Anu Recommends #9
Wishing lanterns, magical orphans, Shakespeare, second chances, and love
Hi and welcome to the Storyteller!
Today I’ve got lots of fun recommendations for you. You’ll have to let me know yours below!
In the end it is all about love, indeed
(those of you who got the above reference, you’re my people; others, you’ll soon find out)
By now, we are already well into the influx of Valentine’s Day media bombarding us everywhere we go, or don’t. I didn’t want to add to that, but I also couldn’t resist putting together some feel-good books that embrace love in all forms and end on a hopeful note without shying away from life’s thorny moments. I didn’t want to repeat any, like Legends & Lattes, Still Life, or the Dangerous Damsels books, though this isn’t the last you’ll read of them on this newsletter, let’s be honest!
February 14, as it so happens, is the pub day for two books that I’ve not only been lucky enough to read in advance, but also fit perfectly for today’s list - When You Wish Upon a Lantern by Gloria Chao and The Grace of Wild Things by Heather Fawcett. As always, a big thanks to the publishers and publicists who I’ve worked and work with - and Netgalley, of course. (For those of my readers not in publishing, you might be interested to know that most traditionally published new books are released on a Tuesday - read this well-articulated piece to learn why that is.)
When You Wish Upon a Lantern by Gloria Chao
Publisher description: Liya and Kai had been best friends since they were little kids, but all that changed when a humiliating incident sparked The Biggest Misunderstanding Of All Time—and they haven’t spoken since.
Then Liya discovers her family's wishing lantern store is struggling, and she decides to resume a tradition she had with her beloved late grandmother: secretly fulfilling the wishes people write on the lanterns they send into the sky. It may boost sales and save the store, but she can't do it alone . . . and Kai is the only one who cares enough to help.
While working on their covert missions, Liya and Kai rekindle their friendship—and maybe more. But when their feuding families and their changing futures threaten to tear them apart again, can they find a way to make their own wishes come true?
My thoughts: A longer review to follow in next week’s issue (along with a chat with Gloria - the interview series returns!) but this is now my favourite book by the author. Family (blood and found), community, best friends, young love, and lots of the author’s Taiwanese culture and traditions.
The Grace of Wild Things by Heather Fawcett
Publisher description: Grace has never been good at anything except magic—not that anyone believes her. While other children are adopted from the orphanage, nobody wants Grace. So she decides to make a home for herself by running away and offering herself as an apprentice to the witch in the nearby woods. After all, who better to teach Grace to use her magic? Surely the witch can’t be that bad.
But the witch is that bad—she steals souls for spells and gobbles up hearts. So Grace offers a deal: If she can learn all 100½ spells in the witch’s grimoire, the witch will make Grace her apprentice. But if Grace fails, the witch can take her magic. The witch agrees, and soon an unexpected bond develops between them. But the spells are much harder than Grace expected, and when a monster from the witch’s past threatens the home Grace has built, she may have to sacrifice more than her magic to save it.
Inspired by Anne of Green Gables, this is a magical story of found family, loss, and the power of a girl’s imagination.
My thoughts: I am only a few chapters in but I love the narrative voice and world-building; and Grace is very easy to root for. As an Anne fan, I’m also enjoying all the Easter Eggs, and the author’s spin on the source material.
The Flatshare by Beth O’Leary
Publisher description: Tiffy Moore needs a cheap flat, and fast. Leon Twomey works nights and needs cash. Their friends think they’re crazy, but it’s the perfect solution: Leon occupies the one-bed flat while Tiffy’s at work in the day, and she has the run of the place the rest of the time.
But with obsessive ex-boyfriends, demanding clients at work, wrongly imprisoned brothers and, of course, the fact that they still haven’t met yet, they’re about to discover that if you want the perfect home you need to throw the rulebook out the window…
My thoughts: This is the book that lured me back to reading contemporary romcoms, and remains a favourite through rereads. I’m looking forward to being able to access its recently released television adaptation in India.
More thoughts here:
And here:
Persuasion by Jane Austen
Publisher description: Persuasion is the last novel completed by Jane Austen. The story concerns Anne Elliot, an Englishwoman of 27 years, whose family moves to lower their expenses and reduce their debt by renting their home to an admiral and his wife. The wife's brother, Captain Frederick Wentworth, was engaged to Anne in 1806, but the engagement was broken when Anne was persuaded by her friends and family to end their relationship. Anne and Captain Wentworth, both single and unattached, meet again after a separation lasting almost eight years, setting the scene for many humorous encounters as well as a second, well-considered chance at love and marriage for Anne.
My thoughts: I really don’t know what stopped me from reading this as soon as my sister said she’d loved it and that it replaced P&P as her favourite Austen. It took me until the summer of 2019 to realise that she was right.
In case you want thoughts more detailed than “half agony half hope” or more coherent than “THAT LETTER” -
In the End It Was All About Love by Musa Okwonga
Publisher description: The narrator arrives in Berlin, a place famed for its hedonism, to find peace and maybe love; only to discover that the problems which have long haunted him have arrived there too, and are more present than ever. As he approaches his fortieth birthday, nearing the age where his father was killed in a brutal revolution, he drifts through this endlessly addictive and sometimes mystical city, through its slow days and bottomless nights, wondering whether he will ever escape the damage left by his father’s death. With the world as a whole more uncertain, as both the far-right and global temperatures rise at frightening speed, he finds himself fighting a fierce inner battle against his turbulent past, for a future free of his fear of failure, of persecution, and of intimacy.
In The End, It Was All About Love is a journey of loss and self-acceptance that takes its nameless narrator all the way through bustling Berlin to his roots, a quiet village on the Uganda-Sudan border. It is a bracingly honest story of love, sexuality and spirituality, of racism, dating, and alienation; of fleeing the greatest possible pain, and of the hopeful road home.
My thoughts: I read this on one April 2021 afternoon and haven’t been able to stop talking or writing about it since. A fundamental game-changer.
You can read my chats with Musa in The Rumpus and HT Brunch.
(Bonus rec) For The Love of the Bard by Jessica Martin
Publisher description: Literary agent and writer Miranda Barnes rolls into her hometown of Bard's Rest with one goal in mind: to spend the summer finally finishing her YA novel, the next installment in her bestselling fantasy series. Yet Miranda's mother, deep in the planning stages for the centennial of the town's beloved annual Shakespeare festival, has other ideas.
Before you can say "all's fair in love and war," Miranda is cornered into directing Twelfth Night--while simultaneously scrambling to finish her book, navigating a family health scare, and doing her best to avoid the guy who broke her heart on prom night.
When it comes to Adam, the veterinarian with a talent for set design and an infuriating knack for winning over Miranda's dog, the lady doth protest too much. As any Shakespeare lover knows, the course of true love never did run smooth, and soon Miranda realizes she'll have to decide whether to trust Adam with her heart again.
My thoughts: I wasn't quite sure what to expect with this book, but once I got settled in after a few chapters and allowed myself to revel in this unabashedly cheesy, nerdy, over-the-top, hectic romp, it was smooth sailing! I'm not enough of a Shakespeare expert to claim to have understood every (even) passing reference, but the ones I did understand and appreciate were fun. I wasn't expecting to enjoy and care about all the characters as much as I did, which made it easier to allow a wide creative license for some of this book's more crazy happenings. Even then it did seem like way too much was on the protagonist, Miranda's plate and we never really got a chance to settle into each (individually) intense issue.
Still a very fun read, and I appreciated a second-chance romance where the characters actually communicate right off the bat instead of skirting around the issue or avoiding it altogether until it all blows up in their faces, and (mostly) continue to communicate. Oh and her dog, Puck and his new bestie (I can't say more or it will be a spoiler) stole the show and I wish we'd seen more of them.
What is your go-to feel-good media?
As always, please feel free send in recommendations—books, movie, TV shows, authors to interview, ideas of what you’d like me to write on, rants/ramblings/excited monologues, GIFs and memes (especially them) and more. Just drop me a line and turn this into a conversation, even if just to say hi and let me know what you thought of the latest issue :) Or share this with someone you think might enjoy it.
Take care and see you next week!
Anu
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Very enjoyable read. Keep them coming.