☀️ Sunday Sharies: May 2024

Beach reads, summer blockbusters, and a strawberry matcha cake to die for

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: I don’t know what happened (I guess life? more sunshine?), but this was an extremely light reading month for me. I did pick up Emily Henry’s new novel, Funny Story and liked it very much. The two main characters Daphne and Miles wind up thrust together in lakeside Michigan after both of their long term partners leave them…for each other. I needed an escapist read and this was simply so cute and light and easy. (4/5 stars)

And then I started Deacon King Kong by James McBride and only got one third of the way through before life got in the way. It’s not the kind of book that begs to be read in one sitting, but it’s sharp, extremely well-written, and charming so far. I’ll have to finish it up in June and come back with my updates.

Jess: I’m spending this Memorial Day Weekend at the beach, so I saved my two most anticipated romcoms this month for seaside reading time. How to End a Love Story by Yulin Kuang (the screenwriter for an upcoming Emily Henry adaptation) is an enemies-to-lovers romance with delightfully fun banter and surprising emotional depth. It deals with grief and trauma, so it was not the perfect choice for sitting on the beach — Matt looked over at me once while I was crying and asked, “Is it a Marley & Me situation?” — but the flirty parts made up for it. (4/5 stars).

My other choice was the new Emily Henry book, Funny Story. I’m still in the midst of it, but I’m already locked in. Even after finding Kuang’s dialogue to be exceptionally cute and witty, no one does it like Emily!!! (rating TBD).

Continuing my romance book streak, I finished The Idea of You earlier this month, ahead of watching the new Anne Hathaway movie adaptation, and call me a hater, but I did not have a good time with either. The book has a cute meet-cute and some fluttery initial exchanges between the leads, but the chemistry fizzles fast, leaving repetitive “spicy” scenes and the main characters being unbearably selfish. (1.5/5 stars).

Having thoroughly enjoyed Leigh Bardugo’s Ninth House, I was hoping to like her new Spanish Inquisition-set fantasy, The Familiar, but I was disappointed in its predicable, meandering plot and flat characters. After this and the Ninth House sequel flopping for me, it might be time for me to put Bardugo aside. (2/5 stars).

Jess: Of the 15 new movies I watched in May, my 3 favorites were: