This is a super late wrap up but I just felt like writing a post cause I've been going through some of my old blog posts and I just find it interesting reading my thoughts on books I've read. While I'm writing this, it's been a super slumpy couple of months. June, July and August haven't been great for my reading and I'm struggling to get into anything at the moment so I just about managed 6 books last month. The plus side is that nothing I've been reading has been less then a 3 star so at least there's that.
STATS
The Dollhouse by Fiona Davis
My second Fiona Davis although I definitely preferred The Spectacular. This is another historical novel set in NYC about a famous building, this time The Barbizon hotel which was renowned for being female only and housing a bunch of famous names such as Sylvia Plath.
The book is dual timeline so in 1952 we focus on Darby who moves to the city for secretarial college and befriends a maid who works in the hotel, and then in present day we've got Rose who is investigating the building to keep her journalism career alive. It was an interesting plot, with a murder bringing both timelines together, and I really love Davis's descriptions of NYC but I wasn't totally invested in either of the characters and looking back a month later, it hasn't really made an impression.
The Bletchley Riddle by Ruta Sepetys & Steve Sheinkin
I actually really enjoyed this middle grade historical mystery set in Bletchley Park and the world of codebreakers in WWII. I loved both characters, Jakob and Lizzie, and their sibling dynamic was loads of fun to read about. I did get kind of slumpy in the middle of it so it took me a while to finish but the second half was really fun and clever and I had a great time. I really hope the authors return to the characters and we get a sequel in the future.
Summer of 69 by Elin Hilderbrand
Elin Hilderbrand's books really are the perfect summer reads! This one follows an entire family during the tumultuous summer of 69 at their holiday home in Nantucket and mainly focuses on the women of the family. They've got a lot to cope with, eldest daughter Blair is pregnant and feeling abandoned by her husband, Kirby feels stifled and takes a job in Martha's Vineyard to escape and youngest Jessie is feeling the effects of brother Tiger's deployment to Vietnam and is struggling to feel seen.
I loved all the POV's we got in this book with Kirby possibly taking the crown as my favourite. This book had a lot of emotional depth for a typical beach read but all the characters were equally fascinating to read about and I loved having it set against the backdrop of the Apollo moon landing, the Vietnam war and the Chappaquiddick incident.
Set Piece by Lana Schwartz
I don't know why I picked this up initially cause me and romance books aren't always besties especially ones with famous people as the MC's but I did quite like this novella. Maybe because it was set on a Great Gatsby remake or cause the two leads were just hard not to root for but this was a lot better that I thought it would be. There is a bit of miscommunication in here as well as so many Britishisms that the author got dead wrong but it's definitely got me intrigued to pick up more from this publisher as they tend to focus on similar stories.
Talking at Night by Claire Daverley
This book is always recommended to fans of Normal People and I can definitely see why. Will and Rosie have got the same met in school/from different worlds/never feeling good enough thing that Marianne and Connell have but with an extra layer of tragic.
I really enjoyed the authors writing in this one and I was almost instantly hooked on the characters and their journey, together and apart. I really connected with Rosie and I thought her and Will's relationship was so sweet and complicated - exactly how I like them! There were some things that happened near the end that kinda threw me cause it was just a bit strange but this was a really melancholic love story that definitely struck a chord with me.
I finished off the month with some non-fiction, a set of essays that focuses on the late 90's/early 2000s world of pop culture and how this affected the author growing up. Some of these essays were really interesting and I related to a lot considering I'm probably a good ten years younger then Kennedy. It's obviously very US focused so some parts I didn't really get like the American Girl dolls which just weren't a thing in the UK but I particularly liked the chapters on growing up in the early years of technology and her experiences in college.
Reading Challenge Update
I've made a decent amount of progress on Beat the Backlist and PopSugar so far but I've definitely stalled on Buzzwordathon and Reads the World cause I haven't been able to update those challenges in a while!
What did you read in July? Have you read any of these? Leave a comment below. Happy Reading!
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