Last week was my 20th book review! That means it’s time for another book review roundup.

I’m giving you a recap of every book I’ve reviewed so far, along with their ratings and links to the reviews. You can also always consult my virtual library, the Index of Book Reviews, to find this list at any time. You wouldn’t want to miss anything, now would you?

Fire (Graceling Realm #2) by Kristin Cashore

Overall rating: 10/10

This book is: an enthralling, beautifully written story.
Other elements: hope, magic, sexy angels, creation myths, a star-crossed-lovers romance, blue hair.
Read it: if you appreciate wonderful writing, vivid description, creative storylines, magic, Prague, art, or romance between people who are very different.
Overall rating: 9.75/10

Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) by Mindy Kaling.
This book is: Awesome.
Other elements: Humor. Being a woman, being yourself. Life.
Read it: If you admire smart, sane women who have smart, sane things to say about life.
Overall rating: 9.5/10

We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver.
This book is: terrifying and brilliant.
Other elements: parenting, marriage, children, psychopaths, motherhood, school shootings.
Read it: if you enjoy really chillingly brilliant characters. If you’re not prone to nightmares.
Overall rating: 9.25/10

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
This book is: beautiful.
Other elements: fate, destiny, following your dreams, love.
Read it: if you enjoy a healthy dose of magical realism.
Overall rating: 9/10

Graceling (Graceling Realm #1) by Kristin Cashore.
This book is: A YA fantasy novel, the first in a series, about a girl with a supernatural gift for killing.
Other elements: Right vs wrong, romance, friendship.
Read it: If you like YA fantasy, if you enjoy ass-kicking women, if you liked The Hunger Games.
Overall rating: 8/10

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
This book is: a well-written, totally insane psycho/mystery/love/crime story.
Other elements: Lies. Marriage. Public opinion. Love.
Read it: If you enjoy crime shows. If you like having your mind blown.
Overall rating: 8/10

Life of Pi Yann Martel
This book is: about a boy and a boat.
Other elements: tigers, prairie dogs, turtles, boats, survival, religion, science, biology, human and animal relationships, the human mind.
Read it: if you’re interested in zoology, tiger taming, lifeboat survival, or religions. If you enjoy wonderfully precise description.
Overall rating: 8/10

The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes
This book is: an bright, engaging, character-driven novel.
Other elements: friendship, philosophy, being middle-aged.
Read it: if you are fascinated by excellent characters.
Overall rating: 7.75/10

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon.
This book is: A story told from the point of view of a 15-year old boy with Asperger’s or autism.
Other elements: Pets, parenting a special needs child, math.
Read it: If you’re interested in psychology, if you appreciate excellent first-person perspective.
Overall rating: 7.5/10

The Lies of Locke Lamora (The Gentleman Bastard Sequence #1) by Scott Lynch

The Man with the Golden Torc by Simon R. Green.
This book is: silly.
Other elements: urban fantasy, magic, adventure, saving-the-world, conspiracy theories, humor.
Read it: if you have the right sense of humor (do you enjoy Terry Pratchett? Monty Python?).
Overall rating: 7.25/10

The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides.
This book is: A book about college and relationships.
Other elements: Some degree of bildungsroman, life with manic depression/life with a manic depressive, how your parents affect who you are, the role of religion in a modern world, unrequited love.
Read it: If you are interested in early prescription treatments for manic depression, if you miss college, if you sympathize with characters having religious crises.
Overall rating: 7.2/10

The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #1) by Rick Riordan.
This book is: about a boy who suddenly finds out that myths are real and he’s related to one. Adventure ensues.
Other elements: Parent/child relationships, Greek mythology, learning disabilities.
Read it: If you like YA fantasy, if you enjoy Greek myths, if you are 10 years old.
Overall rating: 6.9/10

The Passage by Justin Cronin
This book is: a creative, well-written story that just did not float my boat.
Other elements: viruses, vampires, apocalypses, government cover-ups, doomedness of the future.
Read it: if you like adventure, sci fi, and battling monsters created by humankind’s folly.
Overall rating: 6/10

Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin.
This book is: A gritty crime novel set in a rural town.
Other elements: Class issues, race issues, nature of friendship.
Read it: If you like crime shows, don’t mind dialect, and aren’t easily depressed.
Overall rating: 6/10

Snuff by Chuck Palahniuk
This book is: flabbergasting.
Other elements: sex. STDs. Porn. Revulsion. Incest. Dandruff. Suicide.
Read it: if you have absolutely no threshold for depravity.
Overall rating: 4/10

The Reluctant Matchmaker by Shobhan Bantwal.
This book is: boring with sprinkles of offensiveness.
Other elements: fat-shaming, sexism, romance between people of different heights, arranged marriages.
Read it: if the idea of an Indian-American main character is enough to make you forgive a lot of flaws. If you’re not a feminist. If you think women without husbands are pathetic.
Overall rating: 3/10

The Paris Wife by Paula McLain.
This book is: Historical fiction about Ernest Hemingway and his first wife.
Other elements: Women not standing up for themselves, adultery, dependence on men, emotional abuse, alcoholism, polyamorous relationships, bullfighting.
Read it: If you are fascinated by Hemingway, if you like Lifetime movies, if you don’t mind weak female characters, you’re stranded somewhere with absolutely nothing else to do and have run out of thoughts.
Overall rating: 2/10

An Escapade and An Engagement by Annie Burrows.
This book is: a romance novel about a horrible woman and a horrible man who have an unconvincing relationship.
Other elements: Sex. Patriarchy. Golden ringlets.
Read it: If your only alternative is death.
Overall rating: 0.01/10

Life of Pi Yann Martel.

This book is: about a boy and a boat.
Other elements: tigers, prairie dogs, turtles, boats, survival, religion, science, biology, human and animal relationships, the human mind.
Read it: if you’re interested in zoology, tiger taming, lifeboat survival, or religions. If you enjoy wonderfully precise description.
Overall rating: 8/10

I see this book as having 3 distinct parts. I’d give the first part a 6, the middle a 9.5, and the end a 4. In Beckyland, a place where numbers are flexible, that averages out to an 8.

Martel’s writing is excellent, although I was occasionally thrown by the structure/plot of the novel. But that didn’t keep me from thoroughly enjoying this book, especially the middle section. That’s all I can say without spoilers, so I’m hiding the rest of the review under a jump. If you don’t want to know anything about what happens in Life of Pi, stop reading now.

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The Passage by Justin Cronin

This book is: a creative, well-written story that just did not float my boat.
Other elements: viruses, vampires, apocalypses, government cover-ups, doomedness of the future.
Read it: if you like adventure, sci fi, and battling monsters created by humankind’s folly.
Overall rating: 6/10

The first thing I have to say is that as a written work, The Passage is better than a 6/10. It’s an excellent book. The concept is creative, the characters are well-rounded and memorable, the writing is solid. I just didn’t like it.

I picked up this book blindly after a friend recommended it, without even reading the back of a book jacket. Man-made viruses that escape and lead to the ruin of the world as we know it are not my cup of tea. Why? Maybe because I find it really plausible. Secret military facilities, mutant strains of rare tropical diseases…I totally buy it. And I don’t really want to think about it. Perhaps this is the root of my preference for fantasy over science fiction. Give me dragons over a government conspiracy any day.

When I rate a book, there are many factors. Was it well written?  Did it make me happy? Did it awake my feminist rage? Did I enjoy the experience if reading it? Would anyone enjoy the experience of reading it?

This is a good book that I did not like. It’s like if I bit into an excellent oatmeal raisin cookie: I would notice that it was a good cookie, but I would still not want to eat it myself. (Raisins are foul zombie grapes and they ruin any baked good that they touch.)

I am going to give you a better chance than I gave myself. Here is Goodreads’ summary of The Passage:

“First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.

As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he’s done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. He is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors. But for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—towards the time and place where she must finish what should never have begun.

With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterful prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.”

Does that sound like a book you’d like? If yes, you should definitely read it. If it’s not your kind of thing either, I recommend you read one of these books instead.

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