Louise Penny has a big following on bookstagram - some of my favorites, like @topshelftext and @katereadsbooks_, are big fans. Oh, and Hillary Clinton, according to her book What Happened. I was a little afraid to start the Inspector Gamache series because, what if I didn’t like it?! What if I didn’t get the hype? Well, thankfully that didn’t happen. I finally joined the Louise Penny club thanks to a buddy read, and I’m so glad I did. I now understand the fandom, and although this wasn’t my favorite book of the year or anything, I still really enjoyed it and will be happily starting the second book in the series soon.

For those of you who aren’t on the Louise Penny train yet, Still Life is the first book in the series. It takes place in the small village of Three Pines somewhere in Quebec. When a beloved townsperson, Jane, turns up murdered around Thanksgiving (cough perfect seasonal read cough), Inspector Gamache and his team arrive at the village to solve the case.

I appreciated many of aspects of this book. I love the cozy small town vibe of Three Pines. It reminds me of another favorite fictional town, Stars Hollow. However, although this book is cozy AF, I think categorizing it as a cozy mystery would kind of discount the literary elements. I really enjoyed the writing and this book didn’t feel like *just* a cozy mystery, if you will. Not to say there is anything wrong with that, but I feel like the writing in this book is stronger than I would expect for a typical cozy.

Jane, the lady who is killed, is a good character and I felt invested in figuring out who would have wanted to kill her and why. Gamache is another great character and I’m looking forward to see his character development through the series. All of the characters of the town really brought the town to life, and I could picture the relationships in my head pretty easily.

Another great thing about this book: I didn’t figure out who the killer was, and there wasn’t a huge twist to keep it that way! I like a good twist every now and then, but I appreciated that Penny was able to keep me guessing without some crazy completely unpredictable ending. I mean, I didn’t predict the ending, but it was enough of a part of the story that it didn’t feel completely out of left field.

There were a few aspects to this book that sort of bothered me, but definitely didn’t ruin the experience. The first thing that isn’t spoiler-y was the character of Agent Nichol. She is completely immature and maybe she’s this way so we can see her character develop in the future, but she came off as entitled, lazy, and just plain rude. If she’s going to be in future books (which I assume because why else would she have been in this one, but I still hope not), I don’t know why Penny didn’t give her ANY redeeming qualities. She’s completely unlikeable in a bad way, to the point where it was annoying to have to read about her. I mean I get having unlikable characters, and I have enjoyed many a book with extremely flawed characters, but… she was too much.

I also didn’t love was the pacing. Many parts of the book felt a little slow. Long portions of dialogue didn’t hold my interest, and I had to reread a few sections. Another thing - while the descriptions of the characters allowed me to picture them, some characters felt a bit contrived, or like a list of traits. I feel like a list of traits doesn’t make a character. Also the flamboyant gay couple who run a diner and love antiques was a little stereotypical. I mean, none of this was enough to ruin the experience for me - just saying, it isn’t without its flaws.

Okay… and now the spoiler-y stuff. SPOILERS AHEAD! Stop reading now if you haven’t read this yet!

Here we go… Many parts of this mystery were unbelievable. A perfect kill with an old fashioned bow and arrow? People forgetting seemingly important details, like Jane invited them to the living room for the FIRST TIME EVER, and nobody brings it up for a few days? Hmmm…. 

Also the motive for the crime is… well, not a good or believable reason to murder someone, in my opinion. Ben, the person who has been described as kind and nobody suspects, really killed someone on the off chance they would realize he was at Fair Day from the painting? First they’d have to figure out that Timmer was killed, which nobody from the village even really suspected! Meh.

I did really enjoy the experience of reading this book, and the Three Pines world. Despite a few minor complaints, I’ll definitely be picking up the second book in the series soon. I’m happy to have jumped on this LP bandwagon!

Dear Fahrenheit 451 by Annie Spence is so snarky, I laughed out loud many times. I love me a good sarcastic tone, especially in a book about books.

In this book, Annie, a librarian, writes letters to books. Often hilarious, sometimes heartwarming, she has something to say about many different types of books.  She writes love letters to books that made an impact on her (I was surprised to find myself wanting to reread The Time Traveler’s Wife). She writes goodbye letters to books that she’s rehoming. She writes hilarious spite letters to books like Twilight.

This book is perfect for digesting a little at a time, which is maybe why it took me so long to finish it! However, the repetitive nature of a book full of letters was a little tiring, and I caught myself skimming at times. The Special Subjects section at the end was a nice change of pace. In this section, she talks about recommendations to get people to start reading, books that go well together, her favorites of all time, and more. I’ll definitely be flipping to this section when I’m in a reading slump!

I’d recommend this book to anyone who likes books about books. It had me laughing out loud a lot. And thanks to Flatiron Books for providing my copy!

I don’t even know how to start this review for The Changeling by Victor LaValle. It’s just so, so good. And so unexpected. I mean, I didn’t know what to expect going in. Or even when I was in it! Also I saw that this book is nominated for a Goodreads Choice Award in the horror category. I’m not quite sure that’s the category it should fit in. Fairy or folk tale retelling maybe, but not of the Disney variety. Of the scary but still not horror variety? I don’t know. This book has me all jumbled!

The Changeling is about Apollo Kagwa, an antique book dealer living in New York City. After he and his wife, Emma, have a baby, Brian, Emma starts acting strange. Not your regular post-partum depression strange, but, eerie strange. Disturbing strange. It goes on until she commits an unthinkable act and vanishes.

Crippled with grief, stunned, and confused, Apollo searches for Emma. His search takes him from a mysterious island in the East River to a haunted forest in Queens. It feels weird to have to point out a character’s race, but Apollo and Emma are black, and this novel paints a picture of their lives as a black couple in New York City. Race simultaneously isn’t and is a big part of the book. It’s easy to not even think about their race while you’re reading, until Apollo has to think about things like walking alone at night on a dark suburban street, and how that looks.

I don’t even know what to say about the writing. It’s so good! It’s so well done! I don’t know how to describe it. You can completely lose yourself in LaValle’s words and world. The imagery LaValle creates is deft and vivid.

This book is mesmerizing, enchanting, creepy, heartbreaking, and stunningly beautiful all at the same time. The characters feel like real people. The love stories - both romantic and father/son - are compelling. The story about modern parenting and relationships and friendships and family is smart and powerful. The fairy tail elements even felt real.

I can’t say enough good things about this book. I recommend this to, well, everyone.