I’m here for five more 2021 book reviews! This post, as usual, contains quite an eclectic selection, and the books vary widely from among my favorite to definitely NOT favorites!

As has happened a few times, I ran out of audiobooks to listen to for awhile and chose one of the Harlan Coben books off my mom’s Audible. I don’t know why I keep doing this, since I almost never like them!

Well, I take it back. I do know why. Because even though I really don’t like a lot of things about the stories and usually end the book feeling like it was a waste of my time, he’s an incredibly skilled writer at pulling you into the journey. So even though I’m inevitably disappointed at the endings, I do love that feeling of getting really sucked in for the ride!

This book in particular though I really did find difficult to get into. I found all the characters very unrelatable and the kinds of problems they encounter particularly uninteresting. I’ve liked some of his other books more — but this one I liked less.

This book is a long time favorite, but it had been years since I read it so of course I had to suggest it for my book club. I was excited when it was picked, and revisiting the story definitely did not disappoint.

Frank Peretti is one of my favorite authors, because I love reading suspense but usually find it so pointless (see Harlan Coben review above). Peretti, on the other hand, centers his stories on intriguing and powerful theological and supernatural concepts that make me think about myself in relation to God, the spiritual realm, and when it comes to this book in particular, sin and the effect it has on people and communities. It really was a scary and thought-provoking ride.

What can I say? It’s Sherlock Holmes. I’ve read these stories before — I don’t even remember how many times. But even though I remember all of the stories in this particular volume well, including the solutions to the problems, it’s still always so much fun to read.

And that’s honestly because, while many of the mysteries are intriguing, loving Sherlock Holmes isn’t really about the adventures or the plots themselves. It’s about the detective and his faithful associate, their relationship and their personalities, and the way they feel so real and so fantastic all at the same time. I’ll never get tired of going back to these classics.

Now, here’s a classic I never have any plans to revisit ever again! I had never read it, so I voted for it when it was suggested for book club. Then when it didn’t get chosen, a friend and I decided to read it together since she also hadn’t ever read it.

It was horrible. I knew there were problematic things about it, but I expected with how beloved it is there would be SOME sort of redeeming elements to it at some point. Nope. As far as I could see it was just a long story about absolutely terrible people being absolutely horrible. It only got two stars for the quality of the writing itself. Do not recommend.

Continuing on my revisitation of this series, I found that there were quite a few stories I had forgotten. I haven’t read this one quite as often as some of the novels and as The Adventures, and while I recalled some of the mysteries well, some of them had become mysterious to me again.

I was interested to find one story missing on this read-through of Conan Doyle tales — The Adventures of the Cardboard Box. I specifically remembered it from before, since it’s a bizarre and slightly disturbing one. But I didn’t locate it in this volume or any other that I listened to. A little research told me that apparently, though it appears in some editions of both this and His Last Bow, it is also missing from several editions — not because of the disturbing elements, but because of its mention of adultery. Apparently that was too risqué for many publishers of the day. A little different from times!

And that’s all for today — I’ll be back next week or sometime soon with another five! In the meantime, let me know if you’ve read any of these books, and if so what your thoughts on them are!