Does listening to audiobooks count as reading? Here it does. Let’s discuss your favorite reads — or listens.
All in Audiobook
Lisa See’s The Island of Sea Women explores the unique matriarchal culture of Korea’s haenyeo divers on Jeju Island, set against major 20th-century events like Japanese occupation and the Korean War. While rich in historical detail and cultural insight, the novel struggles to deliver emotional depth or strong character development. Best for readers interested in Korean history and women’s roles in wartime, but don’t expect a gripping fictional narrative.
In the end, “Everyone Dies Famous in a Small Town” is a missed opportunity. It gestures toward interconnected trauma and small-town claustrophobia but only occasionally brings those themes to life with the clarity and resonance they deserve.
In this bold and imaginative novel, Bob the Drag Queen reimagines the legendary abolitionist as a returning historical figure determined to tell her story on stage. With help from a once-famous hip-hop producer, Tubman creates a Broadway-style musical that blends history and humor. Packed with sharp writing, emotional depth and two original songs, this audiobook is a powerful mix of speculative fiction and accessible historical storytelling.
If you enjoyed “The Measure,” there’s a good chance you’ll find something to appreciate here. But for those hoping for a bolder leap forward, this one never quite recaptures the promise of its setup.
Kevin Wilson books usually follow a pattern: high-concept premise, strong start, then a slow unraveling into sentiment or chaos. “Run for the Hills” still asks you to suspend disbelief (a lot of it), but for once, the absurdity holds.
This is a novel about space, yes, but it’s also about constraints. What it means to want something enormous, only to realize you may have to make yourself smaller to reach it. About what it means to live within institutions that weren’t built for you.
“Say You’ll Remember Me” didn’t reinvent the genre, yet it respected it. In doing so, it chipped away at my resistance. I still have reservations about the formula, but I understand the appeal. And yes, I’ll read the next one in this series.
“My Friends” often feels like it’s trying very hard to be profound. Like it’s auditioning for an emotional response rather than earning it. There are moments, Backman always has a few, where a single line cuts through the noise and makes you stop. Unfortunately, these ideas are buried in a story that feels chaotic and bloated, trying to juggle too many themes without characters that can hold them together.
Stephen King still knows how to tell a pulse-pounding story, but if he wants to keep his cultural edge sharp, he needs to start asking harder questions about who gets to be the hero – and who keeps getting cast as the victim and the threat.
Hall isn’t writing heroes or villains, she’s writing about people who believe their own rationalizations – even as they unravel the lives of others.
Some novels feel like memoirs, not because they’re confessional, but because they pulse with lived-in truth. “Bad Habit,” Alana S. Portero’s autofictional debut, is one of those books.
“Tell Me How to Be” isn’t perfect. It’s sometimes overwrought, and Akash will test your sympathy, but it’s also culturally honest without pandering and willing to sit in discomfort. It shows real growth from Patel’s earlier work and enough promise to make me want to see what he does next.
“Bolla” isn’t a book you’ll want to live in for long. It offers no comfort, no catharsis, only the slow, painful truth that repression – personal or political – rarely leaves survivors.
If you asked me what this is about, I’m not sure I could tell you. It has several subplots, but no single throughline, and maybe that’s the point. This is a book about transient relationships – the people who find you when you’re at your lowest, who don’t fix you but show up anyway.
Even the weaker stories carry flashes of what makes Sittenfeld compelling: the sly observation, the perfect turn of phrase, the ability to make a character feel ridiculous and real in equal measure. This is objectively not a bad book, it’s just not Sittenfeld at her best.
A solid addition to Stephen King’s bibliography, though it may not stand alongside his most enduring works. The stakes in each story feel high, and while not every piece reaches the heights of his best work, the collection as a whole offers a compelling, if occasionally uneven, journey into King’s evolving narrative style.
I don't give five stars easily and almost never to a series book, or a YA novel, but “Sunrise on the Reaping” earns it. Propulsive, gutting and almost unbearably tense, it takes the familiar structure of the series and makes it feel more personal, more political and more devastating than ever.
To his credit, Baldacci doesn’t sanitize the war. He allows his characters to bristle at their government, at the Americans and at each other. The book isn’t burdened by a need for patriotic polish, and its refusal to lean into easy sentimentality is refreshing.
It’s a curious novel, blending fiction with recognizable realities, that made me care about a family I would have rather forgotten. So I’m surprised to say I’m glad I picked it up. Not because of the subject matter but because it proves Sittenfeld is one of the most fascinating writers working today.
While the romance at times veers into saccharine territory – declarations of love come frequently, and some gestures, like the grand finale at Wrigley Field, feel cinematic to a fault – it is counterbalanced with an exploration of what it means to forgive, even if forgetting is not an option.
