Thought Train to Pusan

So this novel was chosen on a whim, as it was sitting ready and waiting in the Audiobooks Available Now section of the library’s app. And upon reading the synopsis it felt like it had a similar energy to The Secret History by Donna Tartt, a book I definitely liked! If We Were Villains begins by introducing us to Oliver Marks, a man who is just being released from prison for an unspecified crime for which he served a 10-year sentence. The original detective from the case, however, still holds suspicions towards the official story of what happened, and wants Oliver to finally tell him the truth now that the detective is retired from the force. Oliver then tells the tale of his fourth and final year at an exclusive Shakespeare acting conservatory, and the events of one fateful night where he and the 6 other classmates in his graduating cohort host a party that goes awry, resulting in one the students, Richard, dead in a lake. While it looks like a simple accident that occurred in...

Listened to as an audiobook, read by the author. And what a calm and straightforward voice! I can’t remember why Exit West came on my radar (I think I saw someone talking about it on Twitter?) but in any case, it was well worth the read. A story tied to real-world pain but with a fantasy element to string the story along. Does this magical realism entirely work? Mileage may vary, but overall I think the novel was successful in what it set out to do. Exit West follows the story of Saeed and Nadia, in the early stages of a relationship within an unnamed country/city that is on the brink of civil war. As the two navigate their relationship with one another, the violent realties of their lives is inescapable, and inevitably begins to inform their relationship and how much they try to hold on to this good piece of their lives, changing as their situation requires. But amidst all this violence, they hear of doors: doors that will lead to another unknown place. Following these doors,...

Since I’ve been slacking on my reading time so far this year, but sometimes listen to podcasts while I work on art and design projects, my friend suggested I listen to audiobooks to keep with my book goals. And so here we are! Shout-out to the library for having a great digital collection that I can access with a few different apps. Miranda July is a bit of a pickle for me: some of her works I love (ie, Me and You and Everyone We Know ), but a lot of it I really don’t like at all: or at least, I just don’t get it. But there is always something there that I find intriguing, if not ultimately effective or fully developed. Unfortunately, this one was not a winner for me. I’ll admit that I’m not used to audiobooks as of yet, and I didn’t really like the manner in which July told it—for example, how she put on a voice for any character that wasn’t the protagonist, but it was always the same sort of deep, husky imitation of a typical male voice—so that could have been a big factor in...

“If something seems too good to be true, it probably is”. This is one of the lines telegraphed at the beginning of Riley Sager’s Lock Every Door , which inevitably (and unsurprisingly) ends up being far too real for the young protagonist, Jules. Jules is a recently unemployed young woman, nursing a newly broken heart and living on a best friend’s couch, trying to figure her life out. When she finds an opportunity as an apartment sitter, getting to live in the fancy building (albeit with a notorious history) of her dreams, all while making cash for doing very little, she jumps at the chance. But as Jules moves in and starts to become acquainted with the old, gothic Bartholomew building, she finds that the rules are strict and some people strange; she can’t help but feel like something is not quite right in this big old building, and she may have just put herself into the crosshairs of something sinister. Lock Every Door is successful in setting up a mystery to unravel, with enou...

Would you believe that I actually first heard about this YA book from an advertisement during the trailers section of a DVD I took out from the library? Actually, I’m pretty sure I saw it on more than one! How serendipitous to then receive it as a gift. Ultimately, while there were things I really liked about this book, there were also things that I didn’t. Overall, I liked it, but didn’t love it. Being that it is the first of a series, the question is then will I continue with the rest? And well, I’m just not sure (for one thing my to-read list is just far too long!). Children of Blood and Bone brings us the the world of Orïsha, with many elements inspired by West African mythology and the Yoruba culture and language. While this country was once home to a group of people who could practice magic (called maji), the tyrannical King Saran found a way to eliminate magic from the land due to fear of the power of the maji, and slaughtered all adult practitioners of magic as well. Zélie,...