↺ – reread ♡ – favorite

63/50 books read

december

• tristan strong destroys the world – kwame mbalia
  • – "'sometimes there ain't no fixing something, baby. if you wanna rebuild, you gotta break it down and start all over.'"
• the book of delights – ross gay
  • – "our delight grows as we share it."

november

• the color of magic – terry pratchett
  • – "magic never dies. it merely fades away."
• i'm thinking of ending things – iain reid
  • – "small gestures make us feel good – about ourselves, about others. small things connect us. they feel like everything."
• ♡ homegoing – yaa gyasi ↺
  • – "sometimes staying free requires unimaginable sacrifice."
• hollow city – ransom riggs
  • – "laughing doesn't make bad things worse any more than crying makes them better."
• the wide window – lemony snicket ↺
  • – "to have each other in the midst of their unfortunate lives felt like having a sailboat in the middle of a hurricane, and to the baudelaire orphans this felt very fortunate indeed."

october

• the reptile room – lemony snicket ↺
  • – "at least it made them feel better after feeling so sad, for so long."
• house rules – jodi picoult ↺
  • – "for the rest of the journey, we stay connected."
• ♡ pet – akwaeke emezi
  • – "'we’re alive because we can be hurt; we’re alive because we can heal.'"
• ♡ all about love – bell hooks
  • – "what we cannot imagine cannot come into being."
• the boy who could see demons – carolyn jess-cooke
  • – "i had this feeling as if a warm wave of seawater had just passed over me, as if everything was going to be all right."
• ms. peregrine’s home for peculiar children – ransom riggs ↺
  • – "'lion-heartedness must run in your family.'"

september

• red dragon – thomas harris
• the hobbit — j. r. r. tolkien ↺
  • — ”gandalf thought of most things; and though he could not do everything, he could do a great deal for friends in a tight corner.”
• the bad beginning — lemony snicket ↺
  • — ”the worst surroundings in the world can be tolerated if the people in them are interesting and kind.”
• kindred – octavia butler ↺
  • – "'i don't want you to go. but i don't want you to get hurt here either.'"
• the graveyard book — neil gaiman
  • — "'this is where you live and this is where those who love you can be found.'"
• maybe you should talk to someone: a therapist, her therapist, and our lives revealed – lori gottlieb
  • – "love can often look like so many things that don't seem like love."
• ♡ clap when you land – elizabeth acevedo
  • – "i love you. you are the only thing that does not hurt."

august

• the poisonwood bible – barbara kingsolver
  • – "for my whole sixteen years i've rarely thought i was worth much more than a distracted grumble from god. but now in my shelter of all things impossible, i drift in a warm bath of forgiveness, and it seems pointless to resist."
• big little lies – liane moriarty
  • – "the sound of children singing floating down from the second floor of the building always made her weep. she'd never believed in god, except when she heard children singing."
• nine perfect strangers – liane moriarty
  • – "she didn't believe in alternate realities. she believed in the transcendent power of love, memory, and imagination."
• we have always lived in the castle – shirley jackson
  • – ”i remember that i stood on the library steps holding my books and looking for a minute at the soft hinted green in the branches against the sky and wishing, as i always did, that i could walk home across the sky instead of through the village.”
• a pale light in the black – k. b. wagers
  • – "'you're going to fail. you're going to let people down. it's an inevitable part of living in god's universe. what you do after, that's the important moment. remember that.'"
• dancing at the pity party – tyler feder
  • – "she's no-nonsense and silly at the same time."

july

• the subtle knife – philip pullman
  • – "the fact was where will was concerned, she was developing a new kind of sense, as if he were simply more in focus than anyone she'd known before. everything about him was clear and close and immediate."
• the color purple – alice walker
  • – "'i think it pisses god off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don't notice it.'"
• the haunting of hill house – shirley jackson
  • – "i am caught in a kind of wonder, i am still with joy."
• ♡ little weirds – jenny slate
  • "to have to kill even one of my hearts to match up with you is simply not worth it to me, after all that has happened."
• once & future – amy rose capetta
  • – "joy had a way of surprising ari. she never expected it, never sought it out, and some days it felt nonexistent – and yet it found its way in like sunlight through the cracks of a closed door."

june

• why be happy when you could be normal? – jeanette winterson
  • – "the love-work that i have to do now is to believe that life will be all right for me. i don't have to be alone. i don't have to fight everything. i don't have to run away. i can stay because this is love that is offered, a sane steady stable love."
• coraline – neil gaiman
  • – "'because,' she said, 'when you're scared but you still do it anyway, that's brave.'"
• many waters – madeleine l'engle
  • – "'and because we have known each other, we can never be entirely separated.'"

may

• ready player one – ernest cline
  • – "i understood her, trusted her, and loved her as a dear friend. none of that had changed, or could be changed by anything as inconsequential as her gender, or skin color, or sexual orientation."
• ♡ a wrinkle in time – madeleine l'engle
  • – "nothing is hopeless; we must hope for everything."
• ♡ a wind in the door – madeleine l'engle
  • – "'i think we're going to have to be brave, earth child, but it will be easier because we're together.'"

april

• truly devious – maureen johnson
  • – "'i am doing this because you are my friend, okay? and something is wrong with you. i don't want to go to this, obviously. and you don't want to go to this. i'm doing this for you, for your own good. this is the one and only time i'm offering to do something like this.'"
• to stay alive – skila brown
  • – "we have everything we need."
• moo – sharon creech
  • – "sometimes i had to close my eyes to rest them from all the new everythings pouring in."
• wolf by wolf – ryan graudin
  • – "'you're going to have to be brave.'"
• ♡♡ the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe – c. s. lewis ↺
  • – "peter did not feel very brave; indeed, he felt he was going to be sick. but that made no difference to what he had to do."
• ♡♡ the raven boys – maggie stiefvater ↺
  • – "'keep being brave.'"
• the wonder – emma donoghue
  • – "'sometimes, when disaster strikes, there's nothing to be done but begin all over again.'"

march

• beverly, right here – kate dicamillo
  • – "'oh, i'm glad i needed you. i'm glad you needed me.'"
• ♡ the magician's nephew – c. s. lewis ↺
  • – "'let us be good to one another.'"
• ♡ dream work – mary oliver
  • – "if the doors of my heart ever close, i am as good as dead."
• someday we will fly – rachel dewoskin
  • – "people needed each other for acts that mattered, needed affection. and something to say, some meaning. maybe even love."

february

• sex is a funny word: a book about bodies, feelings, and YOU – cory silverberg
  • – "we never stop learning or changing."
• ♡♡ frankly in love – david yoon
  • – "'i love you. i love saying i love you. it's like i learned a new word today.'"
• lumberjanes: beware the kitten holy – noelle stevenson, grace ellis, & faith hicks
  • – "my frieeeeends!"
• ♡ on a sunbeam – tillie walden
  • – "'i really love you guys.' 'i don't think we'd be doing this if we didn't love you just as much.'"
• the golden compass – philip pullman
  • – "she was moved by it; it was so beautiful that it was almost holy."

january

• stir-fry – emma donoghue
  • – "who knows what we all are before anything happens?"
• gregor the overlander – suzanne collins
  • – "even if times got bad, he would never again deny himself the possibility that the future might be happy even if the present was painful. he could allow himself dreams."
• ♡ on the come up – angie thomas
  • – "'i do that because i want to,' trey says. 'a burden? never. you're too much of a gift to me.'"
• just a girl – carrie mesrobian
  • – "'you are just like i dream.'"
• ♡ raymie nightingale – kate dicamillo
  • – "'and i wanted to tell you that no matter what, i'm here and you're here and we're here together.'"
• hood – emma donoghue
  • – "i would do anything for this girl. i will make her smile, make merry, make up for it all."
• ♡ goodbye days – jeff zentner
  • – "there's that feeling that you'll never be lonely again. that every time you speak, someone you love and who loves you back will be listening."
• gregor and the prophecy of bane – suzanne collins
  • – "'hi, you,' gregor said, thinking he would never let go of her. 'oh, hi, you! where've you been, little girl?'"
• ♡ louisiana's way home – kate dicamillo
  • – "'i do think that, more often than not, love has a way of finding us.'"
• ♡ americanah – chimamanda ngozi adichie ↺
  • – "'you know it was love at first sight for both of us,' he said."