BOOKENDS: June, July, August, & September 2021

I fell off the entire book internet thing because work has been so much busier than I expected, and it’s hard to get motivated about books when a majority of my books are still in limbo because I cannot get a hold of my moving company to actually set a date. However, now that work has evened out a little bit and I’m reading a lot of new things, I’m more motivated to post again. I have also made the decision to pivot mostly to library reads and digital reading to save money! It’s definitely easy to get caught up in the consumerism side of blogging/bookstagram, and to me it should be about the reading rather than the accumulation of shiny things.


CURRENTLY READING

I am in between books, and realized I actually did bring The Big Book of Science Fiction with me! I haven’t read anything from it yet, and I’ve been focusing on review copies and library reads. I am in between other books too, as I like to read 3-4 books at a time aside from the anthology. I’ve been venturing into the horror genre a little bit more, and I’m enjoying it, although I generally read them during the day so I don’t keep myself up too late at night. 👀

📚 bookshelf pick  |  📓 physical review copy  |  📱 digital review copy | ⌛️ library/borrowed | 💾 ebook | 🎧 audiobook  |  💞 reread

📱 My Heart is a Chainsaw – Stephen Graham Jones (15%, thank you Gallery/Saga Press!)
📓 Yours Cruelly, Elvira – Cassandra Peterson (33%; thank you, Hachette Books!)
📚 The Big Book of Science Fiction – edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer (32%)


FINISHED READING

I read 10 books in June, 11 books in July, 7 books in August, and 9 books in September.

📚 bookshelf pick  |  📓 physical review copy  |  📱 digital review copy | ⌛️ library/borrowed | 💾 ebook | 🎧 audiobook  |  💞 reread

📱 Cool for the Summer – Dahlia Adler (Thank you, Wednesday Books!)
🎧 The Diviners – Libba Bray
📚 Beach Read – Emily Henry
⌛️ The Helm of Midnight – Marina J. Lostetter
⌛️ The Siren – Katherine St. John
📓 Chosen Ones – Veronica Roth (Thank you, Mariner Books!)
📚 Dick Fight Island – Reibun Ike
⌛️ Bring Me Their Hearts – Sara Wolf
📚 The Beautiful Ones – Silvia Moreno-Garcia
⌛️ Crying in H-Mart – Michelle Zauner

📓 One Last Stop – Casey McQuiston (Thank you, St. Martin’s Griffin!)
🎧 Lair of Dreams – Libba Bray
⌛️ A Master of Djinn – P. Djélì Clark
📓 The Queer Principles of Kit Webb – Cat Sebastian (Thank you, Avon!)
⌛️ Piranesi – Susanna Clarke
⌛️ Minor Feelings – Cathy Park Hong
⌛️ We Were Liars  – E. Lockhart
📓 The Agitators – Dorothy Wickenden (Thank you, Scribner Books!)
💾 Ice Planet Barbarians – Ruby Dixon
📚 Sir Gawain and the Green Knight – Anonymous
🎧 Before the Devil Breaks You – Libba Bray

📓 Earth’s Wild Music – Kathleen Dean Moore (Thank you, Counterpoint Press!)
📓 Faultlines – Emily Itami (Thank you, Custom House!)
📚 The Rakess – Scarlett Peckham
📚 Mythology – Edith Hamilton
⌛️ The World Gives Way – Marissa Levien
📚 The Outside – Ada Hoffmann
💞 Beauty Sleep – Cameron Dokey

💞 Before Midnight – Cameron Dokey
⌛️ Revelations – Mary Sharratt
⌛️ Ring Shout – P. Djélì Clark
⌛️ Tender is the Flesh – Agustina Bazterrica
⌛️ Black Water Sister – Zen Cho
⌛️ The Warrior Knight and the Widow – Ella Matthews
📓 The Inheritance of Orquidea Divina – Zoraida Cordova (Thank you, Atria Books!)
📚 Lessons in French – Laura Kinsale
💞 Sirena – Donna Jo Napoli

 


ON THE HORIZON

I recently updated my Edelweiss information, and now I have access to a lot of e-arcs. I tried not to go download happy, but three of these (The Ex Hex, Sea of Tranquility, and What Moves the Dead) are among my most anticipated. And for What Moves the Dead, as soon as I heard it was an Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” retelling, immediately shot to the top of the list and I was so excited to see it already posted as an e-arc. All of these fit an eerie, spooky vibe for spooky szn 👻👻👻.

📚 bookshelf pick  |  📓 physical review copy  |  📱 digital review copy | ⌛️ library/borrowed | 💾 ebook | 🎧 audiobook  |  💞 reread

📚 The Death of Jane Lawrence – Caitlin Starling
📚 Velvet Was the Night – Silvia Moreno-Garcia
📱 The Ex Hex – Erin Sterling (Thank you, Avon!)
📱 Sea of Tranquility – Emily St. John Mandel (Thank you, Knopf!)
📱 What Moves the Dead – T. Kingfisher (Thank you, Tor Nightfire!)


WHAT I ACQUIRED

It’s definitely time to get back into reading YA fantasy, because omg, so many good titles are out/coming out.

📚 bookshelf pick  |  📓 physical review copy  |  📱 digital review copy | ⌛️ library/borrowed | 💾 ebook | 🎧 audiobook  |  💞 reread

📚 Iron Widow – Xiran Jay Zhao
📚 Six Crimson Cranes – Elizabeth Lim
📚 Vespertine – Margaret Rogerson
📱Jade Fire Gold – June CL Tan
📱The Keeper of Night – Kylie Lee Baker


ON SCREEN

GAMING: I bought the HD rerelease of Skyward Sword, and I think the next Switch game I’m getting is Graveyard Keeper.

TV: I’ve watched most of Shadow of Bone, I really enjoyed Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Loki so far seems like a treat!

MOVIES: I have seen so many since settling in because with my Regal Unlimited card, it’s an easy, relatively inexpensive thing to do. The Green Knight and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.


PERSONAL

Nothing exciting to report as I’m still waiting to hear back regarding my stuff from the movers, and that’s been an adventure.

 

WRAP UP: August 2020

Halfway through September is a good time to do an August wrap up, yes? Time is such a weird thing with the pandemic, and I’m also still struggling about how I want to do this blog, but the more I think about it, the more I just need to do what I want, when I want, and if there’s a week of posts every month, then that’s the case! I know I wanted to do some writing for blog posts and otherwise last week, but with how things lined up at work, I ended up working nine days in a row with little to no time to myself, so that threw me off. I want to try to do three or four posts a week, and if I can schedule/write out a post or two a night, I can keep things on track.

Lately with the weather here in Colorado getting colder, I find myself more interested in keeping up this blog (but who knows how long that enthusiasm will last??), but I have to keep reminding myself that I’m writing for me and really no one else, because I like looking back on what I’ve read and how I thought about the things I read. I think ultimately I’m struggling with social media and Instagram in particular, because while that’s easier in a sense, I don’t feel like I’m getting much out of it anymore. I know I like buying books and collecting books, but I need to actually read them too. I also am making plans to clear out my shelves, reorganize, and weed out everything so that I feel motivated to read what I haven’t read and get rid of what I know I won’t read any time soon. With the library and places to buy used books, I know that if I ever want to read what I’ve let go of I know there will be opportunities to read them again in the future.

I’m also in the process of planning out my 2021 book bullet journal and tying in a book thoughts journal to go with it. I read a lot of books I don’t end up reviewing for one reason or another, but I would like to keep a personal book journal to have a physical thing to refer to in the future if anything happens to the internet!

I haven’t made much progress on any of my challenges and have been reading what I’ve been drawn to, and in August, that was a lot of shorter, easier reads because August felt more stressful with more full days than other months.

In August, I read:

  • The Goblin Emperor, by Katherine Addison
  • Letter From Birmingham Jail, by Martin Luther King, Jr.
  • The A.I. Who Loved Me, by Alyssa Cole
  • The Binding, by Bridget Collins
  • The Duke’s Stolen Bride, by Sophie Jordan
  • Television Was a Baby Crawling Toward that Deathchamber, by Allen Ginsberg
  • Sisters of the Vast Black, by Lina Rather
  • The Times I Knew I Was Gay, by Eleanor Crewes
  • Sex and Vanity, by Kevin Kwan
  • The Scandal of It All, by Sophie Jordan