February is short and it has Valentines Day. I like to pull out a new romance to read in February. It can be contemporary, it can be a classic, it can be cross-genre. Here are some books I have read in previous years that I would recommend:

• Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
• Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
• Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
• Emma, Jane Austen
• Sense and Sensibility, Jane Austen
• Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen
• Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte
• Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare
• Sonnets, Shakespeare
• The Song of Achilles, Madeline Miller
• A Long Petal of the Sea, Isabel Allende
• Sonnets from the Portuguese, Elizabeth Browning
• The Princess Bride, William Goldman
• Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
• A Severe Mercy, Sheldon Van Auken
• A Midsummer Night’s Dream, William Shakespeare
• Anne of Green Gables, L. M. Montgomery (through the first three)
• Rilla of Ingleside, L. M. Montgomery
• Les Miserables, Victor Hugo
• Betting on You, Lynn Painter
• To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, Jenny Han
• Book Lovers, Beach Read, People We Meet on Vacation, or Happy Place, Emily Henry
• Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
• Universal Love, Alexander Weinstein
• Stay with Me, Ayobami Adebayo
• Normal People, Sally Rooney
• Fourth Wing, Rebecca Yarros
• If I See You Again Tomorrow, Robbie Couch

I noticed that I have read a lot of unconventional or anti-love stories this year. If that is your jam for Valentines, then here are a few of those:

• The Marriage Portrait, Maggie O’Farrell (Yeah, it doesn’t turn out too well for this princess)
• Miss Iceland, Audur Ava Olafsdottir (the real love here is between friends)
• The Vegetarian, Han Kang (a book about isolation, with failed love at every turn)

As for Valentines-appropriate books that I haven’t yet read but would like to:

• Me Before You, Jojo Moyes
• Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, Benjamin Alire Saenz
• Eleanor & Park, Rainbow Rowell
• Funny Story, Emily Henry
• The Love Hypothesis, Ali Hazelwood
• The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, Victoria E. Schwab
• Love, Theoretically, Ali Hazlewood
• ACOTAR series, Sarah J. Maas
• Iron Flame and Onyx Storm, Rebecca Yarros
• Better than the Movies, Lynn Painter
• Heartstopper series, Alice Oseman
• Divine Rivals, Rebecca Ross
• Legends & Lattes, Travis Baldree
• North and South, Elizabeth Gaskell
• The Thornbirds, Colleen McCullough
• Red, White & Royal Blue, Casey McQuinston
• On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, Ocean Vuong
• Everything I Know About Love, Dolly Alderton
• Imogen, Obviously, Becky Albertalli

Books that are being published in February that the experts (and fans) tell us we should be excited about:

• Three Days in June, Anne Tyler
• We All Live Here, Jojo Moyes
• Famous Last Words, Gillian McAllister
• The Queens of Crime, Marie Benedict
• You Are Fatally Invited, Andre Pliego
• Black Woods, Blue Sky, Eowyn Ivey
• Listen to Your Sister, Nina Viel
• Something in the Walls, Daisy Pearce
• Deep End, Ali Hazlewood
• Scythe & Sparrow, Brynne Weaver
• Needy Little Things, Channelle Desamours
• Rebel Witch, Kristin Ciccarelli
• Memorial Days: A Memoir, Geraldine Brooks
• Cleavage, Jennifer Finney Boylan
• Source Code, Bill Gates
• The Bones Beneath My Skin, TJ Klune
• Stone Yard Devotional, Charlotte Wood
• Booster Shots, Adam Ratner
• Nothing Serious, Emily J. Smith
• Air-Borne, Carl Zimmer
• Bibliophobia, Sarah Chihaya
• Victorian Psycho, Virginia Feito
• Pure Innocent Fun, Ira Madison III
• Nesting, Roisin O’Donnell

I also want to mention a book that was published in 2023, but has sprung to the top of the bestsellers lists. Why? It is by Mariann Edgar Budde, the bishop who delivered the homily for the inauguration a couple weeks back and confronted President Trump by asking for mercy for scared Americans and immigrants. Her third book, which is the one trending, is crazily (I mean appropriately) enough about being brave and is titled How We Learn to Be Brave. You may find it back-ordered, right now, but I’m sure the publishers are getting right on that.

Like everything I read last month is recommendable, though I certainly enjoyed some reads more than others. The only book I would not recommend, I am not even going to review because it is self-pubbed. Let’s forget that ever happened.

• Scythe (Arc of a Scythe #1), Neal Shusterman
• Miss Iceland, Audur Ava Olafsdottir
• Children of Time, Adrian Tchaikovsky (if you are that sci-fi type)
• Lucky Jim, Kingsley Amis (if you are an older Anglophile)
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain (if you are insistent on classics)
• James, Percival Everett

• The Vegetarian, Han Kang
• Beasts of Prey (Beasts of Prey #1), Ayana Gray
• Orbital, Samantha Harvey
• The Warden (The Warden #1), Daniel M. Ford

I have crammed the February TBR full of other books, too. I will never get through these, but I have a system for carrying over so that I don’t feel too guilty about that.

• Me Before You, Jojo Moyes
• The Secret of the Tower, Andrew Beattie
• The Angel Player, Andrew Beattie (ARC)
• Solito, Javier Zamora
• Julie Chan Is Dead, Liann Zhang (ARC)
• Wicked, Gregory Maguire (finish)
• The Eyes and the Impossible, Dave Eggers
• Love & Lemon’s Simple Feel Good Food
• Painted Devils, Margaret Owen
• Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, Benjamin Alire Saenz
• Hold Me Closer, Necromancer, Lish McBride
• Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut
• I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home, Lorrie Moore
• A Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole
• Eleanor & Park, Rainbow Rowell
• Creation Lake, Rachel Kushner
• Chain-Gang Allstars, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
• Red, White and Royal Blue, Rajani LaRocca
• Prayer, Timothy Keller
• ADHD Is Awesome!, Penn and Kim Holderness (finish)
• Save the Cat! Writes a YA Novel, Jessica Brody (finish)