2021 - Your Best Five Reads of Q2 (April - June)

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2021 - Your Best Five Reads of Q2 (April - June)

1PaperbackPirate
Jun. 30, 2021, 11:00 pm

Another quarter gone, and half the year is over already!

What were your 5 favorite books, fiction or non-fiction, you read in the last 3 months? Please share with any comments you care to add.

2PaperbackPirate
Jun. 30, 2021, 11:06 pm

I have 6, but I only had 3 in the first quarter so I'm giving myself a pass.
In the order I read them:

Song of Susannah (The Dark Tower VI) by Stephen King
The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
The Dark Tower (The Dark Tower VII) by Stephen King
Pride: The Unlikely Story of the True Heroes of the Miner's Strike by Tim Tate
Mary Colter: Builder Upon the Red Earth by Virginia L. Grattan
A Pure Heart by Rajia Hassib

6Molly3028
Bearbeitet: Jul. 4, 2021, 1:40 pm

In order consumed/4 audiobooks and 1 Kindle

When the Stars Go Dark: A Novel by Paula McLain
Aftermath by Terri Blackstock
An Amish Cookie Club Courtship (The Amish Cookie Club) by Sarah Price
The Last Thing He Told Me: A Novel by Laura Dave
The President's Daughter: A Thriller by Clinton and Patterson

7Limelite
Jul. 3, 2021, 10:34 pm

In no particular order. . .because it's impossible to rank books when each is great in its own way.

A Fragile Thing by Kevin Wignall
Circe by Madeline Miller
The Matchmaker of Périgord by Julia Stuart
Everyone Brave Is Forgiven by Chris Cleave
Swimming Back To Trout River by Linda Rui Feng

8LyndaInOregon
Jul. 4, 2021, 5:57 pm

Only four books in the second quarter got an "A" or "A-" rating:

Ella Minnow Pea, by Mark Dunn
Shaman's Daughter, by Nan Salerno
The Toynbee Convector, by Ray Bradbury
The Garden of Small Beginnings, by Abbi Waxman

9msemmag
Jul. 5, 2021, 1:33 pm

Q2 was (as usual for me) a lot of 'finishing up long books or slow books, interspersed with a fair amount of comics for funsies', but there were 2-3 books that really blew me away this quarter.

Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde - if you're interested in queer intersectional feminism, but not sure where to begin, Audre Lorde is a great place to start. If my poor captive audience (i.e. my lovely, PATIENT friends) had a nickel for every time I busted into the groupchat going "GUYS, YOU HAVE TO READ THIS SECTION IT IS SO GOOD".......they'd have at least 30¢. She's smart, takes no shit and a brilliant poet to boot. Need I say I love her work?

Between The World And Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates - This was a book I'd put off for a long time because the topics covered are so raw and present in American society, then and now. But I'm glad that I finally picked it up this year! Coates is an exceptional writer, and his prose really stands out for its lyricality, its ability to convey emotion and clarity of message. He doesn't pull punches in this memoir-letter to his child as he discusses race, police brutality, inequality and trauma, but he also doesn't let us wallow in despair.

Heaven's Design Team vol. 1 by Hebi-Zou - This is such a delightful manga to read in one sitting. Its goofy premise ("What if animals were designed by a team of angels working for their hard-to-please client, God?") belies a solid foundation of science and biology, as well as the process of design. One of my favorite chapters was the design team trying to make a unicorn- and how they try to solve the problems of a horned horse, starting from osteoporosis (the horn's gotta come from somewhere!) to how it digests food. The characters are charming and fun, and the art manages to find a balance between the more stylized character designs and the required realism for the animals they are designing.