Day 241: Book Haul!

I see videos all the time from popular music YouTubers that share a certain popular theme. Namely, taking a metaphorical dump on current chart-toppers that tend to all sound the same. While those videos have always struck me as overly pessimistic about the state of the young people, I think the format has something to offer. That's why for this book haul I went through the top selling fiction list on Amazon and picked out three books to read and see what all the hubbub is about. I haven't read many contemporary books, so this should be an interesting experiment. It'll give me a chance to see what kinds of books people are enjoying these days, gauge the market, so to speak. Here's the three top sellers I chose to purchase.

Starting with a book I've seen in several bookstores the past few weeks is a book called 'Fourth Wing: Empyrean, Book 1' by Rebecca Yarros. I don't plan on reading the whole series unless it really hooks me from the start, but I will give the first book a serious try. Looks like a classic fantasy book to me, full of dragons, magic, and glorious, uncomplicated war against a terrible threat. Then again, here's one of the top reviews:

"Fourth Wing will have your heart pounding from beginning to end... A fantasy like you've never read before."―#1 New York Times bestselling author Jennifer L. Armentrout

Maybe another book about dragons can somehow surprise me against all odds. I guess I'll find out.

Next up is a book from an author I've never heard of. Abraham Verghese has apparently amassed quite a following after publishing a bestseller out of nowhere. 'The Covenant of Water' is a literary fiction novel about a family with a strange affliction. One person each generation dies by drowning, a completely unexplained phenomenon that haunts everyone, their parents, their children, their friends and loved ones, all of whom wait in horror for the next one to drown. It covers three generations forced to grapple with the strange illness as they struggle to understand their deadly fate. Here's a review from the New York Times that sits right on the cover:

“Grand, spectacular, sweeping and utterly absorbing . . . It is a better world for having a book in it that chronicles so many tragedies in a tone that never deviates from hope.”—Andrew Solomon, New York Times Book Review (cover review)

This should be an interesting read. I'm honestly a little surprised to find so much literary fiction so high on the list. There were at least three of them! It seems like every other time I've checked it's been straight romance, or else novels that are not quite romance but still described as 'sexy' in all the reviews. I'm looking forward to this one the most, I think.

The last book I chose is called 'Random in Death: An Eve Dallas Novel' by J. D. Robb. This book is the latest in a 59 book series ... I'm sure I can learn a thing or two about how to structure a novel for high output at least. I don't feel too bad about just grabbing the latest book seeing as I will never, ever, ever even think about sitting down and reading all of them. Or maybe this book will be so incredible that I will. Who knows. As far as I can tell, it's a crime novel set in the near future where hardboiled detective Eve Dallas fights for justice in against a cruel killer. This one also has the 'sexy' descriptor, but hey, if she can write 59 and people keep buying them maybe I need to wrap my head around why.

I'll get started on the first one tomorrow and let you know my first impressions by the end of the week. Should be a fun few reads.

Thank you for reading,

Benjamin Hawley