How to Pronounce Knife

I loved the title of this collection from the moment I first read it. I remember, even as a native English speaker, not ever getting a clear explanation for words like knife (or pterodactyl!) and those ridiculously unnecessary silent letters. And then after studying multiple languages throughout college (including Arabic, Russian, Chinese and, of course,…

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Brown Girls

So, I got this book as an eARC from Netgalley a few months ago. I had a goal, of course, of reading it before publication, but I am just terrible at following through on that. However, I am only a couple weeks late (so that's an improvement!). Plus, I have to say I'm not mad…

Love & Other Disasters

So apparently cooking/baking shows are a new trend in romance settings (ok, maybe this one and Rosalie Palmer Takes the Cake are just two books, not the start of a new wave of reality food tv romances, but still...) and I'm not not here for it. While I don't really watch a lot of reality food tv IRL, I do…

The Verifiers

Thanks to the publisher (Vintage Anchor) for reaching out to send me a review copy of this debut novel. I am not usually a mystery reader, so I was initially hesitant, but something about this one sounded different enough that it might be worth a try. Perhaps the fact that the MC likes girls and wrote…

Open Water

This short novel's release felt like it went a bit under the radar, from what I could tell. I saw a few pub day reviews, but overall (to be horribly punny) it seemed to not have made too much of a splash. But right after reading that it had been shortlisted for the Costa Book Award…

Honey Girl

Well, if the simply stunning cover doesn’t make you want to pick this one up and see what it’s all about, I don’t know what to tell you, because damn *heart eyes.* But then there’s the premise: a recently graduated PhD in astronomy goes on a girls trip to Vegas to celebrate and gets married…

Heavy

This is a book that I’ve been meaning to read for awhile now. I know Laymon has a novel and an essay collection published years before this memoir, but I have to be honest, this is the piece that I first heard about from him. Likely as a result of the myriad of absolutely overwhelmingly,…

The Space Between Worlds

I’d seen a couple (though not as many as I think it deserves) reviews for this one saying that it was spectacular. And if you enjoy SFF, you know how hard it is to find a great standalone in the genre. Though I did recently read another really wonderful one, The Vanished Birds, if you…

Fiebre Tropical

My 12th Aspen Words Literary Prize 2021 longlist read. This is one I had definitely planned to read, regardless of prize listings. The second I heard that it was written in Spanglish I was IN. So unique and so wonderfully about time (as in, hopefully soon, it won’t be that unique anymore). And I’m not…

The Death of Vivek Oji

This is the 5th book of the Aspen Words Literary Prize Longlist 2021 that I’ve gotten to. I’m a third of the way through the list now! This is one I definitely was planning to read anyways, having read and been so freaking impressive by both Freshwater and Pet, so it’s nice that it overlapped…