Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge 2023 - November Update: Little Brother & Murder Among Friends

Happy Wednesday everyone!  I hope everyone's been doing well.  How is it already almost December?  Anyway, I've now completed twenty-two tasks of Book Riot's 2023 Read Harder Challenge.  The tasks I completed this month required me to read a book about activism and read a book with under 500 Goodreads ratings and I selected Little Brother (Little Brother #1) by Cory Doctorow and Murder Among Friends: How Leopold and Loeb Tried to Commit the Perfect Crime by Candace Fleming respectively.  Read on to see my mini reviews and my plans for next month:

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Little Brother (Little Brother #1) by Cory Doctorow is one of those novels I wish I had read back when it was new in 2008.  I've really been missing out for the last 15 years!  Plus, Kirby Heyborn is one of my favorite narrators and he gives a great performance here.  That said, it does get bogged down a bit with explanations of tech related things which slows down the whole thing.  Regardless, I'll have to check out the rest of the series some day.

My review is also on Goodreads.

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Murder Among Friends: How Leopold and Loeb Tried to Commit the Perfect Crime by Candace Fleming is a true crime book I've been meaning to read for a long time.  I spotted it at my library awhile back, but I'm glad I finally decided to pick it up.  I was also already somewhat familiar with the case going in, but Candace Fleming does a fantastic job of putting everything together and laying it all out.  If you're looking for a fascinating true crime read, you can't miss the story of Leopold and Loeb. Now that I've read this, I'm going to have to rewatch Alfred Hitchcock's Rope which was inspired by this and is a hidden gem.

My review is also on Goodreads.

Next Up For December: 

Read a comic or graphic novel that features disability representation.

My choice: The Oracle Code by Marieke Nijkamp - I've been meaning to meaning to try this author for ages and this seems like a good enough place to start.  Who doesn't like Barbara Gordon?

Read a book of short stories.

My choice: Wild Tongues Can't Be Tamed: 15 Voices From the Latinx Diaspora edited by Saraciea J. Fennel - I've been eyeing this at my library.  There are so many great authors involved in this collection.

Are you taking part in this challenge?  Have you read any of these books?  As always, thanks for visiting my blog and perhaps even commenting down below!