Last Week in Reading: April 10-16, 2023

I'm still trying to find my groove between when to write here and when to record/edit/post new episodes, so forgive me while the schedule is in flux!

Last week I actually got through quite a few books! First up was Maeve in America by Maeve Higgins. In this collection of essays, comedian Higgins shares her thoughts on having come to America from Ireland as an adult and what it's been like making a home in this land of the "free" and home of the increasing unnerved (my words, not hers!).

Next up was a novel by Richard Brautigan whose title I will not use because I don't want to get flagged for language. Let's just say it is the same as the name of a healthcare procedure that is currently being hotly contested and banned in states. Anyway, I heard about this book years ago on an NPR podcast because of the book's primary setting: a library where people bring their unpublished works that they have written. This book so captured people over the years that the Brautigan Library is now very much a real thing and operates under the same premise: anyone can bring a book they've written that will never be published there, anyone can come to read the books, but the books must stay in the library. The narrator's girlfriend does find herself in need of the aforementioned medical procedure and the story was quirky and of its time, but mostly I was in it for the setting, and I found it to be interesting.

Friday night I inhaled the graphic novel Anya's Ghost by Vera Brosgol. This has been a book I've passed on my school's shelves a thousand times (and at my last school another thousand), but just never got around to it! I love Brosgol's more recent book Be Prepared about her mishaps at summer camp as a kid, and this was a fun, inventive, appropriately creepy story about a high school girl who accidentally adopts a teenage ghost who died 100 years ago. It's probably better suited for a high school library, but I'm sure my 8th graders would enjoy this if I put it in a Halloween display this fall.

I finally finished reading Alice Oseman's second novel Radio Silence on Saturday, and boy howdy was this an emotional journey! I loved the Netflix version of Oseman's graphic novel series Heartstopper, and bought this ebook when it was on sale last summer. It is a totally different vibe, but at the same time feels like Oseman. Also it's a book about a podcast, which is particularly up my street at the moment! Great high school and LGBTQ representation.

And then yesterday I stayed up past my bedtime to finish reading my ARC of Emily Henry's upcoming novel, Happy Place. It's hard for me to believe she's only been on the chick lit/romance scene for the past few years because she's become such a staple in that market (she was doing YA for a long time before that). This was right on par with her other books, a story of friendship and relationships and found families. Here the story focused on Harriet and Wyn, together for years and even engaged, but they recently called it off and haven't told anyone yet. The two need to keep up appearances for one more week, though, when they're on their annual summer getaway with their best friends. It got me right in the feels, and I could think of worse ways to spend a rainy Sunday.