Hi and welcome to another monthly overview!
August was a really weird month: the days seemed to fly by, yet the month itself seemed to go on forever. We had glorious weather, the hubby and I had the first two weeks of August off and spent most of them outdoors. There was lots of socialising and we had the nephew over for two days (going from the peace and quiet of zero kids to having a nine-year-old around for 48 hours was a bit full-on but we made it through 😅). I did made sure there were also quite a few relaxing days of reading in the garden.
After years of sharing my fennel with swallowtail caterpillars, I FINALLY spotted the “finished product” in the garden. It even struck a pose when it saw me aiming my phone at it 😂 One of the largest butterflies I’ve ever seen, it looked positively majestic and I’m still thrilled I encountered it.
Blogwise, I had a pretty quiet month as I was enjoying my hols and my reading time. As such, August was a fantastic reading month with a record number of books read, most of which I really enjoyed. I indulged in two rereads, The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires and The Stepford Wives, and it was incredibly satisfying that my most anticipated reads did not disappoint.
Honourable mentions to The Botanist, Black Lake Manor, Valentine, The Last King of California, I Remember You, Dogs, The Photographer and The Family Game (yes, all 4.5 stars!) but these were my favourite reads of the month:
In figures August looks like this:
August
Novels: 8673 pages across 26 books and one short story
Audiobooks: 42 hours across 6 audiobooks
And here’s what I did in August and some of what I’ll be posting in September:
What I read:
Malice, Keigo Higashino
Beast of Ruin, Ayana Gray
Absynthe, Brendan Bellecourt
Black Lake Manor, Guy Morpuss (review to follow)
The Botanist, M.W. Craven
Valentine, Elizabeth Wetmore
Orchids for Dummies, Steven A. Frowine
Goldfish: Your Happy Healthy Pet, Gregory Skomal
The Stepford Wives, Ira Levin
The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires, Grady Hendrix
Three Assassins, Kōtarō Isaka
The Hummingbird, Kati Hiekkapelto
Wildlife, Jeff VanderMeer
Bone Crier’s Dawn, Kathryn Purdie
The Last King of California, Jordan Harper
Nuestra piel muerta, Natalia García Freire
I Remember You, Brian Freeman
The Bay, Allie Reynolds
Stay Awake, Megan Goldin
Cats: A Celebration of Our Feline Friends, Julianna Photopoulos
Within These Walls, Ania Ahlborn
You Can Stay, Elle Connel (review to follow)
Dogs: A Celebration of Our Canine Friends, Tom Jackson
This Might Hurt, Stephanie Wrobel
Violet Made of Thorns, Gina Chen
The Photographer, E.S. Blake
The Family Game, Catherine Steadman (review to follow)
What I listened to:
Certain Dark Things, Silvia Moreno-Garcia
What Moves the Dead, T. Kingfisher
Things We Do in the Dark, Jennifer Hillier
Black Mouth, Ronald Malfi
Do No Harm, Jack Jordan
A Rip Through Time, Kelley Armstrong
What I read earlier but reviewed in August:
This Wild, Wild Country, Inga Vesper
The Bleeding, Johana Gustawsson
Black Hearts, Doug Johnstone
I also posted an excerpt from Whisper of the Seals by Roxanne Bouchard.
Let’s have a look at the books that landed on my lap in August:
Two additions to my Orenda collection, a drop dead gorgeous FairyLoot special edition, the latest Deliciously Ella cookery book, a techy thriller I got at a bargain price, the author of Bullet Train‘s latest offering and a highly anticipated sequel:
Four NetGalley eARCs, a mystery book from Vintage and too many 99p deals 🙈:
I hope you had a good month and that you are safe and well! Thanks for joining me today and happy reading xxx
Wow that photograph is fantastic, I’m very jealous! 😂
I’m so glad you loved Cats and The Stepford Wives!
Thank you!
Omg you read a lot! I’m impressed! As a fellow gardener I love that you see swallowtails in your garden. When we rented an urban garden plot we would also get stray fennel popping up and it was always a delight to see the caterpillars eating it. We moved and now have our own backyard (yay!), but I’m toying with the idea of planting a lot of dill next year to bring the swallowtails over.
Thank you, it was an exceptional month 😊 The caterpillars are really cute too, at least I always think so but people tend to disagree 😂 How lovely that you now have your own backyard! Wishing you lots of butterflies 🦋 💜
That butterfly is gorgeous😍😍😍. Another great month! Hope September is equally as good!
Thanks Tessa! Wishing you a great September!
Sounds like a brilliant bookish month and what a haul! The Botanist is on my list of August favorites and I loved Stay Awake as well… And I’m glad you enjoyed I Remember You as well. I love that photo of the butterfly! xx
Truly a fantastic month and a much too big haul 😳😂 Hope you love The Botanist as much as I did!