My Book of the Month for December, 2013
I hope you all had a happy and safe Christmas, that your stockings were filled with wonderful gifts, and your stomachs filled with wonderful food. I certainly had my fair share of both, including awesome apple pie that my wife made (accompanied by FirstBorn’s superb custard), and TUNE IN, the first volume of Beatle historian Mark Lewisohn’s three-part series ALL THESE YEARS. Lewisohn has been involved in many Beatles projects over the last 30 years (including “The Beatles Anthology”), so his access to people and material is without peer among Beatle aficionados. It’ll take a while to read, but as a long-time Beatles fan, I’m looking forward to it.
Since Jaime and Erin are taking a well-deserved break from What’s Up Wednesday this week, I thought I would go ahead and announce my favorite read for this month, and list the contenders for my Book of the Year. Choosing a favorite read for December was hard because I only read a couple of books, neither of which I gave five stars to, and both of which had merit for different reasons. In the end, I’ve decided to name THE DIVINERS by Libba Bray as my read of the month. The story of THE DIVINERS revolves around Evie O’Neill, a teenage flapper in 1920s New York with an ability to read people by touching their possessions. This gift, which so far has meant nothing more to her than a party trick to draw attention to herself, takes on greater significance as she becomes involved in investigating a series of gruesome murders with occult connections. You can read my Goodreads review for more details (though no spoilers). While I had some minor issues with the novel, I thought Libba handled the multiple plots and characters well, and intersected them in interesting ways. I’d definitely recommend it to people who like historicals, paranormal, and mysteries.
As for my favorite read of 2013, these are the books I have selected out of all my five-star reads this year. Tomorrow, I’ll announce which of these is my pick of the year:
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Note: Each picture links to my review of the book either here or on Goodreads.
Which would you choose? Make your selection in the comments, and tell me why.
I hope your New Year celebrations are happy and safe this evening. See you in 2014!
I haven’t read any of these, but some of them might be on my wish list.
Happy New Year.
Oooo… if you haven’t read any of the Lunar Chronicles (CINDER and SCARLET being the first two in the series), I highly recommend them to you. I think you’ll like them. Happy New Year to you, Medeia! 🙂