Tag: weekly roundup

Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted May 24, 2025 by Nicky in General / 16 Comments

Happy weekend! I’ve had a slow start today due to fitting a work thing in this morning, but hopefully a weekend of video games and books awaits me. My exams are creeping closer, but I try to keep my weekends as calm as possible all the same. Nobody can be on 100% of the time!

I hope everyone else is having the kind of weekend they want, so far.

Books acquired this week

Okay, deep breath! As you may recall from last week, I’d ordered quite a few books as a treat after realising I’d waaay oversaved for my taxes. The books I got for myself were exclusively non-fiction this time, though I had a few fiction arrivals for other reasons. Let’s do the non-fiction first!

First, a selection of the V&A museum’s “Fashion in Detail” books…

Cover of Chinese Dress in Detail by Sau Fong Chan Cover of 18th Century Fashion in Detail by Susan North Cover of Underwear Fashion in Detail by Eleri Lynn

I’ve already read those and love them, I definitely intend to get more of these books from the V&A. But more about that when I post the reviews!

Next up, the somewhat more… random… non-fiction books! There is a bit of a history theme this time, no pop-science, though.

Cover of The Haunted Wood: A History of Childhood Reading, by Sam Leith Cover of The Medieval Scriptorium: Making Books in the Middle Ages, by Sara J. Charles Cover of Church Going: A Stonemason's Guide to the Churches of the British Isles, by Andrew Ziminski

Cover of The Butcher, The Baker, the Candlestick Maker: The story of Britain through its census, by Roger Hutchinson Cover of Medieval Graffiti by Matthew Champion

Finally, I did also get a small poetry collection, to test out what I think of the “Poetry Prescription” collections:

Cover of Poetry Prescriptions: Words for Love, ed. Deborah Alma

I did also get a book from my wife, received my preorder of a new book by Vivian Shaw, and seem to have forgotten to mention my latest British Library Crime Classic. So here they are, too!

Cover of The Disabled Tyrant's Beloved Pet Fish vol 1 by Xue Shan Fei Hu Cover of Strange New World by Vivian Shaw Cover of Cat and Mouse by Christianna Brand

So that’s a very exciting haul… and I’m likely to get some more books next weekend, as I’m meeting up with a friend specifically for the purpose of a bookshop trip. Usually I help him find more books than his budget will hold, but that doesn’t stop me stocking up too. Oh noooo… 😉

Posts from this week

As usual, a quick roundup of reviews posted this week:

I still have lots of reviews written up but unposted, but slowly we’ll catch up if I keep posting at this rate!

What I’m reading

Let’s start with the usual sneak peek at what I’ve finished reading in the past week! I’m fully caught up on writing reviews, but as ever, it’ll be a while before most of them are posted.

Cover of Rapture by Carol Ann Duffy Cover of The World's Wife by Carol Ann Duffy Cover of Sir Gawain & the Green Knight, trans. Simon Armitage Cover of Poetry Prescriptions: Words for Love, ed. Deborah Alma

Cover of 18th Century Fashion in Detail by Susan North Cover of Chinese Dress in Detail by Sau Fong Chan Cover of Underwear Fashion in Detail by Eleri Lynn Cover of Cold Night Lullaby by Colin MacKay

As you see I’ve been reading quite a bit of poetry — a number of these were rereads, because I was curious what I thought of them as an adult, and also whether I want to keep them, since these have all been kept at my parents’ house quite a while, since I finished my first degree. I’ll be re-reviewing these since either they were never reviewed on the blog, or they deserve the reconsideration a decade later!

As usual, I haven’t included any rereads I’m not going to review again, though there were a couple: I’ve been rereading The Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System and Vivian Shaw’s Greta Helsing series.

As for this weekend, my plans involve a return to reading fiction to try to finish off my Book Spin Bingo card on Litsy — though I’m also delving into one of my new books, Medieval Graffiti, and finding that fascinating. I’ll probably do some rereading, too, and generally try to follow my whim and get refreshed for a hard work of study ahead.

Hope everyone has a great week!

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

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted May 17, 2025 by Nicky in General / 23 Comments

Good morning! Hope everyone’s doing well.

Books acquired this week

I got woken up today by the arrival of a big package of books for me, which I got myself as a reward for filing my taxes. Turns out I’ve saved up waaaay more money than I need for my taxes, so I released some from my tax budget. Most of it’s gone to the moving budget etc etc, but I gave myself enough for a treat.

Still, those books haven’t been unboxed and accessioned (so to speak) yet, so I haven’t saved and uploaded their covers yet. You’ll have to wait until next week! I’ll have a preorder and a gift arriving too, so it’ll be quite the haul: I might split it across two weeks.

Posts from this week

Here we go, the usual roundup!

I’m making sure to post a review every day, even when I have other features, to catch up a bit with the backlog. It’s good to have a backlog, and to have them all ready, but at my previous posting rate the pile of reviews would just keep building up and up!

What I’m reading

Let’s start first with the usual sneak peek at the books I’ll be reviewing… sometime, when I get through the pile (though review copies get prioritised for reviewing sooner).

Cover of A History of the World in Twelve by David Gibbins Cover of The Apothecary Diaries (light novel) volume 3 Cover of Queer City by Peter Ackroyd Cover of Paladin's Grace by T. Kingfisher

Cover of Greenteeth by Molly O'Neill Cover of A Letter from the Lonesome Shore by Sylvie Cathrall Cover of The Cleopatras: The Forgotten Queens of Egypt, by Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones

I did some rereading as well, so that was a pretty busy and satisfying week of reading!

I have some more rereading planned for this week, but I’ll also dig into Sorcery and Small Magics (Maiga Doocy) and Advocate (Daniel M. Ford), both of which I’ve been looking forward to for a while. All in all, I hope to spend plenty of time reading, since it’s clearly what I’m in the mood for: I managed to read five hours on one workday, this week, which… is quite the feat, compared to usual.

Hope everyone has an excellent weekend, with exactly as much reading as desired!

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

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted May 10, 2025 by Nicky in General / 11 Comments

Good morning (just!). I’ve had a bit of a long week with some illness etc etc, but oh well — onward and upward!

New books this week

And that’ll be a big ol’ zero! I do have a bunch of books that I might request on Netgalley, but I’m waiting to have cleared the decks a little more first.

Posts from this week

As usual, let’s have a bit of a roundup…

And of course I also did a What Are You Reading Wednesday post, as usual!

What I’m reading

I’m not actually sure how much I’ve read this week, so let’s find out. Here’s the usual sneak peek at the books I’ll be reviewing on the blog… sometime soon (bearing in mind my massive backlog):

Cover of Castle of the Winds by Christina Baehr Cover of A Short History of British Architecture: From Stonehenge to the Shard, by Simon Jenkins Cover of Scandalize My Name by Fiona Sinclair Cover of Metropolitan Mysteries, ed. Martin Edwards

Cover of The Magic Books by Anne Lawrence-Mathers Cover of The Banquet Ceases by Mary Fitt Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter manga vol 5 Cover of Unravelled Knots by Baroness Orczy

So quite a good week for reading! I’m hoping to fit in plenty more reading over the weekend: currently I’m deeply ensconced in A History of the World in Twelve Shipwrecks (David Gibbins), but I also want to read more of A Letter from the Lonesome Shore (Sylvie Cathrall), The Apothecary Diaries (Natsu Hyuuga) and… probably a bunch of others too.

Hope everyone has a great weekend, with exactly as much reading as they’d like!

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

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted May 3, 2025 by Nicky in General / 14 Comments

Yay, weekend! My week hasn’t been that busy, but it’s been a lot of time spent not reading, when I’m decidedly in the mood to read.

Hope everyone else has had a good week!

Books acquired this week

This week it’s “just” ARCs — two eARCs, and one book that arrived in the mail a little unexpectedly. Thank you Tor and Hachette.

Cover of Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz Cover of A Mouthful of Dust by Nghi Vo Cover of A Letter from the Lonesome Shore by Sylvie Cathrall

I was especially excited to see the new Nghi Vo (thank goodness for my autoapproval!), but the highlight was A Letter from the Lonesome Shore, which I hadn’t been expecting though I had tentatively reached out asking for it.

Posts from this week

As usual, here’s a roundup of reviews to start with…

And a couple of non-review posts this week:

What I’m reading

Let’s close as usual with what I’ve recently finished and what I’m planning to read this weekend. First a sneak peek at books I intend to review soon that I finished this week:

Cover of Necrobane by Daniel M. Ford Cover of A Drop of Corruption by Robert Jackson Bennett Cover of The Baby Dragon Cafe by A.T. Qureshi Cover of A Mouthful of Dust by Nghi Vo Cover of Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz

I’ve been deep in some chonky books like The Magic Books: A History of Enchantment in 20 Medieval Manuscripts (Anne Lawrence-Mathers) and A Short History of British Architecture (Simon Jenkins), so I’ll read a bit more of those this weekend, but I’m also planning to delve into more classic mystery with Fiona Sinclair’s Scandalize My Name and a short story collection edited by Martin Edwards, Metropolitan Mysteries. Other than that, I’ve also started on T. Kingfisher’s Paladin’s Grace… so I have plenty to keep me busy.

Hope everyone’s having a good weekend!

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

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted April 26, 2025 by Nicky in General / 14 Comments

Greetings! Saturday again, huh? I’ve been trying to have a restorative week, and have been getting back to my reading somewhat — which is a relief to all, since it does wonders for my mood.

As mentioned last week, I had a bit of a spree to celebrate finishing my assignments (the last ones of this degree!) so I’m going to spotlight those now, without any further ado.

Books acquired this week

First up, there are some lovely new editions of T. Kingfisher’s Saint of Steel series. I haven’t read these, but I’ve been meaning to forever. Since they were “buy one, get one half-price” at Waterstones, and Waterstones was having a double stamps event… well. It seemed like the perfect time to splash out.

Cover of Paladin's Faith by T. Kingfisher Cover of Paladin's Hope by T. Kingfisher Cover of Paladin's Strength by T. Kingfisher Cover of Paladin's Grace by T. Kingfisher

But that wasn’t all, of course. I picked up a couple of fiction books too: I’d borrowed Greenteeth from the library, but had to return it, and I just loved the idea of a dragon café and thought that one sounded cute. I already owned a copy of Clockwork Boys, but I liked the new UK issue, so I grabbed that too.

Cover of The Baby Dragon Cafe by A.T. Qureshi Cover of Greenteeth by Molly O'Neill Cover of Clockwork Boys by T. Kingfisher

Aaand finally, a few non-fiction (you knew it was coming).

Cover of The Library of Ancient Wisdom by Selena Wisnom Cover of The Magic Books by Anne Lawrence-Mathers Cover of A History of The World in 47 Borders, by Jonn Elledge

A pretty good haul, I’d say… Technically I have a review copy to share as well, but it isn’t in my hands yet (since I’m not staying at the flat while we do moving stuff), so I’ll share that next week!

Posts from this week

As usual, let’s have a quick roundup of reviews:

What I’m reading

With my assignments finally done, I’ve been finding a bit more time for reading… though partly that means I’ve got stuck into some longer/heavier reads, so I don’t have many new reviews added to the upcoming pile. But here’s what I have read!

Cover of Not To Be Taken: Puzzles in Poison by Anthony Berkeley Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter (light novel) vol 1, by Yatsuki Wakutsu Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter (light novel) vol 2, by Yatsuki Wakutsu

As for this weekend, I’ll be reading Liz Pelly’s Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Price of the Perfect Playlist, and… not sure what else. We’ll see!

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

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted April 20, 2025 by Nicky in General / 16 Comments

Posting much later in the day than usual because I was working on the submissions of my final(!!) assignments for this degree. Exams still to go, but my assignments are in and I am free for a while. Wooo!

So let’s quickly get to talking about books…

Acquired this week

This week was a quiet week until today, where I both got a package of new books (having spent the last of my store credit at Bookshop.org) and went to Waterstones to take advantage of their double Plus stamps offer for this weekend. I haven’t catalogued the Waterstones haul yet, so let’s just stick with my new light novels from Bookshop.org for now!

Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter (light novel) vol 1, by Yatsuki Wakutsu Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter (light novel) vol 2, by Yatsuki Wakutsu Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter (light novel) vol 3, by Yatsuki Wakutsu

I’ve been having fun with the manga (even if I have some reservations that I’ll discuss when I review them), so I’m looking forward to these!

Posts from this week

Mostly just reviews! So here’s the roundup…

What I’m reading

Sadly not a lot, this week, though I have been getting through some manga! Here’s my usual peek at the covers of books I’ve finished this week and plan to review…

Cover of Carmilla by J. Sheridan Le Fanu Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter vol 1 Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter vol 2 Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter vol 3 Cover of The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter vol 4

Which isn’t too bad considering how busy I’ve been!

As for what I’m going to read over the weekend… now I’m free, who knows? Probably my new light novels, but I’m not ruling anything out.

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

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted April 12, 2025 by Nicky in General / 12 Comments

Good evening, folks! I’m a little behind today due to shaken-up routines. Looking on the bright side, the nice thing is that currently me and my wife are preparing to move, hopefully to a bigger flat, where I am promised at least two new bookcases. Excitement!

Books acquired this week

Just one — the new British Library Crime Classic, with an author who is new to me!

Cover of Scandalize My Name by Fiona Sinclair

So I’m looking forward to giving that a shot.

Posts from this week

Let’s do a quick review roundup!

What I’m reading

Given everything going on, such as my grandmother’s funeral, it’s not too surprising that I haven’t finished a lot this week. Here are the two books I did finish and plan to review, though!

Cover of You Have Not Yet Heard Your Favourite Song by Glenn McDonald Cover of Rocket to the Morgue by Anthony Boucher

As for this weekend, I’m not quite sure. I finally started reading Necrobane by Daniel M. Ford, which I’ve been meaning to get round to a while, so I might just focus on that.

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

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted April 5, 2025 by Nicky in General / 15 Comments

Good morning folks! I’m writing this somewhat in haste as I’m also getting ready for a trip (for my grandmother’s funeral). Luckily (though sadly), there’s not a lot to say reading-wise, but let’s dig in all the same…

Books acquired this week

None! Technically I have a little allowance from my wife to get a couple of new books as a reward for hard work on my assignments, but I keep procrastinating on actually choosing any. And I didn’t have time for a library trip this week.

Posts from this week

As usual, here’s a bit of a roundup of the reviews:

* Note: the light novel is completely separate to the manga. It’s the same story/characters, but two totally different formats. Light novels are often illustrated, but are prose fiction, while manga are, well, more like comics. In the case of The Apothecary Diaries, vol 1 of the light novel covers the same events as vols 1-4 of the manga, as I understand it. I am reviewing the light novel here.

I did also post a couple of other features this week!

What I’m reading

Well, “not very much” is the summary, but let’s see — maybe I’ve read more than I thought. Here’s the sneak peek at books I’ve read this week which I plan to review on the blog (eventually):

Cover of Immortal Red Sonja vol 2 by Dan Abnett et al Cover of A Mudlarking Year by Lara Maiklem Cover of Scarhaven Keep by J.S. Fletcher

A quiet week, as I thought. Not sure what I’ll be reading this weekend, if anything, given the travel and the circumstances.

Extra feature

To leave you with a more fun note, a friend set up a list of books that “made” them, and that led me to think about my own… I ended up picking a list of 100 books which have influenced me, and live and breathe with me. A lot of them are a bit arbitrary (and I imposed some arbitrary rules, like mostly not duplicating except for four very important authors), and they’re not all books I’d recommend or endorse, but for better or worse, they tell you a lot about me.

Curious? Here’s the list — you can check off the ones you’ve read, if you like! I’d be curious if anyone can beat my mum and wife’s scores.

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

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted March 29, 2025 by Nicky in General / 8 Comments

Greetings! It’s been a quiet-ish week for me in most respects, though the new raid tier has been released in FFXIV, and the Savage version releases on Tuesday, so getting ready for that is keeping me busy.

But we’re here to talk about books, so let’s get to that.

Books acquired this week

I didn’t get chance to go to the library this week, and though I technically have some money to buy a couple of books, I haven’t 100% decided which to get, so this week there’s just one book, the latest British Library Crime Classic via my subscription. It’s a bit late this month because of printing issues, and it doesn’t seem to have a matching bookmark, which makes me very sad.

Cover of Not To Be Taken: Puzzles in Poison by Anthony Berkeley

I have mixed feelings; I like reading the novels from this series as an academic interest, but sometimes misogyny etc bleed through, and that’s the case with several of Anthony Berkeley’s books, if not all. Still, I’ll give it a shot.

Posts from this week

Time for a roundup!

What I’m reading

I’ve fit in quite a bit of reading considering how much I’ve been playing FFXIV, so let’s start with the usual peek at the books I’ve finished this week which I plan to review on the blog:

Cover of Fence vol 4 by C.S. Pacat and Johanna the Mad Cover of Fence vol 5 by C.S. Pacat and Johanna the Mad Cover of Fence vol 6 by C.S. Pacat and Johanna the Mad Cover of Mortal Follies by Alexis Hall

Cover of Jane Austen in 41 Objects by Kathryn Sutherland Cover of Solo Levelling (manhwa) vol 1, by Chugong, Debu Cover of Strange Pictures by Uketsu Cover of A Breviary of Fire by Marie Brennan

Not sure what’s next, actually, but I’ll be following my whim as always.

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

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted March 22, 2025 by Nicky in General / 22 Comments

Good afternoon, folks! It’s still a weird and busy time around here, but that’s almost the “new normal” for me. It isn’t going to get less busy anytime soon, so I’m just trying my best to do stuff that I enjoy whenever I can.

So, let’s talk about books!

Books acquired this week

First, I got a couple of gifts from my wife, just ’cause:

Cover of Strange Pictures by Uketsu Cover of Jane Austen in 41 Objects by Kathryn Sutherland Cover of Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist by Liz Pelly

I’m not a mega-fan of Jane Austen (though I have enjoyed some of her books, sorry Mum), but I’m a sucker for “x in y objects” type books. As for Strange Pictures, I read about it and I’m kinda mesmerised by the idea — and Mood Machine sounds like the perfect way to really understand some of the issues around Spotify. (I’ve been aware of general problems forever, and I always buy the music I like… but it’s hard to resist the convenience of Spotify, so one likes to be at least open-eyed about it.)

And I got a pre-order of a much-awaited book (see below for my review):

Cover of Everything is Tuberculosis by John Green

Other than that, I also had a quick library trip, partly to pick up my hold of Greenteeth, and partly for a quick browse, in which I picked up a mystery novel I’ve seen around quite a bit, and a non-fiction book that hadn’t been checked out of the library for a few years, on impulse. Here they are:

Cover of Greenteeth by Molly O'Neill Cover of How to Solve Your Own Murder by Kirsten Perrin Cover of The Byzantine Lady by Donald M. Nichol

A random mix, as usual, which is always nice for me.

Posts from this week

First up, a round-up of the reviews I posted:

And other posts:

What I’m reading

As ever, first let’s have a peek at the books I’ve finished this week that I plan to review!

Cover of The Ten Teacups by Carter Dickson Cover of Seams Like Murder by Tilly Wallace Cover of Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales, by Heather Fawcett Cover of Everything is Tuberculosis by John Green

Cover of Fence vol 2 by C.S. Pacat et al Cover of The Graves: Srebenica and Vukovar by Giles Peress and Eric Stover Cover of Fence vol 3 by C.S. Pacat et al

As for this weekend, I’m not sure yet what I’ll be reading. Maybe The Apothecary Diaries (light novel), vol 3. We’ll see!

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

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