The Many Mothers of Dolores Moore

I really loved The Many Mothers of Dolores Moore (publication day September 16, 2025), Anika Fajardo’s debut novel! Though the theme of grief after losing one’s last living parent was difficult, I loved how Fajardo used magical realism with Dorrie’s ancestors a constant chorus in her head, the interludes about mapmaking, and chapters from theContinue reading “The Many Mothers of Dolores Moore”

Not My Type: One Woman vs. a President

Sometimes I’m in the mood for a voyeuristic memoir, looking over someone else’s shoulder into their life. Not My Type: One Woman vs. a President (2025) by E. Jean Carroll met that mood completely! E. Jean narrates the audiobook herself, which is a treat. She begins with being deposed in the first civil suit sheContinue reading “Not My Type: One Woman vs. a President”

Shutter and Exposure

Shutter (2022) and Exposure (2024) by Ramona Emerson, feature Rita Todacheene, a crime scene photographer for the Albuquerque police department who can see ghosts. Raised both on the Navajo reservation by her grandmother and in Albuquerque with her mother, who died when Rita was 18, she started seeing ghosts when she was a young child,Continue reading “Shutter and Exposure”

The Hotel Nantucket

The Hotel Nantucket (2022) was Elin Hildebrand’s 28th book and the first one I’ve read that’s she’s written. A good summer choice by my library book group, Hildebrand centers the story on 19-year old chambermaid, Grace Hadley, who died in 1922 in a fire that gutted the hotel and has haunted it since, hoping forContinue reading “The Hotel Nantucket”

Slow Horses

Slow Horses (Slough House #1) by Mick Herron (2010) was the book club pick for May. If you’re not familiar with the book or the Apple TV series, it follows a group of MI5 agents assigned to Slough House in London for what remains of their failed careers. They are nominally still part of theContinue reading “Slow Horses”

Disappoint Me

I was charmed by Disappoint Me (publication day May 27, 2025), much more so than Nicola Dinan’s first book, Bellies. Max and Vincent are the two main characters. Max is a trans woman, a lawyer who analyzes contracts as an AI, and is in between boyfriends, bored by the queer London scene. She falls downContinue reading “Disappoint Me”

The Griffin Sisters’ Greatest Hits

The Griffin Sisters’ Greatest Hits (publication day April 8, 2025) by Jennifer Weiner is the kind of book I typically gravitate to. It’s about sisters, and music, and it has a fat main character, who is also likely on the autism spectrum. One sister is fat and very talented, the other is conventionally attractive butContinue reading “The Griffin Sisters’ Greatest Hits”

A Tropical Rebel Gets the Duke

Don’t let the fact that A Tropical Rebel Gets the Duke (publication date February 4, 2025) by Adrianna Herrera is the third in a trilogy stop you from reading it! Herrera has written a nearly perfect historical romance, featuring Afro-Latinx characters, set in Paris in 1889, with a female doctor who runs underground women’s healthContinue reading “A Tropical Rebel Gets the Duke”

Call Her Freedom

Call Her Freedom (publication day January 21, 2025) by Tara Dorabji is an intense and powerful multi-generational story of a family in the village of Poshkarbal in Kashmir, starting when Aisha is sent to school by her mother, Noorhajan, though few girls attend school. Her mother is the village midwife and herbalist, and is raisingContinue reading “Call Her Freedom”

Apartment Women

I requested Apartment Women (U.S. publication day December 3, 2024) by Gu Byeong-Mo, translated by Chi-Young Kim, from NetGalley because I really enjoyed her The Old Woman With the Knife, about an aging assassin for a shadowy agency. Unfortunately, Apartment Women was missing much of the intrigue, suspense, and action that drew me in whileContinue reading “Apartment Women”