In the immediate aftermath of my dad’s death, April was a rough month for me. But I still managed to read some incredible books. To devour some incredible books might be more accurate.

The past two months I’ve been subjected to extreme emotional whiplash. In February, I went to Stockholm for my birthday—what a treat! And in March, my dad entered hospice and swiftly died. Somehow, through all of it, reading remained a constant comfort.

I thought December was ridiculous—and then I read TEN BOOKS in January. The pages are a nice place to hibernate for the winter.

Sometimes things slow down at work and you read nine books in a single month. I am living proof.

With the exception of one audiobook, I dedicated the month of November to Tamsyn Muir’s Locked Tomb series—easily some of the best books I’ve read in recent years. We do bones, motherfucker.

Given my dad’s diagnosis, I think I may have gone overboard using Spooky Season to buoy my mental health. I got really into it. But then, can you ever have too much Spooky Season?

I always try to start my spooky season a little bit early, so there are definitely a few horror stories here—plus some other stuff. Variety is the spice of life.

My dad is having some health problems, so I’ve been driving back and forth between Louisville and Wisconsin a lot—which means my audiobook consumption went through the roof in August.

My July in reading was all about finishing different series—with a few one-offs thrown in there for variety.

My June reading was all over the place in terms of genre—but really, there’s no place I’d rather be than all over the place. Variety is the spice of life, or whatever.

Life has been busy lately. I took a trip to New Orleans. My retired and apparently very bored father has come to Louisville multiple times to help me repair my white picket fence. One of my coworkers quit and now I’m doing double work until we replace her. I had friends in town for the holiday weekend. I’ve been wasting time trying to read Roberto Bolaño’s posthumously-published tome 2666 when in fact it is just terrible. Which is all to say—I haven’t had much time to blog, so you’re getting April and May books in one go.

I spent a surprising amount of time on the road in March, so I listened to quite a few audiobooks—which is something I rarely do. Always a joy to consume even more literature.

February unintentionally became a genre month for me. Big sci-fi vibes, with some mystery thrown in there for fun. Plus one work of “literary” fiction that was anything but traditional.