I’ve been guilty of leaving these a little too late in the past, but this time it’s because I’ve been trying to take a bit of a reading/blogging break for the new year, which I expect I’ll be done with soon. I’ve once again been wracking my brain a bit trying to remember what new books I received last month, but I’m pretty sure I’ve remembered all of them. It feels silly just not knowing, but I think part of it is I bought a few books as gifts, which is throwing me off.

Enough dwelling on it, let’s see what I do remember.

New Books

Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro is a novel I’ve had in the back of my mind for a while now. I don’t know too much about it, except that the main character is a sentient AI companion. I’ve been hesitant to pick it up myself because, although I’ve read a number of Ishiguro’s other novels, I didn’t quite love any of them. A friend I was visiting over the holidays randomly pulled his copy out, and after I remarked upon my interest in it he offered it as a gift, which I gratefully accepted.

The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was a gift from my brother. He bought me the second volume a few years ago, and after I recently informed him of his mistake he insisted upon rectifying it by getting me the first one. I’m not really interested in Soviet history, so I’m not sure if I’ll ever read it.

Griffin & Sabine by Nick Bantock is an unusual book I found at a thrift store that my partner subsequently purchased for me. It has envelopes enclosed in it with letters to read, revealing a correspondence between characters, along with various pieces of art, postcards, and the like. After looking it up and discovering it’s not just a random oddity but a rather popular and well-rated one, I decided to pick it up. Fortunately for me, it’s also the first book. I don’t know if I’ll track down the rest, but I hope this will make for an interesting, unorthodox read.

Novel Discoveries

I can’t recall where I learned about A History of England in 25 Poems by Catherine Clarke, although it may have been another blog’s WWW post. At any rate, I try to read poetry when it catches my interest, and I’m intrigued by the idea of tracing a nation’s history through works produced by its poets and how they reflect the way the nation has grown and changed.

Things Aren’t Right: The Disappearance of the Yuba County Five by Tony Wright isn’t a type of book I typically go for, but I’ve watched a few videos about this case now and I’m still very intrigued about what may have happened. The latest video I saw presented a lot of information from this book, so I decided I ought to pick it up sometime to dive in deeper for myself.

The Land and Its People by David Sedaris is the latest book by the author and that about sums up why I’m interested in it. I’ve enjoyed all of his essay collections that I’ve read, and I’m happy to see another is forthcoming. I need to catch up on some I own already, however, so I’ll definitely be putting a pin in this one to check it out later.

One Hundred Nights of Hero by Isabel Greenberg is yet another book that I don’t recall where I learned about it from. Nevertheless, it looks like just the sort of graphic novel I would like to check out at the library without buying for myself, as space is precious and graphic novels are finished so quickly. I don’t believe my library has it, but I’m going to see if I can convince them to purchase a copy.

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Until next time, thank you for reading!