Ten Books I’ve Added to my To-Be-Read List Lately
Top Ten Tuesday is a fun weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week’s topic is Ten Books I’ve Added to my To-Be-Read List Lately. This was a pretty easy topic for me since I’m quite literally adding new books to my TBR list pretty much every day. The ten I have selected made it on to my TBR for a variety of reasons – some are based on blogger reviews I’ve read, others because I’ve received ARCs to review, and still others for random reasons like maybe a gorgeous cover caught my eye.
Ten Books I’ve Added to my To-Be-Read List Lately
1. Ever the Hunted by Erin Summerill
This one made it onto my list because I’ve read several great reviews from bloggers who have read ARCs. It sounds amazing!
Goodreads Synopsis: Seventeen year-old Britta Flannery is at ease only in the woods with her dagger and bow. She spends her days tracking criminals alongside her father, the legendary bounty hunter for the King of Malam—that is, until her father is murdered. Now outcast and alone and having no rights to her father’s land or inheritance, she seeks refuge where she feels most safe: the Ever Woods. When Britta is caught poaching by the royal guard, instead of facing the noose she is offered a deal: her freedom in exchange for her father’s killer.
However, it’s not so simple.
The alleged killer is none other than Cohen McKay, her father’s former apprentice. The only friend she’s ever known. The boy she once loved who broke her heart. She must go on a dangerous quest in a world of warring kingdoms, mad kings, and dark magic to find the real killer. But Britta wields more power than she knows. And soon she will learn what has always made her different will make her a daunting and dangerous force. (Read more…)
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2. Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige
This one made it on to my list as part of my birthday haul (which I, note to self, really need to hurry up and do a post on since my birthday was last month). I saw this on sale and gifted it to myself, mainly because I LOVE the cover.
Goodreads Synopsis: I didn’t ask for any of this. I didn’t ask to be some kind of hero. But when your whole life gets swept up by a tornado – taking you with it – you have no choice but to go along, you know?
Sure, I’ve read the books. I’ve seen the movies. I know the song about the rainbow and the happy little bluebirds. But I never expected Oz to look like this. To be a place where Good Witches can’t be trusted, Wicked Witches may just be the good guys, and winged monkeys can be executed for acts of rebellion. There’s still a yellow brick road – but even that’s crumbling.
What happened? Dorothy.
They say she found a way to come back to Oz. They say she seized power and the power went to her head. And now no one is safe.
My name is Amy Gumm – and I’m the other girl from Kansas.
I’ve been recruited by the Revolutionary Order of the Wicked. I’ve been trained to fight.
And I have a mission. (Read more…)
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3. Timekeeper by Tara Sim
Another addition to the list based on some great blogger reviews.
Goodreads Synopsis: Two o’clock was missing.
In an alternate Victorian world controlled by clock towers, a damaged clock can fracture time—and a destroyed one can stop it completely.
It’s a truth that seventeen-year-old clock mechanic Danny Hart knows all too well; his father has been trapped in a Stopped town east of London for three years. Though Danny is a prodigy who can repair not only clockwork, but the very fabric of time, his fixation with staging a rescue is quickly becoming a concern to his superiors.
And so they assign him to Enfield, a town where the tower seems to be forever plagued with problems. Danny’s new apprentice both annoys and intrigues him, and though the boy is eager to work, he maintains a secretive distance. Danny soon discovers why: he is the tower’s clock spirit, a mythical being that oversees Enfield’s time. Though the boys are drawn together by their loneliness, Danny knows falling in love with a clock spirit is forbidden, and means risking everything he’s fought to achieve.
But when a series of bombings at nearby towers threaten to Stop more cities, Danny must race to prevent Enfield from becoming the next target or he’ll not only lose his father, but the boy he loves, forever. (Read more…)
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4. The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly
A friend from college was telling me about this book and it just sounded so good that I had to add it to my list.
Goodreads Synopsis: High in his attic bedroom, twelve-year-old David mourns the death of his mother, with only the books on his shelf for company. But those books have begun to whisper to him in the darkness. Angry and alone, he takes refuge in his imagination and soon finds that reality and fantasy have begun to meld. While his family falls apart around him, David is violently propelled into a world that is a strange reflection of his own — populated by heroes and monsters and ruled by a faded king who keeps his secrets in a mysterious book, The Book of Lost Things.
Taking readers on a vivid journey through the loss of innocence into adulthood and beyond, New York Times bestselling author John Connolly tells a dark and compelling tale that reminds us of the enduring power of stories in our lives. (Read more…)
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5. Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
The beautiful cover is what caught my eye on this book, but I have been meaning to read more of Adichie’s books anyway because Americanah was so good. I also added We Should All Be Feminists and Purple Hibiscus.
Goodreads Synopsis: With effortless grace, celebrated author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie illuminates a seminal moment in modern African history: Biafra’s impassioned struggle to establish an independent republic in southeastern Nigeria during the late 1960s. We experience this tumultuous decade alongside five unforgettable characters: Ugwu, a thirteen-year-old houseboy who works for Odenigbo, a university professor full of revolutionary zeal; Olanna, the professor’s beautiful young mistress who has abandoned her life in Lagos for a dusty town and her lover’s charm; and Richard, a shy young Englishman infatuated with Olanna’s willful twin sister Kainene. Half of a Yellow Sun is a tremendously evocative novel of the promise, hope, and disappointment of the Biafran war. (Read more…)
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6. The Portable Dorothy Parker by Dorothy Parker
Don’t laugh but I added this one to my list after my last Gilmore Girls rewatch. 🙂
Goodsreads Synopsis: This sublime collection ranges over the verse, stories, essays, and journalism of one of the twentieth century’s most quotable authors. (Read more…)
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7. Iceling by Sasha Stephenson
This book is on my list because I recently received an e-ARC from the First to Read program.
Goodreads Synopsis: Lorna’s adopted sister, Callie, is part of a mysterious group of non-lingual teens, Icelings, born on a remote Arctic island, who may not be entirely human. Now Callie wants to go home.
Seventeen-year-old Lorna loves her adoptive sister, Callie. But Callie can’t say “I love you” back. In fact, Callie can’t say anything at all.
Because Callie is an Iceling—one of hundreds of teens who were discovered sixteen years ago on a remote Arctic island, all of them lacking the ability to speak or understand any known human language.
Mysterious and panicked events lead to the two sisters embarking on a journey to the north, and now Lorna starts to see that there’s a lot more to Callie’s origin story than she’d been led to believe. Little does she know what’s in store, and that she’s about to uncover the terrifying secret about who—and what—Callie really is. (Read more…)
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8. The Most Dangerous Place on Earth by Lindsey Lee Johnson
I recently received an e-ARC from Netgalley and this one also piqued my interest because of the praise from Anthony Doerr.
Goodreads Synopsis: A captivating debut novel for readers of Celeste Ng’s Everything I Never Told You and Curtis Sittenfeld’s Prep, The Most Dangerous Place on Earth unleashes an unforgettable cast of characters into a realm known for its cruelty and peril: the American high school.
In an idyllic community of wealthy California families, new teacher Molly Nicoll becomes intrigued by the hidden lives of her privileged students. Unknown to Molly, a middle school tragedy in which they were all complicit continues to reverberate for her kids: Nick, the brilliant scam artist; Emma, the gifted dancer and party girl; Dave, the B student who strives to meet his parents expectations; Calista, the hippie outcast who hides her intelligence for reasons of her own. Theirs is a world in which every action may become public postable, shareable, indelible. With the rare talent that transforms teenage dramas into compelling and urgent fiction, Lindsey Lee Johnson makes vivid a modern adolescence lived in the gleam of the virtual, but rich with the sorrow, passion, and beauty of life in any time, and at any age. (Read more…)
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9. A Piece of the World by Christina Baker Kline
I loved Orphan Train so when I saw Baker Kline had a new book coming out, it had to go on the list.
Goodreads Synopsis: From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the smash bestseller Orphan Train, a stunning and atmospheric novel of friendship, passion, and art, inspired by Andrew Wyeth’s mysterious and iconic painting Christina’s World.
“Later he told me that he’d been afraid to show me the painting. He thought I wouldn’t like the way he portrayed me: dragging myself across the field, fingers clutching dirt, my legs twisted behind. The arid moonscape of wheatgrass and timothy. That dilapidated house in the distance, looming up like a secret that won’t stay hidden.”
To Christina Olson, the entire world was her family’s remote farm in the small coastal town of Cushing, Maine. Born in the home her family had lived in for generations, and increasingly incapacitated by illness, Christina seemed destined for a small life. Instead, for more than twenty years, she was host and inspiration for the artist Andrew Wyeth, and became the subject of one of the best known American paintings of the twentieth century.
As she did in her beloved smash bestseller Orphan Train, Christina Baker Kline interweaves fact and fiction in a powerful novel that illuminates a little-known part of America’s history. Bringing into focus the flesh-and-blood woman behind the portrait, she vividly imagines the life of a woman with a complicated relationship to her family and her past, and a special bond with one of our greatest modern artists.
Told in evocative and lucid prose, A Piece of the World is a story about the burdens and blessings of family history, and how artist and muse can come together to forge a new and timeless legacy. (Read more…)
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10. A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness
That creepy cover is what got this book onto my list.
Goodreads Synopsis: The monster showed up after midnight. As they do.
But it isn’t the monster Conor’s been expecting. He’s been expecting the one from his nightmare, the one he’s had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments, the one with the darkness and the wind and the screaming…
This monster is something different, though. Something ancient, something wild. And it wants the most dangerous thing of all from Conor. It wants the truth. (Read more…)
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Question: Have you read any of these titles? What have you added to your TBR lately?
The Versatile Blogger Award Tag
I have been nominated for the Versatile Blogger Award. It took me so long to complete the tag that I actually ended up nominated by three of my fellow bloggers, so huge thanks to A Blog Of One’s Own, Pages Bound Together, and Swooning Over Fictional Men for the nominations! 🙂
Rules of the Tag:
-Show the award on your blog
-Thank the person who has nominated you
-Share 7 different facts about you
-Nominate 15 different blogs of your choice
-Link your nominees and let them know of your nomination
7 Facts About Me:
1. I’ve lived in the state of Virginia all my life. Sometimes I think about moving elsewhere, but ultimately I really like the moderate climate and the proximity to both the ocean and the mountains.
Virginia in Autumn
2. One of my favorite hobbies aside from reading is wine tasting. We have over 250 wineries here in Virginia and lots of wine trails, so I love to do girls’ weekends with my mom and sister and go and sample as many of the local wines as we can. This past summer I enjoyed frozen wine slushies for the first time and became completely obsessed with them. Sooo good!
3. Another hobby of mine is photography. I’m more into travel photography than anything else — I took well over 1,000 pics when I went to Europe last summer! Even though I love photography, however, I haven’t tried Bookstagram yet and don’t know if I ever will. I can’t decide if it’s my thing or not. Sometimes it’s all I can do to get my books read and reviewed, so I fear that adding in another component to keep track of would be too much for me. I do enjoy other bloggers’ photography though 🙂
London, August 2015
4. I have quite an obsession with all things Disney. It started with Eeyore when I was a small child, but I honestly really can’t think of a single Disney movie or character that I don’t love. Even the Disney villains are awesome!
5. I’m not a morning person, but I’m not really a night owl either. I guess I’m more of a mid-afternoon/early evening kind of gal, haha. Mornings are the worst for me though. Seriously. Don’t even think about speaking to me until I’ve had my coffee. You’re taking your life into your own hands otherwise 😉
6. I’m a huge sports fan. I love football, baseball, and soccer. When it comes to professional sports, in football I root for the Carolina Panthers and the Baltimore Ravens and in baseball, I root for the Baltimore Orioles and the Washington Nationals. For soccer, although I do enjoy watching the English Premier League teams play, I primarily just root for my son’s soccer team 🙂
7. I want to live a healthy lifestyle but have a hard time committing to any kind of diet or exercise routine that would help me to achieve this goal. I’m constantly disappointed and frustrated by myself in this regard.
My Nominees:
(If you haven’t already done it)
1. Angela at Musings of a Literary Wanderer
2. Grace at Rebel Mommy Book Blog
3. Verushka at pop.edit.lit
4. Greg at Book Haven
5. Eva at All Books Considered
6. Lindsey at Lindsey Reads
7. Megan at Bookslayer Reads
8. Melissa at Book Nerd Momo
9. Resh at The Book Satchel
10. Katie at Girl About Library
11. Olivia at The Candid Cover
12. Jordan at Forever Lost in Literature
13. Diana at A Haven for Book Lovers
14. Loreen at Coffee and Cats
15. Alisia at 4thhouseontheleft
ARC Review of The Animators by Kayla Rae Whitaker
The Animators by Kayla Rae Whitaker 
Published by Random House on January 31st 2017
Genres: Contemporary Fiction
Pages: 384
Source: Netgalley
Amazon
Goodreads
FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley. All opinions are my own.
Goodreads Synopsis: She was the first person to see me as I had always wanted to be seen. It was enough to indebt me to her forever.
At a private East Coast college, two young women meet in art class. Sharon Kisses, quietly ambitious but self-doubting, arrives from rural Kentucky. Mel Vaught, brash, unapologetic, wildly gifted, brings her own brand of hellfire from the backwaters of Florida. Both outsiders, Sharon and Mel become fervent friends, bonding over underground comics and dysfunctional families. Working, absorbing, drinking. Drawing: Mel, to understand her own tumultuous past, and Sharon, to lose herself altogether.
A decade later, Sharon and Mel are an award-winning animation duo, and with the release of their first full-length feature, a fearless look at Mel’s childhood, they stand at the cusp of success. But while on tour to promote the film, cracks in their relationship start to form: Sharon begins to feel like a tag-along and suspects that raucous Mel is the real artist. When unexpected tragedy strikes, long-buried resentments rise to the surface, threatening their partnership—and hastening a reckoning no one sees coming.
“An engrossing, exuberant ride through all the territories of love—familial, romantic, sexual, love of friends, and, perhaps above all, white-hot passion for the art you were born to make . . . I wish I’d written The Animators.”—Emma Donoghue, author of Room and The Wonder.
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My Review:
Buckle your seat belts because Kayla Rae Whitaker’s debut novel The Animators is one wild ride! The novel follows the lives of Mel and Sharon, two art students who meet in college, become fast friends when they realize they have a shared passion of making cartoons, and who eventually become business partners as well. Whitaker weaves together a compelling tale as Mel and Sharon navigate the ups and downs of their personal and professional relationships, as they experience success, conflict, frustration, family drama, love, loss, tragedy, and pretty much everything in between. Their lives become so entwined that they become more like family than just friends. Whitaker does a beautiful job of realistically portraying the many layers of their relationship, while also exploring such themes as using art as catharsis, loss of innocence, addiction, dysfunctional families, and more.
What I Enjoyed:
Mel and Sharon – I immediately fell in love with Whitaker’s main characters. They are basically yin and yang and it’s fascinating to watch the balancing act that is basically their relationship. Mel is outspoken with a larger than life personality. She’s brash and unapologetic and you literally just never know what’s going to come out of her mouth next. Sharon, on the other hand, is more the wallflower type. She’s a small town girl who spends a lot of time trying to figure out how in the world she has even gotten to this point in her life. As she and Mel experience major success with one of their cartoons and embark on a press tour to promote their work, Sharon often seems awkward and out of place, especially when compared to Mel and the way she just seems to eat up the spotlight and the attention. Mel comes across as the driving force behind their projects, with Sharon being relegated to more of a workhouse role. Because Sharon is deemed the more responsible of the duo, it often falls on her to try to reel Mel in and make her act more professionally as they make their required public appearances. Whitaker very realistically portrays the emotions that this kind of situation would easily generate – the jealousy, the resentment, the growing tension as Mel turns more and more to drugs and alcohol thus increasing her erratic behavior, and of course, Sharon’s feeling of not knowing if she even really belongs in this world that they’ve been thrown into. Is she really talented in her own right or is she just riding Mel’s coattails?
I got so attached to these two ladies and became so invested in their friendship working out that I found myself wanting to yell at them whenever either one of them did something to upset the balance: “OMG, get your act together, Mel!” or “Snap out of it, Sharon! You know you’re better than this!”
I actually almost lost faith in Mel at one point because she goes so far off the rails with the drugs and erratic behavior, but then when an unexpected medical incident almost kills Sharon and leaves her with a daunting recovery ahead of her, it is Mel who shows up to help — even though they aren’t even on speaking terms at the time of the incident. Mel is there with her every second of every day as she fights her way back from near death. That’s friendship.
Themes: This novel is just so rich in themes. Aside from tackling the dynamics of Sharon and Mel’s friendship, another theme that really struck me was the exploration of how living in an unsupportive environment can shape who you grow up to be. Sharon and Mel both come from the land of dysfunctional families. Mel’s mother is actually in prison and her influence on Mel is the focus of their first successful cartoon, Nashville Combat. Sharon’s childhood was a little more stable than Mel’s, but coming from a small town where no one EVER went away to school, her family basically never acted as though they were proud of her accomplishments and acted as though they resented her for going away to school. These feelings clearly contributed to her sense of self-worth or lack thereof.
Another theme that I found interesting was the use of art as catharsis. In the novel, Mel and Sharon decide to use their passion for art as a way to take control over and work through some traumatic events that shaped their lives. While on the one hand, this is clearly cathartic for them and an incredibly brave act because they are basically putting their lives, and specifically their pain, on view for the world to see, the act also comes at a cost. As one of Sharon’s childhood friends points out when he objects to being included in their project, it’s not just their lives on display, but also the lives of everyone else who played a role in the events being depicted. Sharon and Mel dismiss his objections, but it really got me thinking about how Mel’s mother, in particular, must have felt seeing herself exposed to the world as some kind of monster. Is using your art to work through your own painful experiences worth the cost, which is potentially causing others pain? I love a book that leaves me with something to think about afterwards and this question has been on my mind a lot since I finished The Animators. I imagine this is a question that many artist have to weigh in their minds if considering this kind of personal artistic expression.
Was there anything I didn’t like?
One potential pitfall for some readers could be all of the animation/cartooning talk. Since the novel does explore, to a large extent, the professional lives of Mel and Sharon, and therefore their creative processes, there is a lot of information about the cartooning/animation process. Much of it was over my head since I know nothing about art, but thankfully Whitaker doesn’t just do a huge info dump — instead, she weaves it throughout the novel, giving the reader just a little at a time so it’s not overwhelming or dry and boring.
One area I would have liked a bit more detail on was Mel and Sharon’s time in college together. The beginning of their friendship was so touching and engaging as they bonded and realized that they had this shared passion. I wanted to read so much more about that, so I felt a little cheated when I turned the page and realized we were jumping ahead in time. I got over it of course since I clearly enjoyed the book, but it was still a little disappointing.
Who Would I recommend The Animators to?
I would recommend The Animators to anyone who enjoys a realistic portrayal of a dynamic friendship. It’s not a light read by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a rich and compelling story with layer up on layer. I think The Animators will end up being a popular book club read next year because it explores so many issues that are perfect for in-depth discussions.
The book does deal, in part, with addiction and some other darker themes of a sexual nature, so I wouldn’t recommend it to younger readers.
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Rating: A solid 4 stars
About Kayla Rae Whitaker
Kayla Rae Whitaker’s work has appeared in Smokelong Quarterly, Split Lip Magazine, BODY, Bodega, Joyland, The Switchback, Five Quarterly, American Microreviews and Interviews, and others, and she is a regular contributor to “American Micro Reviews and Interviews” and “Split Lip Magazine.” She holds a BA from the University of Kentucky and an MFA from New York University. After many years of living in Brooklyn, she returned to Kentucky, her home state, in 2016 with her husband and their geriatric tomcat, Breece D’J Pancake.