Looking Back: A Wrap up of 2020 in Reading

What an interesting year it's been. I had signed up for a number of challenges at the beginning of the year with the caveat that I was going to use them more as guides to my reading as I wasn't sure what was going to happen due to being pregnant and due in May. 

The year started out all right. I decided the best way to tackle the challenges were to essentially cycle through with a focus of two books from the first challenge, then one book of all the others. I also decided to read Anna Karenina over six months by basically reading it for 20 minutes a day. And I did all right. I finished most of my first cycle by March 10th along with a couple of parenting books thrown in. On March 15th, our state issued Shelter-in-Place orders for Covid-19. Luckily I had my next "cycle" of books checked out, but it took a while to make my way through two of them. I managed my way through a third while in a stage of early baby days where the baby would only sleep while on me.

And then I didn't pick up another book until August at which point I basically threw all my lists out the window and focused on parenting books and new releases. It felt appropriate with 2020 being the dumpster fire that it was. 

I managed a grand total of 23 books this year. Not a strong suit by any means, but honestly, with how I felt about reading over much of the year, I'm pretty pleased with that. It has given me much to think about in my future reading and which directions I wish to take this blog but that's a post for the New Year. 

I hope everyone else had a more productive reading year than I did even as we all struggled with the challenges thrown at us and I hope for a much better 2021 for everyone!

Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth

Title: Plain Bad Heroines

Author: Emily M. Danforth

Pages:  617

Finished: December 26, 2020

First Sentence: It's a terrible story and one way to tell it is this: two girls in love and a fog of wasps cursed the place forever after.

Summary: In 1902, two students at Brookhants School, Flo and Clara die in a swarm of yellow jackets. Over the next year, three more people mysteriously die in strange, almost supernatural ways. Cut to the current day, Merritt Emmons publishes a book about these events. A book that is now being made into a movie starring celebrity actor Harper Harper and Audrey Wells in the roles of Flora and Clara. But strange, unnatural things keep cropping up on set to the movie. 

Thoughts: First and foremost, this is the latest in a long list of surreal novels I've read this year. The is a book where you have no idea where it's going until you get to the end. This is a book that should be enjoyed leisurely rather than read straight through. Unfortunately, it's written in a way that makes you want to read it straight through. 

The story jumps back and forth between the Happenings at Brookhants in 1902 vs the movie making business in 2020. And and forth, it definitely take advantage of the stylistic choice of cliff hangers. Just as you are about to learn something on 2020, it's back to 1902 and Libbe Brookhants. Finally you get somewhere with her and it's forward to 2020 learning about Audrey. Oh good. We finally have something there and now it's late 1800s learning how Alex and Libbe ended up together.

If you read the flyleaf of the book, you might think that Flo and Clara are going to be main characters in this novel. They're not. They're the catalyst to the story. Them and Mary MacLane.

One thing that was really cool, this book had more queer representation than I've seen in any mainstream novel I've ever read. All the main characters are either bi or gay. Many of the side characters as well. There's one transgender person whose pronouns are them which is the first time I've actually seen that in a fiction book. No asexual representation, but I suspect that's due to the subject matter of the story. 

The book surprised me. I had inklings of things that were coming, but the actual reveal in it all blindsided me. 

This is one of those novels where I don't think a single character is perfect. Everyone is flawed in some way. Everyone is their own unique person. But then this is what people have been saying in media all the time about diversity. So yes, it was really wonderful to see actual characters rather than diversity points. 

Also, it turns out Mary MacLane was a real person who did publish three books, the first of which took America by storm largely due to how open she was about herself and her feelings in a time when most people weren't. Particularly when those thoughts were the opposite of "good breeding."

This is definitely an experience though. I don't know that one can walk out saying they have a favorite part or a favorite character. At least I don't. I did, however, really enjoy the tone and atmosphere of the novel. I'm glad to have finished out my year with this novel. (I just started another, but there is no way I'll finish it between now and Thursday.)

The Invisible Life of Addie Larue by V. E. Schwab

Title: The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

Author: V. E. Schwab

Pages: 442

Finished: November 19, 2020

First Sentence: A girl is running for her life.

Summary: France, 1714. Adeline LaRue wants to see far of places, live many experiences. Addie LaRue does not want to get married and end up stuck in her small village for the rest of her life. So, desperate on the night of her wedding, Addie makes a deal with a god. A deal that grants her immortality at the price of everyone forgetting her the minute they lose sight of her. It turns out it's much harder to get by when no one remembers you. And that's how things are for Addie for 300 years until one day, someone does remember her.

Thoughts: So this is kind of the "it" book going around right now. As I was reading it, a coworker discussed it for our staff reviews, two friends posted about it on Facebook, and patrons brought it up. And to be honest, it's a pretty interesting book. Of course, any book regarding deals for souls and life or art invoke Faust, and of course this book couldn't escape mentioning that. But I still really enjoyed it.

I appreciate that the main character, Addie, isn't infallible nor is she unlikeable. It seems that often when people write Strong Women, they are good at every skill, strong as a man, accomplished in most things, and friends with everyone. Or they go the opposite direction and are unsociable in a way that makes them hard to identify with. Addie feels like a regular person.. which is all we want in our Strong Women characters. Take note authors!

I went back and forth on Henry. When we first met him, I was intrigued as to who this guy was. Like Addie, he felt desperate enough to make a deal. But even so, I didn't connect to him as well as I did to Addie. 

Our other main player is Luc the not-devil. The god after dark. I appreciated that he was more complex than just evil... but he still was the antagonist and I don't like antagonists, no matter how much back story we get into them.

One of my favorite aspects of the entire work was how Addie showed up in art. I liked the idea of the forgettable woman showing up in art all over the ages. It was such an interesting concept. 

Honestly, even with this being the "it" book of the season, I really enjoyed it. It was the right level of fantasy grounded in realism. The characters felt real even in their wild lives. I feel like I could take another pass at it and slow down in the last 100 pages or so rather than busting through them at midnight... but this is a problem I have with all books I read that I enjoy. Definitely a worthwhile read. 

Ormeshadow by Priya Sharma

*Note, I read this in October and never wrote a review. This review is based on impressions only.

Title: Ormeshadow

Author: Priya Sharma

Pages: 165

Finished: October 14, 2020

First Sentence: The argument started a good twenty miles from Ormeshadow.

Summary: After an event that causes some chilliness between Gideon's parents, he finds the whole family packed up and on their way to Ormeshadow Farm on the coast of Wales. There Gideon finds a family who doesn't welcome him, more mysteries, and stories of a dragon - his family's birthright. 

Thoughts: I'm going to start right off and say this wasn't my cup of tea. It was booktalked in a continuing education course I took for work and at the end, the speaker mentioned it's a readalike to Naomi Novik's Uprooted which I read at the beginning of this year and adored. So I was really excited for a fantasy horror novel. 

This was not that. It was more of a psychological horror novel. The reader spends their time guessing what the heck is going on and what is it that Gideon doesn't see. The reader also has to parse out is the dragon Gideon's father talks about actually real? And then we read through the abuse Gideon suffers. 

In general I found the characters unlikeable and I think I must have missed subtext because things seemed to come quickly and at weird times. The writing style was atmospheric but I just didn't enjoy the subject matter. It did not strike me as similar to Uprooted in the slightest which is the whole reason I picked it up! That being said, for a fairly gentle horror novella, it was quick to breeze through.