Happy New Year 2023! This is a blog post a year in the making, that I had to finally update lol. Here are the books that I have read in 2022, per my Top 22 Books in my To Be Read List of 2022, and some of my thoughts about them. :) I will also include some honorable mentions of books that I have started this year but haven't proceeded or completed.
There is only eight here and some of them aren't from the original list, but the important thing is that I did read! lol
Bad Reputation by Stefanie London, Completed January 6
So yes, this was the first book I completed in 2022, but I read a majority of it in 2021.
Here is my Goodreads review of it:
I wish "Out of Bounds" was real! I want to see it! lol
This book was different from the first one in this series. While the couple in the first book were an enemies to lovers, opposites attract type of thing, which is still a fun trope, the couple in this one vibed right away and had similar priorities, personalities, and sense of humor. They work well more as a couple and you can even sense this from early on as opposed to other romance novel couples.
This one was a little bit more serious than the first too, even though the first one still had some serious moments and themes. There was just more at stake here as well as more darker tones. (I won't spoil them here.) This is very interesting because Remi, the heroine, was portrayed much more carefree when she was a side character in the first book. When she became the main character, we now of course get to know her and her baggage more.
But I really liked this book. It takes place during the behind the scenes of a Broadway dance production and the drama really keeps you hooked to see what would happen in the last third, because the characters are faced with dilemmas that seem to have no beneficial solution either way. There are graphic sex scenes, but there aren't as many here as there are in other romance novels I have read. This book wasn't oversaturated with them, I'd say. Usually when a romance couple has sex for the first time, then that's all they do throughout the rest of the book for the most part. Though there is plenty of sexual tension in this, the focus wasn't too far removed from the show and their career goals, which was the central plot. The whole thing was that they didn't want to mix business with pleasure, so I think it was evenly balanced decently well.
Also, in regards to the sex scenes, I said this about the first book and I'll say it again here. The couple is very communicative during their love making. The want to make each other feel good and they verbally tell each other what they like and want with no gray areas. This sends a very important message.
There's one more book I have left in this trilogy. Looking forward to reading it to see how this series gets concluded! :D
So yes, this book sets up the story for the sequel, Bad Influence (2019). That one has been on my To Read list for awhile, but I have been holding off because reading this one would mean that I finish the Bad Bachelors trilogy and I wasn't ready to say goodbye to these characters just yet. But 2023 might be the year.
I also have other Stefanie London books that I want to read too. There is just something about an Australian author that has the same name as me who writes Australian themed books. lol
All's Well by Mona Awad, Completed January 14
What I really appreciate about this book is that it made me become more aware of what chronic pain is like for people. My mother suffers from this, so it helped me to understand her more. If you want to learn more about the perspective of people with chronic pain, read this book!
My Goodreads review is way more detailed than this because I wrote it fresh after I read this book, so I will include that here as well:
Whoa. I'm trying to wrap my mind around this book. This was the most unique reading experience I have ever had. It was such a trippy mindfuck. I didn't know where it was going and I never fully knew what was real and what wasn't. Still don't to an extent. The story takes place in main character Miranda Fitch's mind as she suffers alone with her pain and makes assumptions about others and how they perceive her. There are also very interesting parallels between Miranda's story and Shakespeare's works. This is definitely the type of book English majors would love to analyze and dissect. lol
One thing that I will take away from this book is that I recommend it to anyone who wants to understand chronic pain better. I have family members that suffer from this and this book has helped me to develop an greater empathy and understanding of what life is like with it. It really hits close to home too because I've seen what happened to Miranda happen in real life.
Mona Awad is a fantastic writer too. She has a distinct style is so descriptive and strange and really knows how to pull her reader into her atmosphere. Every pain she detailed ever so thoroughly I began to feel myself. She wrote Miranda with such eerie sarcasm that I wasn't even sure if I was supposed to trust her, making her a perfect unreliable narrator. But she was also written in a way that you rooted for her and loved seeing her prevail among everyone who treated her wrongly (because a good majority of the characters are awful), especially when she threw words into their faces and handled every confrontation with confidence and wit, always quick on her feet with her responses.
It went from self-deprecating humor to feeling so sorry for Miranda to a complete storm of wackiness to the point where the humor was completely lost and gone and just fully replaced with the horror.
It was horror genre-esque, but more so a surreal avant-garde art.
As a result of this reading experience, I am now interested in reading Awad's Bunny (2019) as well as The Maidens (2021) by Alex Michaelides because it seems to have a similar set up as Bunny.
Seven Dirty Secrets (2021) by Natalie D. Richards, Completed January 24
As you can see, I was on a roll in January 2022. So since I was all set with All’s Well lined up as my next book, I was kind of at a crossroads with a few choices I was considering afterward.
This time I took on some Young Adult Fiction! :D I was between this book and Love & Other Detours (2020) by Jenna Evans Welch, but I was in more of a murder mystery mood.
One thing that I accomplished during my reading endeavors in 2022 was find a new favorite author. I am so excited to read more of Richards's work, and I never would have expected to feel that way about a young adult author since I never read that genre. She keeps you guessing all the time and doesn't waste any time either because she dives right into the plot within the first couple of pages. The characters and stories are accurately written, but they also aren't dumbed down because they're younger. It's severe but yet not as advanced as adult fiction would be.
Richards's next book is called Four Found Dead and is expected to be released in May 2023. It's set in a movie theater, and that alone has me hyped for it.
Escape Room (2020) by Maren Stoffels, Completed June 23
One of my reading goals is to read escape room themed books because I discovered a whole collection of them. In addition to this one, there is also The Escape Room (2019) by Megan Goldin, Not Your Average Hot Guy (2021) by Gwenda Bond, and No Memes of Escape (2021) by Olivia Blacke, the latter of which is on my To Read list for 2023 because I can wait no longer. lol
Not Your Average Hot Guy now has a sequel and No Memes of Escape actually is a sequel, so I'm not sure if I want to take these on just yet for those reasons because that means that I need to be dedicated to them as series, but Blacke's book seems to be a standalone sequel whereas Bond's sequel seems to have less to do with the escape room, so perhaps I'm in the clear. lol
Stoffels's book is...okay. This is another YA book. It kept my interest to get me to read it in one sitting and actually has some pretty decent twists, but overall it just wasn't very likable. It felt like it tried too hard to be an epic thriller while I feel that other authors for this genre and age group do this a bit better. The only thing I liked about it was that it was set in an escape room and the one character Mint has a decent arc where she goes from shy and reserved to breaking out of her shell and becoming a badass.
Five Total Strangers (2020) by Natalie D. Richards, Completed July 29
So because I really liked Seven Dirty Secrets, I decided to read some of Richards's previous work. The plot line of this one caught my interest. There is something about a mystery set in a snowstorm.
Mira is a student who is aiming to get home to her mother for Christmas because this is her mom's first Christmas without her twin sister and Mira's stepfather from whom she is separated. When Mira exits her plane, she discovers that it might be more difficult to get home than she initially realized due to impending weather, so she hitches a ride with her seat mate on the plane as well as some other college kids that the seat mate picked up. Along the way, the group encounters one misadventure after another and it becomes clear that one of them is trying to sabotage the trip, causing them to turn on each other.
Though this one was good, I liked Seven Dirty Secrets more because it was a complete story. Both endings are a little open-ended, but I at least felt satisfied with the ending for Seven Dirty Secrets. In this one, there are certain things that take place that aren't explained so you wonder what happened and why and how. It didn't leave me confused or fully ruin the book for me, but these minor details just made it questionable like there were some elements missing. Maybe the fact that I didn't feel this way about her latest book is a testament to how the author might be improving as a storyteller.
One thing that Richards does really well is suggesting to readers that certain characters aren't white without straight up saying it, providing some methods for how other white authors could do this. For example, in Seven Dirty Secrets there is a Black American character and in Five Total Strangers there is an Asian American character (from what I recall, there is some indication that she could be Japanese American) and she clues us in on this by how she describes them, how they talk, and what concerns them.
The next Natalie D. Richards book that I plan on reading is One Was Lost (2016).
On Second Thought (2017) by Kristan Higgins, Completed August 13
Although I buy books and have plenty of books at home, there is still no stopping me from checking books out from the library if I want to, which is what I did here.
I really enjoyed Good Luck With That (2018), so I want to read more of Higgins's work. This book centers on two half-sisters, Kate and Ainsley, who attempt second chances at love and life when everything goes wrong for them. Kate mourns the sudden freak passing of her husband while Ainsley mourns the potential engagement to her boyfriend of 10 years after her dumps her. Growing up they were never very close, but when circumstances cause them to turn to each other and also live under one roof, their relationship improves as they grow closer. This is the heart of the story and it's a very heartwarming one.
Here is my Goodreads review for this one too:
Pretty long and heavy book, with thankfully humor mixed in. Usually books feel like a movie to me, whereas this one felt like an entire TV series (or at least a season).
Though some of the side characters are insufferable lol, I was invested in the lives of the two main characters, Kate and Ainsley, and appreciate how their relationship grew and how they got second chances, hence the title and theme of the book. The book really picks up when Ainsley finally moves in with Kate.
Kate's story was somewhat difficult to get through because it is very sad content. She is mourning the loss of her husband throughout the book and questioning the role she played in his life, losing herself as a result, and some outsiders don't seem to understand the pain she is in. But her narration conveys these emotions very well, making you the reader understand exactly what she is going through.
The library I went to for this book also has Now That You Mention It (2017) so I attempted that one as well afterwards, but I could not continue it. It has a similar sarcastic humor that the author's other work has, but it is just way too cruel to me. Literally none of the characters are likable, though I feel bad for the main character, and there is an attempted rape scene. Maybe things eventually get better, but I didn't stick around to find out. At least not right now.
The Leaf Thief (2020) by Alice Hemming and Nicola Slater, Completed September 11
Do children's books count? Yes, yes they do.
I am a huge lover of leaves, as you can probably tell from this blog's decor, so when I saw this one in the bookstore, I had to read it. It is so cute, educational, and actually pretty funny, especially the bird character. :)
Mendel’s Hanukkah Mess Up (2022) by Chana and Larry Stiefel, Completed late October
Another children's book released right on time for the holidays, this book is about Mendel who always manages to mess up Hanukkah traditions, so as a result he opts to stay in the sidelines. However, when Rabbi Klein chooses him to drive around the Menorah Mobile, he teaches everyone in town about the true meaning of Hanukkah.
This is a feel good book about the holiday season with humor and illustrations that people of all ages will enjoy. It also includes educational tidbits at the end, such as the history of Hanukkah and a recipe for potato latkes.
This book has a personal significance for me. I occasionally freelance for BC: The Mag, so when the author Chana Stiefel reached out to me about her new books, I decided to interview her and write an article about her work. This was the first book Chana wrote with her husband Larry, whose short stories on his blog were the inspiration. Though she first sent me a PDF file of the book, I eventually met the couple in a Barnes & Noble for their book reading and Chana signed a physical copy for me. Around the same time Chana also released another children's book called THE TOWER OF LIFE: How Yaffa Eliach Rebuilt Her Town in Stories and Photographs. This one is nonfiction and more serious, given the content, and I got a signed copy of this as well.
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| Me with authors Chana and Larry Stiefel |
My article about Chana and her work has now been published in the Early Spring 2023 Issue of BC The Mag. :)
Other 2022 books that I started but didn't finish yet include:
The Divines (2021) by Ellie Eaton
I was so excited about this one, but I think what I expected from this book was more of a mystery and what I got was the main character just reflecting on her past. I didn't realize until later that this is more of a coming of age book than anything. There's nothing wrong with that, just not what I expected or was looking forward to from this reading experience. I still want to read it, but didn't want to at this particular time.
The Love Proof (2021) by Madeleine Henry
This looks like a nice love story and my dad gave this to me as a gift, but it is kind of slow paced and loses me when it talks about the science and math in it. Again, I want to read this, but am just not in the mood for it right now.
Mexican Gothic (2020) by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Another library book here. I want to read more diverse books and this plot seemed up my alley, so I gave it a shot. Unfortunately, I don't really like the characters (they're miserable and although the main character is strong and confident, I found her to have an air about herself that rubbed me the wrong way as well) and I read a spoiler when I was about ready to give up that didn't seem very interesting, so I think my relationship with this book is probably over. For now.
What We Talk About When We Talk About Love (1981) by Raymond Carver
Elvis was one of my favorite movies in 2022, so now I am an Austin Butler fan lol. He said in an interview that this is one of his favorite books, so I thought that I'd check it out. You know, I managed to get halfway and hoped to complete it by the time 2022 ended, but I never had much of a desire to pick it up again. It's actually a simple quick read of short stories, but they're odd at the same time and therefore make me wonder what they are all about. It's very bluntly written and somewhat reminds me of Ernest Hemingway's writing style. But I got this far with it, so I'm not giving up on it. lol
Poems From Murrumbeena (1976) by R.A. Simpson
While at the library I was looking for Australian books and was trying to push books back onto the shelf and realized that this one was jammed and preventing the others from lining up correctly. It's a collection of Australian poems and I keep renewing it for months because I'm intrigued by the unique way we met and I don't want to part with it, but I was never proceeding beyond the first few poems. This one and the Raymond Carver book have trickled into my 2023 reading process.
I have a whole new list of books that I want to read in 2023, including some from my 2022 list, but I have to see if I will create a blog post for them. I'm going to maybe separate them by categories this time. I want to start from scratch. I think I'll probably just read as I go like I usually do instead of providing a list for myself like I did last year to hold myself accountable. I have plenty of choices. lol
I don't like it when I start books and not finish them, or put off finishing them, especially when they are gifts, so I want to improve on that this year. I get fussy because my attention span when it comes to reading needs to change and I want to choose books that I can see myself dedicating my time to.
Happy reading! :)
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