A reading LIST

VOL. 01 — 2026

When the lovely creator and editor of D.RB asked if I’d write a book review column, my reply was, “HELL YES!”

Since January of 2026, I’ve been posting monthly reviews of the books I’ve read on Instagram. Admittedly, my following is small (read: miniscule). With this column, I hope to reach folks beyond that audience, sharing my top-rated reads with an audience of more than just people who already have twenty books that I’ve shoved in their hands at dinner parties happy hours.

What are my qualifications? I’ve read 375 books since 2023, most of which have fallen in the genre of literary fiction. Though, if you are looking for me at the local book store or library, you’re just as likely to find me perusing the horror, thriller, sci-fi, memoir, history, romance (read: smut), politics, and poetry sections. Reading, to me, is an exercise in deepening one’s understanding of others and oneself, trying on different lenses and challenging oneself to go beyond what one knows. 


When the lovely creator and editor of D.RB asked if I’d write a book review column, my reply was, “HELL YES!”

Since January of 2026, I’ve been posting monthly reviews of the books I’ve read on Instagram. Admittedly, my following is small (read: miniscule). With this column, I hope to reach folks beyond that audience, sharing my top-rated reads with an audience of more than just people who already have twenty books that I’ve shoved in their hands at dinner parties happy hours.

What are my qualifications? I’ve read 375 books since 2023, most of which have fallen in the genre of literary fiction. Though, if you are looking for me at the local book store or library, you’re just as likely to find me perusing the horror, thriller, sci-fi, memoir, history, romance (read: smut), politics, and poetry sections. Reading, to me, is an exercise in deepening one’s understanding of others and oneself, trying on different lenses and challenging oneself to go beyond what one knows. 


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external-validation-obsessed cult

Bunny by Mona Awad & Blob by Maggie Su

These books fall somewhere between horror, thriller, and literary fiction. Bunny follows Samantha, a young woman pursuing her MFA, as she becomes involved in a bunny-worshipping, external-validation-obsessed cult.


Blob follows Vi, a recent college-dropout, as she falls for and raises a strange love interest (we’ve all been there, am I right, gals?). Both Bunny and Blob explore themes of projection and modern romance in an era where everyone seems to keep swiping until they find their “perfect match.”

drinking & drugs

Make Sure You Die Screaming by Zee Carlstrom
& Nevada by Imogen Binnie

I read these books fairly close to one another and loved both despite the very similar themes: stolen cars, chaotic personal relationships, drinking & drugs, identity struggles, and severe alienation. Carlstrom’s main character is a non-binary person who decides they’ve had enough of their family’s chaos and escapes in a stolen car to discover themselves. Binnie’s main character is a trans woman going through a break up who decides she needs some space and escapes in a stolen car to discover herself. Both books address the realities of feeling alienated from one’s family and community. Both perfectly capture aspects of capitalism that grate at our beings.

toxic optimism

Discontent by Beatriz Serrano
& Sky Daddy by Kate Folk

Discontent follows Marisa, an advertising professional with a love of prescription drugs and youtube. If you’ve ever worked in a corporate setting and felt gas-lit by the office’s toxic optimism, you will, no doubt, find yourself laughing and commiserating with Marisa. Sky Daddy follows Linda, a content moderator with a different-but-similar love for youtube and the ultimate goal of “marrying” a plane. While focused less on the corporate setting, the work still calls us to reflect on, in much the same way Discontent does, how the internet has changed us, what it means to be “successful” as a 30-something woman, and the struggle to establish positive relationships in a society focused on success. Both Serrano and Folk capture late stage capitalism’s quirks expertly and portray main characters that are equal parts loveably relatable and uniquely chaotic.

jell-o entrees

Motherthing by Ainslie Hogarth & 
Mrs. Caliban by Rachel Ingalis

Motherthing follows Abby, a 50’s/60’s housewife after the death of her overbearing mother-in-law. Abby is haunted by her mother-in-law’s presence and must fight for her marriage with jell-o entrees and a cursed ring. Mrs. Caliban also follows a 50’s/60’s housewife. Dorothy, however, is haunted by the loss of her son and her husband’s infidelity when she falls in love with a different sort of man. Both main characters are perhaps unreliable narrators, perhaps portraying the most popular diagnosis for housewives of their time: hysteria. Both books are strange and play with the reader’s perception of reality. What does it mean to be isolated, as so many housewives are, with your thoughts and your fears for most of your adult life? 

modern struggle

Victorian Psycho by Virginia Feito

Decidedly disturbed and certainly psychotic, Winifred is brought on as a governess at Ensor Hourse. Though this book isn’t set in the present, it still speaks to the modern struggle against the expectation of motherhood, the realities of patriarchy, and the misguided sentiment that all women have a maternal instinct.

private chef

Land of Milk and Honey by C Pam Zhang

Zhang gifts us Anthony Bourdain-level poetic descriptions of the culinary arts married with the dark, dystopian realness of Octavia Butler. Zhang immerses us in a world where corporation-caused climate change has made it impossible to grow any real food. The main character is invited to be a private chef in the last place where produce is able to grow. The catch is that the folks she’s feeding are the Musks and Trumps of society, all of whom bought their place at the table with blood money. This book asks us to reflect on what we’re willing to sacrifice to pursue our passions, how we plan to reckon with the pay-to-live society we’ve created, and when we’ll take climate change seriously enough to do something about it.

inability to conform

Chlorine by Jade Song

Do you remember the first time you felt (or maybe hoped) you might be different? Or the first time you crushed on someone so hard that you felt you might be going just a tad crazy? Chlorine explores the desire to transform, the desire and inability to conform, and the lengths we go to as teens and young adults to get there. Ren, our main character, is a swimmer with a mermaid obsession that gets a little out of hand. Call me when you finish the book, I am still debating whether she’s lost her mind or if her transformation is truly complete! 

craving

The Eyes Are The Best Part by Monika Kim

Upping the Weird Girl antics, in The Eyes Are The Best Part Ji-won discovers she has a very particular craving. This book is disturbing, both because of the gruesome snacking and because of the gut-wrenchingly honest depiction of white people fetishizing non-white people. Ji-won’s character helps us understand how it might feel to be a young woman growing up in a culture that refuses to let go of and reckon with racist tropes.

More about Chronically Online

Honorable Mention: 

  • The Hounding by Xenobe Purvis: A group of young girls are accused of turning into dogs at night. The men are useless! 


  • Little Rot by Akwaeke Emzi: A group of friends and distant-acquaintances discover the dark side of New Lagos, a fictional Nigerian City. Emzi’s stories usually center gender non-confirming and sexually liberated characters with rare complexity. 


  • Rental House by Weike Wang: This is truly dark, depressed lit fic, a la Sylvia Plath, that will have you laughing through your darkest hours. 


  • Patternist Series by Octavia Butler: I credit Octavia Butler with my Sci Fi awakening and the Patternist series with breaking my reading slump of over 10 years. The concept of this series is straight up strange, but if you’ve never wanted to turn into a dolphin for a couple of years, you’re lying. 


  • I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman: A stream of consciousness narrative of a young woman who, you guessed it, has never met a man! 


  • Final Girl Support Group & Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix: Can a white man write weird girl lit? I think Grady Hendrix can. The best horror is just a reflection of what scares us the most about society. Hendrix does that well. 


  • Yellowface by R.F. Kuang: The main character is properly hateable but you’ve also met a version of her in real life at least once. 


  • Milk Fed by Melissa Broder: Why is it that everyone with Mommy Issues has the universal experience of tracking their calories and falling in love with women who can’t love them back? 


On my TBR (To-Be-Read): 

  • Kitten by Stacey Yu: obsessed with boyfriend’s cat

  • Death Valley by Melissa Broder: grief & high-dessert escapism

  • The Water Cure by Sophie Mackintosh: isolated & distrustful of men

  • Best Offer Wins by Marisa Kashino: what won’t she do to get her dream home

  • Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke: a trad wife’s dream! 

  • The Most by Jessica Anthony: you’re getting pruny, hon!

  • Terry Dactyl by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore: trans woman survives pandemics & addiction

  • The Guest by Emma Cline: stuck on long island with no way home and chaotic vibes

  • Boy Parts by Eliza Clark: unreliable narrator flips the creepy-male script 

  • Black Sheep by Rachel Harrison: going back to your hometown for a wedding

  • So Thirsty by Rachel Harrison: girls trip!! 

  • What Hunger by Catherine Dang: she likes it raw 

  • Hungerstone by Kat Dunn: lesbian vampire

  • Model Home by Rivers Solomon: queer baddies take on strange happenings

  • Worry by Alexandra Tanner: sounds like Girls if Hannah and Marnie were sisters 

  • Stag Dance by Torrey Peters: horny lumberjacks, boarding school romance, and a trip to vegas 

  • Eat The Ones You Love by Sarah Maria Griffin: evil carnivorous plant

  • Kittentits by Holly Wilson: sounds pretty fucked up 

  • Severance by Ling Ma: working during the world’s demise 

  • Bliss Montage by Ling Ma: surreal short stories 

  • Harrow by Joy Williams: climate collapse by the water 

  • Bury Our Bones at Midnight by V.E. Schwab: lesbian vampires, multi-generational

  • Tantrum by Rachel Eve Moulton: Post-partum horror 

  • Your Driver is Waiting by Priya Guns: this whole “gig economy” thing is a racket

  • Womb City by Tlotlo Tsamaase: is that all women are to you? A womb? 

  • Earthlings by Sayaka Murata: once again… are women just wombs?

  • Hot Air by Marcy Dermansky: a love triangle but worse 

  • Rabbit Hole by Kate Brody: chronically online internet sleuths