​Ghostly Echoes​ by William Ritter
Basia rates it: 5/5 stars
​Connor rates it: 5/5 stars

Slasher Girls & Monster Boys, by April Genevieve Tucholke (ed.)
Basia rates it: 3.75(-ish?)/5
 
When a book has a title like Slasher Girls & Monster Boys, it's a book you know I'll be picking up. This isn't a novel; it's an anthology of short stories featuring, well, slasher girls and monster boys, to be concise. I was intrigued by this concept, and it struck me as something I might enjoy for the same reason I enjoy Brenna Yovanoff stories: she has a habit of including dangerous boys pitted against even more dangerous girls, and I am all about a good story with an ambitious and/or dangerous woman. 

Like any anthology, some of these stories fell a little flat for me; I kept waiting for something more, some big aha, that never came, whereas others had me fist-pumping in my seat on the plane. It's a trial-and-error sort of book, as most anthologies are, but if you're interested in stories featuring leading ladies, strange circumstances, and dark overtones, I'd suggest picking it up and giving at least one of the stories a try. I'm almost positive there's something for you in it.

​Places No One Knows by Brenna Yovanoff
​Basia rates it: 4.5/5

Maggie Stiefvater said she wasn't sure if this book was "a dream wrapped in razor wire or razor wire wrapped in dream." The beautiful thing about this book is that it's both​. It is a book about people who feel too much and people who feel too little, how to navigate feelings or unfeeling in a world where we're constantly fed expectations of our emotional responses to situations.

All of Brenna's books have a dreamy sort of quality to them, but this one especially. It creates an interesting juxtaposition of dream versus reality--when the thing you're "dreaming" feels like the more tangible, more real space and your reality is the waking dream. This isn't a book for everyone (Brenna's books seldom are), but for those it speaks to, it will practically shout​. It's a story of expectation versus reality, of self-identity, of the difference between the self that you project and the one that you are on the inside. This book is raw and strange, but it is so powerfully honest​​​. There's something here for everyone to connect to, whether you're a Marshall, a Waverly, or someone somewhere in between.

Sunshine, by Robin McKinley
Basia rates it: 5/5
Connor rates it: 5/5
W(REC)'D: FIERY ELMO DOT GIF

​To be honest, the title says it all.

There's not much we can say about this that hasn't been said already by those wiser and more articulate than we (e.g. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie herself), but to put it briefly: we should all be feminists. This isn't about wanting money (although equal pay is important--and let's not gloss over the fact that the disparity is greater for women of color than it is for white women. That's important). It's not about wanting more women in politics, or in science, or nominated for Oscars, or running corporations. 

At least, it's not entirely about that.

This is about opportunity. This is about attitude. It's about working together to re-shape society into a place that welcomes and encourages and supports those of us who aren't white men. It's about creating an environment in which a woman who wants to stay at home with their kids and a woman who wants to work full time are both given dignity and respect for their choices: a space where expectations are not defined by gender. 

It is, as Adichie says, a reminder that culture does not make people. People make culture. And we must--we can, we should, we must--do better.

The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry, by Gabrielle Zevin
Connor rates it: 4.5/5