Another week without having purchased any new books! Surely I deserve some kind of reward, like a new bo — oh. Oh well! Here’s the books I’ve finished this week:

Plenty of reading this week — some of it very last minute, actually.

Just two books acquired this week — two review copies via Netgalley, Less Than Three Press and Hot Key Books:

I’m not a big fan of the cover, but apparently this is part of a set of books which will focus on aromantic and asexual characters. That I can get behind, and I enjoyed Sasha L. Miller’s The Errant Prince. So I’m excited about the whole idea, and I enjoyed the story.

And now the weekly roundup:

Reviews this week:

–Unnatural Creatures, ed. Neil Gaiman. Fun theme and a bunch of great stories, some old and some new. 4/5 stars
–A Portrait of the Brain, by Adam Zeman. Disappointingly simplistic and not really suited to my level of understanding, but probably a good starting point for those interested in neurology. 2/5 stars
–Impulse, by Dave Bara. A fun enough space opera that didn’t really shine. 2/5 stars
–This Savage Song, by Victoria Schwab. Monsters and humans and an interesting world set-up, oh my! I really enjoyed this and recommend it. 4/5 stars
–The Frog Princess, by E.D. Baker. A favourite of my sister’s, I thought this was cute, though slight and very much aimed at the middle grade. 3/5 stars
–The Castlemaine Murders, by Kerry Greenwood. It’s Phryne, so it was fun, but it was lacking the spark that made some of the other books great. 3/5 stars
–Flashback Friday: Memory, Sorrow and Thorn, by Tad Williams. This is a whopping big series with four huge volumes, which is about the only reason I haven’t read it since I was eighteen. It’s typical, in some ways: a scullery boy becomes… well, you’ll see. 4/5 stars

Other posts:

–Top Ten Tuesday: Books Recently Added To My TBR. What it says on the tin — some books I’ve got, some books I’m hankering after.

How’s everyone been doing? Hope you’ve all been reading tons, and adding great books to your shelves!

Not quite an Unstacking the Shelves week, but that’s okay because I don’t have many books finished, either! I’ve been trucking along with reading City of Stairs, but haven’t finished it. As you might expect, given my goal is to finish 365 books this year, I’m now behind! I’ve made my partner promise that tomorrow is all for reading (except for the bit where we go for a walk — I’ve just got a Fitbit, and I’m determined to get my 10,000 steps!).

Still, I haven’t bought any books this week, just received one ARC:

I’m excited to have got this, as I usually enjoy Joanne Harris’ work and this has the same setting as Gentlemen & Players and blueeyedboy, if I recall correctly. Looking forward to reading it.

And now for the weekly roundup:

Reviews this week:

–The Grey King, by Susan Cooper. An old favourite, and set in Wales, so no wonder it gets… 5/5 stars
–The Parthenon, by Mary Beard. Interesting, even if it didn’t focus on what I was expecting it to focus on. 4/5 stars
–Ruin and Rising, by Leigh Bardugo. Last book of the trilogy, and definitely worth it in my view. Loved the moral ambiguity at some points. 4/5 stars
–Murder in Montparnasse, by Kerry Greenwood. Another solid instalment of Miss Fisher solving mysteries, though not my favourite. 3/5 stars
–Lagoon, by Nnedi Okorafor. I found this interesting, but ultimately the pacing didn’t work for me, nor the treatment of LGBT characters. 3/5 stars
–The Mistletoe Bride & Other Haunting Tales, by Kate Mosse. Some interesting stories, but overall it felt kind of overwritten. 2/5 stars
–Flashback Friday: Young Avengers: Family Matters, by Allan Heinburg and Jim Cheung. A reminder to reread this whole series soon, I think! 4/5 stars

Other posts: 

–Top Ten Tuesday: 2015 Releases. Just shows you how behind I am, really…

Hope everyone’s well and reading more than me! Totally feel free to explore the week’s posts and comment, or go further back if you like — I always try to return comments!

It’s Boxing Day already? Where’d the time go?! Anyway, I hope everyone had a good day yesterday, whether they celebrate Christmas or not. I always think of Christmas as a time when I get stacks and stacks and stacks of books… but luckily for my TBR, it didn’t really go that far. Dad and my aunt got me a load of Phryne Fisher books (yay!), and between my parents, my sister and my friends, I got plenty, haha.

Anyway, I also popped by the library this week, where I picked up a couple of books…

I’ve been meaning to read all three of these for a while, so hopefully I’ll get round to them soon.

And here’s my Christmas haul!

My sister also bought me some hard copies of Tanya Huff books that I’ve been failing to get around to on my Kindle. And since I like to show off my geekiness, here are some of my other gifts…

As you see, my Captain America bear got a dressing gown, and slippers too. And I got hedgehog slippers, and Star Trek TNG uniform pajamas. And a shield backpack, because I <3 Steve Rogers.

And most importantly, a surprise from my dad — proper library steps which convert into a chair. You may remember my surprise giraffe, from last year…

So all in all, pretty awesome haul! What’s everyone else been getting? Anything special?

A quiet week, since I haven’t gone to the library (yet)! I got a few books from Robert, but most of them I either had already in ebook or left at my grandmother’s house for now. I also got my early Christmas present from Robert, and that looks really interesting — fantasy/mystery set in Cardiff!

What’s everyone else been grabbing? And don’t forget, I still have a giveaway running here to celebrate my blog’s new home!

First things first! You’ll no doubt have noticed that the layout of the blog has changed. Well, so has the host — The Bibliophibian is now self-hosted, courtesy of the amazing Lynn O’ Connacht (who provided the hosting and did the migration for me)! So you may find that you need to resubscribe, if you haven’t already. If you have any issues at the moment, that might be due to the DNS redirect still percolating through the system. If there’s anything wrong with the layout, please let me know so I can try to fix it — at the moment it’s been optimised based on my mother’s visual needs, as she has macular degeneration, but I want to do my best to make it accessible in general.

Anyway, to celebrate the new hosting, and the fact that I can now embed Rafflecopter, there’s a giveaway! There are several options for joining in, including following the blog, tweeting, commenting on a post and a freebie. So please do join in!

Back to the original purpose of this post. I’m still doing okay on not buying books for myself — two big boxes of books have come in for family members, though! I love getting ready for Christmas and buying people the perfect book.

Despite the buying ban, I did get some preorders arriving. These don’t count, since I ordered them before the ban came into place! (And with Amazon vouchers, at that.)

Excited to read Laura Lam’s books finally, and The Masked City should be a lot of fun too. I did also get a couple of library books, though not as many this week as sometimes!

I’ve been reading Sam Kean’s books one by one, so here’s the latest I’ve picked up. And I read Poison, so I wanted to pick up Charm. Annoyingly, the library had Beauty as well, but my library card was “maxed out”…

What’s everyone else been picking up? And it can’t just be me that “maxes out” their library card, right?

Just library books this week — my resolution is holding good, so far! Here’s hoping I stick to it (though I have put some books on my Christmas list, of course).

Feed and The Talisman Ring are rereads; the former so I can read the whole series, and the latter for sheer fun. Started Early, Took My Dog was a challenge read and ugh, I have not enjoyed it. It’s already winged its way back to the library.

What’s everyone else been getting their grubby mitts on?