Category: Uncategorized

Book Review, Fiction, Uncategorized

Oona Out of Order: A Novel by Margarita Montimore ~ Book Review

Morgan

Oona Out of Order with banana bread

Flatiron Books
Genre: Fiction
Release Date: February 25, 2020
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪

Thank you to Libro.fm for the audiobook Oona out of Order, narrated by the wonderful Brittany Pressley! I am very conflicted about what genre Oona Out of Order falls into. The premise is this: every year at the stroke of the New Year, Oona is transported to a different year of her life. From there, she lives that one year internally a different age than her external self. Enter lots of confusion and difficulty maintaining relationships. It sounds kind of sci-fi based solely off of that, but the story is so much more.

The relationships in Oona’s life, and the exceptional way that she is forced to navigate them really stood out to me. Oona’s mother is particularly central, and seeing the way she supports her daughter as best she can through her strange condition is really touching. As with all parents and children, their love for one another ebbs and flows, with Oona often unaware of why her mother feels a certain way toward her. The dynamic between them is strong and often painfully relatable, and felt like a believable extension of a mother-daughter relationship.

I also loved the world-building in this book. Montimore took the time to really think out how Oona’s condition works. Oona writes notes to herself at the end of each year to help her future self process the world around her. Since she can’t pursue a traditional career, she utilizes her future knowledge of stock markets to support herself (more than support herself, really). It was clear that a lot of planning went into making this premise work, and as a result, it didn’t feel fantastically far-fetched.

Oona deals with things that everyone is forced to grapple with: heartbreak, grief, lust, anger. Her story just written out chronologically would have been interesting, but the added twist of her time-hopping makes it especially powerful. She finds out about the death of loved ones years after they occurred, only to reencounter them, alive, the next year. She learns secrets about the past and the future that she’s forced to keep quiet in order to avoid impacting events to come. Oona Out of Order was definitely not like anything I’ve ever read before, and I thoroughly enjoyed listening to Brittany Pressley’s narration.

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪
Buy Oona Out of Order at an indie bookstore near you
Buy the Audio Book on Libro.fm
Oona Out of Order on Goodreads

Book Review, Fiction, thriller, Uncategorized

The Girl Before by JP Delaney ~ Book Review

Morgan

The Girl Before and cookies

Ballantine Books
Genre: Thriller
Release Date: January 24, 2017
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪.5

I got major Riley Sager vibes from this book (although it definitely came out before any of the Sager books I’ve read). I love the premise of a creepy residence with a life of its own. ‘Settings that almost become characters in and of themselves’ seems to be its own subset of the thriller genre, and I’m not mad about it. One Folgate Street is just such a setting. A futuristic fortress designed entirely to teach its inhabitants to be more minimalistic and alter their morals, it is also steeped in tragedy. Initially designed to be the home of the architect, Edward Monkford, and his family, it was instead put up for rent after Edward’s wife and child were killed in an on-site construction accident.

The book is split between Emma and Jane’s narrations, fifteen years apart. Both women apply to stay at One Folgate Street, a process which includes an extensive and intrusive questionnaire as the first step. Each one is reeling from a personal tragedy, and sees the strange residence as an opportunity for a fresh start despite the strange rules and regulations that they agree to upon signing the lease.

Before moving in, both Emma and Jane meet Edward Monkford, the alluring architect of the home. Both women find themselves instantly attracted to him and the feeling appears mutual. Packed full of desolation, lies, mistrust, instability, and sex, this book was a rollercoaster from start to finish. I will say that there were times when it felt like there was too much trying to be crammed in (the sudden introduction of an eating disorder and excessive compulsive lying caught me off guard), but nonetheless, the parallel stories of Emma and Jane kept me utterly enthralled and on the edge of my seat to know what would happen next.

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪.5
The Girl Before on Goodreads
Buy The Girl Before at an indie bookstore near you

Book Review, Nonfiction, Uncategorized

The Genius of Women by Janice Kaplan ~ Book Review

Morgan

IMG_4182

Dutton
Genre: Nonfiction
Release Date: February 18, 2020
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪

I loved the concept behind The Genius of Women. The perception that geniuses are men is so ingrained in society, that many people don’t even realize that the image they associate with genius is male. Kaplan sets out to expose this deep rooted viewpoint, and to explore the stories of women geniuses, living and dead, many of whom were never recognized (at least not in their lifetime) for their incredible intellect. The statistics and the research behind The Genius of Women were staggering and clearly extremely extensive. Kaplan went to great depths to speak to women who are geniuses and carefully collect their individuals experiences, stories, and coping mechanisms. The statistical nuggets she dropped in were shocking and made me, as a reader, want to get fired up and demand change (or at least encourage it).

Unfortunately, the repetitive nature of the book really took away from the concept for me. After a while, the chapters started to blend together. It seemed that each was following the same format by introducing an incredible new woman or two, outlining all the ways they were slighted because they were female, and then discussing how they did or didn’t address this bias. This was great the first few times, but after a while they were hard to distinguish.

This book was absolutely eye-opening, and made me want to be more careful about how I personally perceive genius as well as incite large scale societal change. I think this was a big part of the reason it was written, so in that sense, it was very successful. I wish it was either shorter, or that the examples and chapters were a bit more varied, so I remained captivated and they felt more distinct.

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪
Buy The Genius of Women at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction, Uncategorized

Conversations with Friends by Sally Rooney ~ Book Review

Morgan

Conversations with Friends and Cookies

Hogarth
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Release Date (USA): July 11, 2017
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪.5

I loved this book, but I hated everyone in it. Does that make sense? Rooney did an unbelievably wonderful job crafting characters whose morals, thought processes, and conversations (see what I did there?) are questionable at best. 

Frances and Bobbi, best friends, college students, and previous lovers, speak like they know everything about everything. They are so self-assured in their intellect that their characters immediately seemed believably like those twenty-one year-olds who think they’re better than everyone else. Bobbi and Frances find their lives intertwined with those of an older married couple, Melissa and Nick. Bobbi is drawn to Melissa, while Frances is attracted to Nick. The friendship with the four of them seemed a bit odd to me given the age difference between the two pairs, but they were all immersed in the art/literary world, so I guess that gave them enough of a connection to maintain their friendship.

The story focuses mainly on Frances and her relationship with Nick, her financial struggles, and her health. The way she approaches each of these obstacles, as if they’re wholly out of her control, was infuriating. She acted as if she had no agency in her own life. This was a fascinating read precisely for that reason. I didn’t understand the type of people any of these characters were, or their motivations. This made for a really interesting character study that wholly and completely sucked me in. Reading about people so different from anyone in my own life always kept me on my toes, although the plot was not action-filled. I would definitely recommend this one, and I’m surprised that I had previously heard so much more about Rooney’s more recent novel, since Conversations with Friends blew it out of the water for me.

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪.5
Buy Conversations with Friends at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction, thriller, Uncategorized

The Twin by Natasha Preston ~ Book Review

Morgan

The Twin with Muffin

Delacorte Press
Genre: YA Thriller
Release Date: March 3, 2020
My Rating: 🍪🍪

I want to preface my review by saying that I’m not the target audience for this book, and I think that had a lot to do with me not loving it. This is a YA thriller, and as such, focuses a lot on high school drama, but doesn’t get super crazy messed up. (Okay, maybe kind of toward the very, very end, but not overwhelmingly so). I actually haven’t read any thrillers with the good twin/bad twin thing going on that I can recall, but it’s a trope we’re all familiar with.

Ivy and Iris are twins who were separated when their parents divorced, but after their mother’s sudden death, Iris comes to live with Ivy and their dad. From the get-go, Iris doesn’t have any discernible grief about her mother’s death, and what seems like clinginess in an attempt to have her sister to lean on, soon becomes something more sinister. Preston illustrates ways that Iris seems to be trying to overhaul Ivy’s life entirely, but the action unfolds very slowly. A lot of the book is used to define Ivy’s relationships with her friends, boyfriend, dad, and therapist, which I thought was great world building, but was a bit slow.

I think what I really needed more of here were character motivations. It wasn’t clear to me what Iris’s agenda was, and I didn’t get why Ivy’s friends and teachers would be so quick to turn against here. Everyone in her life seemed to be freaking out about how much she changed, but it wasn’t made super clear to the reader. I do think if I was in the YA target age range, this may have been something I wouldn’t care so much about, so I would encourage younger readers to give this one a try.

My Rating: 🍪🍪
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The Twin on Goodreads

Book Review, Fiction, Romance, Uncategorized

You Were There Too by Colleen Oakley ~ Book Review

Morgan

You Were There Too with Cookies

Berkley
Genre: Romance
Release Date: January 7, 2020
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪

When Mia and her husband Harrison move to small town Pennsylvania, they are not in a good place with each other, or with themselves. Mia is reeling from another miscarriage, and Harrison, a doctor, struggles to overcome his feelings of guilt associated with a young patient he lost during a routine procedure. The setup speaks volumes about the story as a whole: it is emotionally raw and heart wrenching.

Into this setup walks Oliver, the man of Mia’s dreams — literally. Mia’s shocked to see that the man she’s dreamt about for years is, in fact, real. Not only that, Oliver dreams about Mia, too. As the two get to know each other, Mia grapples with her connection to Oliver and what it means for her relationship with her husband. One aspect of the story that I really appreciated was that Mia shares everything with Harrison. Even though her situation with Oliver is awkward and uncomfortable, she is totally upfront with Harrison, and he respects her decision to try to figure out what her dreams mean. 

Both Oliver and Harrison are wonderful and complex characters, and Oakley makes the reader really feel for Mia. Mia’s tension and confusion were palpable and my emotions ran high along with hers the whole time I was reading. I definitely knew what I wanted Mia to do, but I wasn’t sure if she would follow through, and I certainly wasn’t expecting the heartbreaking ending.

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪
Buy You Were There Too at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction, thriller, Uncategorized

Little Secrets by Jennifer Hillier ~ Book Review

Morgan

Little Secrets with coffee and cookies
Minotaur Books
Genre: Thriller
Release Date: April 21, 2020
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪.5

Thank you to Minotaur Books and NetGalley for an ARC of Little Secrets by Jennifer Hillier (out April 21!).

The depths of this book were seriously impressive. The premise of a thriller based on the a disappeared child was different than many of the domestic thrillers I read and I was interested to see how the pacing of the plot played out. Man, did it pack a punch. Hillier fit so much into this book! Luckily, it was pretty lengthy, so it never seemed like too much was happening at once to the point of disbelief.

Marin struggles to live with herself each day after her son is kidnapped from her side at a busy market. Some days she is more successful than others. Hillier paints a rounded picture of Marin’s work life, her grief group, and her relationship with her husband and her best friend Sal, and how each is impacted and influenced by her loss. Marin has also hired her own private investigator, employed after the police have long given up actively searching for her boy, Sebastian. Marin keeps the investigator secret from her husband, but she soon learns that she is not the only one in their marriage keeping secrets.

As Marin focuses in on the deceit in her relationship, the other parts of her life seem to distort around her. Reading this book was like watching a carefully constructed life fall apart piece by piece. It highlighted the darkest corners of the human psyche, and the truly twisted ways different people react and lash out when they are hurting. 

I never could have guessed how each thread of this story was interconnected, and what elements of Marin’s past were informing her present. I’m not sure how, as a thriller-lover, I am just now discovering Jennifer Hillier, but I can say with confidence that I’ll be seeking out more of her work!

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪.5
Buy Little Secrets at an Indie Bookstore near you
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Little Secrets on Goodreads

Book Review, Fiction, Uncategorized

Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid ~ Book Review

Morgan

Such a Fun Age with Danish

G.P. Putnam’s Sons
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Release Date: December 31, 2019
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪

I really enjoyed Such a Fun Age, but it definitely wasn’t what I was expecting. Twenty-five year old Emira is low on ambition. The highlight of her days is babysitting Briar for the Chamberlain family and she recognizes her importance in the little girl’s life. One night, Emira, who is black, is accused of kidnapping the Briar as they walk through the aisles of an upscale grocery store. The incident is a catalyst, mostly, for Alix Chamberlain to suddenly take an extreme interest in her babysitter.

The book focuses a lot on Alix’s life — her childhood, her career, her insecurities. I found these details really interesting and unusual. Reid creates a very unique character who I liked learning about, although I didn’t particularly like. The grocery store incident sparks a strange obsessive interest in Emira’s life that I didn’t see coming, and made me distinctly uncomfortable. It was wild to read how Alix felt she was trying to help Emira, when it was clear to the reader that she was crossing lines left and right.

The story also has a steady exploration of explicit and implicit racism. There are so many details, experiences, and conversations that Emira goes through that were uncomfortably familiar. Reid does a powerful job of exploring racism through Emira’s lens. It was painful to see how Emira tried to not let her discomfort show in situations that were clearly not okay, but that she had experienced so many times they felt normal-adjacent.

Overall, the plot did a unique job of exploring a deep-rooted societal issue while also laying out an interesting story. Honestly, I didn’t particularly like any of the characters as people, but it speaks to Reid’s skills as a writer that I still enjoyed, and would recommend Such a Fun Age.

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪
Buy Such a Fun Age at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction, thriller, Uncategorized

The New Husband by D.J. Palmer ~ Book Review

Morgan

The New Husband and cookies

St. Martin’s Press
Genre: Thriller
Release Date: April 14, 2020
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪.5

I’ve taken a little break from thrillers, so I was excited to jump into The New Husband (coming April 14!). The book follows a very typical domestic thriller setup. Nina Garrity moves in with her new boyfriend, Simon, two years after her husband Glen mysteriously disappeared. Her children, Connor and Maggie have extremely different views of Simon. Connor seems to love him, while Maggie is increasingly concerned about the flashes of intense anger she catches in his eyes. Who to believe…?

We get to see a few character’s points of view through different chapters, which really allowed the reader to see how they justified actions to themselves. This was alternately disturbing, and clarifying. It allowed me to get to know the characters and their motivations a lot better.

This book was almost 400 pages and the first half really dragged for me. We watch Simon’s manipulative ‘nice guy’ nature slowly chip away at Nina’s life and sanity, in a series of very repetitive vignettes. When the second half of the book hit, however, I was completely shocked. The twist was not at all something I saw coming, and the plot became next-level messed up.

Nina as a main character was not particularly likeable. She fell into a typical thriller ‘clueless female protagonist’ for the most part. I loved that Jewell had Maggie, instead, as the suspicious one who brought things into her own hands, and tried to protect her family. The push and pull between Maggie and her mom was extremely frustrating, but in a good way. I couldn’t wait to see how Maggie would be able to convince her mom that Simon wasn’t all he seemed.

By the end of this thrill-ride I was totally hooked, but the distribution of the action and excitement definitely felt uneven to me.

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪.5
Buy The New Husband at an indie bookstore near you
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The New Husband on Goodreads

Book Review, Fiction, Romance, Uncategorized

The Flatshare by Beth O’Leary ~ Book Review

Morgan

The Flatshare with pastry

Flatiron Books
Genre: Romance
Release Date: May 28, 2019
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪

The Flatshare is a very cute read. The premise sets up an inevitable (and predictable) romance between Tiffy and Leon — flatmates who never meet. Leon works at night and Tiffy works during the day, so they cohabitate like ships in the night. Until they don’t. The slow burn up to the romance is adorable. I loved that they communicated through sticky notes around the apartment, using them to comment on things that needed moving or cleaning, as well as emotionally checking in on each other and sharing food. I could feel the love blossoming.

I really appreciated how different the two main characters were, and how completely Beth O’Leary was able to emulate that through their different chapters. The sections narrated by Tiffy depict her eclectic style and nature, her big heart, and her emotional side. Leon, on the other hand, is very logical and straightforward. His narrative was much more choppy, which was jarring at first, but came to define his voice. It was always very clear which one was leading the story.

The ending of the book threw me off a little bit. Throughout the story, Tiffy’s crazy ex-boyfriend popped up a lot, but I felt like his role was pushed too far at the end. It was really powerful to see how O’Leary wove in flashbacks to the way Tiffy had been emotionally abused by her ex, and the repercussions of that treatment as she came to terms with what she had been through. I think this would have been just as powerful without the ex flying off the handle at the end of the story.

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪
Buy The Flatshare at an indie bookstore near you
Buy The Flatshare on Amazon
The Flatshare on Goodreads