The ‘Un-put-down-able’ books I’ve read recently.

Lately, I have not been giving myself time to read. ‘Slump’ isn’t exactly the right word – there are still books that I want to read, and I have been making fairly steady process on those books. It is simply a matter of what time I have – my life has been busy, and I have other things to do, most of which I feel are more ‘productive’ than reading. At these times, for me, it can often feel like a waste of time to do anything other than what I need to do, so anytime I sit down to read a book, I feel like I should be doing work instead.

That being said, there are some books that you just can’t put down. Regardless of how much work you have, you just need to get back to reading that book, and finishing it as fast as you can. I’ve had several of those experiences in the past few months, and today I wanted to share with you the books that I couldn’t stop reading, despite my busy schedule.

You Don’t Have a Shot, by Racquel Marie

If you’ve been on my blog for more than two posts, you have probably heard something about how I hate reading romance books. I just think that there are far too many of them, and I don’t enjoy reading them in general. And yet, there are just some romance books that I can’t stay away from.

The main pull of You Don’t Have a Shot was primarily the banter. This was a romcom at its finest – there were so many parts that I just couldn’t help but laugh at, and the book itself was just such a joy to read. Not only was the banter top-notch, though, but the slow burn romance was probably the best that I have ever read. The reason I found this book un-put-down-able was truly because I couldn’t wait to see when the two characters would get together – it all felt so close, but just out of reach.

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Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World by Benjamin Alire Sáenz

Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World was a shock for me. I’d read the first book in the duology several years ago and it didn’t really resonate with me – Ari’s personality didn’t really come through, and the book felt very emotionless. I wasn’t expecting to like this one any more, but picked it up on a whim when I didn’t want to read anything else.

The reason I really liked this book more, and I couldn’t put it down, was because of the friend group. In the first book, the only two characters are Ari and Dante, and I found that to be a little boring because they were just always together, and there was no one else. This book, however, saw Ari opening up to some of his friends and slowly forming this group of people who he could trust and confide in. Each of these characters and their own unique personalities made me want to see what they were going to do next.

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Imogen, Obviously, by Becky Albertalli

I’ve read a few of Becky Albertalli’s books before, but haven’t enjoyed any of them nearly as much as I liked Imogen, Obviously. I picked this one up after finding it in my house mysteriously (aka my mom randomly got it from the library), and I literally did not put it down until I was finished.

I liked this book in ways similar to the other two – the characters and their friend group was amazing. I also loved the text conversations happening in this book – I’m not sure why, but I really like reading texts within books. Similar to You Don’t Have a Shot, this was a slow burn which kept me rooting for the characters the whole book.

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Icebreaker, by A.L. Grazadei

I have wanted to read Icebreaker ever since I heard about it in 2021, before it was published. I’ll pick up nearly any book about sports, and especially a queer one. This one is a bit of an outlier on this book, mainly because I actually didn’t enjoy it as much as I was expecting to, and yet I still sped through it and couldn’t put it down.

The main reason I didn’t enjoy Icebreaker as much as I was expecting is that it felt like it moved too fast and so I didn’t get to see the romance develop as much as I would have liked to. Moreover, once the characters got together there still wasn’t many scenes involving them actually being in a relationship, something that was confusing given that it was a romance book. Regardless, all the side characters (especially Mickey’s sisters!!) were amazing and I loved the integration of sports, especially college sports, into the book!!

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Love Letters For Joy, by Melissa See

Another one that materialized in my house one day, I was not expecting to get much from this one. The MC is asexual, which I’m always glad to see, but it was primarily a romance, so once again I wasn’t sure what I was going to get from it.

Love Letters For Joy, however, manages to perfectly blend important discussions about love and identity, a slow burn romance, and amazing friends (plus some not so great ones). I loved the disabled, queer representation in this book, and I also loved Nathaniel’s relationship with his siblings. Plus, the email exchanges were super fun to read!

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Last Violent Call, by Chloe Gong

The one non-contemporary book on this list, Last Violent Call was such a joy to pick up. You’ll have to read Chloe Gong’s other books before you get to this one – it centers around characters from These Violent Delights, while focusing on issues happening in Foul Lady Fortune – but these two novellas were really fun to read in the wait before Foul Heart Huntsman comes out.

Chloe Gong has this amazing ability to make such fantastic, engaging plot lines, while continuing to allow her characters to shine brightly. It seems like most fantasy books I read are centered around the plots, and while Gong’s books are no different, her characters still shine so strong. That’s why reading these novellas, whose plots I felt weren’t as powerful as those of her other books, was still so fun – I got to see all the old characters I had missed from TVD.

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What books have you read recently that you haven’t been able to put down? Have you read any of these books? Let me know in the comments!