I put this list together because I typically felt sorta “meh” about these ones, if I’m being honest…

Hangsaman by Shirley Jackson
I wanted to love this one and I definitely liked parts of it, but overall I found it a little too confusing to fully love. I do love Shirley Jackson, and her writing does feel ahead of its time. However, the main character is slowing going crazy, and it becomes hard to tell what is happening in her head versus what is actually happening in her life. I also don’t think I fully understood her relationship with her father, but that could also be a result of when this book was published. I don’t know! I didn’t hate it, but it wasn’t what I was expecting.

The Farm by Joanne Ramos
I think this novel wanted to be a lot of things, but it should have picked a lane. The story explores a woman named Jane who is an immigrant trying to support her daughter and signs up to be a surrogate in an intensive maternity program. It was partially exploring an interesting community, but framing it to be a cult-like thriller. I wouldn’t say that totally worked for me, and it could have been more interesting if the stories were more grounded in authenticity of experiences rather than this “trying to figure out what is really going on” style of story layout. I also didn’t like the switching of perspectives between chapters and wish we could have stayed in Jane’s brain the whole story. It had potential, and I wish I had liked it more than I did.

The Bombshell by Darrow Farr
This seems a bit old-school and outdated for how recently it was published. This felt like a classic kidnapping thriller, packed with European politics, a privileged heiress, and plans that go awry. It just overall felt a little stale for me I guess. I didn’t really buy into the romance aspects, and I had trouble relating to the main character. The book wasn’t bad, but I just don’t think that this story was for me.

All This Could Be Different by Sarah Thankam Mathews
I wanted to like this only because I saw the author interview someone at a book event, and she’s queer which of course is bonus points. However, I didn’t expect to like this book and ultimately I didn’t. It does explore some interesting concepts around immigrants and family issues, but I didn’t like any of the characters at all. The main character was supposed to be charming in her self-sabotaging, but I am just too old to find this story to be enjoyable. And it ends on a sad note, which I also didn’t appreciate. Overall, very meh.

You Exist Too Much by Zaina Arafat
There was a lot packed into this novel and I’m not sure that I liked most of it. The beginning felt pretty icky, as the main character goes through cheating run on her partner and ultimately ends up in a facility as a result. Extra icky because she’s queer and hurting a woman (or maybe women). Even though she goes through this rehab, she learns nothing and still engages in inappropriate or chaotic relationships until the very end of the book. So mostly, I didn’t like it, and I also don’t understand the point.

The Children Of Red Peak by Craig DiLouie
I will admit that this book was wildly hyped up by my best friend in a way that would never actually meet expectations, and honestly it kinda didn’t. BUT – I think I would have liked it a lot better had she not sung such high praises. Don’t get me wrong – it was definitely a good read. But my main critiques is that I wanted more details from the cult flashbacks and less details about their adult life, and the ending was weirdly religious. Again, definitely not a big fan of the ending but it was still a thrilling read.

Please Join Us by Catherine McKenzie
Ohhh, I wanted to love this one so bad! I love a good cult fiction book, and so much of this book really kept me on my toes and was totally pulling me in. I have to admit though that the ending just didn’t do it for me. It went from this cool, layered cult story to a legal battle with tons of stock jargon that I just didn’t feel was very satisfying. I also didn’t understand the hyper-focus on the Sullivan character who was never really a part of the story? I’m torn cause I did have a good time reading this book but I just was expecting it to go a different way in the end.

Reckless Girls by Rachel Hawkins
This one was just okay. It definitely wasn’t bad but I wouldn’t say this was as captivating as I thought it was going to be. It was very telanovela-esque, and sorta felt like it was written much longer ago than it actually was. That being said, if you go in with low expectations, it’s probably not bad. It was just sorta randomly written I feel and might have been a popular trashy beach read like 15ish years ago but it doesn’t feel super relevant to be reading today. I guess I just was looking for something bigger in the end is all.

Boy Parts by Eliza Clark
Okay so this was definitely problematic, which I think was supposed to be part of the point, but I really didn’t enjoy it? Way too cavalier around age appropriateness and consent, and it was wildly uncomfortable to read. Sometimes uncomfortable books can be fun, but this was absolutely not. And the whole ending was basically her being like “oh I’m hot so I can do anything and act crazy and get away with it” – which could have been a cool concept if she wasn’t sexually assaulting people. So yeah.. not my favorite and I totally don’t get the hype around this book at all!

The Secret History by Donna Tartt
I was so excited to read this one because I thought it was going to be culty – but it was really more of a story of “can we get away with murder?” There’s a group of college kids that seem to get themselves into trouble for no reason, especially when they all lowkey secretly hate each other? There was parts that were interesting, and the characters were really well written, but if often seemed really random and excessively long. I really wanted to love this one, but ultimately I wasn’t a fan.

Brutes by Dizz Tate
This had the potential to be a good thriller, but I don’t think the concept was something I enjoyed. This is the story of teenagers who are hiding information on the whereabouts of a missing girl in town, told from the perspective of the group of teenagers together. I thought this was a cool idea, as each chapter used “we” as the point of view until they get older. Things are often confusing though, which is done purposefully to showcase how your memory is fuzzy from your younger years as you age, but I felt this made things confusing to the plot overall. Ultimately, I liked the concept of the book more than I liked the actual book itself.

The Idiot by Elif Batuman
This book actually reminded me a lot of Brutes (above) except this was the college version instead of the young/teenage version. The book felt a little like diary entries, and it really captured the complexity of college – the mundane coupled with so much emotion that small things become significant. The main character is following a man that she has no business falling for, and she lowkey knows this but continues down the path anyway. I could relate, but it also brought me back to a part of my life that I don’t want to relive. The book went on too long in my opinion, and I think I would have liked it a lot better if it had been shorter.

All Fours by Miranda July
I think this book was made for women who are unhappy in their marriage and wonder if they have “explored” enough in life, and I don’t think that this book was necessarily made for me. I found most of it to be really cringey and eye-rolly, and I hated almost all of the characters. It got a little interesting at one point with the poly plot line, otherwise I actually hated this.

Behind The Green Curtain by Riley LaShea
This was less than just okay LOL. I really wanted to like this one because I found it under “lesbian erotica” categories but it also felt very telanovela-esque in the dramatic ending that was so irrelevant to all the sex that was being had. The plot was pretty basic and got very repetitive, and I kinda got bored of the sex scenes as a result. Also, I had such an issue with the power imbalance and that really took it out for me. I didn’t like the whole “we’re using each other” thing at all. Overall, this was a very cheesy-romance novel, but just a lesbian version.

The Little Liar by Mitch Albom
So, I’ve learned that historical fiction is not really my favorite, and a lot of this story was obviously hard to read considering that it took place during the Holocaust. That being said, I do appreciate the way that Mitch Albom really takes every piece of his story and makes sure that it all gets wrapped up neatly with a nice bow. I stayed along for the whole, horrifying ride because I knew there would be some justice served in the end and that’s exactly what I got. I get why he’s so popular, but this one wasn’t quite a favorite for me.

The Maidens by Alex Michaelides
After reading The Silent Patient, I was super excited to read Alex Michaelides again, but this one just did NOT hit. The plot had so many holes in it and really made no sense from start to finish – I don’t know why a therapist would be so hardly investigating the murder of her niece’s college classmate just because they went to the same university… maybe? And the big plot twist at the end wasn’t quite enough to save it for me. I don’t hate the writing style, but this just really lacked in believable story for me, so I wouldn’t recommend it.

A Beautiful Crime by Christopher Bollen
This one was okay. The story itself was pretty good, which is why I stuck along for the whole ride. The characters are mostly gay men who are either rich or pretending to be rich all trying to out-con each other one way or another. However, I wasn’t the biggest fan of the way it was written. It was overly sophisticated for no reason, almost like it was trying to be this high class European novel. It was still a cool story, but I just think the writing was a little much.

Minor Detail by Adania Shibi
I read this with one of the book clubs that I’m in, but I really was not a fan of this one. Probably because the story mainly revolves around sexual assault, and I’m just not always sure that’s needed at all for fiction. I get the idea – the minor details of every day life of the soldier blend into his brutal assault – but I just don’t think it was necessary. A lot of people from the book club seemed to like it though, but I have to wonder if it’s because this is a Palestinian story. Either way, I definitely wasn’t a fan myself.

We Are Not Like Them by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza
I loved that this book takes place in Philly (where I am from), and it covers a very important problem with the police force in America. It’s told from two perspectives of an interracial friendship, showing two sides of a traumatic event. A white woman is married to a cop who shoots an unarmed teenage black boy, and her black best friend is a journalist covering the story on the news. While I do believe they gave the white woman way too much slack, I think this would be a great book to cover this topic in schools. While the content is heavy, it’s written in a way that reads as young adult and is covered in a way that reads simply enough for varying age groups. I appreciate what the authors did with this idea, and I definitely understand all the accolades and attention the book has gotten.

Acts Of Service by Lillian Fishman
I liked the premise of this book: a lesbian in a boring relationship who wants to secretly step out to explore a little and experience more sexually. But the way that things went down… I really hated it. All of the characters frustrated me and I found a lot of it to be male-centric, despite using the labels of “lesbians”, and it got borderline problematic. So yeah, I didn’t like this one much.

The Great Gambler by YRSD NYDU
So, I found this book from an advertisement on the E train in NYC, and it seemed like something my girlfriend would be into so she ended up buying it. Then she read 3 pages of it and decided she didn’t like the way the author writes, so I ended up reading it for us. It was a little mis-advertised and was a book about AI and the stock market/ investment firms, and it lacked a clear ending. I think the book wanted to be more illusive than it should have been to be successful. So ultimately, it sorta felt like we bought the book version of someone’s mixtape on the subway – not sure I recommend.

Hot Girls With Balls by Benedict Nguyen
I really wanted to like this one because I met the author at the Brooklyn Book Festival and she was so very lovely, and I even got a signed copy of her book after her panel. However, I’m not sure I was the target audience for this book. It was VERY online, and it was mostly the mixed comment section of two trans influencers who play volleyball together. Parts of it were okay, but I found myself skimming over the chapters and chapters of comments. Kinda meh, which was a bummer.

Providence by Caroline Kepnes
I actually liked the first half of this book a lot, where it was just a thriller about a boy who had gone missing for a number of years and there was a mystery to be solved. I didn’t love where it went, with the supernatural aspect and the big tie-in to the Lovecraft author that I am not familiar with. Maybe I would have enjoyed the book more if I was? And the ending felt like a non-ending with several cop-out plotlines. So the second half sorta lost me I’d say.

Thanks for reading! (Last Updated: Sept 2025)