(to the same tone as last month) woooow i read so LITTLE this month LOL
I got distracted a lot this month. Stardew Valley's new update came out, and I got addicted to Lethal Company, so I wound up spending a lot of time playing games online with my partners. I also spent a significant portion of the last couple of weeks preparing for the next chapter in my cosmic horror tabletop game I run.
Anyway, March reads!
Technically I read Cabbage February 29 but I already made my post and it was the weird day of the year, so I'm counting it. In March, though, I read...
- Cabbage, C. S. Fritz (ebook for an ARC)
- A House with Good Bones, T. Kingfisher
- Lone Women, Victor LaValle (audiobook)
- The Outsider, Stephen King (audiobook)
- Zone One, Colson Whitehead (audiobook)
- This Wretched Valley, Jenny Kiefer
I do not necessarily have a favorite this month, but I do want to shout out This Wretched Valley by Jenny Kiefer. The story takes place in a little offbeat, rural town called Livingston in the middle of nowhere Kentucky. This is practically in my back yard, without giving more information than that, so while being familiar with where the horrors are taking place, that made the story feel all the more real and scary. It was a fun time! Definitely recommended if you read wilderness horror and you want something with a really fucked up, body horror, cosmic horror feel.
I had a great time as well reading A House with Good Bones for some more personal reasons. In a lot of ways, the protagonist, Sam, experienced things in some really uncannily similar ways to things that I've experienced in my life, and I had a lot of fun and anxiety while working through the book. This was my first Kingfisher novel and I will be reading more of her work.
Last shoutout I want to give is to Lone Women, which was a harrowing and sad tale, and I wound up feeling so much love and adoration for it and what happened within it by the end of the novel. Excellent prose, storytelling, and themes, and frankly, actually, it might have been my favorite of the month yeah i lied but whatever
Genuinely all three of these books are five stars for me so let's just slap that down:
A HOUSE WITH GOOD BONES: 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌕
LONE WOMEN: 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌕
THIS WRETCHED VALLEY: 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌕
I also read Cabbage, which is a short story, for an arc through netgalley! You can read my review of it here should you wish to! Here's a small excerpt:
Beyond that, it is also a tale about pain, about grief, and about sacrifice. What happens when we spill blood in the name of desire? What happens when we put too much of ourselves into another person or a thing? It's about what changes a person when it comes down to desperation and grief, and how the intricacies of life and death intertwine.
whoosh woosh
One more thought before I leave: I did not like The Outsider whatsoever. I've been reading King's Work for as long as I can remember, ever since I started reading novels. I was maybe ten or eleven when I picked up my first novel, Misery, so I've always loved his works. This one was just not it for me. Unfortunately. I could not stand the theme of the book, I didn't like the enemy itself, and I found the repetition of what happened to the child at the beginning exhausting and disgusting, more for shock value rather than for anything else. That said, you can disagree with me! I'm not looking for arguments if you loved this one :)
I did fucking adore Holly though, and I loved Ralph, and I loved the friendship they had together. So I do plan to read the other Holly Gibney books despite my distaste for this one.
I didn't rate this one on Storygraph nor have I given it a rating itself because I don't feel like my rating is fair since I'm more emotionally responding to it rather than giving a real criticism. If you liked this one, tell me about why you did! I'd love different thoughts and opinions on it :)
My plans for this month are a little simpler but I've started a ton of things at once. I'm currently reading The Blueprint by Rae Giana Rashad, and I grabbed the audiobook for If It Bleeds, as well as a few other things.
Okay, see you all in April unless I wind up with more to share :)
B.
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