The funk continues. I read more in November than October, but wasn’t all that thrilled with most of it. I think I need to stop being tempted by the New Arrivals section of the library website and stick with my own reading lists because I’m spending too much time on recently published disappointments and not enough time on the kind of classic old-timers I know I prefer.
Anyway, these two are fairly new and not disappointing:
The Clementine Complex by Bob Mortimer
I ordered this one when I saw it was nominated for the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction (which it has since won) and realized it was the same loopy Bob Mortimer I have enjoyed watching on Would I Lie to You? It’s a fun little mystery about a guy trying to track down a woman he met in a bar because (1) he liked her and (2) she is his alibi after a work acquaintance he’d met up with for a drink is murdered. It’s equal parts goofy and suspenseful. Fun.
Work It Out by Sarah Kurchak
I confess I ordered this solely based on the subtitle: A Mood-Boosting Exercise Guide for People Who Just Want to Lie Down. I thought it would be about how people who enjoy sedentary hobbies (like me) might find some motivation for not sitting down quite so much. If I had done even two seconds of research, I’d have discovered it’s geared toward people who don’t move enough because they’re struggling with depression, anxiety, ADHD or any other condition that makes it hard to jump out of bed and run ten kilometres every morning. I ended up reading the whole thing anyway because it has a lot of good advice. I’d group it with How to Keep House While Drowning (which I read in August 2022) for smart resources on how to gently and compassionately cope with mental and/or physical hurdles to life-enhancing activities.