Hooray, It’s Time for New Books!

It’s finally available on this side of the pond. If you love Derry Girls, the show about five Catholic high school students and their families set amid the political conflict of Northern Ireland in the 1990s, then you will definitely love this book! It is jammed packed with images of the show, with hilarious diary entires from Erin, written by the show’s creator, plus Erin’s doodles and poetry and illustrations. It will help get you through the long wait for season 3 of Derry Girls, which isn’t expected until at least 2022. Another way to occupy the time is to look up the actual ages of the actors playing teenagers (WOW), watch Nicola Coughlan in Bridgerton, and check out Siobhan McSweeney on the most recent season of The Great Pottery Throw Down.

Backlist bump: The Carnival at Bray by Jessie Ann Foley

This is an amazing, sprawling epic, following generations of a Black family from the early 1700s to present day. It is a strong novel about the women of this family and the trauma and hardships they endure. The main focus of the book is Ailey Garfield, a young Black woman who grows up in the northern part of the country with her parents and two sisters. This novel is a powerful look at racism, slavery, trauma, family, friendship, and more. The book is so big, I feel it difficult to write more about the plot succinctly, but please don’t let my failings—or the book’s 800 pages!—dissuade you from picking it up. It’s full of history and mentions of important works, and is sure to be on a lot of 2021’s best books of the year lists!

(CW for racism and racialized violence, sexism, violence, sexual violence, death, and more.)

Backlist bump: Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

And perennial Book Riot favorite Sarah MacLean is back with the first in a fabulous, feminist series of romance and intrigue. I can’t say too much about it without spoiling it, so you’re going to have to trust me. I can tell you it’s about a young woman named Lady Sesily Talbot, who uses her scandalous reputation to her advantage to do…not what you would expect. And there’s Caleb Calhoun, a young man who has tried to resist his attraction for her, but is failing. It’s saucy and super smart, with hot sexy times on the page! You can always count on MacLean for a great read. Bring on the next book, please!

Backlist bump: Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake by Sarah MacLean.

Okay, I am going to start out this recommendation by saying something that always surprises people, but it is what it is: I don’t find The Great Gatsby interesting. And that’s okay! Not every book is for every person. I do, however, like Jillian Cantor, so I went ahead and read this novel anyway…and I think it’s excellent! She has taken the women of The Great Gatsby, maybe changed the end of Fitzgerald’s classic, and made an excellent historical mystery!

First you need to remember spoilers for a century-old classic: At the end of The Great Gatsby, George Wilson kills Jay Gatsby and then himself. But in Beautiful Little Fools, a detective finds a diamond pin in the bushes by the pool, and has a strong suspicion that the shootings didn’t go down the way they first appear to have happened. His suspects: Daisy Buchanan, known love of Jay Gatsby; her best friend, the golf pro Jordan Baker; and Catherine McCoy, suffragette and sister-in-law of the deceased Tom Wilson.

Told in alternating chapters between the three women and the investigating detective, this is a Jazz Age mystery of romance and betrayal that looks at Jay and Daisy’s early romance, Jordan’s time on the golf circuit, and Catherine’s fights for women’s freedom and independence. And it teases the question: what really happened at Gatsby’s pool? I really dug it. I thought Cantor did an excellent job staying true to these characters while giving the story an updated feel, and I found the story compelling and believable.

(CW for mentions of sexism, homophobia, chemical use and abuse, abuse by a partner, war, sexual assault, car accident violence, and murder.)