Category: General

Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted December 21, 2024 by Nicky in General / 17 Comments

Happy Saturday! Last weekend before Christmas, and as ever I’m inundated with presents to wrap, ready to spoil my loved ones mercilessly.

Books acquired this week

I’ve been getting some early Christmas presents, which is lovely, along with some bribes (the two volumes of manga) to help encourage me when I was feeling meh and having difficulty getting up and getting to work.

Cover of What An Owl Knows by Jennifer Ackerman Cover of The Conductors by Nicole Glover Cover of Against Technoableism by Ahsley Shaw

Cover of A Gentle Noble's Vacation Recommendation vol 6 by Misaki and Momochi Cover of A Gentle Noble's Vacation Recommendation vol 7 by Misaki and Momochi

Aaand then while I was doing some Christmas shopping, I ran into a seasonal romance that sounded fun… And a bit more importantly, a localish queer bookshop had a window smashed in and lost a day of trade in the week before Christmas, along with the till being robbed. To show support, I bought a few more presents there, and also used the opportunity to snag the second volume of MDZS, and a book for myself that I’d been eyeing for a while.

Cover of Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation vol 2 by MXTX Cover of The Cybernetic Tea Shop by Meredith Katz Cover of Look Up, Handsome, by Jack Strange

And let me just take a moment to offer that bookshop a little more support, too: The Bookish Type are back up and running now, but a lost day of trading on the week before Christmas can be a big deal. They have a pay-it-forward programme where you can buy a book for someone who can’t afford it, and a large online shop. If you’re in the UK, I recommend taking a look (and I imagine the pay-it-forward option should work worldwide).

Posts from this week

As usual, here’s a roundup of the reviews posted this week:

What I’m reading

First up, the usual sneak peek at books I’ve finished reading which I plan to review soon! As you see, it was a quieter week around here than the last couple of weeks, but that’s fine! I’m making up for it this weekend.

Cover of A Gentle Noble's Vacation Recommendation vol 3 by Misaki and Momochi Cover of My Happy Marriage, by Akumi Agitomi Cover of A Gentle Noble's Vacation Recommendation vol 4 by Misaki and Momochi

Cover of A Gentle Noble's Vacation Recommendation vol 5 by Misaki and Momochi Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 10 by Akane Tamura Cover of A Gentle Noble's Vacation Recommendation vol 6 by Misaki and Momochi

As for what I’m reading now, there’s another volume of A Gentle Noble’s Vacation Recommendation awaiting me, for a start, and I’m already partway through a book of short stories that feature mysteries set at Christmas, Crimson Snow. Other than that… who knows?

Linking up with Reading Reality’s Stacking the Shelves, Caffeinated Reviewer’s The Sunday Post, and the Sunday Salon over at Readerbuzz, as usual!

Tags: , ,

Divider

WWW Wednesday

Posted December 18, 2024 by Nicky in General / 6 Comments

What have you recently finished reading?

The last thing I finished was apparently Tessa Bailey’s Merry Ever After, which is a short Christmas mystery that was too smut-focused for me. Because of the shortness, the relationship felt very sudden, and also it kinda seemed like the guy was lovebombing the female lead.

Cover of A Mudlarking Year by Lara MaiklemWhat are you currently reading?

Very, very fitfully, A Mudlarking Year, by Lara Maiklem. It’s due back at the library… several days ago, but I’m having trouble getting that into it. I liked her first book about mudlarking, but I guess the format of this isn’t working for me — or maybe one book about mudlarking was enough for me? It’s weird because in a way I’d expect to love the random nature of her finds and the bits of history she pulls out of them, but… yeah.

Maybe I’m just not in a reading mood.

Cover of A Gentle Noble's Vacation Recommendation vol 3 by Misaki and MomochiWhat will you be reading next?​

Most likely more manga, particularly A Gentle Noble’s Vacation Recommendation. I’ve not been in the mood for reading much this week, but if I want to meet my yearly reading goal, I’ve got 31 more books to go… so I might settle down and read a couple of volumes soon.

Tags: ,

Divider

Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted December 14, 2024 by Nicky in General / 28 Comments

A busy week for me, on the book front! Life-wise things have been mostly calm, just work and studying and so on, as per usual.

Books acquired this week

I didn’t expect to acquire any books this week, but… that’s not how it turned out, ahaha. First up, some library holds came in…

Cover of The Wood at Midwinter by Susanna Clarke Cover of Guilty by Definition by Susie Dent

Aaand then I also got an early Christmas present from my bosses at Postcrossing, and of course it was also time for the British Library Crime Classic release, meaning I got the new one via my subscription.

Cover of Around the World in 80 Birds by Mike Unwin Cover of Tea on Sunday by Lettice Cooper

And then while straightening out my wishlist right before setting my wife loose on it for Christmas presents, I picked up a couple of ebooks that were going cheap aaaand I also purchased a new light novel on a whim, just to see what this series is like.

  Cover of The Honey Witch by Sydney J. Shields Cover of This Will Be Fun by E.B. Asher Cover of An Education in Malice by S.E. Gibson Cover of My Happy Marriage, by Akumi Agitomi

As you see, I’ve given myself plenty to keep me busy until Christmas (and beyond)!

Posts from this week

Time for the usual roundup! Reviews first, as ever:

And just one non-review post, my What Are You Reading Wednesday update.

What I’m reading

As ever, here’s a sneak peek at the books I finished reading this week which I plan to review on the blog! As you can see, it’s been another busy week, helped along by novellas and manga.

Cover of The Apothecary Diaries volume 1, by Natsu Hyuuga Cover of The River has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar Cover of Murder at the Ashmolean by Jim Eldridge Cover of The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses by Malka Older Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 8 by Akane Tamura

Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 9 by Akane Tamura Cover of The Wood at Midwinter by Susanna Clarke Cover of The Big Four by Agatha Christie Cover of Immortal Red Sonja vol 1 by Dan Abnett et al Cover of The Dead of winter by Sarah Clegg

Cover of A Gentle Noble's Vacation Recommendation vol 1 by Misaki and Momochi Cover of A Gentle Noble's Vacation Recommendation vol 2 by Misaki and Momochi Cover of Cruel Winter With You by Ali Hazelwood

I’m going to be reading more of A Gentle Noble’s Vacation Recommendation this weekend for sure, but what else…? Probably some more of A Side Character’s Love Story, and finishing up with Michael Waters’ The Other Olympians, my current serious read, which is about the fascist and specifically Nazi origins of sex testing in sport.

But, as ever, it depends on my whims in the moment.

Linking up with Reading Reality’s Stacking the Shelves, Caffeinated Reviewer’s The Sunday Post, and the Sunday Salon over at Readerbuzz, as usual!

Tags: , ,

Divider

WWW Wednesday

Posted December 11, 2024 by Nicky in General / 2 Comments

Happy Wednesday! Here we go again.

Cover of The Big Four by Agatha ChristieWhat have you recently finished reading?

Yesterday I finished reading The Big Four by Agatha Christie — a book of hers that she didn’t think much of, that I actually… kind of liked? I’m still not a huge Poirot fan, nor a Hastings fan, but this one was just so dramatic and over-the-top, while not actually getting too deep into the seaweed to churn out red herrings and misdirections.

It probably helps as well that it was relatively short.

Cover of The Other Olympians by Michael WatersWhat are you currently reading?

I’m most actively working on The Other Olympians, by Michael Waters; it’s slow going because it’s a period of history I’m not personally fascinated by, and I’m also not that interested in sport history in general. I’m here to understand the Nazi underpinnings of sex testing for athletes, along with anything else they gifted sport with along the way.

Cover of Dramatic Murder by Elizabeth AnthonyWhat will you be reading next?

That’s a very good question, to which I mostly don’t know the answer. I’m reading a lot of manga at the moment, and I tend to read each volume all in one go, letting my whim guide me.

That said, if I’m going to do any of my seasonal reading, I should get to that soon, so maybe Dramatic Murder by Elizabeth Anthony, this year’s Christmas-themed reprint from the British Library Crime Classics series, or Miss Beeton’s Murder Agency by Josie Lloyd, a random pick from the library.

What about you, dear reader?

Tags: ,

Divider

Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted December 7, 2024 by Nicky in General / 26 Comments

I’m very much enjoying the advent season so far — as I’ve probably mentioned before, I usually go overboard on creating a custom advent calendar of gifts for my wife, a whole mix of things like craft kits, nerdy phone charms, books, etc. I watch out for people’s reviews of horror books all year (especially from Mogsy at The Bibliosanctum) so I can make some good choices Lisa wouldn’t otherwise hear about, since it’s really not my genre. So that’s a lot of fun, and adds a bright spot to every day.

Hope everyone’s having a good December so far, whether or not you’re celebrating any kind of holiday this month!

Books acquired this week

This week I got a couple of eagerly-awaited books to review via Netgalley: I love the Mossa and Pleiti books, and I’ve been adoring the Emily Wilde series. I also forgot to mention Neon Yang’s new book last week, so here it is!

Cover of The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses by Malka Older Cover of Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales, by Heather Fawcett Cover of Bright than Scale, Swifter than Flame by Neon Yang

I’m really excited to dig into these.

Posts from the last week

First up, the reviews!

And the only other thing I posted was my WWW Wednesday post.

What I’m reading

I have a long way to go to meet my stretch reading goal this year: as I write, I have to read 52 more books to meet my goal, and I haven’t given up yet! I’ve been reading quite a lot this week, finishing 17 things that count as books on StoryGraph (though a couple of them were very short, and there were a lot of graphic novels and manga in the mix). Here’s a sneak peek of the ones I plan to review here!

Cover of Machine Readable Me by Zara Rahman Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 4 by Akane Tamura Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 5 by Akane Tamura Cover of They Came to Slay by Thom James Carter

Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 6 by Akane Tamura Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 7 by Akane Tamura Cover of Breaks by Emma Vieceli and Malyn Ryden Cover of Snowflake Kisses by Jordan Greene & Yayira Dzamesi

Cover of Camp Spirit by Axelle Lenoir Cover of Cultish by Amanda Montell Cover of Star Collector vol 1, by Sophie Schonhammer and Anna Backhausen Cover of Star Collector vol 2, by Sophie Schonhammer and Anna Backhausen

I know, I know, it’s a lot!

Over the weekend, I plan to do a bunch more reading — for one thing, I want to dive into The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses, and there’s more manga I want to read, and I’m partway through Murder at the Ashmolean and Black Ops & Beaver Bombing

Suffice it to say, I’ll be keeping busy!

How’s everyone else doing?!

Linking up with Reading Reality’s Stacking the Shelves, Caffeinated Reviewer’s The Sunday Post, and the Sunday Salon over at Readerbuzz, as usual!

Tags: , ,

Divider

WWW Wednesday

Posted December 4, 2024 by Nicky in General / 6 Comments

2024 really is ticking to a close at alarming speed, huh? Here we go again, another Wednesday!

What have you recently finished reading?

Mostly comics and short graphic novels, playing with my new colour ereader. The last one I finished was Savage Red Sonja: Queen of the Frozen Wastes. I enjoyed Gail Simone’s run on Red Sonja, so I wanted to see if I was interested enough to read some other collections. Answer… maybe? It remains not 100% my thing, and I think I’d prefer it in the hands of female writers, but there is something enjoyable about just leaning into the tropes and letting Sonja rock her chainmail bikini.

Cover of The Spellshop by Sarah Beth DurstWhat are you currently reading?

I’ve been focused on shorter books for a bit, to match my tired-out attention span. In the background I’m slowly reading The Spellshop, which I’m enjoying well enough, but isn’t blowing me away — possibly due to the aforementioned attention span.

I’ve also started on Murder at the Ashmolean, by Jim Eldridge; the series is kinda shrug, but mysteries tend to work for me even when I’m not getting through books with more world-building and such.

Cover of The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses by Malka OlderWhat will you read next?

I just snagged a review copy of Malka Older’s The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses from Netgalley, so I’m inclined to read that right away — it’s just short enough that I can probably finish it in one go, which is another way to handle my short attention span. I love this series, too.

Other than that, I’m not sure!

How about you?

Tags: ,

Divider

Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted November 30, 2024 by Nicky in General / 25 Comments

Hurrah, it’s Saturday! I’ve been spending the day finishing up my wife’s custom “advent calendar”, but it’s time to think about books now!

Books acquired this week

I managed to get down to the library this week, hurrah! It was cold later in the week, but there was one warmer day that was perfect at the start of the week.

Cover of The Scholar & The Last Fairy Door by H.G. Parry Cover of Fated Winds and Promising Seas by Rose Black Cover of Miss Beeton's Murder Agency by Josie Lloyd

I keep meaning to try H.G. Parry’s work, and I’m pretty sure I have a book by Rose Black already on my TBR. As for Miss Beeton’s Murder Agency, it looks like a fun seasonal mystery! I enjoyed reading a bunch of those around Christmas last year, so I thought I’d give this one a shot.

I did get a couple of new books to test out my new ereader with, as well. It’s my first colour one, so I wanted to pick a book with colour, and also a manga to try out on it (since one of the reasons to get a faster ereader was to spend more time reading manga).

Cover of The Apothecary Diaries volume 1, by Natsu Hyuuga Cover of Penguins and Other Sea Birds by Matt Sewell

I actually got a few of Sewell’s books, but I’m not reviewing them all here — it’d be very repetitive.

Posts from the last week

As usual, here’s the round-up!

I didn’t do TTT this week, so the only other post is my What Are You Reading Wednesday post.

What I’m reading

First of all, let’s have a peek at what I’ve finished in the last week which I plan to review here! Here’s a sneak peek:

Cover of Blind Spot by Maud Rowell Cover of Murder in the Bookshop by Carolyn Wells Cover of The Pumpkin Spice Café by Laurie Gilmore Cover of Penguins and Other Sea Birds by Matt Sewell

Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 1 by Akane Tamura Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 2 by Akane Tamura Cover of The Secret Adversary by Agatha Christie Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 3 by Akane Tamura

I’ll be rereading more of A Side Character’s Love Story this weekend, and I think digging into Murder at the Ashmolean, by Jim Eldridge. I’d like to get round to more of The Spellshop, too.

And that’s me for the week! How’s everyone doing?

Linking up with Reading Reality’s Stacking the Shelves, Caffeinated Reviewer’s The Sunday Post, and the Sunday Salon over at Readerbuzz, as usual!

Tags: , ,

Divider

WWW Wednesday

Posted November 27, 2024 by Nicky in General / 0 Comments

Aaand it’s Wednesday!

Cover of A Side Character's Love Story vol 1 by Akane TamuraWhat have you recently finished reading?

It’s still a bit of a bad time for reading for me, but I did get provoked into being more enthusiastic by the arrival of a new gadget: my first colour ereader! So I read Penguins and Other Sea Birds, by Matt Sewell, which has colour illustrations — you know, just to test out the capabilities… It was cute, but I found that he exaggerated some of the weird shapes and features of birds, and the results are a bit visually confusing at times compared to looking at an actual photo.

The crested auklet image was shockingly accurate, though.

One of the reasons for me to get a new 7″ ereader was for manga, so I’ve also been indulging in a reread of A Side Character’s Love Story, since I have started to forget some of the characters from earlier volumes now I’m reading the new ones as they come out. I’ve only reread the first volume so far.

Cover of The Secret Adversary by Agatha ChristieWhat are you currently reading?​

Nothing very actively, despite my best intentions. I’m most of the way through Agatha Christie’s The Secret Adversary; I read that a bit a day via Serial Reader, but I might get the last issues delivered all at once and finish that up. It’s cutting me off at odd places at the moment, e.g. right in the middle of a character’s big reveals.

Cover of The Apothecary Diaries volume 1, by Natsu HyuugaWhat will you read next?

More of A Side Character’s Love Story, for sure. Other than that… I’m not sure. I’m tempted to give Natsu Hyuuga’s The Apothecary Diaries a shot, and I’m sure I have some other manga and graphic novels saved to lists to check out at some point.

It might also be a way of catching up a bit with my reading goal for the year. I was probably too ambitious, since I need to read 75 more books by the end of the year to meet it… but still, it’d be nice to get a bit closer.

How’s everyone else doing?

Tags: ,

Divider

Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted November 23, 2024 by Nicky in General / 23 Comments

Hurrah for the weekend!

I’m a little behind on comments/blog visits, but I’m finally starting to get back on track with my studies, so I’m calling this week a win. Looking forward to spending time today visiting other blogs, replying to comments, etc, etc.

Books acquired this week

There was no library trip this week owing to the wintery weather: first it was too cold for me to cycle without gloves, and then once the gloves arrived, sadly everything’s covered in ice. It’s supposed to warm up a bit this weekend, so we’ll see how that goes.

Nonetheless, I did get some new books! I discovered the Inklings series, from 404 Ink. They’re on a very random range of topics, in a way that delights me, so I’ve snagged quite a few — they’ll serve as quick reads to maybe start catching up with my reading goal for this year.

Cover of The End by Katie Goh Cover of Now Go by Karl Thomas Smith Cover of Blind Spot by Maud Rowell

Cover of They Came to Slay by Thom James Carter Cover of Machine Readable Me by Zara Rahman Cover of The Loki Variations by Karl Johnson

And I did also get a couple more books from my wife, namely these:

Cover of The New University by James Coe Cover of Stonehenge by Francis Pryor Cover of Breakfast Cereal by Kathryn Cornell Dolan

So as you see, it’s been a bookish week, and I’ve inhaled many of them already! (The Inklings books are quite short.)

Posts from this week

First up, the roundup of reviews posted this week:

And other posts:

What I’m reading

Well, as usual let’s start with a sneak peek at what I’ve finished reading this week…

Cover of All the Violet Tiaras, by Jean Menzies Cover of Breakfast Cereal by Kathryn Cornell Dolan Cover of Stonehenge by Francis Pryor Cover of Agatha Christie, by Lucy Worsley

Cover of The New University by James Coe Cover of The Loki Variations by Karl Johnson Cover of Now Go by Karl Thomas Smith Cover of The End by Katie Goh

As for what I’m reading over the weekend, I’m just finishing up with another of the Inklings books, Blind Spot, and then I want to finish Carolyn Wells’ Murder in the Bookshop and Sarah Beth Durst’s The Spellshop. I also want to get back to Amal El-Mohtar’s The River Has Roots.

I need to read 80 more books by the end of the year to reach my stretch reading goal, and it’s looking very far away and unlikely… but we’ll see how it goes.

How’s everyone else doing? Reading anything good?

Linking up with Reading Reality’s Stacking the Shelves, Caffeinated Reviewer’s The Sunday Post, and the Sunday Salon over at Readerbuzz, as usual!

Tags: , ,

Divider

WWW Wednesday

Posted November 20, 2024 by Nicky in General / 6 Comments

Wednesday again! Here we go.

Cover of The Loki Variations by Karl JohnsonWhat have you recently finished reading?

The Loki Variations, by Karl Johnson, which is a bit of a discussion of the various different portrayals of the Norse god Loki in popular culture (including, but not limited to, the MCU). I quite liked it: Johnson’s enthusiasm for Loki stories and the dissection of Marvel’s influence, treating the whole subject as serious and worthy of discussion (which it is), etc.

Loki stories aren’t entirely my thing, but Johnson makes me want to seek out a couple more just for fun.

Cover of The River has Roots by Amal El-MohtarWhat are you currently reading?

Nothing very actively; I have a few books on the go, but all of them have waited at least a few days since I last interacted with them, except for my current Serial Reader choice, The Secret Adversary. It’s Christie’s first Tommy and Tuppence novel. It’s… okay? I’m really not as much of a Christie fan as some.

Other than that, I’m partway through my e-ARC of Amal El-Mohtar’s The River Has Roots, which I’m enjoying, but needed to charge my ereader to continue with. I’ve actually done that now, so I’ll get back to that soon.

Cover of The Spellshop by Sarah Beth DurstWhat will you be reading next?

I’m just starting The Spellshop, because it’s a book of the month on the Bookly Discord. For the same reason I’m about to start The Pumpkin Spice Café, about which I see fairly mixed reviews. The theme was “cosy fantasy”, and as far as I can tell The Pumpkin Spice Café is a romance (and not romantasy, either), but I enjoy romance in general so I’m giving it a shot anyway.

I’m also likely to read some more of 404 Ink’s Inklings series, which are satisfyingly random in topic. Not sure which one, though.

How about you?

Tags: ,

Divider