Verity Reads Books (lots of them)
In which our heroine attempts to tame the to-read pile
There were nearly no books for this post, and I was actually starting to congratulate myself a little bit, but then I went into a bookshop on Tuesday night and bought two books and then another one on Thursday and bought a third and so here we are. The Mitford and Waugh letters should hopefully be interesting, Just As You Are is a Pride and Prejudice retelling and The Gay Best Friend has got comps to other books that I’ve really enjoyed so fingers crossed!
The latest Marlow Murder club mystery is out this week and so I thought now was a good time to point you back at my post about the series last year – which you can find here. This new books is The Mysterious Affair of Judith Potts centres on a secret from Judith’s past. She’s always been a bit of an enigma, but it looks like we might be about to get some answers as someone from her past appears in town. On top of that, there’s two dead local celebrities for the ladies to investigate. I really enjoy these – actually more than the TV versions of them as the adaptation seems much more played for laughs/humour than it reads to me as a book. The new one is in hardback and should be pretty easy to find in shops as well as in ebook and audiobook from all the usual sources. And if you haven’t read the earlier books yet, the first is in Kindle Unlimited at the moment and all the others are on offer for £2.99.
Happy Thursday everyone, and having mentioned one of the Christmas Notch books in my Not-New Christmas Recommendsday, I wanted to flag that Sierra Simone and Julie Murphy have a new book out today, The Fundamentals of Being a Good Girl. This is set in a college town and has a professor for the hero and a new lecturer in town for the heroine. I’m looking forward to reading it, but have a few reservations about the conflict of interest situation here because as you know I’m all about the competent heroines. However given that they’ve managed to handle similar stuff quite well in Christmas Notch I’m prepared to go with it and give it a try!
It’s the second Wednesday of January, and once again I’m back with the Kindle Offers that I’ve spotted that I think might interest you if you read this blog, or interested me while I was looking!
There is actually not a lot that I’ve already read and recommended on offer this month – probably because I don’t read a lot of romantasy or creepy thrillers. But there are a few to mention. I’m going to start with a former BotW: Armistead Maupin’s Mona of the Manor. My love for the Tales of the City books is well known at this point and this is the tenth (and probably last?) in the series. Maggie Shipstead’s Great Circle, which was one of my 50 States books from 2023, is 99p as is the second Bridget Jones book The Edge of Reason and Amy Lea’s Set On You about a curvy fitness influencer is back on offer too.
On the buzzy books front there is Bob Mortimer’s The Hotel Avocado, Harlan Coban’s Run Away – presumably because the adaptation has just hit Netflix, and Hannah Grace’s Icebreaker which is one of a slew of ice hockey related romances on offer, presumably because of the imminent arrival of Heated Rivalry to our streaming screens. In other things I have’t read there is a T J Klune from a couple of years back The Bones Beneath My Skin which I didn’t buy but only because I still have two Klunes in the backlog and I have rules that I’m trying to stick to. Talking of rules I’m trying to stick to, Assistant to the Villain is back on offer – I bough this last year and still haven’t read it and really need to get around to it because there are already two sequels with a third coming in the summer. Also waiting to be read (as a paperback though not on the Kindle) is Ashley Herring Blake’s Dream On, Ramona Riley, presumably because the second book in that series, Get Over it, April Evans, is out at the start of February.
This month the Terry Pratchett are the second and third in the Discworld series, The Light Fantastic and Equal Rites. Frederica is the Georgette Heyer One of my favourite Katie Fforde’s is on offer too – Flora’s Lot is set in an auction house and has bonus kittens. Romancing Mr Bridgerton is back on offer too – this is the book that the last season of Bridgerton was based on. Sidenote: the new season drops at the end of the month and is Benedict’s story aka based on An Offer from a Gentleman (which also happens to be in Kindle Unlimited at the moment). If you’re in the market for historical romance, Mary Balogh’s Remember When from her Ravenswood series is on offer as well. In classics, Ross Poldark, the first in Winston Graham’s Poldark series is on offer too.
In things I booked while writing this post we have The Almighty Dollar by Dharshini David and Dan Jones’s Henry V book (which is £1.99 rather than 99p) which is positively restrained.
Happy Humpday!
Happy Tuesday everyone and this week I’ve picked one of this week’s new releases – it’s out last week if you’re in the US or on Thursday if you’re in the UK. Check me out being actually topical for once.
It’s 1964 and Del and Dinah Newman and their two sons are household names across the States as the stars of a prime time TV show based upon their lives. But their 12 year contract is coming to an end and the ratings are down, the times are changing and behind the scenes the family itself is fraying: Dinah and Del are sleeping in separate rooms, elder son Guy has a secret in his private life and younger son Shep, a rock and roll teen idol, may have run into a problem his dad can’t buy him out of. And then Del is in mysterious car crash that leaves him in a coma with just weeks to go before the season finale – which could well be the series finale. Dinah decides to take matters into her own hands and take over the reigns of the family and the show. But can they keep it all together to get the finale across the line?
This is Jennifer Niven’s latest novel and is being blurbed as for fans of Lessons in Chemistry and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and I would say that that is a pretty good comparison. The family live in the spotlight and who struggle with it in various different ways but as well as that the world has changed around them and their brand of entertainment hasn’t changed fast enough. It’s also a look at the way that women were viewed in society in the 1960s and the restrictions that they chaffed against (or not in some cases). It felt really timely to me, because the fight for various rights has never really gone away and it is good to have a reminder of how recently some of these things actually happened. But that makes it sound a lot heavier a read than it is – it’s fun and frothy and surprised me in how things all resolved at the end. I do hope that’s not too much of a spoiler!
My copy came from NetGalley and I’m writing this before the release in the UK so it’s quite hard to tell how widely available this will be in the bookshops, but I’m hoping to spot it soon because Waterstones are showing plenty of copies on their website. And of course it’s also available in Kindle and Kobo and as an ebook.
Honestly I really picked the wrong week to do the commute in to work daily (rather than staying down there for a few nights) and it was as very rude awakening for the post Christmas return to normality. Still that number of train delays means more reading time I guess? Anyway, I’m pleased with myself – I’ve read two of my January NetGalley books already and also a non-fiction book so I’m off to an alright start to the year really.
Read:
Silenced at the Book Show by Kim Griswell*
Meet-Cat by Adele Buck
Deliberate Cruelty by Roseanne Montillo
Nose Dives by Patti Benning
Meet the Newmans by Jennifer Niven*
The Ape Who Guards the Balance by Elizabeth Peters
Started:
Not Another Love Song by Julie Soto
Still reading:
Square Haunting by Francesca Wade
Ritual of Fire by D V Bishop
Pet Shop Boys, Literally by Chris Heath
Three kindle books bought because of poor will power while writing the offers post!
Bonus picture: Snow week…
*next to a book book title indicates that it came from NetGalley. ** indicates it was an advance copy from a source other than NetGalley.
This is the very final start of year post, I promise. But after the theatre lookahead yesterday, today there are a few bits and bobs that are happening this year that aren’t plays or musicals that I wanted to mention.
Obviously we are less than a month away now from the Winter Olympics, which are happening in Milan and Cortina. I am very, very excited about this, but at the moment I’m even more excited about the fact that the European Figure Skating Championships is happening in Sheffield this week coming, and even better: I’m going. It is not very often that we get an international figure skating competition here – but when they do come it’s usually in Sheffield and I go! I was at the Grand Prix a couple of years ago, and I was also at the Europeans last time they were here – all the way back in 2012.
Also happening in the UK (but that I don’t have tickets for) this year we have the Commonwealth Games which are back in Glasgow because all the other host options dropped out and the European Athletics Championships which are being held in the UK for the first time, at the Alexandra Stadium where I went to see the Commonwealth Games Athletics four years ago. It’s also the men’s World Cup football this summer which has more countries taking part than ever before and is also being staged across three countries for the first time in the USA, Canada and Mexico. This means that for a few weeks this summer, the nation will be gripped with hope that one of our teams will win. This feeling will be fleeting.
Away from the sport to something else that’s actually in the ticket box and this year I’m finally going to see Rufus Wainwright’s Judy Garland concert. This is based on the 1961 comeback concert series that Garland did. I’ve owned the CD of the Rufus version for about 15 years now, and didn’t think I would ever get the chance to see it live, but to mark the 20th anniversary of his original run of it at Carnegie Hall, he’s doing it at the Royal Albert Hall. For those of you who are counting, this will be my fourth or fifth time seeing Rufus – depending on if you count the two Proms on the same day in 2023 separately or not!
Rufus is actually my only musical event in the box at the moment, because the Boyzone reunion concert is happening on a weekend that really doesn’t work for me (and they didn’t add any other dates beyond the first two) and I’ve already seen Take That more than once. But we don’t have the line up for the Proms this year yet, and that’s often where a lot of my concerts come from. And I’m also eyeing up some comedy. As you may know we are deep in Taskmaster at the moment, and several of the comedians that we have really enjoyed on that are on tour this year and coming near us so bookings are definitely possible!
There are a couple of art exhibitions that I really want to see too. There’s a Seurat exhibition at the Courtauld. I have a real soft spot for Seurat and this is the first dedicated exhibition to him in the UK in 30 years. And looking right ahead to the end of the year there is a Renoir exhibition at the National which also falls squarely into my favourite bits of painting. So I’m already plotting when to go to both of those. This summer National Portrait Gallery has got a Marilyn Monroe exhibition to mark the centenary of her birth. The V&A has got a Wallace and Gromit exhibition coming to the Young V&A and a Schiaparelli one at the main museum. Sidenote: I still haven’t been to the new V&A Storehouse and really want to, but the David Bowie archive is already booked out, so I may wait for some availability there before I go there. Yesterday was the 10th anniversary of his death so combined with the fact that it’s only just gone on sale, I’m not surprised it’s popular!
Have a great Sunday everyone!
Yes, I know, you thought that I was done with the start of year posts, but no. One of the other things you hear a lot about from me on here is theatre, so here is what’s coming up this year in the theatre.
I’m going to start with the things that I’ve already got in the ticket box. Firstly in May I’m off to Essex to see Thespians, Mischief’s first musical. This is set in Ancient Greece and is about the invention of acting and the world’s first play. As you know, I have such a soft spot for Mischief – I wrote about Christmas Carol Goes Wrong just a couple of weeks ago and I’ve seen so much of their other stuff too and I can’t wait to see what they do with a musical.
Also in the (virtual) ticket box is Jesus Christ Superstar. This is a revival and also a restaging – it’s the Regents Park production of a few years ago that I didn’t manage to get to see, but at the London Palladium this summer and starring Sam Ryder as Jesus. This is the last of the Andrew Lloyd Webber mega musicals that I haven’t seen live in the theatre (although I have seen the early 2000s DVD version quite a few times) and although it’s not my favourite musical, after missing out on the hot tickets that were Sunset Boulevard and Evita revivals the last two years this time I’ve decided to go for it!
Talking on missing out and Evita, I’ve already missed out on tickets for the Last Five Years concert perfomances (also at the Palladium) starring Rachel Ziegler and Ben Platt which are happening in March and were gone in the blink of an eye. Even sooner that that though is the Cynthia Erivo one woman Dracula. That starts in early Februrary and is by the same production team who produced the one-woman Picture of Dorian Gray with Sarah Snook that won a bunch of Oliviers and Tonys.
We’ve also got the London premiere of John Proctor is the Villain, which I’ve been reading about on the various theatre forums for a couple of years at this point. It’s play about a group of high school students studying Arthur Miller’s The Cruicible and got seven Tony nominations for the Broadway production last year, which starred Sadie Sink. No news on the cast for this transfer at the Royal Court, but it’s a Sonia Friedman production (like Merrily) so it could be pretty good on that front too.
Another Broadway transfer is Beetlejuice, which premiered on Broadway back in 2019 and I suspect would ahve been in London sooner but for the pandemic and all that malarkey. There are quite a few plays transferring into the West End from other theatres too – there’s Shadowlands with Hugh Bonneville, which started at Chichester; Grace Pervades starring Ralph Finnes and Miranda Raison coming in from Bath; and Rosamund Pike in Interalia which is coming in from across the river at the National. Talking of the National, they’ve got a revival of Les Liasions Dangereuses, starring Lesley Manville and Aiden Turner.
And finally I’m totally fascinated to see the revival of Avenue Q. You might remember that I went to one of the anniversary performances in 2024 and although I still adored it and the original cast, there are definitely things that haven’t aged well and I wonder how it will hit for new audiences who haven’t got the fond memories of the original that I do. I haven’t booked yet, but I’ll definitely be there at least once!
Have a great weekend everyone!
Books read this month: 35*
New books: 29
Re-reads: 6 (5 audiobooks)
Books from the to-read pile: 7
NetGalley books read: 6
Kindle Unlimited read: 10
Ebooks: 7
Audiobooks: 5
Non-fiction books: 2
Favourite book: Tough to choose between Season of Love and Second Chance Romance
Books bought: lets not talk about it
Most read author: Really hard to say because there weren’t any repeats ths month except Georgette Heyer rereads. So lets say that
Books read in 2025: 381
Books on the Goodreads to-read shelf (I don’t have copies of all of these!): 829 at the end of the year, but has now gone down after the cull I mentioned in yesterday’s resolutions post.
I finished the year pretty strongly once I had finished off my last states I actually managed to read some Christmas books and get some more NetGalley books off the list too. I’ve already said a lot about 2025, so there’s not a lot more to say here for once. But as we are now well into January, it’s time to look forward!
Bonus picture: one last Christmas photo – from Liberty’s main hall, it’s the good ship Liberty!
*often includes some short stories/novellas/comics/graphic novels – 6 this month!
I know we are a full week into the new year and this is a bit late, but I can only disrupt the publishing schedule so much. Normal service will be resumed next week I promise. Anyway, here we are now with my Reading Resolutions for this year, such as they are.
The first you already know about and it’s no more 50 States challenge. The number of states that aren’t fun is nearly into double figures – and that’s just too many for me to put up with, especially as they all end up being in the last couple of months of the year. And I’m not starting any new challenges, to replace it because the same thing will happen – I’ll end up reading things I don’t enjoy and also buying more books to complete them and that sort of defeats the object.
The second one I’ve actually already done (although you’ll see it in its old state in the stats post tomorrow) and that is clear out the Goodreads to read shelf. It’s been over 800 for months, and it went up again in December as I added all the new releases for 2026 while I was writing anticipated books. And so I spent some time (probably a couple of hours all together) going through all 28 pages of books on to read shelf and removing a whole load of them and it’s now under 600, and hopefully I’ll get it down further.
And then this is the one that is on the list ever year: Reduce the physical to read pile. As I said earlier, one of of the issues with reading challenges is that I never seem to be able to complete them without buying more books and that means that the pre-orders and the other stuff I buy just end up sitting waiting to be read. And we’re now at a point where there are three overflow piles in front of the to-read bookshelf and that’s ridiculous. So I need to really work on that this year. I will have another sort through it to weed stuff out as well and do a round of 50 pages and out on things (which might also get the good reads to shelf down further) but that will have to wait a week or two because I’ve only just done a charity shop run and cleared space to move in the office and I can’t start filling it up with stuff again already!
Wish me luck…
Verity Reads Books (lots of them) 