Review: Harriet the Spy

4 stars. Oops, seemed to have stumbled onto something controversial. What book published in the 60s isn't going to attract some lightning, though? A couple of things: 1) I entered this having remembered reading and enjoying it as a kid but quickly discovered that every memory of the book was completely washed away by memories of the movie adaptation instead... SO, I read this - basically - fresh. 2) I actually understand all of the arguments here. I would just say that there's a difference between a "bad book" and a "book you don't like." Finally, 3) sometimes a book can have wonderful aspects and also not-so-wonderful aspects. Like maybe every book ever. Like maybe every person ever.

Published in 1964, Harriet the Spy is about Harriet M. Welsch, a precocious, intelligent, headstrong 11-year-old determined to be a spy or a writer or some combo of both. She records her observations and thoughts - unfiltered - in a notebook. It's really a coming-of-age story as we witness Harriet experience intense change, face consequences for her actions, and learn several lessons about how messy life can be.

I have to say I really, really enjoyed it. It's hilarious, clever and refreshing... a couple of reviewers have noted that Harriet was a hugely different type of female protagonist for the 60s. She still feels different today, in a good way. No, Harriet isn't sweet, docile, obedient, or filtered in any way. She's stubborn, loud, nosy, confused, extremely critical and judgmental - kind of a toxic friend, too. The ending didn't sit totally right with me, but I think it was the right ending for her, if that makes sense.

I don't think this book - or any book - should be taken as a literal guide for one's behavior. Of course redemption arcs have their time and place, but I think kids are smart enough to be able to distinguish between when a hero isn't acting heroic, no? And smart enough to navigate action and consequence when it isn't perhaps as straightforward? As it isn't typically IRL? Who knows. Not me. But I do know that reading this book was an endlessly entertaining experience that I'd recommend to kids and adults alike. It's a classic for a reason.

Harriet the Spy on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads

Review: Wild Fell

3 stars. Mixed feelings on this one - there were parts I really loved and connected with, but there were also parts that seriously dragged the story in directions it probably didn't need to go. It's an odd one, for sure, which I think was intentional, so I want to be careful about misinterpreting deliberate choices for... mistakes. I've seen a couple of other reviews call it out for pacing and that may be valid but I'm not sure if that's a reaction to the fact that it's unusual - not necessarily wrong or bad. The thing that bothered me most was the dialogue.

More on that later. Wild Fell is a straight-up, self-declared ghost story told by a young man named Jamie. He chronicles his shy childhood, his relationship with his parents, his coming of age and his eventual purchase of a mysterious, isolated mansion in a small Canadian town, plus his experiences with a creepy girl named Amanda who lives in his mirror. Jamie's story offers a really fascinating snapshot into a man's upbringing and identity that happens to involve the supernatural. It's kind of a slow burn that ends with a bang.

I was definitely creeped out. It snuck up on me, especially within the last couple of chapters. I didn't really see it coming, despite all the signs pointing in one direction. So Wild Fell earns a ton of points for that and for delivering a lot of atmosphere. Unfortunately the dialogue really took me out of the story - more than once. The way characters talked with each other, stating each other's names, elongating statements for no reason... it all came across as super unnatural (but not in a supernatural way). 

Not that I could do any better, TBH. And I do tend to overlook or forgive awkward dialogue in what I read, because that's just how it is. Unfortunately this was awkward to a distracting level. BUT!! I do recommend this book to horror fans! It's excellent and will stick with you. It's been a few days since I wrapped it up and I'm still thinking about it. So ignore my nitpicks and go enjoy a damn good ghost story. 

Wild Fell on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads

Review: The Girl in the Tower (Winternight Trilogy #2)

4 stars. Love this whole vibe. Katherine Arden manages to pair cozy fairy tale flavors with intense action and chaos for the characters we know and love at this point. It definitely suffers a bit from second book syndrome, and it took me a longggg time to get through, but The Girl in the Tower really just works. Jumping in immediately after the end of the first book, it follows Vasya as she travels, reunites with her siblings, and finds a lot of trouble along the way. 

I would've wished for a bit more of the creepy spooky bits I loved in The Bear and the Nightingale, and a bit less of the politics, but I get what's going on here. I don't mind a reasonable, deliberate expansion to further along her arc. The way Arden incorporates folklore and legends is really beautiful and interesting. She excels especially at villains - almost more so than heroes. The bad characters in these books are really nasty.

Vasya is a wonderful and flawed heroine. She's brave, smart, determined, stubborn and incredibly selfish. She also demonstrates growth and wisdom and a fierce protection of self despite the constraints of the time. There are hints of what's to come in the finale, and I have a feeling that Arden is going to collectively drag us all across the coals in a very well-written way... can't wait.

The Girl in the Tower on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads

Review: Cunning Folk

4 stars. I recently heard some stuff on Tik Tok about the page 100 rule - that if you're unsure about whether or not to buy a book, open it up to sample page 100 instead of page 1. It's a good technique because page 1 has been picked over to death in drafts, proposals, and numerous iterations of manuscripts by numerous individuals on the publishing team and likely isn't a good representation of what the writing is actually like. If you're considering reading Cunning Folk, read anything past page 1 - past the first quarter of the book, maybe. As other reviews have noted, Adam Nevill starts things off with pages of overly metaphorical prose weighed down by flowery OTT descriptions. But definitely... stick with it, lol. This is one of the craziest horror books I've ever read.

When Tom, Fiona and their daughter Gracey buy a fixer upper in the country, they know it'll be a challenge - financially, emotionally, physically - but they are determined to give their daughter a spacious and quiet home in a safe community. Almost immediately, though, they are met with obstacles they did not expect: rude, weird neighbors, problems with the garden, Gracey frightened by her wanderings in the woods. Things escalate, unravel and spiral out of control until Tom is desperate, etc. etc. etc.

Cunning Folk could've ended after the renovations start to go bad and I'd be satisfied. There's nothing scarier to me than being cash-strapped with an endless amount of  insurmountable home repairs on my to-do list. Nevill really leans into this too - oh, as if spooky neighbors aren't enough? Let's throw crippling project anxiety and debt into the mix. It's the old Amityville Horror trick - real horror is economic. Luckily, or not so luckily for the faint of heart, he balances all this out with genuinely creepy supernatural/folk horror elements... rituals, curses, witchcraft, a clearing in the woods, ancient magic, and a new form of scary to me: competitive garden terror. HGTV landscaping gone horribly, horribly wrong.

I docked a star because you know why, but this is a great, edge-of-your-seat, can't-look-away, immersive book. It's my first Adam Nevill and I'm eager to check out more. It's fascinating that it started out as a screenplay, because so much is communicated through the characters' inner turmoil and thoughts. Anyway, yeah, if you can get past the extreme OTT language in the beginning, this has potential to be a real classic. 

Cunning Folk on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads

Review: Dead Silence

4 stressed out stars. That was intense. I'm glad I own this book, because I'd love to read it again, or maybe force it on my husband so I can talk about it with someone. I have to say I kind of guessed where it was going halfway through, but no worries - the final act is like jumping from the frying pan into the fire into a worse fire and then back into the frying pan again. You've been warned: this blend of sci-fi, horror and thriller is not for the faint of heart.

Dead Silence meets up with the crew of a ragtag repair team on their final mission before the inevitable replacement by machines. Claire, their capable but distant team lead, is our protagonist - deliciously unreliable with tons of trauma to drive the plot. Not thrilled at the thought of returning to a desk job on Earth, she jumps at the chance to extend their job a little longer and check out a mysterious emergency beacon in uncharted territories. Here's what ensues: haunted space Titanic. Who could resist?

Not me, as I plowed through this in 2 days. What I loved: the premise, the spooky sequences, the characters, the world-building and the "system," for lack of a better word, by which Claire was haunted. Her arc was especially satisfying and felt realistic for a survivor once again put in a life-or-death situation. I also loved that not every question was answered; a refreshing choice for someone who believes that sometimes the blank spots should stay blank.

What I didn't love: the romance, the wordiness, the repetition of Claire "shoving thoughts or feelings down" (also Kane and his arm folding - nobody caught this?? It was used 50+ times), a slight... juvenile tone to the writing, which is ridiculous considering the content, but ehhhh that's just my reaction. Maybe the action sequences got a little OTT. I get weirdly triggered by space worlds because I thought the authors of The Expanse books were so arrogant about it, but this one was okay... barely. I also wasn't a fan of the epilogue, but I'm not a fan of epilogues in general. 

Maybe just ignore me. All of those elements are about me, not about the book. Maybe it was just overhyped and I went in with unreasonable expectations. Either way, I highly, highly recommend this and hope it gets adapted one day - I want to fucking see the insanity unfold before my eyes. Truly incredible reading experience. 

Dead Silence on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads

Review: Bone White

5 stars. Might re-read this immediately. Wintery supernatural small town horror is such a huge turn-on for me and this one checks all the boxes.

The bare bones are this: Dread's Hand is an isolated mining town in Alaska with a dark history and bad vibes, and it's where Paul Gallo's twin brother went missing over a year ago. When a serial killer from the Hand confesses to his crimes - along with the location of his buried victims - Paul wonders if his brother is among them. So he travels across the world to find out, following his instincts and the strange connection he and Danny always shared. The Hand offers very few answers and Paul grows more and more desperate, and then terrified, as he begins to connect what happened to his brother and what haunts the woods around the town.

Difficult to summarize, because there are many layers to this story... layers of history and folklore and side treks that don't go anywhere. There is Paul's investigation, and the law's investigation, which both lead to discoveries that tangle up things further. Scary symbols, eerie connections, etc. And there's a journalist with some crazy but helpful stories, and the flu is going around, and some creepy masked kids are causing trouble, and the church was built over a giant sinkhole, and the "Inn" only has one room, and winter is coming. The crosses, so good. The whole thing is really just a vibe.

A couple of minor complaints: some sequences drag on too long, some details are a little too on-the-nose (I adore a creepy town name but this one felt a bit forced), and I could never really connect with Paul as a protagonist. Minor, minor, minor. I couldn't put this down and I absolutely loved how wacky and delicious and OTT it is. Paul's journey ... ugh, so satisfying. The premise, the lore, the showdown... the tropes I know and love are fresh and fun here. Highly recommend.

Bone White on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads

Review: Dark Matter

3 stars. Chills upon chills. This book is one long anxiety attack, from page one. Such a well-formed story - one that I will probably never read again. Michelle Paver is incredibly talented for taking such a fleshed out (initially unlikeable) character and dropping him exactly where he needed to go for our own sick sense of scared shitless entertainment. I for one had full body freak-outs, which didn't happen when I read Dark Matter's sister books (The Terror and The North Water, unnoficial sister status assigned by yours truly). But holy cow does arctic desperation really feel like coming home, for me. Man versus something-out-there-in-the-cold-darkness is my happy place.

It's a lot simpler than the other two. This is a very narrow story - and the POV journal format is clever as it only emphasizes the isolation and claustrophobia experienced by the protagonist. Four men set out to "winter over" in the Arctic, intending to conduct a scientific expedition collecting measurements and instrument readings about the weather, ice, etc. Due to circumstances almost too unlucky to be believed, our main character ends up there alone, determined to carry on the expedition without the rest of the team. But (yyyessssssss): is he truly alone?

It probably goes without saying at this point that a lot of my anxiety stemmed from the dog situation. Hell with Jack, I was sick to my stomach out of fear and worry for them at every point - even the non-scary parts. Every time one of them was mentioned or involved I could barely bring myself to turn the page. That type of fear is not my favorite but I won't dock a star per usual because I didn't do my homework ahead of time and didn't check trigger warnings. Plus, it ends out okay, sort of. But ugh. Not fun.

Still, I could not put this down - I finished it in two days and read the final chapters in a breathless panic. I learned to really root for Jack in the end - guess being haunted in the Arctic really changes you. I'm a huge sucker for things like this:

"And yet I think I now understand the impulse which drives men to shoot bears. It isn't for the pelt or the meat or the sport - or not only those things. I think they need to do it. They need to kill that great Arctic totem to give them some sense of control over the wilderness - even if that is only an illusion.”

And there's another quote I'm too lazy to find where Jack muses that the reason why men try to measure and read environments like the Arctic is just a way of trying to grapple with its intense strangeness, or isolation, or something along those lines; all futile efforts anyhow, because it's essentially unknowable. Not to get too cosmic, but here we are.

Anyway, I liked it. Reminds me a bit of Jennifer McMahon, except that it leans a little more toward Sarah Waters and is a little more male?

Dark Matter on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads

Review: The Bear and the Nightingale (Winternight Trilogy #1)

5 stars. Everything I was promised and more. I am so buzzed off this story, despite the fact that it took me fucking ages to read. I blame that on a very intense job transition... the last month or so has left me barely alive, let alone functioning normally. I will absolutely not be meeting my reading goal for this year, nor will I be even up to what I usually read, numbers-wise. That's life. But I'm so glad to have read this incredible book that is warm and cold at the same time, in all the best ways.

There's enough hype out there so I'll forego a summary, but if you've been living under a rock (in which case, I'm sorry you emerged into the world when you did - read this book, it'll help), The Bear and the Nightingale is an atmospheric fairy tale that braids together threads of Russian folklore, magic, a little history, a fiery, feisty heroine and an ice cold frost demon. It's classic good versus evil set against a fascinating backdrop of religious transition.

There are some elements to this narrative that are unusual or could seem a little confusing. The pacing is very atypical and the character arcs are also unpredictable. In that sense it tastes a little less like a traditional fairy tale even though it smells like one. But I'm a huge sucker for religious transition, as I said ... give me alllll the clashing of beliefs resulting in allllll the social, economic and personal consequences! Bring me the tension between the old and the new! Bring me a protagonist who rejects them both!

I've been really into Katherine Arden's story for a while - not to be creepy - and I'm so happy that her writing matches my impression of her as interesting, capable and talented. Everything about this: the word choice, the flow, the imagery, the premise, the descriptions of winter... all of it has strong appeal. I cannot emphasize enough how unnecessary my stamp of approval is at this point (at any point really), but here it is. Approved. More, more, more, more, please.

The Bear and the Nightingale on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads

Review: Boy Parts

5 stars. What a perfectly electric companion to A Certain Hunger. I need to think about this one some more, but I can safely say it'll land on my list of Kelly Choice Awards for the year. Maybe even top 5. Reading this was just ... a really fantastic experience. Highly recommend for fans of American Psycho, Maestra, maybe even Tampa. Absolutely nails the snooty art world; absolutely nails the bad art friend mood/vibe/aesthetic.

Boy Parts is about a young photographer named Irina who destroys everything in her path. Interested in fetish photography, she is fueled by sheer, alcohol- and drug-fueled chaos; manipulation; reckless behavior; unhealthy relationships; non-consensual interactions; neglected friendships; trauma; toxic emotions; vibes that push the envelope beyond irresponsible and towards criminal, or insane, behavior. I knew the ending was going to be vague and surreal - so in that sense it was a little predictable - but I really loved it. Crunchy. Didn't want a drop of alcohol after putting it down lol

It's a little terrifying how real the correspondence felt in this book. The text / email conversations made me shiver and cringe like I was living them. The party sequences were especially vivid and there was one particularly shrewd part (the chapter with the plastic surgeon when Irina muses about what's actually natural) that will stick with me for a long time. I love that theme: what is real or natural or unreal / unnatural and does anything actually mean anything? Oh yeah. Gets a little existential, in a very entertaining way.

That's it. That's all I'm going to say about this thing. Go read it. It's wild.

Boy Parts on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads

Review: A Certain Hunger

4 stars. This is actually really more of a 3 star read for me, but I have to give it an extra bump due to the sheer audacity of it all and the fact that the premise is so damn attractive, if not exactly groundbreaking. A Certain Hunger clearly and declaratively stands on the shoulders of American Psycho, the Hannibal Lector books, maybe even more contemporary works such as Maestra or You or anything written by Ottessa. And that's what you should jump in knowing: if you enjoy these sorts of books, you will definitely enjoy this one, but don't expect something super fresh or unique. It is what it is - referential, derivative - and delightful all the same.

A Certain Hunger is a faux memoir written by Dorothy Daniels, an imprisoned serial killer who murdered her male victims and ate them. She recounts each crime with wit, whimsy, and an incredible level of detail. Dorothy really is two things: a self-diagnosed psychopath and a former food critic; the only thing that interests her - sparks interest, passion, obsession - is food. And so this book features it predominantly and potentially more than her crimes. But everything is tangled and intertwined, naturally. She eats what she kills.

Here's the thing: I think this book would've been better as a novella. Dorothy is, once you get into her head and used to her voice, a little one-note. I felt less and less entranced as the story continued... the chapters began to feel repetitive. I honestly don't know how to separate that sensation from the fact that the writing itself is so damn stylish and lush and rich and full of words that felt perfectly pretentious for her character - maybe it's because the narrative plot itself is just a bit... thin. We know her trajectory from page one, so the surprises are few and the stakes are low.

Still - this book taps into something strange and cathartic. I hope it becomes a classic. Sex, food, Italy, art, killing men basically because they exist and are trash... what's not to love? I can barely shake off some of the food stuff and I wonder if I'll stay away from meat for a bit. That may have been part of the point, but Dorothy would be horrified. And maybe we should all channel Dorothy every once in a while. Classy, sassy, hungry, murderous AF. Sounds tempting to me.

A Certain Hunger on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads