Friday, January 4, 2019

December 2018 Reads


I've been sharing my monthly book reviews since April of 2015, and it's one of my favorite posts to write and also the one that consistently gets the most comments. I love sharing my thoughts on books and also getting recommendations!

2018 was a year FULL of reading - thanks to the POPSUGAR challenge, I read the most books I've ever read in a year - 106! Holy smokes! That number is insane to me. I don't anticipate that happening EVER again, but it certainly is something I'm proud of. #nerdalert

Now out of the 7 books I read in December, 6 were largely fluff, but it's always fun to occasionally give yourself some pure lightheartedness, ha. But I've already seen some reviews from other bloggers {I'm looking at you Emily and Natasha} of some books I'm excited to read that have more substance! And will hopefully fulfill some 2019 POPSUGAR prompts because Allison and I are going at it again - not as a contest this time but just to finish it. 

Enough blabbing already! Here are my December reads... 


I read 3 more books by Kasie West - they were all cute but P.S. I Like You still ranks as my favorite. So if you like YA, you'll like any of these, but I don't feel the need to put individual plots and thoughts here - they're YA, they're cute and fluff, I liked.


Hello Stranger and Shelter in Place - I read a Lisa Kleypas and a Nora Roberts this month - kind of like Kasie West, no real reason to individually review - if you like romance, you'll like these. Although Shelter in Place starts out with a mall shooting and there were several scenes that made me tear up because that is NOT light-hearted material.

The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang - Stella Lane is a brilliant economist who has trouble with men which she blames on her autism spectrum disorder. She hires an escort to help learn how to interact with men, and shocker, she falls in love with him. This book was cute, a little predictable, a lot R-rated, but also an interesting look at what was formerly called Asperger's. The most interesting part of the whole book was the author's note at the end where the author, Helen, talks about her own self-discovery of her high-functioning autism and receiving a diagnosis in her 30s. Very interesting!

Time's Convert by Deborah Harkness - This is a continuation/companion novel for the All Soul's Trilogy and it was really good. I really loved the All Soul's Trilogy and consider it to be witches and vampires for the non-YA set, ha. The series as a whole is really enjoyable, extremely well-written and thought out, covers a lot of really cool history, overall so good. So if you enjoy fantasy but want something deeper than Twilight, this is the series for you.

I warned y'all this wasn't my strongest month, ha. Let's see if I can turn it around in January!!

4 comments:

Kathryn Bagley said...

I'll have to check out your YA reads! That cover of Hello Stranger looks very familiar #Selectionseries

Emily said...

Have you talked about The Kiss Quotient before or was that from Natasha? I added it to my library request list on 12/22 and so far am still 12 (out of 24) on the waitlist. It looks super good. Almost like The Rosie project, maybe? I loved The Rosie Project

Erika said...

I was going to say the same as Emily above- The Kiss Quotient sounds like The Rosie Project, which I LOVED! I'll have to check that one out!

Natasha said...

Way to go on 106 books! That's amazing!!!

Also, I love your book reviews and get so many great suggestions from here so thanks :)

I keep seeing Shelter in Place and thought it was the next book in the Year One trilogy (which I hated and couldn't get through) but this sounds interesting. I'll have to check it out.

I also thought Hoang's note at the end of The Kiss Quotient about her journey of self-discovery was super-interesting.