February 2021 books

The Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

So much fun!

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Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine, 1921-1933 by Anne Applebaum
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When I picked up this book about the Ukrainian Famine, I did not expect to end up binge-reading it! I've been interested in the Holodomor at least since early adulthood, and when I read Traitor: A Novel of World War II, I was reminded of it and decided to look for a book to read about it. I thought I might be able to get a slightly better picture of what happened than what Wikipedia had on offer. And this book is just what I was hoping for! But also more! I was not expecting this riveting journey through not only the famine itself but also Ukranian nationalism, Soviet language policy, and honest-to-goodness 1930s Fake News!

Here's an excerpt:

In the years that followed the famine, Ukrainians were forbidden to speak about what had happened. They were afraid to mourn publicly. Even if they had dared to do so, there were no churches to pray in, no tombstones to decorate with flowers. When the state destroyed the insitutitons of the Ukrainian countryside, it struck a blow aginst public memory as well....The official silence gave [people's private remembrances] almost a secret power. From 1933 onwards such stories became an alternative narrative, an emotionally powerful "true history" of the famine, an oral tradition that grew and developed alongside the official denials.

And a quoted poem from 1943:

What has happened to the laughter,
To the bonfires girls used to light on Midsummer's Eve?
Where are the Ukrainian villages
And the cherry orchards by the houses?
Everything has vanished in a ravenous fire
Mothers are devouring their children,
Madmen are selling human flesh
At the markets.

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A Very Punchable Face by Colin Jost
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I would have liked this more if I already loved Colin Jost. But it was still a good book with lots of interesting and funny parts! And I SCREAMED when I found out he wrote the SNL bidet sketch.

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The Cousins by Karen M. McManus
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I am finding that I really enjoy this author's books! This was another enjoyable mystery with interesting twists and turns. I like that these books are spooky without being gross - there is always a sense of warmth somewhere in the story that keeps it from getting too dark.

Oh, and if Two Can Keep a Secret was a nod to haunted cheerleader books, then this one almost seems like a nod to Flowers in the Attic. Very cheeky!

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The Duke and I by Julia Quinn
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I think this book should have the subtitle: A Cautionary Tale of What Happens When Society Doesn't Believe in Providing Girls with Sex Education. I mean, the book's central conflict could have been solved by literally ANY well-meaning person in Daphne's life (her mom? her maid? someone who grew up on a farm?) taking her aside and saying look, sis, here's how things work. But I get it, that's not how things were done in Regency England! I wonder if the books in this series from the brothers' points of view will be a little more grounded. I suspect this book series as a whole is greater than the sum of its parts, judging from how many people I know who really appreciate them, including one podcast host who said this series SAVED her 2020 (and her dad died in 2020!). So I will probably read them even though I just noticed that my library only owns the next book in Swedish which means I will have to be the person who requests that they buy the rest of the series in English or else learn Swedish!!!

By the way, I had thought that this was the most sexytimes-book I'd ever read but then I remembered that I read the A Court of Thorns and Roses series which had not only sexytimes, but FAERIES. This book only has plain old Regency Era sexytimes, which are extremely sensible and respectful in comparison (IN COMPARISON, please don't say I didn't warn you).

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Murder on Cold Street by Sherry Thomas
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A decent installment for this series, but not my favorite one, even if it is fun to see the MLD (mysterious loner dude) drop a bit of the M and the L. I feel like in the other books, we got to spend a little more time with Charlotte and her brain. In this one, we were mostly with other characters instead.

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Alone on the Ice: The Greatest Survival Story in the History of Exploration by David Roberts
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

4.5 stars. I feel like I became one of those annoying kids obsessed with some niche subject while reading this book because I kept spouting "did you know" facts to Jeremy every ten seconds. (He finally agreed to just read the dang book, which made me sad because it meant I couldn't tell him about it anymore.) This is sort of a prequel to Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage and I liked it at least as much! I highly recommend reading this book - which is about people trapped in Antarctica - while cosy and wrapped up in blankets in bed during wintertime.

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