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Well, I didn't exactly "vow", which is a good thing because in addition to still working my way through literally hundreds of Umbrella Academy fanfics, in June I managed to read...two books <g>. My once again short list:

The Peacock Feast by Lisa Gornik - I'm not sure quite how to describe this one...it's a work of fiction based on a photograph the author found of a RL party at Laurelton Hall (in Long Island), which was the home of famous stained glass artist Louis C. Tiffany. The party, which took place in 1914, was called, yes, the Peacock Feast and the photo shows five young women with platters of roast peacock (ew) to be served to the guests. From that photograph, Gornik spins a tale mixing historical figures and made up characters; at the heart of the story is Prudence, now over 100 years old, who was a toddler at the time of the Peacock Feast and has only hazy memories of the event, which she witnessed from a hiding spot. Flash forward to present day; another old woman contacts Prudence, claiming to be the granddaughter of Prudence's long estranged brother Randall. From there, we zig zag merrily through time, sometimes learning about Prudence's young adulthood, sometimes learning about Randall's life, sometimes learning about Randall's son Leo and sometimes concentrating on what Leo's daughter Grace has to say to her long-lost great-aunt. My description here isn't great but the book is very good, with everyone's life story sufficiently interesting and with a few twists to keep the story moving (including a big reveal toward the end that...I'd mostly figured out). I'm giving this one an A-, only because it was a bit slow going at the beginning and sometimes it was hard to keep track of all the characters.

Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson - Among other awards, this book won the Pen/Faulkner Award for Best Fiction in 1995. It's part mystery and part scathing commentary on how people treat others who are different from them. The basic story: in...I wanna say 1954?...on the island of San Piedro (a fictitious island set off the coast of the state of Washington, near Seattle), a fisherman is found dead in the net of his boat, which is submerged in water. The local coroner gives the cause of death as drowning...but the victim had a serious head wound as well. Was it an accident or murder? Before the day is over, a local--who happens to be Japanese--is arrested for the murder of the fisherman. But did he do it or is the island still holding all Japanese people responsible for Pearl Harbor and their role in WWII? I really, really wanted to like this book--it won awards! Plural!--and ultimately I did, but I had a lot of issues with it as well. It's too long. The author goes overboard (pun intended) with descriptions, both of characters and of the scene. And he's oddly obsessed with male anatomy. Like, I didn't need to know (nor was it relevant to the case) that the victim was a vigorous but tender lover with a large penis that saw nearly daily action. Um, OK then! Award winning it might be but for me, this book was just a solid B.