Reading

Last week, I wrote about my current state of not reviewing a lot of books. The funny thing is, that post devolved from what was going to be my first book review in a while. My brain basically said, “to make a long story short” and then proceeded to tangentially discuss something instead of telling the story. Then I thought about how I’ll be gone for all of “next Tuesday,” which is “today” in post scheduling time, and I decided to write the review anyway.

Now I feel pressure for this one, since I’ve written so much about it before even titling the review. And it doesn’t matter much at all, because it’s not a new book by any means. (The title of the book looked long and clunky in the post title.) So, with much ado…

What I thought of The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix

Books about book clubs, and book clubs in general, get interesting quickly. Questions abound: Are we reading serious fiction? Current best-sellers? Books that changed someone’s life? Who gets to decide? Is it a democracy or an autocracy or really just an opportunity to toss a book in your bag and drink wine, eat snacks, and hang out with friends?

All of those answers are correct, of course, and the three book clubs in The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires encompass a variety of them throughout the story. The core book club encompasses five unlikely friends and a penchant for true crime stories, though they barely call themselves a book club and one of the member’s husbands thinks they’re doing a Bible study each month.

Spanning almost a decade, the book follows what happens when a southern housewife discovers a terrible secret about her new neighbor, an attractive bachelor on whom she performs CPR while delivering a casserole after his great-aunt severs her earlobe. I know that’s a description you likely haven’t read before, and it’s indicative of the entire story.

I adored this book.

The five friends each manage their homes and their families in slightly different ways, and their relationships with their husbands and children are all slightly different — until they’re not.

Like the title states, this book is about vampires, but it’s also about misogyny and perception and community and the way white women sometimes espouse unity until it means making hard decisions about their own actions. Relationships between friends and between spouses are tested in unexpected ways, and the (I think I can say) universal maternal fear of failing our children pervades each decision made by Patricia Campbell, the central character of the novel.

Broken into sections based on what Patricia’s book club(s) are reading, the novel dives into the mind of a southern housewife who makes both bold moves and tentative, disastrous mistakes in an effort to save her family and her own identity. I’m not southern, but I’m drawn to books about the south, particularly stories of women navigating their lives and balancing their identities and strength with a system determined to keep them under some sort of control.

To circle back, though, this book is about vampires — and not of the romantic variety. A few of the scenes feel like nightmares, and they’re not for the faint of heart. Consider that a warning, though it’s possible to skim through those sections without losing the thread of the plot.

For certain readers, I highly recommend this book. It might end up as one of my favorites of the year, though I don’t think my mom should attempt it nor anyone prone to extreme squeamishness when faced with expertly descriptive prose.

I read 48 books in 2021, which I thought was two short of my goal, but I guess I told Goodreads 45 at the beginning of the year. Technically, I exceeded the goal, but I truly wanted to reach 50, so it doesn’t really count for me. Either way, that’s 48 books, though I turned to re-reads, perhaps more than I have in the past, simply because I needed the comfort of returning to worlds I already know.

These are my favorites of the year, though they’re not necessarily the “best” books I read. Best feels like an objective pronouncement, but these eleven books stand out for their ability to burrow into my life, both during their reading and in the days and months that followed. As always, what works for my brain might not work for yours, but I can recommend at least trying a few on this list.

*Leave the World Behind by Rumann Alam — As soon as I started Leave the World Behind, it felt a little like a nightmare, where everything seems fine — vacation, family, pool, wine! — but something is just a little off. As the story progresses, and the vacationing family (mother, father, teen son, tween daughter) reluctantly welcome the vacation rental’s owners back into the house, it grows even more uncomfortable. Something’s wrong, but no one can get a cell or wireless signal, and getting to town feels futile. Reading it now, with the pandemic still unfolding, felt a little surreal and strange. You know disaster awaits “out there,” but you don’t exactly know how it will unfold for the novel’s small cast of characters. I felt a sense of hopelessness while reading it, the idea of being disconnected from the outside world and suddenly tethered to people you barely know. I’m still thinking about it, which means I’ll be recommending it to people so I can discuss it more. 

* All Adults Here by Emma Straub — I adored this book. For whatever reason, I fall in love with dysfunctional family relationships where you enjoy but want to faux-strangle the characters. The Strick family checks a bunch of dysfunctional boxes. Everyone is holding onto secrets, though some of them aren’t nearly as hidden as the characters think. The small moments make this story for me — the connectedness of a small town, a goat cheese farm, the push and pull between offering privacy and keeping dangerous secrets, a transgendered friend, a gazebo at the town center, a Harvest Parade Queen. One of my major takeaways from All Adults Here touches on a personal parenting fear of mine. Astrid worries and obsesses over mistakes she’s made in the past, but her kids are most affected by other moments, other mistakes, and that seems to be parenting in a nutshell. (Read a slightly longer review on Goodreads.) 

*Genuine Fraud by E. Lockhart — Abbey and I both read Genuine Fraud while on vacation, and we both loved it. The story unfolds in reverse chronological order, which means you could read the book from front to back and have a completely different story. Jule Williams and Imogene Sokoloff are two girls with similar lives. At least that’s what we see at the beginning of the story. My Marvel-loving daughter adored the girls-fighting-for-themselves angle, along with the idea of origin stories. I can’t help loving the unreliable narrator trope — when it’s done well — and a generous helping of trust fund freedom and interesting side characters drew me into the story quickly, keeping me hooked until the satisfying conclusion.

*The Midnight Library by Matt Haig — I waited for this for a long time from the actual library, and I wanted to savor it when I started. Instead, I finished it in one wonderful day. Essentially, I believe I needed to read this book exactly when I did, and I’m not generally the type of person to say something like that. The idea permeating the novel is that it’s possible to undo the regrets in your life when you’re in the Midnight Library. Each different choice will change the way your life looks, but will it change the way your life feels? I adored this story about the possibility of choices, potential, and parallel lives that allows you to build a life that fits exactly right — even created from a foundation of regrets.

*Sisters by Daisy Johnson — This beauty of a gothic story captured me from the very start, though I wasn’t sure where it was leading, or perhaps more accurately, where it had been. Two sisters live with their mother in a state of isolation, depending on each other to speak and live and tiptoe in and out of the outside world. Rife with trauma, more trauma, and a dash of melodrama, I couldn’t stop reading until the end. I appreciate a dark story, and Sisters fits the bill, quickly and in totality.

**The Turnout — Disclosure: I’ve already read this three times, because I completely devoured it the first time and got mad at myself for not savoring it. Ballet lives and breathes at the heart of this story, but what I loved about it is the way ambition and desire become one and the same thing, the cool and the hot Abbott uses to describe sisters Dara and Marie throughout the book. She’s unafraid to gaze into the darkness of the things we want viscerally and the way lines blur between extremes until maybe desires renders them the same in the end. (Read my longer review on Goodreads)

*Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley — I appreciated the insight into and the respect for the Ojibawe community, especially with the familiar ties to Sault Ste. Marie. It’s hard to watch Daunis attempt to navigate the two worlds she inhabits, Ojibawe through her father and wealthy Caucasian through her mother, especially when being a young adult comes with built-in insecurities and worries. When her best friend gets shot, Daunis enters another world, that of undercover law enforcement, which gives her an up-close look at the way drugs can fracture friendships and families.

*Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid — Set against the breathtaking beauty of Malibu, California and the unapologetic excess of the 1980s, Malibu Rising tells the story of a deeply-flawed family led by — and abandoned by — Mick Riva, superstar. During the course of one day in the present and many flashbacks to earlier years, the path of the Riva siblings changes irrevocably. What I loved most about the book, other than the atmosphere of the setting, was the way the various characters dance around the idea of who they are versus what they present to the world versus who they want to be. It’s hard to remember the Riva siblings are as young as they are (twenty-five and under) because of the growing up they have to do within the shortcomings of their parents’ lives.

*The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman — Anyone who has ever read and loved classic murder mysteries needs to read this book. An eclectic group of retirees meets on Thursdays to dissect and try to piece together cold cases, so there’s no better group to take the case (unofficially, of course) when the developer of their retirement community turns up dead.

**The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab — When I posted on Instagram, I said I wished I could start this one from the beginning, with no memory of it (a little like Addie LaRue’s life). This one felt magical from the beginning and stayed with me long after I finished.

*Billy Summers by Stephen King — Another great novel from one of my favorite novelists. This strays into violence but stays in the crime lane rather than horror or supernatural. The story of an assassin trying to leave violence in the past, Billy Summers tells a story within a story, and it works beautifully. I found myself heavily invested, emotionally, by the end, which I thought came too soon, despite the length of the book (and the number of commas in that sentence).

Climbing out of feeling overwhelmed doesn’t come easily to me. I get mired in details and past mistakes and “why didn’t I just”s, even though I know those admonishments keep me firmly in the state of paralysis. When I feel like this in December, it’s tempting to say that anything I want to do, I should do in the new year.

Improving things in December feels futile. Social engagements and holiday prep and the endless errands that pop up because I’ve forgotten something make it almost impossible to adhere to a routine, and I’m a sucker for ritual and routine, especially when I’m trying to make changes in my life.

However, December isn’t nearly over. Three weeks stretch between now and 2022, and staying stagnated for three weeks doesn’t feel right, either.

Paging through our library newsletter, a reading challenge caught my eye.

50 books in a year.

I’ve done this in the past, challenged myself to 50 books, and I go in stops and starts and don’t always track exactly right. I’m a huge re-reader, and I never know if I should count those books. (And then I feel silly, because it’s my challenge. Reading Challenge Police aren’t lurking in the corner, waiting to negate the pages I’m reading, even if I’ve read them already.

This year, I’m enlisting the kids to participate in the challenge with me. 50 books each will be tough. Like me, they each go through spurts with reading, and some of their dry spells last longer than mine. This challenge, though, isn’t one that can be failed. Each book read, each page read, offers us something, even if it’s only a short break from a stressful day or a way to see a situation from another perspective.

Beanstack is new to me, but I signed up today. I can’t wait to see what the year brings, reading-wise. (Also, I don’t want to miss a chance to sing the praises of our library, one of my favorite places.)