My Month Is Booked: September 2024

Welcome to September’s My Month is Booked linkup + I hope you’ve all had a nice summer! :]

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Sociopath, by Patric Gagne – This was a virtual book club pick and not something I would’ve ever picked up on my own, but! It was a surprisingly engrossing read. Patric is a sociopath and this is her memoir about her struggle to come to terms with this often maligned + misunderstood mental disorder.  I admired her dedication to finding out more about herself and what she could do to navigate + thrive in this world despite her disorder.

Whalefall, by Daniel Kraus – In the spirit of me often doing things like watching The Descent prior to going on a bunch of caving adventures throughout Vietnam and watching Jaws for the first time while on a liveaboard diving 3x/day, why would I not read a book on a dude that gets swallowed by a whale + his fight for survival when the plan is to go swimming in the ocean with humpback whales in Tonga? Very fitting, I know.

We were actually initially drawn to the gorgeous cover of this book. It’s set in an area almost-local (2 hours) from me + Monastery Beach is super close to where I got my open water diving certification, so I was really excited to read this book, and I really wanted to like this book more…but I kinda didn’t.

The author describes the scuba diving part very accurately (other than the main character’s very unrealistic air consumption levels) and I enjoyed hearing about the Monterey area by book as it’s one of my favorite places (I’ll be going there later this month to see the aquarium again! :] ), but…meh. I wanted to read this because I wanted to see if/how a dude who got swallowed by a whale would manage to GTFO of the whale, but it was 90% daddy issues in the form of Holden-Caulfield-esque angst throughout. (Catcher in the Rye is one of my least liked books I’ve ever read, so this did not help.)

Firefly Lane, by Kristen Hannah – I was not aware that this had been turned into a Netflix series, but there you go! It has a sequel called Fly Away, which I will probably eventually read too. Firefly Lane follows the lives of two girls with personalities that are complete opposites. They live on the same street (Firefly Lane!) and become inseparable best friends + the novel follows them as their through college, chasing after childhood dreams, securing their careers, finding love, etc. over the next 3 decades. There are for-sure sad moments + a lot of drama, but after finishing this book, the thing I wanted to do most was to go hug my mom.

Don’t Believe It, by Charlie Donlea – If you like reading true crime, you’re in for a treat!

Premise: Grace Sebold has spent the last decade in a St. Lucian prison for the murder of her boyfriend — in a desperate final attempt to prove her innocence, she reaches out to Sidney Ryan, a film-maker who has managed to exonerate the last 2 people she did documentaries on. As Sidney researches Grace’s case, she uncovers more and more evidence that was overlooked during the original investigation.

This is written a documentary-in-progress with past + present POVs + is engaging with a great twist. As Sidney gets closer and closer to the truth + her documentary skyrockets in popularity, prompting public outcry and demands for justice, she is forced to consider whether pursuing the truth is worth her newfound fame, career, and possibly even her life. I finished reading this in two sittings (international flights) only because I decided to take a nap on one of the flights. Will definitely be seeking out more of Donlea’s books in the future!

Salt to the Sea, by Ruth Sepetys – Although you know when you’re reading a historical fiction novel on WWII and the premise of the book is about one of the world’s greatest maritime disasters (6x more deadly than the Titanic, but very little-known) that you absolutely cannot be expecting sunshine and rainbows, but I still hoped for glimmers.

There were definitely heartbreaking moments and this was a very haunting, beautifully written novel. My brother and I have a tonnnn in common, but we overlap about 1% as far as common interests in books we like to read, and we both really liked this one! (We were listening to it as an audiobook during our New Zealand roadtrip.)  Major props especially to the one who voiced the character of Alfred, whose delusions of grandeur/self-assured arrogance/confidence in himself (despite being so breathtakingly incompetent) brought some comical relief to the book.

Got any book reviews from this month? Link em’ up below and make sure you visit others in the linkup too for reading inspiration! :] Feel free to add the below graphic to your post — please link back + comment on other posts in the linkup!

• Do you  usually read one book at a time or are you often in the middle of a couple? I used to be a “one-book-at-a-time” person, but I’m usually in the middle of at least 2 now (1 print, 1 audio at any given time, haha).
• What was your favorite read this month? (Salt to the Sea for me, but I also really enjoyed Don’t Believe It.)
• Anything you’re looking forward to reading next month? I’m reading The House in the Cerulean Sea for a cozy book club I recently joined, and Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers for the book club that I co-run (and Lonely Castle in the Mirror on my own…)!