I am going to force myself to believe that winter is behind us. The sun is shining, I have a window open and I am not shivering- for now at least. So… that means it is time for a winter book summary.

Here goes…

This is probably a funny book to start the year off with but I like to begin the year with a short, fast paced book to set the tone and this one did the trick. It was a little bit of a thriller but it was really much, much more a dark comedy. I liked it while I was reading it for sure but looking back on it, I don’t think it will make my favorite list of the year.

Friday Black is the first short story collection I have ever finished. Every year, I promise myself I will read more short stories but truth be told, short story is just not a genre I really love with the apparent exception of Friday Black. I mentioned on Instagram that the first story in this collection should be required reading for all Americans and all these months later, I am still thinking about the Finklestein Five.

I think that Stephen King is one of the most amazing story tellers of our time. 11/22/63 is on my list of all time favorite books. Elevation was ok but that’s about all I have to say about it. I don’t usually like to give negative reviews (and tend to not finish books that I don’t love) but my guess is that Stephen King won’t be impacted by my thoughts on Elevation 🙂

Karen Thomas Walker’s book The Age of Miracles was so amazing that I think I got a bit too excited for The Dreamers. It was a really great book but I liked Age of Miracles more and I really did not like the ending of The Dreamers. All that said, I think I am in the minority here so add this one to your list for sure!

As a mystery and thriller reader, I had been meaning to read Lisa Jewell forever. This was my first of her novels but it will definitely not be my last.

Like Lisa Jewell, Karin Slaughter has been on my list of ‘to be read’ authors for a long time. Unlike, Lisa Jewell, I think this might be last Karin Slaughter book. I am usually fine with the whole suspension of disbelief thing. I mean really, in the world of thrillers, fortunately, many of the premises are unrealistic but this one was just too unbelievable even for me.

I feel like one of the few readers in the world that hasn’t read and loved Kristin Hannah’s The Nightingale. I think I may have gotten to it too late when the hype was too great? Or maybe I just wasn’t in the right frame of mind when I went to read it? Regardless, I put off reading The Great Alone as I wasn’t sure if I was a Kristin Hannah kind of reader. I am so glad I went ahead and gave this one a try. I am not usually a reader who is drawn in by the setting of a book but oh my goodness- Alaska! After reading this book, I really feel like I have been to Alaska and know exactly what I would need to do to survive a winter there. p.s. I wouldn’t survive a winter there.

A blogger that I have followed for a long time, Sarah’s Bookshelves, listed this as a book she would recommend to anyone and I couldn’t agree more. I had never heard of this book or this author but it was a great read. I was excited to learn that Dolan-Leach has a new book coming out soon and I will be reading it for sure.

This book has been all over the place and rightly so. I rarely find ‘important books’ that are also page turners but A Woman Is No Man fits well into that category. I really learned a lot while reading this book and still find myself thinking about the characters. The ending was also one that had me reaching out to reader friends for discussion.

This winter I  read a lot of books that are getting or have gotten a ton of attention on Bookstagram- my favorite little corner of the Instagram world. For some reason, this book is not among them. I feel in love with this author’s writing immediately and found the characters and the story to be super compelling. If you are triggered at all by talk of eating disorders, do not read this book but otherwise, I really want more people to read it so that I can talk about it.

Daisy Jones and the Six is probably the most talked about book of the season. I first read Taylor Jenkins Reid when her book, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, got a ton of attention last year and I loved it. I was therefore really excited for this new title and it is worth all the hype. I am not a huge music person but in the same way I adore the movie Almost Famous, I absolutely loved the world that Reid created in this book. I wasn’t sure if was the best thing ever until I got to the end but at that point, I was sold.