January Reading Wrap-Up (Part 2)

In the first half of January, I read 6 books (see those reviews here).
In the second half of January, I read...

1 more book.

That's not bad! I read 7 books in the month of January, which is just 10 less than my reading total in 2016, so yay!!

Now my goal was to read 10 books, but I got distracted by marathoning Voltron on Netflix and I honestly don't regret that decision. Though that means I have 8 books to read before I leave for Korea in ... 13 days. Crap.


Anyway - the one other book I read in January was a bit of a brain twister. I loved and hated the story and the characters in turns. That book was The Borrower by Rebecca Makkai.

The Borrower by Rebecca Makkai
A 3-star review.

This is the story of a librarian finding her favorite kid hiding out in the library and running away with him - not sure if she is kidnapping him or he is kidnapping her.

I loved the explorations of self and purpose in this novel. The main character, the librarian Lucy, contemplated her purpose and her choices and her family throughout much of the novel, trying to come to terms with how she fits into her family's history. I think the whole book is more about her coming to terms with who she is than it really is about the kidnapping. 

That said, the tale of kidnapping makes for a hilarious plot filled with moments of ridiculous events too strange to believe, but that you really want to believe in. The boy sometimes made comments that had me questioning his age (it sounded too much like an adult writing a kid and threw me out of the story), but beyond that he added a level of fun to an otherwise serious series of events. Sometimes Lucy would get too self-absorbed to handle (basically having a mid-life crisis while contemplating straight up running away) but she is also relatable as a charater who graduated from college and found herself at loose ends trying to be independent.

I had so many conflicting feelings about this book, but overall I can say that I liked it, so I give it 3 stars and recommend you read it for yourself and come back to me so we can chat about it!

After finishing this book, I honestly wasn't very enthusiastic about picking up another, which lead me to binging on Netflix (first Voltron, then Young Justice season 2, then repeating Voltron....). It was a bit of a slump, and I'm still working through it, but I have plans to spend the weekend reading! Let's see how many books on my TBR I can finish!