2 good books

Glorious Exploits | The God of the Woods

This is your semi-annual reminder to chuck the books that are a slog and get five out from the library at a time so you can find the ones that really turn you on. I don’t have a reading goal this year other than to try to keep the momentum going that I found during holiday downtime and always have a good book on my bedside table. Here are two from January.

Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon (2024)

The Syracusans on the island of Sicily are starting to see their city bounce back after repelling the invading Athenians. The only question is what to do with the surviving prisoners of war. It’s decided that they’ll be confined to a rock quarry and given enough rations for a slow death. It’s here that Lampo and Gelon find men willing to do anything for a few scraps of bread and sips of wine, even recite lines from the work of Euripides. Drunk on the poetry of a great playwright, the two hatch a plan to put on a full production of Medea casting only prisoners.

The God of the Woods by Liz Moore (2024)

When thirteen-year-old Barbara Van Laar goes missing from Camp Emerson in 1975, no time is wasted in organizing a search party. One, because she’s the daughter of the owners of the camp, and two, because her brother went missing from the same place fourteen years ago.

I wish I hadn’t read this in January because I’ll be chasing this high for the rest of the year.