It’s time for my first half of November book review! I am sharing what I read in November so far, although I am skipping a few 5 star reads to share later in the month. The Amazon links to the books I’ve read are affiliate links and if you use them and make a purchase, I may receive a small commission. If you’ve read any of these books or are interested in them, I’d love to hear about it in the comments!
Title: Friends Like These
Author: Jennifer Lynn Alvarez
Genre: YA Thriller
Publisher: Delacorte, 11/1/22
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
I enjoyed this book while reading it but it’s a good thing I write notes when I finish because I was struggling to remember it 10 days later! This book is about Jess, who is dating Jake. He previously dated Tegan, who was good friends with Jess when they were younger. Tegan’s end of summer party leads to a viral video and a missing girl and the story unfolds from there.
“Mistake number one . . .Fun-loving Jake tells his girlfriend, Jessica, that they have to go to Tegan’s end-of-summer party in their tiny California beach town. Jessica doesn’t like parties, and she doesn’t like Tegan, who has an obvious, obsessive crush on Jake. But she agrees to go, to make Jake happy. Mistake number two . . .Something awful happens at the party. Something so embarrassing that Jessica doesn’t know if she can ever get over it—and Jake will do whatever it takes to earn her forgiveness. And now a girl is missing. Everyone is a suspect. And Jake seems to have a lot to hide. . . .When a body is discovered at the beach, friends start turning on friends, and lies start piling upon lies. What happened could destroy their lives. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer? Mistake number three . . .”
I cannot say more without spoilers but know that the book includes drugs, alcohol, death of a parent, violence, and sexual assault.
Title: Frankly Feminist
Author: Susan Weidman Schneider & Yona Zeldis McDonough (eds)
Genre: Literary Short Stories
Publisher: Brandeis University Press, 10/6/22
Source: Book Tour
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 1/2 Stars (Rounded down to 4)
Frankly Feminist is full of short stories by and about Jewish women. They are divided into sections including Transitions, Transgressions, Body and Soul, War, etc. They feature Jewish women from many cultures and points of view, from the Biblical Lot’s wife to a Black Jewish woman marcher in present times. Many of the stories were historical but I would categorize them overall as literary. I loved the ones that started off the collection and the ones that had twist endings. Many deal with losses and contain difficult topics.
“Short story collections focusing on Jewish writers have—no surprise—typically given women authors short shrift. This new volume represents the best Jewish feminist fiction published in Lilith magazine, and does what no other collection has done before in its geographic scope, its inclusion of twenty-first-century stories, and its Jewish feminist focus. This collection showcases a wide range of stories offering variegated cultures and contexts and points of view: Persian Jews; a Biblical matriarch; an Ethiopian mother in modern Israel; suburban American teens; Eastern European academics; a sexual questioner; a Jew by choice; a new immigrant escaping her Lower East Side sweatshop; a Black Jewish marcher for justice; in Vichy France, a toddler’s mother hiding out; and more. Organized by theme, the stories in this book emphasize a breadth of content, and our hope is that in reading you’ll appreciate the liveliness of the burgeoning self-awareness brought to life in each tale, and the occasional funny, call-your-friend-and-tell-her-about-it moment. Skip around, encounter an author whose other work you may know, be enticed by a title, or an opening line. We hope you’ll find both pleasure and enlightenment—and sometimes revelation—within these pages.”
This was a lovely collection that I was happy I had a chance to read!
Title: Courageous Discomfort
Author: Shanterra McBride & Rosalind Wiseman
Genre: Non Fiction – Anti Racism
Publisher: Chronicle Books, 8/2/22
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
For my first non fiction November pick, I read Courageous Discomfort, a book that poses 20 questions about race and racism. It addresses situations of race and racism with friends and relationships, in work and the community, etc. It is written by a Black woman and a white woman who are best friends and it includes stories from various other people.
“Many people struggle to have honest conversations about race, even those who consider themselves allies or identify as anti-racist. For anyone who wants to have better, more productive discussions, COURAGEOUS DISCOMFORT is an empowering handbook that teaches you how to do just that. In these pages, authors (and best friends), Shanterra McBride, who is Black, and Rosalind Wiseman, who is white, discuss their own friendship and tap into their decades of anti-racism work to answer the 20 uncomfortable-but-critical questions about race they get asked most often, including:
• Should I see color?
• I’m a good person—how can I be racist?
• What if I say something wrong?
• What kind of apology makes a difference?
These 20 questions-as-chapters invite you into the conversation without judgment and inspire thoughtful reflection and discussion. There will be moments when you will laugh or cringe at the ridiculous or awkward things you read. But the truth is, there is no perfect solution or script for every maybe-racist, sort-of-racist, or blatantly racist situation. And that’s OK: making mistakes is just an opportunity to do better next time. But doing this work will empower us to have the relationships we really want to have, including the relationship we want to have with ourselves.”
The main point that the authors make is to treat others with dignity. I thought it was a basic look at racism, but a good place to start.
Title: You Are Not A Sh*tty Parent
Author: Carla Naumburg
Genre: Non Fiction – Parenting
Publisher: Workman Publishing, 9/27/22
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
If you’re a parent, it’s likely that at some point you felt like maybe you weren’t the best parent out there. With all of the demands of every day life, social media, and a global pandemic, author Carla Naumberg saw that so many parents were blaming themselves for things they couldn’t fix. She wrote You Are Not A Sh*tty Parent to help parents realize that the key to being a great parent starts with self-compassion.
“Of course you think you’re doing a sh*tty job. Every parent does. It’s pretty much a byproduct of our society, with its incessant demands coupled with the in-your-face competitiveness parents see on social media. Unfortunately, the pandemic only made things worse, as parents juggled the stresses of helping their kids navigate online schooling while they also had to work from home. All of which makes Carla Naumburg’s new book utterly necessary. Author of How to Stop Losing Your Sh*t with Your Kids, with 149,000 copies in print, Naumburg delivers her message right up front—You Are Not a Sh*tty Parent—that all parents need to hear and believe in. And she does it with her singular understanding, relatably funny voice, and keen insights. You don’t react calmly to every situation? That doesn’t make you a sh*tty parent. You’d rather hide in the back of the closet than play dolls with your child (because you hate dolls)—nope, doesn’t mean you’re a sh*tty parent. The fact is, great parenting is not the same thing as perfect parenting. Great parenting starts with true self-compassion, the kind that means you don’t judge yourself. Harnessing this self-compassion is the key to giving yourself a break and embracing your best qualities as a parent. There are four evidence-based elements of self-compassion—noticing, connection, curiosity, and compassion of course—and Naumburg gives tangible steps for how to use each to help parents reduce their anxiety, trust their instincts, move past the guilt and become a calmer, more confident parent. Which, in the end, benefits your child as much as you.”
You Are Not A Sh*tty Parent helps you find self-compassion through four elements: noticing, connection, curiosity, and compassion. Learning self-compassion leads to compassion towards your kids. This book is like having a trusted friend to help you feel less anxiety about your parenting.
Title: The Last Chairlift
Author: John Irving
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publisher: Simon & Schuster, 10/18/22
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 3 Stars
This book took me almost a month to read. I started it in print and finished on audio. It was 889 pages and almost 33 hours long on audio. One of my favorite books ever is A Widow For One Year by John Irving, which is why I slogged my way through this one. Sadly, it did not hold up.
“In Aspen, Colorado, in 1941, Rachel Brewster is a slalom skier at the National Downhill and Slalom Championships. Little Ray, as she is called, finishes nowhere near the podium, but she manages to get pregnant. Back home, in New England, Little Ray becomes a ski instructor. Her son, Adam, grows up in a family that defies conventions and evades questions concerning the eventful past. Years later, looking for answers, Adam will go to Aspen. In the Hotel Jerome, where he was conceived, Adam will meet some ghosts; in The Last Chairlift, they aren’t the first or the last ghosts he sees.”
This is an extremely character driven look at Adam’s life. He is a straight man surrounded by various Queer characters from his extended family. The story became only slightly more interesting as the group made it past the Vietnam War and into the AIDS crisis, but the repetitiveness and annoying repeated descriptions of the characters just annoyed me throughout. It seems that John Irving’s main works focus on topics such as older women and younger men (boys), questionable mothering, and absent fathers. A Widow For One Year may have had these themes, but it also had more – like an actual story – and this one did not.
Title: The Last Party
Author: Clare Mackintosh
Genre: Mystery
Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark, 11/8/22
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
Having really liked Clare Mackintosh’s book Hostage, I was excited to read her newest. It seems that this is a new style for her, as it is more of a police procedural featuring Ffion Morgan and is the first of a series starring this character.
“It’s the party to end all parties….but not everyone is here to celebrate. On New Year’s Eve, Rhys Lloyd has a house full of guests. His vacation homes on Mirror Lake are a success, and he’s generously invited the village to drink champagne with their wealthy new neighbors. But by midnight, Rhys will be floating dead in the freezing waters of the lake. On New Year’s Day, Ffion Morgan has a village full of suspects. The tiny community is her home, so the suspects are her neighbors, friends and family―and Ffion has her own secrets to protect. With a lie uncovered at every turn, soon the question isn’t who wanted Rhys dead…but who finally killed him. In a village with this many secrets, murder is just the beginning.”
There were a lot of characters in this story and they all had reasons to hate Rhys. I had some confusion over who was who and which men were married to which women, etc. I liked the two main characters – Ffion was working with Leo to solve the crime. I also liked the Welsh setting of the story.
Title: The World Record Book of Racist Stories
Author: Amber Ruffin & Lacey Lamar
Genre: Non Fiction – Anti Racism
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing, 11/22/22
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
This is the second book by these sisters and is the follow up to You’ll Never Believe What Happened to Lacey. You don’t have to read that one first but this one does refer to that one and will make you want to read it if you haven’t yet. This book rates racist stories with awards, like most racist school, worst birthday, worst Paris experience, etc. and it is supposedly “not as funny” as the first book, but many of the stories are still pretty funny.
“Families may not always see eye to eye; we get on each other’s nerves, have different perspectives and lives—especially when we consider how we’ve grown up in different generations. But for the Ruffin family and many others, there has been one constant that connects them: racism hasn’t gone anywhere. From her raucous musical numbers to turning upsetting news into laughs as the host of The Amber Ruffin Show or in her Late Night with Seth Meyers segments, Amber is no stranger to finding the funny wherever she looks. With equal parts heart and humor, she and her sister Lacey Lamar shared some of the eye-opening and outrageous experiences Lacey had faced in Nebraska in their first book. Now, the dynamic duo makes it clear—Lacey isn’t the only one in the family with ridiculous encounters to share! Amber and Lacey have many more uproarious stories, both from their own lives and the entire Ruffin family. Recounting the wildest tales of racism from their parents, their siblings, and Amber’s nieces and nephews, this intergenerational look at ludicrous (but all too believable) everyday racism as experienced across age, gender, and appearance will have you gasping with shock and laughter in turn. Validating for anyone who has first-hand experience, and revealing for anyone who doesn’t, Amber and Lacey’s next book helps us all find the absurdity in the pervasive frustrations of racism. Illuminating and packed with love and laughter, this is a must-read for just about everyone.”
Many of the stories will have your jaw dropping at the things people actually say and do. It was interesting to hear stories from the older members of the family as well as from Amber and Lacey. I found some of the inclusions to be a little disjointed, like random songs that the siblings made up, but I think they are meant to break up the seriousness of some of the stories. Also, I thought one of the stories might have been just a kid being a kid, but impact certainly matters!
There you have it – 7 of the books I read this month. Of these books, 6 were print and 1 was partially read on audio. 7 were adult books and 1 was YA. Genres included thriller, literary, non fiction, and mystery.
Have you read any of these books or do you want to? What have you been reading lately?