March 2025 Book Reviews

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Hi friends! Curious to find out what I've been reading this month? Well, check out my March 2025 book reviews! I've also made a new blog category "book reviews" where you can check out all my previous book reviews on asheycakes.

I am currently up to 16 books read. Considering my goal was 20 - 30 this year, I am doing well me thinks.

Previous 2025 Book Reviews:

• January 2025 Book Reviews (6 Min Read)

• February 2025 Book Reviews (4 Min Read)

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March 2025 Book Reviews

1. Fairy Tale - Stephen King: I went into this book without actually reading the synopsis and I was pleasantly surprised. It did feel like King kinda smooshed two completely different stories together in one book, but in saying that, if that's what he set out to achieve, then he did that. There were bits in the book that took me on an emotional roller coaster and other bits that didn't make sense. It was like Stephen King was kinda like, "okay, what can I do to make this story as crazy as ever?" It was an enjoyable, long read that took me a lot longer to read than I expected. If you're new to Stephen King, I wouldn't start with this book - I'd maybe go for something like The Shining or even Pet Sematary. I also kinda wished that we would have had more of the two worlds slipping into each other - I think that could have made the story just that much more chef's kiss. If you are looking for something other-worldly and want to literally step into a new world, then I recommend this book.

2. The Goodbye Man - Jeffery Deaver (#2 in the Colter Shaw series): Because I have been watching the TV show Tracker that was inspired by these books, I felt like we were going to get more of Colter Shaw doing what he does best - tracking. But that's only for about the first quarter (if that) of the book to set up the rest of the story - where Colter infiltrates a cult, and that's right up my alley. I love learning about how cults work and how people get indoctrinated into certain mindsets, and I also loved how there was a little twist here and there all the time. I didn't like how the author would back track though - like something would happen and we think Colter's in trouble but then it's like "Hey, nah I'm just kidding, Colter had set this up already" - I don't know whether I don't like it because I don't see it coming or if the writing style is just a bit different to what I normally read. But overall, I liked how we got a lot more back story of Colter in this book and I really did feel like I was alongside Colter for the ride the whole time. An easy read and I definitely recommend it if you want something that's a bit dark but also relatively quick and easy to read.

3. The Mind-Gut Connection - Emeran Mayer, MD: I honestly thought that I was going to pick up this book and it was going to teach me something new and profound but the only real new bit of information I learned was that IBS is a neural development disorder and we likely can't control whether we're going to get it or not. The rest of the advice is this book is to eat similar to the Mediterranean diet, take probiotics, eat probiotic rich food, and diversify your diet with lots of plants/whole foods. This is stuff I learned about when I first got diagnosed with IBS and I do love the Mediterranean diet. I found that the book was well-written, it would be easy for someone who didn't know anything about gut or brain health to understand. However, for me, it felt like some pieces of the puzzle were missing - like it didn't talk about potential side effects of things OR what someone might suffer from if they have IBS or Crohn's and I wanted more of that stuff. I also think that as it was written from a male perspective, there wasn't much about the female body and how that might link to IBS and I think sometimes Endo could play a role in things, women are more likely to have low iron/be anemic and stuff like that. I liked the book but I wanted more from it. I did just Google the author, and he has his own website that has lots of content written by women so that's a plus. Maybe the book is just a bit outdated but if you do have IBS or Crohn's, it's a good place to start.

4. Ushers - Joe Hill (Short Story): I don't know if this one technically counts as a book because it was a short story but I'm going to count it anyway. It was a super quick read and a really interesting premise where two detectives/policemen are interviewing a young man named Martin about suspicious deaths and it leaves enough up to the imagination that you can piece together what happens at the end. I really liked it and if you're looking for a spooky quick read, then I recommend this one. It would also be good to read if you want to get into writing short stories yourself. It's definitely one that hooks you from the get-go.

   
   

The next books on my list to read are: Lights Out - Navessa Allen (which idk if I am going to be able to get through omg), 488 Rules For Life - Kitty Flanagan, Sometimes I Lie - Alice Feeney, and The Forest of Lost Souls - Dean Koontz. I am hoping to keep up my reading pace so that every month, I can give you one of these book review posts - fingers crossed I can keep reading.

What's on your TBR list? Let me know in the comments below!

Thanks for reading,

Ash x

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