April was a very exciting month for reading in many ways. I read a ton of fantastic books this month, and I also hit my yearly reading goal… How you might ask? Well, my post with tips for becoming an avid reader explains a lot of it, but basically I have just been obsessed with reading this year and there’s no end in sight. I set my goal for 30 last year and only ended up hitting 27, so I get it for 30 yet again, hoping I would hit it but thinking I would likely go over. Well, it looks like I’m going way over!
I know I will hit 50 by the end of 2021, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it ends up looking more like 75… I usually read the most during the summer days spent by the pool.
Looking back over these, the first book I read in April feels like it was six months ago and another time entirely. I don’t know how things are moving so quickly around here! I read a lot of great books this month, so grab a cup of coffee and catch up on my recent reads with me.
What I Read in April 2021
The Authenticity Project, Clare Pooley: 3 stars
Description: Julian Jessop, an eccentric, lonely artist and septuagenarian believes that most people aren’t really honest with each other. But what if they were? And so he writes—in a plain, green journal—the truth about his own life and leaves it in his local café. It’s run by the incredibly tidy and efficient Monica, who furtively adds her own entry and leaves the book in the wine bar across the street. Before long, the others who find the green notebook add the truths about their own deepest selves—and soon find each other In Real Life at Monica’s Café.
The Authenticity Project‘s cast of characters—including Hazard, the charming addict who makes a vow to get sober; Alice, the fabulous mommy Instagrammer whose real life is a lot less perfect than it looks online; and their other new friends—is by turns quirky and funny, heartbreakingly sad and painfully true-to-life. It’s a story about being brave and putting your real self forward—and finding out that it’s not as scary as it seems. In fact, it looks a lot like happiness.
The Authenticity Project is just the tonic for our times that readers are clamoring for—and one they will take to their hearts and read with unabashed pleasure.
My thoughts: This was a recommendation from my friend Alyson, and I liked it! It was not a page turner by any means, and I definitely struggled to get interested in the first few chapters, but it does pick up speed after that.
I loved the premise of the book- strangers coming together just in the time they need each other most. I didn’t expect the ending at all (don’t want to say anything and risk giving it away!), but my friend Alyson said she suspected it would end that way so I don’t know if that’s a universal experience.
Monica’s story was very relatable for me. The only reason I gave this three stars was because the ending didn’t tie up as nicely as I would have liked. I thought there were still a few loose ends left that could have been explored a little further.
All Adults Here, Emma Straub: 4 stars
Description: When Astrid Strick witnesses a school bus accident in the center of town, it jostles loose a repressed memory from her young parenting days decades earlier. Suddenly, Astrid realizes she was not quite the parent she thought she’d been to her three, now-grown children. But to what consequence?
Astrid’s youngest son is drifting and unfocused, making parenting mistakes of his own. Her daughter is pregnant yet struggling to give up her own adolescence. And her eldest seems to measure his adult life according to standards no one else shares. But who gets to decide, so many years later, which long-ago lapses were the ones that mattered? Who decides which apologies really count? It might be that only Astrid’s thirteen-year-old granddaughter and her new friend really understand the courage it takes to tell the truth to the people you love the most.
In All Adults Here, Emma Straub’s unique alchemy of wisdom, humor, and insight come together in a deeply satisfying story about adult siblings, aging parents, high school boyfriends, middle school mean girls, the lifelong effects of birth order, and all the other things that follow us into adulthood, whether we like them to or not.
My thoughts: Ok, ok I liked it this for a lot of reasons, but it still wasn’t my favorite book ever. I think I rated it so highly because I really liked the writing and it had a lot of good character development, but I just didn’t like how the book encompassed almost every single social issue of today’s time. I mean what are the odds this family would experience every single one of the issues it explores?
That felt forced to me, but otherwise I really liked it. This is definitely more of a The Dutch House, The Goldfinch, kinda book. You know those ones where the plot isn’t super defined with big action points? I like those personally, but I know some do not.
I liked how this book highlighted the very real worry I experience often- thinking about something you said or did years ago and how it still haunts/embarrasses you today.
Romancing Mister Bridgerton, To Sir Phillip With Love, Julia Quinn: 2-3 Stars
Description: These were the Colin and Eloise Bridgerton stories!
My thoughts: Not including much detail here because these are just so short, and if you’re not interested in the Bridgerton books, you’re just not interested. If you are though, I did not like the Colin Bridgerton book, but I loved the Eloise book a lot.
These are incredibly short, and I can read them in a couple of hours if I’m really feeling up to it. I can’t wait to finish the series, but I just haven’t bought them yet because I have a ton of books to get through.
The Star-Crossed Sisters of Tuscany, Lori Nelson Spielman, 5 Stars
Description: Since the day Filomena Fontana cast a curse upon her sister more than two hundred years ago, not one second-born Fontana daughter has found lasting love. Some, like second-born Emilia, the happily-single baker at her grandfather’s Brooklyn deli, claim it’s an odd coincidence. Others, like her sexy, desperate-for-love cousin Lucy, insist it’s a true hex. But both are bewildered when their great-aunt calls with an astounding proposition: If they accompany her to her homeland of Italy, Aunt Poppy vows she’ll meet the love of her life on the steps of the Ravello Cathedral on her eightieth birthday, and break the Fontana Second-Daughter Curse once and for all.
Against the backdrop of wandering Venetian canals, rolling Tuscan fields, and enchanting Amalfi Coast villages, romance blooms, destinies are found, and family secrets are unearthed—secrets that could threaten the family far more than a centuries-old curse.
My thoughts: Wow, I did not expect to like this as much as I did. It was so good. The cover reminded me a little too much of a Hallmark movie, so I was expecting it to be extremely cheesy.
Was it cheesy? Just slightly, but it was also heartwarming, adventurous, meaningful and so much more. This book is definitely an underdog, and I hope more people discover it soon!
I loved that the main character enjoyed a good night in. I relate to a lot of her feelings even though I’m much less of a wallflower.
Finlay Donovan is Killing It, Ellie Cosimano: 5 Stars
Description: Finlay Donovan is killing it . . . except, she’s really not. She’s a stressed-out single-mom of two and struggling novelist, Finlay’s life is in chaos: the new book she promised her literary agent isn’t written, her ex-husband fired the nanny without telling her, and this morning she had to send her four-year-old to school with hair duct-taped to her head after an incident with scissors.
When Finlay is overheard discussing the plot of her new suspense novel with her agent over lunch, she’s mistaken for a contract killer and inadvertently accepts an offer to dispose of a problem husband in order to make ends meet . . . Soon, Finlay discovers that crime in real life is a lot more difficult than its fictional counterpart, as she becomes tangled in a real-life murder investigation.
Fast-paced, deliciously witty, and wholeheartedly authentic in depicting the frustrations and triumphs of motherhood in all its messiness, hilarity, and heartfelt moment, Finlay Donovan Is Killing It is the first in a brilliant new series from YA Edgar Award nominee Elle Cosimano.
My thoughts: OH MY GOSH!!! I loved this book. I read it right after star-crossed sisters, and it felt so nice to read two back to back fantastic books. This was one of the most unique books I’ve read recently. It was definitely in the mystery/thriller category but also equally a romantic comedy. I was smiling the entire time, while constantly being on the edge of my seat at the same time.
The main character is so relatable, and the story is somehow entirely believable even though this would never happen??? I found the plot and dialogue amazing too. Please try this book out! You will not be disappointed.
I also wish we had picked this for my book club, it’s one of those books that would just be easy to discuss and pour over for an hour with friends.
The Woman in the Window, A.J. Finn: 5 Stars
Description: Anna Fox lives alone—a recluse in her New York City home, unable to venture outside. She spends her day drinking wine (maybe too much), watching old movies, recalling happier times . . . and spying on her neighbors. Then the Russells move into the house across the way: a father, mother, their teenaged son. The perfect family. But when Anna, gazing out her window one night, sees something she shouldn’t, her world begins to crumble and its shocking secrets are laid bare.
What is real? What is imagined? Who is in danger? Who is in control? In this diabolically gripping thriller, no one—and nothing—is what it seems.
My thoughts: Wow, wow, wow. This book was hyped up a lot, so I wasn’t really sure what to expect. How could it be that good? Well it is. A true page turner from the very beginning, this story is twisty, dark and full of secrets.
There is one big twist in the middle of the book that I guessed very early on, but I almost think that was placed there to give you the satisfaction of knowing you were right about something? It’s hard to explain, but I now need to look at reviews and see if it was obvious enough for other people to guess it too.
The final secret though? Wow, no I did not guess that. I don’t think anyone could have! I do not want to say anything else because I want you to go into this book blind. I gave this to my mother-in-law, so I hope she reads it soon so we can discuss. This is coming out on Netflix with Amy Adams as the star, and I don’t think they could have cast it better. Watch the trailer after you’r finishd
Bringing Down the Duke, Evie Dunmore: 3 Stars
Description: England, 1879. Annabelle Archer, the brilliant but destitute daughter of a country vicar, has earned herself a place among the first cohort of female students at the renowned University of Oxford. In return for her scholarship, she must support the rising women’s suffrage movement. Her charge: recruit men of influence to champion their cause. Her target: Sebastian Devereux, the cold and calculating Duke of Montgomery who steers Britain’s politics at the Queen’s command. Her challenge: not to give in to the powerful attraction she can’t deny for the man who opposes everything she stands for.
Sebastian is appalled to find a suffragist squad has infiltrated his ducal home, but the real threat is his impossible feelings for green-eyed beauty Annabelle. He is looking for a wife of equal standing to secure the legacy he has worked so hard to rebuild, not an outspoken commoner who could never be his duchess. But he wouldn’t be the greatest strategist of the Kingdom if he couldn’t claim this alluring bluestocking without the promise of a ring…or could he?
Locked in a battle with rising passion and a will matching her own, Annabelle will learn just what it takes to topple a duke….
My thoughts: This book is for mature readers only! It was very, very steamy. I didn’t realize it was such a romance novel, and I think the cover is very misleading for that reason. Both myself and two others who have read this book thought it would be more intellectually stimulating and more about female leadership, confidence, etc., but it was really a romance through and through.
It was still good, and I’ll read anything about British aristocracy, especially in the 1700-1800s! At first I didn’t think I would want to read the next one, but I found myself thinking about the characters for a while after I finished reading it. I got off the waitlist for it at the library, and I knew that was a sign to just go for it!
What Comes After, JoAnne Tompkins: 4 Stars
Description: In misty, coastal Washington State, Isaac lives alone with his dog, grieving the recent death of his teenage son, Daniel. Next door, Lorrie, a working single mother, struggles with a heinous act committed by her own teenage son. Separated by only a silvery stretch of trees, the two parents are emotionally stranded, isolated by their great losses—until an unfamiliar sixteen-year-old girl shows up, bridges the gap, and changes everything.
Evangeline’s arrival at first feels like a blessing, but she is also clearly hiding something. When Isaac, who has retreated into his Quaker faith, isn’t equipped to handle her alone, Lorrie forges her own relationship with the girl. Soon all three characters are forced to examine what really happened in their overlapping pasts, and what it all possibly means for a shared future.
With a propulsive mystery at its core, What Comes After offers an unforgettable story of loss and anger, but also of kindness and hope, courage and forgiveness. It is a deeply moving account of strangers and friends not only helping each other forward after tragedy, but inspiring a new kind of family.
My thoughts: This book is very complicated. It’s another book similar to All Adults Here, The Dutch House, etc. with not many huge or shocking revelations, but more a simple tale of a group of people and how they deal with what comes after.
That’s such a good title for the book. I think we can all relate to the feelings of despair after losing a loved one- the rest of the world just moves on, and you and your family are left to grapple with the loss for much longer when it feels like nothing in your world will ever be the same again. I liked how this didn’t focus on the mystery or lead up to the boys’ deaths, but instead simply focused on what comes after. At first I thought this was going to be very boring, but it really wasn’t at all.
It doesn’t just focus on what comes after death, but also what comes after an affair, a birth, a parent leaving and more. It really focuses on those stories that don’t get told when the book ends, which felt really fulfilling because I’m usually left wanting more.
I also liked that this book contained a lot of information about the Quaker faith. I’ve said before that I love reading anything about another culture, religion, country, lifestyle, etc., so this fit the bill!
The genre on Amazon says “best in Mystery, Thriller, Suspense,” but if you usually avoid those types, I think you will be good here. It isn’t really thrilling or suspenseful, and the mystery weaved throughout isn’t the main focus of the story.
Everything I Never Told You, Celeste Ng: Stars
Description: “Lydia is dead. But they don’t know this yet.” So begins this exquisite novel about a Chinese American family living in 1970s small-town Ohio. Lydia is the favorite child of Marilyn and James Lee, and her parents are determined that she will fulfill the dreams they were unable to pursue. But when Lydia’s body is found in the local lake, the delicate balancing act that has been keeping the Lee family together is destroyed, tumbling them into chaos. A profoundly moving story of family, secrets, and longing, Everything I Never Told You is both a gripping page-turner and a sensitive family portrait, uncovering the ways in which mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, and husbands and wives struggle, all their lives, to understand one another.
My thoughts: *TW: suicide* This was really good. It revolves around an Asian American family in the 70s, and it was really interesting to read about their experience, especially considering current events. I also was brought back to American Girl Julie’s story with her friend Ivy, haha.
This also sort of focused on the topic of being loved too much, and the effects of multi-generational problems, secrets and more. I really enjoyed all the shifting perspectives, and I thought the author did a great job of letting you hear from the right person and the right time. I never expected many of the twists and turns throughout. I’ve also read “Searching for Sylvie Lee” by this same author, and it’s crazy how similar the two stories are to each other, but I like each on its own too.
A Rogue of One’s Own, Evie Dunmore: Stars
Description: Lady Lucie is fuming. She and her band of Oxford suffragists have finally scraped together enough capital to control one of London’s major publishing houses, with one purpose: to use it in a coup against Parliament. But who could have predicted that the one person standing between her and success is her old nemesis and London’s undisputed lord of sin, Lord Ballentine? Or that he would be willing to hand over the reins for an outrageous price—a night in her bed.
Lucie tempts Tristan like no other woman, burning him up with her fierceness and determination every time they clash. But as their battle of wills and words fans the flames of long-smoldering devotion, the silver-tongued seducer runs the risk of becoming caught in his own snare.
As Lucie tries to out-maneuver Tristan in the boardroom and the bedchamber, she soon discovers there’s truth in what the poets say: all is fair in love and war…
My thoughts: I liked this one much better than the first, and I am surprised to say that. This one did a much better job highlighting the story of female empowerment, what it means to be an independent woman, the struggles of women during the time period and the suffragist movement. I didn’t realize how much the first one mainly just focused on politics in general as the secondary plot line (steamy romance being the first), until I read this one and found what I was looking for in the first.
Lucie is a much more likable character than she was in the first book, and I think it’s just because we got to hear from her more and read why she is so passionate and demanding for the cause. I also liked the love story here much more than the first and found the ending more believable to a degree- still a point here or there I thought wasn’t realistic, but I don’t want to give away the ending.
I think I will definitely read the third one when it comes out this fall!
Read with me:
What I’m Reading Next:
Shadow and Bone – I just need to say now, I am about halfway through this book, and I LOVE it! If you like Hunger Games, Divergent, Twilight, Harry Potter, etc., add this to your list!!!!
Shop my upcoming reads:
