The Absolute Best Books I've Read This Year // Five Star Reads, Fantasy Favorites

And I have to say that she really knocked it out of the park with book two. It continues to build and expand on the character arcs that I loved so much in book one. It deepens those characters.

Highly recommend this as a Pearl Harbor memoir, just a military memoir in general. Honestly, I had this on my TBR for a long time and it honestly makes me mad it took me as long as it did to read it because it is absolutely as fabulous as I thought it was going to be.

But the characters were so real. I never doubted for a second that these characters really lived throughout the entire book.

This one, I think, delves a little bit more into Shin Dongyak's aftermath in terms of him finding his identity because he was he's coming from a different starting point than a lot of his fellow North Korean escapes in terms of his situation just born and growing up within the prison.

And I've read other memoirs by North Korean escapes like The Girl with Seven Names that I've recommended to pretty much everybody. , and also Every Falling Star by S. Julie. I think both of those are also incredible.

The relationship that grows between the housekeeper, the professor, and the housekeeper son is such a beautiful story of human dignity and the value of life. Meeting people where they're at, despite their circumstances.

While Detective Kaga is the backbone of these novels, he takes a bit of a backseat at the beginning of the books. He did in Malice and he did here in Newcomer where we're allowed to be brought into this location.

I loved this. The small town community feel of this book was so beautiful. the way that he wo in this incredibly immersive flavor of the shops and the families and each one had its own feel to it and you could immediately see these human struggles that all of these characters are dealing with.

But Curse of Shalon was an easy pick for me for this list because it really came out as a surprise for me. Not that I didn't think I would love it, but I didn't know what to expect and this blew away all of my non-expectations if that makes sense.

I loved the plotline in this one. I loved a lot of the side characters that we get introduced to.

And I've read other memoirs by North Korean escapes like The Girl with Seven Names that I've recommended to pretty much everybody. , and also Every Falling Star by S. Julie. I think both of those are also incredible.

But through the whole thing, the story of the resilience of these women and the incredible journey that they live through, all of that is just really unputd downable.

But once I did, it's it really dawned on me how much of a masterpiece this book is. I absolutely loved this and I highly recommend it.