booksdanilikes

Series plans, pt. 1

Hello Kittens! July is certainly off to an interesting start so far. How’s it going for you? I just had to send a correction email because I sent an email saying it was only the second week in June (no, it wasn’t just a typo. I literally forgot it was July). So there’s that.

In any case, today I want to talk to you about some reading goals that I have for the rest of the year related to series. I feel like I’ve either been starting or hearing about series books lately and there are so many that I want to start/finish. Reading a series is a whole different matter from picking up a stand alone novel.

You as the reader are going into the book with the knowledge that if it is good, you are committing a potential unknown quantity of your time to finishing it. Series are serious commitments for the reader. Plus, there’s always the chance that you get deeply invested into a series and then that series doesn’t get completed for some reason. As someone who likes order, I can’t tell you how sad I was that Sue Grafton passed away, and that she did so when she was one book away from finishing her Kinsey Millhone detective mysteries. Plus, let’s not forget the agony that is being a George R. R. Martin fan right now.

For today, I’m going to tell you about the series that I have either started and hope to continue with or finish this year. I’ll follow up with a post later this week of the series that I want to start before the end of this year.

Series I’ve already started (links to go to the Goodreads page for each series):

Furyborn (Empirium, #1)

Claire LeGrand’s Empirium trilogy. I’ve already read Furyborn and have Kingsbane on my shelves right now waiting to be read. I was also lucky enough to get an e-ARC of Lightbringer, which marks the end of this trilogy and will be publishing in the Fall (hopefully). I reviewed Furyborn earlier this year and am definitely invested enough in this series to finish it off by the Fall. It’s a Young Adult Fantasy series that features elemental magic and power-hungry angels meddling in human worlds, plus two awesome female heroines.

The Invisible Library (The Invisible Library, #1)

The Invisible Library Series by Genevieve Cogman. This series currently has 6 books published, with book 7 set to publish in December and book 8 already hinted at on the author’s website (although she says it’s a long way off). I just finished book 1 as part of my July TBR and really enjoyed it. It’s an adult Fantasy series revolving around the concept of alternate worlds and the preservation of creative thought through books. So far we have a Librarian, a dragon, a Holmes-like detective, and an evil villain with enormous power and a long-standing grudge. I might be able to finish the next 5 books before the new one publishes in December since they’re not very long.

Throne of Glass (Throne of Glass, #1)

The Throne of Glass Series by Sarah J. Maas. I read the first book in this series last month and liked it enough to continue on. I think this series is now complete with 7 books total (not including prequels or novellas). The books seem to get longer as you get further into the series. I’m not 100% invested in this series yet, so while I will be continuing on, I’m not going to make it a priority to get through all of the books by the end of the year. I think I’ll shoot for one additional book per month in this series. This is a YA series that follows an unwilling court assassin who is dealing with a corrupt and brutal king from within his own court. There was also a lot of hinting at Celaena’s past and the potential for it to impact the future, so I expect to see that backstory develop over the next few books.

Serpent & Dove (Serpent & Dove, #1)

Serpent & Dove series by Shelby Mahurin. I read the first book in the series and am keeping my fingers crossed that I get approved for the second book, Honey & Blood, on NetGalley. If I don’t get it, I might have to do something really crazy, like pre-order it or subscribe to a fandom box or something. I am deeply invested in this series and can’t wait to see what the next book holds. Originally this series was set to be a duology, but a little internet digging is turning up the information that Mahurin and her publisher have confirmed that there will be a third book. I don’t know if it will be a continuation of the original story or if we’re going to move on with new characters. This is a YA Fantasy series that follows a witch who ends up being forced to marry a witch hunter. It is equal parts romance and action and I loved the fact that the magic system demands a literal price at the time that it is used. It is the most unique magic system that I have come across in a while. I’ll definitely be finishing the next book as soon as it comes out and will be anxiously awaiting the publication of the third book.

Illuminae (The Illuminae Files, #1)

The Illuminae Files by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff. The first book in this trilogy was one of my favorite reads this year, so I will definitely be continuing on with the series and finishing it by the end of the year. I’ve heard the second and third books don’t continue the story in the traditional way, so I’ll be interested to see what kind of ending we get with the third book. This is a YA Sci-Fi book following young teens who are dealing with the fallout from a hostile takeover/attack of a planetary colony by a large and mysterious corporation.

The Murder of Twelve (Murder She Wrote #51) Murder in the Storybook Cottage (Book Retreat Mysteries #6) The Penguin Who Knew Too Much (Meg Langslow, #8) Fudge Cupcake Murder (Hannah Swensen, #5)

I will also be continuing with several cozy mystery series, including: the Murder, She Wrote series currently written by Jon Land, the Book Retreat mysteries by Ellery Adams, the Meg Langslow mysteries by Donna Andrews, and the Hannah Swensen mysteries by Joanne Fluke. While I’m invested in all of these series, they are all ongoing (as far as I know) and I won’t stress about reading every single published book in the series by the end of the year. I use these as escapist books when I get into a slump or when I just need something light.

Cinderella is Dead by Kalynn Bayron

Hello Kittens! How do you guys feel about fairy tale re-tellings? I am a fan of them, personally, which is why I jumped at the chance to read an upcoming release that is a re-telling of Cinderella. This is a YA fantasy book that features a black female lesbian protagonist. It is a debut for this author, who has signed a 2-book deal with the publisher. It’s always hard to know how a book like this will land in my area of the country, but I really enjoyed this read. It wasn’t perfect, but I honestly enjoyed this take on the classic Cinderella story and I was rooting for the protagonist throughout. Give it a try if you’re willing.

Title: Cinderella is Dead

Author: Kalynn Bayron

Author website: https://www.kalynnbayron.com/

Publisher: Bloomsbury YA

Publish date: July 7^th, 2020

ISBN: 9781547603886

Buy the Book: Amazon, Barnes and Noble

Summary:

It has been 200 years since Cinderella married Prince Charming, and all who live in her land know the story by heart…all the girls at least. Things have changed a little bit since Cinderella sat on the throne. First, there are a set of decrees that are designed to “protect” the women of this land. Things like curfews and rules about obeying their heads of households (all men, by the way). Additionally, a ball is held in honor of Cinderella’s fairy tale ending every year, but attendance is now mandatory for every young woman of marriageable age. Girls come to the ball to be chosen by their husbands. If they are not chosen by their third ball, they are considered “forfeit” and are sent to work as laborers in service to their kingdom.

This year, a young woman named Sophia is agonizing over the upcoming ball. She’s read Cinderella’s story over and over again. She knows it by heart, as do all of the girls in this land. The only problem is, she wouldn’t have chosen a prince for herself, she would much rather have married a princess. She is in love with her best friend Erin and has no desire to be “chosen” by any man at the ball. As she struggles with what her parents and her country expect of her, desperation sets in. Not content to accept her fate, Sophia begs Erin to run away with her. If they’re caught, they’ll be put to death and their families will suffer, but Sophia sees it as their only option. Erin, however, is not brave enough to turn away from their fate and endanger her family.

When the night of the ball finally arrives, everything goes wrong and Sophia ends up fleeing for her life. As she runs from the castle, she encounters a young woman named Constance who is a descendant of one of Cinderella’s stepsisters. Constance begins to unravel the tale that Sophia thought she knew and they both set off on a course to change this world for all of the girls who are still trapped in it. It won’t be easy. They’ll have to seek magic that they aren’t even sure exists and will still need to return to the castle to confront the evil king. No one thinks they will win, but Sophia and Constance know that there are no other options.

Why I liked it:

I appreciated that the original story was kept in tact, but that the author played with the interpretation of events. I think that Sophia is a well-developed character and the reader is invested in her personal growth throughout the story. There are some emotionally gutting moments in the story that the reader feels as viscerally as Sophia does. I also appreciated that Sophia’s inner monologue directly addresses what might feel like inauthentic moments in the plot. In particular, I appreciate how Sophia’s feelings about the witch are expressed in the story. Up until it was put on the page, I found her acceptance of Amina to be a little too convenient, but Bayron gives the inner monologue the authenticity that was lacking a little in the dialogue.

I really appreciate that we get a Cinderella (both in the character of Sophia and the original Cinderella) who is more of a warrior. I know Disney likes their happy, uncomplicated endings, but I like a Cinderella who has a little more depth to aspire to. The Cinderella that we get in this story suffered a terrible fate, but she was a fighter who was trying to do what was right for her people. Admirable.

What I would like to change:

We get thrown right into the story here, and that was pretty disorienting for me as the reader. We get a lot of information dumped on us at the very beginning, which feels a little awkward because the book is 400 pages long. I was left wondering what the rush was and it made the first part of the story feel clunky. Once that initial portion was over, we moved on to a little more action.

I also didn’t love Erin’s development in the story. I felt like the character was sacrificed but that her motivations didn’t line up with what the reader was told about her. She’s in a relationship with Sophia up until the ball and then she suddenly shuts it all down? Her first foray into marriage is with a highly abusive man and she doesn’t take an opportunity to run? I can understand her staying if the pattern of abuse was more established, but by all accounts she had a good home life and a reason to believe in Sophia. I just didn’t quite buy into that part as a reader.

Disclaimer: I received an electronic copy of this title from the publisher via NetGalley.

My library rating: Like I said, it’s hard to peg how a title like this will be received in my area of the country. There are certainly people who will object to it for a number of reasons, but I think in terms of my ability to recommend it to patrons, it still has a lot of potential. I hope there will come a day where I don’t need to worry about someone screaming at me or writing to the local paper because a Librarian recommended material that they consider “inappropriate” to their child. I hope it comes soon.

lemonade_icon 3 glasses of lemonade= a book that you could recommend to coworkers and friends you don’t know very well.

My personal preference rating: I gave this title 4 stars and look forward to the author’s next book.

The Shadows by Alex North

Hello Kittens! I was looking through my archives in preparation for writing this review because I just knew that I had reviewed The Whisper Man by Alex North sometime last year. I absolutely had to have reviewed it because I raved about the book to nearly anyone who would listen and recommended it to all of my colleagues who read thrillers. But, guess what? I must have been so busy talking about the book that I forgot to write about it, because there was no review on the site. I will not make that mistake again. Here today for your reading pleasure, I offer my review of Alex North’s second book, The Shadows. It is even creepier than The Whisper Man was. If you like spooky thrillers, then you need to clear your calendar for this book, because it is definitely worth the read.

Title: The Shadows

Author: Alex North

Author Twitter (no website found): https://twitter.com/writer_north?lang=en

Publisher: Celadon

Publish date: 7/7/20

ISBN: 9781250318039

Buy the Book: Amazon, Barnes and Noble

Summary:

Twenty-five years ago something terrible happened in the town of Gritten Woods and Paul Adams was an unwilling witness to most of it. As a young man, his best friend James got caught up with two other local boys who were nothing but trouble, Billy Roberts and Charlie Crabtree. Before the school year is out, Billy and Charlie will murder one of their classmates in a ritualistic effort to leave this world for a dreamworld that they have worked to convince James and Paul is real. That murder will tear many lives apart for many reasons, but the biggest one of all will be that while Billy is brought to justice for the crime, Charlie is never seen again. Did his sacrificial offering work? Did he die in the woods? Is he still out there somewhere? These questions will haunt everyone who was involved in the case then and have unforeseen repercussions in the present.

Paul left Gritten Woods as soon as he was old enough, severing contact with nearly everyone there. He hasn’t been back since he was a teen and only returns now because his mother has been placed in hospice care. Coming home is not easy and he is bombarded by the memories that he has been shutting out for so many years. He is forced to confront everything that happened then and works to figure out what actually happened wtth Charlie. Someone is leaving creepy and threatening messages for Paul in the present and this time he is determined to stand his ground instead of running away.

We also reunite with Detective Amanda Beck (who readers will remember from The Whisper Man). While she was not involved in the original case, a current case in her jurisdiction sends her looking for answers in Gritten Woods. What starts out as an isolated incident suddenly seems to have connections to the dark past of this desolate town. Amanda will be facing her fears and confronting her feelings about her job and her relationship with her deceased father, all while chasing a killer who seems to be pure evil.

Is it all just a story made up by twisted teenagers or is there something lurking in the shadows of Gritten Woods? Something that wants to finish what it started 25 years ago?

Why I liked it:

It’s seriously creepy right from the start. While we only have 2 books to judge, this seems to be an Alex North hallmark. He sets the scenes perfectly in these dying towns which are described as being lacking in purpose and opportunity. These are the places that people want to leave but often find themselves stuck in. These descriptions really add to the perception that the characters are going to become trapped in their situations.

I loved the twists in this book. It made writing the review a little tricky, because there’s one piece of information about 75% of the way through the book and it makes the reader re-evaluate everything they’ve read up to that point (as all good twists should). Once you know, you can’t un-know it, and I look forward to re-reading this title with that knowledge the second time around.

I also like that North gives the reader everything that they need to know for the story to make sense without twisting the plot too dramatically in an effort to shock the reader. I don’t love when authors make the bad guy at the end an unknown entity with motives that the reader would not have known ahead of time. North gave us all of the clues and I appreciated that, even if I didn’t catch them all at the time. I did peg one of the twists, but the second one caught me completely off guard and I loved that.

What I would like to change:

I wish that I had re-read The Whisper Man more recently before starting this. For me, Detective Amanda Beck started out as a stranger for me. I had to go back and re-read some reviews from the first book to remember her character. I really appreciated that she was there and that there was a reference to the “Whisper Man” case in this book, since it was like finding an Easter egg for the fans, but I really had forgotten a lot about her in the meantime.

Disclaimer: I received an e-galley of this title from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

My library rating: There are a lot of f-bombs and a little bit of gore in this book. I would probably be a little more selective about who I recommended it to. While it is a thriller, it’s darker than a traditional thriller and leans heavily towards horror.

lemonade_icon 3 glasses of lemonade= a book that you could recommend to coworkers and friends you don’t know very well.

My personal preference rating: I gave this title 5 stars. I have no idea how long we’ll be waiting for the next book from Alex North, but it will be an auto-buy for me for sure. This was no sophomore slump effort as far as I was concerned. I may have even liked it better than The Whisper Man.

Extra stuff:

The Mysterious Alex North

Alex North is a somewhat mysterious author at the moment. This is his second book written under this pen name and there is no author website or photo associated with him, only a Twitter account and some brief info on the publisher’s page. A little internet digging is suggesting however, that Alex North and Steve Mosby are one in the same (http://www.stopyourekillingme.com/M_Authors/Mosby_Steve.html#North). Mosby has 11 published works that might be worth a look, just based on how great Alex North writes. I’m not sure what the point of separating the works is at this point, but I can only guess that his work as Alex North is drastically different from the Mosby writings. Either way, it adds an air of mystery to Alex North’s titles.

Lucid Dreams

A good bit of the plot in this book deals with a concept called lucid dreaming. Lucid dreaming is a type of dreaming that involves the dreamer being aware that they are asleep and having the ability to control what happens in the dream (a simplistic definition). As it turns out, this is an actual thing. If you’re interested in learning more about it, I found a list of books on Goodreads that focus on lucid dreaming.

Goodreads list: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/19403.Best_books_about_Lucid_Dreaming

July 2020 TBR

Welcome Kittens! I hope you’re staying cool and getting ready to enjoy a safe and socially distanced holiday weekend. I’ve been busy planning my reading for the month, with the goal being to create a more realistic reading plan that I actually stick to. The best thing about reading is that even when things don’t go according to plan (*cough* last month *cough*), there’s no real consequence. As long as you’re reading something, you’re winning.

For this month, I’m breaking the TBR into a few categories. Category 1 is read-a-longs that I hope to participate in. Category 2 is ARCs that I need to get done before they publish. Category 3 is books that I would really like to get to this month, most likely because I borrowed them from the library and they need to go back soon.

(links are to the book’s Goodreads page)

Read-a-longs:

The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon. I got really behind on this read-a-long from last month, but I am determined to finish this fantastic book this month. This was a read-a-long over on oliviareadsalatte’s (one of my favorite booktubers) discord server. Technically it finishes this week and I definitely won’t make that deadline, but I’m going to read it nonetheless.

Malice by John Gwynne. This one is for the Shelf Space Book Club run by Jessie Mae over on Instagram. I really enjoyed the last pick, Kings of the Wyld.

Red Rising by Pierce Brown. This one was chosen by a Facebook Book club that I participate in.

The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin. This title is the July book club book for The Page Turners book club on Facebook. (Yes, I’m in more than one Facebook book club. Sue me)

ARCs:

Cinderella is Dead by Kalynn Bayron. Pub date is 7/7

The Shadows by Alex North. Pub date is 7/7. I just started this one today and it is definitely twisted.

True Story by Kate Reed Petty. Pub Date is 8/4

Everything Else:

The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman. Already in progress on this one and liking it so far.

Exit Strategy by Martha Wells. Also already in progress. This was my most recent Bookopoly roll for my book club and it’s pretty short.

Crown of Midnight by Sarah J. Maas. Library book.

A Blade So Black by L. L. McKinney. Library book and Alice in Wonderland re-telling.

That’s a total of 11 books that I’m committed to reading this month. Hopefully there will be more, but those are the top choices. I still have a few days of Bookopoly left, so that may throw a few curveballs in there, but the fun kind of curveballs. I will probably continue to let the Bookopoly board choose some titles for me even after that challenge is over. It’s fun!

June 2020 Wrap-Up

Hello Kittens! June has come to an end and it ended for me with a wicked case of food poisoning which dragged my stats for the last week way down. It’s a bummer, but it happens. I’m still reading more than I did this time last year and I’m really excited for the books I’ve got planned for July. Without further ado, here’s how June went:

Total Books Read: 15

(links here are to my reviews for these titles)

Serpent & Dove by Shelby Mahurin, Rated: 4 stars

Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson, Rated: 3 stars

Haze by Rebecca Crunden, Rated: 3 stars

Kings of the Wyld by Nicholas Eames, Rated: 4 stars

Giant Days, Vol.3 by John Allison, Rated: 3 stars

Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas, Rated: 3 stars

Furyborn by Claire Legrand, Rated: 4 stars

Home Before Dark by Riley Sager, Rated: 5 stars

Forensics by Val McDermid, Rated: 3 stars

Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells, Rated: 4 stars

The Vanishing Stair by Maureen Johnson, Rated: 4 stars

Followers by Megan Angelo, Rated: 3 stars

The Borrower by Rebecca Makkai, Rated: 2 stars

The Hand on the Wall by Maureen Johnson, Rated: 4 stars

The Return by Rachel Harrison, Rated: 1 star

If you’re keeping track, you’ll notice that only 6 of these are from my June TBR post that contained a total of 14 books. I’m giving myself partial completion points for that TBR, since I did exceed the total number of books read…they just weren’t the books I originally planned on. The joke’s really on me, since some of those books were on that list because they are ARCs with upcoming publishing dates and now I’m in a mad dash to finish 2 ARCs and get them reviewed in the next 5 days while still not feeling great. Will I ever learn?

Reading stats:

Personal Ratings

5 Stars: 1

4 Stars: 6

3 Stars: 6

2 Stars: 1

1 Star: 1

Format

Physical: 10

Ebook: 3

Audiobook: 2

Genre

Young Adult: 6

Romance: 1

Fantasy: 1

Graphic Novel: 1

Thriller: 2

Non-Fiction: 1

Sci-Fi: 2

Contemporary: 1

New To Me Authors: 10 (Maureen Johnson was new to me, and I did finish her Truly Devious trilogy this month, but I only counted her name once for these purposes)

Authors I’ve Read Before: 3

Total Pages: 5,283

Next month’s focus will be on getting some more reviews up for these titles and the one’s I’ll be tackling the rest of this month,

Happy Reading, Kittens!