May Book Club Reviews

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The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz

“Meet Isabel “Izzy” Spellman, private investigator. This twenty-eight-year-old may have a checkered past littered with romantic mistakes, excessive drinking, and creative vandalism; she may be addicted to Get Smart reruns and prefer entering homes through windows rather than doors — but the upshot is she’s good at her job as a licensed private investigator with her family’s firm, Spellman Investigations. Invading people’s privacy comes naturally to Izzy. In fact, it comes naturally to all the Spellmans. If only they could leave their work at the office. To be a Spellman is to snoop on a Spellman; tail a Spellman; dig up dirt on, blackmail, and wiretap a Spellman. 

But when Izzy’s parents hire Rae to follow her (for the purpose of ascertaining the identity of Izzy’s new boyfriend), Izzy snaps and decides that the only way she will ever be normal is if she gets out of the family business. But there’s a hitch: she must take one last job before they’ll let her go — a fifteen-year-old, ice-cold missing person case. She accepts, only to experience a disappearance far closer to home, which becomes the most important case of her life.” 

Since this is a mystery, I will try and steer clear of the plot. This is fine because what drew me into this book was everything else. When I was a kid, I adored radio dramas. I had tapes and tapes, later CDs and CDs, of old radio shows that I would listen to on long car trips. And I had two favorites. Number 1 was The Shadow, but in a close second were the Sam Spade mysteries. This book reminded me of those stories. While Sam Spade and Izzy Spellman are years apart in both era and age, The Spellman Files are written with that same snappy, dry, and wry style. When dealing with a modern woman in her 20s, it adds a significant amount of humor to it. The book itself is a solid noir detective story, with Izzy even detailing her early criminal exploits to mess with her brother through their early childhood. 

The hardboiled tone used to explain her family dynamic in such a deadpan way is, at least to me, hilarious. I love the tropes of a classic detective story, and by using the trappings to tell the story of a modern family drama sets up what’s to come and undermines expectations. It also allows the author the room to tell a completely straight-faced mystery story while making the family almost farcical. Rather than choosing whether to make this a dark or comedic take, it gets the best of both worlds. This means that we, the readers, get the best of both. 

Review by Adam

Wilder Girls by Rory Power

It’s been eighteen months since the Raxter School for Girls was quarantined. Eighteen months since the Tox hit and pulled Hetty’s life out from under her. It started slowly. First, the teachers died one by one, and then it began to infect the students, turning their bodies strange and foreign. Now, cut off from the rest of the world and left to fend for themselves on their island home, the girls don’t dare wander outside the school’s fence, where the Tox has made the woods wild and dangerous. They wait for the promised cure as the Tox seeps into everything. But when Hetty’s friend Byatt goes missing, Hetty will do anything to find her, even if it means breaking quarantine and braving the horrors lying beyond the fence. 

Wilder Girls is a feminist horror/mystery story not to be taken lightly. Set in an all-girls boarding school on a small island overtaken by a plague called the Tox that transforms everything it touches, the wildlife and the girls. The writing is just as wild as the story and often poetic. The imagery is brilliant and often unsettling, painting the perfect picture of its eerie setting. The book follows three friends, Hetty, Byatt, and Reese, through their emotional and physical journey through the plague and the environment impacted by it. The characters almost feel three-dimensional. They are unlikable, unapologetic, stubborn, passionate, independent queer women with complex plotlines and emotions. I loved seeing their character progressions and relationships with each other change and grow as they fight to survive on the island. 

I recommend this book for adults because the author does not shy away from describing the Tox in detail. “It’s like that, with all of us here. Sick, strange, and we don’t know why. Things bursting out of us, bits missing and pieces sloughing off, and then we harden and smooth over.” The themes are mature, and the characters feel so real. The way the author writes is addictive. I knew from the moment I read the first chapter that I would want to read more from her. This book may not be for you if you don’t like gore, body horror, or open endings. But if you’re like me and love a good character-driven horror/mystery with a sprinkle of romance and a unique writing style, then I can’t recommend this book enough.  

Trigger Warnings: (taken from the author’s website) Graphic violence and body horror. Gore. 

On the page character death, parental death, and animal death (the animals are not pets). Behavior and descriptive language akin to self-harm and references to such. Food scarcity and starvation. Emesis. A scene depicting chemical gassing. Suicide and suicidal ideation. Non-consensual medical treatment.  

Review by Liz

Simple: If you are a passionate and devoted dog owner, you will love this book. There’s a scene later in the memoir where the author Caroline Knapp recalls seeing an uncle she hadn’t seen in a while and excitedly asked him how his dog was. He responded, confused, “fine?” If that is your response, this book is not for you. Instead, Knapp could – and does – talk for hours about her dog Lucille. She recounts where she was in her life when she decided to stop at an animal shelter, how she picked her puppy and details her life with Lucille, who becomes a true best friend in every sense of the word. She meets other dogs, dog owners, and people who share her passions. She speaks with experts and synthesizes the information they give her. She shares how Lucille impacts her life, mood, and relationships. She briefly discusses historical information about dogs but without ever becoming dry or preachy. 

This review is not doing the book justice – it’s so much more than just the story of a woman adopting a dog. Knapp writes somewhat sparsely but beautifully, weaving together personal anecdotes, historical context, and moving dialogue and action. She recalls her own experiences, processes them, and teaches the reader. She is honest, funny, emotional, and intelligent. After reading the book (and recently becoming just that type of passionate dog owner), I felt proud to have so many similarities in how I feel about my own dog. After reading this book, I immediately put the rest of Knapp’s books on hold and have been slowly working my way through them. She has not disappointed me yet! 

Review by Shelly

Let’s Make Ramen! and Let’s Make Dumplings! both by Hugh Amano and Sarah Becan
Both of these books can be described as playful yet informative, with the hybrid design of a graphic novel and a traditional cookbook. Let’s Make Ramen! tells you the brief history of ramen and how to properly Raman-Ya before transitioning into a typical cookbook with a list of ingredients and equipment you’ll need. The book then covers making the different broth, noodles, meats, and accompaniments before ending with some variations. Throughout the book, you’ll get information sections on various topics associated with the recipes.  

Let’s Make Dumplings! starts with some lore behind the dumpling before transitioning into a more typical cookbook. The cookbook covers the making of dumplings and the various folding techniques, and the different types of dumplings like savory dumplings: gyoza, potstickers, wontons, and Rangoon, and sweet dumplings. It also teaches you how to make all the dipping sauces. There are different information sections like Let’s Make Ramen!, for example, a few words on gyoza.  

I’ll be honest, I will probably not cook anything out of these books. They are the type of cookbooks I enjoy reading and flipping through to enjoy the artwork and the idea of the food. I enjoy eating ramen and dumplings, so it was interesting learning the history behind both, how to make some of my favorite dishes, and has me interested in some dishes I haven’t tried yet! The artwork is clean, simple, and really brings the food to life (and makes me hungry). 

Review by Amelia

Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey 

Leviathan Wakes is the first book in The Expanse Series space opera written by authors Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck. Humans are now living in space. Earth is the seat of the U.N. and tries to maintain diplomatic control; Mars has a superior and strategic strategy; and the Belters, with a reputation for piracy and uprisings, live in the expanse of space on moons, asteroids, and spaceships. Each sector of humanity vies to control the protomolecule, an intelligent alien matter that can control, change, and annihilate anything.  

James Holden is an Earther who works among the Belters mining ice and salvaging wrecks. He and his crew, Naomi, Amos, and Alex, are aboard the Roci, a salvaged Martian ship searching for those behind a series of deadly attacks on Belters and Earthers. Joseph Miller has always lived in space. A cop on Ceres station, Miller is given the case to find Julie Mao, daughter of Jules-Piers Mao, a CEO with questionable values. Miller and James unite to search for the ones using the protomolecule to become a bioweapon that can control and destroy humanity. 

I first discovered The Expanse series as a television series. I was drawn to the characters and how the creators of the series explored how humans lived in different parts of space, how gravity plays a vital role in the development of humans, and how precious resources such as food, water, and air are to live. The creators of the TV series did a great job adapting the books to television, and this series is no easy task. The Expanse is a complex story with layers of government intrigue, clashing of economic and ethnic classes, and basic human emotion. If you think this is just another sci-fi book with laser beams and aliens, you might want to think again. Even though the events and characters of the book are in the distant future, the stories are relatable to a lot of events happening in our world today, maybe even warning us of what we could face in our future. 

Review by Allison

The Poppy War by R.F.Kuang 

The Poppy War is an epic historical military fantasy inspired by the bloody history of China’s twentieth century and tells the story of a small-town war orphan Fang Runin (Rin). When her cruel adoptive parents attempt to marry her off to a middle-aged merchant at 14, she sees the Keju. This incredibly difficult standardized test permits a few Nikarans to attend national boarding schools and is her only escape. Rin’s journey at an elite military school as a dark-skinned peasant girl isn’t easy as she explores the depth of her power while the threat of another poppy war looms on the horizon.   

The beginning of this book reminded me of a popular fantasy trope – an inexperienced girl goes through rigorous training and finds out she is the Chosen One. But that is just the starting point. The first of a trilogy, this military fantasy gets an A-plus for its vividly written action scenes. The author does not pull her punches while describing the action, war crimes, violence, or the intensity of war, so brace yourselves. The world-building aspect of this fantasy does not disappoint. As opposed to the usual concept of magic being good and glorious, magic is unstable and leads to ridiculously overpowered players and results in a lot of chaos.   

I got sucked in very quickly while reading the first third of the book and ended up finishing it in a single sitting, but by no means is this a quick, light fantasy read. It deals with heavy topics and has a lot of trigger warnings, but the characters are unforgettable, and I cannot say there was even a moment I was bored reading The Poppy War. 

Trigger Warnings: War crimes, substance addiction, racism, genocide, and graphic violence 

Review by Sai