ARC Review of The Saints of Swallow Hill by Donna Everhart

 The Saints of Swallow Hill focuses on two people working at the same turpentine camp during the Great Depression. The first perspective is Del Reese who is a single man who treats "negros" with respect and draws the ire from his racist boss. The second perspective is from a young woman named Rae Lynn who goes into the camp pretending to be a man. They strike up a friendship and we follow what happens afterward. The treatment of these desperate people during The Great Depression was awful and most likely illegal. This was incredibly eye-opening. I gave the story 4 stars because while I enjoyed most of it, I felt the ending was a bit saccharine. I was given this as an advanced audiobook copy by Netgalley for my honest review. The book is released today, January 25th, 2022.

ARC of Cost of Living: Essays by Emily Maloney

 I received an advanced audiobook of Cost of Living: Essays by Emily Maloney. This is a book of essays detailing her medical experiences as a patient and also when she worked in the medical industry, It starts with her suicide attempt at age 19 and the medical debt that followed her. She then worked a variety of healthcare jobs to try to pay off that debt. I thought this was going to be more about what it costs to live, getting medical care in the United States but that was just a small part. She also talks of the excess in the pharmaceutical industry, spending money to advertise and hold conferences. I found her thoughts on chronic pain patients and how insurance creates a dependency on medications, rather than seeking out alternative therapies interesting and enlightening. Overall, I enjoyed this collection, even though it wasn't quite what I was expecting. I gave it 4 stars and would encourage anyone interested in medicine or disability to seek it out. She narrates the audiobook herself which I enjoy with nonfiction. The book will be published February 8th, 2022. Thanks to Netgalley for the advanced copy.

Best Books I read in 2021

 I read a total of 59 books in 2021. While quite a bit less than usual, I did find some really great books. Here's my top 10 list:

10. The Broken Girls by Simone St. James

9. The Vanished Birds by Simon Jimenez

8. The Prettiest Star by Carter Sickels

7. The Galaxy and the Ground Within by Becky Chambers

6.  In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

5. All the Young Men by Ruth Coker Burks

4. Broken (In the best possible way) by Jenny Lawson

3. The Bear and the Nightingale (trilogy) by Katherine Arden

2. Amari and the Night Brothers by B.B. Alston

1. Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

ARC Review for The Storm of Echoes by Christelle Dabos

 The Storm of Echoes by Christelle Dabos is the fourth and final book in The Mirror Visitor series translated from French. I was lucky to receive an advanced audiobook in exchange for my honest review. Unfortunately, the book was a huge disappointment.

While we get to know several great characters throughout the first three books, many of them are mere cameos in the fourth book. I wanted more Berenilde, Madame Rosaline, and Archibald. We get a fair bit of perspective from Victoria, a nonverbal child with the ability to dream-walk. Because she cannot warn any of the characters about what she's seen, these scenes are used to build tension by giving the readers info that the main characters do not know. I liked this in the third book as it was used more sparingly, but felt it was overused as a plot device now.

Two other things annoyed me before the ending. This book is translated from French, but the translator leaves in a lot of French words, something that wasn't done in the first three books. This gave the book an entirely different mood. Secondly, there is a lot of focus on infertility that seemed incredibly out of place, especially for a YA book. I know the protagonist is now a bit older, probably 20-21 but when facing the destruction of arks and losing great swaths of people, it felt like an odd thing to focus on.

Even with these complaints, I was still enjoying the book until the last 40 or 50 pages. The pacing suddenly speeds up, several reveals happens, making little to no sense. I felt the author didn't know how she was going to make some things happen so she shoehorned in events that she wanted to occur, even if there were no links or clues to these sudden reveals.

I ruminated on how to rate this and decided on 2 stars. I don't hate it, but I also don't recommend reading this book either. While this is a quartet, it really feels more like two duologies. The first two books focused on politics and magical societies whereas the latter two focus on religion/god/cults. 

Both the book and the audiobook are out now. Thanks to Netgalley for my advanced copy.

January TBR

Here's what I want to get to in January.

1.  Kaffir Boy by Mark Mathabane

2. Saga issue #55 by Brian K. Vaughn and Fiona Staples

3. How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu

4. Tell the Wolves I'm Home by Carol Rifka Brunt

5. The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

6. Tears of Amber by Sofia Segovia

7.  The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen

8. Kingdom of Copper by S.A. Chakraborty

9. Cost of Living by Emily Maloney (ARC) 

10. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

December Wrap Up

 In December I read 4 fantasy books.

I picked up The Winter of the Witch by Katherine Arden to finish out the trilogy. A snowy wintery read that was nearly perfect. As it is the third book, I don't want to say what it was about but I loved it and gave it 4.5 stars.

I read The Hatmakers by Tamzin Merchant. This was a cute children's fantasy about different clans of "makers" and a king that needed their help. It was silly and fun and I gave it 4 stars.

Next I read A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske. I knew there was a M/M romance in this, but didn't realize it was smutty. A man who doesn't know about magic gets a cursed tattoo and a magician tries to help him. I enjoyed this quite a lot and will continue on with the series when new books are released. 4 stars.

I read The Troubled Girls of Dragomir Academy by Anne Ursu. I'd heard fun things about a magical school, and while that wasn't quite true, I still enjoyed this story immensely. A girl yells at a sorcerer and is sent to a troubled girls school where she has to learn "manners". She makes friends and uncovers a long-held secret. I flew through this and gave it 5 stars.

I'm in the middle of another book that is an ARC, so I'll review it separately.

Owned Audiobooks Prior to 2022

 I will probably buy audiobooks next year, but since my resolution is to target audiobooks purchased prior to 2022, I'm writing out all of my options. I didn't pay full price for all of these but I did for some and need to read them. I have 60+ titles.

Audiobooks I bought before 2022:

Tell the Wolves I'm Home by Carol Rivka Brunt

Middlesex by Jeffery Eugenides

The Distance Between Us by Reyna Grande

American War by Omar El-Akkad

A Crooked Tree by Una Mannion

The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson

Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin

Tears of Amber by Sofia Segovia

The Butterfly Garden by Dot Hutchinson

The Light Brigade by Kameron Hurley

Arcadia by Iain Pears

The Axe and the Throne by M.D. Ireman

Spin by Robert Charles Wilson

Unmentionable by Therese Oneill

The Traveling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa

Keeper of the Lost Cities by Shannon Messenger

Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline

The Lighting-Struck Heart by TJ Klune

Wolf Song by TJ Klune

Good Talk by Mira Jacob

Foundryside by Robert Jackson Bennett

Girl at War by Sara Novic

The Collected Schizophrenias by Esme Weijun Wang

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat by Oliver Sacks

Women of Copper Country by Mary Doria Russell

The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell

A History of Loneliness by John Boyne

The Glass Palace by Amitav Ghosh

Princess: A True Story of Life Behind the Veil in Saudi Arabia by Jean Sasson

Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bronx by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc

Children of the Land by Marcelo Hernandez Castillo

Song of a Captive Bird by Jasmin Darznik

Follow Me to Ground by Sue Rainford

Pines by Blake Crouch

Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie

The Yield by Tara June Winch

Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood

Skyward by Brandon Sanderson

Soulless by Gail Carringer

Burial Rites by Hannah Kent

Sin Eater by Megan Campisi

Ayesha at Last by Uzma Jalaluddin

Lost Children Archive by Valeria Luiselli

The Familiars by Stacey Halls

The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi

Notes of a Crocodile by Qiu Miaojin

Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky

The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Ngyuen

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss

The Glorious Heresies by Lisa McInerney

The Five by Hallie Rubenfold

Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson

Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls by T. Kira Madden

From Here to Eternity by Caitlin Doughty

Elantris by Brandon Sanderson

The Collector by John Fowles

Red Sister by Mark Lawerence

The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin

Lock In by John Scalzi

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Barkskins by Annie Proulx

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemison

Ohio by Stephen Markley

•