Hi and welcome to another monthly overview!
It’s been a month, you guys! A month of highs and lows: we had the first week off, celebrated the hubby’s birthday and had a lovely Indian Summer, but then work stress hit and I turned into a tiny anxious bean for a while there. Feeling wrung out and more than a little blue, I struggled with reading (and everything else, for that matter), and as a consequence the brilliant first half of my bookish month was partially offset by the miserable second half.
As such, September has been a pretty average bookish month. I read some absolute corkers, started a series I enjoyed tremendously and can’t wait to continue (The Diviners! So good!) and for my Spanish book of the month I picked up a novella to even out the behemoth I read in August.
Next month I will be celebrating Orenda Books, which means I will not only be posting an Orenda-related post every day, I will also be reading some Orenda novels, and revisiting a few favourites. However, October is also the spooky month and I have some brilliant sounding reads lined up to get my spook on! Onwards and upwards!
In figures September looks like this:
September
Novels: 5038 pages over 16 books
Audiobooks: 63 hours over 7 audiobooks
And here’s what I did this month, and some of what I’ll be posting in October:
What I read:
The Night Visitor, Lucy Atkins
Off Season, Jack Ketchum
The Coral Bride, Roxanne Bouchard (review to follow)
Las manos pequeñas, Andrés Barba
Son of Rosemary, Ira Levin
Star Daughter, Shveta Thakrar
We Begin at the End, Chris Whitaker
Dead Perfect, Noelle Holten
The Ice Swimmer, Kjell Ola Dahl (review to follow)
The Shadow Friend, Alex North
The Once and Future Witches, Alix E. Harrow
Black Summer, M.W. Craven
Murder Ahoy, Fiona Leitch
Betrayal, Lilja Sigurðardóttir
Music and Malice in Hurricane Town, Alex Bell
Orfeia, Joanne M. Harris
What I listened to:
Scythe, Neal Shusterman
The Storm, Amanda Jennings
The Diviners, Libba Bray
The Inheritance Games, Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Playing Nice, JP Delaney
Spirited, Julie Cohen
I, Witness, Niki Mackay
What I read earlier but reviewed in September:
The Harpy, Megan Hunter
King of the Crows, Russell Day
The Bone Shard Daughter, Andrea Stewart
The Trials of Koli, M.R. Carey
The Raven, Jonathan Janz
I also unboxed the FairyLoot August box and shared excerpts of The Seven Doors and A Song of Isolation. I also talked about what I’ve learnt from reading fiction these last few months.
Let’s have a look at the books that landed on my lap in September (brace yourselves!):
A blog tour book, courtesy of Viking:
A proof copy, courtesy of Headline:
Three proof copies, courtesy of Orenda Books:
Four books, courtesy of my bookish benefactor a.k.a. Eva at Noveldeelights (thanks again, lovely!), two she had double and two she didn’t enjoy… Will one bookaholic’s trash be another bookaholic’s treasure? Stay tuned to find out 😄
Two audiobooks:
5 eBooks, all 99p bargains!
Two paperbacks: I fell in love with Music and Malice in Hurricane Town after seeing it on The Withering and I just had to get Tall Oaks after loving We Begin at the End as much as I did.
And two gorgeous hardbacks: one I picked up because of Rachel (ICYMI) and one I added to my BD order because of Don Jimmy (ICYMI). I won’t deny instant cover love had something to do with it too 😉
Well that took me a while to sum up 😳
I hope you had a good month and that you are safe and well! Thanks for joining me today and happy reading xxx
Lots of great looking reads there!
Right?! And the unread ones are all glaring at me accusingly 🙈😂
That is one impressive book haul! Hermit looks great but so does all the rest really! How did you like The Inheritance Games? I really enjoyed some of her other books but the title alone makes me think of Hunger Games and I don’t know if I want to read another novel like that…
Thanks Inge 😊 I really enjoyed The Inheritance Games, and I think you would too. No need to worry, it’s nothing like The Hunger Games, it reminded me more of Karen McManus and A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder. The games are riddles and puzzles to solve. If you’re on the fence, I’d say give it a chance.
Wow for a bad second part of the month, you did amazingly Kelly! Wow still in awe! xx
Thanks Nicki 😊 I know I really can’t complain, I just hate it when stress prevents me from reading, while I know reading is one of the things that help me forget about my stress 🤷♀️
Totally kicking you out of the “never get book post” club. 🙄
October is going to kick ass! You’ll see! And if not, we will still laugh our way through it because that’s what we do! Sisterhood and all that jazz. We may need traveling pants. 🤔
September was an exceptional month in terms of bookmail 🤷♀️ I’ll probably get nothing at all in October 😂 And considering everything I added to my TBR in September, that might be a good thing 😂
Sure, traveling pants, great idea, they’ll be full-length on me, and hit you mid-calf 🙈😂 How about a Sisterhood of the Travelling Scarf? 😂
Scarf! Bahahahahaha! 🤣🤣
It still sounds like a fantastic reading month to me! And that book haul is to die for. 😉 Here’s to October treating us well! I’m SO excited for all the Orentober posts starting tomorrow. <3
Yeah, I can’t complain 😄 Oc/Orentober here we come 😂