Catching Up

Current TBR List: 17
Currently Reading: 7
Books Finished in December: 20

AHH! I "fell behind" in my reading schedule because I was knocked out sick over the last weekend… I slept for 13 hours on Sunday and lost precious valuable reading time! Still though, reading game is strong this month even though I am neglecting my TBR in lieu of some mood reading.

I picked up the short story For I Have Sinned by Darynda Jones after reading First Grave on the Right. Even though it was less than 100 pages it was pretty emotional and lets you see Charley Davidson in a different light. It makes the character that more endearing and I seriously cannot wait to pick up the rest of the series.

Switching gears I listened to A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman. I don’t think I was emotionally prepared for this story. I see where all the hype is and I was thoroughly impressed with the story myself. Ove is a grumpy old man. At least, that’s what his behavior screams. Looking into his thought process though you see the emotion and the reasoning behind his behaviors and you cannot help but love him. A great reminder that you never know a person and you cannot imagine the journey their life has taken them through. A great read for everyone (unless you are sensitive to suicide/suicide attempts). Ove has lost the love of his life and is on a journey of closing up his affairs so that he might be able to kill himself in peace. Then the new neighbor keeps interrupting, he can’t leave without everything being in perfect order. This book was super touching and the last couple chapters just killed my heart. 

I then finished Because You Love to Hate Me edited by Ameriie. Just like all anthologies there were hits and misses. I did not care too much for the start of this book. I get what was happening but the execution was just okay for me. The latter half of this book though I really started to enjoy! Favorites: The Sea Witch by Marissa Meyer, Beautiful Venom by Cindy Pon, Death Knell by Victoria Schwab, Julian Breaks Every Rule by Andrew Smith, Indigo and Shade by April Genevieve Tucholke and Sera by Nicola Yoon.

After each short story there was the prompt and then a couple pages from the YouTube personality. In my personal taste, I would have liked to see the story prompts and the reason behind the prompt before the actual story. Not all the prompts/character draws were as self-explanatory or well known as others so it was a bit harder to connect to the story. Some are well known villains i.e. the sea witch, death, and the beast, so it was easier to set an expectation for behaviors of the characters knowing it is such a short story and you don’t get a lot of room for background. As for the YouTube personality pages, some added a lot to the story. Made you think deeper either about the short story itself or about the topic that faced that particular villain. Others just seemed very young and impromptu additions.

Overall, it was a good collection but not my absolute favorite. I would love to see some of my favorite stories expanded though!

  

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