February was a really hard month for me. Along with the ups-and-downs of buying a house from overseas in a really tough housing market, winter depression set in and it was just too much. This definitely had an effect on my reading life. I found myself easily distracted and unable to focus.
In addition to all of that, I read two books that were solidly in the “not for me” category. I finished one of them, but could only give it two stars, which I almost never do, and the other one I had to DNF.
When I sat down to look at the books that I completed in the month of February, I was pleasantly surprised at the number of books I actually read. In my mind, I was thinking that I only read maybe two or three books when I actually read seven, with one of those being over 500 pages. I’m counting that as a win, friends!
Let’s take a quick look at the books I read in February:
The Wisdom of Your Body by Hillary L. McBride
3/5 stars
I heard psychologist and award-winning researcher, Hillary McBride, on a podcast last fall and liked what she had to say, so I added this to my Amazon Wishlist and my husband gave it to me for Christmas. I liked this, but at a certain point–it became a bit too much for me. In The Wisdom of Your Body, McBride is exploring the broken and unhealthy ideas we have about our body. I have experienced many of these unhealthy ideas and found what she had to say enlightening. At a certain point, I just became a bit bogged down by the ideas presented in this book and, honestly, I don’t like books with “assignments” in them. I prefer narrative non-fiction to self-help types of books and this was more in the self-help arena.
The Attic Child by Lola Jaye
4/5 stars
I received this in my September Book of the Month box as an add-on and it has been sitting on my TBR shelf waiting on me to pick it up since then. I finally found the right time to read this emotional story of family secrets, love and loss, identity and belonging. This was a truly emotional book that I really loved. I would have given it a higher rating, but there were lots of typos and editing mistakes that would really lessened the reading experience for me.
The Attic Child centers around the stories of two children locked in the same attic almost a century apart. They are bound together through a shared secret. The most compelling story line is of Celestine, a young boy who was taken from his African homeland to become the companion of a wealthy English explorer. He desperately misses and clings to the memory of his family in Africa and longs to reunite with them. Lawra is a young orphan girl born into wealth a privilege, but her fortune changes when she loses both of her parents and is locked away by her step-mother. As an adult, Lawra, discovers secrets and goes on a quest to find Celestine and learn his full story. I loved the relationship that develops between these two very different people and how they found healing from their past.
Becoming Dutchess Goldblatt by Dutchess Goldblatt
2/5 stars
Ugh…ha…that’s not the best way to start a book review, is it? I listened to Becoming Dutchess Goldblatt on audio after hearing it recommended in several places (bookstagram, podcasts, etc.). Billed as a memoir, Becoming Dutchess Goldblatt is the story behind a pseudonymous twitter account by the name Dutchess Goldblatt. It tells the story of the reclusive writer who created this fictional character out of a place of loneliness and eventually finds some meaning in it. The Dutchess Goldblatt character on twitter is apparently beloved by many and has fans around the world. This book was solidly not for me–I tend to sigh and roll my eyes every time I think of it. The author eventually grated on my nerves as she was pretentious and showed herself to be extremely selfish and needy. I could not relate to her or her story at all.
Independence by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
5/5 stars
This novel pretty much ticked all the boxes for what I love in a book. From the historical and cultural setting to the family connections to the strong women characters–I loved it all!!
Independence tells the story of three sisters, daughters of a well-respected doctor, in India during the time of when it gained Independence from British control. Priya is resolved to follow in her father’s footsteps by becoming a doctor even though society frowns upon this. Deepa, the daughter graced with beauty and charm, falls in love with someone who is forbidden. Jamini is the devout daughter who has learned her mother’s craft of quilt making, but harbors deeper passions than she reveals to her other sisters. These three sisters find themselves of different paths after the partition of India is officially decided. They fight to survive and reunite despite the obstacles in their way.
I don’t want to tell more than that because I don’t want to give any of this brilliant story away–just know that it is a must read highly recommended by me!
Finlay Donovan Knocks ‘Em Dead by Elle Cosimano
3/5 stars
This is the second book in the Finlay Donovan series. I read the first book in January after receiving it for Christmas. Finlay Donovan is a writer, recently divorced mom of two small children and accidental assassin-for-hire. In this second novel, Finlay is focused on trying to find out why someone wants to kill her ex-husband, Steven. This is filled with some of the crazy antics and slap-stick-ish humor as the first, but it doesn’t hit quite as humorous the second time around. It was an enjoyable read, but fell a little flat for me.
A Lady’s Guide to Fortune Hunting by Sophie Irwin
4/5 stars
This was a different kind of read for me, but one that I really enjoyed! A Lady’s Guide to Fortune-Hunting is a recency-era novel filled with humor and wit. It follows the adventures of Kitty, an unconventional heroine, who throws herself into the London “season” to find a wealthy husband in order to rescue her family from debt and save her four sisters from lives of poverty. Kitty meets her match in Lord Radcliffe who initially sees her as noting more than a mercenary fortune-hunter and he is determined to thwart her plans at all costs. As you are probably guessing, this becomes a classic enemies-to-lovers story. What is not classic or predictable is the pure delight that this story is. I loved the wit and banter between the Kitty and Lord Radcliffe and I was cheering Kitty on the entire time!
Babel by R.F. Kuang
5/5 stars
Wow…I’m not even sure where or how to start with Babel. It is an epic tale that captured my attention when my attention was incredibly hard to capture. Babel is a historical fantasy epic that grapples big topics such as student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as a dominating tool of the British empire. This was beautifully written and told a captivating story that really deals with big questions that demand attention. After being orphaned in Canton, China, Robin Swift is brought to London by the mysterious Professor Lovell. There he is expected to train for years in languages–Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese–in order to earn a spot at Oxford University’s prestigious Royal Institute of Translation, also known as Babel. Robin eventually realizes that serving Babel means betraying his motherland and he finds himself caught between Babel and a secret organization dedicated to stopping imperial expansion. He must decide whose side he is really on when Britain pursues an unjust war with China. This was an incredible story that will be one of my top reads of the year, if not all time!
What have you been reading lately?