The Short Stack July, or the First Anniversary

This marks the one year anniversary of the Short Stack! It started last August over on the UT iSchool's Student Portal and now I've migrated all my posts over here. I'm very happy that this made it to one year!

This Short Stack does not include any of the books I finished during the 24 in 48 Readathon, so you can hop over to this post to see what else I've been up to this past month. I've been very busy reading. Mostly books with secrets, for some reason. Until I started writing about my favorites from July, I hadn't noticed the pattern of ladies with secrets. Now though...sigh. Time to branch out. Send me some recommendations!

The Very Secretive July Short Stack:

1. The Lying Game by Ruth Ware
Another excellent mystery from Ruth Ware. I was impressed with her last novel, The Woman in Cabin 10, and my inability to guess the finale, which was not at all out of left field, so I snagged this one as soon as I could. The Lying Game is told in two time periods, when a group of four friends were at boarding school and over a decade later when their childhood secrets start to unravel. It starts with a dog finding a human bone in the sand and a text message that pulls all four back together. They clearly had something to do with it, but what it was and why is slowly pieced out through the novel. From girls who told lies for fun and points to women who must deal with their past, Ruth Ware writes believable, flawed female characters who have all tried to hide their secrets. Now everything might be exposed.

2. Eliza & Her Monsters by Francesca Zappia
Imagine that you are JK Rowling and everyone around you is reading your works and writing fanfiction about it and tattooing quotes on their body. Just generally freaking out, peak Harry Potter-mania. Except now JK Rowling is a high school student and has somehow remained anonymous, except for her parents who just think what she does is sort of cute. That is Eliza Mirk's life. That is, until a new guy transfers to her school. He's a huge fan of the comic Monstrous Sea and thinks he's found a kindred, and very cute, spirit to talk to about it. Except she doesn't know how to tell him that it's her comic. As he pulls Eliza into the real world, she's introduced more and more to her fandom, including one of her biggest fans/fanfiction writers. She's not ready to share her secret, but it seems that it's on the verge of slipping out anyway.

3. Saints & Misfits by S. K. Ali
What do you do if a devout Muslim boy sexually assaults you at a party? He's your best friend's relative and everyone thinks he's great. Plus, you don't want anyone to think that it has anything to do with Islam, because it doesn't, but people will absolutely think that. You keep a secret, despite seeing him at community events. Despite him telling people that you're an item. Despite everything because no one will believe you. Janna keeps it a secret, not telling her mother, her brother, her uncle who is an imam, or any of her friends. But it's not easy to keep a secret that makes you flinch and hide and avoid a specific someone. Eventually, someone will notice.

It seems like every lady has a secret. What's mine? I'll never tell. xoxo, Gossip Girl. (Or just me, signing off until next time).