My most recent read was The River is Waiting by Wally Lamb.

It was my 38th book this year and only my 3rd 5 stars. I finished it this morning, it’s now the evening, and I can’t stop thinking about it.

I was enthralled by this story - it had sat on my TBR for a few months and I finally picked it up as just a lucky dip after being in a bit of reading slump.

After finishing, I saw a lot of criticism on Goodreads about the narrator Corby being “unlikeable”. I see this criticism a lot with other books - and I’ve never quite understood.

For me, a good reading experience is a complicated, flawed, or at least a character who is thought-provoking. Given one of the main themes of The River is Waiting being redemption, and finding out very early on that Corby accidentally kills his son while intoxicated, surely the reader wouldn’t expect the MC to be a “hero?”

There were times while I was reading that I thought “oh yeah he’s kind of a douche”, I’ve thought this about other MCs as well before, but it would never impact negatively on my rating as long as the story itself was enjoyable.

Would love to have a discussion below! And I’d really recommend this book if you can handle a gut-punch ending!

I have seen many Reddit posts where readers have posited that the behavior of MC Nattie of Yesteryear was due to postpartum depression or a psychotic break. To me, that seems that posters use this to excuse her behavior and possibly makes her a sympathetic figure. I considered her an unlikable character with no justification for her actions.

My take away was that Nattie’s extreme behavior is that of a malignant narcissist from the very beginning, in her individual life as well as in family life. The world needed to bend to her will throughout the book and every time she screwed up pre- or post-tradwife she just doubled down. This made the ending where she is tried and given a sentence of decades for child abuse very believable to me. The character’s flaw was she was simply unable to see and process how her decisions affected anyone but herself, the textbook definition of narcissism.

I am loaning my copy of the book to my therapist after she indicated interest. It will be interesting to hear her analysis as a medical professional.

I’m interested to hear other’s perspectives on Nattie’s mental health or lack of it.

Edit: I greatly enjoy unreliable narrators, particularly unlikable ones. To me, Nattie seemed to be a perfectly consistent character, whether one views her as mentally unhealthy or simply a flawed personality, and her viewpoint increased the book’s overall effectiveness.

I've been getting into the Fantasy genre as of late and this is my second book in the genre after Jeniffer Fallon's The Immortal Prince. As you may know it was acclaimed and popular so I was pretty hyped. I already knew it would be a slower burn compared to Fallon's book due to other reviews, but I didn't mind as I thought that would mean a better pay off.

I'll start by saying Rothfuss's writing style made for an enjoyable read throughout the entire book. I loved Kvothe's relationship with Abenthy, as you could practically feel through the page just how grateful he was to have spent time with him. The massacre of Kvothe's troupe coupled with the appearance of the Chandrian hit like a ton of bricks. And while not what I was expecting, the Tarbean sequence proved to be my favorite part of the book.

The University sequence was fine, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little annoyed with the fact that the Kvothe's search for the Chandrian got derailed by him getting banned from the archives. However, I guess you could chalk it up to Kvothe being an impatient, know-it-all, teenage dumbass who had the misfortune of having to go through an utter bastard, Ambrose, after drugging himself and getting whipped.

Problem is he keeps running into Denna over and over. And while I could get past the coincidences, their relationship with each other isn't really a highlight for me, because as a reader I don't find her all that compelling or interesting. Although, I did love their sequence together when Kvothe is investigating the wedding massacre.

Outside of that I kind of just rode through the rest of it expecting an ending that would leave me satisfied or get me hyped to read the sequel, but alas.

“Jackknife” by Joe Hill (The Shivers Collection #1) is the first book in this exclusive Amazon Original Series of horror short stories. I’m so glad they started this off with Hill because this is one hell of a way to start a collection.

In case you’re interested in “The Shivers Collection” and which authors are a part of it, here’s the entire collection…

Jackknife by Joe Hill (The Shivers Collection #1)
The Indigo Room by Stephen Graham Jones (The Shivers Collection #2)
The Blanks by Grady Hendrix (The Shivers Collection #3)
Night and Day in Misery by Catriona Ward (The Shivers Collection #4)
Letter Slot by Owen King (The Shivers Collection #5)

I love every author in this collection, and I can’t wait to complete it. Before I begin my review, here are all the trigger warnings I found while reading…

- Grooming teenagers (nothing graphic)
- Drugs
- Dead animals (very graphic involving a cat)
- Politics
- #MeToo movement
- Sexual abuse of minors
- Suicide

If any of these trigger you, please do not read this book. Moving along, I have to give credit to Hill, since I’ve never read a “tree horror” book as scary as this. I love his writing style, as it was great and over the top. It’s barely 46 pages, and my goodness, what a powerhouse of a freaky read.

The main character, Dennis, was someone I loathed. Hill’s character development of Dennis was surreal. I hated him and was hooked on what kind of karma was coming his way. I would never ruin a book for anyone, so no spoilers here, but this was fantastic from start to finish.

As always with Hill’s work, I enjoyed his references in this book. As a coffee lover, it was great to see Dunkin’ mentioned, and of course, The Lord of the Rings thanks to Ents. I love LOTR, but the tree horror found here was so wild, I made many weird faces while reading.

The backstory and insight in “Jackknife,” with its uniquely written tree horror, were compelling and felt like they could have easily been part of The Conjuring universe. This was a genuine page-turner that I couldn’t put down from the sheer horror of it all.

When it comes to the ending, this was on the level of Stephen King because I didn’t see that coming at all. I finished this book with a huge smile on my face, thanks to a beyond satisfying ending that has a “drop-the-mic” moment and proves why Hill is such a phenomenal author. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Get it? Tree? Tree horror? Okay, I’ll see myself out now.

I give “Jackknife” by Joe Hill (The Shivers Collection #1) a 5/5 for being one hell of a fun ride with a refreshing take on tree horror. Seriously, you’ll probably never want to look at a barren tree the same ever again after reading this short story. I’m so excited to dive into the rest of this collection.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, since I already found a jackknife, it’s time to go hang out in an indigo room.