Tag: Matthew Dicks

My Favorite Non-Crime Fiction of 2019

Like last year, while trying to come up with a Top 10 this year, I ran into a small problem (at least for me). Crime/Thriller/Mystery novels made up approximately half of the novels I read this year and therefore dominated the candidates. So, I decided to split them into 2 lists—one for Crime Fiction and one for Everything Else. Not the catchiest title, I grant you, but you get what you pay for.

These are my favorites, the things that have stuck with me in a way others haven’t—not necessarily the best things I read (but there’s a good deal of overlap, too). But these ten entertained me or grabbed me emotionally unlike the rest.

Anyway…I say this every year, but . . . Most people do this in mid-December or so, but a few years ago (before this blog), the best novel I read that year was also the last. Ever since then, I just can’t pull the trigger until January 1. Also, none of these are re-reads, I can’t have everyone losing to books that I’ve loved for 2 decades that I happened to have read this year.

Enough blather…on to the list.

(in alphabetical order by author)

A Man Called OveA Man Called Ove

by Fredrik Backman, Henning Koch (Translator)

My original post
I’ve been telling myself every year since 2016 that I was going to read all of Backman’s novels after falling in love with his My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry. The closest I got was last year when I read his first novel, A Man Called Ove (and nothing else). It’s enough to make me resolve to read more of them, and soon. The story of an old, grumpy widower befriending (against his will, I should stress) a pretty diverse group of his neighbors. It’s more than that thumbnail, but I’m trying to be brief. The story was fairly predictable, but there’s something about the way that Backman put it together that makes it perfect. And even the things you see coming will get you misty (if not elicit actual tears).

5 Stars

Dark AgeDark Age

by Pierce Brown

My original post
When I started reading this, I was figuring that Pierce Brown’s Red Rising Saga was on the downward trend. Boy, was I wrong. Dark Age showed me that time after time after time after time . . . Entertaining, occasionally amusing, stress-inducing, heart-wrenching, flat-out captivating. It was brutal and beautiful and I can’t believe I doubted Brown for a minute.

5 Stars

Here and Now and ThenHere and Now and Then

by Mike Chen

My original post
One of the best Time Travel stories I’ve ever read, but it’s so much more—it’s about fatherhood, it’s about love, it’s about friendship. Heart, soul, laughs, and heartbreak—I don’t know what else you want out of a time travel story. Or any story, really. Characters you can like (even when they do things you don’t like), characters you want to know better, characters you want to hang out with after the story (or during it, just not during the major plot point times), and a great plotline.

4 1/2 Stars

Seraphina's LamentSeraphina’s Lament

by Sarah Chorn

My original post
Chorn’s prose is as beautiful as her world is dark and disturbing. This Fantasy depicts a culture’s collapse and promises the rebirth of a world, but getting there is rough. Time and time again while reading this book, I was struck by how unique, how unusual this experience was. As different as fantasy novels tend to be from each other, by and large, most of them feel the same as you read it (I guess that’s true of all genres). But I kept coming back to how unusual this feels compared to other fantasies I’ve read. The experience of reading Seraphina’s Lament isn’t something I’ll forget any time soon.

4 1/2 Stars

No Country for Old GnomesNo Country for Old Gnomes

by Delilah S. Dawson and Kevin Hearne

My original post
Having established their off-kilter world, strong voice, and approach to the stories of Pell, Dawson and Hearne have come back to play in it. The result is superior in every way that I can think of. I lost track of how many times I said to myself while reading something along the lines of, “how did they improve things this much?” These books are noted (as I’ve focused on) for their comedy—but they’re about a lot more than comedy. The battle scenes are exciting. The emotional themes and reactions are genuine and unforced. And tragedy hits hard. It’s easy to forget in the middle of inspiring moments or humorous aftermaths of battle that these kind of novels involve death and other forms of loss—and when you do forget, you are open to getting your heart punched.

(but mostly you laugh)

4 1/2 Stars

Twenty-one Truths About LoveTwenty-one Truths About Love

by Matthew Dicks

My original post
It’s an unconventionally told story about a man figuring out how to be a businessman, husband, and father in some extreme circumstances. The lists are the star of the show, but it’s the heart behind them that made this novel a winner.

5 Stars

State of the UnionState of the Union: A Marriage in Ten Parts

by Nick Hornby

My original post
This series of brief conversations held between a married couple just before their marriage counseling sessions. At the end of the day, this is exactly what you want from a Nick Hornby book (except the length—I wanted more, always): funny, heartfelt, charming, (seemingly) effortless, and makes you feel a wide range of emotions without feeling manipulated. I loved it, I think you will, too.

4 1/2 Stars

The SwallowsThe Swallows

by Lisa Lutz

My original post
This is not my favorite Lutz novel, but I think it’s her best. It has a very different kind of humor than we got in The Spellman Files, but it’s probably as funny as Lutz has been since the third book in that series—but deadly serious, nonetheless. Lutz puts on a clinic for naturally shifting tone and using that to highlight the important stories she’s telling. From the funny and dark beginning to the perfect and bitingly ominous last three paragraphs The Swallows is a winner. Timely and appropriate, but using tropes and themes that are familiar to readers everywhere, Lutz has given us a thrilling novel for our day—provocative, entertaining, and haunting. This is one of those books that probably hews really close to things that could or have happened and you’re better off hoping are fictional.

5 Stars

PostgraduatePostgraduate

by Ian Shane

My original post
This has the general feel of Hornby, Tropper, Norman, Weiner, Russo (in his lighter moments), Perrotta, etc. The writing is engaging, catchy, welcoming. Shane writes in a way that you like reading his prose—no matter what’s happening. It’s pleasant and charming with moments of not-quite-brilliance, but close enough. Shane’s style doesn’t draw attention to itself, if anything, it deflects it. It’s not flashy, but it’s good. The protagonist feels like an old friend, the world is comfortable and relaxing to be in (I should stress about 87.3 percent of what I know about radio comes from this book, so it’s not that). This belongs in the same discussion with the best of Hornby and Tropper—it’s exactly the kind of thing I hope to read when I’m not reading a “genre” novel (I hate that phrase, but I don’t know what else to put there).

4 1/2 Stars

The Bookish Life of Nina HillThe Bookish Life of Nina Hill

by Abbi Waxman

My original post
This is a novel filled with readers, book nerds and the people who like (and love) them. There’s a nice story of a woman learning to overcome her anxieties to embrace new people in her life and heart with a sweet love story tagged on to it. Your mileage may vary, obviously, but I can’t imagine a world where anyone who reads my blog not enjoying this novel and protagonist. It’s charming, witty, funny, touching, heart-string-tugging, and generally entertaining. This is the only book on this particular list that I know would’ve found a place on a top ten that included Crime Novels as well, few things made me as happy in 2019 as this book did for a few hours (and in fleeting moments since then as I reflect on it).

5 Stars

Books that almost made the list (links to my original posts): Not Famous by Matthew Hanover, Circle of the Moon by Faith Hunter, Maxine Unleashes Doomsday by Nick Kolakowski, In an Absent Dream by Seanan McGuire, The Rosie Result by Graeme Simsion, and Lingering by Melissa Simonson

Twenty-one Thoughts About Twenty-one Truths About Love by Matthew Dicks

Twenty-one Truths About Love

Twenty-one Truths About Love

by Matthew Dicks

Hardcover, 352pg.
St. Martin’s Press, 2019

Read: December 5-9, 2019
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!

NOVEMBER 4
8:10 AM

5 Problems with Lying
1. We lie most often to the people we love.
2. There is no greater shame than getting caught in a lie.
3. A lie often requires additional lies, making it impossible to ever come clean.
4. Liars are the worst human beings.
5. Lies always cover up the worst parts of you.

NOVEMBER 4
8:40 AM

How liars with the best intentions are like the owners of every iteration of Jurassic Park
They never set out to hurt anyone.
They operate with enormous hubris.
Denial both perpetuates and intensifies the problem.
The situation inevitably gets worse and worse as time goes by.
The end is never pretty.

1. Yes, that’s how this entire book is written.

2. No, it doesn’t get old or tiresome or start to feel overused. In fact, you’ll probably end up wishing you could read more books written like this.

3. But you’ll know if you did, they’d feel like cheap rip-offs of this great idea.

4. Some time back Daniel Mayrock’s therapist wanted him to keep a journal, making lists about his life/likes/thoughts was the compromise they reached. Now, this is how he processes things in his life, tracks ideas, and even occasionally plans things (including incredibly stupid things that even he realizes that he shouldn’t be planning).

5. A year ago, Daniel quit his job as a teacher to open a bookstore.

6. The bookstore is struggling, and he’s losing money

7. The lying that he’s focused on in that quotation above (and throughout the book) is primarily focused on that—Daniel’s lying to his wife to the extent she thinks they’re turning a profit

8. Other things that Daniel lies to Jill about include: his interest in/preparedness for having a baby (not just about the financial strain this would be, but that’s a big chunk of it); and the amount of jealousy he has toward his wife’s first husband, who died young.

9. The book contains the cutest authorial cameo this side of the stand-alone novels that Brad Parks has been putting out lately.

10. This guy is so addicted to Little Debbie Snack Cakes, I’m beginning to wonder if the frosting is laced with nicotine.

11. We don’t get to know Jill very well, because this book is about what’s going on in Daniel’s mind, with a focus on his issues, not the people around him. We know she has trouble with the principal at her school, that she really wants a baby, is still in love with her dead husband—and is apparently crazy about Daniel (not that he’s great at seeing it).

12. The other big thing we learn about her is that she is really bad at putting away clothing after it’s been laundered.

13. I mentioned earlier that Daniel plans something incredibly stupid, with the goal of helping finances. It is incredibly stupid, but along the way, he unintentionally makes a friend. My sole complaint with this book is that we don’t get to spend more time with this friend. Thankfully, we get enough to enjoy him.

14. I spent a lot of time thinking this plan was a fantasy/daydream kind of thing that he was indulging in—and liked it. When I realized (later than I should have) that Daniel was serious about it, I worried that this would ruin the book for me. It didn’t, so I’m glad I didn’t give up on it.

15. You’d think that given the unique way this book is written in that you’d speed through it in an afternoon.

16. You’d be wrong—it’ll take you about as long as any other 350-page book would take to read. You end up having to think a little bit more about the words than usual to piece together the story from the snippets given in the lists. (this is not a complaint, it’s an observation)

17. This is one of the funniest books I’ve read this year. But it’s not all about the laughs—there’s brutal honesty, there’s the inherent ugliness of jealousy, the despair of hopelessness, Daniel’s self-loathing at lying to his wife . . . Daniel’s a great, flawed, human character that you can’t help but root for (including rooting for him addressing some obvious character flaws).

18. I remember in a Creative Writing Class in College spending about 40 minutes going over the rules/strategies involved in using lists in fiction. I’m pretty sure that Dicks breaks half of them—and the book is better for it. I’d love to discuss this book with that instructor. (Unlike a lot of what I read, I can see her enjoying this book and appreciating the craft). The execution is perfect—and it’s easy to tell that, if it wasn’t this would’ve been a disaster of a novel.

19. No, I did not sit in my car weeping while reading the end of this book.

20. If the eponymous title was Thirty-Six Truths . . . I might have. I probably would have. (It might have only taken 25 truths)

21. I’ve been telling myself for years that I needed to pick up another Matthew Dicks novel, and I’m so glad that I did and that it was this one. It’s one of my favorite reads of 2019.


5 Stars2019 Library Love Challenge

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