Hi and welcome to another monthly overview!
I can’t believe it’s May already! Where has April got to?! I felt incredibly fatigued during most of the month so I guess most of it passed in daze I remember nothing about but the good news is: this is my final week at my current job! It’s really weird to think that when I leave there on Friday, for the first time in almost 17 years I won’t be returning. It’s scary but also exciting and I’m looking forward to settling into my new job, but first, some time to recuperate! I have the rest of the month off, mostly due to overtime I had accumulated, and it’ll be really good to kinda reset and let go of the old in order to be ready for the new.
Bookwise, I had a pretty good month. Fatigue might have made me read a bit slower than usual but I read some really great books and the lovely weather allowed me to potter about in the garden, which was really good for my April audiobook stats.
Honourable mentions to Once Upon a Broken Heart, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Last to Disappear, Quicksand of Memory, Lamentation and Cinder (which was a reread but in Spanish this time) but these were my favourite reads of the month:
In figures April looks like this:
April
Novels: 5642 pages across 19 books
Audiobooks: 71 hours across 8 audiobooks
And here’s what I did in April and some of what I’ll be posting in May:
What I read:
The Fugitive Colours, Nancy Bilyeau (review to follow)
Once Upon a Broken Heart, Stephanie Garber
A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams
Jack & Jill, Kealan Patrick Burke
Insomnia, Sarah Pinborough
The Last to Disappear, Jo Spain (review to follow)
Cinder, Marissa Meyer
The Jigsaw Man, Nadine Matheson
The Cutting Season, M. W. Craven
Hotel Magnifique, Emily J. Taylor
The Book of Cold Cases, Simone St. James
What Big Teeth, Rose Szabo
Blind Spot, Paula Hawkins
Quicksand of Memory, Michael J Malone
The Dance Tree, Kiran Millwood Hargrave (review to follow)
Killer Fashion, Jennifer Wright
Life Sentence, A.K. Turner
The Dark, Sharon Bolton (review to follow)
Killing Eve (Codename Villanelle), Luke Jennings
What I listened to:
The Secret History, Donna Tartt
The Deepest of Secrets, Kelley Armstrong
The Book of Extraordinary Impossible Crimes and Puzzling Deaths, Maxim Jakubowski
The Eighth Girl, Maxine Mei-Fung Chung
The Club, Ellery Lloyd
Lamentation, C.J. Sansom
Night of the Mannequins, Stephen Graham Jones
FantasticLand, Mike Bockoven
What I read earlier but reviewed in April:
Little Drummer, Kjell Ola Dahl
Nothing Else, Louise Beech
Begars Abbey, V.L. Valentine
Keep Her Sweet, Helen FitzGerald
I also shared an extract from The Shot by Sarah Sultoon and Quicksand of Memory by Michael J Malone and I had a look at my first bookish quarter of the year in pie charts. What I’ve learnt from reading fiction is already at its 8th instalment, I never seem to stop learning 😁
Let’s have a look at the books that landed on my lap in April:
A whopper of a review copy from Orbit (seriously, you could kill someone with that thing) and three paperbacks I treated myself to:
A NetGalley eARC, two highly anticipated reads and two Quick Reads:
I hope you had a good month and that you are safe and well! Thanks for joining me today and happy reading xxx
LAST WEEK! I’mma dust off my dancing shoes!
🤣
If that’s what you read when you’re tired I don’t want to know what numbers you read otherwise ;-). I’m curious about The Jigsaw Man, I’ve had this one on my wishlist for a long time because of some rave reviews. So this week is all about lasts… I bet that’s quite emotional! Enjoy your transition time and I know I’m early but already best of luck on your first day at your new job (is it the same kind of job, I can’t remember.. I know I’m getting old :-)). Also on a final note, I can’t believe Orbit can send you a review copy you can kill someone with and other publishers can’t, I can’t wrap my head around that.
I enjoyed The Jigsaw Man, it’s suspenseful but also somewhat gruesome in places. No, it’s a entirely different job, I work for a huge multinational and I’m going to be working as a medical secretary at a GP’s practice. So far so good, but saying goodbye to my colleagues will be super tough. I had to pay import duties for the Orbit proof 😕 It’s a finished hardback though, so I do feel it was worth it 😄
And thanks Inge! 😘
I hope you have a wonderful last week at your job. Wow! 17 years! Best wishes for your new job. 🍾🥂.
I just realized I haven’t been seeing your posts like normal. Not sure why that is but I will figure it out or figure out a work around.
Thanks so much, Tessa 💜
Can’t wait to see what you think of The Dark! Hope you’re last day at work goes really well, and that you have a wonderful break before you start your new job! xx
Thanks Nicki 😘 I really loved The Dark, I was so happy to be reunited with Lacey!
I hope you will enjoy your break and best wishes for your new job! I hope you feel plenty rested by the end of May. xx
Thanks so much, Yvonne 💜