I was intending to post my rambles about The Heart of Betrayal and the Beauty of Darkness before I posted this, but then I saw the date and wanted to get this post out there before it became even more ridiculous. Don’t worry, I going to talk about the rest of the Remnant Chronicles soon—but probably not until next week. But first I’m going to tell you all about the books I read in November.
November was a pretty good month. My parents came to visit and spent a week with me in D.C., I got my new writing group off the ground and after a few meetings we’re still going strong, I got sworn in as a real lawyer, and of course Thanksgiving. I managed to write every day in November too, so I’m feeling pretty proud of myself. I’ve been flipping back and forth between my middle grade space adventure project, which is what I’m showing to my new writing group, and my middle grade fantasy book, which I got more edits on from my agent. So a lot’s going on, but it’s all really good.
I can’t believe it’s already the end of December, and I’ve been living in D.C. and working at the FCC for almost four months now. I love December so much more than November, because the holiday season kicks off and everything is so much brighter and happier than November, which after daylight savings time is pretty much just dark and cold. December has Christmas lights and holiday parties and cookie swaps and carollers singing to you as you come out of the metro. See what I mean?
December also means it’s time to look back at the books I read in November. I read ten books in November. Four of them were rereads. A lot of them were pretty short books that I just blew through in a single day. It was sort of a weird month in terms of how fast I read, because when my parents were visiting and when I was home for Thanksgiving, I didn’t get much reading done because I wanted to actually interact with people instead of just hang out in my room reading. But in the couple weeks in between my parents’ visit and Thanksgiving, I just churned through a ton of books. On the whole, I was really happy with what I read this month.
First, I finished The Remnant Chronicles series by Mary E. Pearson. In October, I read the first book, The Kiss of Deception, which I talked more about here. This month I read The Heart of Betrayal and the Beauty of Darkness. Since I just talked about the first book and I’m aiming to talk about the other two soon, I’m not going to go too deep into the plot summaries in this post. The second book follows Lia, Rafe, and Kaden as they navigate life in Venda. Lia is trying to escape with Rafe, but she’s also becoming more entangled with the people of Venda. Rafe is trying to help her escape, and Kaden, of course, is trying to both keep her alive and keep her in Venda. I won’t give you a plot summary of the third book at all because basically anything I say about the third book will spoil the second book. I absolutely loved this series. The first half of the first book was a bit cringy, but it grew on me so fast, and now it’s definitely a favorite. I just love Lia and how she goes from a runaway spoiled princess to a young woman who makes these really difficult choices. She becomes such a strong character, and I love it.
Last spring, I read City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab. The sequel, Tunnel of Bones, came out recently, and I read that next. After their adventure in Scotland, Cassidy and her family are off to Paris, where Cassidy manages to attract the attentions of a poltergheist and get a glimpse of what her ghost friend Jacob could become if he gets too strong. This book was delightfully scary, but also full of such great moments. I love Cass and Jacob’s friendship so much and I love how it develops over the course of this book. I can’t wait for the third book!
After that I read Willow Run by Patricia Reilly Giff. This is a companion novel to Lily’s Crossing, which I read last year. Twelve-year-old Meggie moves with her family to Michigan to work at the Wi’low Run airplane factory during World War II. We deal with prejudices against German Americans, a son and brother who is missing in action, and the fears of war. For being from the point of view of a twelve-year-old, it gets into some deep issues and it feels very real. Which just proves the point I make every chance I get that middle grade and young adult books can deal with really serious issues often in ways that are more poignant and powerful than adult books. This book made me cry quite a few times. Actually since it’s such a short book, I just cried the whole way. Not that it’s a downer of a book. I just have a lot of feelings sometimes.
Next, I read Half a World Away by Cynthia Kadohata. This is another book that I read in an evening. Twelve-year-old Jaden is adopted, and he considers himself an epic fail. Which is obviously why his parents are going to adopt another son. but when they arrive at the orphanage in Kazakhstan they learn that the baby they were going to adopt has been given to another family. They have to choose another baby on the spot. Jaden’s parents pick a baby, but at the same time Jaden latches onto a different toddler. This book was another one with a lot of feelings attached to it, and I really really liked it. The ending felt a little rushed and convenient, and I felt like Jaden’s feelings that his parents were replacing him weren’t really resolved to my satisfaction, but I really did enjoy this book.
I was talking about Tamora Pierce’s books with a friend in the beginning of November, and we were being generally gleeful about the fact that her Tortall books are going to be made into a TV show. My friend asked if I’d discovered the Tortall Recall podcast, which is basically a forroup of friends who read the Tamora Pierce books as children rereading them now as adults and yelling about them. I decided to give it a try, and then decided to reread the books along with listening to the podcast. So I reread the entire Song of the Lioness series this month. As always, I really enjoyed revisiting these books about a girl who decides she wants to become a knight and disguises herself as a boy to do just that. Tamora Pierce’s books had a huge influence on me as a young writer, and even now I am banned from rereading her Circle of Magic series until I get my revisions done. But I admit that a lot of what keeps me loving the Song of the Lioness books is nostalgia. Now that I’m older, more widely read, and honestly more woke than I was even a few years ago, these books don’t stand up as well, and that makes me kind of sad. They’re still good books, I still enjoy them, and I’d still recommend them to anyone who hasn’t read them, definitely, but I now have other feelings that I need to unpack. I’m actually planning a whole post on this so stay tuned.
And finally, I read the fourth Expanse book, Cibola Burn by James S. A. Corey. After I finished the third book back in September, I said I would give this series one more book before I gave up on it, and I’m so glad I gave it one more book. Because this book was great! Now that they’ve figured out the rings, humanity has access to all these new earth-like planets, and there’s basically a land rush going on. But then there’s a group of refugees who fled Ganymede after the incident in book two and a corporation who start fighting over one of the planets, and the U.N. and the OPA send James Holden to mediate. And then of course the alien artifacts on the planet get cranky and everything goes off the rails. This was a fast easy read. I loved seeing the characters I loved from book two coming back in so many different ways, and I loved the different roles Holden and his crew were forced into in this book. It was good, and I’m pretty much sucked in for the series now, though I’m still not sure if it’s one for the favorites list.
And that’s it for November. I’ve already read a bunch of books in December, and I’ve already passed my goal of reading 100 books in 2019. I’ll be back in a few days with a wrap up of all the crazy and great things that happened to me this year, my December reading roundup, and my favorite books of 2019. I’m also hoping to talk about the rest of the Remnant Chronicles, cliffhangers, and strong female characters soon too. In the meantime, let me know if you’ve read any of these books and what you think of them.