Foolish Puckboy (Puckboys 4), by Saxon James and Eden Finley (2023)
⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: When a Queer Collective party gets out of control, a sexy fireman gets an eyeful of a newly out pansexual hockey player.

Review: I‘m definitely reaching some diminishing returns with this series. This was a cute romance, but lacked in the story front. ⬇️

Endling, by Maria Reva (2025 🇨🇦)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: The plans of 3 Ukrainian women—one trying to preserve critically endangered snails and two trying to bring down the dating tourism industry—and 1
a disaffected Ukrainian-Canadian man are upended when Russian forces invade.

Review: This is one of the strangest books I‘ve read, from its unique content/themes to the incursion of real-world events into the book‘s autofictional elements. ⬇️

Blood on Her Tongue, by Johanna van Veen (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: The discovery of a bog body showing signs of ritualized killing unleashes terror upon a nineteenth-century Dutch estate.

Review: This is contemporary gothic fiction at its best. ⬇️

The South, by Tash Aw (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: Two young men from very different backgrounds form a connection during one dry Malaysian summer.

Review: This is a fascinating window book, exploring not only queerness in a SE Asian context, but also how urban-rural, racial, and class divides play out in Malaysia. Overall this worked very well, but I was left wanting a bit more from it.

Etta and Otto and Russell and James, by Emma Hooper (2015 🇨🇦)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: An 82-year-old Saskatchewan woman living with dementia embarks on a long-desired trip to see the ocean, leaving her ailing husband alone with his memories.

Review: This novel felt to me like it wasn‘t sure whether it wanted to be a modern fairy tale or something more down to earth. Its themes of dreams deferred and duty, and depiction of prairie are great.⬇️

Universality, by Natasha Brown (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A disturbing satire of the current state of journalism and public discourse

Review: While this has a lot going for it, it felt like a cynical take down of the easiest targets in our media landscape, and offered nothing in the way of an alternative or way forward. ⬇️

Franny and Zooey, by J.D. Salinger (1961) - Re-Read
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A classic two-story collection about the existential struggles of the two youngest grown children in a famous family.

Review: Salinger excels as always in his incisive satire of social norms; here his portrayal of disaffected and cynical undergrad Franny is perfect. ⬇️

The Weather Machine, by Andrew Blum (2019)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A look at the history and science of weather forecasting.

Review: The content in this was good but left me a bit disappointed. Nothing was wrong with it; I just wanted more science.

Common Goals (Game Changers 4), by Rachel Reid (2020 🇨🇦)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: An aging demisexual goalie contemplates both his unexplored bisexuality and his biases when he meets the much younger friend of a teammate.

Review: This was enjoyable even if it didn‘t hit quite as hard as Reid often can. I appreciated the reflection on middle age and unexplored aspects of personality, and loved the appearances from the previous heroes in this series.⬇️

A Change of Habit, by Sister Monica Clare (Powell) (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: A memoir of one woman‘s journey from a chaotic childhood, through a struggling career in Hollywood, to her ultimate discernment of monastic vocation.

Review: This is a solid memoir that beautifully describes the author‘s life story. But, as a book, I found it a bit unfocused. ⬇️

Clean, by Alia Trabucco Zerán (2023, transl. 2024)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Premise: A maid tells her story to the police when she comes under suspicion for the death of her employers‘ daughter.

Review: There‘s a lot about this that worked really well: I loved the premise, appreciated the way the class dynamics were presented in the Chilean context, and enjoyed main character‘s crisp point of view. ⬇️

Julie Chan is Dead, by Liann Zhang (2025 🇨🇦)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Premise: A down-on-her-luck twenty-something stumbles into taking over her dead twin sister‘s social media empire, but uncovers disturbing truths behind her success.

Review: There is probably no group today more ripe for satire than social media influencers. I thought this did a pretty good job of doing that, overall. I loved how it showed how the demands of the algorithm ⬇️

The Lady He Lost (Lucky Ladies of London 1), by Faye Delacour (🇨🇦 2024)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: Jane has a plan to make her own way in the world, despite the strictures of early Victorian high society, but her plans are complicated when a neighbour returns home, two years after being declared dead.
⬇️

My Father Always Finds Corpses (Jarrod Jarvis Mysteries 1), by Lee Hollis (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️💫
Premise: A former child star teams up with his grown daughter to solve the mystery of her estranged boyfriend, an up-and-coming documentary filmmaker with a startling number of enemies.
⬇️

Perspective(s), by Laurent Binet (2023, transl. 2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: An epistolary mystery set in the midst of the political, social, artistic, and religious upheavals of Renaissance Florence.

Review: An ‘entertaining‘ and accessible Binet novel is still smarter and stranger than most literary fiction. ⬇️

Detective Beans: The Case of the Missing Hat, by Li Chen (2024)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A plucky kitten solves the greatest mystery of his young detective career: the loss of his favourite fedora.

Review: This is just pure graphic novel cuteness. That is all.

Bookish Pair: Cat‘s Cafe by Gwen Tarpley (2020)

No Hiding in Boise, by Kim Hooper (2021)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫
Premise: The aftermath of a mass shooting through the eyes of its survivors and those left behind.

Review: This is the kind of book that could very easily come across as manipulative, preachy, or overly sentimental⬇️.

Frying Plantain, by Zalika Reid-Benta (2019 🇨🇦)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: Interconnected stories about growing up in a first-generation Jamaican-Canadian family.

Review: This is a very strong collection, well-written, with a lot of heart. Toronto‘s Eglinton West neighbourhood really comes alive, as the main character and her mother are pushed toward and pulled away from it. ⬇️

Heaven, by Mieko Kawakami (2009, transl. 2021)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: Two bullied Japanese teenagers form a tenuous friendship.

Review: This was a very hard read. The descriptions of the bullying the two main characters experience are vivid and intense, and increase in severity as the book goes on. ⬇️

Orbiting Jupiter, by Gary D. Schmidt (2015)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A rural family takes in a teenager prematurely matured by a series of tragic events.

Review: I can‘t say enough about this wonderful (older middle grade) book about the grace of second chances. ⬇️

The Winter‘s Tale, by William Shakespeare (ca. 1610)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Premise: A paranoid tyrant destroys his family and friendships, but everything works out in the end.

Review: I‘m slowly working my way through Shakespeare‘s catalog, and have to say this was my least favourite so far. The plot depends on a wholly unmotivated turn by a main character, whip then disappears for the meat of his narrative arc, only to reappear in time for a happy ending. ⬇️

Pizza Girl, by Jean Kyoung Frazier (2020)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A pregnant LA teenager who works at a pizza place becomes obsessed with a harried mother who always orders pepperoni and pickle.

Review: This is as bold as it is quirky. The main character is a complete mess and she knows it. For the most part, I enjoyed seeing her struggle to figure herself out. ⬇️

After 1177 BC, by Eric Cline (2024)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: An exploration of the latest evidence on the recovery of the Aegean, Eastern Mediterranean, and Mespotamian worlds in the aftermath of the Late Bronze Age Collapse.

Review: I am a big fan of Cline‘s book 1177 BC, which documented the disappearance within a single generation of a centuries-old network of civilizations. ⬇️

Vlad, by Carlos Fuentes (2010, transl. 2012)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: The life of a middle-aged Mexican lawyer takes a turn for the horrific when he‘s asked to help an old friend of his boss relocate to Mexico City.

Review: This doesn‘t have great reviews, but I found this to be a very successful piece of contemporary Gothic fiction that played with traditional vampire lore in interesting ways.

Hungerstone, by Kat Dunn (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A Sapphic retelling of Carmilla set in Industrial Britain.

Review: This was a disappointment for me. A Sapphic retelling of an already Sapphic novel, retold in essentially the same time period (though a different location), I was left wondering … why? ⬇️

Hit Girls, by Nora Princiotti (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A closer look at the female pop stars that defined pop culture in the ‘00s

Review: Nora Princiotti is a staff writer for the pop culture site The Ringer (where she also cohosts the popular Every Single Album podcast), and she brings that site‘s patented blend of informed, personal, and referential writing to this book. ⬇️

Strange Houses, by Uketsu (2021, transl. 2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: The discovery of an unmarked space on the floor plan of a house for sale piques the curiosity of a writer and his architect friend, to creepy effect.

Review: Like so many others, I was totally taken by Uketsu‘s Strange Pictures earlier this year. This one doesn‘t quite hit the same highs, but was still a delicious dose of the author‘s macabre and mysterious sensibilities.

Vanishing World, by Sayaka Murata (2015, transl. 2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: This speculative novel explores the social impacts of a world in which sexual reproduction is considered obsolete (and kinda gross).

Review: This is my favourite kind of speculative fiction, changing a single detail about our present world then exploring its impacts to a logical extreme. ⬇️

Medea, by Euripides (431 BCE)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: Spurned princess Medea plots revenge upon her faithless lover Jason

Review: Euripides‘ plays have stood the test of time for a reason. They demonstrate a keen and nuanced understanding of the human psyche. Is Medea portrayed as a monster or as a sympathetic victim? ⬇️

A Week to Be Wicked (Spindle Cove 2), by Tessa Dare (2012)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Premise: A burgeoning geologist enlists the help of a notorious rake to get her across the country so she can deliver a paper to a society.

Review: I adored the first book in this series, as well as the holiday novella released before this official book 2. Sadly this didn‘t hit the same highs for me, though this is not likely the fault of the book. Cont.

Warriors of Anatolia, by Trevor Bryce (2019)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A survey of the rise, reign, and fall of the Hittite Empire from one of the major English-language scholars of the field.

Review: Hittite history is notoriously difficult to understand, due primarily to a lack of solid evidence. This volume is a solid attempt at putting the available pieces together. Cont.

Flux, by Jinwoo Chong (2023)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A young man‘s life takes a bizarre turn when, after miraculously surviving a fall down an elevator shaft, he‘s recruited to a work a new tech company that promises to revolutionize the energy sector.

Review: this book is incredibly high-concept—the premise above only touches half of what‘s going on—and every plot line comes at things at odd angles. Cont.

Heart Berries, by Terese Marie Mailhot (2018 🇨🇦)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: An unflinchingly honest memoir about growing up and living with abuse and mental illness while Indigenous

Review: This memoir takes a no holds barred # approach and I think is much better for it. Mailhot bares all here, in all her intelligence and education and all her trauma, illness, and heartbreak. Cont.

Proto, by Laura Spinney (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A look at the latest evidence about the history of the Indo-European languages and the people who have spoken them.

Review: This is a truly excellent work of popular history, incorporating archaeological, linguistic, and increasingly genetic evidence to piece together our current best guesses about this diverse language family, which is as mysterious as it is common. Cont.

Mice 1961, by Stacey Levine (2024)
⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: A mysterious narrator looks on as orphaned half sisters find themselves at crossed purposes during a neighbourhood potluck.

Review: This was a surprise finalist for the Pulitzer Prize this year so I was very curious to pick it up. This is an absolute masterclass in setting and atmosphere, and unique in its approach to storytelling. Cont.

The Girl and the Galdurian (Lightfall 1), by Tim Probert (2020)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: An anxious girl teams up with an adventurous stranger to search for her missing wizard grandfather.

Review: This is an adorable graphic novel featuring charming characters and stunning illustrations. I have some quibbles about the plotting, mostly how book one ended without any resolution and I‘m still not sure what the stakes are. Cont.

Run Away with Me, by Brian Selznick (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: Two teenage boys fall in mysterious and magical first love in 1986 Rome.

Review: This was very sweet but ultimately I think it felt a bit too scattered. At first I thought there was some fantasy element to the pairing, but that turned out to be a misdirect. And there was a compelling secondary plot involving a mysterious book that deserved more attention. But overall this was fun.

Liquid, by Mariam Rahmani (2025)
⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: An Iranian-American woman struggling to find sustainable work as an academic rethinks her priorities.

Review: Despite some promising marketing copy, this turned out to be my least favourite type of literature: a cancerously excessive postmodern critique that devolves into complaining about everything in the most obvious ways. It‘s also filled with unnecessary pretentious literary references. Cont

Woodworking, by Emily St. James (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: Things get complicated in a small town when a high school teacher just beginning to come to terms with her trans identity befriends a brash trans student.

Review: This is a fascinating and unique exploration of the complexities of trans experiences. I love how realistically messy the main characters are: when there are no good options, it stands to reason. Cont.

Scientific Marvel, by Chimwemwe Undi (2024 🇨🇦)
⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A collection of poems largely about the poet‘s feelings of erasure from the Canadian, and specifically Manitoban, story.

Review: I‘m not in a good position to offer an opinion on this one. Cont.

In the Absence of Men, by Philippe Besson (2007, transl. 2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: In 1916 Paris, a queer teenager experiences love for the first time in very different relationships with a middle-aged writer and a soldier on leave from the War.

Review: Once again, Philippe Besson has demonstrated his knack for exceptional, short, melancholic, queer fiction. Cont.

The Horse, the Wheel, the Language, by David W. Anthony (2007)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A thorough exploration of the evidence in favour of the Kurgan hypothesis of Indo-European origins.

Review: This did a great job in filling in the pieces for me in where this area of study has been at this century.It offers a detailed defense of the Kurgan hypothesis through a mixture of linguistic and archaeological evidence. Cont.

YHWH‘S Divine Images, by Dan McClellan (2022)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: An academic study of Ancient Near Eastern conceptions of divinity and what they might mean for the interpretation of the Tanakh/Old Testament.

Review: The author here is a popular social media personality in the informed religion space, so I was intrigued when his academic work found its way to me. Cont.

The Farm, by Tom Rob Smith (2014)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: A London man must sort out the truth when his father tells him his mother has had a psychotic break, but his mother insists she‘s being railroaded for uncovering unspeakable crimes.

Review: I don‘t read a lot of psychological thrillers, but this really worked for me. The author did a great job in setting up the story and added just enough to keep me guessing till the end. Cont.

The Voyage Home (Women of Troy 3), by Pat Barker (2024) ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A Trojan nurse accompanies the doomed prophetess Cassandra to her fate as Agamemnon‘s entourage returns home.

Review: In a landscape overstuffed with retellings, once again this effort from Pat Barker elevates the genre to its full potential. It was jarring not to have Briseis as our point-of-view character in this third book. Cont.

The Summer of Jordi Perez, by Amy Spalding (2018)

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: A Los Angeles teen‘s plans for her Summer internship at a fashionable boutique are complicated when she catches feelings for her colleague and rival.

Review: This is a sweet YA novel perfect for Pride. While the romance is solid, where this really impressed me was in its unique take on body positivity and teenage male-female friendships.

Set Piece, by Lana Schwartz (2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: Five years after a passionate chance encounter, an up-and-coming Hollywood production designer gets a second chance with one of the industry‘s hottest actors.

Review: This was a really solid romance, with great characters with strong chemistry and understandable conflict.

Bookish Pair: For another good Hollywood romance, Olivia Dade‘s Spoiler Alert (2020)

Elizabeth Rex, by Timothy Findley (2000 🇨🇦)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: On the night before her lover is put to death on her orders, a restless Queen Elizabeth I spends time with William Shakespeare‘s troupe and gets into a battle of wits about the performance of gender with a man who has spent his whole career in drag.

Review: This is probably my favourite play-as-literature thus far. Cont.

Under the Eye of the Little Bird, by Hiromi Kawakami (2016, transl. 2024)
⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Premise: A novel in linked short stories about the distant fate of humanity.

Review: This will no doubt work for a lot of readers, but despite the fact that I can recognize that it‘s very well done, it was not for me. Told in short stories, all at different moments in the future,, this is meant to keep the reader off guard. Cont.

My Own Lightning (Wolf Hollow 2), by Lauren Wolk (2022)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: After getting struck by lightning, a 1940s Pennsylvania girl begins to see the world—and people—around her differently.

Review: With the first book in this series being such a triumph for me, I was a bit unsure what to expect with this sequel. But wow! I think I like it even more! Cont.