Welcome to Levin’s Library

“I always like that thought, the way two people really did seem to grow into one. Or at least two overlapping parts, trees with tangled roots.” I started August with Beach Read. I absolutely loved this book. I read it in one sitting because I physically could not put it down. This is the first Emily Henry book I read and I fell in love with her writing. January and August are such lovable char...

“It hurts to want it all, so many things that can't coexist within the same life.” After I finished Beach Read, I ran to get this book. I didn’t love it quite as much, probably because I went into it with such high expectations, but it was still amazing. Again, we have opposites attract, but this time it’s a friends-to-lovers book that was so slow burn I wanted to scream. I read this on v...

“Sure I do,” countered Lila cheerfully. “There’s Dull London, Kell London, Creepy London, and Dead London,” she recited, ticking them off on her fingers. “See? I’m a fast learner.” I read the Shades of Magic series over the entire month, but I love them so much. The premise is that there are four parallel universes, all different, but connected by London. The protagonist Kell has the...

“We're all crazy, I believe, just in different ways.” This book was insane and the plot twist absolutely destroyed me. Theo Faber, a therapist, sets out to help Alicia Brenson, who has not spoken since she murdered her husband. No one knows why she did it, her life with her husband seemed perfect. There may be more to the mystery than there seems... 9/10 - Psychological thriller...

“To the person in the bell jar, blank and stopped as a dead baby, the world itself is a bad dream.” The Bell Jar is beautifully written, and short enough that it only takes a few hours. I enjoyed this book, although I think it needs to be read critically because it was published in 1963, so there’s some racism and antisemitism. Plath wrote the book about her own stay in a mental hospital. I ...

“The circus arrives without warning.”  This book immediately became a favorite. Two powerful magicians have been locked in a competition, set in a circus, since they were children. There is no way out, but to win. Morgenstern’s writing is so beautiful, and her worldbuilding is incredible. The story can be a little hard to follow, but it is so worth it. 10/10 - High fantasy...

“Inside her there was only the perfect, blank brightness of belief and desire. Desire is the cause of all suffering. The greater the desire, the greater the suffering, and now she desired greatness itself. With all her will, she directed the thought to Heaven and the watching statues: Whatever suffering it takes, I can bear it.” I am in love with this book. It was marketed as the Song of Achi...

“Mors irrumat omnia. Death f***ks us all.” I am, before all else, a Leigh Bardugo stan. I know a lot of people who didn’t like Ninth House, and I’ll admit that it’s nowhere near as good as her other books, but I still really enjoyed it. Set at Yale, Alex Stern is recruited to the Lethe, an organization tasked with monitoring the occult activities of Yale’s secret societies. I did ...

“I am writing because they told me never to start a sentence with because. But I wasn’t trying to make a sentence一I was trying to break free. Because freedom, I am told, is nothing but the distance between the hunter and the prey.” I absolutely love this book. The main character recounts his life to his dying mother in a letter he knows he will never send. He talks about his Vietnamese ...