April 2025 - What are you reading?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just finished Careless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams. Very eye opening. Absolutely worth a read.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just finished Claire lombardo’s Same As It Ever Was. I initially didn’t like it, but ended up really enjoying it, though it is long, fairly slow.

This one was on my birthday wishlist - I really liked The Most Fun We Ever Had and hoping this one is as good! That one was also long and slow but in an enjoyable way.

[Anonymous]

Am currently reading The History of Sound by Ben Shattuck. It's 12 linked short stories that beautifully work as a novel. I am entralled by the writing and storytelling.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just finished "Maybe in Another Life" by Taylor Jenkins Reid.
It is about a young woman who, at the end of a party, is faced with the choice of going home with either her old boyfriend or her best female friend. The rest of the book depicts her living different lives as a result of which choice she makes. It reminded me of those "choose your own adventure" books from back in the day.
I thought the book was good. Okay. Meh. The target audience for the book was young adult, I think.

LOVE TJR. She has a new book coming this spring/summer. It's been added to MCPL so I was able to put a hold on it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just finished "Maybe in Another Life" by Taylor Jenkins Reid.
It is about a young woman who, at the end of a party, is faced with the choice of going home with either her old boyfriend or her best female friend. The rest of the book depicts her living different lives as a result of which choice she makes. It reminded me of those "choose your own adventure" books from back in the day.
I thought the book was good. Okay. Meh. The target audience for the book was young adult, I think.

LOVE TJR. She has a new book coming this spring/summer. It's been added to MCPL so I was able to put a hold on it.

I should add it's called Atmosphere. It's about women joining NASA in the 80s.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/220817728-atmosphere

[Anonymous]

Just finished Isola on Audible narrated by Fiona Hardingham. Historical fiction based on the life of Marguerite De La Rocque do Roberval. Beautiful writing and narration. Favorite book of 2025 so far.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just finished Isola on Audible narrated by Fiona Hardingham. Historical fiction based on the life of Marguerite De La Rocque do Roberval. Beautiful writing and narration. Favorite book of 2025 so far.

I much preferred Sam. Some parts really dragged for me in this book.

[Anonymous]

Just finished North Woods. I liked it & thought the writing was beautiful and artful. I wanted to love it given all the hype, but I didn’t. Did you?

Reading The Little Liar by Mitch Albom. So far I’m invested in the story.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just finished North Woods. I liked it & thought the writing was beautiful and artful. I wanted to love it given all the hype, but I didn’t. Did you?

Reading The Little Liar by Mitch Albom. So far I’m invested in the story.

I really liked The Little Liar. I ended up writing out a few quotes from that book.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The Covenant of Water - It’s good but long. Saga about a family living in India starting in 1900 to 1970’s. I’m on chapter 40 something and I’m not halfway through.

I got to about that point over the summer and never picked it back up. Beautifully written story, but I feel like I have to be in the right mindset (able to handle all the trauma throughout).

[Anonymous]

Late to the party on this one, but just read The Paper Palace over spring break. I really enjoyed it even though I would have liked to see more character development of Jonas. Growing up, I spent summers in a place very much like the one in which the novel was set (generational family “camp” on the water / near the ocean) so I especially liked that aspect.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just finished Careless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams. Very eye opening. Absolutely worth a read.

+1. Late to this up finished wicked as well, which was okay (so different from the play). Starting tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just finished North Woods. I liked it & thought the writing was beautiful and artful. I wanted to love it given all the hype, but I didn’t. Did you?

Reading The Little Liar by Mitch Albom. So far I’m invested in the story.

I read North Woods several months ago. I thought it was very good. I did not expect the book to have some supernatural parts to it.

[Anonymous]

Just finished "Brooklyn" by Colm Toibin.

It is about a young woman who grew up in Ireland and then immigrated to Brooklyn asa young woman in the early 1950's.

I liked it. It seemed realistic. One bit in the book was about whether or not to buy a television or if TV was going to be a short-lived fad.
I actually listened to it as an audiobook and the narrator did an excellent job of narrating with an Irish accent.

Now I have started on "Long Island", which is the sequel to Brooklyn. Long Island picks up about 20 years later. In this one, the main character answers the door one day and a man tells her that her husband has impregnated his wife and when the baby comes he will be dropping it off on their doorstep.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just finished Claire lombardo’s Same As It Ever Was. I initially didn’t like it, but ended up really enjoying it, though it is long, fairly slow.

This one was on my birthday wishlist - I really liked The Most Fun We Ever Had and hoping this one is as good! That one was also long and slow but in an enjoyable way.

NP. I found Same As It Ever Was to be absolutely maddening. The writing is good, even great in parts, and a couple of the characters were well drawn. But the book was several times longer than it needed to be, and I wanted to shake the main character every third page. I loathed the ending. I am assuming this author somehow got a deal that did not include an editor.