It’s time for my first half of December book review! I am sharing what I read in December 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: Better Than We Found It
Author: Frederick Joseph & Porsche Joseph
Genre: YA Non Fiction
Publisher: Candlewick Press, 10/11/22
Source: Storygram Book Tour
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review / Non Fiction November
My Rating: 4 Stars
This book took me quite awhile longer than regular books take me to read. It is a bit long and full of information. It may be more easy to consume if taken bit by bit, but I read it the whole way through.
“Every generation inherits the problems created by the ones before them, but no generation will inherit as many problems—as many crises—as the current generation of young people. From the devastations of climate change to the horrors of gun violence, from rampant transphobia to the widening wealth gap, from the lack of health care to the lack of housing, the challenges facing the next generation can feel insurmountable. But change, even revolution, is possible; you just have to know where to start. In Better Than We Found It, best-selling author Frederick Joseph and debut author Porsche Joseph make the case for addressing some of the biggest issues of our day. Featuring more than two dozen interviews with prominent activists, authors, actors, and politicians, this is the essential resource for those who want to make the world better than we found it.”
Much of the book is told through stories and interviews from people directly effected by the topics. While this book is meant for teens, I do think it was pretty meaty. It gives ideas as to how to respond to people on subjects of racism, homophobia, the wealth gap, climate change, the barriers to higher education, health, and housing issues. It definitely makes you consider your privileges. There is also a website you can check out with further recommendations and resources.
Title: The Jasmine Project
Author: Meredith Ireland
Genre: YA Rom Com
Publisher: Simon and Schuster Audio, 9/7/21
Source: Booksparks / Audio Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review / Requested audio
My Rating: 4 Stars
The Jasmine Project by Meredith Ireland has been waiting for me to pick it from the stack for over a year. I realized that I also had the audio and so I decided to listen to it. This was a cute book and the audio was done well!
“Jasmine Yap’s life is great. Well, it’s okay. She’s about to move in with her long-time boyfriend, Paul, before starting a nursing program at community college—all of which she mostly wants. But her stable world is turned upside down when she catches Paul cheating. To her giant, overprotective family, Paul’s loss is their golden ticket to showing Jasmine that she deserves much more. The only problem is, Jasmine refuses to meet anyone new. But…what if the family set up a situation where she wouldn’t have to know? A secret Jasmine Project. The plan is simple: use Jasmine’s graduation party as an opportunity for her to meet the most eligible teen bachelors in Orlando. There’s no pressure for Jasmine to choose anyone, of course, but the family hopes their meticulously curated choices will show Jasmine how she should be treated. And maybe one will win her heart. But with the family fighting for their favorites, bachelors going rogue, and Paul wanting her back, the Jasmine Project may not end in love but total, heartbreaking disaster.”
Both the author and main character are Korean and adopted. In this book, Jasmine has a huge family with many cultural backgrounds. When her awful ex wants to see other people, her family schemes to have three eligible bachelors compete for Jasmine’s attention. Just one issue – Jasmine doesn’t know that her family recruited the guys to date her. However, she is pleased to meet all three of them and seems to quickly prefer one over the others as he helps her move out of her comfort zone. I found Jasmine to be relatable as an awkward teen who just wanted to please everyone. Interspersed with Jasmine’s viewpoint are family text message threads that were really amusing. I liked that the audio narrators alternated on the texts rather than having one narrator read them all. This was very much YA and would be appreciated by younger readers for sure.
Title: Before I Let Go
Author: Kennedy Ryan
Genre: Rom Com
Publisher: Forever, 11/15/22
Source:Book of the Month
Why I Read It: Book of the Month add on for November
My Rating: 4 Stars
I’m behind on my Book of the Month reads again as I got two in November (birthday month) and two in December (Book of the Year) but that’s ok because I finished this year’s challenge and I’ll have a head start on next year’s! One of the books I chose in November was Before I Let Go by Kennedy Ryan. Everyone has been raving about this one and as is usually the case for me with hyped and loved books…I liked it. Yasmen and Josiah are a divorced couple who dealt with tragic losses including a stillbirth. Josiah was resistant to seeking therapy while Yasmen went through intense depression. Now, while both try dating other people, it becomes apparent that they are still attracted to each other.
“Their love was supposed to last forever. But when life delivered blow after devastating blow, Yasmen and Josiah Wade found that love alone couldn’t solve or save everything. It couldn’t save their marriage. Yasmen wasn’t prepared for how her life fell apart, but she’s is finally starting to find joy again. She and Josiah have found a new rhythm, co-parenting their two kids and running a thriving business together. Yet like magnets, they’re always drawn back to each other, and now they’re beginning to wonder if they’re truly ready to let go of everything they once had. Soon, one stolen kiss leads to another…and then more. It’s hot. It’s illicit. It’s all good—until old wounds reopen. Is it too late for them to find forever? Or could they even be better, the second time around?”
What I got from their relationship was attraction and lust. I didn’t find myself believing that anything changed or that they would be able to improve their relationship moving forward, even though Josiah did agree to go to therapy, as did their son. Their daughter was also struggling and I would have liked to see some believable on page family therapy, although I did like the way therapy was normalized overall. I think I just needed a little more to root for Yasmen and Josiah as a reunited couple.
Title: Pride and Puppies
Author: Lizzie Shane
Genre: Rom Com
Publisher: Forever, 11/22/22
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
Pride and Puppies is the 4th in a series but even though I own two of the previous books, I haven’t read them! This was easily stand alone, although the others take place in the same town. This one is about Charlotte, who makes a “puppy pact,” in which she adopts a puppy stops dating. By the way, I think the title of the book should have been The Puppy Pact! This is not a Pride and Prejudice retelling, but it does include Jane Austen quotes at the beginning of the chapters and Charlotte and her sisters do enjoy Austen.
“Dr. Charlotte Rodriguez is single—again—and she blames Jane Austen. She made brooding, aloof men sound oh sodreamy. But after years of failing to find her own Mr. Darcy, Charlotte decides it’s time to swear off dating. She’s going to lavish all her love and affection on someone who actually deserves it: her new puppy, Bingley. And there’s no one better to give her pet advice than her neighbor and coworker George Leneghan. He’s quiet and patient and, best of all, way too sweet to ever be her type. But as their friendly banter turns flirty, the unimaginable happens—Charlotte starts catching feelings. Just as Charlotte is trying to untangle what it is she truly wants, George announces he’s contemplating a cross-country move. Suddenly, Charlotte wonders if she’s kept her soulmate in the friend zone so long that she’s entirely missed her chance at a happily ever after. Dear Reader, could it be possible she’s had it wrong all this time?”
After swearing off dating, Charlotte then begins to fall for her good friend George, who is new in town and trying to make a home away from his family. He was such a sweet character and I enjoyed rooting for the friends to acknowledge their feelings for each other!
Title: The Vibrant Years
Author: Sonali Dev
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Publisher: Mindy’s Book Studio, 12/1/22
Source: PR for Book
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
This is the first book published under Mindy Kaling’s new imprint, Mindy’s Book Studio. The Vibrant Years is about three generations of Indian American women. Bindu uses a surprise inheritance to purchase a condo in a retirement community and move out from where she has lived with her daughter in law Aly, even after Aly divorced Bindu’s son. Aly is a news reporter who is dealing with discrimination and fighting for more opportunity at her job. Aly’s daughter Cullie is an app developer and is now working to keep people from having to pay for her app that helps people cope with anxiety. When Bindu has a situation involving a new man in her life, Aly and Cullie come to her rescue. Cullie is trying to develop a dating app and she, her mother, and grandmother become the test subjects.
“When sixty-five-year-old Bindu Desai inherits a million dollars, she’s astounded―and horrified. The windfall threatens to expose a shameful mistake from her youth. Desperate to keep the secret, Bindu quickly spends it on something unexpected: a condo in a posh retirement community in Florida. The impulsive decision blindsides Bindu’s daughter-in-law, Aly. At forty-seven, Aly still shares a home with Bindu even after her divorce from Bindu’s son. But maybe this change is just the push Aly needs to fight for the segment she’s been promised for years at the news station where she works. As Bindu and Aly navigate their new dynamic, Aly’s daughter, Cullie, is faced with losing the business that made her a tech-world star. The only way to save it is to deliver a new idea to her investors―and of course they want the half-baked dating app she pitched them in a panic. Problem is, Cullie has never been on a real date. Naturally, enlisting her single mother and grandmother to help her with the research is the answer.”
The women and their stories, their secrets, and their possibilities become the focus of the story. I would call all three women strong and I enjoyed the way they interacted with each other. There were both funny and serious parts and I liked how each woman was given her own story resolution.
Title: Buy Yourself the F*cking Lilies
Author: Tara Schuster
Genre: Self Help / Memoir
Publisher: Dial Press, 2/18/20
Source: Publisher & Publisher Audio
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 3 Stars
I had this book waiting to be read and decided to request the audio and listen to it as it is read by the author. I liked her voice but that may have been my favorite part of the book. As maybe I should have anticipated from the title, there is so much cursing in this book! I don’t usually mind cursing but it was practically in ever other sentence. This book would be perfect for someone in their 20s who doesn’t know much about ways to connect with themselves as a grown up.
“By the time she was in her late twenties, Tara Schuster was a rising TV executive who had worked for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and helped launch Key & Peele to viral superstardom. By all appearances, she had mastered being a grown-up. But beneath that veneer of success, she was a chronically anxious, self-medicating mess. No one knew that her road to adulthood had been paved with depression, anxiety, and shame, owing in large part to her minimally parented upbringing. She realized she’d hit rock bottom when she drunk-dialed her therapist pleading for help. Buy Yourself the F*cking Lilies is the story of Tara’s path to re-parenting herself and becoming a ‘ninja of self-love.’ Through simple, daily rituals, Tara transformed her mind, body, and relationships, and shows how to
• fake gratitude until you actually feel gratitude
• excavate your emotional wounds and heal them with kindness
• identify your self-limiting beliefs, kick them to the curb, and start living a life you choose
• silence your inner frenemy and shield yourself from self-criticism
• carve out time each morning to start your day empowered, inspired, and ready to rule
• create a life you truly, totally f*cking LOVE
This is the book Tara wished someone had given her and it is the book many of us desperately need: a candid, hysterical, addictively readable, practical guide to growing up (no matter where you are in life) and learning to love yourself in a non-throw-up-in-your-mouth-it’s-so-cheesy way.”
I felt like the advice that the author gave was very obvious and done before, including journaling, gratitude, exercise, and finding good friends. I also thought she was trying too hard with her way of addressing the reader as a friend. Certainly there are people who will appreciate this book, but it wasn’t for me.
Title: Dead and Gondola
Author: Ann Claire
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Publisher: Bantam, 11/1/22
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
Dead and Gondola is an Agatha Christie adjacent cozy mystery. The story features sisters Ellie and Meg Christie, their cat Agatha, a town of quirky residents, and their family bookstore that can be accessed by gondola, The Book Chalet.
“Ellie Christie is thrilled to begin a new chapter. She’s recently returned to her tiny Colorado hometown to run her family’s historic bookshop with her elder sister, Meg, and their beloved cat, Agatha. Perched in a Swiss-style hamlet accessible by ski gondola and a twisty mountain road, the Book Chalet is a famed bibliophile destination known for its maze of shelves and relaxing reading lounge. At least, until trouble blows in with a wintry whiteout. A man is found dead on the gondola, and a rockslide throws the town into lockdown—no one in, no one out. The victim was a mysterious stranger who’d visited the bookshop. At the time, his only blunders had been disrupting a book club and leaving behind a first-edition Agatha Christie novel, written under a pseudonym. However, once revealed, the man’s identity shocks the town. Motives and secrets swirl like the snow, but when the police narrow in on the sisters’ close friends, the Christies have to act. Although the only Agatha in their family tree is their cat, Ellie and Meg know a lot about mysteries and realize they must summon their inner Miss Marple to trek through a blizzard of clues before the killer turns the page to their final chapter.”
When a stranger is killed, a mystery ensues – who was he and who killed him? I did not figure out the culprit. This mystery would be perfect for Christie fans, but is also amazing for book lovers in general and features a wonderful bookstore cat!
There you have it – 7 of the books I read this month. Of these books, 5 were print and 2 were audio. 5 were adult books and 2 were YA. Genres included non fiction, rom com, contemporary, and mystery.
Have you read any of these books or do you want to? What have you been reading lately?
