Booktube Prize Quarterfinals: Nonfiction Group D [ CC] 

Wifedom sounds so good, and I love that bold cover choice 😍

I enjoyed your thoughts on all of these but particularly on Lumumba and the Wager.

Those trolling letters in Flee North sound so satisfying!

Melissa, I was a judge for this section too! So happy to see your video and rankings. I was very close to your list, some in different orders. I found that my last place book, The Dictionary People was the easiest to place. Your points for all of these were excellent. Dictionary People was ultimately somewhat interesting in the moment but largely forgettable. I appreciated the effort the author took in researching it but it was mostly a miss for me. Also in my bottom half were The Lumumba Plot and The Wager. I agree with your assessment of both though, and honestly it was tough to decide between the number 4 and number 3 spots. My top three were We Were Once A Family, Flee North, and Wifedom. Wifedom is the book that surprised me the most as far as content and achieving its goal. I agree that I hadn’t really ever thought about it so it was incredible to realize the Orwell wasn’t the best husband anyway and then even the idea for 1984 came from a poem she had written earlier. It makes you wonder how much of some of the classic authors married women who were instrumental in their success. Thanks for the video! Are you judging the semifinal round? I did rounds 1 and 2, so taking a break.

The Wager isn’t my typical book either but I loved it. So tremendously readable!

It was fun to hear your thoughts. I skipped this round, but it happens that I’ve read three books from this group. I agree that The Dictionary People is a good book, but not extraordinary. I also agree that The Wager is super interesting even for someone who doesn’t care about ship wrecks or naval stories. Where we differ is on Wifedom. I read it for the first round. It reads super well, the author makes good points, but there were things that really got on my nerves, enough to supersede the good points. I ranked it second to last in my group, but I am not surprised it is moving on.

I really enjoyed your reviews! I’ve never heard of We Were a Family but remember the tragedy. I think I’ll check that one out.