Best Books of January
As I say every month, I’m shamelessly stealing this idea from Jessica Lahey. She has a recurring monthly date where she reviews all the books she reads that month. Book reviews are important for authors, and I want to get better at doing this.
So. I’m going to review them here and also online, but I’m going to do it a little differently. I’m only going to review the stuff I really liked. I don’t see a reason to spend my time writing about something I didn’t love; it’s just using up more of my energy. So only positive reviews.
These are the books I liked (or mostly liked) from January.
You Be Mother (Meg Mason): I own Sorrow and Bliss, but I haven’t read it yet, so this was my first Meg Mason book. It was a gorgeous, beautiful, heartbreaking book. You will love Abi and want her to win. Such a great piece on how we form family and what we mean to each other. And how people can let us down, and we can still find a way back to each other and trust again.
Mr. Wilder and Me (Jonathan Coe): I listened to the audio version while on trains, and I was sucked into the story despite never seeing any of the films mentioned in the book. Coe is an extraordinary writer, and the writing here is so subtle and clever. My only quibble is that I feel like he may have missed sides of Billy and Iz’s life that would have turned them from black and white to technicolour, but even black and white and even without ever seeing a Billy Wilder film, I loved this book.
The List of Suspicious Things (Jennie Godfrey): This book has been on my to-read list for a long time, and I bought it for myself now that it’s in paperback. I wish I had gotten it sooner. It will go down as one of the best books I read this year. I want to get it for everyone I know. I plan on re-reading this one a few more times this year — it was that good.
All Her Fault (Andrea Mara): Solid thriller with great pacing that (I think) is being turned into a tv show. It feels very tv show-y. I don’t usually read child endangerment thrillers, but I wanted to read an Andrea Mara book. And this one was so solid that I bought another one immediately after.
Strange Pictures (Uketsu): It was billed as a horror-mystery, but I can’t say that I was ever scared or challenged. It was neat how the stories fit together, but the answer to the mystery was usually delivered a page or so later, and the horror didn’t feel like traditional horror. I’m glad I read it, but I don’t know if I would read a second book like this.
What did you read last month?
4 comments
I haven’t read “You Be Mother” (yet), but I’ve read & liked “Sorrow & Bliss” — it’s kind of dark, but ultimately affirming — you feel like the heroine is going to be OK, no matter how things turn out for her.
I finished 3 books in January, all reviewed on my blog and on Goodreads & StoryGraph:
* “Others Like Me” by Nicole Louie, a Brazilian childfree-by-choice woman who married a Swedish man, lived there for a while and woud up in Ireland. A combination memoir and interviews with other childfree & childless women from around the world. 4 stars.
* “Peter West” by D.E. Stevenson — the one DES book my DES group has NOT read together, in its 25+ years of existence! Her very first published novel, from 1923, and I’m afraid it shows its age and her inexperience. You can see seedlings of her future books here, but she was still very much finding her groove at this point. 2-2.5 stars.
* “Yellowface” by R.F. Kuang, for one of my online book clubs. Very much a book for our times. It explores what happens when a struggling writer steals a recently completed manuscript from a recently-deceased writer friend, and passes it off as her own work. Explores/comments on the publishing industry, social media, “cancel culture,” culture wars, cultural appropriation and racism, among other hot topics., which sometimes left me feeling a little queasy…! No doubt this will generate a lot of discussion in my book club! 4 stars.
Thank you – I love your “best books” series – so many new titles I will add to my reading list.
For once, I can join your monthly book post! I had a month of reading enjoyable books.
Richard Osman’s latest, “We Solve Murders” was as usual a fun and enjoyable book. Though as I write this, I have no memory of the story! A very similar book was Susie Dent’s Oxford based “Guilty by Definition” which has stayed with me. The fact we visited Oxford in November/December helped, as I could picture the streets. If you love words, Oxford, and a bit of a mystery (though I did see the ending coming, it was by no means certain), you’ll like this.
“Piranesi” by Susanna Clarke was fascinating. It had been recommended to me, and so I read it, despite not knowing anything about it. That was part of the fun. A slower start, it is worth getting through the first chapters, when little hints are dropped that this is more complicated than it first seems.
I re-read “We Are All Made of Glue” by Marina Lewycka completely by accident. I was about one quarter way through the book when I realised it sounded familiar, but couldn’t remember the ending so kept going. I think I enjoyed it better the second time round. Which makes me wonder if I should be re-reading books more often!
I am unable to find All Her Fault or The List of Suspicious Things at my libraries. 🫤 Guess I’ll have to see if they can find them for me.