Currently Reading: 16 July - 29 July 2023

Currently Reading

- The Jasad Heir by Sara Hashem (22%)

- A Song of Sin and Salvation by L.H. Blake (10%)

- The Sun and the Void by Gabriela Romero Lacruz (6%)

- The Obelisk Gate by N.K. Jemisin (01%)

* * *

Yearly Goal

50/72

(69%)

* * *

I'm still just shy of my writing goal for Camp Nano July 2023. I think I need something like 695 words and I'll meet my goal. I don't know where I'm going to go with it. I know I strayed from my original project, into a few others, but I cannot just work on one thing. That's, sadly, not how my brain operates. I wish it were. I think I know what project I can work on to get to the necessary 700 words. An fanfiction of sorts. It's all original content, but it's based on a browser breeding game that I play. 

I could (and probably should) be listening to The Obelisk Gate while I do this. It will help bring me closer to finishing the Orilium readathon goal. We all got to start three days early, since we completed more books in April 2023 than we did in April 2022 as a whole. I believe G said 502 or 503 more to be precise (I know I'm an addition as I kept forgetting to log my books last year). So, I began on the 29th. I already finished one book for the goal: Astronomy [Ordinary] and I'm working on my Astronomy [Qualified] now. I need a Distinguished to pass the class.

Not much else has happened. I bought a few new books on Pango, to complete series I have. And...well, I've been reading nonstop pretty much. So, with that, I will let you all go~

2023 Mid-Year Book Freak Out Tag

 It's that time of year again. We've reached the midpoint of 2023 and thus it is time to embark on the Mid-Year Book Freak Out tag. Of course I will answer the questions as honestly as I can? 

1. What is the best book you've read so far in 2023?

I'd have to say that's Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero which was the first (and currently only) five-star read of the year. I love the way it just reads like an alternate Scooby Doo. The allusions to them with things like having a shared family name or the Zoinx (lol Shaggy) River Valley? It was well worth the five it got. 

2. Best sequel that you've read so far in 2023?

I honestly think the only sequel I've read at all this year, pending my memory, is Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation #3 by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu. I'm not even sure I'd consider it a best sequel. It's just literally the only one that I've read that is a sequel at all. I did love it, despite it's terrible translating from it's original source language. 

3. What is a new release you haven't read yet, but really want to? 

This feels like a cop-out answer, but it really is Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros. It came out not that long ago and just absolutely took the reading world by storm. You couldn't open any bookish related social media platform without hearing about it's sprayed edges and how bookstores just absolutely couldn't keep it on the shelves. I found a copy at Barnes & Noble and snatched and I'm greatly looking forward to reading it.

4. What are your most anticipated releases for the rest of the year?

There are three. The first one is The Jasad Heir by Sara Hashem, which I have an eARC for. It's all about this girl who is the heir to a taken over country and how she has to reclaim her throne. The second one is Stone & Sky by Z.S. Diamanti, which I know literally nothing about beyond that it's a fantasy novel that looked fun. The third, and final, is Flight of Icarus by Caitlin Schneiderhan, which is one of the non-canon Stranger Things books featuring only my favorite character now, Eddie Munson. 

5. What was the biggest disappointment of 2023 so far? 

Wicka by Christy Deveaux. I didn't rate it, and don't recall my rating, but I don't think it was all that high. I don't remember thinking all that highly of it. I had gone in with slightly higher expectations than I should have, and it was a bit of a let down. I don't plan on ever rereading this. 

6. What was the biggest surprise of 2023 so far?

This one would definitely have to be Sister, Maiden, Monster by Lucy A. Snyder. I was not much of a horror girl, but now I think I have to start delving in more. I was anticipating being grossed out by this book and not wanting to continue and rating it low...I ripped through it and want more. I now go to the horror section of bookstores. I definitely was surprised at how much I enjoyed it. 

7. Who is your new favorite author?

Uh. Hmm...Edgar Cantero. I loved his writing style for Meddling Kids, and I've ordered another book in the same universe, This Body's Not Big Enough for the Both of Us, which follows one of the characters that we meet in the first book. I'm looking forward to it and I can solidly say that Edgar Cantero is a new favorite of mine. 

8. Who is your newest fictional crush?

I kind of want to say Ari from The First Binding. He was a well written man with a very tragic backstory and I adored it. The poor guy could just use some love. Beyond that, I don't really do fictional crushes/boyfriends/girlfriends. 

9. Who is your newest favorite character?

I rarely think on books past finishing them long enough to have a favorite. Like I couldn't tell you the name of the main characters of pretty much any books I read in June. I have no idea. It's gone. I don't have any favorites. 

10. What book made you cry so far in 2023?

Did one make me cry? I don't remember. I think I got close with The Last Cuentista by Donna Barba Higuera. I'm not all that emotional of a reader. It's fairly hard to make me cry while I'm reading. I cried more watching TV. 

11. What book made you happy so far in 2023? 

The Kiss of '89 by Ruth Hanson because it's the most ridiculous ride of a story. Obviously a rebranded fanfiction, it just made me laugh out loud on more than one occasion. I couldn't put it down. 

12. What is the most beautiful book you've gotten so far in 2023?

Belladonna by Adalyn Grace. It's absolutely stunning. I love the cover and I cannot wait to get to to it. It looks like it's going to be a good read. 

13. What books do you need to read before the end of 2023?

I'm going to go with two books by the same author. The Hunger of the Gods and Malice both by John Gwynne. I've read The Shadow of the Gods and I can't not with the plot. I'm hoping Malice is equally violent.

Currently Reading: 16 to 22 July 2023

Currently Reading

- Girl, Serpent, Thorn by Melissa Bashardoust (04%)

- The Ivory Key by Akshaya Raman (01%)

- The Jasad Heir by Sara Hashem (22%)

- The Orphic Hymns by Patrick Dunn (07%)

* * *

Yearly Reading Goal

48/72 (67%)

* * *

They actually got a physical copy of Yellowface by R.F. Kuang at my library and I had to have it. I finished it by 23:30. Had it all of 10 hours and I blazed right through it. I couldn't stop!!

My orders for July all came in back to back. Wednesday I got in This Body's Not Big Enough for Both of Us by Edgar Cantero, which is a stand-alone in the same universe as Meddling Kids that follows A. & Z. Kimrean and their adventures sharing one body between them. Then I also got Age of Myth by Michael J. Sullivan because Raegen (Raegan?) over PeruseProject has been raving about it and I was too curious for my own good. Then! My pre-order of The Jasad Heir by Sara Hashem arrived earlier than it was supposed to. I'm looking forward to finishing it and getting my dang review up. 

Writing is going. I'm just below 25k, which is still above goal. I'm not getting the write every day badge. I knew I wasn't though. I get sucked into doing other things and forget about it. It is what it is. Anyone who is still following my Flights Rising FanFiction will have noticed that. I think it was March when i last updated. I will go back to look at where I stopped and try to resurrect it for September. I have far too much reading to get to in August...

Anyway! I will likely not continue it for a fair while since the readathon begins in a week. I can hardly believe a week from tomorrow (Saturday, July 22) we can all start reading for Orilium. I'm undecided as to which book I want to start. The Picker Wheel landed on Conjuration - Ordinary, which is The Blood Heir by Amélie Wen Zhao. I can do that. 

I even set it up to tell me which level I'm on. As I finish, I will either update the letter [Conjuration (O) -> Conjuration (Q)] or delete that spot all together in the case of say Demonology where I only need an Ordinary to pass for the year. Because otherwise I'll end up going entirely "off script" and reading unrelated things.

I got distracted from Project Secret by another story....Project Medusa. I have so much already in mind and I know I'm going to need to do a lot of research to be ready for it. I have the characters and basic plot in mind and here's hoping it goes well and that I can get it written in a timely manner. Here's to a new writing adventure!!

I will close for now, stay tuned for next week and the unoffical official start of the Orilium Autumn Equinox Semester!

Currently Reading: 09 - 15 July 2023

Currently Reading

- Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo (25%)

- Nimona by ND Stevenson (17%)

- Whispers from the Depths by C.W. Briar (15%)

- The Orphic Hymns by Patrick Dunn (04%)

* * *

Yearly Reading Goal

45/72

(63%)

* * *

The urge to just drop every single book from my Currently Reading list and just pick up Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros is strong. So is the urge to save it and see if it fits into any of the prompts necessary for the Orilium Magical Readathon in August. Not that I'd be able to finish it in anything close to the time necessary. I'm also excited about that. 

Let me tell you...Orilium is going to be a tough nut this Fall semester. Aurin, my PC, has taken on probably more than he should have? 

 

In 2023, G announced the new career path, Star Whisperer. Aurin naturally did not want to give up his Godseer status, and figured why not just become both? So I have a minimum of 16 books to read in August. 17 if I want to keep the two Lore courses different from one another. This ought to be a fun time. It could be worse. I could have gone Alchemist or something. The one where you need like 20+ books. 

Camp NaNo July has been progressing well. Just counting the actual words written in the draft instead of all over the various documents and we're past halfway. I broke 16k the other day and I should only be hitting 9k today. So that's definitely good. I still need a lot of words to catch up today. I'm over by a ton, but still not at my 1k daily. I think to reach today I'd have to hit 18,670. I'm at 16,670. Definitely need the numbers. I'm probably going to bring a notebook with me to the game to actually go through and work on the novel. 

September 2023 Wrap Up

In September I read 9 books! 

1. Hekate Liminal Rites by Sorita D'Este & David Rankine - I'm not sure really what to rate this. I went with the blanket three-stars, becuase it's a non-fiction work and that's usually what I give them. I feel awkward rating them. This book was interesting as it went over a lot of the history of her myths, but didn't give you very much in the way of actual rites. Perhaps they couldn't? I don't know. It was interesting either way and I definitely recommend it for anyone who is studying Hekate or one of Her devotees. 

2. Assistant to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer - Easily a five-star read. I absolutely loved the exchanges between the Villain and Evie. How he slowly, despite himself, revealed his life to her. Things that he had not told to any of his other employees. Not even the ones who had been with him for years. It was beautiful. I am looking forward to the next book to see if they get him back from wherever he ended up and what is going on with Nura Sage. I need to know!!!

3. The Obelisk Gate by N.K. Jemisin - The second book in the Broken Earth trilogy (third, and next on my list being The Stone Sky). I loved the continuation of the story. We are still following Essun in this one, but now we are starting to get more from her daughter, Nassun as well. I can't really say super much, since this is the middle book in a series and I don't want to spoil it, but it was really good and I definitely enjoyed it. 

4. The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill - Another amazing read. I loved working through the mystery with the characters. Who did what and why? My guess had been right. One of them was just too convenient a choice for the actual perpetrator. He barely knew anyone or anything that was related there. I think the connections were also a bit too...easy? Simple? They jumped too quickly into the idea of who it was without stopping to think. I loved how it we got to read the book she was writing as well as her critique partner's thoughts and then the letters from the various governmental agencies? Chef's kiss. It was beautiful. 

5. The Oracles of Apollo by John Opsopaus - I am a huge fan of divination and learning various techniques, so when I saw this book I couldn't pass it up. As typical of me for nonfictions, I gave it a middle of the road 3-star rating. It was good, don't get me wrong. However I don't normally like rating them highly. Anyway, there were a lot of things to try in this book and I have already made the oracle stones. I am curious to start using them soon and see how it goes. 

6. Girl, Serpent, Thorn by Melissa Bashardoust - I loved this. It was well written. The way Soraya learns that maybe the way she is is exactly what she needs to be for the best for her people. I loved the storytelling and the growth of the characters as they learned more about themselves and their own history. 

7. Honoring Your Ancestors by Mallorie Vaudoise - I purchased this book a while back, and have finally gotten around to reading it. It's another nonfiction, so was only rated a 3-stars, but I did rather enjoy it. It's kind of partially through a Catholic lens and partially through a Voodoo (I think) one? I liked the information that it provided and I plan to put some of it into practice (as soon as I find my screwdriver....) 

8. Heaven Official's Blessing #2 by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu - I adored this. Xie Lian is so adorably obtuse that I can't not love it. We continue following his misadventures in the present time at first, as he meets more people from his past and things are revealed to him that he'd totally forgotten about or possibly blocked from his own memory. Then in Act 2, we are taken back to his first time being alive and who he was before his first ascension to the Heavenly Court. I loved his interactions with Hua Cheng, Mu Qing, Feng Xin, and Qi Rong. I cannot wait to get my hands on #3 and keep reading on. 

9. The Jasad Heir by Sara Hashem - I pre-ordered this from Barnes & Noble (may as well support an actual bookstore if I am going to pre-order things). It was wonderful. I loved how tense the whole things was. I will be posting a full review here if you all want to see it. I liked the volatile relationship between Arin and Sylvia and how she was with her friends. Worth the read. 

Currently Reading - 01 July to 08 July 2023

Currently Reading

- Yellowface by R.F. Kuang (25%)

- Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo (22%)

- The Orphic Hymns by Patrick Dunn (04%)

- Whispers from the Depths by C.W. Briar (15%)

* * *

Yearly Reading Goal

43/72

(57%)

* * *

Trying to talk my roommate into taking me to Barnes & Noble to abuse the Premium membership 3x points that they have going until July 11th is harder than I thought it would be. I only asked if we could go somewhere I wanted to go (she wants to go look at ceiling fans, which I don't particularly care for) and she said "No, we are not going to Barnes & Noble." I want to know how she knew where it was I wanted to go...I want to get my once a month bookstore haul and they are doing SO MANY POINTS. 

Okay, so that mission was a success and I left the store with thirteen new books. Including a first edition (sans sprayed edges) of Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros, which made me stupidly happy. I don't care that I ended up spending nearly all of the money I had on it. It was worth it!!

However, that will be all for the time being as I don't have much else to put today!

September 2023 Book Haul

I am going to try to keep my book-buying down in September. I know I'm terrible at it, but hey, it's my goal. Who knows if I'll actually be able to keep up!

In September, I managed to borrow or buy 3 books:

1. Thanatos by Eva Pohler - I do not remember exactly why I picked this up, other than it was free on Amazon (or rather cheap, I don't remember which). It appears to be about the God of Death getting stuck in the human world? Ah, no he makes a deal to live in the mortal realm as a human. Which makes no sense as Hades wouldn't exist without Thanatos....he's the God of Death/Dying. I'm curious to see how exactly this will work because from what I remember of actual myth...no one will die now. Immortality because the guy who separates your soul from your body wants to be a man? Cool. 

2. The Bookbinder by Pip Williams - Originally titled The Bookbinder of Jericho, I saw this while browsing for my free book (it's my birthday month!) on Book of the Month and it looked kind of interesting. I've been in a historical fiction mood and this one takes place in 1914. Follows a bookbinder who realizes what she wants and goes after it. I think. I'll tell you more in the wrap up when I read it. 

3. The Stranger Upstairs by Lisa M. Matlin - And for a complete three-sixty in bookish acquisitions for the month, in the same order I got this. It looks spooky and it's going to be perfect for October reading. I also may have fallen for the cover. I already have a ton of books I want to get to in the back half of the year, but will I likely pick this up anyway? Probably. 

4. The Book Eaters by Sunyi Dean - I have been wanting this one for some time. The last time I attempted to order it, the site had an estimated arrival of August...2024. I have no idea why it was so far out for a book published in 2022. I bought it this go round from Barnes & Noble and I've already started it. It looked really good and I was curious if they had meant figurative or literal eating of books. I cannot wait to find out more!!! (If anyone ever wonders what I spend my scratch-off ticket winnings on...it's this.) 

5. House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland - I am actually clueless what this book is about. It is the October selection for a reading group I'm part of, so I picked it up from PangoBooks for relatively cheap to read along with the rest of the group. Something happens to some girls in Scotland, and then years later it comes back. That's literally all I know and I am looking forward to reading it. 

July 2023 To-Be-Read

I know I don't always remember to post these, but I've been getting better at it. So in July (hard to believe it's already July) I want to keep to the status quo and read 6 books (9 if I get to the back-log):

Print

1. The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina by Zoraida Córdova - This one looked very interesting and I couldn't resist the pretty cover. I think it has something to do with a family that inherits magic of some kind and then someone else wants it for their own. I have no idea. It looked good. 

2. A Song of Sin and Salvation by L.H. Blake - I really don't know if its intentional or not, but it gives such HARD Chrissy/Eddie vibes that I couldn't resist and actually pre-ordered it from Barnes & Noble (that will now be the bane of my existence, I'll have to mark down things). It looks super adorable and even comes with a playlist. I'm excited to get to it. 

3. The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi - I meant to get to this one last month, then got distracted with library books. It's interesting in that it follows someone in an alternate universe who is trying to save the kaiju (giant monsters like Godzilla, Mothra, etc.) and I am very intrigued by it. 

Digital

4. The Jasad Heir by Sara Hashem - An eARC for a book coming out in July that I've pre-ordered from Barnes & Noble. The synopsis was amazing. A revenge story based on Egyptian mythology? Sign me right up. I was obsessed with Egyptian mythology when I was a kid, so this is right up my alley. I'm looking forward to it!!

5. Bound by Honey by Jamie Dalton - Another eARC, this one for a book being published in August. I have the sneaking suspicion most of my digital reads are going to be eARCs. I don't remember what this book is about beyond some kind of disgruntled magical librarian and a dude who thinks their shit don't stink purely based on the fact they are related to royalty. And...honey. But that's all I know. It looks brilliant. 

Audio

6. House of Salt and Sorrows by Erin A. Craig - I know literally nothing about this book other than it exists and I am curious to read it. Beyond that I have no idea. Going in completely blind!!

Bonus Books

This section, like usual, is reserved for the books I didn't finish in June and am going to just move to July in an attempt to finish them. We have:

7. Small Favors by Erin A. Craig - I started this book in May, and then never actually finished it. Put it off to read other things. If I get to it, cool. If not, then there are no real hard feelings. 

8. Thousand Autumns #1 by Meng Xi Shi - It is one of those Seven Seas productions that I am absolutely in love with that I, again, started (this time in June) and never finished. Maybe July?

9. The Storm Singers by Michael Boccardi - I have been stuck at 17% of this book for most of 2023, I think. Maybe July will finally be my month and I'll actually read it all the way through!!! It's good, so far as I can remember, I have just been reading eARCs instead of all the digital books I bought.