Feeding, Changing, and Reading and Books Read 7/18/19

A confession from one reader to another:  Sometimes when I'm feeding Jax, I'm also reading a book.
I know I'm probably supposed to looking lovingly into his eyes, and I do that too, but sometimes he drinks'n'dozes and other times I feel like we're already on pretty solid ground relationship-wise and that he admires my ability to multi-task.

Therefore, I'm going through books at a pretty steady clip.  This week, I finished three pretty solid reads and am halfway through two more.

​Recursion by Blake Crouch

I really loved Crouch's Dark Matter from a few years ago and wanted to give his new release a try.  The books are similar in that they are thriller/sci-fi/romance/do-your-life over all rolled into a fast-paced novel.  I'm liking his style.  In fact, I think Blake Crouch is going to become a household name in the coming years.  
Now that I've had a few days to digest it, I think Recursion was just as good as Dark Matter.  I don't read sci-fi and time travel regularly, so I have to remind myself to suspend my disbelief so that I can just go with it.  Still, that's not too tough of a task thanks to how the author handles the story and the explanations of why this reality could be feasible.  
I know I said that this has a romance component.  Don't let that scare you off.  It's not a boy-meets-girl smoochfest.  Instead, it provides some meaningful insight as to what real love really looks like - within the frame of time travel and living your lives over and over again!  With that, it's one of the most romantic books I've read so far this year.  Weirdly.  
Love!  Highly recommend!​

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The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

I've heard a lot of great things about this new psychological thrillers, so I was excited to add it to my maternity leave reading list.  It earned points for the title not containing the word "girl" or "wife."  Especially when one of the main characters is a wife/adult girl!  That must have taken a lot of willpower for the publishing house, but I'm glad they resisted.
I don't read gobs of mystery/thrillers.  I find them to be overhyped with promises of twists that either don't twist enough for me or the twist was too obvious, or I'm distracted throughout the book trying to figure out the twist.  Also, they tend to run together for me with lots of unlikeable characters, soap opera dialogue, and unreliable narrators.
I also tend to shy away from any book with a description that starts out, "So and so seemed to have the perfect life..."  I swear.  I feel like every other book begins with this description.  I'm glad I didn't see that before I grabbed this book.  That's completely misleading for this novel, anyway.  
All that said, I did enjoy The Silent Patient.  This is the author's debut, and I'm really impressed.  It was quite the page-turner and although it was formulaic, it was well-written and satisfying.  
My boy Blake Crouch felt that the twist was shocking and mind-blowing.  While I wouldn't go that far, I would say that the twist is one of those were you laugh out loud a little and say, "Oh, haha, I knew it!" even though you didn't know it.  You should've known it, but you didn't.
​I would recommend this to those who enjoy the genre.  

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Arcadia by Lauren Groff

I liked Groff's recent novel, Fates and Furies, so I took advantage of the Kindle price of $2.99 to have this to read on my phone during feedings.  (As of this moment, it is still $2.99.)
Although beautifully written, the first half of this book didn't really do much for me.  It was interesting, I suppose, to read about life in a growing hippie commune, but I wasn't too invested in anyone or anything.  The second half, set thirty-some years later in the near future, read like a completely different book and was depressing but moving.  We got to learn what happened to most of the hippies we may or may not have cared about from the first half.  Still, I was rooting for the main character and could appreciate his present-day challenges.

Up Next:  I'm currently making my way through a slightly fluffy book about a librarian and I've got Mindy Kaling's first book on my phone (another Kindle deal!).  A few heavier books are waiting for me at the library, so it should be a good week!

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