Top Ten Tuesday is featured by That Artsy Reader Girl. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.
Topic: Mainstream Popular Authors that I Still Have Not Read
When I started this I asked myself the question, who exactly is a mainstream popular author? Who gets to decide that?!! How are these defined?
So I did what any confused person does, I googled! I found a list of 100, most of who I have never heard of! But I’ve added some below that I recognise their names but don’t think I’ve ever read!
Steven King John Grisham Dean Koontz Anne Rice Margaret Atwood Patricia Cornwell Jodi Picoult Neil Gaiman David Balducci Robin Hobb
In a fallen kingdom, one girl carries the key to discovering the secrets of her nation’s past—and unleashing the demons that sleep at its heart. An epic fantasy series inspired by the mythology and folklore of ancient China.
Once, Lan had a different name. Now she goes by the one the Elantian colonizers gave her when they invaded her kingdom, killed her mother, and outlawed her people’s magic. She spends her nights as a songgirl in Haak’gong, a city transformed by the conquerors, and her days scavenging for what she can find of the past. Anything to understand the strange mark burned into her arm by her mother in her last act before she died.
The mark is mysterious—an untranslatable Hin character—and no one but Lan can see it. Until the night a boy appears at her teahouse and saves her life.
Zen is a practitioner—one of the fabled magicians of the Last Kingdom. Their magic was rumored to have been drawn from the demons they communed with. Magic believed to be long lost. Now it must be hidden from the Elantians at all costs.
When Zen comes across Lan, he recognizes what she is: a practitioner with a powerful ability hidden in the mark on her arm. He’s never seen anything like it—but he knows that if there are answers, they lie deep in the pine forests and misty mountains of the Last Kingdom, with an order of practitioning masters planning to overthrow the Elantian regime.
Both Lan and Zen have secrets buried deep within—secrets they must hide from others, and secrets that they themselves have yet to discover. Fate has connected them, but their destiny remains unwritten. Both hold the power to liberate their land. And both hold the power to destroy the world.
Now the battle for the Last Kingdom begins.
In this Chinese folklore story we have Lan who has a secret (that she doesn’t know!) and Zen who is a practitioner magician.
Lan escapes a song/pleasure house where she has been sold and takes off with Zen to uncover her secret and to get rid of the Elantian leaders.
I did enjoy the different kinds of magic but it just didn’t hit the spot for me mainly because the description of the world building was quite info dumpy and there was a lot of repetition. Due to this I did lose interest a bit.
But what saved this for me was Lan and Zen’s romance! It was so cute and I lived for it!
The Sunday Post is a blog news meme hosted by Caffeinated Reviewer It’s a chance to share news, a post to recap the past week on your blog and showcase books and things we have received.
Hi everyone, hope you’ve had a good week?
I think I’m gradually settling into my job but it’s a steep learning curve! I’m still glad when it’s Friday each week because my brain is tired!
I’ve got a free 90 day sub to Bookbeat so for Remember November (a Storygraph challenge) I’m listening to books I already own because I can’t seem to pick up a physical book at the mo!
New Arrivals
Nothing this week – can you believe it!
I’ve also done an unhaul and sold 12 special editions and I’ve still got 19 to list!
What I’ve Read
🎧 Curious Tides by Pascale Lacelle ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
🎧 A Conjuring of Light by VE Schwab (reread) ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
🎧 Lizzie & Belle: Portraits and Poison by JT Williams ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
🎧 Heartsong by TJ Klune ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Look out for my reviews soon!
You might have missed…..
Review – The Hunting Moon by Susan Dennard Review – Curious Tides by Pascale Lacelle Review – Bookshops and Bonedust by Travis Baldree Review – A Power Unbound by Freya Marske
Jack Alston, Lord Hawthorn, would love a nice, safe, comfortable life. After the death of his twin sister, he thought he was done with magic for good. But with the threat of a dangerous ritual hanging over every magician in Britain, he’s drawn reluctantly back into that world.
Now Jack is living in a bizarre puzzle-box of a magical London townhouse, helping an unlikely group of friends track down the final piece of the Last Contract before their enemies can do the same. And to make matters worse, they need the help of writer and thief Alan Ross.
Cagey and argumentative, Alan is only in this for the money. The aristocratic Lord Hawthorn, with all his unearned power, is everything that Alan hates. And unfortunately, Alan happens to be everything that Jack wants in one gorgeous, infuriating package.
When a plot to seize unimaginable power comes to a head at Cheetham Hall―Jack’s ancestral family estate, a land so old and bound in oaths that it’s grown a personality as prickly as its owner―Jack, Alan and their allies will become entangled in a night of champagne, secrets, and bloody sacrifice . . . and the foundations of magic in Britain will be torn up by the roots before the end.
Back in Edwardian England with the gang of the Last Contract!
Aaaah Lord Hawthorn, how I love him so I am very glad this book was his because he deserves a hea! His guardianship/brotherly actions warmed my heart.
‘Three months ago an unmagical girl had accosted him on a ship, inserted herself inconveniently into his life, and forced him back into magical society and magical conspiracy.’
Enter Alan Ross, writer and thief who we met in A Restless Truth. Oh I loved him too! He was real and he was just what Jacky boy aka Lord Hawthorn needed! Alan’s had a hard life and seeing him fit in with the gang was heartwarming.
So in short, there was action, found family, magic, basically enemies to lovers and a lot of spice! An honourable mention to the Elsie part, waaaaaaah!
Viv’s career with the notorious mercenary company Rackam’s Ravens isn’t going as planned.
Wounded during the hunt for a powerful necromancer, she’s packed off against her will to recuperate in the sleepy beach town of Murk—so far from the action that she worries she’ll never be able to return to it.
What’s a thwarted soldier of fortune to do?
Spending her hours at a beleaguered bookshop in the company of its foul-mouthed proprietor is the last thing Viv would have predicted, but it may be both exactly what she needs and the seed of changes she couldn’t possibly imagine.
Still, adventure isn’t all that far away. A suspicious traveler in gray, a gnome with a chip on her shoulder, a summer fling, and an improbable number of skeletons prove Murk to be more eventful than Viv could have ever expected.
If you loved Legends and Lattes then you will 100% want to read this, I promise you!
We are back with Viv but this time it’s before Thune and coffee in the sea city of Murk where Viv is convalescing. In her recovery she stumbles across a bookshop and a bakery and some new faces….
What ensues is:
~ Found family, ~ A cozy read, ~ A charming but slightly dangerous town, ~ A foul mouthed shop owner, ~ A cute, odd animal, ~ Viv in all her glory, ~ A fabulous use of the word moist, ~ A skeleton who you’ll love, ~ A small summer fling, ~ A book lover/advocate.
All of this will make you want to jump into this book headfirst so you can live in this world!
In the acknowledgements the author says he had a cozy, fun, mystery in his head set in Thune (and I’m hoping featuring Viv and Tandri) but this book came to pass instead. With the events at the end of B&B, I’m hoping we will now get the original too, preferably with Satchel (IYKYK), because I want to get this warm, fuzzy feeling again from this authors work!
‘Sometimes, it’ll never be the right time. And sometimes, we aren’t the right people yet.’
Emory might be a student at the prestigious Aldryn College for Lunar Magics, but her healing abilities have always been mediocre at best—until a treacherous night in the Dovermere sea caves leaves a group of her classmates dead and her as the only survivor. Now Emory is plagued by strange, impossible powers that no healer should possess.
Powers that would ruin her life if the wrong person were to discover them.
To gain control of these new abilities, Emory enlists the help of the school’s most reclusive student, Baz—a boy already well-versed in the deadly nature of darker magic, whose sister happened to be one of the drowned students and Emory’s best friend. Determined to find the truth behind the drownings and the cult-like secret society she’s convinced her classmates were involved in, Emory is faced with even more questions when the supposedly drowned students start washing ashore— alive —only for them each immediately to die horrible, magical deaths.
And Emory is not the only one seeking answers. When her new magic captures the society’s attention, she finds herself drawn into their world of privilege and power, all while wondering if the truth she’s searching for might lead her right back to Dovermere…to face the fate she was never meant to escape.
Emory is back at Aldryn College after ‘the incident’ where she lost her best friend and finds herself with more magic than she originally had.
Baz is also back with his grief of losing his sister, Romie, in the incident.
But all is not what it seems.
2 words – absolutely brilliant!
This was a dark academia read where the writing was rich and captivating. The magic system was so unique and I found myself so immersed in the storyline that I read this in 2 days (which is a feat for me!)
However I am left wondering if there is something amiss with me because, damn, I always fall for the wrong guy!!!!
Top Ten Tuesday is featured by That Artsy Reader Girl. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.
Topic: Book Titles That Would Make Great Newspaper Headlines
I had a blast with this! Could’ve done a list of 20 I think!!!!
Destroy the Day by Brigid Kemmerer Famine by Laura Thalassa Fire Night by Penelope Douglas Fear Me by BB Reid Days of Blood and Starlight by Laini Taylor War by Laura Thalassa Empire of the Vampire by Jay Kristoff Hexed by Julia Tuffs End of Days by Susan Ee The Theft of Sunlight by Intisar Khanani
Winnie Wednesday has gotten everything she thought she wanted. She passed the deadly hunter trials, her family has been welcomed back into the Luminaries, and overnight, she has become a local celebrity.
The Girl Who Jumped. The Girl Who Got Bitten.
Unfortunately, it all feels wrong. For one, nobody will believe her about the new nightmare called the Whisperer that’s killing hunters each night. Everyone blames the werewolf, even though Winnie is certain the wolf is innocent.
On top of that, following her dad’s convoluted clues about the Dianas, their magic, and what happened in Hemlock Falls four years ago is leaving her with more questions than answers.
Then to complicate it all, there is still only one person who can help her: Jay Friday, the boy with plenty of problems all his own.
As bodies and secrets pile up around town, Winnie finds herself questioning what it means to be a true Wednesday and a true Luminary—and also where her fierce-hearted loyalties might ultimately have to lie.
Back with Winnie Wednesday and Hemlock Falls and, after the events of The Luminaries, Winnie and her family are back in the good graces of the Luminaries but Winnie has her own plans!
I listened to the audio and can totally recommend it, the narrator was perfection!
This book certainly does not suffer from 2nd book syndrome, I really enjoyed it, more than book 1 in fact!
I do love a bad boy and Jay is my utter fave in this book but Winnie’s growth is amazing!
I don’t want to say anything about the plot but you can expect the same darkness, mystery and gothic forest from book 1 along with more action, drama and maybe a bit of romance!
There’s a jaw dropping reveal (which I did guess and then dismissed!) and an ending that made me aaaaw and say no way! Book 3 please!
The Sunday Post is a blog news meme hosted by Caffeinated Reviewer It’s a chance to share news, a post to recap the past week on your blog and showcase books and things we have received.
Hi everyone, hope you’ve had a good week?
Halloween was a bit of a wash out here as it was pouring down but the kidlets just kept coming!
It was back to work and school for us after our week off and I met my new colleagues face to face in the office which was nice!
I’ve been having some neck issues this week, I keep getting muscle spasms in the big muscle on the right (trapezium?) and it’s so painful!
Today is Guy Fawkes/Firework night here and, for a change, it’s raining so we aren’t going to the local display, we are just going to have a few sparklers in the garden and some hotdogs!
New Arrivals
Chain of Thorns by Cassandra Clare
(I’ve got the series in paperback and this is out now!)
The Hurricane Wars by Thea Guanzon
What I’ve Read
🎧 Blood Scion by Deborah Falaye ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
🎧 The Night Hunt by Alexandra Christo ⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
A Demon’s Guide to Wooing a Witch by Sarah Hawley ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Hercule Poirot’s Silent Night by Sophie Hannah ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Look out for my reviews soon!
You might have missed…..
Review – House of Roots and Ruin by Erin A Craig Unboxing – Illumicrate: October 2023 Review – A Lady’s Guide to Scandal by Sophie Irwin Review – Hercule Poirot’s Silent Night by Sophie Hannah
CJRTB Books 