Hello, everyone, my name is Olivia, and today I wanted to recommend you a couple of books
that are under 300 pages but still pack a punch and are some of my favorite books of all time.
These books are great if you are just a big fan of short books, if you want to reach a reading goal,
if you are in the middle of a readathon, if you want to break a reading slump. I think these
books are great for all those types of situations, but before we get into the recommendations, this
video is being sponsored by Book of the Month, so let me tell you a little bit more about them
before I give you my short book recommendations. I'm sure you can all recognize the iconic blue
box from Book of the Month. They are a popular and fast-growing online service perfect for all
types of readers. Their goal is to promote new and emerging authors to help readers discover new
books that they will love. Each month their team vets hundreds of novels and provides bookworms
with a curated selection of new and early release titles to pick from, so you could spend more time
reading and less time researching titles to add to your TBR. The picks for January are The Magnolia
Palace by Fiona Davis, Fiona and Jane by Jean Chen Ho, Love and Other Disasters by Anita Kelly,
Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson, and Reckless Girls by Rachel Hawkins. I am personally excited
about Fiona and Jane. This sounds like such an amazing read and the cover really calls to me as
well. It says it is a “witty, warm, and irreverent book that traces the lives of two young Taiwanese-
American women as they navigate friendship, sexuality, identity, and heartbreak over two
decades.” I am such a big fan of literary fiction, and this is also a really short book as well,
so I think I can fly through it, and I think it's going to be hard-hitting. I think it's going to be
insightful, and I liked how at the end it says that it is “a brazenly honest account of two
Asian-American women who dare to stake a claim on joy in a changing contemporary America.” I'm just
so excited to read this. I think it's right up my alley. I think I'm going to fall in love with the
story, and I cannot wait to pick it up. Another great thing about Book of the Month is that they
are risk-free, so if you want to skip a month, if you aren't feeling any of the titles, or if
you are in a reading slump, you are able to do so and you will not be charged, which is amazing for
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my description and use the code “LETSGO” to get your first book for $9.99. That is a brand new
hardcover novel for less than ten dollars, and that is not a deal you want to pass up. Thank
you so much to Book of the Month for sponsoring this video, and let's get into the short book
recommendations. I am so excited to tell you about them. So the first book that I want to recommend
is Open Water. On Goodreads, it says it is 145 pages. I am getting all these page counts from
Goodreads, so they are subject to change, so don't hold it against me if any of these books are over
300 pages. Open Water is a beautiful literary fiction told in a second-person point of view
following two young, Black artists in London as they fall in love with each other. So it's a very
short novel that I read in a couple of sittings, and it just captures the beauty and the essence of
falling in love for the first time. It discusses life in London and discusses life as an artist
and how these two different people come together to form this beautiful romance that has its highs
and its lows, and it just captures the beauty of love itself. Open Water is lyrical. It is
heart-wrenching. It has such beautiful lines that you will want to highlight forwards and backward,
and it is just such a beautiful novel that is so simplistic and it really packs a punch in such
a short amount of time. I've seen a couple of people pick it up on BookTube, but I want more
people to do so because it is just beautifully written, and I think it captures the essence
of being young and falling in love and living in a very big city. The next book I have to recommend
is actually 306 pages, but it is told in verse so I'm pretty sure you can read in one sitting.
That's exactly what I did, and it is Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds. If you're looking for a story
that will blow your mind and leave you absolutely breathless, this is the book for you. This novel
told in verse takes place over the course of one minute as we follow our main character,
Will, who is dead set on getting revenge for his brother who was recently murdered. So this
minute-long story follows Will as he is traveling down his elevator and people from his past are
showing up to speak to him. It is a novel that makes you raise your eyebrows when you hear the
premise because I'm sure you've never read a novel that takes place over the course of one minute,
but this one does and so much happens within one minute and so much thought goes into the
story as well as grappling with the idea of revenge, his brother's recent passing,
and how his life can be changed forever due to the action that he wants to commit. And it will
be a story that, once you start, you will not want to put down and you will finish it in one sitting.
It is beautiful. It is lyrical. Jason Reynolds’ writing is unlike anything I've ever read before.
He is just such a master at crafting stories that pack a punch but are very short in size.
The next story that I have to recommend says that it is 192 pages on Penguinrandomhouse.com and it
is called The Body in Question by Jill Climent. I picked this up because I am deeply fascinated
by sequestered juries. This is when the jury has no contact with the outside world because the case
that they are working on is so popular and spoken about that they cannot be influenced by the media,
by their family, so they are locked into hotel rooms and they only ever go to court and go
back to their hotel room because they really have to be protected from outside forces. I am
interested by this because I am fascinated by the trial itself for the People versus O.J.
Simpson. So I asked people on Twitter if they had a book recommendation for a jury sequestering and
someone delivered and they recommended The Body in Question. So The Body in Question follows
two different jurors during a three-week trial following the case of a toddler that was murdered
by their sister. These two jurors do not know each other's names. They only know each other
by their juror number, and they are staying at a hotel during this trial and they fall into a
very intense love affair. And during this affair, they learn that they are on different sides of
the trial. One thinks that the sister is guilty and one thinks that the sister is innocent. So
we follow these two different jurors as they have this affair and they are speaking about the case
and learning more about each other, even though they are strictly forbidden from speaking about
this case outside of the courtroom. So this is the type of novel where this relationship just
really affects every single person around them. It affects the case. It affects the other jurors,
and it affects their people in their personal life that they don't speak about because they have to
keep their lives very secretive as jurors. And I just thought it was a fascinating book because I
am very interested in what it's like to be a juror when they are not allowed to leave their
hotel room. They are not allowed to speak about the case to anyone else and they just have to live
a very closed off life, so this novel discusses how the sequestering affects their personal lives,
it affects their relationship with one another, and we are also slowly learning more about the
case as they go to court every single day. I do have to say I wish they spoke more about the case,
in general, rather than focusing solely on the affair, but the affair, alone, is so juicy,
so dramatic, so mind-boggling because it consumes them whole. And it's just so–
it is so wild. I also said in my Goodreads review that I could have done without the hefty amount of
ageism from the perspective of the protagonist. It was jarring to hear about to be honest. And
I'll be honest, I don't really remember a lot about the book because I've read so many books
in between reading this one, so I just wanted to mention that because Past Me pointed it out,
but Present Me can't remember a single thing about that, but I did want to point it out
either way. And I definitely do want to read more courtroom dramas, so if you have recommendations,
please put them down below. The next book that I have to recommend is Three O'clock in the Morning,
which is 192 pages according to Goodreads. I listened to this on audiobook and greatly enjoyed
it. It is a simple story translated from Italian following a son and a father as they travel to
Marseilles to get help from a very special doctor, and this doctor tells them that, in order to
complete this health trial for the son, they have to stay awake for two days straight. They cannot
go to sleep. They cannot take a nap, so the father and son decide to travel around Marseilles day and
night and just kind of stay awake for two days together as they reconnect because they do have
a very strained relationship after the divorce between the mother and the father. So the son and
the father are kind of hanging out for the first time together and they are staying awake together
for two days straight and they are having these discussions about their dreams, their past, their
desires, and the similarities that they share with one another that they didn't realize they had
beforehand. I also want to say that I recently got a pop socket and it's giving me some type
of attitude because, like, holding my phone like this, without having to actually hold my phone.
I'm sorry. I– if you get annoyed by this. I– it probably annoys everyone else, but I'm just like
this now. This is my personality now. Three O'Clock in the Morning is just a beautiful,
meditative story that just follows a fathering son as they reconnect with one another. They just
have these very deep conversations that I love seeing characters have. I love when a story is
dialogue-heavy because we get to really delve into their personalities. We get to see them
connect with one another, and I also think it's very special to watch a father and a son reconnect
after years and years of being strained and I don't know, I just really enjoyed it. I just love
reading about characters traveling to a new place, and I also love a good family exploration. So it's
really good on audiobook. I'm pretty sure it would be a beautiful reading it physically, as well,
but if you're looking for a short audiobook to listen to, I would highly recommend Three O'Clock
in the Morning. It was fantastic. The next short book that I have to recommend is actually a play,
and I wanted to include it because I just distinctly remember having an absolute
[ __ ] blast reading this, and I'm sure you've all read it in high school, and I'm sure you all hated
it but give it another try because it's really fun, and it is The Crucible by Arthur Miller. The
Crucible follows the fictionalized account of the Salem Witch Trials in Massachusetts. This follows
a group of people who are all being accused of being a witch. Everyone's accusing one another.
People are pointing fingers and the mass hysteria that is captured in this play is astounding. I
just love a good story with drama. I'm a gossiper. I love gossiping. I love hearing the chisme,
and The Crucible is exactly what you need if you love gossip. The Crucible is just like he-said,
she-said for like 200 pages. It is absolutely bonkers how the court system, at the time,
will just listen to this one random girl's account and say, like, “Oh yeah, she's definitely a
witch,” and they'll put that person on trial. It was bonkers back then. So in my Goodreads review,
I said it was a wonderful play depicting mass hysteria, how corrupt a government can get once
it intertwines between Church and State, and how easily people are just accusing one another and
pointing blame and to save their own skin. The Crucible is just– it's just such a great time
okay. I'm here to defend the amazingness that is The Crucible. I had a great time reading
it. I read it for fun because I never read it in high school because I wasn't in Honors English.
So if you want to learn more about the Salem Witch Trials, if you want to be easily entertained
like I was, if you want to read about John Proctor and like his attitude– my god that
story was great. I don't know I feel like Arthur Miller had a lot of fun with it showcasing the
ridiculousness of the characters while also showcasing the seriousness of the actual
crimes being committed with these people being put on trial without having representation and
there being no actual court system at the time. It was just– it balances out in a way. I don't know.
Read the– read The Crucible. It was really [ __ ] great. But the next story that I have to recommend
that is less than 300 pages is Before the Coffee Gets Cold. I feel like I'm the spokesperson for
this story. Before the Coffee Gets Cold follows four different stories within this novel and it
is all set at this magical cafe where you are able to time travel to any period in time, as
long as you get back to your present time before the coffee gets cold. So we follow the lovers,
husband and wife, the sisters, and mother and child, and these four different stories utilize
this magical cafe to talk to people from their past to reconcile, to speak to someone for the
last time, to have some form of closure, and it is such a beautiful story pondering the question:
if you can go back in time, would you? It is beautifully written and it is heavily
reliant on dialogue as these characters travel in time to speak to people from their past and
reconcile. And it's just a very endearing, soft story that can help you break out of a book slump
or provide you with comfort if you need something that is not plot-heavy, that is just very simple.
There's not a lot of action, even though we are dealing a lot with time travel. It's not intense.
It is just a beautiful story that will leave a smile onto your face and make you happy. I don't
know. This is like a new comfort read for me, and I really enjoyed it and I always recommend it to
people because I think more people should pick it up. The last short book that I have to recommend
I actually have a reading vlog all about, so I will be sure to link it down below, if you want
to see me talk more about it in detail, and it is Piranesi. Piranesi is 245 pages and it is unlike
anything you will ever read in your life, besides The Starless Sea. I feel like they are on par,
in the way that they're both very magical. They deal a lot with the love for literature and they
both have a whimsical setting that I feel like not a lot of authors can recreate because it just
takes a certain type of craft and a certain type of writing style to create these types of stories.
So Piranesi follows our main character, Piranesi, and he lives in a house full of endless corridors
and endless statues and there's an ocean at the bottom of his house and a sky at the top. Piranesi
lives with one other person called the Other, and every two weeks or so, they meet up together
to talk about the information that they are collecting about this house, but as they meet with
one another more and more, Piranesi is beginning to believe that another person lives in this house
with them. So the story starts there as we follow Piranesi as he delves deeper into this house.
He tries to figure out how it works, why he even lives there, why there's only one other person or
a possible third person in this house. And it's an atmospheric, beautifully written story that is so
magical and beautiful, and it's just so unique in a way. I haven't read a story like this. I haven't
felt so immersed and thrown into this lush world like I have with Piranesi and The Starless Sea.
I feel like it's the most slow-moving novel out of all of these that I have to show you, but the
slow-moving atmosphere is what makes Piranesi so great. I feel like, if you loved The Starless Sea,
you would absolutely enjoy Piranesi, and it's also shorter, so it's not as time-consuming as
The Starless Sea, which took me about a month to read. Piranesi, I think, I read in one week and
really enjoyed and it left a very big impact on me. So those are some short books that I
would highly recommend to you. We have a novel in verse. We have a traditional literary fiction. We
have a play to recommend, as well, and I feel like all these stories span so many different genres,
so I feel like there is something for everyone on this list. Thank you so much to Book of the
Month for sponsoring this video. If you want to check them out, click the link in my bio
and be sure to use the code “LETSGO” to get your first book for $9.99. If you have any short book
recommendations for stories that are under 300 pages, please put your recommendations down below,
along with the genre so people are able to pick out stories that interest them.
If you want to follow me on social media or check out my Patreon, all my links will be down below,
if you want to connect with me elsewhere, and I will see you in another video. bye~