Where did April go? This month seems to have blown by really fast, and I can’t even articulate exactly why. I didn’t do any traveling, taxes were an exciting, I turned around a short story in what-feels-like a short amount of time, and got a lot of work done on the revision. I’ve also gotten back to tri-weekly workouts which has been really good for my energy levels. A productive month, even if the productivity wasn’t exactly linear.

I did two blog interviews, which you can find here:

• M. Shaw to celebrate Tenebrous Press’s first novella, One Hand to Hold, One Hand to Carve
• Mar Romasco-Moore to welcome their second YA, I Am the Ghost In Your House

In May, I believe there is an author interview every week so get hype for those.

ARCs

• Glitterati by Oliver K. Langmead (adult, science fiction)
  • Fashion forward and deeply unsettling in its dystopia
  • Deeply unlikeable protagonist but I couldn’t stop reading
• I’m the Girl by Courtney Summers (young adult, thriller)
  • A girl wants to work a resort
  • Elements of a murder mystery, but mostly about finding agency in a world that violently wants to deny it
  • Crushing ending, proceed with caution
• The Many Half-Lived Lives of Sam Sylvester by Maya MacGregor (YA, mystery)
  • Autistic, nonbinary Sam Sylvester is fascinated by kids who died before 19 and moves into the former home of just one kid
  • A lot about rebuilding trust after trauma and finding “your people”
  • Forthcoming author interview on 5/3/2022
• Under Fortunate Stars by Ren Hutchings (adult, science fiction)
  • Two shifts are trapped in a time rift where past meets present
  • Fun cast of characters with deeply un-fun backstories in some cases
  • Forthcoming author interview on 5/12/2022

Audiobooks

• Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company That Addicted America by Beth Macy (adult, nonfiction, 2018)
  • Chronicles the opioid epidemic from the perspective of a ravaged Appalachian community
  • Empathetic despite the despair
• The Icepick Surgeon: Murder, Fraud, Sabotage, Piracy, and Other Dastardly Deeds Perpetrated in the Name of Science by Sam Kean (adult, nonfiction, 2021)
  • Collection of medical crimes that range from goofy to downright horrifying
  • A good primer for more reading to come
• I’m So (Not) Over You by Kosoko Jackson (adult, romance, 2022)
  • Kian and Hudson are exes until Hudson invites Kian to play boyfriend at a relative’s wedding
  • Sweet in its romance and thoughtful in its exploration of class
• The Paris Apartment by Lucy Foley (adult, thriller, 2022)
  • Jess sees an opportunity to get a fresh start by staying with her brother, Ben, in Paris
  • However, he’s vanished a mystery unfurls
  • Intertwined cast of characters with an exploration of dirty money in elite society
• This Might Hurt by Stephanie Wrobel (adult, thriller, 2022)
  • Hard-ass sister tries to get her younger sister out of a wellness center that’s clearly a cult
  • How I realized I’m not too interested in reading stories that empathize with a cult leader
• Unacceptable: Privilege, Deceit & the Making of the College Admissions Scandal by Melissa Korn and Jennifer Levitz (adult, nonfiction)
  • The entire saga of the College Admissions scandal that started with a fraudster
  • Infuriating topic in a book that covers a wide scope of possible solutions to improve college admisisons as a whole

Physical Copies

• Orochi Vol. 1 by Kazuo Umezz (manga, horror 2022 )
  • Re-issue of 70’s manga in a beautiful bound edition
  • Two stories in which we follow a young woman with strange powers upending situations with even stranger circumstances
• Woman, Eating by Claire Kohda (Adult, horror, 2022)
  • Vampire Lydia is at the threshold of independent adulthood while also existing within several interstitial spaces
  • Makes great use of vampirism as a vehicle for exploring one’s personal identity

Manga

• Chainsaw Man Vol. 4 – 11 by Tatsuki Fujimoto (dark fantasy shonen, 2021-2022)
  • Denji is a devil-human hybrid working for public safety to take down the Gun Devil
  • Twists on twists on small details that pay off later
  • Definitely will be rereading this one at some point