January is definitely working out better than December. I read 9 books! I'm hoping that January ends up much higher than December did. (It did, by two books!)
1: The Echelon Vendetta by David Stone - I had purchased the whole series at my old library's $4 bag sale. I was quite impressed with the writing in it. We follow Micah Dalton, a cleaner for the CIA. Someone who goes in if a mission has gone wrong to make sure things can't be traced back to "the Agency" as it were. We open with him in a small Italian village to identify a body. We then go with him on this wild journey to figure out what happened and stop it from happening again. Micah was amazingly abrassive and sarcastic and I absolutely adored it. He was not super serious at all. I couldn't put the book down. I loved practically discovering stuff with him as he was given more information on just how deep the deceit went and how he fixed the problem. I have already pulled out the next volume in the series, The Orpheus Deceit, to continue on and figure out where we go from here. I definitely recommend this to thriller readers.
2: Y/N by Esther Yi - I don't know what I read. This poor girl, whom we only ever learn to call N, is obsessed with this K-Pop singer called Moon. And not even obsessed with him, she seems to be more obsessed with just her idea of him. Almost to a delusional level were she superimposes her own thoughts onto reality and just assumes that's the way it's always been. She eventually tracks him down and tells him all of this and has him read a story she wrote that has some exeptionally disturbing content. I mean, I'm not surprised at all at his reaction. Along her way she meets someone in a similar situation. I definitely liked this storyo and the pure sense of "What.....?" it left in me, but be warned, you do need a higher vocbulary for it. Esther Yi uses a lot of $3 words in it. Some that I had to actually look up to understand what was even happening in her head. Really well written, though.
3: The Keys to Perception by Ivo Dominguez, Jr. - This was interesting. I'd classify it as an intermediate to advanced book. Something not to be gone into lightly. I fully recommend being at least moderately comfortable in grounding and shielding and some mild energy work before even reading this. Or you will be horribly lost. I got to meet Ivo and he had a wonderful piece of advice if you have a signed book, and you don't know what the author was talking about: Put your hand on the signature and concentrate on what it is you don't understand. Then open the book back up. It should be clearer.
4: The Black Phone Stories by Joe Hill - I picked this up because I'd already seen the Blumhouse movie and I was curious about what the short story would be like in comparison. I was greatly let down by that in particular. I think the only things the short and the movie had remotely in common were the black balloons, Finney, and the phone itself. I liked some of the other stories. A few were just weird and there were two that left an oddly bad taste in my mouth. I didn't like them at all. I think overall, I'm going to give this one a 3.5/5, it was so close to a 4, but let me down. I can't even say "in the end" because Voluntary Committal was actually really good.
5: Mercury by Amy Jo Burns - My January Book of the Month selection. I picked it because I come from a rural Pennsylvania town in a river valley (other side of the state, but....no less famous being only 30 minutes from Scranton up I-81). This book was just a comedy of errors. They kept trying to cover for each other's faults and just continually made it worse. The slow reveals of which Joseph was doing what and how it contributed to the family drama was just PERFECT. I loved the tangle they accidentally got themselves into. Baylor needed a bit more grace. He was the oldest. He was kind of forgotten/compared to Dad more than Waylon and Shay. He should have gotten better treatment.
6: The Will of the Many by James Islington - I loved this. I'm not much of a Roman Empire girly (I'm a Hellenistic Greece girly), but this was well written and I loved the drama of it all. We follow Viz Telemus as he gets all these various tasks to follow and has to figure out his way through this school that he didn't want any part of due to certain things from his own history and where he ends up. It was really good. I loved how he had to keep all of this knowledge from literally anyone else and he was starting to not be able to.
7: Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas - I enjoyed this one. Yadriel has always wanted to be a brujo, like all the other boys in his family. The only problem is that he is AFAB and they will not see him for who he is. In his efforts to prove himself, he tries to prove himself by performing the tasks of a brujo on his own and it kind of blows up in his face. I loved the way Adrien Thomas told the story and how we see the people on Yads's side and the people who are against him and that betrayal! I never even saw it coming. A 4.5/5 solidly. I'm looking forward to reading more from him.
8: Firekeeper's Daughter by Angeline Boulley - I read this one as a buddy read with my friend Rowan. It definitely took a twist that I was not expecting. I thought it was going to be just a coming of age story about an indigenous girl and her efforts to just belong within her own clan. Nope. Well, yes, but no. It did involve that, but also a huge thing that was just so exciting to read. I felt bad for her having to go against her tribal teachings and more or less lie to her elders. I already have the sequel (Warrior Girl Unearthed) and I plan to pick it up as soon as possible.
9: The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams - I don't know how to describe what I read. It was supposed to be slice of life in the 1930s, I suppose? But it seemed kind of dumb to me. We are treated to just a little time (two days?) in this family's life. There's nothing exciting or dramatic or really all that special about it. I didn't much care for it at all...this was just...something. Another book where my only take away is "Well, I read it...?"
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