I'm really enjoying watching these rankings..everyone's lists are so different! I also really loved North Woods! I'm a little iffy with "experimental form" novels, but this one really worked for me.
North Woods just worked so well, it was both simply a great example of the thing it was trying to do AND an entertaining read, that's about as good as it gets.
Every time I hear about Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, I think it sounds like not a book for me. Wellness sounds the same. Glad you found some enjoyable books from the list! Tom Lake sounds good to me - cozy vibes are where it's at.
I could see you getting along with AJ Fikry possibly better than I did, but Tomorrowx3 seems likely you would find it very frustrating. Tom lake definitely explores a few heavier topics with a light touch, so for me it really fit what I imagine as a litfic version of cozy and would like to see more, also absolutely that audiobook *chefkiss* spoiler for wellness Wellness throws the whole kitchen sink of modern issues and struggles at us, with these unlikeable characters who have so grown apart, inhabit the same space but don't even know each other anymore. Then over the course of the latter half their backstories build to learning they had these horrible upbringings, and what do you know, they realize hey we're actually products of a lot of past trauma who would have thought. Then magically they get over everything and be happy. I was so mad.
Great reviews! I was curious about all of these, but haven’t read any. I did try to get into Tom Lake, but I just wasn’t in the mood for lit fic at the time (despite Meryl Streep lol) so I ended up DNFing after the first chapter. It was totally just a mood thing and maybe I’ll get back to it someday. I’ll put North Woods on my list! I really enjoyed your thoughts on each book. :)
I think of these Tom Lake and The Rachel Incident both had so little going for plot, you definitely have to have the confluence of both right mood and enjoying the characters, otherwise it won't work! So probably the right choice for you to set it aside at the time.
I felt very similarly about Tom Lake earlier this year! It was a solid, good time and very well written, I thought. I am very interested in The Rachel Incident because I read Caroline O’Donoghue’s young adult trilogy earlier this year and absolutely loved it
Awesome to hear it was good, I immediately checked what else she had written and was interested in trying O'Donoghue's previous books, but was hoping it wasn't more simplistic for being YA.
@@ReadBecca that makes total sense. Yeah, I think she has written some of the best recent YA fantasy that I have read, so I would definitely recommend it
I am really excited to get to North Woods! I have been on hold for it for a while. People say not to judge a book based on it's cover and I hope that holds true for this one. For some reason I really dislike the cover of the book 😅
Hah! I don't hate it, but I too find the cover somehow unsettling for some reason. "catamounts" do come up throughout so it is referential, though I'm not too sure of their real importance either.
I'm starting to think that every book over 400 pages should be passed to a really strenuous editor. I liked Wellness more than I expected but it was toooo long. I also loved North Woods. I would have placed either that or Tom Lake at the top.
Yes! We need an editing standard for prize entry 🤣 I felt like so many people loved North Woods, so I was surprised it was not near the top at least! BTP is always a ride.
Oh no! I have high hopes for Wellness and The Bee Sting. I'm now interested in The Rachel Incident. I hope the audiobook is good. North Woods was my first place when I judged. I loathed Tom Lake and dnfed it about 40%. ( I picked it up on my own. Not for a booktube prize.) I felt like the mother was romanticizing the pandemic, grossly unaware of her privilege. And there was no conflict. Not even Meryl Streep could save it.
Loads of people have loved Wellness/Bee Sting, so don't go by my thoughts necessarily... but I would say if you start and don't get along with the writing, it probably won't improve, so don't force thru 600 pages!!! I agree about Tom Lake, but for me that was the character rather than author perspective I mentioned, where she is a very clearly defined sort of person ideologically.... but spoilers In the end we learn a couple things about her story from her internal monologue that she specifically excluded from what she told her daughters, including having an abortion, and yet she still reinforces to herself she is that person she upholds internally still. I think it didn't get heavy about that element, but I think it was smartly demonstrating living right along with someone and not really knowing them, as well as the idea of people who you'd never know have lived one way while presenting themselves outwardly differently without seeing any inconsistency to that (or the value in the openness they could have).
Both Bee Sting and Wellness both felt unnecessarily long didn't they? Whereas North Woods justified its page count. Two of my top three match yours. We disagree on The Rachel Incident though. I thought it was charming but forgettable.
I'm definitely biased toward brevity and a strong editor, Bee Sting and Wellness absolutely felt they could have achieved their goals with much less verbosity. I do think Rachel incident may be very influenced by reading mood, so if I read it at another time it may not have worked as well, but when it hit it was really a strong connection for me.
@@ReadBecca timing does affect our experience. I'm sometimes rereading books now that I read forty years ago and having wildly different experiences of some.
Did all of your top three not make medalists? That is so odd. I have heard great things about North Woods, but I dnf'd it. Just not my kind of story. But, to be honest, I'm not sure any of the finalists were my kind of book.
Yep, In typical fashion, my picks were least popular! 😅 Tom Lake would be most likely to work for you, in my opinion, but even then I really doubt you'd love it the way most seem to. I very much think the struggle and overwhelm of modern life was the big theme of the year, but that made for very contemporary and maximalist feeling stories.
