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Happy Monday, book lovers! I hope you all had an enjoyable weekend. I will admit to watching the Dune trailer several times. It’s an epic nerdpurr, like a little movie in itself! It’s weird, I wasn’t excited about it and then all of a sudden, I am SO excited for the movie. Mostly because the cast is AMAZING. This will be my first time seeing Timothée Chalamet or Zendaya in anything, and I am also excited about that. Come on, October 1st!
Moving on: I have a little delightful book news for you today. I also have a look at an awesome upcoming summery thriller, plus cover reveals, a terrible pun, my distracting office mate, and trivia! Let’s get started, shall we?
Here’s Monday’s trivia question: In Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead, where does Marian Graves’s plane go missing? (Scroll to the bottom for the answer.)
Deals, Reals, and Squeals!
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Sanaa Lathan will direct the adaptation of On the Come Up by Angie Thomas.
Here are the winners of the 2021 Pulitzer Prizes!
Tor Nightfire announced their first graphic novel.
Seven Days in June by Tia Williams is being adapted for television.
A Lord of the Rings anime movie is in the works: The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim.
Issa Rae is adapting the book The Gang’s All Queer: The Lives of Gay Gang Members by Vanessa R. Panfil.
Netflix released the Fear Street trilogy trailer.
Here’s the first look at Like a Sister by Kellye Garrett.
The Peabody- and Pulitzer-nominated podcast Ear Hustle is releasing a book: This Is Ear Hustle: Unflinching Stories of Everyday Prison Life by Nigel Poor and Earlonne Woods
Here’s the cover reveal for You Truly Assumed by Laila Sabreen.
Harry Melling will play Edgar Allan Poe in the Netflix mystery The Palest Eye.
Here’s the first look at Anthem by Noah Hawley.
Lucy Boynton and Will Poulter will star in the adaptation of Agatha Christie’s Why Didn’t They Ask Evans?
Book Riot Recommends
At Book Riot, I work on the New Books! email, the All the Books! podcast about new releases, and the Book Riot Insiders New Release Index. I am very fortunate to get to read a lot of upcoming titles, and learn about a lot of upcoming titles, and I’m delighted to share a couple with you each week so you can add them to your TBR! (It will now be books I loved on Mondays and books I’m excited to read on Thursdays. YAY, BOOKS!)
Loved, loved, loved:
Not a Happy Family by Shari Lapena (Pamela Dorman Books, July 27)
This is a perfect book for summer vacation! It’s fun, compulsively readable, and a little bit ridiculous, which is my favorite kind of murder thriller! The day after a disastrous Easter dinner with their three grown children and their significant others, millionaires Fred and Sheila Merton are found brutally murdered in their mansion.
Fred Merton was a cruel tyrant who did everything he could to belittle and undermine his children. Sheila Merton was an often-absent mother who had a nanny raise her children, and never stood up to her husband when he was being abusive toward their children. Each of their three kids has a motive for murder, besides the obvious inheritance, but did they do it? Each of them has an alibi, but are they telling the truth? There’s also a few other people who knew the Mertons who might want them dead, or maybe this was just a random robbery. It’s up to two detectives to figure it out.
I read a LOT of mysteries, and I am usually good at guessing who is responsible. So the thing I loved most about this book was that I had no idea who the murderer was through the whole book, not even an educated guess! Lapena doesn’t show her hand at all during the story, just teases out why each person could have done it, then retracts it with more information, and then blows those theories up too, and so on. And when I said earlier it was a little ridiculous, I meant that the plot is wildly over the top, which for me makes enjoying a book about murder much easier to handle. I like fictional murder, and this book does it right.
(CW for bullying, abusive parents and partners, stalking, and murder.)
What I’m reading this week.
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The Undertakers by Nicole Glover
Godspeed by Nickolas Butler
Yours Cruelly, Elvira: Memoirs of the Mistress of the Dark by Cassandra Peterson
Vespertine by Margaret Rogerson
Dear Senthuran: A Black Spirit Memoir by Akwaeke Emezi
Groan-worthy joke of the week:
What kind of car does a sheep like to drive? A lamborghini.
And this is funny:
You’ve been struck by a smooth criminal.
Happy things:
Here are a few things I enjoy that I thought you might like as well:
- Music! I’ve had to take a lot of car trips recently, which means I get to listen to music! It’s something I rarely do at home, because I cannot read while there is music playing. So I turn the stereo in my truck all the way up (yes, I’m that driver, I’m sorry) and rock out on the road. Here’s a playlist I made last summer that is once again all I want to listen to. (*Roger Daltrey voice* Meet the new playlist, same as the old playlist.)
- Purrli: This website makes the relaxing sounds of a cat purring.
And here’s a cat picture!
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My office mate is totally useless.
Trivia answer: Antarctica.
Remember that whatever you are doing or watching or reading this week, I am sending you love and hugs. Please be safe, and be mindful of others. It takes no effort to be kind. I’ll see you again on Thursday. xoxo, Liberty