According to my Storygraph tracker, I'm 3 books behind schedule but given the fact that I fell sick at the end of January, meaning I only read two books in the whole month and that I've actually read FIVE! books in February, I'm pretty chuffed with myself.
February was a good reading month and not only because I've read quite a lot, but mostly because I've read great books. I was hopeful, especially because January started out absolutely fantastic with All These Beautiful Strangers by Elizabeth Klehfoth (seriously, whoever you are, read it!) I needed the same excitement to keep myself into reading mode (especially because the last book I've read in Jan was Less by Andrew Sean Greer and what a disappointment!).
I've read weird books, awesome books, interesting ones and yeah, also disappointing ones but the good definitely beats the bad here. I mean, you win some, you lose some, it's a fair world - most of the time.
The first book I've read was a new release I got sent from the Publisher and although I was sceptical at first, it turned out to be so lovely. Chouette by Claire Oshetsky is a weird book. It's about a woman who finds out she's about to become a mother and so she starts adjusting to this new life that at first she's not sure she wants but then the creature that is growing inside of her becomes all her life.
This book explores maternity in a new, sort of "metaphorical" way, where a mother is pregnant with an owl-baby who is a savage creature that has very different needs compared to all the other kids, especially the child her husband wanted. So it's a constant battle between the two about Chouette's life, whether they should try to give her a "normal" existence or accept her for what she is.
I wrote a full review if you want to know more about it.
This next book I'm talking about fell on my lap when my TBR was already picked but I got in contact with the author and worked with her to review her book, Ghosted.
It's a memoir so I was a bit scared to review it, but as I was reading it, I found it quite relatable in some parts, especially as she talks about being an adult with different priorities compared to what society expects and she finds herself in her thirties, with no instruction manual on how to navigate feeling lonely, seeing your friends starting families and feeling like not a grown-up at all.
Some parts were fun and others a bit hard to relate to, but overall an interesting read. I wrote a full review where I go into details on what I enjoyed and what I didn't.
From here on, these next two books have been my absolute favourite reads this month. I'm talking about All the Bad Apples by Moira Fowley-Doyle and Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson (the Book Club pick for February)
All the Bad Apples is such a magnificent story, I already knew I would have loved it because Moira Fowley-Doyle never disappoints, but this got way deeper into my core as it starts like a magical realism adventure that sees Deena leaving her home to go look for her "apparently dead" sister.
On her journey she finds more about herself, her story, her family's secrets, heartbreaking revelations that sink deeper into real stories about real women and their tragedies, abuse and heartwrenching losses they had to see.
One of the best books I've read in my life.
The February Book Club pick was a book I've been meaning to read for a long time, especially after I saw it on my favourite bookstagrammer's Ig page: Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson.
It follows Stevie, as she's escorted by her parents to this old, prestigious boarding school, the Ellingham Academy that accepts students with very different and researched talents, to give them a higher education in their field of interest, all this for free.
Stevie takes this opportunity not only as a chance to study for free but also as her only way to finally find out what really happened to the founder's family years ago when the school had just opened and Albert Ellingham's wife and daughter were kidnapped.
I loved this book so much, especially because I have a soft spot for riddles and secret passageways and cold cases and this book had it all. I can't wait to finish the whole series now!
The last book I've read this month I kinda wish I read sooner as a way to get rid of it because it was a total disappointment.
I love books that talk about women fucking up in life and finding ways to start over and Becoming by Laura Jane Williams was supposed to be exactly that. I've been following her blog for a while so I was excited to have more of it in book form.
But it wasn't as I expected it to be. Not only I didn't relate to her at all - and it's okay, it wasn't supposed to be about me, after all - but all this journey to start over, to get over her ex cheating on her with her best friend and eventually marrying her could have happened in less than 300 pages. It dragged for ages and at one point I was so bored of it, I really thought about giving it up.
I didn't though and managed to finish it and take a very long, relieved breath.
So yes, this month was quite an up and down, jumping from boring books to amazing ones but I'm glad anyway because now I'm only three books behind schedule and that has to mean something, right?