of those episodes were great (the beginning, Amsterdam...) but others were so difficult to get through. Also, the fact that the MC feels like the least important character for most of the book was...interesting. Some relationships were so well developed (Eddie and Mario) others were basically nonexistent (Ruth and basically everyone in her life). To be fair, this book has been stuck in my mind since I read it, so I'll give it that. 

Roomies - Christina Lauren (3.5/5)
I think I might've mentioned before that I really like Christina Lauren ;) but this was a little disappointing. (spoilers ahead!) The main issue wasn't really that big of a deal, the relationship developement a little anticlimactic and the drama over the top. What I loved (and the reason why the rating was relatively good) was the incredibly mature way the characters communicated with each other and resolved their drama. I think I'm getting to that age where there's nothing sexier than a good talk and resolving a fight maturely. And of course make up sex. The second great thing was the way the MC cut out a very, very toxic best friend. We don't see that enough in books and so I was super proud of her when she said good bye to a hateful bitch (not even going to apologise for my word choice here). Overall one of those "Sunday morning in bed-" reads, but not one of the better ones.

Shadow and Bone series by Leigh Bardugo (all parts 4.5)
Disclaimer, I'm new/reintroduced to fantasy books as of late. What I might find amazing might be boring to someone who is well read in the genre. 
That being said, this series was so good. It wasn't perfect, there were a few things that annoyed me a little but over all this was exactly (EXACTLY) what I pictured when I heard YA fantasy. It had a strong, but flawed main character (which I stan), there was a mildly awkward love triangle (again, these are teenagers, so this was expected) and the world was beautiful. Leigh Bardugo really has a talent to describe worlds and make me want to move to some part of the Russian tundra. I also really appreciate it, that this isn't yet another "Britain but not Britain" world, because even with my very limited experience in fantasy, I've already seen enough of those. 
This series is fast paced, easy to read, with a good amount of bravery mixed with angsty teen love and all of the characters are well rounded and so entertaining. Can highly recommend this series and can't wait until I've finished Six of Crows and can finally watch the TV show. 

Moonglow - Michael Chabon (4/5)
My last April read was a very surprising one. When I started this I thought I would not like this, but boy, was I wrong. This was so funny while having so much depth, it was intimidating. One page we read about the main characters mentally ill wife struggling and on the next page he sets out to hunt an snake in suburbia. It is a bit chaotic, because it is told in little episodes about a man who is old at the time he tells his story, but it made for a very comforting read. It felt like you were sitting in the room as the story was remembered, told and added to. This book deals with so many different things, but one that really stuck with me is this idea of having dreams and expectations for your life or idols you look up to and what happens when they don't turn out the way you expected. Apparently this is a memoir about the author's grandfather, but I'm very curious to know how much of it actually happened like it's written in the novel. If it was all true then I'm genuinely impressed with the life his grandfather had. 

It was honestly kind of fun to not have to restrict myself so much because I didn't read as many books this month, I hope you enjoyed theses slightly longer, short reviews.
I always love looking back on the books that I read in a month and review them again, because I get to reflect on what I still remember about them. I really hope you had a great reading month and if you didn't, then so what. 

As I said, I will be back with another post on Saturday, until then I wish you all the best. 
Take care, stay healthy and read on. 
Lena 

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