I’ve seen several other bloggers list and do mini-reviews of the books they read the previous month. I love seeing what other people are reading, so I thought I’d try it, too.
August was a fairly light reading month for me. I always seem to read less during the summer
and then read a lot more during the winter.
I’ll usually pick going swimming with the neighbors over reading in the
evening, but there’s not much that can lure me outside during the winter.
So, here are my August books:
The Locked Room by Elly Griffiths. It’s number 14 in the Ruth Galloway mystery series. If you like mystery and you
haven’t read this series, do yourself a favor and start reading it now. I always love these books. I’ve grown very attached to most of the
characters, and I love that there’s a little bit of the story from all of their
points of view.
The Locked Room is the only book I’ve read so far that takes
place during the early days of the pandemic.
It takes place in the UK, so obviously, it’s a little different than it
was here in NC, but I think the author did an incredible job of portraying what
people were feeling early on. It took me
right back to all of the how long should I plan to work from home and how much
should I change my routine type of questions.
She also did a great job of capturing the early emotional rollercoaster
of “this won’t be that bad” to “this is terrible,” and everything in
between. I think, years from now, when
someone wants to know what the early days of the pandemic were like for regular
people, this book will do a great job of conveying that. I assume that there will be more and more
books coming out that take place during the pandemic, and I’m interested to see
if other authors do an equally good job capturing all of the feelings.
Pandemic writing aside, the mystery was excellent, as they
always are with this series, and there was a lot of character development. After reading the same characters for so
long, you wouldn’t think there would be much room for more character
development, but they reached new depths in this book. I gave it five stars. I’m anxiously waiting for the next book in
the series!
If you’re a fan of the Ruth Galloway series, are there any
other series you recommend? I’m on the
hunt for another good mystery series.
The
Templars: History & Myth by Michael Haag. We listened to this one on Audible. One of my coworkers got us hooked on the show
The Curse of Oak Island, and there are a lot of references to the Knights Templar. My entire knowledge base of the Knights
Templar came from watching National Treasure, so it seemed prudent to learn
more about them. Nick was interested,
too, so it was an easy Audible pick.
I’m sure there are plenty of good and interesting books
about the Knights Templar.
Unfortunately, this wasn’t one of them.
It was essentially a very dry list of facts, and the narrator's voice
was extremely annoying.
I tend to read fiction, so I definitely prefer a more
narrative type of book. I tried to
factor that into my opinion of this book, but nothing about it was
engaging. It felt like “Fact One, Fact
Two, etc.” I think I would have liked it
a lot more if there had been more about some of the people involved and less
about building plans for temples, etc. I
gave it one star. Nick reads almost
exclusively nonfiction and said it was definitely on the drier side. He gave it two stars.
Have you read an interesting and engaging book about the
Knights Templar? I’d definitely like to
try another one since I feel like I was too bored to actually learn very much
about them from this book.
The Ones Who Got Away by Roni Loren.
Here’s the goodreads blurb on it:
“It's been twelve years
since tragedy struck the senior class of Long Acre High School. Only a few students survived that fateful
night—a group the media dubbed The Ones Who Got Away.
Liv Arias thought she'd never return to Long
Acre—until a documentary brings her and the other survivors back home. Suddenly her old flame, Finn Dorsey, is closer
than ever, and their attraction is still white-hot. When a searing kiss reignites their passion,
Liv realizes this rough-around-the-edges cop might be exactly what she needs...”
I just couldn’t get into this one. I started it in July and read a few other
books in the meantime, which is never a good sign for me. It wasn’t terrible, and I didn’t hate the
characters. I just didn’t feel anything
for them. There were a few points in the
book where I thought things might take a turn and get more interesting, but
they never did. I gave it two stars, and
I probably won’t try another Roni Loren book.
Hers are popular, but I’ve read one other one, and I didn’t like
it. I think maybe her style just doesn’t
work for me.
The Vanishing Type by Ellery Adams. This is the fifth book in the Secret, Book, and Scone mystery series. I love pretty
much everything about this series. It
takes place in NC, and the main character owns a bookstore. They’re classified as cozy mysteries, but I
think they’re a little more than that.
They’re definitely not overly suspenseful, but I think they’re deeper
than a lot of cozies.
There’s a group of four women who are the main characters,
and there are some great secondary characters.
There’s usually some kind of literary twist to the mysteries, and there’s
a lot of focus on the friendship the women share. I’ll be honest; I usually find myself wishing
I could join their book club and try to befriend them.
Each chapter in the series begins with a quote, and I love
that. Two of my favorite quotes in The Vanishing Type were, “A life with
love will have some thorns, but a life without love will have no roses.” (Dr.
Seuss). “You can’t go back and change
the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” (C.S. Lewis).
 |
| Tara also likes the book. |
As usual with this series, the mystery was intriguing, and
I enjoyed all of the secondary storylines.
I gave it five stars.
If you’ve read and loved this series, are there any similar
ones you recommend?
And that’s everything I read in August. I told you it was a slow reading month.
Have you read any good books lately?
