Chelsey's April 2025 Reads | 17 Books

This was my biggest reading month of the year so far! I was mentally shooting to finish 18 books so that I can try to read 200 by the end of the year, but 17 was close enough (and I don’t think it’s helpful to set arbitrary goals if it means I’m not enjoying my reading).

❤️ Favorite Book of the Month ❤️

My very favorite book this month was The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo. It reminded me very much of Hello Beautiful on a larger scale. I generally enjoy sweeping family sagas, and this one checked all my boxes because the people in it act like real people. They get upset, they have complicated emotions, they make bad decisions, and they have to deal with the consequences. But ultimately they do really love each other. The book doesn’t get tied up with a big happy bow, but it does have a solid ending.

⚠️⚠️⚠️This book does have references to sexual activity in the context of the relationships in the book, although it’s not overly graphic. Everyone has a different tolerance for adult content, so I wanted to make sure I mention this!

👎Least Favorite Book of the Month 👎

I didn’t have any 1- or 2-star books this month, so I’m having to choose a 3-star book as my least favorite. That feels unfortunate, since I don’t consider a 3-star book all that bad. I think that I’d have to say that my least favorite was The Tell by Amy Griffin. I’ll talk more about it below, but I was sad that I disliked a memoir (usually a favorite genre) so much.

Other Book Stats

Here’s how all the books I read broke down. I read/listened to a total of 5,675 pages!

📚 Print books: 4 books
🎧 Audiobooks: 11 books
📱 Ebooks: 2 books

⭐⭐⭐: 5 books
⭐⭐⭐⭐: 6 books
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐: 6 books

📗 Fiction | 5 Books

Happiness Falls by Angie Kim

One of the downsides of audiobooks is that the narrator greatly influences the enjoyment of the listening experience. In some cases, the narrator has made the book (for example, The Dutch House by Ann Patchett, narrated by Tom Hanks). In this book, the main narrator made the main character seem like an incredibly annoying person. I hated the way she talked in general, so I don’t think reading the print version would have made it much better, but the audiobook was in this case the worse option. The premise is that in a family with a teenage son with special needs who is nonverbal, the father disappears. The teenage son was with him, but he can’t tell anyone what happened. With a different “voice” for the main character, this could have been a 4-star book.

None of This is True by Lisa Jewell

I had never read any Lisa Jewell books but usually enjoy more mainstream psychological thrillers. This is a story within a podcast within a book, which is an interesting perspective. However, once I figured out where it was going, it felt predictable. It also had some really uncomfortable family dynamics that were hard to get through.

The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo

See my description above!

Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale

My friend, Anna, who says she only likes books with happy endings (weird), recommended this one to me. She seemed hesitant to even recommend it because I think she assumed I probably wouldn’t like it, but I really did! It’s not a book I would have chosen to read on my own, but one of the things I love about books is that they can open us up to other worlds. The world of this book was a world I liked being in for a few days. The story is inspired by an old Brothers Grimm fairy tale called Maid Maleen and takes place in Mongolia, giving it a very interesting vibe.

The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien

I last read the LOTR trilogy at least 20 years ago, and I felt it was time for a re-read. I struggled at the beginning, which my husband, who has read the series at least 20 times, assured me was normal. He said it would pick up the pace by the end and it did, leading me straight into The Two Towers, which I’m currently in the middle of. Christian recently listened to the new audio version that is narrated by Andy Serkis, which he loved. I don’t know how much more I can say about this, except that you should read it.

📘 Nonfiction | 9 books

The Age of Diagnosis: How Our Obsession with Medical Labels is Making Us Sicker by Suzanne O’Sullivan

I felt sure I’d give this book 4 stars as I was reading it. It was well written and so interesting, but it didn’t necessarily move into 5-star territory. By the end, though, I felt like it had helped me understand several things so much better than I decided it was a 5-star read. Since last fall I’ve been struggling with an injury to my foot, which I’ve mentioned here before. I went to the doctor at the end of January and eventually had an MRI. Part of the reason for the MRI was to rule out a stress fracture, which it did, but it didn’t really answer the question of what was going on or do anything to explain the pain I was having.

Over the last couple of months, I have been to PT in person and also been searching the Internet. For a large portion of the time I felt like I needed to just keep Googling so I could figure out what exactly was going on with my foot. Finally, I stumbled across either a YouTube video or a Reddit post and something in it made me realize that I didn’t need to know what was wrong. I knew it wasn’t a stress fracture, so it was OK for me to be bearing weight. What was important was what kind of pain I was having and what kinds of things were making the pain better or worse. And so I did what I do best, which was to start collecting data. I’ve also been trying not to focus so much on how my foot feels. This is something talked about in the book, about how excessive focus on a physical ailment can actually exacerbate the problem. In doing this, not only have I found strengthening exercises that are actually helping, but I’ve realized that all this time, I’ve been so afraid of what the pain in my foot meant that I’ve been guarding my heel as I walk. I haven’t been walking normally. I got new shoes and new orthotics, and now I’m focused on not subconsiously protecting my foot. In doing so, I think my foot muscles have been strengthened, and the pain is starting to decrease.

Of course I’m not advising against medical care — the book doesn’t do that either. But it gave me a lot of food for thought and also confirmed some of my own experiences.

Be Ready When the Luck Happens: A Memoir by Ina Garten

I used to be a big watcher of Food Network and also enjoyed Ina even as I kind of laughed at her. The story of how she got to be where she is is not relatable in any way unless you come from money and marry a wealthy investment banker. Will I ever be struggling over how to best furnish my Paris apartment? No, but it was still a fun read.

The Marriage You Want: Moving beyond Stereotypes for a Relationship Built on Scripture, New Data, and Emotional Health by Sheila Wray Gregoire and Keith Gregoire

I’ve been eagerly awaiting this book, and it did not disappoint. It was my other 5-star nonfiction book for this month. I don’t think it is the only book anyone should read on marriage, but it should be one of the top 3 books any married couple reads, in my opinion. I also think a broad survey of it would be great for engaged couples in terms of what to expect from marriage and how to set good foundations.

The Plan: Manage Your Time Like a Lazy Genius by Kendra Adachi

This might have been my most disappointing read. I hate to say that, because I love Kendra and all of her Lazy Genius ways, but this book was not good. It felt like she took a bunch of podcast episodes and turned them into 27 different acronyms that I’ll never remember. I had debated buying this book and am so glad I saw it at the library and didn’t spend money on it. There are parts of this book that I think could be helpful if you feel you struggle with executive functioning, but the fact that she had to have a whole appendix in the back of all the different systems listed in this book kind of tells you that it’s trying to do too much.

Money, Lies and God: Inside the Movement to Destroy American Democracy by Katherine Stewart

This was a book I was excited to read but that turned out to be pretty disappointing as well. I thought it would be a version of The Kingdom, the Power and the Glory from a different perspective, but the tone of the book was condescending and seemed to lack any kind of nuance about evangelicals and what they believe. If you want to read about Christian nationalism, I recommend The Kingdom or Jesus and John Wayne.

The Tell: A Memoir by Amy Griffin

This was my least favorite book of the month, which makes me feel a bit icky because I hate to “rate” someone’s life as described in their memoir. It wasn’t so much an issue with what the memoir is about, but rather with the tone in which it was written. In short, the author as an adult realizes that something has happened in her past that she has totally repressed. She discovers this by using LSD under a “supervising practitioner.” She then goes into a journey into the past to figure out what actually happened to her. Everyone deals with trauma in their own way, and her childhood experience was particularly horrific, but her overall tone left a bad taste in my mouth. And also, I’m not sure what those of us who don’t want to take LSD should do if we’re trying to work on our traumatic past.

Koresh: The Story of David Koresh and the Tragedy at Waco by Stephen Talty

I love to read about cults because I found them psychologically fascinating. This book tells the story of David Koresh (which I didn’t realize wasn’t his given name until this book) and how his life and beliefs culminated in the tragedy at Waco. It’s a trainwreck waiting to happen and the whole book read like a fiction book.

Here Be Dragons: Treading the Deep Waters of Motherhood, Mean Girls, and Generational Trauma by Melanie Shankle

I happened to run across this and when I found out the author was a Christian who was a former mommy blogger I used to read over a decade ago, I was interested. As with The Tell, I’m not trying to rate the author’s life. Part of the issue was that I didn’t necessarily feel it was especially relatable to me, since I have a positive relationship with my mom. I also didn’t like the way the book got preachy at the end and attempted to give advice to other parents who are all going to have kids different from hers. That said, I did highly recommend it to a friend who has a difficult relationship with her mom, because I think she will find it way more helpful than I did.

Slither: How Nature’s Most Maligned Creatures Illuminate Our World by Stephen S. Hall

Everyone take a deep breath while I tell you that this book about snakes was my favorite nonfiction book of the month. I don’t really know what compelled me to start reading this when it randomly popped up on Libby. And note that I did not read it; I listened to it. I am quite sure the print book includes pictures, which I wouldn’t have been able to tolerate. But hearing about snakes and how different and interesting they are turned out to be incredibly fascinating. Who knew how much research on snakes has contributed to medicine and technology? Do I now feel like I’d be more comfortable seeing or touching a snake? Nope. But this was a really good read.

📕 Spiritual | 3 books

Understanding Spiritual Abuse: What It Is and How to Respond by Karen Roudkovski

This was a hard read, but one I’d recommend to any Christian, especially if they are in ministry in any capacity. I found my own experiences of spiritual abuse described in these pages, and it was a further reminder that I’m not crazy for having been harmed by things said and done by those in spiritual authority over me. If you believe you may have experiencing spiritual abuse, please read this book.

Love Walked Among Us: Learning to Love Like Jesus by Paul Miller

I can now say I’ve read all of Paul Miller’s books (aside from some of his booklets and Bible studies). They are all excellent. This was the final one I hadn’t read, and I appreciate the time I spent each morning examining my heart and how I fail to love others. The chapter on forgiveness and reconciliation was especially challenging.

To Seek and to Save: Daily Reflections on the Road to the Cross by Sinclair B. Ferguson

I have read this book several years during Lent. It wasn’t until this year that I realized most of the notes I’d written at the end of each chapter were from 2020, a very difficult year. I felt like I was reliving the past, which could have been painful, but because I was seeing it through the lens of Jesus’ suffering, it actually turned into more of a reminder of God’s faithfulness. Go ahead and buy this one for next year!

---

That’s it for this month. I’d love to know if you’ve read any of these and what your April reading looked like!