Hello Interwebs!
It was a great reading month for me in the month of April for a change. I was really digging the romance vibes and after taking forever to finish a subpar horror novel I plowed through books this month. I finished 8 books in the month of April (one at about 130 in the morning on May 1st technically so I'm going to count it for April). Most of the books I enjoyed quite a bit but I did have a couple of misses. I read a total of 2,492 pages and my books had an average rating of 3.7 stars on Goodreads. So without further ado here's the books I read in April.
- Such a Pretty Smile by Kristi DeMeester: this is the first book I read in April and probably my least favorite of the month. It's a new release horror that follows a mother and daughter in dual timelines: mother Caroline Sawyer in 2004 and daughter Lila Sawyer in 2019. Young girls are being torn apart by a killer force known as the Cur in a cycle that keeps repeating. The book was supposed to have a feminist bent but the end message seemed to be conform or die so I think I missed the feminist angle. This book was really not great. I lost interest halfway through and it took me two days to read the last fifty pages.. I read this book from March 29-April 9, 2022 and gave it a mediocre 2 out of 5 stars.
- Break Your Glass Slippers by Amanda Lovelace (You Are Your Own Fairytale #1). This is the first book in Amanda Lovelace's fairytale poetry trilogy. This one is Cinderella based if Cinderella's happily ever after wasn't based on being rescued by the prince but rather if Cinderella broke her glass slippers and fucked shit up on her own. I love her poetry and follow her on every social media platform. I read the entirety of this book on April 10, 2022 and gave it a very happy 4.5 stars.
- The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood: So this is my first romance novel of the entire year and this is the book that everyone's been talking about since it's release last year. In this you follow biology grad student Olive and biology professor Adam, who Olive kisses to make her best friend Ahn believe that she's in a relationship so Ahn will let herself date the guy she wants. So Olive and Adam begin a fake dating relationship with definite grumpy-sunshine vibes and I was HERE FOR IT. This might actually be my favorite romance novel I have ever read. I read this book from April 10-19, 2022 and gave it the most enthusiastic 5 star rating. I took advantage of Barnes and Noble's coupon for preorders and have preordered her next book Love on the Brain which releases later this year. Also this cover is absolutely adorable.
- The Fine Print by Lauren Asher (Dreamland Billionaires #1): this is the first book in what will be known as my "tiktok made me do it" series. This is a spicy romance that is the first in the Dreamland Billionaires series and follows Rowan, one of the heirs to what is essentially Disneyland, and Zahra, a worker turned designer. Rowan's grandfather set tasks for his grandsons to fulfill before they can inherit their shares of the company and Rowan's task involves a revamp of the park which Zahra turns out to be an instrumental part of. This book was amazing and spicy and the characters were absolutely addicting. I read this book from April 19-22 and gave it a nearly perfect 4.75 stars.
- Nine Lives by Peter Swanson: So this is the other book that I did not care for this month. This is a thriller and was The Book Troop book club pick for April from GabbyReads. This book follows a group of nine people who all receive a list in mail with nine names on it, including their own. Then people start dying one by one and no one can work out the connection between the names on the list aside from the fact that they keep dying. I didn't hate this book but it wasn't great. It was painfully obvious that they were trying to emulate Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None and it fell painfully, painfully short. Furthermore, it was even more painfully apparent how short it was falling because you're literally beaten over the head by references. There was a tiny twist at the end that I didn't see coming but overall I didn't care about the characters, certainly didn't care that they were dying, and didn't care enough to puzzle out the plot. I listened to this book on Audible from April 22-26 and gave it a sad, sad 2 stars.
- I Am I Am I Am by Maggie O'Farrell: this was the pick for Cheryl Strayed's Wild Reads book club on Literati for April and it's a memoir told in episodes of near-death experiences. Some of them were legitimate almost died moments like a man holding a machete to her neck in South America while others were sillier like volunteering to be the target for a knife thrower at a festival. All in all this book was amazing and I really really enjoyed the format and subject matter for the memoir. I think I will be picking up her very popular novel, Hamnet, in the next couple months as I did love her writing style. I read this book from April 10-27 and gave it 4.25 stars.
The last two books I read in April were both for Spring Fling-o-Ween so I'll give the reviews and everything in the wrap up for that.
- Fragments of Horror by Junji Ito: this is a horror manga/collection of short standalone stories by my favorite author/artist. I read it on April 28 and gave it 4.25 stars.
- Reckless Girls by Rachel Hawkins: this is a recent release thriller about young people on an island. I read it from April 28-May 1 and gave it 3 stars.
So that's it, everything I read (or listened to) in the month of April. My favorite book, hands down, was The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood which I gave 5 stars too. My least favorite books which I gave a disappointing 2 stars to was Such a Pretty Smile by Kristi DeMeester. Keep an eye out for my Spring Fling-o-Ween wrap up which should go up later today and my May TBR which should be up in the next couple days.
Happy Reading!
Richelle
No comments:
Post a Comment