Verity Reads Books (lots of them)
In which our heroine attempts to tame the to-read pile
We may be into July but there are still some summery romances releasing. This week it’s The Next Best Thing, which is Gabriella Gamez’s debut romance with a librarian heroine, an NFl hero and a fake relationship situation. Sounds promising doesn’t it? And I really like the cover too.
I’m back with the most expensive post of the month – as it’s a rare month when I manage to write this without buying books myself. But I’ll give it a go – hang around until the end and I’ll let you know how I get on!
As usual, lets start with the former books of the week that are on offer. At 99p there’s Emily Henry’s Happy Place, which is last year’s release and thus just out in paperback. Also on offer because the author has a new book out is Ali Hazelwood’s The Love Hypothesis – and at this point Hazelwood seems to have a book at 99p every month, so you just have to wait long enough for the one you want to come around. I’m still waiting to get my hands on the new Christina Lauren, but The Unhoneymooners is on offer at the moment – this is an enemies to lovers, forced proximity romance– where food poisoning in the bridal party sees the bride’s twin sister go on the honeymoon with the best man – who happens to be her nemesis.
A much more recent release is How To End a Love Story – and I stand by my reservations about one aspect of this one, but it is a pretty good summer read. And The Lifeline, Libby Page’s sequel to The Lido which I read on our holiday in April is also 99p. And Iris Kelly Doesn’t Date, the last book in the Bright Falls series by Ashley Herring Blake is 99p as well.
I’m really trying not to be annoyed about this considering I went out and bought the hardback on release day, but the final Maisie Dobbs The Comfort of Ghosts is down to £2.99 at the moment. This was my favourite book I read last month and is a lovely ending to the series, but as usual you’ll probably want to have read the others to get the most out of it.
On the non-fiction from Tara Westover’s Educated is 99p – it’s a few years now since I read this one, but it has really stuck with me because Tara’s childhood is so awful and she has overcome so much. Something I read much more recently is Nick de Semleyn‘s The Last Action Heroes about the stars of the blockbuster action movies of the 80s and 90s -if you liked the Arnold Schwarzenegger documentary on Netflix, then you’ll be interested in this. And if you want some history, Lucy Worsley’s Jane Austen at Home is 99p too.
I still haven’t watched the new series of Bridgerton, but the book that inspired it Romancing Mr Bridgerton is on offer this month – all the usual caveats about the differences between the twenty-plus year old source material and the adaptation.
This month’s Terry Pratchett is The Fifth Elephant, which is £1.99 and is in the fifth book in the City Watch sub-series of the Discworld books. The Science of Discworld III is also 99p at the moment too. The Georgette Heyer is one of my favourites – Sylvester – and not quite as cheap, but Have His Carcase aka Peter and Harriet 2 is the Peter Wimsey.
Happy Wednesday!
Back next week. I promise.
Well that was quite a week. I’m still not sure if I’m coming g or going. And my brain has been pretty fried so I think that explains the descent into binge-reading of Patti Benning mini-mysteries. I wish I could say what I’m going to do tomorrow, but I don’t know yet and I’m hoping inspiration will come to me at some point.
Read:
Welcome to Glorious Tuga by Francesca Segal*
These Old Shades by Georgette Heyer
Jackie by Dawn Tripp*
Curried Lobster Murder by Patti Benning
Creamy Casserole Murder by Patti Benning
Grilled Rye Murder by Patti Benning
A Quiche to Die for by Patti Benning
A Side of Murder by Patti Benning
Started:
The Way We All Became The Brady Bunch by Kimberley Potts
Seven Lively Suspects by Katy Watson*
Still reading:
The Unforgettable Loretta, Darling by Katherine Blake*
No books bought!
Bonus picture: Tuesday night watching John Lloyd Young sing.
*next to a book book title indicates that it came from NetGalley. ** indicates it was an advance copy from a source other than NetGalley.
I promise normal service will return soon, but my brain is still recovering from Thursday night, my sleep is out of whack. England needed penalties to get through to the semi finals of EURO 2024 last night and it’s the British Grand Prix just down the road from me today. And that’s not even mentioning the MotoGP, the Tour de France and Wimbledon. Plus the fact that I have to run around the park today because I’m doing the Race for Life next weekend. Back tomorrow…
Books read this month: 36*
New books: 31
Re-reads: 5 (all audiobooks)
Books from the to-read pile: 12
NetGalley books read: 3
Kindle Unlimited read: 12
Ebooks: 4
Audiobooks: 5
Non-fiction books: 3
Favourite book this month: The Comfort of Ghosts
Most read author: Patti Benning
Books bought: Three book-books, four ebooks and two pre-orders
Books read in 2024: 208
Books on the Goodreads to-read shelf (I don’t have copies of all of these!): 736
A pretty solid month of reading all in all. Not as much from the NetGalley list as I should have done, but more from the to-read pile than some months so swings and roundabouts.
Bonus picture: Regents Park on a summer evening. Lovely stuff.
*includes some short stories/novellas/comics/graphic novels – including 2 this month!
Wet and rainy Westminster at 6.30 this morning on my way home to bed. Normal service will be resumed when I’m back on normal time!
Normal service will be resumed after the general election in the UK. I’m likely to be asleep as this publishes because I’m working the overnight tonight to cover the results…
Only three things to tell you about today, and one of them is a check in on something I mentioned on release day, but hey, here we go:
One Last Summer by Kate Spencer*
I read Kate Spencer’s In A New York Minute back in 2022 and enjoyed it so I was really excited to see what she had written next. This is about a group of friends who met at summer camp and have kept a tradition going of meeting up at that camp again into adulthood. But this summer is the last hurrah – because the camp is being sold. Clara our heroine hasn’t been on the last few reunions – but her boss has forced her to take time off so she’s back – and now has to deal with her former camp crush Mack. I really liked the premise, but I found Clara really hard to like and the one-upmanship vibe that her relationship with Mack has is just not my thing. It will be for some people – but it veered to close to the “I’m pranking you to show you I like you” vibe that can really get on my last nerve. It was also much closer to New Adult in feel than I was expecting. Not for me – but never mind, I know other people will really like it, which is why I’m including it here.
Truly, Madly, Deeply by Alexandria Bellefleur
I mentioned this when it came out, so now I’ve read it, it’s only fair I come back to report. I’ve got a longer summary of the plot in that last post – but it’s a jaded romance author and a family lawyer at the centre of it and a enemies to lovers plot. I’m sad to report that it didn’t really work for me – mainly because of some issues with the subplots that I can’t really explain without spoiling them completely. But I am finding a theme with the Alexandria Bellefleurs that I’ve read that I like the idea of them or the plot description more than I like the actual execution. Count Your Lucky Stars was a BotW – but I had an issue with the final act. I don’t ever hate them – because I keep coming back for more – I just don’t ever love them-love them if that makes sense!
Career Books for Girls by Kay Clifford
It’s only a month to go before Book Con 2024, so I’m having a quick check that I’ve read everything I bought home from Bristol two years ago (yes, I know, I know) and this was one of the ones I found. As the title suggests, this is basically an encyclopaedia of books aimed at encouraging girls into careers, or informing them about what was actually involved in careers, in the long first half of the twentieth century. I had read more of them than I was expecting – and I really liked Kay’s writing which wryly points out the issues with the world view of these books as well as telling you about them. It’s not meant to be read all at once, more a dip into type thing, but that didn’t stop me!
And that’s it for this month, a reminder of the Books of Week in June were: Summer Fridays, Summer Romance, The Formula and A Nobleman’s Guide for Seducing a Scoundrel.
Happy Humpday!
For the second week in a row, I’m writing about a book that I finished on Monday. But it was one of two books I finished on Monday, so that gives a bit of a sense of how close to the end I was, and how hopping around my reading was last week. It’s also out this very day in the US (it came out here last month) so it’s also relatively well timed. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!
Tuga is a remote island in the South Atlantic, only accessible by boat at certain times of year. On the last boat in this season are Charlotte Walker, on her way to study the island’s tortoises, and Dan Zekri, on his was home to take over from his uncle as the island’s chief medical officer. What follows is a year in the life of the key characters on the island – full of ups and downs and a huge learning experience for Charlotte.
I really enjoyed this – it’s gentler than I expected but also all the characters felt very well rounded and fully formed, not just Charlotte and Dan. And this is also the first in a trilogy, which I only realised after I finished it and is good news because I wanted more! I’m trying to think of comparison books – but struggling a lot. It may yet come to me, but everything I’ve thought of so far had a lot of “it’s like one thing that this book does, but not like any of the rest of it” so I don’t think they work! And it’s so new that the Good Reads suggestions are still other new releases which doesn’t help either!
I mentioned Welcome to Glorious Tuga in my Summer of Not Sequels post and as I predicted in that I have already seen it about a lot this summer – at the airports and in the bookshops. My copy came from NetGalley, but you can buy it now in all the usual formats like Kindle and Kobo as well.
Happy Reading!
Verity Reads Books (lots of them) 