so, if all goes according to plan, this month I will finish the following:

“those who wait” by haley cass
Sutton Spencer's ideas for her life were fairly simple: finish graduate school and fall in love. It would be a lot simpler if she could pinpoint exactly what she should do when she graduates in less than a year. Oh, and if she could figure out how to talk to a woman without feeling like a total mess, that would be great too. Charlotte Thompson is very much the opposite. She's always had clear steps outlining her path to success with no time or inclination for romance. Her burgeoning career in politics means everything to her and she's not willing to compromise it for something as insignificant as love. Fleeting, casual, and discreet worked perfectly fine. When they meet through a dating app, it's immediately clear that they aren't suited for anything more than friendship. Right?

“the ruin of kings” by jenn lyons
Far from living the dream, Kihrin finds himself practically a prisoner, at the mercy of his new family's power plays and ambitions. He also discovers that the storybooks have lied about a lot of other things too: dragons, demons, gods, prophecies, true love, and how the hero always wins.

“bluets” by maggie nelson
A lyrical essay that explores the color blue through 240 numbered prose poems. It's a philosophical and cerebral work that examines depression, desire, pleasure, and pain, and how blue is associated with both sadness and calmness. The narrator is obsessed with blue and attempts to create a "pillow book" about it, but ends up confronting a painful affair and a friend's injury.