Show Us Your Books - What I Read in December

New Year, same book link up. New button on the right sidebar if you're interested.

What have you been reading? Lay it on me!

Linkup Guidelines:

This link up happens the second Tuesday of every month.

The next one is Tuesday, February 9, 2016. 

1. Please visit and comment with both of your hosts, Jana & me
2. Please display the button (need it? let me know) or link back to us on your blog post
2. Please visit a few other blogs who've linked up and get some book talk going!

Here's what I read since the last linkup. 

Engrossing Reads

The Girl With a Clock for a Heart by Peter Swanson - My second Swanson novel of 2015. Similar to the first one (The Kind Worth Killing), the end was sort of like the balloon lost its air suddenly. Regardless, I enjoyed this and gobbled it up, frequently wishing I was home reading instead of doing whatever I was doing.

Hidden Bodies (You #2) by Caroline Kepnes - All year I've been pining for this advanced copy of the second book in the You series. The first time it came out, I wasn't really using Netgalley. Well, they re-released it, which I found out because I was on there trying to find out who the publisher was so I could stalk them in true Joe style and get me a copy. It did not disappoint. I still liked the psychotic Joe. He's still psychotic. It was like visiting a fucking crazy old friend. Like oh that crazy Joe - still the same psycho! Joe was just as funny as the first time around, but the shock factor had worn off and it was just like living life alongside Joe. Which is psychotic, but really, really interesting. He's one of my favorite characters.

Black-Eyed Susans by Julia Heaberlin - I sort of slowly rolled into this book, then all of the sudden the one day, all day, I wished I was home finishing this book. When I was at work and out at night, I was like damn I wish I was reading Black-Eyed Susans right now. And that's what I did that night, stayed up too late on a school night to finish it. There were some holes and weird things, but overall I really enjoyed it and the people in it. It was interesting.

Passed the Time Just Fine

Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh - I spent much of my time reading this waiting for something that was surely going to happen soon...and did not. The actual action is quite abrupt and close to the end. This is absolutely a character study, and not a bad one, but I was looking for more of a story.

Eight Hundred Grapes by Laura Dave - I liked this book a lot more than I thought I would. It had some annoying shit that I hate in books - the female lead is painted as overly emotional and unable to see her own path, blah blah bullshit - but I liked it anyway.

Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff - Given that her novel Arcadia ranked as one of my 10 top books of 2015, I thought I'd love this. I liked it, and liked the second half much better than the first, but I think girlfriend fell victim to some overwriting here. Don't get me wrong - the writing was lovely, but sometimes the story got lost in the quest for the turn of phrase. It turns me off when that happens.

The Family by Marissa Kennerson - Thanks to Karen for this title, given my love of cult books. I found this a little scary and intensely interesting but the ending pissed me off. A lot. And I typically don't have problems with how authors choose to end their tales but this was like what?

The Orchardist by Amanda Coplin - It was beautifully written. It was evocative. I really enjoyed Talmadge. But the plot seemed to take a backseat to the characters and the prose, neither of which were enough to catapult it into greatness for me. It was good. I won't remember it by the end of the year. 

Hard No
No hard nos, per se, but I did start and stop a few books. Some I will go back to, like the next Anna Curtis novel by Allison Leotta, some I might go back, and some couldn't hold my attention past four pages so they might be in the wind forever. 

Non-bloggers, what have you read recently? Let me know what you recommend and what to stay away from. Bloggers, link up your posts below.

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