With all my hip stuff going on, I realized I never posted my book recaps from May or June, so I wanted to catch up and update you on what I've been reading the past two months.

I did a decent amount of reading in May, but in June I only got through two books. I had a lot going on last month that made it hard for me to sit and concentrate on books.

All that said, I read some great books in the last two months. Seriously Darktown and When Breath Becomes Air are probably two of the best books that I've read all year.


On to the recaps!

May Books

Darktown by Thomas Mullen
Holy crap was this book good. Not only did it have the twists and turns one would expect from a typical crime novel, but it also carried the plot line of the first group of black police officers established in Atlanta in 1948. This group of officers had very limited power, and when two of them find the body of a dead black woman, who was last seen with a white man, they aren't allowed to investigate the case. It's instead turned over to white detectives. Being in the deep South during that time period, you can probably imagine how well that went. This book was excellent as a piece of historical fiction, but I also found the parallels with what's going on today between police forces and black citizens to be particularly striking.

The Madwoman Upstairs by Catherine Lowell
I happened to stumbled upon this book at the library and picked it up because the story sounded interesting. The gist is that a descendent of the Bronte family ends up at Oxford and copies of her cousins' books keep appearing on her doorstep. The book tells the story of the girl trying to find out who is leaving her the books. It was fun and pretty easy read -- and it definitely made me want to go back and read all the Bronte books.

The Girl With the Lower Back Tattoo by Amy Schumer
I felt kind of meh about this book. I think I thought it would really suck me in because I think Amy Schumer is really funny. While some of her essays hit, others didn't. There were a mix of funny and serious stories, and while I enjoyed getting to know more about Schumer, I didn't totally love the book. I've read a bunch of books by women comics (Mindy Kaling, Tina Fey, Amy Poehler) and I think this book fell above Poehler's, but below Tina and Mindy's.

The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing by Melissa Bank
I know this is one of those books that everyone is supposed to love because it has good reviews and all, but I just didn't. It started out really promising, but I could not get into the main character's creepy relationship with a much, much older dude. That pretty much ruined the book for me.

June Books

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
Break out the tissues, this true story will break your heart. I basically sobbed my way through the second half of this book. It's heart-wrenching, but so, so good.

Maybe in Another Life by Taylor Jenkins Reid
This book had an intriguing premise -- how does a single decision you make impact the rest of your life moving forward. The book followed the main character from that single decision point and each chapter alternated between what happened in her life if she chose option A or if she chose option B. I will say, at first I found the jumping back and forth between story lines to be a bit jarring, but I eventually got used to it. This was a light and easy read. Good for the summer or a day at the beach.