The Girls at 17 Swann Street By Yara Zgheib
Yara Zgheib did a great job of taking the reader into the world of eating disorders and in-patient recovery. The slippery slope that Anna slid down, removing one food group, controlling every bite and becoming obsessed with eating and food is hard to explain and understand from the outside and even harder to watch someone you love slide.
The Smell of Other People’s Houses by Boonie-Sue Hitchcock
The Smell of Other People’s Houses was a pleasant find. A few ladies in my online book group recommended it. I listened to on Overdrive, I love that resource. I love books and movies that are several stories about different people that are all connected but may not know it or each other. I have also been loving stories set in Alaska, so mysterious. My only complaint about this book was that now I need more from the characters.
To All the Boys I Loved Before by Jenny Han
I have been patiently waiting to read this one! And now I’m patiently waiting to read the rest of the trilogy. Oh man did I relate to Lara Jean! Secret letters I wrote to boys never made their rounds through my high school, but I was a teenage girl navigating crushes and figuring out who is OK to date and who is off limits. Not to mention the mean girl situation! The writing by Jenny Han was right out of a teenagers mind and spoke to those feelings that most of us have been through but would not return to! I appreciated the immaturity of the characters and their authenticity. I’m still not sure how I feel about who ended up with who in the end but maybe that will change in the next book. Look forward to reading that!
An Improbable Pairing by Gary Dickson
I was immediately drawn to this book because of the mysterious woman on the cover. I want to know her and know her secret. I was not disappointed by her or her story. Gary Dickson gives the reader a love story set in a romantic world only Paris can provide.
A Place For Us by Fatima Farheen Mirza
My Instagram book pals and I read A Place For Us as a buddy read. This was another example of a book I would not have picked up on my own and honestly would not have stuck with if it wasn’t for the friends telling me to stick with it. I was blown away. I wasn’t sure where the book was going and I needed a big moment and it never came, and that’s what made the story so beautiful. The daily life of a family with a father who was overbearing and strict out of love. A mother that married her husband in an arranged marriage but followed him to America and through life, standing behind all of his decisions. Children that didn’t understand their parent’s relationship or the relationship each parent had with each child. The story was so relatable even through the lens of another culture. I put A Place For Us in my all time favorites.
Army of Readers 