October

This month I read 2 audiobooks, 2 ebooks, and 2 print books from the Toronto Public Library, totaling to 6 books.

Before we begin,

Dishonourable Mentions

Marriage, A History by Stephanie Coontz

Synopsis: The author discusses the history of marriage (and the idea of marrying for love) from the beginning of human civilization, all the way to the 20th century.

My thoughts: This book is pretty long, and since I got it on ebook from the library, I was going to have to read an entire chapter per day if I wanted to finish it. So I just didn’t. In my defense, I did read the first quarter, and the entire thesis across several chapters was that marriage unions were usually made to build relationships between different family groups, not for love. You need community in order to survive, and marrying your daughter to their son will grow your community. I get it. So I don’t feel that bad about not finishing it.

You may like this book if: you want to do me a solid and tell me if I was right about this book.

The Body Below by Daniel Hecht

Synopsis: Conn Whitman’s only remaining vice is his long swims in various bodies of water all around Vermont. It’s the only way he can really clear his head. During one of his swims, he crashes into a large object partially submerged in the water, and although it spooks him, he doesn’t report it to the police. It turns out that object was the body of Conn’s estranged sister Trudy, who went missing days ago. As the police investigation into Trudy’s death continues, Conn (a journalist by trade) starts his own parallel investigation, determined to get to the bottom of what really happened.

My thoughts: Readers will know that I often hate it when people who are not the police try to solve mysteries, especially when they do it badly or there are no other endearing characteristics. Generally I didn’t find this book to be interesting, and because it’s 500 pages long, I wasn’t about to sit through it just for the sake of finishing it. The eponymous body on the front cover also looks like one of those 3-D ultrasound pictures people get of their developing fetuses, which certainly doesn’t help the book be endearing.

You may like this book if: you like true crime but in a boring way

And now,

The Real Reviews

Nine Perfect Strangers by Liane Moriarty

Synopsis: Frances is a romance writer who was recently defrauded by an internet romance scam. Carmel is a newly divorced mum of four little girls. Tony is a retired Aussie Rules Football star who doesn’t see his adult children much. Ben and Jessica are a young married couple who recently won the lottery, and are now struggling in their marriage. The Marconi family (Parents Napoleon and Heather, and daughter Zoe) are still struggling three years after their son Zach committed suicide. And Lars is just a family lawyer that enjoys health retreats. These nine perfect strangers have congregated at Tranquillim House, a historic house in the Australian bush country, in order to be refreshed, rejuvenated, and transformed. Tranquillum House owner Masha takes the business of personal transformation very seriously. Secretly, she’s a huge advocate of psychedelic therapy and microdosing LSD, although none of the guests know that. Will the nine strangers come out the other side of their experience with a new lease on life? WIll they come out at all?

My thoughts: This book is possibly the greatest piece of meta-fiction ever, in that the first half was completely boring, but once the characters started taking LSD, it became way more compelling. The actual trips themselves were fun, and then the plot sped way up, and the events that took place after the trips were a lot more interesting. It was also more interesting to watch Masha’s descent into obsession, and to see the characters make a lot of breakthroughs, instead of just listen to everyone complain about their lives all the time. I think the beginning of the book also felt more boring because I used an audiobook for the first three quarters, and the narrator was good but very slow and plodding. Thankfully, the audiobook glitched and refused to play certain chapters (I’ve never had that before??) and a paper copy of the book was delivered basically into my arms, so the last quarter that I read only took me 45 minutes, instead of a projected 3 hours.

Rating: 3/5 human pyramids that you really should have formed instead of trying to execute a ridiculous jump straight out of Aussie Rules Football

The Last Devil to Die (Thursday Murder Club #4) by Richard Osman

Synopsis: The Thursday Murder Club have another mystery to solve, but this one hits a bit closer to home than usual. Kuldesh Singh, noted antiques dealer and beloved friend of Stephen and Elizabeth’s has been found shot dead in his car. The one thing not found at the scene was a small box containing $100,000 of cocaine. This has greatly upset some of the local cocaine dealers, as well as members of the National Crime Agency, who have come all the way from London to take over the case, forcing Chris and Donna to investigate some local horse thefts. On a more somber note, Stephen’s struggles with dementia continue to worsen, leaving Elizabeth in a hellish private situation, while Joyce, Ron, and Ibrahim attempt to step up. Will they find the cocaine and avenge Kudesh’s death?

My thoughts: Again, Osman absolutely knocks it out of the part with another fantastic book. I really liked that the book’s own synopsis mentioned that the club would have to make their way through heartbreak, because the aforementioned heartbreak was actually grief and not just a break-up or something. It’s not fully divested from romantic love, but it’s another kind of emotion that should get explored more. I will warn potential readers that I had tears streaming down my face during my lunch break, so don’t read this while at work. Honestly, every part of this book was good. The characters are all iconic, the writing style is chef’s kiss. I would actually consider paying $40 (the price for a new copy at Indigo) for it, which should tell you all you need to know. Osman has said that he’s taking a break from the Thursday Murder Club in order to write about a Father-in-Law/Daughter-in-Law detective team, hopefully to be released sometime next year, which I will be forced to read out of loyalty.

Rating: 5/5 little orange foxes with white tips on their ears named Snowy

Just Another Missing Person by Gillian McAllister

Synopsis: 1 year ago, Detective Julia Day failed at her job. A young woman, Sadie, went missing and Julia failed to find her because she was too wrapped up with her own daughter, Genevieve. A local criminal attempted to rob Genevieve at gunpoint, and she accidentally stabbed him in self defense, leading to his death. Julia has been so occupied with covering up the crime and protecting her daughter that it has affected her marriage and her job. 1 year later, things are finally starting to get back to normal when a different young woman, Olivia, is also reported missing. But when Julia starts investigating the case, a stranger threatens her: plant evidence and convict a local boy of Olivia’s murder, or else he’ll reveal Genevive’s crime to the public. Will Julia be able to stay true to her convictions and redeem herself?

My thoughts: I think this book made really good use of the second person, by using it to mix up different timelines and obscure who the narrator was actually talking to. The characters were not particularly noteworthy, but the plot was fine up until the last few twists. I thought it was tired and overdone, and although there was technically some foreshadowing I found it to be a bit abrupt (as if the author just gave up and used a trope to assign the final killer). I also thought it was strange that the main character completely missed the book’s climax; she only briefly confronted the killer before she was locked in the trunk of her car, and the killer ended up being defeated by a minor character. That minor character also immediately released the protagonist, so it wasn’t like there was a dramatic search for her or anything.

Rating: 3/5 work husbands who can’t say no to a side hustle

The Dresden Files

Death Masks (Dresden Files #5) by Jim Butcher

Synopsis: Harry Dresden has been hired to do his most important task ever: find the missing Shroud of Turin. Yes, the Shroud of Turin that Jesus himself used. It was stolen from Italy by a group of European Thieves known as the Church Mice, and is thought to be in Chicago. Unfortunately this has come at a very busy time. The War between the Red Court of Vampires and the White Council of Wizards is still ongoing, and the wizards are taking heavy losses. Paolo Ortega, a Duke of the Red Court and a very powerful vampire, has challenged Harry to a duel: if Harry wins, the Red Court will surrender and end the war, but it’s a duel to the death, and if Harry loses he will die. Ortega has also causally mentioned that he’ll kill all of Harry’s friends if he doesn’t agree to participate in the duel. Plus, Karrin Murphy of the Chicago PD needs Harry’s help with an unusual corpse: a man who apparently died from every disease all at once. And, Susan (Harry’s ex-girlfriend turned vampire) is back in town. Will Harry be able to save his friends, recover the shroud, end the war, and save his girlfriend? (No.)

3/5 epic battles at Wrigley Field

Blood Rites (Dresden Files #6) by Jim Butcher

Synopsis: Harry Dresden doesn’t have a lot of friends, and the few he has have done him many favours over the years. So when Thomas Raith, a White Court vampire who has helped out Harry a few times, asks for a favour, Harry of course agrees to help him out. Thomas’s friend Arturo Genosa is a film producer whose production assistants keep being killed in mysterious and unlikely ways (Eg. getting hit by a car while waterskiiing). Thomas is worried that someone is trying to kill Arturo, and Harry agrees to go undercover on the set in order to find the killer and protect Arturo. At the same time, Harry is being hunted by Black Court Vampires, whose superior strength, speed, and power make them formidable enemies. In order to protect himself, Harry is forced to go on the offense and put together a strike team that will destroy the vampires, their leader Mavra, and rescue a group of children that they have taken hostage.

3/5 Renfields: humans who have been so deeply mind controlled by Black Court Vampires that their psyches have been broken, turning them into insane killing machines

My thoughts: The saga of me trying to read through all of the Dresden Files continues. To be honest, the books are starting to blend together at this point, especially because each book has so many different plot threads that are going on at the same time. I didn’t even fit all of them into my synopses because it would have been too confusing. Jim Butcher is also still extremely horny, to the point where it is making me uncomfortable. In Death Masks, Harry attends a party undercover with Susan. Even though they aren’t together, Harry is deeply in love with and attracted to her. So why, when they are literally holding hands, does he oogle another woman at the party (who is literally working as a bodyguard for one of Harry’s enemies)?? And in Blood Rites, Arturo Genosa turns out to be an erotic film producer, so Harry is constantly on set with (and oogling) a bunch of porn stars. Are men okay??

Baseballissimo: My Summer in the Italian Minor Leagues by Dave Bidini

Synopsis: This is the true account of how Dave Bidini spent the summer of 2002: living in Italy and reporting on the Nettuno Peones, a minor league Italian baseball team. Nettuno is a small town in the Lazio region of central Italy, just south of Rome. In WWII, it was an important HQ for the Allied operations in the Italian theater. The American soldiers played baseball with each other during their time off, and introduced it to the local Nettunesi, making Nettuno the birthplace of Italian baseball. Dave, born in Toronto to Italian-Canadian parents, grew up a staunch Blue Jays fan. He later became a newspaper columnist and musician in two bands (the Rheostatics and the Bidiniband). In the book, Dave chronicles the Peone’s 2002 season, detailing each game and most practices, interspersed with his own memories of watching baseball.

My thoughts: This book rates 3/5 for content, but 5/5 for pure vibes. A Canadian born in Toronto with Italian heritage that likes the Blue Jays? Readers will know that’s literally me! Apparently, he’s the only person to have ever been nominated for (what I consider to be) the Canadian EGOT (Gemini (TV), Juno (Music), Genie (Film), and Canada Reads (Books)), which is hilarious if true. Dave clearly cares A LOT about baseball, which is nice to see, but as a more casual and recent fan most of it went over my head. However, the wacky stories of him and his young family living in Italy for the summer and hanging out with all the players were so perfect. I think the choice to follow the Peones instead of Nettuno’s major league team was a great one: they didn’t have a lot of money or a ton of skill, but they had A LOT of heart. He was also able to focus more on the people and the culture instead of getting caught up in statistics and jargon. He gave every Peone’s player a nickname (including The Emperor, Solid Gold, Fab Julie, and Skunk Bravo, to name a few), attended every practice and game, and practically lived with the head coach Pietro. I also really appreciated that many of his conversations were sprinkled with Italian words (the vibes! impeccable).

Rating: 4/5 Italian-Canadians living the dream

And finally,

The bracelet of the month will be posted to the cafe.

i am, your most faithful blogger, elisa