December was a bit of a mixed bag of reading for me. Covid really halted my ability to read much for a good chunk of the month because it hurt my eyes to try to focus on the words. A couple of books I expected to be great fell flat, but there were a few pleasant surprises in the mix too. 

Four Stars

Chasing Space: An Astronaut's Story of Grit, Grace, and Second Chances by Leland Melvin
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A friend in my book club got this for me a few years ago and it's been sitting on my TBR pile for quite some time. But it was the perfect book to close out 2022. It's an uplifting story of how Leland Melvin overcame an injury that he thought meant he'd never get to go to space. I learned a lot about Melvin's life, both as an astronaut and as his time serving at NASA in a variety of different roles. I've always found space interesting and it was fun to read a book about one of the more recent astronauts. I feel like lots of has been written, filmed, etc about the early days of the space program, but more recently stories aren't as widely told.

The Maid by Nita Prose
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Molly is a maid who works at a fancy hotel. It's never specifically stated that Molly is autistic, but it seems that's what the author would want us to assume. Because her reactions are perhaps different than "normal," Molly soon finds herself in some hot water with the police over the death of one of the hotel's customers. But Molly and some of her friends set out to clear her name. I loved the friendships Molly develops in this book, and the twists this book took to figure out who killed the person in the hotel room.

Our Crooked Hearts by Melissa Albert
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I've been really enjoying escapist books lately and this one about witches and dark magic really struck a good note. On the way home from a party Ivy and her boyfriend almost hit a young naked woman in the road, and after that strange things start happening at Ivy's house. Dead rabbits show up, someone seems to be inside the house taking a bite of her snacks. Ivy's mom and aunt disappear, but clearly have a sense of what's going on. This book took so many turns and was definitely a bit darker than I expected for a YA book, but it was so different than my normal reads, that I really enjoyed the change of pace.

Payback's a Witch by Lana Harper
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book was fun and definitely different from a lot of my normal reads. Emmy is a witch who has fled her magical hometown for Chicago and has hoped to put magic behind her. But after she returns home out of a sense of familial duty to host the competition between all the witch-y families for power in the city, she finds herself pulled into a ploy to bring down one of the long dominant families. Her magic isn't as strong as it used to be, but the more time she spends in her hometown, the more she reconnects.

Three Stars

The Rewind by Allison Winn Scotch
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This book took me a little while to get through, and I couldn't tell if it was because I just wasn't feeling it or because I got sick in the middle of reading it and had to pause for a while. Two exes see each other for the first time in 10 years at a wedding. The next morning they wake up in the same bed together and neither of them remembers what transpired the night before that led them there. It picked up a bit at the end, but felt like a slog in the middle.

The It Girl by Ruth Ware
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I normally love Ruth Ware's books, but this one wasn't one of my favorites. It took me a while to get into and it moved a bit slowly. I'm used to Ware's books grabbing me from page one and really sucking me in, and this one I felt like I had to force myself to finish a bit. The plot picked up around the midway mark as one of the main characters headed back to her college to look into the murder of her college roommate. The ending was certainly fast-paced like I'd expect, but it just took a while to get there, hence the three stars.

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