July is likely to be one of my best reading months of the year. I finished fourteen books, and started two others, and discovered some real gems along the way- including four five-star reads.
A number of the audiobooks I listened to were only around four hours long, so the quantity read sounds more impressive than it really was, but I'm going to take the achievement and run, anyway! Haha! It's still a lot of books, even if they weren't all chunky.
I'm going to run through what I read in July, and then talk about some of my favourites- and least favourites- of the month with you.
July Reading Stats:
📖 14 books completed, 2 started.
📖 4 hardbacks.
🎧 10 audiobooks
📖 1409 pages (3281 pages including audiobooks).
🎧 62.33 hours listened at 1.1x to 1.3x speed.
📖 4 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reads!
📖 3 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reads!
📖 Average rating: 3.82 stars.
📖 Average book length: 252 pages.
📖 Average time to finish: 4 days.
I read a good mix of authors and genres of fantasy; finally got to When the Coffee Gets Cold, and the rest of the Wayward Children series after years of meaning to; and listened to a ton of audiobooks.
I Read:
📖The Ballad of Falling Dragons by Sarah A. Parker. 4⭐
📖Under the Whispering Door by T. J. Klune. 5⭐
📖The Bones Beneath My Skin by T. J. Klune. 5⭐
📖Six of Crows: A Darker Shore Letters From Ketterdam. 4⭐
🎧Rite of the Starling Graphic Audio Part One by Devney Penney. 5⭐
🎧Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire. 3.5⭐
🎧Mislaid in Parts Half Known by Seanan McGuire. 3.5⭐
🎧Adrift in Currents Clean and Clear by Seanan McGuire. 4⭐
🎧Through Gates of Garnet and Gold by Seanan McGuire. 3⭐
🎧Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire. 3.5⭐ (Reread).
🎧Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Yamamoto. 3.5⭐
🎧A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking by T. Kingfisher. 2.5⭐
🎧Kingdom of the Wicked by Kerri Maniscalco. 3⭐ (Reread, 5 stars in print).
🎧A Crown of Ruin Graphic Audio Part Two by Jennifer L. Armentrout. 5⭐ (Reread).
And I started
📖The Wolf King by Lauren Palphreyman.
🎧Belladonna by Adalyn Grace. (Reread).
Favourite Reads: My favourites for July were Under the Whispering Door, The Bones Beneath My Skin, and The Ballad of Falling Dragons
I'm so glad that I bought Under the Whispering Door with my birthday money (along with The Bones Beneath My Skin), in an effort to try more of TJ Klune's work, because it's one of my favourite reads of the year so far. It's about a recently-deceased, tyrant workaholic learning the error of his ways in a way station between life and death, and discovering for the first time what it means to live. I can't help but compare it to The Midnight Train- if The Midnight Train was set in a tea shop instead of on a train, had diverse characters with a playful sense of humour, and the lessons were learned moving forward instead of looking back. A story about Death might sound depressing, but it was actually a wonderfully uplifting and heartfelt read, with cosy fantasy and found family vibes, epic world-building, the loveliest gay romance, and a good dose of comedy. I laughed my way through it- except when I was sobbing over the bittersweet and hearfelt moments- which may have happened a time or a dozen... I found it to be a very thought-provoking read, and it got me thinking about my own mortality, as well as the mysteries of the afterlife, and the impact different kinds of loss have on us. It also made me consider what's really important in life, and left me wanting to make better life choices, so I don't end up like Wallace. I should note that the story focuses on different kinds of death, including heart attack, murder, and suicide, plus a parent's grief caused by a child's death from cancer, and while it's all handled sensitively and often in a light-hearted way, if you find any of those topics triggering, this probably isn't the book for you. But if it isn't triggering and won't upset you, I'd highly recommend this book because it's amazing. You can find my full review of the book on Goodreads, here, if you want to know more.
The Bones Beneath My Skin was another fantastic book from TJ Klune, and I think I enjoyed this one even more than Under the Whispering Door. Seriously, I was obsessed with this book, and wish I could erase my memory so I could read it for the first time all over again. It's about two guys on the run from the government with an alien in the body of a ten-year-old girl who calls herself Artemis Darth Vader. An alien who is obsessed with bacon and western novels and the healing powers of chicken soup. There's a hostage situation, a bit of Stockholm Syndrome, a road trip across America as they flee for safety, and a tense stay in a creepy cult to hide from the bad guys while they try to get Artemis back where she belongs. There's also a lovely LGBTQIA+ enemies-to-lovers romance, and unbreakable bonds between the three main characters that will give you all the feels, and might just tear the heart right out of your chest. It's awesome, and everyone should read this book. Just trust me on this.
The Ballad of Falling Dragons was a sequel I was excited to dive in to after loving the first book, When the Moon Hatched, but after an interesting start, I was actually disappointed by how slow-paced it was. For much of the book, I couldn't discern what the true purpose of the plot was, or where the author was taking it, and it wasn't until I was about three-quarters into it that it really started to come together, make sense, and get good. Don't get me wrong, I did enjoy the story all the way through- especially the humour, banter, the relationship between Raeve and Kaan, the bonds with the dragons, and Pyrok developing feelings for someone unexpected... it just felt like a lot of effort for little return at times. The story flourished into an exciting, action-packed, and trauma-inducing clim@x, rolling out wave after wave of shock reveals, despicable villainy, harrowing fights for survival, and enough emotional pain to leave a girl rocking in a corner. The imprisonment, torture, childbirth flashback, and dragon deaths were brutal, and turned me into a sobbing wreck! I ploughed through the last two hundred pages in a whirlwind of emotions, and enjoyed it more that the rest of the book combined. Ironically, after days of struggling onwards, by the end, I was so invested in the storyline and characters' wellbeings, that I was sad it was over, and left longing for more! I need to know what happens to them all next! It ended with so many unanswered questions, and I can't wait for the third and final installment. Even if I'm waiting another couple of years to get it. I wrote a much longer review on Goodreads here.
Favourite Listens: I listened to a lot of audiobooks in July, but I think my favourite was probably A Crown of Ruin by Jennifer L. Armentrout.
Crown of Ruin was a reread of a novella from The Blood and Ash series that I read in print last winter, but it was a lot of fun to hear the story brought to life as an audiobook. It follows straight on from the The Primal of Blood and Bone, and helps to end a bit of the agony that its massive cliffhanger ending left us in before the final book's release. I'm so very grateful for this novella, because that book left me shooketh, and I would have been left reeling in despair until the next one comes out and everything ends happily for the three main characters- because I refuse to believe in any other ending for the series. I loved getting a taste of Casteel in his 'chaos era'- villanous Cas is delightful- and seeing him and Kieran mending the rift between them. Plus Millie and Malik's back and forth was hilarious, and I felt less anxious about the main characters' futures by the end. Jadis' return broke my heart, though, and Kolis, as usual, just gave me the ick. The only thing, besides Kolis, that I found off-putting was that the narrator made Cas sound like he belonged in a 1970s crime drama, and Kieran like he should be lurking in the shadows of a smog-filled London alleyway with a dagger in his boot. Which was just weird, since they're both meant to be nobility that grew up together from birth... I much prefer the narration on the Graphic Audio versions of the series over these unabridged versions, but Graphic Audio hasn't reached this book yet, and the unabridged is still well worth a listen. The first book in the series is From Blood and Ash, but just a warning, it's a very spicy romantasy series, and not suitable for under eighteens.
Least Favourites: And the worst thing I read last month was definitely A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking by T. Kingfisher. I enjoyed this middle-grade fantasy story well-enough, but I found the exaggerated English accents- especially the haughty voice of the FMC, which made her sound more like a 50-year-old woman off to a luncheon at the country club than a teenaged baker girl- incredibly annoying, and it was a real effort to keep listening. In fact, it got so bad, I had to pause it and listen to something else for a few days to destress, before going back and trying again. I wish I'd just bought a physical copy instead. Maybe I will one day. I'd like to give her children's books another go, because I always love T. Kingfisher's YA and adult books, because of her imaginative and humourous writing, and I'm curious about how she writes for younger audiences.
Anyway, that's what I read in July.
I'll be back to talk about what I read in August really soon.
Have you read any good books lately?
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