Books I Read Recently

The books I have read over the last three months are an array of different reads that are based on my personal preferences, I am sharing my opinion of these books and how much I like or dislike them.

Spanish Lessons by Lambert Derek

Spanish Lessons, I really enjoyed this little book. I am just being honest with you. Derek is funny, and I mean in that witty writer’s way of being funny. You cannot help laughing at his mishaps and adventures with his wife in Spain. The travel adventures are believable, and he has an excellent eye for detail and language. I see the journalist and novelist in their writing style with the ability to describe reality and events accurately, and with the humor and creativity of the novelist, they create a good story. The book is short and broken into small chapters, with a different story for each chapter. I enjoy his stories about his misunderstandings with the locals about homeownership, his vocation, and his new friendship with the locals. The stories are easy to read and very light. I hope you will enjoy reading this travel book too.

The Writer’s Cats by Barbery

The Writer’s Cats is a cute little graphic novel. The book is concise and easily readable. However, the narrative is told from the observations of the writer’s cats. The observations of the cats are funny little stories about the habits of their owner’s daily life. Also, I love the bits about the cat’s inability to figure out her obsession with typing things and moving around pieces of paper. The cats also like to destroy and mess with their writer’s desk. The book has a cute narrative line of the cat’s love for their owner and their own independents as cats. I highly recommend The Writer’s Cats if you want a light and cute read.

The Wolf Age by Tore Skeie

The Wolf Age, I enjoyed reading about Viking and Anglo-Saxon history. I found this book immensely engaging for readers and easily understood for a thick piece of Scandinavian history. An exciting account of British and Scandinavian early history and the many early adventures and conquests of the Vikings. The book was laid out nicely, easily accessible, and readable. The narrative of has a nice rise and fall tell us about the empire’s swift changes of history. The narrative was exciting and gave insight into this vital piece of history in northern European ancientry.

Moby Dick by Melville

Moby Dick, I cannot say I dislike or like this book. I need some clarification on the characters odd motivations. Moby Dick is dark and moody and hard to understand at points. I struggled to understand and relate to the characters and their motivations or obsessions. Anyway, Moby Dick is a classic work of American fiction. I cannot say it was poorly written or poorly plotted. However, I did not find the text enjoyable, and the characters were all a little disturbed. I found the thick text off putting and character motivations a little crazy. I really did not enjoy this read. However, someday I will appreciate it. Maybe someday, when I reread this classic work of fiction, I will fully understand this early American literature.

Happy Place by Emily Henry

Happy Place, I really dislike this book. I am just being honest with you. Honestly, the romance was unbelievable and very much a trope with the ex-lover to enemies, now lover’s again plotline. And the added mental health element about the main characters’ discontent with their lives got repetitive after a while. The main love interest seemed very immature for being a man in his thirties. Did he not have a life and other romantic interests besides his ex-girlfriend. Also, he never seems to support Harriet’s ambitions. And spoiler alert, she gives up her ambition to be with Wyn and be happy in the end. I want to scream and through the book across the room, “What a jerk and what a lame romance!” The trope of the second romance plotline was not believable as each character seemed so burnt out from the first round of the relationship why would they try it again. The combined trope of the fake relationship and the enemies to lovers in the book plotline between the broken couple was tiring after a while. Harriet seemed to struggle with the pressure she felt to look good and make her friends happy and hide her broken relationship with Wyn. I did not like that that the characters felt like they needed to deceive others about the truth of the relationship with each. It seemed toxic and immature for two grown adults in their thirties not to have the guts to be honest with their family and friends. I wish I had liked this book more and had not found so many behaviors of the characters immature and unbelievable. One last word, people that love you do not make you give up your goals and your friends to have a romantic relationship with them. A huge red flag, indeed.

Story by AG

Alaina Gaffney