This Is Where You Belong - Melody Warnick

Another fortuitous dollar store find. They really get an odd assortment of books at the one I occasionally go to just to poke around. The subtitle of this book is "The Art and Science of Loving the Place You Live" and that sums it up nicely. I probably didn't mention this earlier, but one of the many reasons I didn't read much in 2018 and 2019 overall is a move, so this book is timely for me. To be honest, I love my new living place, so in a way this book doesn't apply, but on the other hand it has lots of practical suggestions for getting to know a new place (or even a place you have lived I for a while - there are sure to be surprises!). In fact, I have done some of them and it's been fun. So this book is great if you want to explore your home town, whether you're a new arrival or a native.

You Are A Badass - Jen Sincero

This book's subtitle is "How to stop doubting your greatness and start living an awesome life" and that pretty much sums it up - it's a self-help book about motivating yourself to fulfill your goals and dreams. It was ok... I never read that book The Secret but I do kind of know what the central premise of that book was, and to be honest this book seems to tread similar ground. It does have practical steps to take so it's not all theory, which is good. All in all I guess this isn't a bad way to motivate yourself if you have a goal in mind that you can't seem to take steps toward getting to.

This Searing Light, the Sun and Everything Else - Jon Savage

Subtitle: "Joy Division: The Oral History"

You probably don't know this but I am a huge Joy Division fan. I have loved their music since the beginning (I'm old, kids, ha ha) and I have enjoyed the relatively recent biographical movie chronicling how the band formed and their career up until the moment of Ian Curtis' tragic suicide. This book, published very recently, is a compilation of first-person accounts of the band's history, and it makes for fascinating reading. It really evokes the feeling of what Manchester was like in the late 70s/early 80s (not that I was there, mind you, just that the book is evocative) and the music scene that spawned this amazing band. If you have already read a lot about the band, there aren't going to be huge surprises or anything in this book, but it's still a fascinating read all these years later.
For some reason I was out of the loop of this author's previous book about the band, and I will have to rectify that. Highly recommended.

This Is Where I Leave You - Jonathan Tropper

Yet another Library Sale Shelves book, but not a winner. I like to read contemporary novels as they read faster for me than, say, Jane Austen books do, and sometimes I just want to be in a relatively contemporary setting with modern vernacular and settings and stuff like cell phones and whatever. This book wasn't awful, but it just didn't grab me. Maybe because it was more about men, father/son relationships, and that sort of thing - who knows. My copy happens to be a movie-tie-in version with a photo of the cast on the cover, and they got some great actors for the movie, so maybe I should give that a try. I guess this one is a "meh" for me.

Hitman Anders and the Meaning of It All - Jonas Jonnasson

This book was found at a dollar store and it looked interesting so I picked it up and read it on two flights for a work trip. It was an entertaining novel and kept me quite content on the plane, which is as good of a recommendation as I can make for it. I liked the characters and how the story changed them (or didn't, as the case may be). I'd definitely read other books by this author.

The Girl on the Velvet Swing - Simon Baatz

Evelyn Nesbit is a name I have run across while researching my vaudeville-era obsession, so when I ran across this book in the library, subtitled "Sex, Murder, and Madness at the Dawn of the Twentieth Century," I had to pick it up. The crime central to this book isn't well known today but at the time it was the scandal on every front page. This book is really well researched and well written and the story is bizarrely tragic and doesn't quite end how one might expect. This book is well worth a read.

A Matter of Degree - Don Massey & Rick Davey

Came across this non-fiction book in a museum gift shop. It was on sale and I thought the topic (summarized in the subtitle: "The Hartford Circus Fire and the Mystery of Little Miss 1565") seemed interesting so I picked it up and actually managed to even read it without having it gather dust on the TBR pile for a silly length of time first. The authors are a writer and a firefighter who both extensively researched this infamous fire for years before writing this book and solving the mystery of a little girl who went missing during the fire. The subject matter is disturbing, as you might imagine, but the book is written well (if the tone is a tad lofty and dramatic at times) and the research is obviously impeccable. A well done and educational read.

A Lesson Before Dying - Ernest J. Gaines

There is nothing I can say about this book that could in any way match the elegance and power of the writing and of the story. This book is heartbreaking and moving and should be required reading for all humans. Highly recommended.