Anticipated books of 2019

If you read one of my earliest posts on this blog about how I'm a book hoarder, then you'll know that I truly do not need to go out looking for any more books to read, as I have years worth of books already sitting on both my physical bookshelf and my kindle.  And yet, part of the way I ended up a book hoarder - and the author of a book blog - is that I'm always keeping an eye out for new interesting books coming out, especially when they're by my favorite authors.  So, here is a list of the books I'm most excited for in 2019, so far!  I've listed them in order of their currently scheduled publication date, with the date in parentheses after the book title and author.  Some of them I have advance copies of from Netgalley, others I'll be waiting for them to come out and hoping that either the library gets them or they go on sale!  So many books to read!

A Critical Look At Critics' Top Books of 2018

I know that a few of you are anxiously awaiting my reveal of my top 10 books of 2018.  But if you have been getting my top 10 lists for years, then you'll know that I don't make and distribute my list til January.  After all, what if I read an awesome book (or books) in December?  So, in the meantime, I thought it would be interesting to take a look at various different critics' lists of their favorite books of 2018.

GCBC - Fall Reading Roundup

As I've mentioned a few times previously, I am in a book club of sorts that consists of just me and my friend Sarah, which we call, GCBC, which stands for Grand Central Book Club (since we usually meet for lunch at Grand Central).  We used to just pick a book to read occasionally when we had plans to get together, but earlier this year we decided that since we like to read so many of the same books anyway, we might as well coordinate reading them together.  Plus we both seem to derive perhaps as much enjoyment from planning out what we are going to read as we do the actual reading itself!  And since life has been busy and thus conspiring against us getting together, most of the book discussion these days is done over e-mail, which makes it pretty easy to turn it into a blog post to share our views!  So, following is a discussion between us of 12 books we both read this fall.

From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2009

Since shortly after I started this blog about a year ago, I've been periodically looking back on my top 10 favorite books of years past, which were lists I made at the end of each year (since 1999!) and shared with a growing group of friends.  Each list consists of my favorite books I read in a particular year, not necessarily books published that year.  Today, I'll look at my list from 2009.

Here's my list from 2009, in alphabetical order by author's last name:

The Opposite of Love - Julie Buxbaum
Belong to Me - Marisa De Los Santos
Love the One You're With - Emily Giffin
Barefoot - Elin Hildebrand
The House at Riverton - Kate Morton
The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox - Maggie O'Farrell
The Year of Fog - Michelle Richmond
Driving Sideways - Jess Riley
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society - Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
The Book Thief - Marcus Zusak

Contemporary Fiction By Male Authors

A few months ago, I wrote a post on some of my favorite authors of contemporary women's fiction.  One of the things I realized while writing it is that I read WAY more books by women authors than I do by male authors.  But another thing I realized is that there isn't a genre called "contemporary men's fiction."  If a woman writes a book set in the present day about every day life and relationships, unless it is written in an extremely highly literary style, it's most likely to be called "contemporary women's fiction."  But if a man writes a book set in the present day about every day life and relationships, it's just going to be called "fiction."  What's up with that?

Man reading or man-spreading?

Anyway, just as I did for my post on contemporary women's fiction, I'm going to exclude any books that fall into other genres - science fiction, mystery and thrillers, young adult, etc. - and focus on books set in the present (or relatively present times) by men, books that aren't super literary but just about realistic characters.  These books may or may not have male protagonists - some male authors also like to write from the point of view of women, just like some female authors like to write from the point of view of men.  And while I would generally recommend these books for guys to read, I would equally recommend them to women - I am a woman myself after all, and they're books I like!  But I can also tell you that my husband Dan has read almost all the books below and enjoyed them all.

Best and Worst Books You Read in School

As I mentioned in my post a few months ago about school reading, I find it interesting that in my kids' school district, at least through middle school, there seem to be less specifically required texts that kids read and discuss as an entire class than there was in my day.  There are definite pros to being able to pick your own books, but my opinion is that there are also definite pros to being assigned to read certain texts - not just because you can get more out of a book when discussing it with teachers and fellow students, but also to expose you to books you might not otherwise pick up for yourself.

Some commonly assigned HS books

Anyway, it got me thinking about some of the most memorable books I read in my own school days, both those I loved and those I hated.

World War II Fiction

Historical fiction is one of my favorite genres, but for some reason I haven't written about it much on here.  Today is Veteran's Day, and both my grandfather and Dan's grandfather served in World War II.  So today I thought I'd write about World War II fiction.  I know some people can't stand to read World War II fiction, but I generally find it really interesting and moving.  Holocaust fiction can certainly get very depressing so I don't tend to read a ton of it, but I also find myself fascinated by books set in London during the Blitz, occupied France, even the U.S. homefront.  So here are some of my favorite novels which are set primarily during World War II.

From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2008

I've been slowly working my way through re-visiting all my past annual top 10 book lists, so today we'll take a look back at my 10 favorite books of 2008.  As a reminder, that means books I read in 2008, not necessarily books published that year.

2008 was a momentous year for me personally because my second child, my son Jonah, was born in 2008!  Nonetheless I managed to hold steady by reading the exact same amount of books I had read the previous year.  (68 books, if you are curious!)

Here's my list from 2008, in alphabetical order by author's last name:

Away - Amy Bloom
March - Geraldine Brooks
London Is the Best City in America - Laura Dave
I Love You, Beth Cooper - Larry Doyle
The Monsters of Templeton - Lauren Groff
A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini
Finishing Touches - Deanna Kizis
My Best Friend's Girl - Dorothy Koomson
The Department of Lost and Found - Allison Winn Scotch
How to Talk to a Widower - Jonathan Tropper

Supernatural Fiction

With Halloween tomorrow, I thought it would be fun to do a post with a theme that relates to the holiday.  I don't read horror novels (or watch horror movies for that matter) because they're too scary for me!  But I do enjoy not-too-scary supernatural fiction.  So today, I'll share with you some recommendations for books about witches, vampires, and ghosts!

Book Lover's Playlist

For some reason, lately I have been obsessed with coming up with ideas of themed music playlists.  So, I came up with the idea of creating a literary themed playlist for book lovers.  Here are the songs I came up with.  I've linked to the music videos for the songs, where available, if you want to hear the songs.  (Side note:  old music videos are really weird.)

5 Star Review: The Clockmaker's Daughter by Kate Morton

Kate Morton is one of my favorite authors, as I've mentioned before on the blog.   It's been 3 years since she last published a book, so her latest book, "The Clockmaker's Daughter," was one of my most anticipated books of Fall 2018.  And, I'm happy to report that it did not disappoint, as it's one of her best.

From the Top 10 Archives: Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2007

Continuing my trip down memory lane of favorite books of years past, today we'll re-visit my 10 favorite books from 2007.  As a reminder, that means books I read in 2007, not necessarily books published that year.

I joined Goodreads in 2007, so one of the things that should be interesting as I look back at these lists from 2007 on is that my ratings (and reviews where applicable) on Goodreads will have been made contemporaneously, giving me a better view of what I thought of these books at the time I read them.

Here's my list from 2007, in alphabetical order by author's last name:

The Summer Guest - Justin Cronin
Sharp Objects - Gillian Flynn
Water for Elephants - Sara Gruen
The Girls - Lori Lansen
The Preservationist - David Maine
Evidence of Love - Melissa McConnell
Promise Not to Tell - Jennifer McMahon
Special Topics in Calamity Physics - Marisha Pessl
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - J.K. Rowling
Love Walked In - Marisa de los Santos

Contemporary women's fiction

Since I started this blog, I've been writing periodic posts focusing on some of my favorite books/authors in some of my favorite genres.  A lot of what I read doesn't necessarily fall into a genre, however - or if it does, it's a pretty broad genre which I would refer to as contemporary women's fiction.  Basically, books written by women, generally aimed at women though they can certainly be read by men as well, and set in the present day without other genre elements like thriller, fantasy, etc.

I've already written about my favorite authors in chick lit, which definitely is a subset of contemporary women's fiction.  It's kind of hard to say what the different is between the two, but I'd say chick lit (which for me is certainly not a pejorative) tends to be just a little lighter, fluffier, more focused on romance, and often about younger protagonists.  Some of my favorite writers, who I mentioned in the chick lit post I just linked to, definitely have written more serious books as they have gotten older themselves.  So definitely check out that post as well if you're interested in contemporary women's fiction.  But in addition to the authors mentioned there, here are some of my other favorites:

School Reading

It's been a little while since I posted - it has been a busy few weeks between adjusting to the back to school routine and the Jewish holidays.  And on top of that, I'm the coordinator for the school library volunteers for my son's elementary school, so a flurry of e-mails, organizing, scheduling, and training has been occupying a lot of my free time.  Still related to books, but a little less time for reading and even less for writing about reading!

Speaking of school, I'm interested to hear other people's opinions about reading for school.  One thing that seems to have changed since my own school days is a shift to letting students pick their own books rather than having assigned reading.  In my day, in elementary school we had a textbook for reading, and then in middle school and high school we read many books/plays as a class, as well as (I believe) still having a text book.  

GCBC - Summer Reading Roundup

As I've mentioned a few times previously on this blog, my friend Sarah and I have a book club that consists of just the two of us.  We call it GCBC, short for Grand Central Book Club, since ideally we meet in person to discuss the books, which we usually do over lunch at Grand Central Terminal.  We used to just pick a book to read together only when we planned to meet, but earlier this year we were discussing books we both wanted to read, and since we're both slightly crazy obsessive types, we compiled a list of books we both wanted to read and started aligning our reading so that we were reading more and more books at roughly the same time, as long as both of us either owned the book or could get it from the library!

So, from mid-June to the beginning of the September, we read a whopping 10 books together!  And unfortunately, various factors conspired against us so we were unable to get together for lunch to discuss.  So, we decided to do just a quick summary of our thoughts on each book, both to share with each other and for the edification of readers of this blog as well!

Anticipated Books of Fall 2018

Hard to believe when it's still so hot, but summer is drawing to a close.  Well, technically summer does not end until September 22nd, but to me, summer ends and fall begins when school starts.  For some of you around the country, that already happened weeks ago.  But here in New York, school starts after Labor Day, so my kids have just gone back to school.

With how hot and humid it has been in New York, I'm really looking forward to some nice fall weather.  But of course I'm also looking forward to fall reading!  There are lots of books being published this fall that I'm looking forward to, including some by a few of my favorite authors.  Here are some of them, listed in order of publication with the dates in parentheses representing the publication dates:

What I Read on My Summer Vacation

We came back yesterday from a lovely week in Cape Cod.  So in what is becoming a tradition for this blog, I'm going to tell you all about what I read on vacation (and what the rest of my family read too).  I love to read all the time, obviously, but vacation reading is especially enjoyable - isn't there just something nice about reading by the beach or pool, especially when you have nothing else pressing to do?

Jonah reading

Judging a Book By Its Cover

Have you ever seen a book where the cover is just so great looking that the cover itself is what makes you want to read the book?  Obviously this happens to me a little less often now that I pick most of my books on the internet as opposed to a bookstore or library.  But it definitely still happens.

For this whole post, I'm not talking about books where I've heard of the author, read a review, or had someone else recommend it to me.  I'm talking about the kind of book where you see the cover without knowing anything about the book, and that is the first thing that makes you want to read the book.

Here are a few on my to read list where the cover was the first thing that drew me in.  I haven't read them yet so I can't tell you whether they're any good, but I love the covers!

 Next Year in Havana by Chanel Cleeton - Seriously, is this the most gorgeous cover or what?  I was browsing Netgalley one day and saw this cover and I was pretty much sold on the spot - and obviously when I read the description and saw that it was in my beloved genre of dual time period historical fiction I was in for sure.  I didn't get approved for a copy by Netgalley, so now I'm on the library waitlist for this one.  But the fact that I saw it before publication proves that it's not the endorsement of Reese's book club that made me want to read this one - though she does tend to pick books I want to read!

The Passage TV show trailer

Regular readers of this blog will know that I'm totally obsessed with the book trilogy "The Passage" by Justin Cronin.  When I first heard that it had been optioned for a TV show, I was pretty excited, especially because originally it was going to be adapted for a movie and I knew there was just no way to cram that whole book into a movie.  Then I heard the TV show was going to be on Fox, and I started to worry.  Because this really is a show that screams for premium cable or a streaming network.

From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2006

It's been a while since I did one of these posts, so thought it was about time to look again at one of my old top 10 book lists.  Today we'll re-visit my 10 favorite books from 2006.  As a reminder, that means books I read in 2006, not necessarily books published that year.

Here's my list from 2006, in alphabetical order by author's last name:

Memoirs

The last time I asked if anyone had any requests for topics for future blog posts, my friend Rachel suggested I cover memoirs.  I have to admit, that was more than a month ago and I kind of put off writing this post!  As those of you who are familiar with my reading habits know, I am not a big reader of non-fiction.  While I read a wide variety of fiction genres, non-fiction composes maybe 5% of what I read.  As it happens, memoirs are my favorite non-fiction genre, and I've started reading them a bit more in the past few years.  But since I don't read that many, I'm not as widely read in the memoir genre as I am in other genres, so I guess I felt a little under-qualified to write about the best memoirs!  However, I decided that I can still recommend some of my favorites - even if they're likely to be ones that fans of memoirs have already read.  And you, the readers of my blog, can chime in with other memoirs worth reading!

Picture Book/Board Book Favorites

I have been meaning for a while to write a blog on my favorite picture books/board books to read to babies and young children, but have kept that idea on the back burner for a while.  However, I've been inspired by my sister to finally sit down and write it.  Lisa has her own blog, Truth in Parenting, which generally focuses on the ways in which parenting is not always all fun and games!  Today, she posted a sweet and positive story about my favorite baby book, and in doing so asked her readers for their recommendations of favorite books to read to their own kids.  Well, my kids are long past the age of needing to read picture books to them, but I have plenty of thoughts on my favorites, so I'm responding now with a blog post of my own!

With that being said, here are some of my favorites.

A selection of some of our favorites, art-directed by Jonah

Summer-themed books

Back in May, I wrote a post on summer reading, focusing on books that were being published in the summer of 2018.  (And if anyone's wondering, so far I've only gotten to 2 of the 10 books I mentioned in that post since I keep getting distracted by other books!)  But writing it also got me thinking about other summer-themed books which I've read in the past.  So, now that we're in hot and sunny mid-summer, if you're looking for some good books set in the summer in summery destinations, here are some suggestions!

What I Read on My Weekend Away

This past weekend, thanks to the generosity of my parents who came to my house to stay with my kids, Dan and I had a lovely long weekend away without kids!  People seemed to enjoy my post about what I read on my winter vacation, so I thought you all might also be interested in hearing about what I read on this mini-vacation.  Amazingly, I read (most of) 3 books from Thursday-Sunday!  Luckily for me, I am married to someone who has a compatible idea of what vacation should entail - pretty much minimal activity and total chillaxing.  ;)  Sure, we also swam in the pool, did a little walking around the resort property, got massages, had some great meals, etc. - but we also spent lots of time just reading!

Just one bookshelf in the Library cottage at Winvian

All the rooms at the resort where we were staying are themed.  I'm sure it does not come as a surprise to you that we stayed in the Library cottage!  The picture here is the view from the living area to the bedroom - and that's just one of many bookcases in the room.  The books were certainly an odd assortment.  Most of them seemed to be quite old books, many from the 1930s and 40s - I'm assuming that they were sold/bought in giant lots just for the purpose of decorating.  Interspersed throughout were more recent books that were presumably left behind by previous guests.  I noticed several I have previously read myself  - "All the Missing Girls" by Megan Miranda (enjoyable thriller); "The Address" by Fiona Davis (enjoyable historical fiction); "Fates and Furies" by Lauren Groff (overrated literary fiction); "White Teeth" by Zadie Smith (even more overrated literary fiction).  There was also lots of old Agatha Christie which I had read back in my teenage years.  And a 1947 Bowdoin College yearbook, randomly enough!

5 Star Review: Force of Nature

We're halfway through the year, and I just read my second 5 star-worthy book of the year, Force of Nature by Jane Harper.  (The first was "What You Don't Know About Charlie Outlaw" by Leah Stewart, and you can read more of my thoughts on that here.)  "Force of Nature" was a terrific literary mystery, and was such a can't put it down kind of book that I kept sneaking away from my family to read it, and stayed up late reading too.  I read the whole thing in about 24 hours!

Bookstores vs. libraries vs. the internet

I took my daughter to Barnes & Noble today, which got me thinking about the question - where is the best place to pick out books:  bookstores, libraries, or the internet?  And do you select books differently depending on where you are choosing them?

If you read my blog on physical books vs. electronic books, you will know that I do the majority of reading on my kindle.   Therefore, the majority of my books are sourced from the internet - either from Amazon, from the website for the Westchester County library system or from Netgalley (where I request free books in exchange for honest reviews).  But being in a bookstore reminded me of how great it is to pick up and peruse physical books, and how much more serendipitous picking books that way can be.  

Mysteries

I always enjoy reading a good mystery.  These days it seems like thrillers tend to be more popular than straight mysteries among most readers.  I've already written a post on some of my favorite thrillers, and some of the books listed in that post definitely fall into the mystery category as well.  It can be hard to define the exact difference between mysteries and thrillers, but I'd say it's that in many thrillers, especially the psychological kind, the mystery tends to be more just for the reader - figuring out exactly what is happening, what characters' secrets or motivations were, etc., while in a more traditional mystery there is generally a crime, and either a police officer or a private investigator (though occasionally a private person) is investigating what happened.

In my teenage years, mysteries were one of the genres I read the most, working my way through many an author - I think I may have actually read every book Agatha Christie wrote, as well as many of the books by Dick Francis, Mary Higgins Clark, Lillian Jackson Braun, Sue Grafton, Sara Paretsky, etc.  But for the purposes of this post, I'll concentrate more on more recent mysteries that are a little fresher in my mind.

Here are some of my favorites:

From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2005

Once again, I'm looking back at one of my old top 10 book lists - today we'll re-visit my 10 favorite books from 2005.  As a reminder, that means books I read in 2005, not necessarily books published that year.

Here's my list from 2005, in alphabetical order by author's last name:

Books That Made Me Cry

I don't know about other people, but I actually love it when a book makes me cry.  Both for the element of the cathartic release of that I'm emotionally invested.  Often I'm crying at something sad, but sometimes I find the ending of a book I loved to be so poignant that it makes me cry even if it's happy!  In fact, if you look at my reviews of some my favorite books on Goodreads, it's not uncommon for them to include a statement along the lines of "I sobbed my way through the last chapter of this book."  All that being said, I am a famously easy crier.  My kids actually laugh at me because I cry so easily at movies and tv.

So, the following is not at all an exhaustive list of books that made me cry - just a look at a few of the most memorable cries.  Yes, they're all books that I loved (and many of them made my ten favorites lists the years that I read them).  But for the ones I list below, it wasn't just the book that was memorable but also specifically my emotional response to it!

Young Adult Fantasy Series

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you've probably figured out by now that I love young adult books.  I've previously discussed young adult dystopian fiction and young adult realistic fiction.  Today, I'll talk about another one of my favorites - young adult fantasy.

I'm not sure what it is about young adult fantasy - often these are giant thick tomes with lots and lots of characters to keep track of over the course of multiple books in a series - yet they are also just so much fun to read.  My 13 year old daughter (almost 14) Allison is also a big fan of the genre, so she's read many of these as well and I'll fill you in on her opinions too where applicable.

So, if you share my love for the genre here are some of my favorite young adult fantasy series:

What To Read This Summer

As the weather starts to warm up (intermittently, that is), I'm thinking about what I'm going to read this summer.  I'm going to highlight some books that either were recently published or will be published this summer (May through August), and which sound like they'll make good summer reading.   For the purposes of this post, summer reading excludes anything that sounds too heavy or overly literary, but includes books that are either set in the summer or that sound like fun, juicy, reads.   Below you'll find some books that hopefully will fit the bill - a few books I've recently read, and other recent/forthcoming books that I'm hoping/planning to check out this summer.  Dates in parentheses are publication dates.

From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2004

Continuing my series of posts looking back at my top 10 book lists from years past, today I'll re-visit my 10 favorite books from 2004.  As a reminder, that means books I read in 2004, not necessarily books published that year.  2004 was a very eventful year for me personally, in that I became a mother for the first time!  (And yes, that means Allison will be 14 next month - crazy!)  I definitely did somewhat less reading in the latter half of the year being a new mom.  But nonetheless, this is a pretty good selection of books!

Here's my list from 2004, in alphabetical order by author's last name:

Virtual Book Club: The Female Persuasion and The Power

Today, I bring you a virtual book club discussion with Jennie Rothman, who was brave enough to volunteer to discuss books with me for your consumption!  I met Jennie MANY years ago when I was a summer associate and then an associate at Hughes Hubbard and Reed, and we later reconnected on Facebook and Goodreads, and she is definitely a trusted reader friend.  We both separately read the book The Power by Naomi Alderman for our respective book clubs this year, and then Jennie read The Female Persuasion by Meg Wolitzer and recommended it to me, and suggested that discussing them together for the blog could be interesting since, although they are very different books, they both deal with feminist themes.

Our discussion took place over e-mail, a lightly edited version of which is below.  Enjoy!

Middle Grade Fiction Adults Can Enjoy Too

So far, I've discussed adult books and young adult books, but for the most part I haven't really discussed children's books, other than a mention or two.  So you may not realize that I'm just as passionate about children's literature, and about encouraging a love of reading in my kids.  I also volunteer at the school library at my kids' elementary school, so I love seeing what the kids are reading there and recommending some of these books to them too!

Today's post focuses on kids books that are so great, I recommend them even if you don't have a kid in your life to share them with.  These are also books that I recommend for kids who are strong independent readers, or for read-alouds with your kid.  Many of the books on this list I either read aloud to one of my kid, or I read them at the same time as one of my kids and then we discussed, though some I read purely for my own enjoyment.

Two series adults can enjoy too!

Historical fiction books with present/past stories

I can't believe I haven't written a post focused on historical fiction so far, especially because it's one of my favorite genres!  In fact, I read so much historical fiction that there's no way I can cram it all into one post, so I'm going to subdivide it into multiple sub-genres.  For today, I'm going to focus on one of my most favorite types of books - books that go back and forth between two time periods, usually a present day and historical story.  I don't know exactly what it is about this kind of book that appeals to me, but I tend to just LOVE books that are structured this way.  Plus I respect that it must be trickier to write these books, as the author ideally needs to make both story lines equally compelling, and also to find a connection between the two stories that makes sense without being too obvious/gimmicky.

Books I Hated

So far on the blog, I have focused on books that I love.  Obviously, if I'm recommending books to people, I'm going to talk about books I love.  But I thought it would be fun for a change to talk instead about books I hated, since I can get equally worked up about about that.  And I mean really hated.

I'm also not going to include any books that I had to read for school, rather, these are all books I read on my own, either voluntarily or for book club.

And since I have this weird compulsion to finish reading every book I start, these are all books I actually suffered through to the end.  Occasionally there have been books that I hated at the beginning but which actually grew on me as I read them.  But the books below are books I finished and still hated.  I don't mean disliked, but HATED, and which still inspire me to feelings of white hot hatred!

From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2003

Part of an ongoing trip through time looking back at my top 10 book lists, today we'll re-visit my 10 favorite books from 2003.  As a reminder, that means books I read in 2003, not necessarily books published that year.

Since I started writing down all the books I read for fun all the way back in 1992, I can tell you that 2003 was the year I read the least amount of books ever - only 44 books.  I know a lot of people would consider that a huge reading year, but for me that's not so many!  So this top 10 list therefore represents almost 1/4 of the books I read in 2003.

Book club books

At Passover seder at my parents' house two weekends ago, my dear family friend Liz and I were discussing our respective book clubs and good book club books.  Conveniently, while this question was fresh on my mind, my book club met last week.  Since I happen to have a Goodreads shelf keeping track of all the books we've read as a book club, we also took some time to scroll through the list and talk about the books and discuss which ones were the best.

5 Star Review: What You Don't Know About Charlie Outlaw

For the first time this year (and since I started this blog last December), I read a book which deserves a 5 out of 5 stars - What You Don't Know About Charlie Outlaw by Leah Stewart.  So far on the blog I have not written any posts focused on a single individual book, but reading a book that excellent seems to merit it.  Since I know for sure it will be on my top 10 list of 2018, why wait until the end of the year to tell you about it?

GCBC: Red Sparrow, Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda, and the Assistants

My friend Sarah and I have a book club composed of just the two of us, which we call GCBC, short for Grand Central Book Club.  Since for various reasons we have had to reschedule our last few lunches and therefore were unable to discuss our books at the actual Grand Central in NYC, we bring to you once again our conversation on the books we have been reading, conducted by e-mail and then edited into this post!

Today, we're discussing 3 books we've read over the past few months:  (1) "Red Sparrow," by Jason Matthews, a spy thriller about a young male CIA agent and a young female Russian agent who end up being assigned to spy on/recruit each other; (2) "Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda" by Becky Albertalli, a young adult novel about a gay teenage boy who is not yet out to his friends or family, only to an anonymous fellow high school student on the internet whose identity he does not know; and (3) "The Assistants" by Camille Perri,which is kind of a chick lit/satirical novel about the assistant to the CEO of a media empire, who somewhat accidentally ends up in a Robin Hood-esque expense account embezzlement scheme.

Thrillers

Thrillers are a genre I enjoy and often get asked to recommend.  And I can promise you this - I won't call any of these books the next "Gone Girl"!  "Gone Girl" definitely started a craze for a certain kind of thriller - the psychological thriller hinging in part on the question of whether the narrator(s) are reliable, and that is definitely one kind of thriller I'll discuss here - but there are also a number of other categories of thrillers as well.  (Though I'm not going to include legal thrillers, since it's not a sub-genre I usually read.)  As I usually do in my genre posts, I'll focus on books I've really enjoyed and would recommend.  I've read a lot of mediocre and even somewhat crappy thrillers, and while I sometimes enjoy them even when their quality is not fantastic, I'm not going to include them here.  And apparently I really like this genre because I had trouble narrowing this one down.  So if you enjoy this genre, be prepared to add a lot of books to your to-read list!

Best series

Recently, I asked for suggestions of what genres/topics related to books people wanted to hear about next.  My friend and fellow book-lover Sarah suggested "best overall series of books."  That was definitely not something I had ever thought about before, but it seemed like an interesting - if daunting - topic.

In order to figure out what series to include, I decided I needed to set some parameters.  These are the ones I decided on:

• There have to be at least three books to qualify as a series.  Otherwise, it's just a book with a sequel, not a series.
• I have to have read all of the books in the series to include it on the list; or, if it is a series still in progress, I have to have read all of the books published to date.
• Not every book in the series has to be amazing, but they all need to be of sufficient quality to make it worthy of embarking on the series, and if the series has come to an end, the ending has to be satisfying.
• The series has to be memorable, can't just be books that I remember that I enjoyed but can't really remember anything about.

Once I figured that out, it became abundantly clear to me that though I had many, many series which I had enjoyed, I had a clear top 3 favorite series ever.

Young adult realistic fiction

Today's post was inspired both by the fact that the last book I read was an awesome young adult novel, and by my friend Joanna, who asked for recommendations of books that are good for teenagers.  So I decided I would write about young adult realistic fiction.  I've previously written about young adult dystopian fiction, and in a future post I'll cover young adult fantasy.

This is not to suggest that only young adult fiction makes for good reading for teenagers - my own teenage daughter Allison also reads adult fiction and non-fiction, with some of her favorites including some of the adult dystopian novels in my dystopian fiction post, and also a couple of the books in my post on contemporary fiction with a science fiction edge.  (Interestingly, Allison has not read most of the books below because she generally finds realistic young adult fiction to be too romance-y.)  And when I was a teenager myself, the young adult genre was definitely not as robust as it is now, so I read a lot of mysteries and science fiction - I specifically remember working my way through all the books by both Agatha Christie and Robert Heinlein, among others.  Nor is a book being labeled young adult any guarantee it is more appropriate, especially for younger teens - I've definitely read a few young adult books that have a lot more sex/drugs/alcohol than many adult books!  But to the best of my recollection, that's not true of the books below.

That being said, here are some favorites of mine in the genre of  contemporary realistic young adult fiction:

From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2002

Part of an ongoing trip through time looking back at my top 10 book lists, today we'll re-visit my 10 favorite books from 2002.  As a reminder, that means I made this list in January 2003 covering books I read in 2002, not necessarily books published that year.

Chick Lit

Following up on my recent post on light fiction, there's a whole genre I left out of that post that is generally pretty light and not too depressing, though some books definitely have their darker subplots - chick lit.  Some people take issues with the term "chick lit" but to me it's not an insult, just a descriptor of a genre.  They're usually books about women in their 20s and 30s where the main plot is about love and/or finding yourself, and they're written in a pretty light style that no one would describe as heavy literary fiction.  Then there's the related genre I would call "contemporary women's fiction" which perhaps includes chick lit as well.  But to me, there's a fine line between the two which is a little hard to define. There are definitely some writers that straddle the line too, where the books they wrote when they were younger are more chick lit, but the books they have written later have a more contemporary women's fiction vibe to me.  But for the purposes of this post, I'm going to concentrate on more chick-lit-y authors, other slightly more serious contemporary women's fiction will have to wait for another day!

Anyway, although I read less chick lit now than I did when I was younger, I still love it so much that I can't limit myself to just naming a few favorite books.  So I'm going to go ahead and profile some of my favorite authors instead.

What I Read on Vacation

I returned home last night from a great week in Mexico with my husband and kids.  I've written before about recommended vacation reading, so I thought this time I'd tell you all about what I read on my vacation!

Yup, that's me reading on the beach!

From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's Top 10 Favorite Books of 2001

Part of an ongoing trip through time looking back at my top 10 book lists, today we'll re-visit my 10 favorite books from 2001.  As a reminder, that means books I read in 2001, not necessarily books published that year.

Here's my list from 2001, in alphabetical order by author's last name:

Physical books vs. electronic books

Back in the day, when it came to what book format you liked, the only real question was whether you preferred paperbacks or hardcovers.  Now, however, there are so many different ways to consume books - there are still physical books, of course, but there are also e-readers, reading e-books on your phone or tablet, and audiobooks, among others.  What's your favorite way to read?

Until early 2012, despite the growing popularity of digital books, I was a staunch defender of the physical book, and swore up and down that I would never convert to an e-reader.  But Dan got tired of me lugging a ton of books every time we went on vacation, and for Hanukkah 2011, he got me a Kindle.  At first I was somewhat reluctant, and figured I would only use it for vacations.  But over time I converted to an enthusiastic fan of the Kindle, even more so when I got my second one, which glows in the dark.

Last year, I'd say I read maybe 10% of the books I read in physical form, a handful of books on my phone, and the rest - the vast majority - on my kindle.  So, clearly, it would seem, I prefer the kindle.  And yet, I just finished reading my second paperback in a row, and I have to say, it reminded me that there's something great about them.  And it's funny, because this tends to be my pattern - I'll read on my kindle for months, but when I pick up a real book, I'll often go on a bit of a roll reading physical books because I remember that I do like them after all!

The last 2 paperbacks I read, and my Kindle

That being said, here are some of my thoughts on different mechanisms for consuming books.  If I had written this a month ago, I definitely would have led with e-readers, but since I was just reminded that I also enjoy reading physical books, I'm going to start there instead.

Contemporary fiction with a sci fi edge

Today's blog was inspired by Sarah, who e-mailed asking for recommendations for books for her husband to read on vacation.  She mentioned that he loved "The Martian" and "The Passage," which anyone who reads this blog knows are two of my most favorite books of the last few years.  It's funny, other than recommending books to my husband and my father, it's pretty much always women who I am giving recommendations to, and I do definitely read a lot of stuff that is probably more appealing to women.  So it definitely was different to focus my mind on books a guy would like!

I gave slightly broader recommendations than those I present here, including some from my dystopian fiction post but the bulk of my recommendations fell into a category inspired by "The Martian" and "The Passage"- contemporary literary fiction, but with a science fiction edge.  These are books that might even be found in the plain old fiction section of your local library or bookstore rather than the science fiction section, books that would appeal not just to avowed readers of science fiction like myself but also to others who might think they don't like science fiction even if they loved "The Martian" too.  So here are 5 books that fit that bill from the last few years.