The Monthly Line: November 2024

Happy five years to Line by Caroline

Good evening dear reader,

I hope this missive finds you well, and you haven’t been blown away by Storm Darragh. Darragh is quite a good name for a storm I think, it has a certain amount of menace to it.

This month’s reads have very little menace. They are almost entirely comfort reads. For a multitude of reasons, I found November quite stressful, so I read four books I’ve read before, and two others which were the reading equivalent of a warm bath. I don’t actually like having a bath so having a literary version of that feeling is quite important for my wellbeing. If you would like some cosy reads to add to your list, then let’s dive in.

One to Four. Uprooted and The Scholomance Trilogy by Naomi Novik

Unsurprisingly, Novik is where I turn to when I need to be transported away from my current situation, but in a very safe way that means I know exactly what’s going to happen and It Will All Be OK In The End. I continue to find much solace in these (very different) versions of magical worlds, where a rot has set in and our intrepid heroine has to root it out. I continue to really enjoy Novik’s worldbuilding style, which keeps you up to date as you go along, rather than throwing three chapters of exposition at you right at the beginning. If you like books about magic, but haven’t tried these yet, then do give them a go. (I entirely understand that there are many people who do not like magic books, it’s OK, you get a pass).
How I read them: Gobbled up as fast as I could go over the course of a week

Five and Six. A Single Thread of Moonlight and A Sky Painted Gold by Laura Wood

I’m becoming a Laura Wood completist; I’ve now read four of her books in as many months. They are a delightful place to escape to - where the most important thing is finding the right dress to wear for a fancy party, and particularly in Sky, there were a lot of parties. There are a lot of details about clothing in these novels actually, which I really appreciate as someone who pored over Vogue when they were a teenager and used to be fairly handy with a sewing machine. Moonlight is a rewrite of Cinderella and hits the very satisfying beats of that story while updating it with a bit more nuance, while Sky is a classic coming of age in the countryside and feeling the lure of the big city. Both are entirely fanciful, and places where nothing bad ever really happens - which sometimes is exactly the place you want to live in for a while.
How I read them: Both very quickly, and one with a sick toddler sleeping on my chest

Seven. I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman

Originally published in 1995, this slim dystopian novel seems to be having a renaissance, with a re-release recently. It’s narrated by a woman who grew up in an underground bunker with 39 other women. She was just a child when they were put there and so remembers nothing else, but the others were all adults. They’re surrounded by guards at all times, and aren’t allowed to touch each other. They have no idea why or how they got there. It’s about as bleak as you can get, as their escape, when it comes, also doesn’t lead them anywhere. But it’s also fascinating as you get to be inside her mind as she grapples with what it means to be human, to be free, to be alive. I was gripped by it.
How I read it: At bedtime, savouring the strangeness

Eight. Just for the Summer by Abby Jimenez

I thought this was going to be a cute romance novel and was not prepared for the TRAUMA. Don’t get me wrong, there is still a cute romance in there, but both main characters are really going through some stuff and it unexpectedly all hit me pretty hard. Still, I thought it was a well-crafted ‘will-they, won’t-they’ story, with a great set up, and it was nice to read a romance with a bit more heft than the average, especially after some of the total lightweights I’ve read this year.
How I read it: In bed, trying not to cry

Book of the month: A bit of a weird reading month but I think I’ll go for I Who Have Never Known Men for being unlike anything else I’ve read.

And that’s it for this slightly odd collection, I hope you’ve enjoyed hearing about them. As ever, thank you for subscribing. It’s now been five years of this little newsletter, which I faithfully send out every month, and you faithfully read, so thank you for following along on my reading journey.

Have a lovely week, and I’ll see you very shortly with my best books of 2024!