Shooting Up - Jonathan Tepper (Constable, 2026) In the 1980s, the Tepper family moved from the United States to Madrid as Christian missionaries. Husband and wife and their four young sons. There they began working with addicts and started a rehab for heroin addicts, many of whom were HIV+ at the height of the AIDS… Continue reading Book Review: Shooting Up by Jonathan Tepper
Make Believe - Mac Barnett (Little Brown & Co, 2026) I really like Mac Barnett's picture books for kids - Sam & Dave Dig a Hole is a favourite - so when I saw that he was coming out with a book about writing stories for children, I was interested. I already had my copy… Continue reading Book Review: Make Believe by Mac Barnett
Read: The Golem and the Jinni - Helene Wecker (Olive Editions, 2020) Whistler - Ann Patchett (Harper, 2026) The Return of the King - J.R.R. Tolkien (Houghton Mifflin Co, 1965) Enormous Wings - Laurie Frankel (Henry Holt and Company, 2026) Tenderness - Rowan Beaird (MacMillan Audio, 2026) (narrated by Evan Sibley, Katharine Chin, Pete Cross)… Continue reading What I Read: June 2026
Read: Nightbitch - Rachel Yoder (Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 2021) Good Dirt - Charmaine Wilkerson (Penguin Random House, 2025) (narrated by January LaVoy) Honeydew: Stories - Edith Pearlman (Little, Brown and Company, 2015) Tenth of December: Stories - George Saunders (Random House, 2023) The Wedding People - Alison Espach (Macmillan Audio, 2024) (narrated by Helen… Continue reading What I Read: June 2025
Read: The Ladies of Grace Adieu & Other Stories - Susanna Clarke (Bloomsbury, 2006) The Harder I Fight the More I Love You - Neko Case (Hachette Audio, 2025) Dept. of Speculation - Jenny Offill (Alfred A. Knopf, 2014) Sunbirth - An Yu (Grove Press, 2025) Far to Go - Alison Pick (Anansi, 2010) All… Continue reading What I Read: May 2025
Read: Two-Part Invention - Madeleine L'Engle (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1988) Notes from Underground - Fyodor Dostoevsky (Vintage Classics, 1994) (translated from Russian by Richard Pevear & Larissa Volokhonsky) Instructions for the Drowning - Steven Heighton (Biblioasis, 2023) The Memory of Animals - Claire Fuller (Tin House, 2023) Shrines of Gaiety - Kate Atkinson (Little,… Continue reading What I Read – April 2023
Hello and Welcome Back to the final installment of the Fifth Annual Karissa Reads Books Literary Awards! Undoubtedly, most of what I read is fiction so this final category is the Big One. I have my top 5 below but some other titles I greatly enjoyed reading in the past year are (in no particular… Continue reading Best Fiction: The Fifth Annual Karissa Reads Books Literary Awards
Red Clocks - Leni Zumas (Little, Brown, and Co, 2018) Red Clocks is a book about women. The story loops through the lives of 5 women, 4 of whom live in the same Oregon fishing town and find themselves more connected than they might have initially thought. The 5th woman is a long-dead polar explorer,… Continue reading Book Review: Red Clocks by Leni Zumas
Read: The Odyssey - Lara Williams (Zando, 2022) Circe - Madeline Miller (Little, Brown, and Company, 2018) The House in the Cerulean Sea - T.J. Klune (Tor, 2020) Jack - Marilynne Robinson (McClelland & Stewart, 2020) The Lonely Stories edited by Natalie Eve Garrett (Catapult, 2022) Did Not Finish: Lucia - Alex Pheby I picked… Continue reading What I Read – February 2022
Circe - Madeline Miller (Little, Brown, and Company, 2018) I had high hopes for Circe after enjoying The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller so much and I'm pleased to report that this book didn't disappoint. Circe is our main character and our narrator. She is a daughter of Titans, daughter of Helios, the sun… Continue reading Book Review: Circe by Madeline Miller
Karissa Reads Books 