March 2024 Reading Wrap Up
March has been a major reading month for me because, right in the middle, I had Spring Break, which offered a ton of time to read and access to my hometown library. I honestly thought I'd get more reading done over Spring Break, but alas, the end of the week turned into a lot of fun social plans, so I guess I can't be mad at that. Still, in that week alone, I read 3 books which offered my usual total boost. I also read a ton of nonfiction through audiobooks that I got really invested in and, therefore, spent more listening hours reading. Looking over the list of what I read, I'm realizing that March truly has been the world's longest month. I'm heading into a super stressful 5 weeks that include finishing my senior year of college, taking finals, wrapping up one job and starting another, and moving out of LA in a very compressed period of time. This will either lead to a ton of reading to escape the chaos or almost no reading as my attention has to be everywhere else. Only time will tell, I guess, but wish me luck on this next month and a half of my world getting turned upside down! Read on for all the juicy details on what I read, what I thought about it, what I'm reading now, and what's up next.
stats
This month, stats are really fun to talk about because this has been an abundant reading month where I read so many of my most anticipated titles. To break it down, I read 18 books total, which is 6 books more than last month. That brings my yearly total to 41 books read for 2024. I'm hoping I'll cross 50 books in April, which will put me well on my way to my stretch goal. The genre breakdown comes out to 8 fiction books and 10 nonfiction books. I also read some very long books and very short books, both from the nonfiction category, with my longest book coming in at 608 pages and shortest coming in at 52 pages (and yet it was still made into an audiobook?). As for format, all the nonfiction I read was as audiobooks, and in fiction, I read 4 library e-books, 3 physical library books, and 1 digital ARC. My average rating across nonfiction and fiction was a 3.8, which is pretty solid for having read that many books. I gave out one 5 star rating to a nonfiction book and one 3 star rating as the lowest number of stars given this month to a fiction book, which I'll get into more in a second.
fiction
It feels like March is the month when the book world really starts to heat up from winter. The most anticipated reads of the first few months are finally filtering down to me through the library holds, and there are tons of new books releasing as well. Among my most anticipated for 2024 were Piglet, Green Dot, and Anita de Monte Laughs Last. Sadly, though, only one of these books fully held up to my expectations. This is why I hate going into books with preconceived notions from reviews or online hype or even knowing anything about a book. I feel like I do better with books when I have a totally blank slate. Sometimes that can go really wrong, but you can always DNF!
Also, a quick apology that I've gotten a bit behind with publishing reviews in March, so my full thoughts on all these books aren't available to read yet for most of these. I'll link the ones that are out now, and you'll just have to follow along to see when the rest of them come out.
Besides anticipated books, the biggest theme of my backlist reading was books that I felt unsure about through the reading, but with distance, grew a fondness for. I'm particularly thinking about Maggie O'Farrell and Brandon Taylor's books. Both have a beautiful, impressionistic quality to them presenting slightly blurry but beautiful paintings to the reader. They both certainly have their flaws, but I haven't been able to fully move on from them, which is making me like them more.
Piglet by Lottie HazellOverall: 4Having found out a devastating secret days before her wedding, Piglet must decide whether to destroy the life she's built or marry a man she'll never trust.
The Late Americans by Brandon TaylorOverall: 3.5Set in gloomy Iowa, we follow a large cast of graduate students utterly lost in the world.
Victim by Andrew BorygaOverall: 4Javier decides he'll become a writer at any cost, but stretching the truth like taffy eventually becomes a trap too difficult to escape.
Green Dot by Madeleine GrayOverall: 4Why do our lives have to look like the corporate blueprint we're told to idolize? Hera doesn't know either.
Ellipses by Vanessa LawerenceOverall: 4 Getting your dream job in print magazines right as the industry finally crumbles is a unique kind of heartbreak to heal from.
The Book of Ayn by Lexi FreimanOverall: 3No matter how bad life gets, following Ayn Rand is never the answer.
After You'd Gone by Maggie O'FarrellOverall: 4While Alice lies in the hospital in a coma, we watch her life unfold from a vast number of perspectives and through a number of timelines.
Anita de Monte Laughs Last by Xochitl GonzalezOverall: 3Raquel discovers her own life mirrors a famous artist who was erased from history.
nonfiction/audiobook
My feelings on the nonfiction books that I read are always super all over the place because I'll listen to almost anything as an audiobook. This month was a lot of memoir and research blended with memoire, lots of personally rooted books, and only a few sciencey, removed-tone titles. I'm posting a full review of Filterworld soon, but I'm excited to encourage you to read so many of these that I wouldn't really talk about on the blog otherwise. From an oral history to a more how-to guide style to a straight up memoir, it was fun to experience a wide spread of styles.
On Our Best Behavior: The Seven Deadly Sins and the Price Women Pay to Be Good by Elise LoehnenOverall: 4This book was a bit dense and limited in the scope as it was very rooted in Loehnen's experience of the world and womanhood, but within her lens, the book is well done. While there wasn't much I didn't already know, it did give me certain things to mull over.
Grief Is For People by Sloane CrosleyOverall: 4There's nothing wrong with this book, and it clearly worked for a lot of people given its popularity. I just never quite found a point to really get into the story.
The Multi-Hyphen Life by Emma GannonOverall: 4This book was fine. It didn't give any particularly useful information, but anything that validates a new model of working (one I personally click with more) is a good thing. I just think her newsletter, The Hyphen, is much more effective at delivering this content, and I'd recommend you turn to that instead. I actually pay to have a subscription to it!
Sabotage by Emma GannonOverall: 4Of Emma's 2 books I read, this bite sized one felt much more cohesive and like it delivered a thoughtful, useful message.
The Courage to Be Disliked: How to Free Yourself, Change Your Life, and Achieve Real Happiness by Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake KogaOverall: 3.5I didn't realize this book was going to be all transcripts of a conversation, and I never really meshed with the style. There are some good nuggets of information here, but it wasn't my thing.
Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection by Charles DuhiggOverall: 3The topic is fascinating, but the prose is super dry, and none of the information surprised me or went beyond what I could intuit. It never hooked me in.
Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture by Kyle ChaykaOverall: 5My review is coming soon, but I loved this book! If you use the internet in any capacity, you should read this book and consider how algorithms are changing our world and also us as individual people.
Stay True by Hua HsuOverall: 3.5There's great writing here, but I never got into it as a story. The book felt a bit aimless and got repetitive at times.
Sorry I'm Late, I Didn't Want to Come: An Introvert's Year of Living Dangerously by Jessica PanOverall: 4This is one that I didn't want to put down! For fellow introverts, adults who've struggled to make friends, or just people who like living in their own company, this will be a funny and relatable read.
The Freaks Came Out to Write: The Definitive History of the Village Voice, the Radical Paper That Changed American Culture by Tricia RomanoOverall: 4I love learning about the media world, especially how it was at its peak in New York. While this one took a while to get into and is extremely long, I really enjoyed delving into the history of the Village Voice. You have to be pretty invested in media history, though, to get into this one; certainly not a mass appeal kind of book.
what I'm currently reading
Now it's time to talk about the books that are going to bridge me from March into April. In fiction, I'm currently 60% into another Maggie O'Farrell backlist novel, This Must Be The Place. I'm enjoying it, but I also seem to read O'Farrell's novels quite slowly, and I've been struggling to remember to pick it up in my free time. I also just started a new audiobook that I've been in the hold queue for a while called Mastery by Robert Greene. So far, it's a bit dry for my taste, but we'll see where it goes.
what's next
If my holds schedule stays this same, this is what I have next in my Libby holds. No promises it's actually what I read next, though.
audio: Women Who Work Too Much by Tamu Thomas
kindle: The Hearing Test by Eliza Barry Callahan
Books on My Radar
kindle: The Hearing Test by Eliza Barry Callahan
There's nothing I'm really burning to read at the moment like I was last month. I'm ready to just accept whatever books wander my way. I am curious about Worry by Alexandra Tanner, Dead Weight by Emmeline Clein, Memory Piece by Lisa Ko, Holiday Country by Inci Atrek, and Boy Parts by Eliza Clark. All of these are so far back on my holds shelf, I doubt they'll be tackled in April, though.
Movies & TV
I watched two movies this month and no scripted television. I watched plenty of reality TV, but that doesn't necessarily feel like a fit for this wrap-up like scripted does.
First, I finally watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, which I've been meaning to watch since Halsey heavily featured the movie in her 2020 album Manic. People have been talking about it again after Ariana Grande named her new album after it, and while I haven't listened to that album, it reminded me that I was supposed to watch it. I really liked the movie, even though it ended up being nothing like what I expected. I feel like it's held up well for a movie that's only a year younger than I am. It's wild to see what the world looked like when I first came into it and how the same it was but also how profoundly different. Is it weird that I felt a sense of nostalgia for a time I don't remember at all? I ended up writing a Tumblr post about my feelings on the movie itself.
Then, last night I watched Aftersun as a part of my quest to watch all the movies Paul Mescal is in. If you know me, you know I don't really watch movies. In 2024, I've been on a quest to watch 2 movies a month to expand my knowledge of storytelling in another form, and I've had a pretty chaotic approach to trying to choose new movies. It turns out that choosing movies starring Paul Mescal leads to a lot of googling the endings to see if I interpreted what happened correctly. They're also beautiful and emotionally layered films. Also, I wanted to point out that your library is good for more than just books! You can stream movies from them as well! Aftersun wasn't available on any of the streamers I subscribe to (it's only on Paramount+), but I checked my library's Hoopla movies, and it was available there which saved me the rental fee! I noticed a few other movies I'd been interested in but hand't found on streaming there as well. So, while you might not find the most recent blockbusters here, there is a good selection. I'm thinking that next up will be Fresh to see more of the work of fellow Normal People star Daisy Edgar-Jones.
In Case You Missed It
To close, I just want to recap all of the reviews, tags, discussion posts, and more that I've posted over the course of the month. I share every new post on Instagram (@readingwritingandme) if you want to follow along over there for regular updates.
Also, if you're interested in more general pop culture, music, and internet culture related articles, I post a couple times a month on my newsletter Lanie Land, which you can find here.
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