June Wrap Up
Now that we are officially half way through July, I guess it's time to tell you about all the books I read in June. Buckle up.
The Accidental Law Librarian by Anthony Aycock - Aycock is (or was, at one point) a librarian for a law firm. This book was very helpful for what I have to do as a public librarian in charge of the law collection at our library. Some of it was beyond the scope of what I do, but it was good to know about those things in order to know where my role ends, and I recommend a lawyer to the customer.
Aycock has a humorous style that made some of the drudgery of reading about law research less snooze-worthy. Sometimes the book went deep into the weeds of stuff I don't have to know about, but it was done well, and was as understandable as possible. There was a whole chapter for public librarians.
I liked it enough that I bought a used copy to keep at my desk at work.
Literature In Our Lives by Richard Jacobs - I listened to this via Libro.fm advanced listening copy. This is a collection of lectures Mr. Jacobs gave at university in England. Most of it went over my head, either because I hadn't read the book he was discussing, or I wasn't familiar with the technique he was expounding on. I did laugh a few times. It felt a lot longer than it's 204 pages, though.
Read This to Look Cool by Maeve Dunigan - This is another audiobook I listened to from Libro.fm. Maeve Dunigan is a Millennial Jenny Lawson. Jenny Lawson made her name as The Bloggess. She posted bizarre musings about her life. Then she wrote a few books that are absolutely hysterical, never mind that they are about depression and mental illness and miscarriage and whatever else befell her. Her life has been profoundly weird, and she writes about it so well.
Maeve Dunigan is solidly in the Millennial age bracket, but the tone of these essays is highly reminiscent of Jenny Lawson. She is highly anxious about everything, which makes her point of view wildly off-beat. She wanted to see an old high school friend so she ignored the pain in her stomach and went out with him. Her appendix burst in the McDonald's bathroom because she didn't want to cut the outing short due to her not feeling well. Not feeling well! I've had appendicitis. I don't know how she was upright. I passed out in the hospital admitting office.
Anyway, this book had me giggling throughout.
The Assassin's Blade by Sarah J. Maas - Wow, I only finished this a month ago? It seems like it was much farther back. Time is a construct and is basically meaningless at this point.
This is a collection of 5 novellas that pre-date the first book in the Throne of Glass series. Not that they were written first, but the storyline takes place before that book. I don't usually like short stories, but in this collection, each book follows after the one before it, so it reads like one book. I appreciated that. I didn't have to learn a whole bunch of new characters every 100 pages.
The writing was Maas' usually engaging, snarky fare, which I eat up with a spoon. This series is YA, but I don't even care. It's super fun, and now I know the back story of our main character.
Life After Death by Damien Echols - I probably bought this book 10 years ago. The events took place in the next state over from me, albeit on the other side of the state, and I feel a connection to the culture this author came from.
When he was 18 years old, Damien Echols was convicted of killing three 11-year-old boys in the woods outside of his town of West Memphis, Arkansas. He was the weird kid who wore a lot of black. His parents divorced when he was young and his dad disappeared for years. His mom married a guy who was pretty terrible. They were dirt poor and frequently didn't have running water or electricity. Somehow he got on the radar of the social services office and a social worker became obsessed with him. This guy was convinced Damien was a satan worshipper and constantly hounded him about where the rituals were held and who was in the cult. He would follow him around trying to pin him to a devil worshipping group that didn't exist. When the 3 boys were killed, rumors immediately sprang up that it was ritual sacrifice. He and two of his friends were fingered, and easily convicted.
Echols spent 17 years in jail before somebody decided to fund an investigation into the events and press for a retrial. There was an HBO documentary about it. Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings, anyone?) got involved as well as Johnny Depp and Marilyn Manson and a whole bunch of famous Hollywood types. Now he is free and lives in New York with his wife (who he met while in prison !!!) and tries to live with the demons he picked up in those 17 years of prison.
The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, Vol. 1 by Beth Brower - I was looking for something light, and this fit the bill perfectly. I read it in two sittings (it would have been one sitting if I hadn't had to go to an appointment).
Emma M. Lion is a young lady who has just finished the end of a 3-year stint as her Aunt's Husband's Sister's companion. She took the job after all her guardians/protectors had died and she was not old enough to take her inheritance. The aunt-in-law was horrible to live with, but she was promised a large sum of money at the end of the 3 years. She is now at her house in London which has been in the care of the Aunt's Husband until her majority. He is not happy to have her there and has apparently forgotten that she is now the proper owner of the house. Turns out this guy has spent all the money. Now she has to figure out what to do next.
Emma is delightful and even though everyone is horrible, she is smart and funny and I love reading about her.
The King's Ransom by Janet Evanovich - I finally came back to this one I started a long time ago. This is the author that writes the Stephanie Plum series. Gabriella Rose is just as funny as Stephanie, but she's actually talented and good at her job. I like them both.
In this one, Gabriella's ex-husband's cousin has got into trouble. He was made the president of a bank and told to insure a bunch of famous pieces. Then they all went missing. The bank thinks he was in on it and he's on the run. Gabriella and the two bumbling idiots run all over the world looking for the missing pieces and finding out who is actually behind all the thefts.
It was a lot of fun and all the characters are bigger than life. The end was amazing and I didn't see it coming.
Mercury Raine: Ghost Broker by Sarah M. Eden - I started this at a doctor's appointment and got about 60% through it before I was through. I finished it that night.
In this alternate history, everyone is born with a ghost attached to them. A few people have more than one. Mercury has an alarmingly large number. Only he knows how many there actually are. The fact that he has so many means that he can be a ghost broker. This is someone who lets people trade out their ghost for a different one. Having the popular kind of ghost is very important in society. This year's trend is to have a judgmental and sarcastic ghost. When a woman brings her daughter to trade out her ghost, strange things start to happen.
This was pretty adorable. The ghosts are hilarious and Mercury is an interesting businessman.
The King in Yellow by Robert William Chambers - I listened to this from Libro.fm. It is not a new book, it was published in 1895, so I'm not sure why it was on Libro.fm as an advanced copy. Maybe it's being republished.
In this world, when someone reads a copy of the play The King in Yellow they go mad. Bat-shit crazy. Each one of these stories is about some people in Paris and at least one of them reads the book. Then they go nuts and the people around them respond.
It's marketed as horror. It's not really scary, but it is pretty gross in some places. I feel like there is a lot of urine involved. It was fine, I guess. I can say I've read it.
And that's it. 9 books in June. At the end of the month, I was 2 books away from reaching my reading goal of 50 books. Hooray me!