☀️ Sunday Sharies: August 2024

a good recommendation from BookTok, the 4 best movies this month, and a lot of wedding prep

It’s the last Sunday of the month, and you know what that means. There’s a lot of stuff we’d like to share that won’t fit in our usual Thursday TV newsletter. Some of that stuff is here. Read on for a special monthly peek into what your trusty Double Take duo has been watching, reading, listening to, and more.

— Jess Spoll and Jenni Cullen

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Jenni: August was full of travel and hiking for me, which meant a lot of long fantasy books for planes, and not much reading otherwise.

The Mortal Fates duology by J. Bree is a Booktok recommendation I was pleasantly surprised by. It has an enemies-to-lovers romance at the core, but it is extremely slow burn and I was pulled in more by the world-building and politics than anything else. These two books sort of reminded me of the Cruel Prince series, except more high-fantasy battle coded and less well-edited. It was just what I wanted though and I tore through both books. (4/5 stars).

The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik was definitely the best of the Scholomance books, full of twists and semi-satisfying resolutions to this magical adventure, but it was still not quite for me. In this final installment, the wizards have “graduated” and are now trying to survive in the dangerous world around them — without the protections of their former school. I think I never fully got over the style of writing that felt so very “in the main character’s head”. It felt like pages would go by without any action or dialogue, instead filled with the musings of this teenage girl and her backfilled backstory. Ah well. (3/5 stars)

Swordheart by T. Kingfisher was a charming, light adventure fantasy with (yes) a romance at its core. I think this would be considered a cozy fantasy, so if that’s your thing, go forth! Though it dragged a bit in the second half, the writing was decent, the characters were fun, and the “found family” aspects were quite heartwarming. (3.5/5 stars)

Jess: It was a pretty great reading month for me, with lots of 4-star reads and enough downtime to make a good dent in my TBR (to-be-read) list.

One Dark Window by Rachel Gillig is a little slow to get going, but I was pretty quickly sucked into this fantasy-romance (aka “romantasy”) novel about a young woman who has a monster in her head. The world-building is weak, and it's not marketed as being YA, but it's certainly written like it is. Yet, it has gothic fairytale vibes which I enjoyed, and a unique magic system, and I tore through it and immediately downloaded the second. (4/5)

I was expecting a near-future dystopian adventure similar to the greats of the 2010s (The Hunger Games, Divergent, etc), but The Grace Year by Kim Liggett was more of a contemplative allegory for the treatment of women circa the 19th century wrapped in the plot of The Lord of the Flies. It seems like it was a case of mismatched expectations ruining my experience, because the reviews on Goodreads are largely much more positive than mine. (3.5/5)

I wanted an easy and cute poolside read and The Paradise Problem by Christina Lauren delivered exactly that. The set up — a billionaire's heir has to pretend to be married to a broke artist in order for him to receive his inheritance — requires a LOT of suspension of disbelief, but the banter is lively and the escapism is top tier. (4/5)

In Vicious by V.E. Schwab, two college friends figure out a way to give themselves superpowers, but become supervillains instead. I love an antihero story, and this one delivers action, suspense, and atmosphere. Again, I immediately downloaded the sequel after finishing the last page. (4/5)

Described as a “harrowing struggle for survival,” The Troop by Nick Cutter was my first horror read of my early celebration of spooky season. It fell flat for me, though, with way too much (very overly descriptive) gore and a predictable plot. (2.5/5)

The Summer of Broken Rules by K.L. Walther was one of those books that I should have DNF'd, but I can never bring myself to. It's a light beach-read rom-com about a girl who falls in love with a groomsman at her cousin's wedding on Martha's Vineyard. Had potential to be cute, but the majority of the book was a play-by-play of a game of Assassin and I didn’t feel invested at all in the central romance. (1.5/5)

Jess: I watched 12 new movies this month, these were my 4 favorite:

Strange Darling is a subversive horror film that is best enjoyed if you go in blind. It's twisty and creative, and even though it loses some momentum in the second half, I loved the experience of watching it. Willa Fitzgerald and Kyle Gallner nail the complexities of the lead characters, and the technicolor-style aesthetic is stunning.