June Recap
A month of hiding indoors
June went by alarmingly fast. I swear all I did was work and read books, which explains why this monthly recap is mostly a reading roundup with a few signs of life around the edges.
Florida has been disgusting in the way only Florida can be disgusting. The weather has been in the “feels like” hundreds for weeks, and when the sun isn’t actively trying to melt everyone, it’s torrential rain. So I’ve barely left my house. I blinked and it was July. I don’t know what else to tell you.
Out of office
The good news is that I’m on vacation for the first week of July. I don’t have any plans to travel, and honestly, that is the dream right now. No answering emails, no responding to Teams messages or being available to anyone in any professional capacity whatsoever.
I’m hoping to spend the week catching up on life, which mostly means catching up on TV, watching a few movies, working out, and probably reading more books. I might try to get to the pool if it’s not raining all day. Thrilling? Maybe not. Deeply necessary? Absolutely.
I haven’t had a true week off in a very long time—and no, being laid off doesn’t count. That is a different genre of time off, and the vibes are terrible.
What I watched
Succession: I finally watched the last season of Succession, which is weird because I always loved that show and have no real explanation for why I never finished it. I could have sworn it ended six months ago, but apparently it ended several years ago. During the Biden administration, even. Who knew?
I’m sure I have nothing interesting to say about Succession that hasn’t already been said by people who finished it on time like responsible members of society, but damn. What an ending. What a season. Those last few episodes were sick good, and I’m going to miss those horrible Roy kids.
Maternal Instinct: I also watched the documentary Maternal Instinct on Netflix, and I’m still pretty gobsmacked. I hadn’t heard much about the case beyond “holy shit,” and while I have my misgivings about the sheer volume of true crime documentaries Netflix keeps turning out, that apparently has not stopped me from watching them.
The documentary follows Taylor Parker, a Texas woman who faked a pregnancy in 2020. It carefully lays out the deep web of lies she built her life around, culminating when a state trooper finds her on the side of the road after she claims to have just given birth in her car. Her story quickly falls apart from there, and to say that it gets very, very grim is a massive understatement.
Even if you don’t know where the story is going in advance, you can piece it together by this point. And yet, I still spent the last 30 minutes of this documentary with my hand over my mouth in utter horror. I usually have a pretty strong stomach for true crime, but there is very little I can think of that’s as despicable as what this woman did. It’s a rough watch, but it’s very well done. I don’t know that I can exactly recommend it, but if you watch true crime, this one’s a friggin’ doozy and not to be missed.
Reading roundup
June was heavy on horror, grief, influencer chaos, and two standout cannibalism books, so that’s apparently where I am as a person right now.
Not Quite Dead Yet by Holly Jackson: This was my first read of the month and unfortunately, I did not enjoy it. If you like negative book reviews, you’ll want to click that link.
Girl Dinner by Olivie Blake: I wrote about Girl Dinner quite a bit in my last Scattered Shells post, but TL;DR: I loved it! You can read more about why in that post. Highly recommend.
A Good House for Children by Kate Collins: Told across two timelines in the same house, this follows Lydia, a nanny in the 1970s caring for three grieving children, and Orla, a present-day painter trying to find herself again after having her second child. Both women start experiencing strange things in the house: doors opening and closing, unexplained noises, and children with imaginary friends who seem a little too real. I’d heard this one was scary, and while it didn’t scare me exactly, it was definitely unsettling and much darker than I expected. A very good haunted house story, but bleak enough that you should probably be in the right mood for it.
Little One by Olivia Muenter: Catharine West has spent the last decade rebuilding her life after escaping the cult her father ran when she was a child. When a journalist reaches out asking if she’s the same Catharine from the cult, she has to decide whether to keep running from her past or give him what he wants in exchange for answers of her own. I’m always here for a cult thriller, and this one worked for me. Muenter’s writing is easy to sink into, Catharine is interesting in that slightly unlikable way I tend to enjoy, and the ending has a nice kick to it. Solid, fun, exactly what I wanted it to be.
Dear Debbie by Freida McFadden: Look, sometimes you read a couple seriously heavy books in a row about grief and loss and overcoming your own demons, and you need to pick up a Freida McFadden book to wash it all away. This follows Debbie, a Dear Abby-esque advice columnist whose life is falling apart. Naturally, she decides to reclaim control in the most insane way possible. I was pleasantly surprised for most of this book: the characters are strong, the plot is delightfully unhinged, and Julia Whelan’s performance as Debbie on audio is perfection. Then, of course, Freida had to go full Freida in the last handful of chapters and make me change my mind. Ugh.
Her One Regret by Donna Freitas: When a baby is found abandoned in a parking lot and her mother, Lucy, is missing, the search begins. But Lucy’s best friend Michelle knows Lucy had been regretting motherhood, even fantasizing about faking her own kidnapping to escape her life. Michelle has to figure out whether Lucy is in real danger or if she staged the whole thing herself. This book digs into something rarely talked about: women who regret becoming mothers. That part felt honest and real to me, and I appreciated how frankly it was addressed. Unfortunately, the book also had an excess of characters and side plots, and the ending got too messy, which took away from the gravity of the topic for me.
Incidents Around the House by Josh Malerman: This haunted house story is told from the perspective of eight-year-old Bela, who is being visited by a malevolent presence she calls Other Mommy. Based on that premise, I expected this to be terrifying. Instead, I spent most of the book wondering if Josh Malerman has ever met a child, because Bela reads more like a toddler. The book is formatted in a very stylistically unique way that irritated me so much I tried switching to the audiobook—only to discover that the child narration was nails on a chalkboard. I know a lot of people found this genuinely scary, but I didn’t. What could have been a really creepy story ended up being massively irritating. This is going to be a movie, and I do think it could work better cinematically, so I’m looking forward to that.
The Influencers by Anna-Marie McLemore: This book follows “Mother May I” May Iverson, a momfluencer who is almost certainly supposed to be a Kris Jenner type, and her five daughters, who are absolutely supposed to be versions of the Kardashian-Jenner clan. When May’s husband is found dead, it becomes a whodunit with the finger-pointing going in every possible direction. On the surface, this is a passable thriller, but the more interesting part is the way it touches on what happens to children who grow up with their lives commodified and the psychological damage that can cause. This is a topic that fascinates me, although the book didn’t go as deep as I would have liked. Unlike the Kardashian-Jenners, May’s children aren’t all eager to follow in her footsteps, which makes the family dynamic much more interesting. Overall, this was a decent, somewhat forgettable read.
The Lamb by Lucy Rose: Oof. This was the standout book of the month for me, and I can’t stop thinking about it. Margot and Mama live in a cottage in the forest, where they wait for lost strangers to knock on their door. They call them “strays.” Mama feeds them, takes care of them, and then uses them to satisfy her endless appetite. Things change when a stranger named Eden arrives and Mama decides to keep her. The shifting dynamics force Margot to confront her relationship with Mama and the possibility that this might not be the life she wants. This book is so sad? I know cannibalism books as metaphors for loneliness and need have become A Thing, but this is done exceptionally well. And the ending will leave you staring into the distance, unsure what to do with the rest of your life. Just…wow. I can’t wait to see what Lucy Rose does next.
This Thing Between Us by Gus Moreno: Speaking of books that make you stare into the void! This book follows Thiago after the sudden death of his wife, Vera, and the strange, unsettling events that seem to surround them before and after she dies. There is an Alexa-like device called an Itza doing weird things in their condo, so the book is often marketed like some kind of AI-gone-wrong horror story. It is not that at all. This is a book about grief. It is definitely horror, and it has some deeply disturbing parts, but it’s really about the way grief consumes you and possesses you. Thiago tries to escape the haunting he feels from Vera’s absence, which becomes both palpable and real, and he has no idea how to get away from it. It’s a short book, but it hits like a punch in the throat. Hard to say much more without spoiling it, but: yikes (complimentarily).
Jar of Hearts by Jennifer Hillier: When 16-year-old Angela, the most popular girl in school, goes missing, her disappearance haunts everyone she left behind. Fourteen years later, her body is found in the woods behind her best friend Georgina “Geo” Shaw’s house, and it turns out Geo knew more than she ever admitted. Her teenage boyfriend, who grew into a serial killer, was responsible, and both he and Geo end up in prison. But that’s only the beginning of the secrets left to be uncovered. Overall, this was a really entertaining thriller, and I was engrossed from start to finish. The ending goes completely batshit in a way that didn’t fully work for me, with too many twists hitting too quickly to be satisfying. There is also some absolutely unnecessary fatphobia at the beginning that almost made me put it down. Still, this was my first Jennifer Hillier novel, and I’ll likely pick up another one.
You Will Never Be Me by Jesse Sutanto: Clearly, I was on an influencer kick this month. This one follows influencer Meredith Lee, whose protégé Aspen Palmer quickly surpasses her in followers and fame. After the two have a horrible falling out, Meredith goes on a quest to destroy Aspen’s success, while Aspen decides she’ll do whatever it takes to keep her own following on track. This was fine: an entertaining but largely forgettable thriller that helped cleanse the palate after a couple of heavier reads. I’d recommend it if you’re looking for something fun, not too deep, and deliciously unhinged. If you’re into women behaving badly on the internet, this one gets the job done.
Girl’s Girl by Sonia Feldman, Mad Mabel by Sally Hepworth, and The Lowe Job by Grace Alexander: These were ARC copies I received from NetGalley and gave a full review of each on Instagram. Click the links in the captions to read.
How was your June? Tell me what you read, watched, or got up to in the comments.
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Ugh, I've liked Josh Malerman books in the past and this one was on my radar, but I can't with kids who are written much younger than they're supposed to be. Now I'm worried about reading it.
I hope you enjoy your time off!
I just watched Maternal Instinct last night!! Crazy stuff. Check out "The Con: Kaitlyn's Baby" podcast... similar vibes