Hi and welcome to another monthly overview!
September was a tough month. I was… well, “forced” seems the most appropriate word here 😬 to do quite a bit of socialising in my supposedly free time and it was nightmarishly busy at work as we were trying to sort out both covid and flu shot appointments on top of everything else. So far, I’ve managed to hang on by the skin of my teeth, but I do hope for some more peace and quiet in the very near future, so I can reset and beat this fatigue. Having just got my covid jab, I’m afraid beating my fatigue is wishful thinking, since I usually feel under the weather for about a month afterwards. I’m starting October fearing the worst and hoping for the best…
Despite the socialising and the fatigue, my bookish month was pretty great! I read less than I usually do, I think I also read a little slower, and I had a few duds, but I also had a record number of favourite reads. With the Indian summer we’ve been having, I spent a lot of time in the garden, reading but also gardening, so I managed to get through a fair amount of audiobooks. I am, however, a little disappointed that I read so little of what I bought this month. I’ve been trying to read as many books as I can when I buy them, to prevent an escalating backlog, but in September, I bought more books than usual and read only the one. I mostly blame the lack of time due to socialising 😂
Honourable mention to A Gift for Dying, but these were my favourite reads of the month:
In figures September looks like this:
September
Novels: 5600 pages across 14 books and one short story
Audiobooks: 62 hours across 10 books
And here’s what I did in September and some of what I’ll be posting in October:
What I read:
You’d Look Better as a Ghost, Joanna Wallace
Abandoned Scotland, Alastair Horne
A Gift for Dying, M.J. Arlidge
The Beaver Theory, Antti Tuomainen
Run Time, Catherine Ryan Howard
The Smiling Man, Joseph Knox
Stigma, Thomas Enger & Jørn Lier Horst (review to follow)
Nobody But Us, Laure Van Rensburg
The Blue Monsoon, Damyanti Biswas
The Sleepwalker, Joseph Knox
His Favourite Graves, Paul Cleave (review to follow)
The Turnglass, Gareth Rubin
Upstairs at the Beresford, Will Carver (review to follow)
The Tsarina’s Daughter, Ellen Alpsten
Yo no la maté, Fernando Trujillo Sanz
What I listened to:
Set My Heart to Five, Simon Stephenson
A Mirror Mended, Alix E. Harrow
The Adventure of the Egyptian Tomb, Agatha Christie
77 Days of February: Living and Dying in Ukraine
Perfume, Patrick Süskind
The Great Alone, Kristin Hannah
Holly, Stephen King
Immortal Longings, Chloe Gong
These Things Hidden, Heather Gudenkauf
Harlem After Midnight, Louise Hare
What I read earlier but reviewed in September:
White as Snow, Lilja Sigurðardóttir
Let’s have a look at the books that landed on my lap in September:
Two for the Orenda collection, a tête-bêche hardcover, a stunning FairyLoot hardcover and a short story collection:
Five 99p deals (whoopsie 😬😂) and one NetGalley eARC:
I hope you had a good month and that you are safe and well! Thanks for joining me today and happy reading xxx
Great bookish month! Those 99p deals keep getting me as well. I was just deliberating with myself about whether to pre-order one few minutes ago! 😂
Tempting, aren’t they 😂
Too tempting! I ended up pre-ordering the one I was deliberating over, and then another one came along but I’ve resisting it! 😂
Good for you 👍😂
I hope your October is much better than you are fearing and that you get some peace and quiet. I love my quiet time. I’m glad you had some great reads in between the socializing 😊
Thanks lovely 😘
That’s such a great bookish month despite the socializing! I hope the covid jab isn’t bothering you as much. xx
I seem to be having a better reaction to it than last time but I’m still tired, so it’s hard to tell, really.