reading Archives

Dead in Long Beach, California

“All humans would eventually try anything to feel more than nothing.” Author: Venita Blackburn I came to Dead in Long Beach, California accidentally, through an Audible sampling that ran automatically after my previous book finished. The sample was only a few minutes, but I was hooked by the dark lyricism and the idea. In Dead in Long Beach, California Coral arrives with groceries at her brother’s apartment to find him dead, the result of suicide. She pockets his cellphone and then, as she devolves into complicated grief, starts answering his messages as though she were him. She talks to his girlfriend. [...]

Frances Carden2025-08-11T10:14:26-07:00August 11th, 2025|Tags: book review, grief, literary fiction, read, reading|

Victorian Psycho

“I wonder if this blackness isn't in fact the real world, and the true blindfold is that other world of color we are accustomed to.” Author: Virginia Feito Winifred Notty is the new governess for Ensor House, where she will work with her charges Drusilla and Andrew. On the outside, she seems like the model governess, if a bit too young and pretty for Mrs. Pounds’ taste. On the inside, she is a sociopath with a taste for violence. Here and there, when the children are alone, she lets little clues sneak through, such as jokes about eating them. As her [...]

Frances Carden2025-08-10T16:45:51-07:00August 10th, 2025|Tags: book review, historical fiction, horror, read, reading|

Piglet

"To say something, to do something, to feel something, would be to self-destruct." Author: Lottie Hazell Piglet finally has it all. She’s clawed her way to the top. She’s an up-and-coming chef on the brink of a brilliant career and engaged to a handsome society man. Her lavish wedding, where she will make her pièce de résistance, her own cake, is just around the corner. She has posh friends now, a fancy life, and despite the childhood nickname that hides a bevy of trauma, she has finally made it. But then, two weeks before her wedding, her fiancé confesses something horrible. [...]

Frances Carden2025-08-04T10:57:43-07:00August 4th, 2025|Tags: appearances, book review, fiction, hunger, read, reading|