After a fiction heavy July, I unintentionally turned the tables and read predominantly non-fiction in August. That said, I feel like reading an epic tome like Gone With the Wind is a bit like two or three regular works of fiction rolled into one, so that has to count for something.
I also had a few big DNFs, the main one being Land by Maggie O’Farrell. She is an incredible writer, but in the same way I just could not bring myself to finish Hamnet—which I still consider one of the most depressing books I’ve ever read—I found myself dreading the emotional weight of picking up Land. I got over halfway through the book before I decided I needed something lighter. Admittedly, most of my non-fiction reads were about depressing subjects, but somehow it doesn’t tend to land for me the same way as it does when consuming it as fiction.
Because of the amount of time I had spent on Land, I did read the final chapter to figure out what happened (depressing!). I can see why it is so beloved.
Now it’s time to talk about the books I did complete in the month of August.
(January, February, March, April, May, June, and July.)
NONFICTION READS IN AUGUST 2026
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While Idaho Slept: The Hunt for Answers in the Murders of Four College Students by J. Reuben Appelman *not rated
I read While Idaho Slept a few days after watching The Idaho Murders: College Nightmare documentary on Netflix.
There was quite a bit of overlap, but the book contained more behind-the-scenes information. I say information, but a lot of it felt very gossipy. I have no doubt a lot of it was truth, but returning regularly to the fact that several of the murdered students had parents with criminal backgrounds (when it was known this didn’t impact the case) started to feel… a bit icky.
It’s also deeply troubling that this book was published before the case went to trial! Being put out into the world so quickly does feel a bit like a cash grab, but maybe I’m wrong.
That said, it was an interesting complement to the documentary and it’s a case that captured the attention of the world.
Content warnings. Descriptions of brutal murders. Discussions of substance abuse. Some strong language.
The First Survivor: Life with Canada’s Deadliest Mass Shooter by Maureen Banfield *not rated
This book isn’t just the story of the deadliest mass shooting in Canada’s history—which, sadly, happened just a few hours from where we live—it’s the story of domestic abuse and how hard it is for victims to escape that cycle.
The writing wasn’t stellar and there’s plenty of repetition. It’s raw and I was left feeling sad about everything (the failure of police to follow up on early warning signs, the decades of abuse endured by Banfield, each and every family touched by this horrific crime), but also grateful to Banfield for speaking out.
Content warnings. References to domestic abuse. Some strong language. Discussions of serial murder and arson.
How to Winter: Harness Your Mindset to Thrive on Cold, Dark, or Difficult Days by Kari Leibowitz *4 stars
This book was an interesting read. I did find it repetitive and a bit boring in places and it definitely could have been more streamlined. I also would have appreciated more engaging anecdotes.
But it provided a good overview of how we approach winter in North America vs northern countries in Europe. Her suggestions of how we can dread winter conditions less—and even come to enjoy winter—were inspiring for me, a professed winter hater. The most helpful mindset reframe was actively creating spaces and events that bring joy in the winter season (having something to look forward to), and also her references to preparing for the season. I had never thought about the fact that people who burn their own firewood, for example, have to slowly prepare for winter to come so there is an easing into the season that just doesn’t seem to exist for those of us who aren’t preparing fields or homes for winter in more traditional ways.
I think some people could find this book tremendously encouraging. And I can see myself re-reading (skimming) it in the future.
[*I have a Patreon post all about how I’m applying what I learned in this book directly to my life for this upcoming winter. I have a plan! I’m feeling optimistic and excited!!!]
Nobody’s Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice by Virginia Roberts Giuffre *not rated
What a gutting, horrific read. The thought of the level of human trafficking carried out at the hands of Epstein and Maxwell is truly appalling. It is also devastating to consider the wide network of people involved, both as victims and abusers.
What struck me most while reading this book was the generational impact of early trauma. Virginia Roberts Giuffre was abused as a child by her father and a family friend, and that had far-reaching impacts that ultimately put her on a path toward being targeted and exploited as a teenager.
This book is relentlessly sad. While she stands up to her abusers, there is no real sense of victory. Even when some of the people involved faced consequences, I never felt a complete arc of justice. And, sadly, Roberts Giuffre ultimately took her own life.
It was uncomfortable to read about her trauma, but what compounded it most for me was the way she referenced her husband so glowingly, knowing that reports after her death alleged that he had physically abused her throughout their marriage. Of all the things in the book, that is the part of the story I found most devastating: that she never really managed to escape the clutches of controlling men, that she was abused for so much of her life, and that her own children must have been deeply affected by everything they watched their mother go through—and everything they are surely enduring themselves.
My heart aches for all of them.
Content warnings. So many. References to grooming and sex trafficking, childhood sexual abuse, domestic abuse, suicide, and occasional strong language.
Cleanup on Aisle Five: Essential Work, Poverty Wages, and the View from Behind the Supermarket Register by Ann Larson *4 stars
I heard about this book through Engie and Sarah, who met up to discuss Cleanup on Aisle Five!
I appreciated the message of the book, but didn’t always love the delivery. I found the writing a bit choppy and there wasn’t a cohesive feeling to the “characters” (in this case, people Larson was working with in the store).
But her take on self-checkouts was fascinating and I truly had no idea about the health problems (including a lot of paper cuts!) suffered by retail workers on the job. Working in these low-wage positions is hard, exhausting work and is tremendously undervalued.
Content warnings. Occasional strong language. Discussions of health complications related to insufficient medical care/poverty.
The Phantom Prince: My Life with Ted Bundy by Elizabeth and Molly Kendall *not rated
I thought this was a fascinating and incredibly sad look at the relationship between Elizabeth Kendall and Ted Bundy, her long-term partner. She originally published this memoir shortly after Bundy was convicted of his crimes, but I read a more recently updated version with a new foreword and an afterword written by her daughter, Molly, who spent a lot of time living with Ted Bundy as a surrogate father of sorts.
This book is almost exclusively written about Kendall and Bundy’s tumultuous relationship. There is no doubt she loved him and remained committed to him, but she is ultimately the person who did the most to tip law enforcement off to the fact that Bundy was likely at the heart of a spate of violent crimes against women.
Content warnings. Strong language. References to alcoholism and substance abuse. References to domestic violence and sexual assault.
The End of Normal by Stephanie Madoff Mack
I’m not rating this memoir.
I have a lot of feelings about this book, and they are decidedly mixed!
More than anything, this feels like a book that should have been written a few years after the fact, rather than in the immediate aftermath of her husband’s suicide. Everything was still so raw, and I wonder whether more time and distance would have changed the way she told the story.
There are a lot of negative reviews criticizing her privilege and self-centeredness throughout the book, which I think are unfair. This is a woman who, in the blink of an eye, lost just about everything. Other people suffered enormously too and in a range of different ways, but this is her story to share. Her husband ultimately took his own life as part of the fallout, and the level of grief and upheaval she experienced is hard to fathom.
That said, I can also appreciate some of the skepticism surrounding the book. For example, she changed her name in an effort to distance herself from the Madoff family, but then included Madoff in her author name on the book. The optics, as she herself might say, don’t look great.
There was clearly a tremendous amount of dysfunction within the family, much of it simmering beneath the surface long before everything publicly imploded. The whole story is sad from start to finish.
Despite my mixed feelings, I found this a compelling book to read, though an incredibly heartbreaking one. More than anything, I would be VERY curious to know how she views the entire situation now, with so much more time and distance from everything that happened.
Content warnings. Periodic strong language; discussions of suicide and self-harm.
The Irish Goodbye: Micro-Memoirs by Beth Ann Fennelly *5 stars
I love memoirs, I love essays, and I love short chapters. This book has all three, so it was pretty much guaranteed I was going to love it!
The Irish Goodbye isn’t written around one cohesive theme, but it does spend a lot of time discussing the loss of the author’s only sister, detailing the author’s relationship with her aging body, and processing her mother’s cognitive decline due to Alzheimer’s.
The chapters/micro-memoirs vary in length from many pages to just a sentence or two. I was here for all of it.
Content warnings. Occasional strong language. References to suicide/homicide.
FICTION READS IN AUGUST 2026
Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell *5 stars
What can I say about this book that hasn’t already been said? Nothing.
But I will still say things.
I can definitely see why Gone with the Wind won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. I can also see why it’s been so widely banned. It’s scandalous, deeply uncomfortable a lot of the time, and the racial side of the story is VERY complicated and distressing.
It was All the Things.
It was frustrating. It was sad. It was confusing. It was beautiful. It was tragic. It was gripping. It was a 1,000-page masterclass in fiction. (Though, as per usual, I do think the book would have been better with 300 pages shaved off; the middle section dragged for me.)
That said, I could not put this book down, and my bedtime suffered for a week because of it.
Scarlett is an incredible protagonist because she’s so hard to like… and yet impossible to stop watching and, in a way, rooting for. She’s selfish, manipulative, vain, ruthless, and obtuse. But she is also resourceful, brave, fiercely determined, and almost superhuman in her ability to survive. I kept alternating between wanting to shake her and wanting to cheer for her. (I think that’s part of Mitchell’s genius with this book and set of characters.)
Survival really is at the heart of the story. Scarlett survives because she’s willing to adapt while almost everyone around her is clinging to the world that existed before the war. But the book raises the question: at what point does resilience become ruthlessness?
Every single character is flawed (aren’t we all!) and yet each one also has redeeming qualities. Melanie surprised me most. At first she seems like the meek, conventional foil to Scarlett, but by the end I think she was one of the strongest characters in the entire book. Her strength just looks completely different from Scarlett’s.
The Civil War almost functions like another character. Money, status, social rules, security—everything gets stripped away, and we get to see who these people really are when the structure holding their lives together disappears.
Of course, there are also enormous racial themes at the heart of the book. It romanticizes the antebellum South and contains a tremendous number of harmful stereotypes and troubling portrayals of people groups.
I both loved and hated the ending. After watching Scarlett misunderstand herself and everyone around her for literally 1,000 pages (that is a big investment in a character) she finally begins to understand what she actually wants/what’s actually important… at the moment it seems to be too late.
I really wanted to know what happened next to Scarlett and Rhett and it genuinely pained me not to know the rest of the story. Do she and Rhett patch things up and live Happily Ever After at Tara??? (I hope so; they deserved each other and I feel like they did have a depth of character to turn their lives around for good; they had so much potential!)
Mitchell died at 49 and this was the one and only novel she wrote in her career, so we’ll never know how she may have envisioned the story panning out.
Content warnings. A lot for such an old book; it must have been truly scandalous at the time of publication. References to prostitution. Regular racial slurs and derogatory comments related to people of various ethnicities. References to the Ku Klux Clan. Innuendo. Domestic abuse. Miscarriage and death of children.
The Sea of Monsters: Percy Jackson and the Olympians (Book 2) by Rick Riordan *4 stars
This book was fine. It was 3-stars for me, but 5-stars for my son (he really loves these books), which makes it 4 stars for me because I love his enthusiasm.
I felt like the link between Percy Jackson and Harry Potter wasn’t nearly as overt in this book.
Content warnings. Peril and violence.
Heft by Liz Moore *5 stars
This book was… surprising. But it made me think and pulled me in from the start to the finish (okay, it dragged a little bit in the middle section).
I was left wanting to know more, but did feel satisfied with how the book ended. (Note, this has a very different vibe from The God of the Woods!!)
Content warnings. Substance abuse and suicide. Strong language. References to domestic abuse and violence. Some derogatory references to obesity.
Cannery Row by John Steinbeck *3 stars
Meh.
A few portions of the writing were phenomenal, as one would expect from Steinbeck, but I didn’t really “get” the point of this book.
I wouldn’t say there’s no plot, but I would say there is no real resolution of any sort. There were moments and characters I enjoyed, but overall, I kept waiting for the story to turn into something more than it was.
I’m glad I’ve read another book from Steinbeck’s canon, but I will almost certainly never revisit this one.
Content warnings. Strong language. References to suicide and violence.
TOP PICKS FOR AUGUST
- Fiction. No contest on this one. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell! A classic—epic—book. I’m so glad I finally got around to reading it. Runner-up would be Heft by Liz Moore.
- Non-fiction. Also no contest. My last non-fiction read of the month was the best. The Irish Goodbye: Micro-Memoirs by Beth Ann Fennelly wins for my top pick of the month.
Your turn:
- What was your favourite book in August?
- Last book you DNF’d?
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You read so much ( depessing) non-fiction! I don’t think I could take it.
I DNFed The Phone Book ( cute but started to annoy me – I should have tried a chapter at a time. ), Unreliable Narrator ( did not like any character), and a few others. I tried a lot of different books at least.
I reread a bunch of old Emma Latham mysteries- older novels tend to be shorter- do authors get paid by the word these days? I like a streamlined plot. Her books also featured a different industry/finance issue in each, whichi found really interesting. They are a product of their decade, so some desciptions/attitudes of characters differed from what you might be used to. Favorite Book? Maybe none. I liked the Spellshop series ( recommended by NGS) and A Trade of Blood by Robert Jackson Bennet. Very different moods! Daggerbound by T Kingfisher was good but not much different than the first in the series. So nothing I would recommend unreservedly.
It was a lot of depressing non-fiction. It was what happened to be available last month but… yikes. That said, I don’t feel oppressive sadness when I read non-fiction because I feel like it accomplishes something for the author and informs me more about humans and resilience, etc?
I struggle a lot more to read depressing fiction!
Ooh! My takeaway is that I need to get my hands on a copy of Heft ASAP.
July was kind of a meh reading month and so was August, so now it’s up to September to break the curse. Things are starting off well with Good People, which was a joint you/Nicole rave. At first all that I had to go on is that I liked the voice and the tone of the book, and then the story built up and I am DYING to finish it. I’m at 80% and it reads quickly so the odds are high that I will finish it today.
My last DNF was Lost Lambs and I’m pretty sure that my next DNF will be You With the Sad Eyes by Christina Applegate. Kyria and I listened to 50% of it on our road trip, and I’m not sure that I can bear to go back to it. I’m going to catch up my podcast queue and see how I feel after that. It’s a very good book but it’s so sad.
I don’t think Heft will be for everyone, but it really surprised me by how much it pulled me in!
I LOVED Good People. It really left me pondering a lot after I finished the book. I hope you love it as much as I did. A very compelling read.
I have You With the Sad Eyes on my TBR, but we’ll see how I feel once it comes in and I’ve started it. Definitely everything I’ve heard made it seem like an intense read.
I am laughing a little at your nonfiction choices for the month- they seem VERY depressing! But, Gone With the Wind!!!! A big huge yes to everything you said. It’s an incredible book, and I can’t believe I didn’t read it until last year. Birchie and I did a buddy read, and we both just flew through it.
The best book I read in August was Lady Tremaine! It was so good.
Jenny, they WERE depressing. I didn’t set out to do that and for some inexplicable reason (it should be the opposite), I feel a bit less depressed by non-fiction that’s depressing.
GWTW was EPIC!
I am still on the waitlist for Lady Tremaine. I CANNOT WAIT for it to come in; everyone who has talked about it has shared positive feedback.
I LOVED Hamnet. Then I was very lukewarm about The Disappearing Act of Esme Lennox. And then very on the fence about the Marriage Portrait. O’Farrell’s writing is beautiful, but she was a way of leveraging trauma that I find …. I don’t know… manipulative, maybe? It’s as if she takes these very terrible things (sometimes very cliched terrible things) and packages them in gorgeous prose so you feel okay about it, or it makes the trauma feel worth reading about. Anyhow, I’m always intrigued by her books, but they aren’t going to rise to the top of my TBR as quickly anymore.
My favorite book I read in August was Dolly All The Time – it was the right blend of romance and reality for me. I keep re-reading it because I want to hang out with these characters forever.
Etna by Paul Yoon was also very good. It’s told from a Dog’s perspective. It’s an adult book, but the kids and I listened to it together an they were rivetted.
Speaking of short essay books – Have you read any books by Amy Krause Rosenthal? She wrote two books of short memoir-ish essays that were very funny, poignant, and true. (Textbook and Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life) – you might enjoy them. She passed away at age 51 from cancer.
Also Sarah Ruhl, a playwright, wrote a book called 100 Essays I Didn’t Have Time to Write. It gets a little in the weeds about being a theatre artist and what it means to be creative, but she also muses on how parenthood fits in with that life. I really enjoyed that book.
Thanks for these suggestions! I’ve just added multiple books to my TBR.
I am on the waitlist for Dolly All the Time. I LOVED Norah Goes Off Script, was so-so about Summer Romance, but am really excited for Dolly as I’ve heard really good things.
The Virginia Giuffre is such a sad book but I am glad I read it. I had some excellent reads in August and I honestly can’t remember the last time I DNFed a book, although I have no problem doing so.
These were stunning reads for me:
John of John – Douglas Stuart (great writing, interesting setting north of Scotland, father/sun complicated relationship)
The Things We Never Say – Elizabeth Strout – I’m in the process of reading the ones she’s written that I somehow missed.
Address Unknown – this short epistolary novel, about 70 pages, originally published in 1938 about two former business partners – one Jewish who remains in San Francisco, the other who returns to Germany at the high of Hitler’s rise. For such a short story it really packs a punch!
Good reads:
The Director – Daniel Kelmann – another WWII story about W.G. Pabst, an Australian film director at the mercy of the Nazis
Wild People Quiet – Tara Gereaux – about a Metis woman who passes as white in Saskatchewan. The title of the book refers to a quote said by John A. McDonald. Some interesting Canadian history
The House on Mango Street – Sandra Cisneros – vignettes from a young Hispanic girl growing up in her Chicago neighbourhood
A Marriage at Sea – Sophie Elmhirst – a British couple who set out on a sailboat and get lost at sea for months. I found the first part more compelling than the second half of the book.
Olga Dies Dreaming – my book club pick. This was my least favourite, some good characters, meandered a bit and the details on Puerto Rico, which is what drew me to the book, weren’t incorporated into the story well.
I just finished The Things We Never Say yesterday. Strout is an excellent writer, but I just find her books so relentlessly sad and depressing.
Thanks for all the recommendations; I just added some books to my TBR. (I think I started A Marriage at Sea and DNF’d it??)
If I remember, I’ll email you a few photos from Monterey’s Cannery Row area. (If I can find them)
The only one of those books I really want to read is The Irish Goodbye. I hope I can find it in my library!
The rest of those non-fiction —slim, fat, and none. Thank you for doing the recon on these so that I can skip them!
Ha! Happy to do the recon 🙂
I know there’s a follow-up book to Cannery Row, but I didn’t love the first book so might just skip the second…
I really enjoyed The Irish Goodbye, but I’m a sucker for memoirs and one with short essay chapters = MY FAVOURITE.
Wowza, those are some intense non-fiction reads. Holy moley, friend.
Mark LOVED those Percy Jackson books! Jake adored the Wings of Fire series. NEITHER OF THESE APPEAL TO ME. So I applaud you for reading his books!
I had a great month of reading, partly because I declared it to be Reread Month, and revisited some big-time favourites. But I also read Kin, Silver Sparrow, Good People, and The Sweet Spot, all of which were five stars. So TEN five star reads in total! What a great month!
I will admit that I would not be reading Percy Jackson if it were left only up to me. BUT, Indy doesn’t love reading books to himself, preferring audio books (which he listens to at bedtime each night), or having a book with me. And this series really holds his interest.
That is SO MANY 5-STAR books, Nicole. Woot, woot!
I loved, loved, loved Good People. Probably my favourite book so far in 2026, just because of how it made me feel. It was an intense subject, but written in such a compelling way.
You read a lot of books! Dang! I’m so impressed! Land is a DNS for me because I have found I don’t care for her deeply historical titles, like The Marriage Portrait and Hamnet. I love her contemporary novels, though! This Must Be the Place is my favorite of her works! You should read Heating and Cooling by Beth Ann Fennelly. Her ‘Great with Child’ book is also lovely!
You saw my book post so know I had a great month of reading! I’m anxious for Paul to get back so we can keep reading the 2nd book of the Nevermoor series. We are both really enjoying it! Harry Potter is too dark/intense for sensitive little guy but Nevermoor is working well for us!
It was a lot of books which seems OUTRAGEOUS since August was bonkers. But reading is one of my go-to stress coping mechanisms. Unfortunately, the way I read so many books was staying up way too late, so there is a demerit buried inside this whole situation.
I have read Heating and Cooling, but not Great with Child! Thanks for the rec.
I’m so glad you and Paul have a go-to series you’re enjoying together. That’s such a special bonding experience as a parent <3
You should read SCARLETT…the follow up to Gone With The Wind.
I keep hemming and hawing about this since there is an odd hangup in my mind that we have no idea how Mitchell would have finished the story, but I am very intrigued after hearing you talk about it! I’ll add it to my TBR.
Oops, The Director was about G.W. Pabst, an Austrian!!
Heft looks so good. Of course, I think GWTW is such an epic novel, especially for it’s time.
My friend, a lot of your August books looked pretty sad/deep/depressing, but you did fit in a lot of books. You need something light and funny for September! 😄
I think the best book I read in August was Dolly all the time. (Or was that July?) I also enjoyed The Mad Wife by Meagan Church.
It DOES look so depressing now when I reflect back, but I wasn’t making any conscious decision to read such tough books.
I am STILL waiting for Dolly All the Time (and I also have The Mad Wife on my holds list, too).
Sounds like some heavy reading, Elisabeth.
I skimmed a lot through How to Winter as well but did find it fascinating that SAD isn’t a thing in other countries like it is here in the US. We do burn firewood and have been splitting wood all summer long but somehow that still does not prepare me for winter. I have found having things to look forward to is key as is reframing my mindset– being “stuck” inside versus “getting to stay inside!” It helps a bit but I still mostly have a grin and bear it mindset when it comes to winter. My boys and I are huge Percy Jackson fans; I homeschooled them and we would listen to all of Rick Riordan’s books in the car while we drove to our various activities. In fact, we had to stop and see the Parthenon when we were in Nashville because of the books and it is one of our fondest memories of the trip.
I will admit I have no desire to split firewood, so hearing that it doesn’t really get you in the mindset for winter helps relieve any FOMO.
Yes to reframes: stuck inside vs get to be inside can be surprisingly powerful.
So many heavy books in a row! Do books not affect you too much emotionally? I really can only handle 1-2 heavy books for every 5-6 lighter books, but that might be the empath in me speaking. I get so deeply affected by heavy books and I find them such a struggle to read. Probably why I read so much romance! I’m always fascinated by people who can read hard books that make them sad, but it doesn’t upend their entire world. lol. I want that!!
My last DNF was The Blind Assassin, and I hope Nicole never sees this comment because I know it’s her favorite book of all time. I kept falling asleep while I was reading it, lol, and I figured it just wasn’t the right book for me right now. Maybe I’ll attempt it again in a few years!
I am going to write a whole blog post in answer to your questions, Stephany! Stay tuned.
I think falling asleep is a good sign the book should be a DNF (that or keep reading it because it’s so effective at lulling you to sleep; that alone isn’t a wholly negative thing… I struggle a lot with not wanting to put books down at the end of the day, so having one put me to sleep is tempting.)
I have read none of these books. Most don’t really intrigue me. But I love Steinbeck and I may see if I can read another one of his. Also I am on the fence about reading Gone with the wind so it might have moved up a notch.
Gone With the Wind is a major investment (it’s so long!), but I found it captivating and tremendously well written.
I loved Of Mice and Men… not so much Cannery Row. Both are quite short, though, which is nice.