It's February, which means I have to tally up all the books I read in January before they end up sitting in a big pile on an end table, waiting for the end of the year. I only made it through four books this month, but if I'm going to make it through a book a week this year then I'm right on track.
1) I started the month and, I guess, the year with politics. As the election approaches and the field of Democratic candidates narrows, I've read Mayo Pete's book, Kamala Harris' book, a book about Joe Biden, and now Elizabeth Warren's This Fight Is Our Fight. Warren does a good job of clearly defining the problems facing the American middle class, and lays out defined, logical policies for addressing them. Right now I'm planning to vote for her in the primary, and really hope that Harris gets a vice president nod from someone, or maybe becomes attorney general.
2) My parents got me Rainbow Rowell's Carry On for Christmas, and I enjoyed it, so I ordered the sequel, Wayward Son. It finds our heroes, Simon, Baz, and Penny in a road trip across America in a convertible, finding wild magic, dragons, vampires, monsters with goat heads, and maybe themselves? What does the hero do the summer after he fulfills his destiny?
I enjoyed this, but the end makes me want another sequel and it took a few years to get this one, so now I'm a little bit sad about it.
3) Stephen King's Elevation was a novella, rather than a novel, and probably would not have gotten full hardcover treatment if it came from a less established author. Scott is busy fighting with his neighbors, a married pair of lesbians who moved to town to open a struggling restaurant, over their dog pooping on his lawn. Scott is also, a few pounds at a time, becoming immune to the effects of gravity, a secret that he'll only be able to keep for so long as his scale slowly counts down to zero. This was an interesting character study, but really should have just been part of a larger collection.
4) On the last day of the month I finished Mike Pearl's The Day It Finally Happens. Pearl is a disaster thinker, and this book walks through a number of world-shaking scenarios: the day Saudi Arabia runs out of oil, the day the internet fails, the day we verify the existence of extraterrestrials, and even the day we build Jurassic Park, among other things. What was a little surprising is that even though Pearl is a worst-case thinker, he manages to sound rather optimistic and hopeful. Overall, he thinks we'll get through it.
So, like I said, I'm on track for reading in January. Let's try to keep it going in February or, possibly, maybe even get a little ahead.
1 comment:
So I loved Wayward Son. I listened to the audio of Carry On (which is the fan fiction story mentioned in Fan Girl by Rainbow Rowell) but struggled with it despite knowing it was supposed to be fan fiction written by 16-18 year old twins.
Wayward Son was written so much better (I'm assuming as an older writer by this point, that was the reason) and really kept me engaged and wanting to not put it down.
The going back and forth about being unsure about their relationship, their attraction and all those feelings - took me back to that age and having all those questions/concerns myself and trying to figure out who you are, if the person you are dating is in love with you or is the relationship ending and you aren't admitting it.
Loved the book so much (I have so many feelings about it!). There will be a third book - it has a name on Goodreads, but since this one took her 4 years to write, I doubt, like you said, we will see it anytime soon.
If you haven't read her other things, I'm a HUGE fan of Landline and Fan Girl. I also really enjoyed Eleanor & Park (that was the one I read first of her books). She also writes the Runaway comics series.
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