The Book Blog - Learning Resources at St. Johns River State College

Goodreads snuck something new into my reading life this year: bookmark awards. At first, I thought, oh, that’s cute, but then I realized how much they feel like the sticker charts I used to obsess over as a kid. Shiny sticker for finishing my homework? Yes, please. Digital bookmark for finishing a mystery at the pool? Same exact joy.

The Summer Challenge (running July 1–September 14) came with a whole set of themed bookmarks to earn. Some are straightforward:

Page Turner – read 2 books
Speed Reader – read 3 books
Book Boss – read 5 books

And others are curated lists:

Challenge Faves – read one of the most-read books of the 2025 Reading Challenge*
Poolside Puzzlers – pick up a beach-ready mystery or thriller*
Chart Toppers – grab a hit new release from earlier this year*
Acclaimed Titles – go for an award winner*
Debut Darlings – a first-time author*
Lightning Round – books of varying lengths in a month or less*

(*These come with a list of qualifying titles)

I was surprised at how many of the books on these lists I had already read. Sure, I could have gone back and re-read them, but instead I went hunting for something new. Sometimes I’d spot a book I’d already marked as “Want to Read.” Other times, I’d just pick a book I knew absolutely nothing about. Both options kept things interesting—comfort picks on one hand, complete surprises on the other.

Of course, every time I checked a new list for “just one option,” I’d end up adding three (or more) new books added to my TBR. Needless to say, the bookmarks didn’t exactly shrink my stack, but they did make me excited about it again. And that feels like the whole point—especially during a reading slump.

Sunday is the last day to grab a Summer Challenge bookmark. A new set is dropping on the 15th, and I’m very curious what the prompts will be.

If you’re someone who loved stickers growing up (or honestly still do), these bookmarks hit that same sweet spot. Tiny, silly, motivating—and kind of addictive.

If you are on Goodreads: which bookmarks have you earned, and which ones pushed you to read something totally unexpected?

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Chasing Bookmark Awards

Goodreads snuck something new into my reading life this year: bookmark awards. At first, I thought, oh, that’s cute, but then I realized how much they feel like the sticker charts I used to obsess over as a kid. Shiny sticker for finishing my homework? Yes, please. Digital bookmark for finishing a mystery at the pool? Same exact joy.The Summer Challenge (running July 1–September 14) came with a whole set of themed bookmarks to earn. Some are straightforward:Page Turner – read 2 booksSpeed Reader – read 3 booksBook Boss – read 5 booksAnd others are curated lists:Challenge Faves – read one of the most-read books of the 2025 Reading Challenge*Poolside Puzzlers – pick up a beach-ready mystery or thriller*Chart Toppers – grab a hit new release from earlier this year*Acclaimed Titles – go for an award winner*Debut Darlings – a first-time author*Lightning Round – books of varying lengths in a month or less*(*These come with a list of qualifying titles)I was surprised at how many of the books on these lists I had already read. Sure, I could have gone back and re-read them, but instead I went hunting for something new. Sometimes I’d spot a book I’d already marked as “Want to Read.” Other times, I’d just pick a book I knew absolutely nothing about. Both options kept things interesting—comfort picks on one hand, complete surprises on the other.Of course, every time I checked a new list for “just one option,” I’d end up adding three (or more) new books added to my TBR. Needless to say, the bookmarks didn’t exactly shrink my stack, but they did make me excited about it again. And that feels like the whole point—especially during a reading slump.Sunday is the last day to grab a Summer Challenge bookmark. A new set is dropping on the 15th, and I’m very curious what the prompts will be.If you’re someone who loved stickers growing up (or honestly still do), these bookmarks hit that same sweet spot. Tiny, silly, motivating—and kind of addictive.If you are on Goodreads: which bookmarks have you earned, and which ones pushed you to read something totally unexpected?...

“Goddammit Donut!” or how I learned to stop worrying and love the Crawl!

This week, the Book Blog is brought to you by Professor Matt Giddings. He may teach history, but he knows a thing or two about fantasy! So, we’ve got to talk about Dungeon Crawler Carl.Boy, I love fantasy. And when a series or a novel gets a lot of buzz, I tend to hear about it. That’s what happened here – I had heard about this series for a while. The thing is, it's generally classified as a litRPG – a literal rendering of a computer role-playing game (as distinct from an adaptation of the plot of a role-playing game – think of the difference between reading a movie script and a novelization of a movie). I had some qualms about litRPG, if I can be honest with you. But earlier this summer, I was in Brooklyn at a local bookstore, and they had a copy of the first book in this series on the shelf, so I grabbed it. Later that night, when I was about halfway through, I ordered the rest. The series’ protagonist, Carl, is a Coast Guard vet living with his girlfriend and her purebred show cat (Princess Donut). One night, after seeing a breakup-worthy Instagram post from the gf, Carl opens the window, and Donut jumps out into the winter cold. Following Donut outside, Carl is trying to coax her down from a tree while shivering in his boxers when all structures and buildings on earth collapse, killing most of the human race. Wait, what!? (Go with me here, the setup is a bit of a thing.) You see, Earth and the human race have been chosen to be the set and stars of the galaxy’s greatest and most popular reality TV show, Dungeon Crawler World! Doors open up on the surface, and the remaining humans who enter are the contestants. Surviving is winning, and you have to kill to survive! Carl, having sought shelter with Donut, discovers her purebred nature and high stats make her a fellow crawler and not a pet, and thanks to some magic, sentient as well. So, off the two of them go on a bizarre and crazy adventure, involving camels, llamas, gnomes, dinosaurs, trains, sand, spiders, and goats, among other things. The series is in its 7th installment at this point, and frankly, Matt Dinniman (the author) pretty consistently hits it out of the park. The books are exciting adventures full of cool monsters (which you’d expect from the title), but also showcase Carl’s problem-solving skills – he frequently builds cool gadgets to outwit monsters. In addition, his relationship to Donut and the other characters is an unexpected and surprisingly thoughtful and touching one. The lit rpg element comes through as rules and elements of the game show – a deft way of handling what otherwise would be a potentially intrusive idea. Finally, the show itself, and the media coverage of the ongoing season functions as kind of a metaplot to the series itself. (Think of podcasts breaking down episodes of popular shows as they air, or of the stars of the show going on talk shows as the current season airs to discuss it). Frankly, the series surely sounds goofy when I explain it like this – but what else can I say? A guy and his talking magic using cat fight aliens in a fake dungeon on a tv show. But, buried under this shell lies a thoughtful story about reality TV, media, corporations, friendship, and family. It really surprised me! A final note: Dinniman self-published these as paperbacks – those are now hugely hard to find. The series blew up as ebooks, and that got him an audiobook and a new hardcover release. I’ve got the hardcovers, but my wife, having had me read funny bits to her over and over, got an audiobook to listen to, and they are amazing. Jeff Hayes, the narrator, does all sorts of hilarious voices and really captures the feel and flavor of the series. It’s also been hilarious listening to them with my wife and watching her reactions. So, do yourself a favor and give Carl and Princess Donut the Queen Anne Chonk (Grand Champion, Best in Dungeon) a shot. You won’t be disappointed! ...

Faculty Guest Blog: Lisa Mahoney

Readers come to stories in myriad ways. Friend recommendations. Book clubs. Best-seller lists. Perusing the library shelves. Deep dives into genres. Blogs, like this. For me, every so often, a title alone sinks its hooks into me, and I just have to explore it. I stumbled across one of my favorite books this exact way--through its enigmatic title: My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry by Fredrik Backman.This Swedish author’s claim to fame is probably his best-selling novel, A Man Called Ove, made into a Swedish film in 2016 and an American adaptation, A Man Called Otto starring Tom Hanks. Incidentally, after working closely with Hanks on the film, Backman gifted him a Swedish typewriter to add to his collection. I digress. Backman has many other titles to his name, and while all have received much acclaim (his latest, My Friends, was chosen for Jimmy Fallon’s Book Club) My Grandmother holds a place in my heart.Readers immediately fall in love with Elsa, the seven-year-old protagonist. Backman writes in the opening sentence, “Every seven-year-old deserves a superhero. That’s just how it is. Anyone who doesn’t agree needs their head examined.” Elsa is precocious and different and her only friend/superhero is her Granny. When Granny dies, Elsa is left alone to field life in all its weirdness and, per Granny’s request, to deliver a series of apology letters to people Granny has wronged. Despite being sad and angry at losing her Granny, Elsa takes her task seriously and embarks on an adventure meeting the quirky cast of individuals that have populated Granny’s fairy tales. Readers see in Elsa and Granny the complexities of being human and not only navigating a devastating loss but also learning to live. Ultimately, Elsa’s broken heart is mended. We’re all left learning much about family, forgiveness and ultimately embracing individuality. Backman’s storytelling is funny, heartwarming, and poignant, “One day at a time. One dream at a time. And one could say it’s right and one could say it’s wrong. And probably both would be right. Because life is both complicated and simple. Which is why there are cookies.” If a quirky title is all it takes to get you to read the rest of the book, check this one out. ...

Ranking Every Grady Hendrix Horror Novel & Short Story

Grady Hendrix is one of my favorite authors, and with Spooky Season coming up, what better time to start talking about some spooky books than now (not that I’ve ever needed an excuse)?As a disclaimer, this list does not include Hendrix’s self-published novellas, his early short story collection, or his nonfiction works, as these are not as widely accessible and many exist in categories outside the genre of horror. Below, I’ve ranked all seven of Hendrix’s mainstream-published horror novels, as well as the two short stories he’s published in the last few years as part of Amazon’s Creature Feature and The Shivers collections, which feature short horror stories by top authors in the genre like Stephen Graham Jones (The Only Good Indians, I Was a Teenage Slasher, The Buffalo Hunter Hunter) and Joe Hill (20th Century Ghosts, NOS4A2, The Fireman).9. We Sold Our SoulsOverall Goodreads Rating: 3.71/5 starsMy Goodreads Rating: 2/5 starsOne-sentence summary: Kris, a former heavy metal guitarist, fights back against a former bandmate who once betrayed her and who is now in league with dark supernatural forces.Relevant subgenres and tropes: Supernatural/paranormal horror, cult horror, vague slasher vibesThe premise was interesting, and it had a lot of potential, but it felt oddly lackluster and disappointing for what it was. The one thing he did successfully in this book is the thing that makes so many of his other books so great: the way he writes friendships between women. There just wasn’t enough of it for me to care about this book, like, at all. I thought the section where Kris and Melanie crossed paths was amazing, but I almost wish that they'd been friends the whole book, or that we'd at least gotten a more satisfactory ending for the two of them. As it was, this book felt underdeveloped, and the relationships between Kris and her bandmates (all men) just felt kind of so-so, while every woman who wasn't Kris or Melanie felt like an extra in a movie who had no personality.8. How to Sell a Haunted HouseOverall Goodreads rating: 3.65/5 starsMy Goodreads rating: 3/5One-sentence summary: Following the sudden death of her parents, a single middle-aged mother must travel back to her hometown to help settle her parents’ affairs and clean out the house while dealing with her man-child brother (and also some creepy dolls, puppets, and taxidermized woodland creatures).Relevant subgenres and tropes: Supernatural/paranormal horror, haunted/possessed dollsThis one wasn’t technically bad. I didn’t dislike it. I just got a bit bored with it by the end because there was a mystery, and it didn’t seem like anything was being done “on-screen” to solve that mystery. The dolls and puppets were pretty creepy and weird, and at points a bit upsetting. The squirrels were honestly kind of hilarious. While this one wasn’t my favorite, I’d still recommend it as a fair example of what Hendrix’s work is like—if you’re patient enough to get past some of the boring bits.7. HorrorstörOverall Goodreads rating: 3.65/5 starsMy Goodreads rating: 3/5 starsOne-sentence summary: A woman working at an Ikea-knockoff store is voluntold to work overnight while the store is closed to help solve the mystery of whether or not someone has been sneaking into the store at night—but the truth is way weirder.Relevant subgenres and tropes: Supernatural/paranormal horrorI think the most fun part of this book is that the physical copy is laid out like an Ikea catalog. There are diagrams and store maps in the front matter, and throughout, there are pictures of the furniture described in the book that get more and more unhinged as the story progresses.Other than that, much like the previous book, this book was just kind of boring. And much like the previous two books, it was lacking in the female friendship department. I wish there’d been more of that, and some more intrigue and more of an explanation of whatever the deal with the restless spirits was.I did appreciate the retail worker representation, and the night-shift worker representation in this one. A lot of this weirdly felt the same as working nights at Walmart when I was in grad school during the pandemic.6. My Best Friend’s ExorcismOverall Goodreads rating: 3.93/5 starsMy Goodreads rating: 4/5 starsOne-sentence summary: A group of girls spend the weekend at a friend’s parents’ lakehouse doing teenager things like swimming in the lake, going for walks outside, and playing with a ouija board; over the next few weeks, one of the girls goes through a rapid decline, and her friend determines she must be possessed by a demon.Relevant subgenres and tropes: Supernatural/paranormal horror, demonic possession, possession as a metaphor for sexual trauma, period piece (1980s)This was the second book I read by Hendrix, and I didn’t love it as much as the first one I read, but by this point, I knew what I loved most about his books: the way he writes women’s friendships. For a man, he does this tastefully and with incredible authenticity, which makes me feel like he must have grown up in a predominantly female household, or he was the only boy in his friend group when he was in school.Regardless, I loved this book right up until the actual exorcism scene, which I thought was really cheesy and embarrassing, though I did understand what he was going for. Up until that point, I loved the various character interactions, and I loved the main character’s commitment to her friend and finding out what was wrong and how hard she fought to help her. There were cringey moments—of course there were! That’s Hendrix’s whole thing—but nothing felt out of place or made me actually roll my eyes until the exorcism happened.5. The Final Girl Support GroupOverall Goodreads rating: 3.51/5 starsMy Goodreads rating: 4/5 stars (probably closer to 4.5 if I’m being fair, but I don’t like slashers)One-sentence summary: A member of a support group for real-life “final girls” (the survivors of slasher attacks) realizes someone is killing off the women from her support group and now must battle her own intense PTSD and social awkwardness, as well as the killer, to try to stop him before he kills anyone else.Relevant subgenres and tropes: Slashers, references to supernatural/paranormal horror and Lovecraftian/Eldritch horrorI initially rated this one 3/5 stars when I first read it, but after reading We Sold Our Souls and really disliking that one, I realized Final Girl Support Group actually wasn’t that bad. In fact, all the action, humor, drama, and gore were there, and there was an excellent mystery plot that was full of twists and turns. I just really don't like slasher movies, so I don’t feel like I probably got as much out of this one as someone who does like those kinds of movies might have. If you love slasher films, this might be an excellent book for you!4. “Ankle Snatcher” (part of Amazon’s Creature Feature collection)Overall Goodreads rating: 3.70/5 starsMy Goodreads rating: 4/5 starsOne-sentence summary: Ever since his father suffered a mental break and murdered his mother, Marcus has feared the dark and romantic intimacy; one night, a date sleeps over at his apartment—and makes the mistake of turning off the light.Relevant subgenres and tropes: Psychological horror, supernatural/paranormal horror, generational traumaThis is Grady Hendrix’s only mainstream-published work told from the perspective of a man, which I find fascinating. He’s very good at telling women’s stories, but I never considered until I read this that he never really writes about men’s thoughts and experiences, so it was interesting to see this shift in perspective.While this story and The Final Girl Support Group both get four stars, I definitely like this one more because I tend to prefer supernatural or paranormal horror over horror stories featuring humans killing other humans, and I think that’s what Hendrix does best anyway.Also, shout-out to the Discovery Channel, which was basically a supporting character.3. The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying VampiresOverall Goodreads rating: 3.79/5 starsMy Goodreads rating: 5/5 starsOne-sentence summary: A bored stay-at-home mom from Charleston, South Carolina, helps the new guy who moved in down the street get settled in after finding out he’s the nephew of the old woman with dementia who attacked her while she was taking out the trash, only to find out later that he’s a vampire who wants to take over the whole community.Relevant subgenres and tropes: Vampires, monsters, supernatural/paranormal horror, vampirism as a metaphor for sexual violenceThis was the first book by Hendrix I read, and even after reading all the rest, it’s still one of my favorites. This one really is Hendrix at his best, and this is probably the book I’d recommend first if someone asked me what a good book by him is, or for a good modern twist on the vampire novel. There are a lot of fun callbacks to other vampire books, films, and TV series, and lots of strong female characters.2. “The Blanks” (part of Amazon’s The Shivers Collection)Overall Goodreads rating: 3.95/5 starsMy Goodreads rating: 5/5 starsOne-sentence summary: Wealthy families staying on Jekyll Island live in relative peace and harmony amid the idyllic landscape—there’s just one rule: don’t look at the monsters that call the island home.Relevant subgenres and tropes: Supernatural/paranormal horror, paranoiaThis short story came out earlier this year, and I was really excited about it because I got to read it early, before it was published. Hendrix did not disappoint.While many of his earlier works have felt very kooky and campy and silly, this felt like a very serious, almost Stephen-King-esque horror story. There was no comedy to break up any of the tension. Hendrix told the story straight, and for the first third or so, it read like a simple summer story about a family on vacation. Then came the first sighting of “The Blanks,” monsters native to the island that are sort of hard to describe. But what they look like doesn’t matter so much as what they do, which the main character doesn’t exactly tell us at first, which adds to the suspense. The main character lets her son go ahead of her to the beach to meet his friends, and later, she learns that he saw a Blank attack another person. She asks him if he looked at it, and he swears he didn’t. If he did, it was only for a moment.But only a moment is enough.She becomes paranoid and locks her family up in their house, locking and barring the doors, shuttering and boarding up the windows, convinced that because the Blanks saw her son, they will come back for him.This story was only 35 pages, but it was terrifying. I think he could have stretched it out into a whole novel if he wanted, but I respect the decision to keep it condensed into a short story because this is one of the best things he’s written, and one of the best short horror stories I’ve ever read.1. Witchcraft for Wayward GirlsOverall Goodreads rating: 3.96/5 starsMy Goodreads rating: 5/5 stars (I’d give it more if I could)One-sentence summary: An unwed pregnant teen is sent to a home St. Augustine, Florida, against her will by her parents to have her baby and then give it up for adoption; along the way, she befriends the other girls in the house and together they learn the true meaning of friendship, love, and family, and that being a woman means supporting other women.Relevant subgenres and tropes: Witches and witchcraft, supernatural/paranormal horror, period piece (1970s), fantasyI struggle to agree with the classification of this as a horror novel. It wasn’t really scary to me (except for the graphic description of the protagonist giving birth, and the sense of discomfort and anxiety I felt throughout every time one of the girls was scared or hurt or sick), but it was an amazing book with some really interesting fantasy elements. I was impressed for a number of reasons, but mostly because this was a book written by a middle-aged man about a bunch of pregnant teenage girls. There was a lot that could have gone wrong simply because he was writing about an experience he has never had and never has to worry about, but in reality, there were only one or two things that made me go, “I… don’t think that’s how that works.” Hendrix did his homework, and he listened to enough stories from people who had been pregnant and given birth before to get those elements as close to accurate as they possibly could have been. Between this and “The Blanks,” I think Grady Hendrix is really coming into his own as a “serious” author.Copies of many of these works can be found across the three campus libraries....

Chasing Bookmark Awards

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