Ten Favorite Bossy Spring Reads
- The Bossy Bookworm
- 3 hours ago
- 11 min read
Spring Bossy Book Favorites
On Fridays I love to post Greedy Reading Lists of my favorite books. I recently gave a talk for the second year in a row to a wonderful group of book lovers who wanted to hear about newly published books they might want to check out, and I thought I'd share that list of ten books with you Bookworms as well.
Talking about books and showcasing my Bossy favorites is one of my favorite bookish things to do, and for this talk I chose recent favorites in a range of genres.
To find last year's Bossy Spring Favorites list, please check out this link.
If you've read any of these books, I'd love to hear what you think! What are some of your favorite recently published--or recently read--books?
01 More Than Enough by Anna Quindlen
Quindlen's key characters find themselves in messy situations whose resolutions are all but assured. The small moments between characters bring them to life (and link them inextricably together), and while their heartwarming, heartbreaking paths are not all smooth, More Than Enough offers a version of a happy ending. I loved this.
Polly's friends gift her an ancestry DNA kit, and when she lightheartedly submits her results, she is matched to a stranger. Sure that it's an error, Polly digs into her family history to make sure she is who she has always thought.
Polly's connection to the young ladies she teaches in her school becomes more evident to her and to the reader as the story unfolds; her influence and affinity for the teens--as well as the new teen friend she meets through her DNA test journey--is a poignant juxtaposition to her struggle to start the family she wants to have.
The tone of this one let me know that the story might be messy, and it might not turn out satisfactorily for all involved, but that some version of a happy ending was coming without feeling unrealistically easy.
For my full review, please see More Than Enough.
02 Wolvers by Taylor Brown
Taylor Brown offers up a suspenseful, adventure-filled story in Wolvers. Trace is an angry young man who sets out on an ill-advised, illegal revenge journey, but he's not the only wolf tracker in the New Mexico forest. He's starting to rethink his mission and be headed toward a fresh start--if he can survive that long.
Trace Temple is a disillusioned, angry young man whose family lost its ranch after hard times. Then Trace, a gifted tracker who knows the woods better than almost anyone around, is hired by a shadowy, powerful militia group to take out One-Eleven, the female leader of the most famous wolf pack in New Mexico, the Dark Canyons.
But One-Eleven is uncannily gifted in eluding human pursuit, and Trace is far from the only outdoorsman in these woods.
And the longer Trace tracks One-Eleven, the more he begins to second-guess everything about his life.
This is an outdoor adventure story that explores tensions between the preservation of nature and development, and between power and vulnerability. But it’s also layered with elements of redemption, love, unlikely loyalties, and character growth.
I'm a huge Taylor Brown fan.
Check out my Bossy reviews of his novels Rednecks, Wingwalkers, The Gods of Howl Mountain, and Fallen Land, a title I loved and included in the Greedy Reading List Six Great Historical Fiction Stories about the Civil War.
Click here for my full review of Wolvers.
03 All in Her Hands (Nora Beady #3) by Audrey Blake
I love historical fiction about female physicians before this was common; Nora Gibson is a willful, clever woman fighting against prejudice in 1849 London and aiming for better healthcare for women--until cases of cholera emerge and all rules must be reimagined. Blake includes wonderful scientific detail and details of life in that time.
I love how Blake shapes a story in which privileged education comes up against gritty, real-world life experience, and I love how she works in the gaps in knowledge as well as the leaps and bounds that were taking place in science in that era.
Blake also weaves in issues around body autonomy, pregnancy challenges, and societal and professional issues for women who might become mothers.
This is the third book in a series, but it works beautifully as a stand-alone read. I had no idea there were prior books until I finished; this is seamless and fascinating.
I listened to All in Her Hands as an audiobook courtesy of Libro.fm and Recorded Books, Inc. For my full review, please see All in Her Hands.
You might also like these novels that include female physicians.
04 Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke
The premise, structure, and dark humor of this buzzy spring novel were so intriguing that although I was left a little unsatisfied by the ending and resolution, I was so hooked on the story to that point, it didn't ultimately matter.
Natalie is a fundamentalist Christian who subscribes to male-dominated power structures and “traditional” values. When she is quite young and naïve, she marries the son of a powerful senator. They marry, benefit from his family's wealth and influence in every way, and begin to have children within their privileged bubble of existence.
Eventually Natalie delves so far into trying to achieve (an appearance of) perfection in homemaking and parenting, she becomes a "tradwife" influencer with 8 million followers.
We can see that Natalie believes she is as flawless as her painstakingly curated posts would have others think she is, but we can also see the cracks in her façade. She is smug, self-righteous, and insufferable, and she glosses over anything that doesn't fit the narrative she has created and the fictional perfectionism within which she lives.
Then one day, Natalie wakes up panicked, without her perfectly showcased, support-staff-driven, manicured, and merchandised modern farmhouse. She is living in a true homestead version of her life: she is without electricity, indoor plumbing, heat or air conditioning, or running water. It's terrifying for her, and no one will explain to her what’s going on or where (or when) she is living.
While the ending and explanation of the reality of events didn’t land for me, I thought the premise, the structure, the tone, and the story were so intriguing, I didn't ultimately mind.
I received a prepublication version of this title courtesy of Knopf and NetGalley.
Yesteryear is Caro Claire Burke's debut novel. Please click here for my full review of Yesteryear.
05 Kin by Tayari Jones
Jones throws every issue imaginable at her two main protagonists, best friends living in the Deep South, both without their mothers. The young women cope with their pain in divergent ways, and while I was interested in the story, I wanted to feel a deeper emotional connection to the characters and the increasingly dramatic layers of the novel's events.
Young Annie and Vernice were best friends in small-town Louisiana. Both grew up without mothers, but then their paths diverged.
For me, a main strength of Kin is Jones's ability to build a rich Southern setting and to layer issues of race, class, wealth, and power atop it.
Annie's almost-constant focus on her mother's abandonment began to feel overpowering; she is unable to live day-to-day life because of her obsession with her mother's absence.
Jones's characters face issues around body autonomy; wealth and privilege; the paralysis of poverty; issues of race, civil rights, education, and women's rights; loyalty and friendship; relationship power mismatches; and more. A lot occurs within the story, yet I found myself wanting to feel more around the dramatic scenarios within which Jones places her characters. I felt more curious than invested, and I wished for more of an emotional anchor with the protagonists.
Tayari Jones is also the author of An American Marriage. You might want to check out these books that center around race, the South, and friendship.
For my full review, please see Kin.
06 This Book Made Me Think of You by Libby Page
Page's romantic novel celebrates the importance of books for coping, celebrating, and exploring, while also delving into our main protagonist's deep grief and fight to find her footing again after loss. The sweet story offers poignancy, heart, and hope.
Tilly is a young adult still reeling from the death of her beloved husband Joe, and she's hoping that the start of a new year will mean hope and maybe a version of a fresh start.
She receives a mysterious message from the owner of Book Lane, a local London bookshop, and learns that Joe had made arrangements for a handpicked book for Tilly each month of the coming year, hoping to inspire, comfort, and challenge Tilly, but most of all, to open her up to living again. The books become a touchstone each month during that first difficult year after Joe's death.
Tilly befriends bookseller Alfie and his coworkers, and her new friends allow her to grieve as well as celebrate small joys without guilt. But the year following Joe's passing also allows Tilly to imagine a new version of herself and a future with happiness, hope, and the promise of unexpected adventure.
This is a feel-good romance celebrating books while its main protagonist reels with grief. While the complications and difficulties exist, Page makes you certain things will turn out with hope and the promise of joy.
You might also want to check out these other Bossy reviews of books about books and books that deal with grief.
You can read my full review here: This Book Made Me Think of You.
07 Lady Tremaine by Rachel Hochhauser
This loose retelling of the Cinderella folk story offers the perspective of the "evil" stepmother, who is here actually a savvy, strong woman determined to provide for her household after being widowed in a patriarchal, 1700s-feeling society. I loved Hochhauser's turning the traditional tale on its head, the details, and the twists.
This is my favorite read of the spring so far.
Lady Tremaine is a loose retelling of the damsel-in-distress Cinderella folk tale, here from the perspective of the "evil" stepmother--who is shown to actually be a strong, determined, clever widow stuck in an era where men hold all of the property, power, and freedom.
Lady Tremaine is single-minded about protecting her daughters and trying to secure futures for them in a world where the safety and security of unmarried women is shaky.
A royal ball opens up the opportunity for Lady Tremaine to use the respectability of her deceased husband's title to secure invitations for her daughters (who are not, after all, shallow and greedy horrors of young women, as in the Disney story) and her standoffish but beautiful stepdaughter Elin. Elin is this novel’s version of Cinderella, and here she is a mostly insufferable girl, gloriously and willfully obtuse, dedicated to needlework and pious prayers while the rest of the househould is scrambling, hustling, and exhausting themselves to make ends meet.
There’s some gritty business, there are difficult choices, and there's a surprising shift of loyalties I loved. I adored the details of the late-1700s-feeling setting; the exploration of women’s struggles to carve out lives for themselves in a patriarchal society; and the creativity, strength, and resolve necessary to survive.
The story would have stood on its own for me, but the references to the Cinderella story were a fun added bonus.
I received a prepublication edition of Lady Tremaine courtesy of NetGalley and St. Martin's Press.
Click here for my full review of Lady Tremaine. You might also be interested in Bossy reviews of other retellings.
08 London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family's Search for Truth by Patrick Radden Keefe
Patrick Radden Keefe took a subject I wasn't initially captivated by and crafted another work of his signature masterful narrative nonfiction. He hooked me with details, then astounded me with the order he was able to impose upon the chaos of secrets, lies, and the still-unknown elements of the story.
London Falling is about the disappearance of a young man, Zac. Zac’s dogged parents won’t give up on finding out the truth of what happened to their son, and when the reactions from London police feel disappointing and lackluster, Zac’s parents approach the media directly. Then Patrick Radden Keefe crafts this nonfiction work that reads like a novel.
The book delves into Zac's astounding, long-held personal secrets; into the implications of the increased presence and power of Russian oligarchs in London; into the pressures and alternate universe of high society and extreme wealth; and into the many sinister tendrils crisscrossing the city’s dark underbelly.
As he always seems to do, Patrick Radden Keefe takes a complex, tangled situation and shapes it into intriguing narrative nonfiction that you can latch onto. There are so many branches of this story, and so many complicated implications of the main players’ actions, lies, and secrets, I can’t imagine anyone but Patrick Radden Keefe successfully imposing this much order on so much chaos and so many unknowns.
There are mysteries at the center of the story, but for me this was a captivating, atmospheric dive into the pressures, pain, and hope within extreme isolation, the power of external forces, and the push to protect each other at all costs. I was intrigued throughout.
Patrick Radden Keefe is also the author of the powerful Empire of Pain and Say Nothing, one of my favorite nonfiction books.
For my full review, please check out this link.
09 The Night We Met by Abby Jimenez
Abby Jimenez knows how to layer difficult situations and messy complications into her rom-coms, and her main protagonists must confront and overcome past and present difficulties in order to banter their way through the story and build a sweet life together. I was hooked on the chemistry and fascinated by the significant, heartbreaking obstacles and how they might possibly be addressed to allow for love.
Larissa made a split-second decision one night after a concert, when she was shoeless and in need of a ride home: she chose joking, fun-time-guy Mike to drive her, and they quickly started to date. Then she became friends with his far-more-serious best friend, Chris, a pharmacist who is kind, thoughtful, and more quiet.
Larissa and Chris feel more and more connected to each other, but because they'd never hurt Mike, they have to remain just friends.
The sweetness between Chris and Larissa is irresistible, and Jimenez takes what feels like an impossibility of a future and ekes out a story and a love that manages to move forward--despite messy, complex, potentially heartbreaking repercussions.
I listened to The Night We Met courtesy of Harper Wave and Libro.fm.
You might also want to check out these other Bossy reviews of books by Abby Jimenez or other rom-coms I've loved.
For my full review, please see The Night We Met.
10 Saoirse by Charleen Hurtubise
Count me in for Irish-set novels--and for suspenseful, mysterious-past stories that hint at darkness, dangerous secrets, and the destructive power of the truth. But Hurtubise builds the true heart of this story around the development of its characters and relationships. This is a fast, intriguing read that I loved.
When she was old enough, Sarah ran from an emotionally cold childhood in Michigan and mysterious circumstances to the rugged coast of Donegal, Ireland, where she now lives as an artist and goes by the name Saoirse (pronounced SUR-shuh).
She and her beloved partner and two daughters live peacefully, and Saoirse often paints the members of her beloved family.
But if the truth of Saoirse's secrets came out, it would upend her existence, and she is terrified that her past will somehow be uncovered and destroy her family. When a piece of her art wins a competition, it garners unwelcome attention and publicity that might reveal all Saoirse has done and the lengths she has gone to to escape her origins.
I love a story set in Ireland, and Hurtubise doesn't skimp on building an evocative setting on blustery cliffs and in lush green countryside. I also love a story involving a character's mysterious past, and I love a suspenseful story that I'm eager to piece together. Saoirse provides all three of these elements, plus a bad guy who's easy to detest, the overcoming of trauma, a deep love story, a passion for art, and more.
I blew through this novel, and the whole time I was reading Saoirse, I held my breath that it would hold up because I couldn't wait to start recommending it!
I received a prepublication edition of Saoirse courtesy of NetGalley and Celadon Books.
For my full review of this book please see Saoirse.