The Books I'm Reading Now
I'm reading the newest novel by Adrienne Young, time-traveling magical realism based in small-town North Carolina, The Unmaking of June Farrow; I'm reading Angie Kim's suspenseful story that also centers around family connection, Happiness Falls; and I'm listening to Starling House, Alix E. Harrow's newest spooky, darkly funny, fascinating novel.
What are you reading these days, bookworms?
01 The Unmaking of June Farrow by Adrienne Young
June Farrow is biding her time on her family's flower farm in the small town of Jasper, North Carolina.
But she's been seeing and hearing visions for a year now, and she believes they're linked to the curse that the community believes has its hold on the Farrow women.
June is determined to end the curse once and for all. When she realizes she can walk through a magical door, she finds unexpected circumstances--and realizes that she may be able to reinvent her path forward--and possibly also shift the events of the past.
Adrienne Young is also the author of Fable, its sequel Namesake, and The Last Legacy, loosely set in the worlds of Fable and Namesake, and Spells for Forgetting.
I received a prepublication edition of this book courtesy of NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group: Ballantine, Delacorte Press.
02 Happiness Falls by Angie Kim
For the rest of our lives, every time one of us goes somewhere and doesn’t return on time, doesn’t let the others know where we are, we will remember this time, what can happen. And we will fall apart.
Mia doesn't panic when her father and brother Eugene are late returning from a walk in the park. They might have forgotten their phones, or taken a detour.
But when Eugene rushes into the house, bloody and alone, Mia realizes something terrible has happened. And Eugene, who has the rare genetic condition Angelman syndrome, cannot communicate to tell her what occurred.
Kim's missing-person story is also about a family deeply connecting to each other and going to extraordinary lengths to work together.
Angie Kim is also the author of Miracle Creek.
03 Starling House by Alix E. Harrow
Opal is desperate for cash, and her petty theft at her minimum-wage jobs isn't going to cut it. She's got to raise the money to send her bright younger brother Jacob to a private school where he can thrive--and have better prospects than Opal herself has had since the loss and disappearance of their single mother.
She's been cobbling together enough to get by, but when a mysterious draw to the spooky Starling House ends up in an overpaying job offer, she feels she can hardly say no.
Arthur, the young, haunted-seeming caretaker of the estate, seems resigned to her presence even as he advises her to stay far away from Starling House. He's caught up in solving some sort of puzzle related to the past. Which Opal promptly attempts to file under Not My Problem.
Opal takes his envelopes of cash for her overpriced housekeeping, but she doesn't tell Arthur that she's been dreaming of the decrepit, rambling house for years, and that she has some eerie sense that she's finally home.
I received a prepublication edition of the audiobook of this title courtesy of NetGalley and Macmillan Audio.
Alix E. Harrow is also the author of the wonderful The Once and Future Witches and The Ten Thousand Doors of January.