BOOK CLUB ☆ I have so many things to say and this is such a long post

HI FRIENDS I am so happy to say that with this, I am officially caught up with yapping about all of the standalone books I've read!! I will be making individual posts about series I have read (ACOTAR, The Hunger Games, and A Good Girl's Guide to Murder), as well as making new posts with every several books I inhale. I'm formatting this a little differently because the way I was making these posts before was so impractical for me (it took me way too long) so I hope the massive amounts of scrolling required to get through this post isn't too treacherous LMAO

Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam  ☆☆☆☆☆

Y'all… there are truly no words for how much I hated this book. I WILL be talking about spoilers because I need to explain WHY this book was ass. The concept of this book was absolutely lovely – family of four staying in an Airbnb, the original couple comes home claiming there’s something going on in the city (causing power outages and lots of troubles) and they want to stay in their own home with the renters. The book description makes it seem like there’s a lot more discourse as to if there’s anything REALLY happening, or if the owners of the home are lying and doing something malicious.... but that goes away pretty quickly in the book itself. First peeve: the writing is atrocious. Every single thing is unnecessarily detailed (multiple pages dedicated to a grocery list, for example) AND icing on the cake is that this writer uses big words SO often and SO unnecessarily, which makes this genuinely a chore to read. I listened to the audiobook and the way I had to actively listen so hard to even understand what was happening ?? Second peeve: characters are insufferable. INSUFFERABLE,,, the main family (renters) are regularly spewing racist remarks about the owners of the home (the owners are black and the renters, upon meeting them, keep talking about how they seem like they’d be the “help” instead of the homeowners because why would black people own a nice home?). I understand that racism can be a powerful writing tool and an important subject to draw attention to as people in 2024 are still tremendously racist, but this really didn’t feel like it added ANYTHING else to the story. Third peeve: the family has a teenage son who is described VERY uncomfortably on multiple occasions! I don’t know what this author is on, but the mother in the book was thinking about her son’s (around 17 years old iirc?) perfect chest and how his nipples come to pink points and teehee we didn’t need that info! I tried to look past this but then we also got a completely unnecessary scene of him masturbating that was just.. uncomfortable. Onto the actual plot of this book?? Do you want to get edged super hard by a story that seems like a great plot but instead just gives you nothing to work with? This is the book for you! As the book progresses, it becomes obvious that something really IS happening in the outside world,but you never, ever, ever, get to find out what it is! The book occasionally mentions super loud noises happening, weird and large animal migrations, and a couple other strange occurrences.. leading you to believe it’s some kind of apocalypse…? but then it just doesn’t ever say what’s going on! We are given hints from the author occasionally, stating that it’s not a war but something worse (but then there’s large military planes from multiple countries flying by??) and it’s,,, yall,,, this book was so exhausting. It just keeps dropping weird hints and weird things happening and then the book literally just ends with some message along the lines of “it’s about the friends we made along the way!”. This book exhausted me and the way it ended without explaining anything that happened… this book was such a waste of time. And the second bad book I read in a row!!! I was so scared to keep listening to books!!!!!!!

Don't Let Her Stay by Nicola Sanders ★★★★★

I can and will scream from the rooftops about how absolutely AMAZING this book is!! After reading two shit books in a row I had such low expectations, but holy hell Don’t Let Her Stay blew my MIND. It’s about a couple who recently had a baby, and the man’s daughter from a previous marriage wants to be involved in her new sister’s life. I don’t want to explain more than that because I really think going into this book without much info is so lovely, but this book has really big Orphan vibes of the gaslighting/shit behavior with one parent versus angel behavior with the other. So much happens in this book, there are multiple twists at the end that truly had my jaw DROPPED TO THE FLOOR!!! ITS SO GOOD Y'ALL if you like mystery/thriller books at ALL then this is a must read. This is my favorite standalone book I have had the pleasure of experiencing thus far, and something would have to be unbelievably good to top this. 

Mother-Daughter Murder Night by Nina Simon ★★★☆☆

This book was good! It really wasn’t anything special, but it was interesting enough and a decent read. About a daughter, mother, and grandmother living together when a dead body is found on the grounds of the daughter’s workplace and she immediately becomes under suspicion for the death. It’s pretty quickly debunked that the daughter has any involvement, but then the grandmother takes it upon herself to solve what happened. I think a lot of my lack of further interest in this book is because the grandmother really didn’t have her own ties to the dead body, therefore it was… a really impersonal thing? But it was still a good read and had a good ending!

Just Another Missing Person by Gillian McAllister ★★★☆☆

Another book that was good but nothing insanely exceptional. This book is about a detective who gets blackmailed to plant evidence at a crime scene for a missing girl. The book is told from multiple perspectives, which don’t line up until pretty late in the story which caused some confusion but it all ties together and makes sense eventually! 

The Overnight Guest by Heather Gudenkauf ★★★★★

This book was really really good!! About a true crime writer who decides to stay in a home where multiple homicides took place 20 years later, and she ends up getting closer than intended to what happened. I am not the biggest fan of books told from multiple perspectives, but I DO really like that trope specifically when it follows multiple perspectives through the past and present. This book starts on the slower side but once the plot picks up, it’s really good and has a handful of banger twists!! 

Pieces of Her by Karin Slaughter ★★★★☆

This book is so so insanely sexy for starting off with a genuine bang. Most books have a pretty slow start, but this one goes STRAIGHT in to drama and it’s SO nice!!! Pieces of Her is about a daughter named Andy who is super anxious and has terrible emergency reaction skills (real as hell) who finds herself taking care of her sick mother. One day at the mall, a shooter attacks, and Andy sees a new side of her mother who is a bad bitch and handled a really bad situation… really well. And then things change for her mother, more unfolds, and Andy has to flee the state on her mother’s orders. Andy starts to uncover her mother’s past and learns there’s a lot that she didn’t know. The book itself starts off being VERY interesting, very fast paced and lovely, then kinda dies down and gets.. a little boring in the middle.. but finishes being really good!! I feel like the first 25% is a 5 star, the middle 50% is 3 stars, and then the last 25% is 5 stars again.

Girl, Forgotten by Karin Slaughter ★★★★☆

I actually had no idea that this was a sequel to Pieces of Her until I started listening and noticed the same character names popping up,,, and then I put it together LMAO,, this book is good! Andy is now a US Marshall and gets sent on a job that throws her into learning more about her own past and her biological father. A lot of different plot points happen in this book, and it does have the beloved trope of listening to the POV of Andy in the present AND the POV of a different character in the past. I was attached to the characters from the previous book so that also made this one higher rated imo 

Midnight Sun by Stephanie Meyer ★★☆☆☆

Although I didn't really enjoy reading the Twilight saga, I felt like,,, I needed,,, to at least read Midnight Sun to experience it ?? I had the same experience with Midnight Sun as I did with the rest of the series where the beginning kinda slapped, and then it just,,, got ..,, so annoying. Midnight Sun is literally just the first Twilight book from Edward's perspective instead of Bella's. It's actually very cool seeing the story from his pov since he has the privilege of reading everyone's minds (minus Bella) and seeing what stupid things his creeper ass is up to is.. still .. interesting. Tbh if the rest of the series had Edward’s pov I think I'd read that too despite not really liking it so idk what that says about me ?? dedication to twilight?? masochism? idk. regardless, this was yet another annoying take of a horribly offset power dynamic between Bella and Edward where Edward is so weird and does so many things,,, considers himself in love with her whilst knowing her for several days, is immediately possessive of her in an ownership way, watches her sleep after having just met her ???? not considering what she wants and only enforcing what he believes is best for her ??? referred to her as soft and vulnerable when he was creeping on her (its giving fedora, Edward) ????? there's so much and I have so many negative thoughts but it’s like a car crash where I can't look away and I need to consume the entire series at least once

Beware the Woman by Megan Abbott ★★★★★

This book is so insanely good but also it SUCH an annoying read because it really is just a book about a woman minding her own fucking business and then everyone around her is manipulating her, gaslighting her, and making her feel like she’s crazy. The main character, Jacy, goes to visit her husband’s parents with him, finding herself in a really stranded area with no service. At first everything is cool and fine, but progressively people start making more and more decisions for her, start telling her what’s happening to her (pregnant) body, and just… being super unreasonable and annoying. If you liked the movie “Mother!” then this is along the same wavelength (except thankfully not as irritating as Mother! imo)

The Only Survivors by Megan Miranda ★★★☆☆

Another good but not exceptional book. A group of adults meet every year to maintain some kind of bond after they endured a terrible accident in high school, where on a trip, two vans went off road and the lives of twelve kids and two teachers were lost. In the present day, now two of the survivors have died, some suspicious stuff is happening, and they realize someone has malicious intentions. I feel like the explanation and twist of what happens in this book is kind of underwhelming (as well as the incidents that occurred while they’re in high school) but it did keep me interested enough to enjoy the book. 

Home Is Where The Bodies Are by Jeneva Rose ★★★★☆

When their mother passes, three siblings get together to sort through her things and mourn. While looking through old home videos, they come across a short recording that ties their parents to the disappearance and murder of a teenage girl from when they were kids. The twist of this book was a little expected, but it was still a good read and I’m a big fan of the ending of this book!! There were several plot points that I was absolutely not expecting, making this a good mystery thriller!

Just the Nicest Couple by Mary Kubica ★★★★☆

I read this at the recommendation of my best friend and this book is WILD. It follows three perspectives – Christian and Lilly, who are a married couple, and Nina, Lilly’s friend in and out of work. Nina’s husband goes missing, Christian and Lilly are somehow involved, and… good god. poor Nina. That poor girl goes through so much through this book and literally cannot trust anyone in her life. It’s honestly a really good read with a twist at the end that 100% took me off guard and I would’ve NEVER anticipated. 

As per usual, if any of you guys have thoughts you wanna share about any of these books, feel free to do so below!

♡ Chrissy