Fairyloot – May 2020

Theme = Desert Dreams

‘Get swept away in lands filled with fairy tales, magic and djinn!’

Items inspired by We Hunt The Flame, The City of Brass, An Ember in the Ashes, Rebel of the Sands and The Forbidden Wish.

Included was:

🖤 Bookish Tin designed by @chattynora

🖤 Bookish Wooden Spoon engraved with a design by @kdpletters

🖤 Tea Towel by @eviebookish

🖤 Bath Salts by Little Heart Gifts

🖤 Tribal Desert Candle hand-poured by Wick and Fable

🖤 Sunglasses Pouch by @kitstercronk

🖤 Tarot cards: Inspired by ToG by @Gabriella.bujdoso

 

BOOK OF THE MONTH

Girl, Serpent, Thorn by Melissa Bashardoust

Inspired by Persian mythology. In this original fairy tale, a girl is cursed to be poisonous to the touch.

EXCLUSIVE COVER ✔

SPRAYED EDGES ✔

ARTWORK ON REVERSE OF DUST JACKET by @orikye ✔

SIGNED BY THE AUTHOR ✔

This series was just heaven for me.

And what better to make it feel more like heaven than wafting some ‘inspired’ by candles round your room?!

And believe me the smell of this candle is just delish…..flowers, magic and spring rain!

It smells so fresh and clean, just like the air when rain has hit spring flowers.

Do you have bookish candles?

It feels like so long since I’ve done a tag, but I think this one is fitting for me at the moment…..freaking out at the size of my tbr (but there really is nothing new there!)

This tag was created by EarlyGreyBooks (see her vid here).

BEST BOOK YOU’VE READ IN 2020 SO FAR

Lifelike by Jay Kristoff

 

BEST SEQUEL YOU’VE READ IN 2020 SO FAR

Aurora Burning by Jay Kristoff

 

NEW RELEASE YOU HAVEN’T READ, BUT WANT TO

Incendiary by Zoraida Cordova

 

MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK FOR THE SECOND HALF OF THE YEAR

The Invisible Life of Addie Larue by VE Schwab

 

BIGGEST SURPRISE

Moti on the Water by Leylah Attar

This book was everything. Funny, beautiful and totally heart warming.

 

FAVORITE NEW AUTHOR (DEBUT OR ONE YOU KNEW)

Lani Lynn Vale

Credit to lanilynnvale.com

I started reading Lani in 2020 and she has me hook, line and sinker with her alpha characters!

 

NEWEST FICTIONAL CRUSH

Kaliis Gilwraeth…need I say more?!

Credit to the mega talented @charliebowater

 

NEWEST FAVORITE CHARACTER

Bones from Halfway to the Grave

There is specific fan art that is 100% Bones for me but I’m not sure of the origins of the photo so probably copyrighted up to the eyeballs so I haven’t posted!

 

BOOK THAT MADE YOU HAPPY

Dream Maker by Kristen Ashley

The Queen of the rock chicks is back….this makes me happy and reading this book made me totally happy!

FAVORITE REVIEW YOU’VE WRITTEN SO FAR THIS YEAR

Probably for Aurora Burning

To say I was excited to read this is an understatement. Yes, I went in with high expectations. And oh my lanta, this book should come with a warning = Buckle up people, cause this is one hell of a ride!

‘Know the past, or suffer the future’

I wasn’t prepared for this. Mentally, physically, everything!

It was not just good, it was phenomenal!

There are so many things I loved about this book, the plot, the characters, new and original, the feeling of family, Scarlett, Fin and the mystery of Zila’s earrings!

But the clear winners for me are Aurora and Kal. I’m a romantic at heart and I was so interested in The Pull. Every time the word Be’shmai was uttered I melted in a puddle of love (please don’t read too much into that!!!!)

‘She is smoke and starlight, she is blood and fire, she is a song in my veins as old as time and deep as the Void.’

We get a little bit of everyone’s lives. The journey they each had to take to get where they are now and what the future could possibly bring. It was mostly heartbreaking but there was beauty there too.

It was non-stop action, mystery and drama. I was actually out of breath reading it! I mean these poor kids couldn’t catch a break! And that ending….I was like wtf, where’s the rest….noooooooooooo, it cannot be left like that!

They did it. The authors wrote a humdinger of a second book. Words fail me. It was totally and utterly amazing.

 

MOST BEAUTIFUL BOOK YOU’VE BOUGHT OR RECEIVED SO FAR IN 2020

Bone Criers Moon by Kathryn Purdie

My copy is a Fairyloot exclusive and is so beautiful!

 

WHAT BOOKS DO YOU NEED TO READ BY THE END OF THIS YEAR?

Right.

How long have you got?

*starts listing 150 books*

And that’s it!

With Shanah being super busy and taking a well deserved blog break, there is no Top 5 Tuesday for June so I thought I’d have a go at doing my own (not all the time, I struggled to come up with 5 weeks worth!!!)

I was toying with idea of a half year book-ish reflection and to set me up for the next half year – very loosely!

Last week we had books with yellow covers and this week I perused my tbr and came up with…..

Books from my TBR that I predict will be 5 stars.

Ironside by Holly Black

Rhapsodic by Laura Thalassa

Penmort Castle by Kristen Ashley

The Last Namsara by Kristen Ciccarelli

The series of the HEA’s of the men featuring in Kilgore Police Department’s Charity Calender continues…..

See the first quarter of 2020 reviews in this series here.

 

Ask Me If I Care

Mr April – Hayes Romine

This is the one. This is the one I wanted, needed, dreamed off…..Hayes Romine!

The man makes me swoon so hard……

‘Only then did I allow myself to sneak a peek at the very first thing that caught my attention in years. ~ Hayes Romine

*falls unconscious*

It’s ok, I’m ok. Be still my beating heart!

I had to add, am I the only one who noticed that Ares brothers name was Lock Downy??! Very apt in this situation we are in, got to love 2020!

And another addition, with another character’s name (who we haven’t met yet)……Caro! I can just pretend it’s me!

 

May Contain Wine

Mr May – Louis Spurlock

Firstly let me say that Calloway broke my heart in first half of this book, chronic aneamia, a broken heart and weird outlook of herself…..

‘I wasn’t fat, but I wasn’t skinny. I wasn’t pretty, but I wasn’t ugly. I wasn’t anything. I just was.’

Louis knew he had blew it and knows what he lost in Callie and he wants his HEA.

All this with lots of drama mixed in of course!

And another few of mentions of the elusive me, I mean Caro!

 

Jokes on You

Mr June – Booth Pena

‘As it was, I wasn’t a nurse, I just had a stellar ability to check out the male form’

Oh me too Dillan, me too!!!!

A near death experience made Booth evaluate his life choices and go for what he wanted (and made me swoon!)…..which means Dillan is screwed!

I love that Dillan is an unapologetic romance reader.

I loved Bobo the dog.

I love how these couples have known each other for years and fall into a happy pattern of bliss.

Drama, great families, sweetness, hotness upon hotness all rolled up into a great read!

I didn’t intend to start a new series….but I’m oh so glad that I did!

Kilgore Police Department’s Charity Calender starts……..

Just Kidding

Mr January – Dax

Apart from the dragon series this is the first book I have read by this author. I don’t even know why I haven’t before. And now I am kicking myself because it was superb. Just what I wanted.

Poor old Rowen, never really fitting in and an unfortunate incident and she flees back to her family…..and the men of SWAT!

Back in her home town she re-meets Dax and what follows is just the most beautiful thing ever, he has her back (and head!) from the start and it was pure bliss.

‘Dax had been the star of my thoughts. My dreams. My fantasies.’

 

Fries Before Guys

Mr February – Derek

Avery, poor old Avery has the weight of the world on her shoulders and she is doing it all alone since both her parents died. 19 and alone. Getting kicked down again and again. I wanted to be there and go all mother hen on her!

Its emotional, its drama filled, and it’s beautiful.

 

Maybe Swearing Will Help

Mr March – Ford

‘Because life’s more interesting when Ashe Trammel is riled.’ ~ Ford

Frenemies. Mutual hatred. Nothing to do with lust. Yeah right!

I loved reading about Ashe and Ford, their names for each other, what they have dared each other to do over the years and also about the undercurrent of looking out for each other too.

This series is just so sweet and I’m really loving it. I really needed a change, a bit of escapism and this has provided that for me. Just what’s required!

I set my self a little challenge on my week off…..can I read a book a day?

I had the week off work and there was no school work to help my son with as it was school holidays. He was busy with his Zoom social life (!) so I had time that I didn’t know how really to fill once the cooking, washing and cleaning had been done, so I read!

I picked books from my tbr that I was in the mood for and also a sneaky new release. I can’t say all the books were big (well 1 was!) but I still did it!

Saturday

Ask Me If I Care by Lani Lynn Vale

(Read inside with coffee and biscuits to stay out the wind!)

Look out for my review soon!

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Sunday

May Contain Wine by Lani Lynn Vale

(Read half inside and half in the garden in the sunny intervals)

Look out for my review soon!

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Monday

Moti on the Water by Leylah Attar

(Read in the garden in the sun between rounds of swingball and laughter as it was so amusing!)

Look out for my review soon!

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Tuesday

Dream Maker by Kristen Ashley

(A whopping 497 pages read inside as I couldnt move from the sofa when I started!)

See my review here.

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Wednesday

King of Libertines by Pam Godwin

Prequel to Sea of Ruins

(only 79 pages but I think I more than made up for that yesterday!)

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Thursday

Hooking Him by Aurora Rose Reynolds

(Read as a bit of pre bed reading!)

See my review here.

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Friday

Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan

(Read in the shade in my garden on a very hot day!)

See my review here.

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I can safely say I enjoyed every minute! Could I do it every week, no I don’t think so!

Have you ever set yourself a challenge like this?

So books I want in July.

You know, I really shouldn’t buy any and just put them on my wishlist until I’ve made a small dent in my tbr.

But I just cant help myself!!

So here they are!

The Rising series by Kristen Ashley

The Beginning of Everything

The Plan Commences

The Dawn of the End

The Rising

 

 

Ok this is 4 books and I said that I was only going to get 3 a month BUT the series is all out in July so thought it was ok to class this as 1? 🤣🤣

With Shanah being super busy and taking a well deserved blog break, there is no Top 5 Tuesday for June so I thought I’d have a go at doing my own (not all the time, I struggled to come up with 5 weeks worth!!!)

I was toying with idea of a half year book-ish reflection and to set me up for the next half year – very loosely!

Last week we had Summer Releases I am looking forward to and this week I thought I would give a shout out to Summer with…..

Books with Yellow Covers!

Yellow is the colour of the sun, sun is associated with summer……ba ba bing!

King of Scars by Leigh Bardugo (am reaching here!!)

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Kingdom of Ash by Sarah J Maas

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Paper Princess by Erin Watt

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The Bride Test by Helen Hoang

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The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren

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These all came from my read/tbr – are there any others?