March 2025 BookSnacks
Vol. 27—Historically Fictitious?
Welcome back to BookSnacks! I’m so grateful you’re here! In this letter you’ll see:
The BookSnacks you might have missed this month including the podcast!
Our regular book reviews:
From the Bookish Market
What I saved on Substack
Exciting, right?! Let’s get to it.
And if you find something useful or joyful or meaningful here, you can buy me a coffee or become a paid subscriber! This monthly letter is free but paid subscribers get access to The Reading Pantry, where I answer questions and help you with all aspects of reading, and The Young Reader’s Bite, a specific guide for books for kids of all ages!
Snacks you might have missed this month:
The Reviews!
We’re adjusting this month. Normally I give you a review of the book I’m currently reading, one I just finished, and my latest ‘vintage’ read. However, it’s been a slower month over here working my way through some very long books so I’m currently reading three books and those will be what we discuss today.
And this year we’re trying out monthly themes. March is Historical Fiction!
Historical fiction is a genre on which some of the most renowned, respected and well-loved books have been built for hundreds of years. They teach us about history in the most personal ways possible. This genre feels comforting because it is confining. Each new work is restricted by its time period and place while also allowing for innumerable stories to be unearthed.
Because we can’t experience the past personally, we learn from records that have been left behind. This genre gives us the chance to breathe life into those records. To make them personal and in turn make us more empathetic. These authors have the ability and responsibility to study the past in deep, meaningful ways and translate what they find into stories we can feel. When we feel things our mind and body is more likely to remember them and will use them to influence our actions and choices in the future.
Stories like To Kill a Mockingbird, Beloved, Les Misérables, Pride and Prejudice, and The Boy in the Striped Pajamas honor the history on which they’re founded while telling compelling, heart-driven stories that give eye-opening understanding to lived human experiences. The world, and we, would be much more dry and cold without them.
I have loved this genre since I started reading again about four years ago and it’s a love that’s only grown over these years. I’m thrilled to share with you my latest reads and some of my all-time favorites in this space! Thank you for reading here today!
Should we start off with some light humor about the genre itself?
Currently Reading #1
The Last Green Valley by Mark Sullivan
Midread Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Read if you like:
Libro.FM $32 | Bookshop $15 | Barnes and Noble $16 | Amazon $14
The Martels are one of many families of German heritage whose ancestors have farmed in Ukraine for more than a century. But after already living under Stalin’s horrifying regime, Emil and Adeline decide they must run in retreat from their land with the wolves they despise to escape the Soviets and go in search of freedom. This has been a more difficult read to get into for me. I started it and will likely finish it(because I’m sometimes stubborn), but if it were any other month and I hadn’t planned this I would likely put it down and save it for later. The story is well-written and the characters have depth and are compelling so I do enjoy that. I just think it’s a matter of right book, wrong time for me.
Currently Reading #2
The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah
Rating(I actually just finished this): ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Read if you like:
Libro.FM $25 | Bookshop $18 | Barnes and Noble $16 | Amazon $9
Hannah is an author that can take history and magnify it. By putting a time period under a microscope she brings to light an everyday life. The people in her books aren’t characters in history they are the people who lived it. The most prominently remembered events of the time period become the backdrop and the people’s lives fall under the spotlight. She did this in The Nightingale and The Women, but this one feels the most pure, at least of the ones I’ve read. It really is about a family and how a giant, horrible long spanning and impacting war affected them inside their tiny cabin in the wilderness. The juxtaposition of that is profound in many ways. I really loved this book and I loved Hannah’s writing once again. I still love The Women the most, but this one is second.
Currently Reading #3
Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
Read if you like:
A quick read with quite a bit of depth
Not a lot to compare with this one because it doesn’t feel similar to anything I’ve read recently.
Libro.FM $7 | Bookshop $19 | Barnes and Noble $20 | Amazon $15
This novella tells the story of a small Irish town and some of the dark secrets that have been kept hidden as the town has been controlled by the church for years. I added this to my list because a film adaptation was released last year starring Cillian Murphy, which I’m excited to see! I’ll likely finish the book today on my way to and from work. While I’m not exactly a Novella person, I am enjoying the writing and the flow of the story. It feels as though the power of the story will be coming in the very last chapter, which may be common in this format? Let me know if you’ve read this! I actually am excited to watch the film so I’ll keep you updated once that happens.
The Book-ish Market
We’re thinking of this for our little reader bean who has a birthday next month! Any others your kids love? I’m open to recommendations!
The Kindle I have (also open to recommendations of other e-readers. And the Kindle I would buy if I won the lottery.
I have a fancy Kindle case from Page the Shop, but I’m thinking I need to get into a clear case so I can do like I did in high school and collage it with stickers and notes and fun things.
This is such a sweet little print. As soon as I hunt down a frame it’s going in my daughter’s room.
Another cozy lamp for you for your bedside table or couchside table. The perfect lighting for snuggling up with a book!
Lately it seems we need more things in our life that don’t have a productive purpose other than to bring joy. In that spirit, I give you, the desk pet.
Why did it take so many years for someone to create these?
One of my goals this year is to start thinking about journaling again. I started following
of and have been so inspired. Maybe this journal would be a good place to start at some point?Substack Saves
sharing where she gets her book recommendations is a treasure trove for all of us. Thank you, Natalie! wrote about the shrinking of the American Bibliography which I thought was an interesting perspective. And that’s it!
There are 200 of us here! Thank you for reading here today! I’m grateful for you!
If you found something to add to your TBR or something to remove from either of those, become a paid subscriber so you don’t miss the weekly content. Or buy me a drank!
Talk soon,
Adri
Ah so glad the rec sources were useful 😃