Book Round-Up: Cozy Witchy Edition

Thornyhold by Mary Stewart: Just about the gentlest possible story you could imagine about witches in a small English village. As with most of Stewart's romantic suspense novels, the protagonist is an orphan looking for a purpose. In this story, she inherits a cottage from her witchy aunt and finds among her neighbors a busybody who seems to have powers of her own and a handsome widower with an adorable son.

 The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna: Just about the coziest story you could read about witches in a small English village, complete with magical potions, adorable moppets (three daughters this time), a goofy dog, and a sweet romance. As one would expect from a modern romance, the magic is a much bigger deal than in Stewart's novel and the characters are dealing with not just a growing attraction but their own past trauma. It was lovely, and I look forward to Mandanna's other novels.

 Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones: Just about ... eh, I guess third time's not the charm. While waiting for some holds to come in at the library, and having just watched Miyazaki's adaptation of Howl, I decided to re-read it. Some day I have to get the sequels.

 Cackle by Rachel Harrison: Every once in a while I feel like my understanding of a book is vastly different from others’, or at least of those who are active online. Cackle is often described as a cozy, witchy, feminist novel, and it is that, but there is serious psychological horror underlying it. “It’s about female friendships, and not needing a man to have a fulfilling life!” It is, but it is also about how friendships can be just as toxic as romantic relationships. “It’s about empowerment and discovering your authentic self!” But Annie’s empowerment comes at the expense of a whole lot of people. The life Annie ultimately chooses – carefree, living day to day, enjoying nature and beauty and good food – seems like a dream to anyone mired in the daily grind, but it is ultimately a superficial life, lacking in meaningful connection or purpose of any kind. Annie finds herself but loses her humanity, and to me that is a horror.

Book Round-Up: Supersized Edition

 The Witch of Wild Things by Raquel Vásquez Gilliland: A romance novel with a touch of fantasy. It has been advertised as magical realism, but it's not really that because of the efforts to make sense of and explain the magic. I liked the plot and the characters, but once again the melodramatic, YA-influenced style of writing kept me mildly annoyed. Occasionally, though, a different narrative voice shone through that was much more engaging. I may someday read the rest of the trilogy.

Anne of the Island by L.M. Montgomery: These really are a comfort-read for me. As a girl I was intrigued by the depictions of college from almost a century ago, although there was less of that than I remembered. And it was amusing to see Anne delude herself about Gilbert for almost four years; what an ending, though!

Ragnarok by A.S. Byatt: Another novella in the Canongate Myth series. Byatt relates the myths of the Norse gods through a young English girl who has evacuated to the countryside during WWII, and her version is beautiful, visceral, and bleak.

Swordheart by T. Kingfisher: This is the third of Kinfisher's novels set in the Temple of the White Rat world, after the Clocktaur books. Like all of her novels so far, it has wonderfully rich world-building, endearing characters, serious topics handled with a light touch, and plenty of humor.

60 Songs that Explain the 90s by Rob Harvilla: A fun series of essays on popular songs from the 1990s, linked thematically. The essays are more impressionistic than critical, and had me seeking out a bunch of songs I haven't listened to in years.

Paladin's Grace by T. Kingfisher: Kingfisher has feet of clay! The fourth in the Temple series and the first in the Saints of Steel subseries. These books qualify as romantasy, meaning the romance is the primary story, but unfortunately this romance did not interest me too much; the beats were just too similar to Swordheart. The fantasy part, on the other hand, was great, and will be continued in the next novel.

Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales by Heather Fawcett: A wonderful conclusion to the series. I'm 90% sure Fawcett wrote this in response to certain popular romantasy series out there, because while Wendell might be tall and a fairy king, but he is blond, genial, friend to the fairy equivalent of the working class, and kinda lazy, rather than dark and brooding. And when he has his big, angry show of power, and Emily points out that based on her research he will regret it, he's happy to take her advice. I hope Fawcett writes more fiction for adults.

Nine Coaches Waiting by Mary Stewart: An unexpected discovery in the little free library across the street from me, it's a thoroughly enjoyable romantic thriller with gothic elements and a dozen allusions to literature including Jane Eyre.

Paladin's Strength by T. Kingfisher: The second Saints of Steel novel had a much more interesting love story. And it was so much fun -- Nuns! Paladins! Gladiators! Bears! Really creepy golems!

Book Round-Up

 Who We Are and How We Got Here by David Reich: Reich goes over the history of the human race and its migrations, based on the latest techniques for harvesting and analyzing DNA. I'm a sucker for this kind of thing, and I was especially interested to see that modern studies are confirming what 1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus argued: that the Clovis culture people were not the first to settle the American continents.  The takeaway from this book is that different human populations (and almost-humans) have been mixing and remixing for hundreds of thousands of years, far more often than we thought. 

Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore by Matthew Sullivan: Sullivan's debut novel is about a bookstore employee who witnesses a favorite customer's suicide; when she learns he left clues in a number of books for her, she starts a quest that forces her to confront her traumatic past. It's an engaging read with interesting characters, but be warned: the book is much darker than its title sounds.

The Hating Game by Sally Thorne: This is the enemies-to-lovers trope on steroids, and it was lots of fun to read. Lucy in particular was an endearing character, and I greatly enjoyed watching her and Josh get to know each other.

Here by Richard McGuire: this is an expansion of McGuire's original 6-page comic, showing the history of a corner of a room over millions of years. It's an amazing feat of imagination, and an unusual demonstration of life and humanity over the ages. I adored it.

The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart and Carson Ellis: A cute middle-grade adventure involving puzzles, bullies, and a dastardly plan to take over the world. Beadboy2 wasn't interested, but maybe Beadboy3 will be in a couple of years.

Book Round-Up

Darned if You Do by Monica Ferris: the latest but one of the Crewel World series, this novel had some sloppy editing, but it was made up by a genuinely interesting mystery.  Ferris's character development continues to shine.

Rose Cottage by Mary Stewart: A quiet, gentle story set in post-war England, this novel is part mystery, part family drama, and part romance, but is mostly a pleasant diversion.

The Strawberry Hearts Diner by Carolyn Brown: This was ... kind of awful.  I'm all for cozy novels set in cute small towns, but this was too unrealistic.  The small-town superiority was too ridiculous, the characters' relationships developed far too quickly, the alleged conflicts were too minor (or just petered out instead of being resolved). I ended up skimming through to the anti-climactic ending, and it wasn't worth it.

The Mystery of the Yellow Room by Gaston Leroux: Published in 1907, it's one of the first locked room mysteries, and well constructed; I was able to accurately guess the perpetrator of the crime and his motive, but the way he did it confounded me. It's also a product of its time; the success of the crime hinged in part on two people deliberately impeding the investigation to protect someone's honor -- not an internal sense of honor that comes from integrity, but an external one based on reputation.  I have little patience for that sort of thing, and it kept me from appreciating the novel as much as I should have.