Anxious People

Anxious People (2019) by Fredrik Backman, 336 pages.

Your palms are sweating; your heart is racing; you can't think straight. You are anxious. 
The bank robber stands in the apartment-for-sale--chest pounding, pistol in hand--and stares at the group of people ahead. These "hostages" include a young couple with a baby on the way, an older couple with a shared project, a banker with a haunting secret, an elderly woman, a real-estate agent, and a rabbit. Down on the street, assessing the situation, are two police officers working to diffuse this incident before backup from Stockholm arrives. Each of these people has plenty to be anxious about, even without the hostage situation. Each of these folks probably shares an anxiety with you. 

After reading My Friends--Fredrik Backman's most recent work, and loving it--I was excited to pick up this previous issue of his, and it did not disappoint. Anxious People shares many of the same themes as other Backman books, themes of loneliness and connection especially, and touches on some dark subject matter, such as suicide and addiction. Backman uses his characters to represent different anxieties that one might experience at different stages in life. He addresses the broken system in which we live but counteracts the hopelessness that it can cause with an call for community and connection. It can be a scary world, and sometimes the only way to get through is by reaching out. 

The (Most Unusual) Haunting of Edgar Lovejoy

The (Most Unusual) Haunting of Edgar Lovejoy by Roan Parrish, 384 pages

Since he was a teen, Edgar Lovejoy has seen ghosts, often when he's least expecting them. They terrify him, and it's made going to big public places really difficult, especially in a city with as much history as New Orleans. But when his coworkers do convince him to do a bit of socializing at a club, he's captivated by nonbinary burlesque performer Jamie. Jamie, who, when not dancing at the burlesque, is a horror connoisseur and full-time haunted house designer. Despite their vastly different feelings toward the supernatural, they can't deny their attraction to one another.

Jamie and Edgar make for an unusual pair, but somehow it works incredibly well. Jamie offers the strength and kindness that helps Edgar come to terms with his fears and anxieties, while Edgar is able to provide the supportive friends and family that Jamie deserves. My one quibble is that even though Edgar admits that he should probably see a therapist, the comment is pretty much tossed aside, as this relationship has fixed all his anxieties. I love to see people grow in romance novels as individuals, not just as co-dependent friends/lovers, and by implying that this relationship fixes everything, it makes me as a reader doubt the longevity. However, that doesn't detract from a lovely story, perfect for reading during spooky season.

Work It Out

 Work It Out: A Mood-Boosting Exercise Guide for People Who Just Want to Lie Down by Sarah Kurchak, 208 pages.

This mental health-focused exercise guide for the absolute beginner is aimed mostly at people with mental health struggles, but it's modular piece-by-piece approach would be very helpful to anyone facing barriers to exercise for any reason. More than that, Kurchak's extremely sympathetic and honest book makes it feel possible to try, even if exercise has seemed insurmountable in the past. This book is funny, actionable, and very thorough about presenting choices (as well as the pros and cons of why some options may be better choices for some people). It's very creative in coming up with possibilities that are fun, practical, and approachable. It also includes flailing your arms in despair for a few minutes as an option for a basic way to get moving when everything else feels impossible, which I think really sets the tone for the book.

This is a very approachable, kind guide to exercise for people with no idea where to start, and I'm definitely planning on getting my own copy. 

Everything Anxiety Ever Told You is a Lie

Everything Anxiety Ever Told You is a Lie by Dr. Toni Lindsay (2024) 167 pages

In a book geared towards young adults, Toni Lindsay gives strategies for managing anxiety. She makes a case that the more we give in to anxiety and avoid activities that make us uncomfortable, the harder it is to keep it from dictating our lives. On the other hand, the more we learn to confront our anxiety and then learn not to focus on it, the better off we are.

I think this book would be helpful for people of any age.

The Prospects

The Prospects by KT Hoffman, 366 pages

In his third year playing for a minor league baseball team, Gene Ionescu is the first openly trans player in professional baseball. He's a well-regarded solid shortstop, so imagine his surprise when his team brings in Luis Estrada, a former teammate and now rival, to take over at short, shifting Gene over to second base. While the two initially can't stand to be around each other, eventually they realize that they're going to have to start communicating and working together if they're ever going to escape errors and finally turn a double play. But as they start working together, Gene and Luis realize that something more than friendship is developing between them.

This combo of enemies-to-lovers and second-chance romance works well between the two main characters, both of whom struggle with their place in baseball — Gene for the understandable challenges that come with being trans, Luis with a double whammy of debilitating anxiety and living as a closeted gay man. I love that they find solace in each other, no matter how awkwardly it plays out in the beginning stages. While the hyper-realistic baseball talk sometimes clashed in my head with the absolute fantasyland of an LGBTQ-friendly MLB, at the end of the day, it's nice to see a trans character thriving and finding love in fiction. Fans of Check, Please! will dig this one.

Honey Girl

 Honey Girl by Morgan Rogers, 241 pages

Grace Porter has just spent a decade driving herself to burnout to earn her PhD in astronomy, only to find (disappointingly, but not surprisingly) that the job she was supposed to have guaranteed had little space for all of her as a queer woman of color. So, reeling from the sudden lack of driving force in her life, her and her friends go to Vegas and she gets drunk married to a woman she has just met. Then, months later and still struggling with burnout, her family's expectations, and her own deteriorating mental health, she decides to spend the summer in New York getting to know her new wife, Yuki.

This book was not at all what I expected. I think there's an expectation when I see "romance novel" that I'll be getting into a romantic comedy, which was really furthered by the fact that we started off with the premise of getting drunk married in Vegas. But that's not at all what this was. It was honestly hardly a romance novel, and more a novel about aching loneliness and the crushing weight of both other people's expectations and your own. It's also part of a relatively small genre I'm realizing I enjoy which I've been thinking of as "coming of age novels for adults," which explore the space of aimlessness and emptiness that can happen after graduation (Portrait of a Thief is another good example). This novel is sad and beautiful and entirely unexpected, and I really enjoyed it.

Kiss Her Once For Me

 Kiss Her Once For Me by Allison Cochrun, 351 pages.

Despite recommending this book to her, Kara got around to writing about this one before me, and she did a great job so I'm going to link her review here instead of summarizing again. 

I liked this book a whole lot! I love "marriage of convenience" as a plot point, and this whole book is very cozy and fun. It also has moments where characters make decisions so bad I had to put down the book and walk away for a minute, which tend to have very predictable results. But! I do really like the characters, and even side characters have the power to carry the book. Also, I didn't know about Ellie's demisexuality going into this book, so it was a real surprise treat to see more identities under the asexual umbrella represented. I would definitely recommend this book as a nice and cozy winter romance.

 

Kiss Her Once for Me

Kiss Her Once for Me by Alison Cochrun, 351 pages

Last Christmas, Ellie was crying on the floor of Powell's Books when she met a woman with whom she immediately fell in love with. Literally — they spent 15 hours together and then they slept together (a HUGE deal for Ellie, who, as a demisexual, normally takes a LONG time to first trust and respect someone before finding them sexually attractive). And then as quick as it started, it ended. Almost a full year later, Ellie is struggling with a dead-end job and a week away from eviction when handsome real estate heir Andrew drunkenly suggests a marriage of convenience: he gets access to a $2 million trust while Ellie gets 10 percent to help get her on her feet. All they have to do is tie the knot, stay married for a bit, and then divorce — oh, and spend a week at Andrew's family's cabin at Christmas. Despite her reservations, Ellie agrees, only to learn that Andrew's sister is the woman from the year before, and what do you know, they still have some SERIOUS feelings for each other.

OK, so it's kind of a convoluted plot, with a whole bunch of tropes shoved in (there's even a "there's only one bed!" situation at one point), and WAY too much Christmas music for my grinchy heart... but it's a sweet and funny book, and an homage to While You Were Sleeping (probably my favorite romantic comedy ever), and I totally loved it. My one complaint is that Ellie's beautifully described web comics appear here as text. I get the complications of having interstitial comics in a romance novel, but man, that would have made this really good book great.

Everyone in this room will someday be dead

 

Everyone in this room will someday be dead / Emily Austin, read by Emily Tremaine 243 pgs. 

Gilda is a 20 something lesbian who is fixated on death.  She has a hard time living day-to-day and gets fired from her job.  Obviously she needs some help with this issue but is sometimes too sad to see it.  She answers an ad and gets hired at a Catholic church...oh yea, she is also an atheist so that is a great match.  She is replacing a woman who died.  When questions come up about the circumstances of the death, Gilda is now a depressed, atheist, lesbian who is investigating the death of her predecessor.  Does this all sound depressing to you?  Oddly, it really isn't. It turns out to be kind of fun. The audio was very well done by Emily Tremaine.

The Charm Offensive

The Charm Offensive by Alison Cochrun, 358 pages

For the last six years, Dev has been a producer/handler on the Bachelor-esque dating show, Ever After, helping craft compelling storylines of women finding their "prince" on national TV. This year, the prince is tech millionaire Charlie Winshaw, who is gorgeous and dashing...but awkward as all-get-out. Dev, however, has dealt with enough awkwardness to help Charlie work through his issues, and is soon assigned to be exclusively in charge of the show's male lead, assisting him through the masses of cutthroat women vying for his love. But as the season progresses, both Charlie and Dev start to realize they're falling for each other, which is not at all what Ever After's conservative producer wants to see on TV. Is there any way forward for them?

Oh my goodness, this is a wonderful book. It's sweet and kind and handles the complexities of sexual identity and mental health issues with so much care. It's refreshing and amazing, and I'm going to be recommending this to everyone. It's one of my favorites of the year.

Honey Girl

Honey Girl by Morgan Rogers, 293 pages

Grace Porter is 28 years old and has just received her doctorate in astronomy. For the past 11 years, she's been working hard for this degree, and is ready to enter the world of non-stop research and publishing. Except that her first interview goes disastrously and her graduation celebration trip to Las Vegas lands her with the last thing she was planning on: a wife whose name she doesn't remember. No matter what she does, Grace is losing control of her carefully planned life, and is also coming apart at the seams. 

For a book that starts with a very fictional premise (how many bad movies start with a drunken Las Vegas wedding?), it handles the complexities of mental health and big life changes very well. There were a few things that didn't entirely make sense to me (like the whole idea of holding sacred vows that you can't remember making to someone you'd never met before; why not just annul?), but on the whole, I enjoyed reading this book. Sometimes it was a bit too real, particularly regarding Grace's anxiety and lack of family communication, but that's just something I'll have to deal with in my own therapy sessions. I'm looking forward to seeing what Rogers comes up with next.

The Other Passenger

The Other Passenger by Louise Candlish, 388 pages

It's December 27 and Jamie is on his way to work at a cafe when two police officers stop him. His friend Kit has been missing since the 23rd, and they suspect Jamie may have been involved. Told in alternating present day and "one year earlier" chapters, Jamie weaves a story of deception, drug addiction, infidelity, and anxiety that he swears proves his innocence...until it doesn't. There are so many twists and turns in this thriller that I'm still trying to process how Jamie got himself into this predicament, and how he ended up where he did. A propulsive story, perfect for fans of thrillers where all the characters are suspect.

Turtles All the Way Down

 Turtles All the Way Down by John Green, 286 pages.

This book centers on Aza Holmes, a teenager struggling with OCD and anxiety. Aza's life gets more exciting when local Indianapolis billionaire Russel Pickett disappears in an attempt to evade arrest and a huge reward is offered for information that would lead to his arrest. So Aza and best-friend Daisy Ramirez go seeking the reward, which leads them to Davis, the missing billionaire's son and Aza's old friend from "sad camp" a summer camp for kid's with dead parents. Despite that plot, this book is really less a mystery and more an exploration of Aza's relationships with her friends and herself.  

I find it a little hard to rate this book. I thought it was good and interesting, but I had a hard time finishing it. We spend a whole lot of time in Aza's head, and it is not a very comfortable place to be. That being said, I found this book extremely honest and it is very obvious that Green is writing about problems that he personally deals with. All-in-all I would call this a worthwhile read, but be prepared for something heavy.

Take a Hint, Dani Brown

Take a Hint, Dani Brown by Talia Hibbert, 384 pages

PhD student Danika Brown has been burned by love in the past, so now she's only in for no-romance, no-strings-attached friends with benefits. When her students' phones capture her hunky friend Zafir Ansari rescuing her from a stalled elevator, Dani and Zaf are suddenly #couplegoals (despite the fact that there's no actual couple there) in viral video that brings new attention to Zaf's struggling non-profit organization.  The pair decides to fake a relationship until the buzz dies down, but given Zaf's romantic commitment to, well, commitment, will Dani be able to keep from catching feelings?

Oh, this was a delicious romance novel! I loved that the stereotypes were switched (Zaf's the romance reader, Dani's oblivious to anniversaries, etc) and in a way that still felt organic. It's steamy, it's funny, and it's very realistic. An awesome sophomore effort from Hibbert. Can't wait for the next book about a Brown sister!

Pretty as a Picture

Pretty As a Picture by Elizabeth Little, 338 pages

Movie editor Marissa is desperate for a job, so she doesn't say no to an opportunity to work with megalomaniac director Tony Rees, despite coming in halfway through filming and not seeing a script first... or even knowing where she's going to work on the movie. Soon, anxiety-ridden Marissa is spirited off to a small island off the coast of Delaware, the site of a decades-old murder that is the focus of Tony's passion project. But Marissa can't figure out why the previous editor left so quickly, or why nobody will talk to her. There's definitely something wrong, and it's doing nothing to help her nerves.

Full of movie references and behind-the-scenes tidbits, this is an exhilarating thriller with a very relatable protagonist. Her discomfort with people and particular locations (a watery cave, a creaking fire escape) definitely rang true in a way I've never seen in thrillers. Fantastic story, and a fun escape.

Girl Gone Viral

Girl Gone Viral by Alisha Rai, 384 pages

Katrina King has always suffered from anxiety and panic attacks, making getting out of the house difficult (even without heaps of emotional baggage that she acquired over the years). She's slowly making progress -- visiting her therapist at a cafe, taking short day trips, etc. -- though always with her strong, serious (and seriously sexy) bodyguard, Jasminder Singh, in tow. But when an innocuous trip to the cafe turns Katrina into a mysterious Twitter hashtag, her panic attacks return in full force, making Kat and Jas flee to a seemingly safer locale: Jas' family farm in northern California.

This is a sweet romance, full of kind people in a not-so-kind world. Kat and Jas both have their issues, none of which are completely solved by the end of the book. But that's OK. It makes it a bit more realistic, and gives a story that could easily swerve into COMPLETELY unbelievable some grounding. I enjoyed this book, and gobbled it up as quickly as Kat's friends eat her fabulous cooking.

Guts

Guts by Raina Telgemeier, 211 pages

When she was in fifth grade, Raina Telgemeier began experiencing upset stomachs any time someone was sick near her...or when she thought too much about certain types of food...or when she had to get up in front of her class for a presentation. Her parents took her to the doctor, but they couldn't find anything physically wrong with her — turns out that her upset stomach was a symptom of her anxiety, which she began to fight with the help of a therapist.

In her trademark approachable way, Telgemeier uses her own experiences to create a narrative that is familiar and relatable to everyone who has ever felt stressed out or afraid. She also normalizes therapy for kids, which is super awesome. Ms. Telgemeier, never stop doing the amazing things you do!

Monkey Mind

Monkey Mind: A Memoir of Anxiety by Daniel Smith, 212 pages

In his 2012 memoir, Smith offers a personal take on living with anxiety, describing how it feels to have an anxiety attack, how he's suffered, and how he's working through it today. It's an OK memoir in that it definitely gets the word out that there are others who have anxiety, but don't go here looking for inspiration on how to treat the condition. I enjoyed the humorous portions of the memoir, particularly his discussion of being a fact-checker at The Atlantic (a job he says is both uniquely suited and a horrible idea for sufferers of anxiety). However, at times, it felt a bit too cookie-cutter as memoirs go, and I wish it had been propped up with bit of research rather than personal comparisons to Kafka and Philip Roth.

Let's go (so we can get back)

Let's go (so we can get back): a memoir of recording and discording with Wilso, etc. / Jeff Tweedy, read by the author, 292 pgs.

Listen to this audio and hear a regular guy from Belleville tell you about his life, his family and the choices he made that led him to be one of the most respected song writers in the world.  Told with honesty and sincerity, Tweedy tells of his addiction problem, his band breakup problems and his desire to skip most casual social situations.  His wife and oldest son weigh in and I'm sure he would have also had his parents on the audio if they were still alive.  I have always admired the music, although it isn't my favorite style, but now I admire the person even more than what he has created. 

Alice Isn't Dead

Christa summarized the plot very well in her review of the book last week. Click this link to read her review. This book is based on a podcast by the same name. It follows the same plot but changes certain aspects to work better within a novel format. I am an avid fan of the podcast (and subsequent novels) Welcome to Night Vale and so was instantly hooked when the authors released the Alice Isn't Dead podcast.

I don't even know how to convey how much I adored this book. Its exploration of human nature, mental health, and the nature of relationships made me examine on my own experiences. It is a book that I am going to reflect upon for a long time.