Saturday again! It comes round so quickly. No real news from me this week, so straight into the book haul that I accidentally acquired…

Received to review

I always enjoy Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s ideas — only one of her books has seriously clicked with me, but I enjoy them anyway.

Stacking the Shelves

A real mix, as usual! I’m excited about Black Water Sister and The Jasmine Throne, in particular; I’ve been wanting to get my hands on those for a while now, since I first heard about them. Likewise The Fabric of Civilization, actually — ever since I was going on a tear of reading books about sewing and textiles, at the start of the year.

The most impulsive purchase was Seashaken Houses, which would not usually be my thing. Something about the idea of a book about lonely lighthouses built onto rocky reefs got under my skin, apparently. I’ve gone with the whim and started reading it right away!

Books read this week

Not a big reading week — or a big finishing week, at least: I’m halfway through seven books at once!

Reviews posted this week

• And Only To Deceive, by Tasha Alexander (4/5 stars) [mystery/romance]
• The Acts of King Arthur and his Noble Knights, by John Steinbeck (3/5 stars) [arthuriana]
• White Bread: A Social History of the Store-Bought Loaf, by Aaron Bobrow-Strain (5/5 stars) [history]
• The Echo Wife, by Sarah Gailey (5/5 stars) [speculative fiction]
• The Secret Life of Books, by Tom Mole (3/5 stars) [history]

And that’s all from me this week! How’ve you all been doing? Have you got any great new books this week, or been reading anything that knocked your socks off?

Good afternoon, folks!

General update

As you’ll have noticed, I’ve been queuing up some of my backlog of reviews — mostly written during the Final Fantasy XIV dungeon “The Praetorium”, since you get good items from it at the moment… but it has looooong unskippable cutscenes!

What have I been up to? Mostly playing Final Fantasy XIV, along with the Mass Effect remaster. If any of you play FFXIV, say hi sometime, we can run a dungeon or something! I’m on Cerberus server, and I can let you know my avatar’s name…

I have been reading a bit, though; I’ve gone back to reading a whole bunch of books at once, and I’m using Beeminder to help track them and keep me from putting them down and forgetting about them for ages. Here’s how I’m doing with Maryn McKenna’s Beating Back the Devil, for example!

Stacking the Shelves

This week I don’t have too many new books in — last week’s splurge was actually kind of out of character for me lately. However, I did pick up Tasha Alexander’s A Fatal Waltz in paperback, since it came back into stock, and I’ve just got a new book to review because I remembered one of you guys talking about it recently, and it has a pretty cover.

Books read this week

I’ve actually finished a few books this week, which isn’t so common lately!

Reviews posted this week

• Death in Fancy Dress, by Anthony Gilbert (3/5 stars) – A classic mystery
• Word by Word, by Kory Stamper (4/5 stars) – Non-fiction about writing a dictionary
• A Murderous Relation, by Deanna Raybourn (4/5 stars) – historical mystery and romance
• The Angel of the Crows, by Katherine Addison (5/5 stars) – Sherlock Holmes pastiche with a fantasy twist
• Long Live Latin, by Nicola Gardini (1/5 stars) – Non-fiction designed to get you reading Latin

So that’s it! What have you guys been stacking up, devouring, or flinging across the room in despair?

Greetings, folks! This is very slightly late, but I’m determined to get it out of the door anyway and get back into the habit…

Books acquired:

Books read this week:

Reviews posted this week:

• A Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula Le Guin (5/5 stars)
• Sabine’s Notebook, by Nick Bantock (5/5 stars)
• The Golden Mean, by Nick Bantock (4/5 stars)
• He’d Rather Be Dead, by George Bellairs (3/5 stars)
• A History of the Paper Pattern Industry, by Joy Spanabel Emery (4/5 stars)
• The Tombs of Atuan, by Ursula Le Guin (5/5 stars)

How’s everyone else doing? Lots of reading?

And here we are, a proper weekly roundup. At a ridiculous hour, because apparently we’re reliving our teen years and making bad sleep decisions on the weekends.

Books acquired this week:

Thanks to Arbieroo, since it was his Christmas gift that got me A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (plus Griffin & Sabine, which arrived a bit sooner).

Books read this week:

Reviews posted this week:

• The Case of the Famished Parson, by George Bellairs (4/5 stars)
• The Bookseller’s Take, by Martin Latham (2/5 stars)
• The Citadel of Weeping Pearls, by Aliette de Bodard (4/5 stars)
• Blood and Circuses, by Kerry Greenwood (4/5 stars)
• Defekt, by Nino Cipri (4/5 stars)
• Life in Miniature, by Nicola Lisle (3/5 stars)
• Ruddy Gore, by Kerry Greenwood (4/5 stars)
• So You Want To Talk About Race, by Ijeoma Oluo (4/5 stars)
• Fence, volume 1, by C.S. Pacat and Johanna the Mad (4/5 stars)
• The Tightrope Walker, by Dorothy Gilman (3/5 stars)

So how’ve you folks been doing?

Well, it’s been a while! I’m not going to do a full roundup, because it really has been too long, but this will serve as a placeholder for hopefully getting back to business as usual. So here’s a selection of books I got recently/for Christmas…

Books acquired:

As ever, a pretty eclectic mix, and I look forward to ignoring them all equally while I reread older books… okay, okay, not really — I hope to read some of these very soon! But we all know what I’m like…

So, how are you all doing?

Well, folks, it’s been a couple of weeks since I did a roundup! I’m not going to try to be exhaustive here: I’ll post the covers of some of my new books, some of the books I’ve been reading, etc.

I keep thinking I’m on top of things and then things get on top of me again, but that’s 2020 for you. I’m trying to take it one step at a time. So that said, let’s get on with this!

New books:

A weird mix, as ever! I’m looking forward to Ruby especially. I know I won’t get to Return of the Thief for quite a while (I haven’t read Thick as Thieves yet)… but I’m looking forward to all these! I also got a copy of Unconquerable Sun by Kate Elliott, from winning the SciFi Month giveaway — I forgot to grab an image of the cover, though! Thank you to imyril and Head of Zeus for this one.

Books I’ve finished reading recently:

Looks like a lot, but that’s 2-3 weeks!

Reviews posted recently:

• Stuck, by Heidi J. Larson (2 stars)
• Kushiel’s Dart, by Jacqueline Carey (5 stars)
• Two Rogues Make a Right, by Cat Sebastian (4 stars)
• The Goblin Emperor, by Katherine Addison (5 stars)
• Deadline, by Mira Grant (4 stars)
• The CBT Toolbox, by Jeremy Crown (3 stars)
• Dead Man in a Ditch, by Luke Arnold (4 stars)
• Proper English, by K.J. Charles (4 stars)
• How to Change Your Mind: The New Science of Psychedelics, by Michael Pollan (4 stars)
• Fake Law: The Truth About Justice in an Age of Lies, by The Secret Barrister (4 stars)
• Stormhaven, by Jordan L. Hawk (4 stars)

Other posts:

• Weekly Blogging Challenge: To Reread or Not to Reread?
• SciFi Month 2020

How are you doing? Any exciting new books you’ve added to your shelves? Anything got you glued to its pages? Let me know!

Hey folks! How’s everyone been doing? I’ve been back at work and busying myself with trying to figure out some better work patterns, like only working during set hours and on a separate laptop. It feels kinda better… and having an offline lunchbreak at least three days in the week is meaning I get a bit more reading done!

I did also get well stuck into my studying, and am currently swearing at the depth in which I need to remember glycolysis/the Krebs cycle/oxidative phosphorylation. Blast!

New books:

Technically we got The Cloud Roads a while ago, but I don’t think I ever put the cover up, and it’s a nice set. And thank you to Tor for the eARC of Winter’s Orbit, which I’m looking forward to!

Books read this week:

Reviews posted this week:

• X+Y: A Mathematician’s Manifesto for Rethinking Gender, by Eugenia Cheng (4/5 stars)
• The Widow of Rose House, by Diana Biller (4/5 stars)
• Feed, by Mira Grant (4/5 stars)
• Entangled Life, by Merlin Sheldrake (3/5 stars)

Other posts:

• Top Ten Tuesday: Books with Fall Colours on the Cover
• WWW Wednesday, featuring Michael Pollan, Mira Grant, Marlon James…

How’s your week been? Reading anything good? Stacking your shelves with anything exciting?

Greetings, folks! Well, my time off is over and I’ve been back to work for a couple of days… but I think I did manage to unwind a bit and figure out some better ways of having a work/life balance. I didn’t finish a lot of books, but I managed to go “as my Whimsy takes me” more than usual. So maybe I’ve de-stressed a bit!

On the other hand, my course has now started and I’ve added an hour or two of studying per day to my schedule. Yipes.

Books acquired:

Yaaay! Thanks so much to the person who bought me Cemetery Boys. <3

Books read this week:

Reviews posted this week:

• Piranesi, by Susanna Clarke (4/5 stars)
• The Story of Wales, by Jon Gower (3/5 stars)
• The Firebird, by Susanna Kearsley (2/5 stars)

Other posts:

• Top Ten Tuesday: Favourite Quotes from Recent Reads
• Weekly Blogging Challenge: A Non-fiction Recommendation
• WWW Wednesday, discussing my recent reads by Eugenia Cheng, Susanna Kearsley and Jon Gower

That’s it for this week! How’s everyone doing?

Greetings, folks! This weekend’s roundup has been delayed by extreme laziness during my holiday (although laziness is perhaps the wrong word when I spent ~2.5 hours climbing up onto the moors today). How’s everyone?

Books acquired this week:

Finished this week:

Reviews posted:

• Utopia for Realists, by Rutger Brenman (3/5 stars)
• The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, by Dorothy L. Sayers (3/5 stars)
• Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men, by Caroline Criado-Perez (2/5 stars)

Other posts:

• Top Ten Tuesday: My Fall TBR
• WWW Wednesday: The Firebird, The Story of Wales and others

So how’re you all doing? Get any great books lately?