Sunburn - Chloe Michelle Howarth (Verve Books, 2023) Sunburn is set in the early 1990s in a small village in Ireland. Our narrator is Lucy, a teenage girl at the cusp of adulthood. She lives with her parents, her brothers, and her granny on their farm. It's a similar life to almost all of her… Continue reading Book Review: Sunburn by Chloe Michelle Howarth
I received an Advance Reading Copy of this book thanks to the publisher. All opinions are my own. Available through Greenleaf Book Group Press 13 April 2026. Elly Sparrow didn't plan on having four children or that her life would be narrowed down to simply being their mother. But somewhere along the way, her life… Continue reading Book Review: Rules for Mothers by Julie Swendsen Young
The Man Born to be King - Dorothy Sayers When I added this to my TBR back in 2019, I don't think I realized that it was written as a play and not a book. Not until I saw it available on Spotify and looked into it a little further did I realize this was… Continue reading (Audio) Review: The Man Born to be King by Dorothy Sayers
Read: Man or Mango? - Lucy Ellmann (Biblioasis, 2022) Seascraper - Benjamin Wood (Simon & Schuster Audio, 2025) Demon Copperhead - Barbara Kingsolver (Harper, 2022) Beautyland - Marie-Helene Bertino (Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, 2024) I Hold a Wolf by the Ears - Laura van den Berg (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2020) The Man Born to… Continue reading What I Read – January 2026
I Hold a Wolf by the Ears - Laura van den Berg (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020) A short story collection was just the kind of palette cleanser I needed in the midst of my Goliath reads. Reading Laura van den Berg's collection reminded me a lot of the sort of short stories we would… Continue reading Book Review: I Hold A Wolf by the Ears by Laura van den Berg
Beautyland - Marie-Helene Bertino (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2024) I started listening to Beautyland on audio back in, I think, November, via the Libby app. My time lapsed and the wait was so long that I kind of gave up on it. But when I saw that it had no wait at the library in… Continue reading Book Review: Beautyland by Marie-Helen Bertino
Demon Copperhead - Barbara Kingsolver (Harper, 2022) Damon Fields is born to a single mother in the bathroom of a trailer. He is born into poverty in a small, Appalachian community. His childhood is unsteady but not necessarily unhappy. He quickly becomes known as Demon Copperhead instead of his legal name (just as his best… Continue reading Book Review: Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
Seascraper - Benjamin Wood (Simon & Schuster Audio, 2025) I received an Advance Listening copy of this book thanks to the publisher and Libro.FM. All opinions are my own. I began listening to Seascraper just before the winter holiday and so even though it is a short novel - just over five hours listening time… Continue reading (Audio) Book Review: Seascraper by Benjamin Wood
Hello and welcome back! The vast majority of the reading that I do is fiction. This is a hard category for me to narrow down because it's the closest I'll get to picking a favourite book of the year. But the year is long and the reading is varied and how do you choose? I… Continue reading The 2025 Karissa Reads Books Literary Awards (Best Fiction)
Hello and welcome back! Today's category is a stacked one. Non-Fiction is a pretty broad category and encompasses biographies, histories, essay collections, and works of theology. I don't read as much non-fiction as I do fiction but I read some truly excellent non-fiction in 2025. The runners-up (in order that I read them) are: One… Continue reading The 2025 Karissa Reads Books Literary Awards (Best Non-Fiction)
Karissa Reads Books 