It’s a little late for this post, but I had a lot going on in July! With preparing for my vacation and lots going on at work and my personal life, this blog post sat in my drafts for far too long. Better late than never.
July was a difficult month for me. Thanks to my anxiety, I experienced bouts of numbness and memory problems. The amount of reading I did in July is very much reflective of that — it’s actually a lot for me, and I know that has to do with the fact that I turned to books whenever I wasn’t feeling well (which was often) or when I needed a distraction. Luckily, I discovered one of my new favourite books, and a new favourite author to watch. So there were definitely some “highs” this month despite everything going on.
Here’s are the books I read in July, and some thoughts on each of them!
Wilder Girls
It’s been eighteen months since the Raxter School for Girls was put under quarantine. Since the Tox hit and pulled Hetty’s life out from under her.
It started slow. First the teachers died one by one. Then it began to infect the students, turning their bodies strange and foreign. Now, cut off from the rest of the world and left to fend for themselves on their island home, the girls don’t dare wander outside the school’s fence, where the Tox has made the woods wild and dangerous. They wait for the cure they were promised as the Tox seeps into everything.
But when Byatt goes missing, Hetty will do anything to find her, even if it means breaking quarantine and braving the horrors that lie beyond the fence. And when she does, Hetty learns that there’s more to their story, to their life at Raxter, than she could have ever thought true.
Source: Goodreads
Thoughts: I loved this book. It checked all the boxes for me: weird, ambiguous, suspenseful, and empowering. The fact that this is a debut from Rory Power is so impressive. Power is 100% an author to watch out for in the future, and I can’t wait to see what her mind comes up with next. Whatever it is, it’s going to be pretty hard to beat Wilder Girls, a story that acts as an original and terrifying allegory for the treatment of girls’ and women’s’ bodies.
Wilder Girls is perfect for a very specific kind of reader. If you get frustrated when an author doesn’t provide answers or closure, I wouldn’t recommend this book to you. Personally, I loved that very little was explained. It mirrored how the girls were feeling, and captured their confusion and despair perfectly. So, if you like all things weird, aren’t afraid of gross stuff, and you don’t get too upset when left in the dark, then this book is very much up your alley.
The Dreamers
In an isolated college town in the hills of Southern California, a freshman girl stumbles into her dorm room, falls asleep—and doesn’t wake up. She sleeps through the morning, into the evening. Her roommate, Mei, cannot rouse her. Neither can the paramedics who carry her away, nor the perplexed doctors at the hospital. Then a second girl falls asleep, and then another, and panic takes hold of the college and spreads to the town. As the number of cases multiplies, classes are canceled, and stores begin to run out of supplies. A quarantine is established. The National Guard is summoned.
Mei, an outsider in the cliquish hierarchy of dorm life, finds herself thrust together with an eccentric, idealistic classmate. Two visiting professors try to protect their newborn baby as the once-quiet streets descend into chaos. A father succumbs to the illness, leaving his daughters to fend for themselves. And at the hospital, a new life grows within a college girl, unbeknownst to her—even as she sleeps. A psychiatrist, summoned from Los Angeles, attempts to make sense of the illness as it spreads through the town. Those infected are displaying unusual levels of brain activity, more than has ever been recorded. They are dreaming heightened dreams—but of what?
Source: Goodreads
Thoughts: This book blew me away. I’ve never read a book like The Dreamers. I don’t even know how to begin to explain it. At times it felt like horror, but I’m not even sure it can be categorized as that. Every single line felt like it was plucked right out of a poem. Every chapter punched me in the gut. The Dreamers is one of my new favourites.
Like Wilder Girls, this book is meant for a very specific kind of a reader. There are a ton of characters and story lines to follow, and a lot is left up to the reader’s interpretation. You might even finish the book thinking, “What did I just read?” And that’s why I loved it so much — because I wasn’t able to clearly define it or place it neatly into a box.
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine
No one’s ever told Eleanor that life should be better than fine.
Meet Eleanor Oliphant: She struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she’s thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life of avoiding social interactions, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy.
But everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office. When she and Raymond together save Sammy, an elderly gentleman who has fallen on the sidewalk, the three become the kinds of friends who rescue one another from the lives of isolation they have each been living. And it is Raymond’s big heart that will ultimately help Eleanor find the way to repair her own profoundly damaged one.
Source: Goodreads
Thoughts: I have struggled with how to review this book and properly put my thoughts into words. I’ll start with the marketing. As I discussed on Instagram, I found the marketing of this book to be a little misleading. I was expecting a quirky rom-com, but the book ended up being really heavy as it deals with mental illness, physical abuse and domestic violence, to name a few. Writing this, I realize that most of my problems are outside of the writing itself, so I don’t fault Honeyman for that. As a character, I like that Eleanor is often portrayed as unlikeable, but you end up rooting for her and empathizing with her life experiences. In general, I think this is a solid book, but the discourse around it makes me feel a little icky knowing what the story is really about.
Stay Sexy & Don’t Get Murdered: The Definitive How-To Guide
The highly anticipated first book by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark, the voices behind the #1 hit podcast My Favorite Murder!
Sharing never-before-heard stories ranging from their struggles with depression, eating disorders, and addiction, Karen and Georgia irreverently recount their biggest mistakes and deepest fears, reflecting on the formative life events that shaped them into two of the most followed voices in the nation.
In Stay Sexy & Don’t Get Murdered, Karen and Georgia focus on the importance of self-advocating and valuing personal safety over being ‘nice’ or ‘helpful.’ They delve into their own pasts, true crime stories, and beyond to discuss meaningful cultural and societal issues with fierce empathy and unapologetic frankness.
Source: Goodreads
Thoughts: If you’re a fan of the podcast, I’d say this is a great way to get to know more about the hosts, Georgia and Karen. I probably wouldn’t have picked this up if I hadn’t gone through a whirlwind phase of devouring every episode of My Favourite Murder a few years ago. I was hoping for some more insight into why Georgia and Karen are so drawn to stories of murder and serial killers, and to be fair, the reader can connect the dots on their own. I think there’s a lot to be said about why women are so often drawn to macabre stories of true crime. Is it because we’re so hyper-aware of and accustomed to violence in our own lives? This wasn’t explored too much in the book, but I still enjoyed reading it.
That’s it for July! Thanks for reading. What are you reading right now?
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