It’s already the end of October! I guess that means it’s time for a review of the books I managed to read over the past 30 (or so) days. OH MY GOSH!!! Was this ever a S.L.O.W month! I only finished 3….just THREE, books! yikes. Now to be fair I actually started several more but they were terrible and I set them down after only a chapter or so. But ultimately, I completed three.
I think the reason it was such a slow month had more to do with the first book I finished being SO good, everything else paled in comparison. Okay, onto the reviews….
Where the Crawdads Sing by: Delia Owens
This one will for sure be in the running to be my favorite book of the year. At times the story is heartbreaking but also beautiful in many ways. Where the Crawdads Sing follows a young girl living out in the swamps of North Carolina back in the 60’s-70’s (and beyond). She is, one by one, abandoned by her parents and older siblings and must learn to survive on her own. Her resilience, resourcefulness and spunk keep the story line from being a total downer. I don’t want to say too much because this story, even with it’s ultimate plot being that of a lonely girl, with no one to rely on but herself, is really lovely. The swamp girl becomes quite the naturalist and along the way the reader gets a real sense of just how full of life and beauty the swamps can be. To top that off, a murder mystery interwoven throughout the chapters which has a very satisfying resolution. When I closed this book I knew I was going to be hard pressed to read anything even close to being as good for quite some time. 5 stars
If the Creek Don’t Rise by: Leah Weiss
I really wanted to LOVE this book. The description and the first paragraph had me gripped right from the start. Young bride figures out within days of marrying, that her new husband is a mean drunk…truly he’s a real a-hole. I liked this girl, I could tell she was going to find a way to deal with this situation. BUT the first chapter ended and suddenly there was a new character who is only kinda relevant. I thought, ok, different view points…but it’s turns out that every chapter was a new character and while their lives intersected at times, it really seemed like each chapter was it’s own short story. I DO NOT LIKE this way of story telling. I want cohesiveness and characters who are intricately connected. The best parts of this books were the opening paragraph and the final paragraph. The rest?….well it was just blah. 2 stars
Winter in Paradise by: Elin Hilderbrand
I’m a huge Hilderbrand fan. I’ve read all but one of her many books. (The one being out of print and it seems no library has it!) Up until now, all of her books have taken place on Nantucket. Her new winter series, instead, takes place on the island of St. John. In her usual fashion there are many characters which I typically like as the author, in the past, has been very good at giving each person a very distinct “voice”…essential for keeping track of who’s who! I did not find that to be true this time. I actually had to jot down a family tree of sorts to keep track of who was related to who and how. So many of the characters voices sounded just the same to me. The story centers on Irene, a late 50’ish woman who finds out her husband has died in a helicopter crash. That’s bad enough, but it turns out he’s been hiding an entire other life in St. John for many, many years. Irene and her two grown sons (both of who were total twits by the way) fly to the island to try and sort things out. Irene was boring, and I find her reactions to all of this totally unbelievable. Same with the brothers, they are far more interested in pursuing some waitress than wondering what their father has been up to for the past decade. This, as with the authors other winter time series, looks like it will be a trilogy. I’m sure I’ll read the others but I can’t say that I really enjoyed this book. Honestly it just felt like something I had to get through so I can continue to say that I’ve read (almost) all of Hilderbrands books. I’m hoping the second is way better than the first. I’ll give it 2 1/2 stars just because I’ve had such good luck with her previous books.
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That’s it! Just three books this month. I’m hoping for a much more productive November!! I’m only at 69 (out of 100) for my 2018 reading challenge! I’m thinking it’s unlikely that I’ll be able to read 31 books before December 31st, but we’ll see how close I can get!
To read my other monthly book reviews, check out my 2018 Books
