I’m going to do something a bit different this time and reverse the book order, because I LOVED #34, really liked #33, and did NOT like #32.

[34] Yours Truly by Abby Jimenez
Fiction / Women, part II of Part of Your World, which I read in December and loved, read on Kindle

Synopsis: Briana dislikes Jacob, her new ER doctor coworker, from the get-go. He’s quiet and impersonal and it comes off as unfriendly. But then Jacob writes her a letter to apologize for his behavior, and as they exchange letters back and forth, Briana starts to see a different side of him, and wants to get to know him better. They spend time together and start to really like each other… the only problem is she’s getting over a horrible divorce and completely uninterested in anything long-term. And Jacob is dealing with his brother marrying Jacob’s ex.

Review: The plot of this book is ridiculous, and I was 100% here for it (until the end where it seemed to really unravel, ha). I had a stupid grin on my face most of the time I was reading this book. Briana is hilarious, and Jacob is so sweet, and I loved their interactions and that they brought out the best in each other.

Interestingly, there is a trigger warning (see below) for cheating, pregnancy issues, suicide, and clinical anxiety at the beginning of the book. The clinical anxiety got to me a bit while reading – you could really feel it in Jacob’s character, but Briana’s chapters provided relief (and the whole book wasn’t that way).

Recommend? yes!

[33] Aurora by David Koepp
Fiction / Thrillers / Medical (hmm), green light from Knox on The Popcast, listened to on Libby

Synopsis: A solar storm reaches the earth and shuts down the power grid for months. Billionaire Thom thinks he’s done all the prepping necessary for this scenario, and is ready to live in his silo underground. Meanwhile, his sister Aubrey wings it as she deals with her pos ex-husband, and his teenage son who she has custody of.

Review: I love disaster plots, so this is right up my alley. Plus, it’s mostly set in Aurora, Illinois, which is near where I live! This was the first fiction book (ever) I listened to on audio, so that gave me a different perspective. I thought the voices were a bit cheesy, but I was able to keep the many characters straight, so that’s saying something!

What of the actual book, Kim?! The pace was great, the science was realistic enough, and the characters were interesting and well formed. There were characters you rooted for, and characters you wanted to see die. I was really entertained, and totally get why this is being made into a Netflix movie!

Recommend? Yes

[32] Island Time by Georgia Clark
Fiction / Romance / Romantic Comedy, saw in “available now for Pride month” on Libby, read on Kindle

Synopsis: The Kelly and Lee families are vacationing together for a week on a remote island near Queensland, Australia when a volcano erupts and a tsunami hits the island, and they become stranded there with two island caretakers for six weeks.

Review: The beginning of this book is interesting, as we start to meet all the characters in the family, and the volcano goes off and the tsunami hits the island. Then it’s just slow, slooooow character development. The characters are sort of interesting (but all terrible and unlikeable), but not enough to warrant how damn long this book is. I felt like it was never going to end, and nothing really picked up until the end of the book.

So I need to dive into this a bit to complain. Feel free to stop here. I do NOT recommend this book.

There are so many damn characters and points of view. Too many. I couldn’t keep them straight at times. I feel like I need to write them out so I feel like I got something out of this book I should have DNF’d.

• Julia and Gene Kelly (Australian) – married parents who are secretly separated
• Matty (Matilda) Kelly (Australian) – oldest daughter, married to Parker Lee, supposed to carry their baby but unsure about it
• Amelia Kelly (Australian) – youngest daughter, so excited to introduce her family to her boyfriend, only he never shows and she falls in love with the caretaker, Liss
• Ludmila and Randall Lee (Russian & American) – married parents, Ludmilla is cold and serious, Randall is friendly and energetic (think golden retriever in human form)
• Parker Lee (American) – their daughter, married to Matty, uprooting her NYC startup life to move to Australia with Matty to start their family
• Liss (Canadian) – island caretaker, escaped her Canadian life to the remote island
• Jarrah – indigenous island caretaker

This book was just trying to do way too much. Fitting in too many story lines. Trying to fit in indigenous culture and land reclamation (I appreciate the effort). Because there was so much (yet somehow, so little) going on, nothing was done well. Blah. I did pull a few quotes from it though, so that’s saying something:

Surprising and delighting her best-loved people through small, altruistic acts gave Amelia a solid sense of well-being. It was so easy to do, it quietly perplexed her why it wasn’t a more widespread practice.

People felt their perspective was oceanic—mutable and deep—but it was just a grain of sand, tiny and contained.

The writer Sheila Heti said the egoism of childbearing was like the egoism of colonizing a country. Both carry the wish of imprinting yourself on the world and making it over in your values and in your image.

Recommend? F no