All the Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker Genres: Adult, Historical Fiction, Mystery/Thriller
Published by Crown on June 25, 2024
Format: Audiobook, eBook, Hardcover (608 pages) • Source: Owned, Purchased, Spotify Audiobooks
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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • OVER ONE MILLION COPIES SOLD • From the author of We Begin at the End comes a soaring thriller and an epic love story that “hits like a sledgehammer . . . an absolutely must-read novel” (Gillian Flynn, author of Gone Girl).
Read with Jenna Book Club Pick as Featured on Today
The Boston Globe’s #1 Thriller/Mystery of 2024 So Far
A Best Book of the Year: Washington Post, She Reads, Kirkus Reviews“Kept me frantically turning the pages and somehow made me cry at the end . . . Brava!”—Kristin Hannah, author of The Women
“Melds tense suspense with a powerful exploration of devotion, obsession, and love.”—People (Best New Books)
1975 is a time of change in America. The Vietnam War is ending. Muhammad Ali is fighting Joe Frazier. And in the smalltown of Monta Clare, Missouri, girls are disappearing.When the daughter of a wealthy family is targeted, the most unlikely hero emerges—Patch, a local boy, who saves the girl, and, in doing so, leaves heartache in his wake.
Patch and those who love him soon discover that the line between triumph and tragedy has never been finer. And that their search for answers will lead them to truths that could mean losing one another.
A missing person mystery, a serial killer thriller, a love story, a unique twist on each, Chris Whitaker has written a novel about what lurks in the shadows of obsession and the blinding light of hope.
It’s taken me a really long time to write this review because there’s SO much within this book that could be discussed. I got it a year ago with BOTM and put it off because of the length. I wasn’t sure how another historical literary mystery would go for me. I loved THE GOD OF THE WOODS but surely this isn’t a genre for me, right?!
Very wrong. I loved this book! We picked it for my local mystery/thriller book club and there was no shortage of topics to discuss. Everyone gave it 5 stars with a few 4.5 stars sprinkled in. We love the fact that he tackled so many topics without ever feeling like too much, or feeling like the book was too long for a mystery. It’s very much a character study, a story of the time period, and a mystery all rolled into one.
The reviewers who didn’t like this book thought the writing was trying too hard or thought it was boring, and I definitely disagree. I read this 600+ page book in two days and literally could not stop reading it. The short chapters coupled with the way he created suspense even within paragraphs because of the writing style made this impossible to put down for me. I will say, my only complaint is that some passages were confusing because of how he wrote them. Sometimes I had to read things more than once. The author was so careful with his language though because there was incredibly subtle foreshadowing simply in the way he phrased things.
It covers topics like religion, abortion, small town life, missing and murdered girls, and so much more. I was nervous a book with many religious characters and people in law enforcement wouldn’t work for me, but it really did.
I was really never sure where the story was going next but this is truly a decades-long sweeping story about so many different things. Very twisty and surprising in parts but really beautiful.
Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid Genres: Adult, Literary Fiction, Historical Fiction
Published by Random House on June 3, 2025
Also by this author: Maybe in Another Life, After I Do, One True Loves, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Evidence of the Affair, Daisy Jones and The Six, Malibu Rising, Carrie Soto Is Back
Format: Audio/Physical (352 pages) • Source: Purchased, Spotify Audiobooks
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#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • GOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK • From the author of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones & The Six comes an epic new novel set against the backdrop of the 1980s space shuttle program about the extraordinary lengths we go to live and love beyond our limits.
The stunning hardcover of Atmosphere features beautiful endpapers and a premium dust jacket!
“Thrilling . . . heartbreaking . . . uplifting . . . the fast-paced, emotionally charged story of one ambitious young woman, finding both her voice and her passion.”—Kristin Hannah, author of The Women
“NASA? Space missions? The ’80s? This is a collection of all the things I love.”—Andy Weir, author of Project Hail Mary and The Martian
Joan Goodwin has been obsessed with the stars for as long as she can remember. Thoughtful and reserved, Joan is content with her life as a professor of physics and astronomy at Rice University and as aunt to her precocious niece, Frances. That is, until she comes across an advertisement seeking the first women scientists to join NASA’s space shuttle program. Suddenly, Joan burns to be one of the few people to go to space.
Selected from a pool of thousands of applicants in the summer of 1980, Joan begins training at Houston’s Johnson Space Center, alongside an exceptional group of fellow candidates: Top Gun pilot Hank Redmond and scientist John Griffin, who are kind and easygoing even when the stakes are highest; mission specialist Lydia Danes, who has worked too hard to play nice; warmhearted Donna Fitzgerald, who is navigating her own secrets; and Vanessa Ford, the magnetic and mysterious aeronautical engineer, who can fix any engine and fly any plane.
As the new astronauts become unlikely friends and prepare for their first flights, Joan finds a passion and a love she never imagined. In this new light, Joan begins to question everything she thinks she knows about her place in the observable universe.
Then, in December of 1984, on mission STS-LR9, it all changes in an instant.
Fast-paced, thrilling, and emotional, Atmosphere is Taylor Jenkins Reid at her best: transporting readers to iconic times and places, creating complex protagonists, and telling a passionate and soaring story about the transformative power of love—this time among the stars.
TJR is probably my favorite author, if you asked me to pick right now based on her entire catalog and my success rate. She has a few more books than Emily Henry, which is really the only reason I’d give her the edge!
I was really looking forward to ATMOSPHERE, as I do with all of her books. I heard it may be gay and involve astronauts (amazing) but also was historical fiction (less my thing but I’ll read anything TJR puts out). I read it slowly in June and really complicated my TBR/book club reading to do it (long story) but I finally finished and really loved it.
ATMOSPHERE follows Joan, a new astronaut-in-training with NASA as she manages complicated family dynamics, her sexuality, relationships and friendships with colleagues, and being one of the first women to go to space. I love the way TJR writes and how Julia Whalen narrates so I definitely thought this combination along with the physical book would have me cruising through this one. I had to pause at one point to pick up another historical fiction book for book club but otherwise I definitely was intrigued enough to keep reading. Once I finished my book club book, I got into a little slump and kept putting off the ending… I knew people were sobbing and freaking out so I got nervous!
All in all, this is a total winner from TJR. It definitely falls in my top favorites by her! I loved learning more about the space program and seeing it through Joan’s eyes. It was interesting to see how each of the women approached their time there – some, like Lydia, allowed the rude jokes about women and tried to be “one of the guys,” versus Joan, who essentially had the opposite approach. Vanessa was a really strong character too.
A lot of folks expected this be heavier on the historical fiction/NASA vibes than the romance and were disappointed when they felt it was opposite. First of all, the book title says “A Love Story” right in the second half, so you should kind of expect that! Second, I actually didn’t feel like that – I kind of wish there was even more romance! I loved their dynamic and seeing them finally get together while managing the extremely complicated situation (both to/with regular society AND within their workplace).
Yes, I was fully sobbing for the final 10-20 minutes of the audiobook while I was in the shower. The book really packs an emotional punch. It begins with Vanessa in space and the mission reaching a critical moment, then the story goes back in time to give the history leading up to that mission. Chapters from “present day” intermix throughout the story and were really intense. I’ll say that I thought pausing and restarting the book to read something else would affect my rating but the emotions of the ending fully propelled this to five stars.
I think this book will sit with me for a really long time.
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