AJ Dunn Reads

 In the Woods by Tana French In the Woods is a solid crime procedural novel about a Detective on the murder squad investigating a case of a murdered little girl and the personal stake he has in solving the crime. The characters are incredibly well fleshed out, with likeable personalities, even when they are being awful to one another. I was totally invested in the main mystery and liked how the investigation unfolded. I have to say, I knew who the killer was the second they hit the page, but I didn't know why they had done it. It was satisfying to learn the answers; the underhanded and manipulating psychopath involved was a delicious addition and really pushed the characters to their limits, which I liked. One thing I have to knock points off for for In the Woods is that the Detective Ryan past plot line wasn't resolved in a satisfying way for me. I would like to have seen some real answers to that case of his two missing friends. I was invested in his backstory and was disap...

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn  Wow! What a ride. Gone Girl is hands down one of my new favorite books. Fast paced, edge of your seat, page turner. Characters you love to hate and plot twists you never saw coming. Trope flipping. It has everything. And on top of all that, it is well-written, with biting, sharp, no holding back prose. Gillian Flynn hit a home run with this book. Amy Elliott-Dunne is missing and her husband quickly becomes public enemy number one in the case. Did he kill her? All signs point to "yes". BUT, that's not the whole story. Was Amy truly afraid for her life before she disappeared? Was she the victim of a cold, cheating liar of a husband? I so badly want to write the plot twist here because it was just so good, but in case someone happens to actually read this, and has not read the book or seen the movie, I don't want to give it away. It's the kind of twist you tell someone, "You have to read this book!" or "Wait till you get to...

  The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton One of my favorite book tropes is the adolescent or pre-adolescent boy with psychological or social trauma and self-discovery. Some of my favorite books involve this theme: Catcher in the Rye , I Know This Much is True , and The Perks of Being a Wallflower , to name a few. The Outsiders is another book that carries this theme, following Ponyboy Curtis and a gang of greasers in the mid-20th century. Ponyboy and his two brothers navigate a world of delinquency and violence, though the three of them are smart and savvy in there own ways. The greasers and the socs have turf wars and throughout the story Ponyboy discovers that even though the two groups are very different, they are both beset by there own problems, both societal and psychological, and that they can be taken down by the prejudices of their respective social groups. After a tragic incident involving Ponyboy, his friend Johnny, and two socs, Ponyboy and Johnny go on the run to escape a murde...

  Night Shift by Stephen King Night Shift is Stephen King's first short story collection. Among the many other books I read I am working my way through Stephen King's catalog in order of publication date. Mainly in an attempt to see how his writing evolved over time. Even though I've read many of his books (and I've read this one before), I decided to start from the beginning and read them in order, even if I've read some of them already. So, before this one came Carrie , 'Salem's Lot , and The Shining . All of them were very good. 'Salem's Lot was the only one up to that point that actually gave me the physical creeps. Night Shift contains some top-notch stories, including "Children of the Corn," "Jerusalem's Lot," "The Boogeyman," and "Sometimes They Come Back." "Children of the Corn" gave me legitimate shivers. For a horror writer, mainly, I think that is the best compliment I could give Kin...

  Summerlings by Lisa Howorth Summerlings follows John, Ivan, Max, and Beatriz as they navigate youth in 1950s Washington, DC during the summer of a mysterious spider epidemic.  What to say about this book? First, I think it would have worked better as a novel for middle graders. It read young throughout most of the book, until about the climax point where it takes a decidedly adult turn. The kids engage in age-inappropriate acts that seem to enable a tragedy to occur, resulting in the death of one of the adults whom they all admire. While I was reading through most of the book I kept waiting for something to actually happen. Many, if not most, of the events that occur were unnecessary to the climax of the book. It could have easily been boiled down to a chapter book for 10-year olds. I liked the characters, but as a novel for adults, it didn't hold up. The blurb on the back cover didn't deliver on the adult themes I was expecting. It didn't lie, exactly, but the book was ...

  Gilead by Marilynne Robinson What a beautifully written novel. The language in this book is possibly the most tender I have ever read. Reverend John Ames, a 77 year old Congregationalist pastor in the 1950s small fictional town of Gilead, Iowa, is dying and he is leaving behind a memoir to his son who is just seven years old and to his young wife. Ames recounts episodes in his life that have shaped him, especially those involving his father, grandfather, and his good friend Reverand Boughton, whose son Jack returns to Gilead and rekindles the somewhat adversarial relationship he had with Ames (his Godfather, for whom he was named). Ames struggles with his own theological understandings, especially where Jack is concerned, among other things. This book is filled with moments of beauty we should all recognize in everyday life; moments Ames finds awe in and hopes that his son will come to understand and appreciate as he grows. It is a reflective novel on a life lived mostly in solit...

The Bright Lands by John Fram John Fram's The Bright Lands is a strong debut of a queer thriller set in Texas. The story is told in multiple points of view (maybe too many??) and centers around the disappearance and murder of a high school football player in a small town hiding insidious secrets. A paranormal undercurrent grips the town, connecting them through their nightmares. It is haunting and sexy, and decidedly queer. This was a great page turner, as every good thriller should be. With a large cast of characters and multiple points of view, the reader is bombarded with personalities--some likeable, some we like to hate--that take us through the mystery. It's nice to read queer characters that have personalities outside of their queerness, though sex and sexuality play a large role in this story. Usually sex is not my cup of tea in anything I read, but here it works and is elemental to the story. The climax to The Bright Lands is a well-choreographed dance from viewpoint t...

  The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead   The Nickel Boys follows an intelligent young African American boy named Elwood Curtis in the 1960s who was bound for university, but instead is sent to the Nickel Academy after being falsely accused of a crime. His stay at the reformatory is marked by violence, enacted towards him and the other boys living there. Elwood befriends another inmate named Jack Turner who gives him the idea for escape. The two flee together, but only one makes it to freedom alive. The Nickel Academy is based on a real historical location, a reform school with allegations of beatings, rape, torture, and murder of its "students." Over 50 graves have been found on its premises, and a forensic investigation of the site continues. Whitehead's book won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2020. I liked the story, but I'm not sure why exactly it won a Pulitzer. Though I've read the judges' reasons, the book didn't really do it for me on that level. ...