Books I Read in December

+ a poll!

Jan 06, 2025

Book Poll

I’ll be popping in the next two weeks with book related things - the December wrap up (today’s post) and then a fun one with my top books of 2024 broken into a few different, juicy categories.

After that, I’m thinking of hitting pause on book related posts for a bit. Perhaps putting them into a quarterly round up of my faves or maybe just a short list inside of a monthly recap or something. I’ve just been feeling like I want to have more space for the STYLE the FASHION posts without also overwhelming your inbox while also knowing people love books! It’s a quandary I tell ya. So, if you’d be so kind, please vote in the poll below and let me know your thoughts. Appreciate you!

On to December reads!

With these last eight books, I’ve hit my goal of reading 100 books in a year. Moving into 2025, I set a goal of one. A general life statement for me this year, is more loosely holding onto goals while still tracking progress. So what better place to start than books! You can follow on GoodReads if that’s your jam.

A Walk in the Park: The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon by Kevin Kedarko. I love an epic outdoor quest that is coupled with humor and history and overcoming the hard things. This is a great one that follows two men’s mishaps walking the length of the Grand Canyon (there are no set trails for this btw) and what they learned along the way.
Where the Library Hides by Isabel Ibanez. This is the long awaited 2nd book in this series and it’s a fun romp through more misadventure and romance and spies and bad guys.
Hey, Hun: Sales, Sisterhood, Supremacy, and the Other Lies Behind MultiLevel Marketing by Emily Lynn Paulson. If you like things like cults, you’ll probably like this insider’s look at an MLM (multi-level marketing) from one woman’s rise to the top of one (some internet sleuthing tells me it was Rodan + Fields, although she never names names).
The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer. I started this many, many, many months ago and couldn’t bear to let it sit unfinished. I love a good YA book, but also feel strongly that there are YA levels of 1 -10. I consider Hunger Games to be a 10 on my YA scale (aka: great! fun!). It writes and reads above the bar. This one, while winning an award, reads below the bar. It feels like a story written for an elementary school student (whereas Hunger Games is High School). So it’s not bad by any means, but it just reads very, very young.
Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan. A book club read that I listened to on audio. I don’t love books that deal with the daily minutia of life (sorry!). I want grand adventure and fast moving things. Books are like my TV so I don’t really want to be sad or grapple with moral quandaries. I also get very distracted by audio books (I cannot pay attention for the life of me) so I was quite frequently lost at what was going on in this book. Thankfully, Sean also read it and he could recap it for me. Objectively, this is a good book with a good story (it’s being made into a movie), so I recommend reading it if this style is your thing.
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. My fave book of this month! You get thrown into the story not really knowing what’s going on, but slowly pick it up over time. I don’t even want to tell you a summary because you should just experience it for yourself (don’t read the back cover!). This is my first book by this author. I feel like they became more well known with a reassurance of this particular book (it came out in 2010!) and Klara and the Sun (2021). I’m excited to dive into this author’s rabbit hole of 11 books.
Reasons to Stay Alive by Matt Haig. As someone who can struggle with intense anxiety, I deeply felt a lot of what he said and how he described anxiety and depression (like a swamp, is one descriptor that sticks out in my mind). It’s also a good perspective read if you don’t struggle with these things yourself but someone you know/love does.
A Bad Character by Deepti Kapoor. The first novel by the author of Age of Vice, my fave read from last month.

Book I Loved the Most:

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. It’s really beautifully written.

Book I Would Add to My Collection:

A Walk in the Park: The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon by Kevin Kedarko. Such a fun adventure! Makes me want to do this even though they expressly say “don’t do this.”