{"id":18772,"date":"2024-02-01T19:52:33","date_gmt":"2024-02-02T00:52:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/notreally\/?p=18772"},"modified":"2024-02-01T19:52:33","modified_gmt":"2024-02-02T00:52:33","slug":"the-books-of-january-2024-how","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/notreally\/archives\/18772","title":{"rendered":"The Books of January (2024?! How?)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ridiculous. How is Jan 2024 OVER already?<\/p>\n

The weather has been frequently crappy, and I’ve been unmotivated, so a fair amount of reading was done in January.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

Just over 50% rereads, which, not really a surprise. And only three and a half books had new-to-me authors, so in that sense I had an idea of what I was getting.<\/p>\n

There were two books I actively disliked. Once because it focused on characters I disliked the other because it was all about the boinking and didn’t have enough story to keep my interest.<\/p>\n

But I did discover a couple new series, by authors I already liked!<\/p>\n

I’d only read Lish McBride’s YA fantasies. Uncanny Romance is a boinking series, but I was easily able to skim those bits and enjoy the story.<\/p>\n

I discovered Katharine Schellman’s Lily Adler series last fall and very much enjoyed it, so I decided to try this series, even though it was set in the US–historicals set in the US tend to make me skittish. I don’t like historicals that pretend slavery and segregation didn’t exist, but I have a hard time with stories that go into too much detail about sexism and racism. (I know. It’s ridiculous.) <\/p>\n

\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

Last Call at the Nightingale<\/em> didn’t gloss over the racism and sexism and poverty of the Roaring 20s, but it didn’t dwell on it, hitting a good balance for me. (I know<\/em> the world has been and continues to be awful for many people. Reading about it in detail puts me into a tailspin I have trouble escaping.) So I’ve got the next book lined up.<\/p>\n

I ended up reading three ace romances, two of which had characters with ASD. And I ended up reading them one after another. My favorite of the lot was The Mistletoe Motive<\/em>, despite the fact I generally dislike “enemies to lovers” as a trope.<\/p>\n

Fantasy<\/h3>\n