Friday Reads June 2 2023

This was a very weird week. I had Monday and Wednesday off work, so I thought Thursday was Monday because it was also the first day of the Summer Reading Program. I only know it's Friday because my brain opted to stay in bed this morning, so I am here without it today. We'll see how this goes.

It's a new month, so I am reading from a new TBR. None of this should be a surprise, but here we go.

Fire in Paradise by Alastair Gee and Dani Anguiano - This 50-by-50 book came in from the library so I'm mostly working on it right now. In 2018 the Camp Fire started from a downed power cable in the woods in Northern California and started a fire that destroyed the entire town of Paradise. 27000 people without homes. This is the story of how the town was set up to burn even though they had made changes to attempt to protect themselves and created evacuation routes and notification tools. Fire has always been terrifying to me. This is like true crime.

The First Thing About You by Chaz Hayden - I started this Tuesday when I realized I forgot to bring a book to work. I found the only book in the library that was on my June TBR and started it at lunch. This is about Harris who is a Freshman in high school when his family moves from California to New Jersey. Starting at a new school is hard enough as a teenager, but Harris is wheelchair bound. The kids at the new school don't make fun of him, but no one is begging him to sit by them. Well, there's one guy, but he's the nerd and Harris doesn't want to be with the nerd crowd. Oh well. It's better than no friends. He immediately crushes on the girl with the locker next to his. She also sits next to him in homeroom and is in most of his classes. She doesn't appear to notice his wheelchair or the fact that his mom has to feed him lunch. Harris categorizes people by their favorite color. He believes he can only be good friends with people whose favorite color is the opposite of his on the color wheel. His is blue. Oranges, yellows, reds: those are the best fit for him. Frustratingly, his crush won't tell him her favorite color. I'm at the part where he is interviewing a new nurse to replace his mom at school. So far, he's not impressed. This is a Sequoyah book. This is also one of those "sick kid" books I was complaining about, but it's kind of not. His illness affects his day to day life, but it isn't about him being sick. He's not in and out of the hospital or coughing up a lung, he is just in a wheelchair. So we'll see if that makes a difference.

Love, Pamela by Pamela Anderson - Nobody understands my love for this woman. My coworker thinks it's because we both have a history of toxic boyfriends. I don't know. I don't even really like celebrity memoirs. But I like Pammy, so I'll read this. Also, it's less than 300 pages. I have noticed that the actors who have roles where they are really dumb are sometimes the smartest people in the room. Marilyn Monroe, Lisa Kudrow, you see where I'm going? Sometimes Pamela slips her mask and shows her brain. I'm hoping to see that in this book.

That's it for now. The YA book is the longest at almost 400 pages, but it reads quickly, so here's hoping I can get a lot of reading done this week. I have 3 doctor appointments Monday so I can probably get a little bit done.

What are you reading?