Last month I made some big claims about how I was going to read a book a day this month. Was I successful? Oh yes. Yes, I was. I read 24 books in the first 13 days. Then I slacked for about a week. And then I read some more. I also went to the eye doctor this month and he was all, “Do you read without contacts or glasses?” in a semi-disapproving tone. I didn’t know what to make of it. Because I do that thing. Meh-*izzle*.
Books Read: 38 (ha! Suck on that, March!)
Books Partially Read: 3
Books Bought: 2
Money Spent (approximately): $25
Books Borrowed: 19
Books Given: 17 (my mommy loves me. and there was a library book sale)
Books Re-read: 15 (feeling nostalgic again but none of them were graphic novels. I totally didn’t read those to up my numbers. This was legitimate book reading! Though admittedly a lot of it was YA. But when it is NOT?)
Money made (from selling books): None. But I’m creating a pile to sell
Books on To-Be-Read Shelf: 31. Guh.
Favorite Books this month: Ascendant
by Diana Peterfreund and Call Me Irresistible
by Susan Elizabeth Phillips.
I’m trying to keep it short and sweet this month for you. =)
Ascendant is, of course, the sequel to Peterfruend’s Rampant
, which I believe I wrote about before. Yup. It’s about an ancient order of nuns who are unicorn slayers. Unicorns come in many different forms–more than the one that’s on all those tapestries. Some are huge. One hung out with Alexander the Great. The unicorn history bits are actually pretty fascinating. I mean they are fictional, but it’s an intriguing conceit. Primarily the books follow one girl who is a descendant of 2 great unicorn hunting lines. In the first book she finds out unicorns exist and learns to fight them. In this one she’s still fighting but there’s a lot more about endangered species and finding better solutions than outright slaughter. It’s kind of better than the first one. I’ll read the third one (wink) that’s all I’m saying.
Call Me Irresistible is the culmination of several different books set in the same town for Phillips. It’s a small town in Texas with a lot of wacky characters. The main female lead comes from LA (and cameo’d in a previous book). The guy is from a couple different books. He was in one about his parents and another one about his best friend. There’s also some characters in this one who come from a fourth book of Phillips (about a female POTUS. Yeah. She gets to be President AND have a romance novel.) I LOVED this book. The other ones that have led up to this were good but this one is great. Excellent writing, characters, plot momentum. Just all around fabulous romance novel. I want to read it again already and the last book I did that with was Agnes and the Hitman
so that should give you some idea of this one stacks up. Also, I think if you liked Agnes you’ll like this one.
Honorable Mentions: Slice of Cherry
by Dia Reeves (it was maybe not AS GOOD as Bleeding Violet
which I wrote about here.), Lost Laysen
by Margaret Mitchell (I mostly loved the intro/biography part but the novella was good too), The Rules According to JWOWW
by Jenny Farley (I blame Katy W. for this one. Ha! But I did find parts of it amusing), and When Harry Met Molly
by Kieran Kramer (which was HI-larious. It’s a romance novel but one of the most non-stereotypical I’ve ever read. So much of it was NOT what would have happened in that time period. Totally ridiculous. I want to read her second book–Dukes to the Left of Me, Princes to the Right
–pretty bad now.)
Least Favorite Books: The Iron Witch
by Karen Mahoney (didn’t like the main girl, didn’t like the love interest. Did like the male best friend and was sad he wouldn’t get the girl. Didn’t like it’s a series, didn’t like the writing–written down to teenager. Way, way down.) and Jekel Loves Hyde
by Beth Fantaskey (should have known better since I didn’t like Fantaskey’s Jessica’s Guide to Dating on the Dark Side
much either. This one seemed worse though.)
Fave Quote of the Month (from a gorgeous art book which really should have been included in the Honorable Mentions. Super pretty):
“[speaking of the Eiffel Tower] For it will be told in no uncertain terms that it is simply a pretext, a mere excuse to depict everything admirable that is to be found in its vicinity, and it ought not forget those occasions when it has been allowed, by special favor, to figure prettily in the landscape…So be quiet, abstraction! Shut up, theorem!”
–From Arsene Alexandre’s ‘Prologue’ in Thirty-Six Views of the Eiffel Tower: A Turn-of-the-Century Tribute to the City of Light
.
Ta-Ta Till Next Month!
