So last month, I unfortunately didn’t get to read as much as I’d wanted to. But I kind of expected that, what with going on vacation and all – it always completely destroys my schedule and productivity whenever I go out of town. Without fail. (Plus, I don’t read when during vacation. I dunno why.)
But it’s a new month, and I’ve got a good feeling about July. Heck, even though I haven’t posted as much as I’d have wanted to here so far this month, I’m posting Monthly Reading Wrap-Up for June 2024 within the first week of July, which is waayyy butter than last month. And I’ve got a solid TBR lined up of stuff I’ve been meaning to read that I’m excited about – not to mention whatever new releases catch my eye – so I think that this month’s reading is gonna be good.
Anyway, without further ado, let’s get into my StoryGraph statistics from last month.
June Reading 2024
I read 2 books and 960 pages
😐 MOODS: Not as many Moods as in May, but that comes with reading less books. Adventurous was of course number one, as it always is. The other three Moods were Tense, Hopeful and Funny, and they were actually pretty equal on the chart.
👢 PACE: My books from last month were all either fast or medium paced.
🔢 PAGE NUMBER: Everything I read was between 300 and 700 pages.
📖 FICTION/NONFICTION: It was once again all fiction this month. As is usual.
🎭 GENRES: There weren’t as many Genres in June as there were in the month before. (Again, it comes with reading less.) The Genre king for last month was once again Fantasy as is almost always the case – I don’t think I’ve ever had a month where it wasn’t. The other four genres were Romance, Middle Grade, LGBT+ and Young Adult. (It bothers me that StoryGraph lumps in reading demographics with genres though – they’re not the same thing!!)
📄 FORMAT: This particular pie graph is once again wrong. (As usual.) All of the books that I read were ebooks.
⭐ RATING: My median star rating for last month was 4.0. The two ratings I gave were 3.0 stars and 5.0 stars, so 4.0 is exactly in between them.
📉 PAGES READ DAILY: I didn’t read as much as I’d have liked during June. The only days I read were the 7th and 8th, as well as the last three days of the month. June 28th thru the 30th was also my biggest reading spike.
So yeah, June wasn’t the best month I’ve had this year in regards to reading books, but it certainly wasn’t the worst (I’m looking at you January and February). I’m excited about the books I’ve got on my TBR, and looking into the new releases as well.
As I’ve said, I’m really hoping that July is a good reading month. I’m starting the next arc of One Piece tonight, and I’m looking forward to reading the books that are out in the Legendborn Cycle and the Unorthodox Chronicles. And whatever comes out this month and catches my eye, of course.
Anyway, thanks for joining me in checking out my StoryGraph stats for my June reading in 2024. Thank you also for reading, and I hope you have an wonderful day/night!
GENRES: Fantasy, Romance, YA, LGBT+, Graphic Novel, Fiction
PUBLISHER: HarperAlley
RELEASE DATE: 4 June 2024
BOOK DESCRIPTION:
In this queer reimagining of Arthurian legend, Knights of the Round Table Lancelot and Tristan set out on a quest to find the missing magician Merlin, but instead discover an unexpected romance. An inclusive, magical twist on the enduring legend of Arthur that is a tale for the ages.
Merlin is missing, and Camelot is under attack.
When King Arthur calls for aid, Morgan le Fay answers her estranged half brother’s plea—for a price. She’ll locate Merlin in exchange for the mysterious magical sapling their father bequeathed to Arthur on his passing. Much to her chagrin, Arthur insists on sending two Knights of the Round Table with her.
Sir Lancelot has carefully built himself a reputation as the most well-liked of Arthur’s knights, but he can’t crack quiet Tristan’s brooding exterior. Sir Tristan is silently battling a curse—one that has bound him to the lady Isolde against his will, and one he grows ever more desperate to break.
As the trio journeys through Albion, sparks begin to fly between the two knights. But before they can unravel the tangle of feelings and secrets between them, they will have to face a threat that could destroy all of Camelot—unless they and Morgan can learn to work together to destroy it first.
My Review
I love retellings. Fairytale, classic fiction, legends – it doesn’t matter. I love reading reinterpretations of old works, as well as stories based on or inspired by them.
Regarding Tristan & Lancelot: A Tale of Two Knights however… I found it very mid. It wasn’t even close to being a bad book, but I didn’t really enjoy it that much either. I guess it was just another book that wasn’t for me. The art is fantastic though – it was my favorite thing about the graphic novel! (I gave my rating an extra half-star because I loved it so much.)
Aside from the great art, I kind of felt that the rest of the stuff the novel had going for it was pretty meh. The characters were very, very basic and weren’t well defined, and the plot and “twists” were extraordinarily predictable. It just wasn’t a book that I super enjoyed. Also, the title is way too long.
This graphic novel also felt like a fanfiction, not gonna lie. (And I mean, technically I guess it was…) Especially with how the story was presented and the way it was written. There wasn’t really much to establish the background or world (because everyone knows about King Arthur and stuff right?), and it all felt kinda rushed. Like, I’m all for a fast paced adventure, but you gotta establish your world and characters first.
I also wasn’t sold on the romance. I never really understood what Lancelot initially saw in Tristan. The latter was mostly irritable and standoffish and didn’t interact with anyone if he could help it. Was it just because Tristan was hot? Because that’s not good enough for me sometimes when it comes to books and stuff. I need something more than that. And Lancelot spent a good amount of time mooning over Tristan for (what I felt) was seemingly nothing.
Morgan and Arthur’s slight animosity didn’t make sense to me after I finished reading A Tale of Two Knights either. Like, I get it, in Arthurian lore they’re antagonistic. But they didn’t really have a reason to be here. And the mystery of why they put each other off was one of the more interesting things about the novel, and I didn’t feel like it had a good payoff. Also, everything regarding the plot resolved just a little too nicely.
Anyway, I don’t really have anything else to say. This clearly wasn’t for me, but others might enjoy it. And the art was amazing.
As always, thank you for reading and have an awesome day/night!
See ya ~Mar
Some Interactions I Liked
[Guinevere] “I miss being out in the field. And I miss having you around. Camelot could use you.”
[Morgan] “I’m here now. All it took was my brother’s kingdom to fall into utter chaos.”
[Arthur] “I do wish we could meet under better circumstances.”
[Guinevere] “Maybe if you had invited her for dinner every once in a while.”
[Arthur] “I…”
[Morgan] “Careful. It’s a long drop. And we don’t know what’s underneath the water.”
[Lancelot] “Don’t tell me. Something isn’t right about this place.”
[Morgan] “What gave it away?”
[Morgan] “It doesn’t matter where you come from… Or who you are… Or what you struggle with. You don’t do it because you’re a knight. You don’t do it for a title or glory or for Arthur to pat you on the back. I don’t do it just because I’m getting paid. We do it because it’s the right thing to do. It doesn’t matter who was born a peasant or noble. It doesn’t matter if I’m part fae or if I’ve lost most of my magic. We don’t get to sit around and mope.
Happy Monday (and April Fools Day) everybody! I’m super early with this post this time. It’s April 1st – you don’t get any earlier in the month than that! So yeah, second quarter SFF releases let’s gooooo!
It’s time to do that thing I’ve done every quarteragain. I’m gonna go over the books that are coming out over the next three months that interest me the most. And they’re pretty much only gonna be science fiction and fantasy. Because that’s mostly what I read.
Anyway, this time I have a list of eight books that I’m interested in. Eight. Never have I had a number so high on one of these. (…I think.) But yeah, you know the drill; I’m only interested in these books – there’s no guarantee that I’m gonna read all of them. We’ll see.
RELEASING: April 2nd
A skeptic and a supernatural being make a crossroads deal to achieve their own ends only to get more than they bargained for in this lively young adult romantic adventure from the New York Times bestselling author of Spell Bound and So This Is Ever After.
Seventeen-year-old Ellery is a non-believer in a region where people swear the supernatural is real. Sure, they’ve been stuck in a five-year winter, but there’s got to be a scientific explanation. If goddesses were real, they wouldn’t abandon their charges like this, leaving farmers like Ellery’s family to scrape by.
Knox is a familiar from the Other World, a magical assistant sent to help humans who have made crossroads bargains. But it’s been years since he heard from his queen, and Knox is getting nervous about what he might find once he returns home. When the crossroads demons come to collect Knox, he panics and runs. A chance encounter down an alley finds Ellery coming to Knox’s rescue, successfully fending off his would-be abductors.
Ellery can’t quite believe what they’ve seen. And they definitely don’t believe the nonsense this unnervingly attractive guy spews about his paranormal origins. But Knox needs to make a deal with a human who can tether him to this realm, and Ellery needs to figure out how to stop this winter to help their family. Once their bargain is struck, there’s no backing out, and the growing connection between the two might just change everything.
RELEASING: April 2nd
A seductively twisted romance about loyalty, fate, the lengths we go to hide the darkest parts of ourselves… and the people who love those parts most of all.
Wyatt Westlock has one plan for the farmhouse she’s just inherited — to burn it to the ground. But during her final walkthrough of her childhood home, she makes a shocking discovery in the basement — Peter, the boy she once considered her best friend, strung up in chains and left for dead.
Unbeknownst to Wyatt, Peter has suffered hundreds of ritualistic deaths on her family’s property. Semi-immortal, Peter never remains dead for long, but he can’t really live, either. Not while he’s bound to the farm, locked in a cycle of grisly deaths and painful rebirths. There’s only one way for him to break free. He needs to end the Westlock line.
He needs to kill Wyatt.
With Wyatt’s parents gone, the spells protecting the property have begun to unravel, and dark, ancient forces gather in the nearby forest. The only way for Wyatt to repair the wards is to work with Peter — the one person who knows how to harness her volatile magic. But how can she trust a boy who’s sworn an oath to destroy her? When the past turns up to haunt them in the most unexpected way, they are forced to rely on one another to survive, or else tear each other apart.
RELEASING: April 2nd
The Shadowhunter Chronicles meets Chinese diaspora folklore in Darker by Four, the first in an epic contemporary fantasy duology from Jade Fire Gold author June Tan.
A vengeful girl. A hollow boy. A missing god.
Rui has one goal in mind—honing her magic to avenge her mother’s death.
Yiran is the black sheep of an illustrious family. The world would be at his feet—had he been born with magic.
Nikai is a Reaper, serving the Fourth King of Hell. When his master disappears, the underworld begins to crumble…and the human world will be next if the King is not found.
When an accident causes Rui’s power to transfer to Yiran, everything turns upside down. Without her magic, Rui has no tool for vengeance. With it, Yiran finally feels like he belongs. That is, until Rui discovers she might hold the key to the missing death god and strikes a dangerous bargain with another King.
As darkness takes over, three paths intersect in the shadows. And three lives bound by fate must rise against destiny before the barrier between worlds falls and all Hell breaks loose—literally.
Perfect for fans of This Savage Song and Only a Monster, Darker by Four will pull readers into a world of love and desperation and revenge—a world where every deal has a catch, no secret stays buried, and no one is exactly who they say they are.
RELEASING: April 16th
She has power over death. He has power over her. When two enemies strike a dangerous bargain, will they end a war… or ignite one?
Heroes die, cowards live. Daughter of a conquered world, Ruying hates the invaders who descended from the heavens long before she was born and defeated the magic of her people with technologies unlike anything her world had ever seen.
Blessed by Death, born with the ability to pull the life right out of mortal bodies, Ruying shouldn’t have to fear these foreign invaders, but she does. Especially because she wants to keep herself and her family safe.
When Ruying’s Gift is discovered by an enemy prince, he offers her an impossible deal: If she becomes his private assassin and eliminates his political rivals—whose deaths he swears would be for the good of both their worlds and would protect her people from further brutalization—her family will never starve or suffer harm again. But to accept this bargain, she must use the powers she has always feared, powers that will shave years off her own existence.
Can Ruying trust this prince, whose promises of a better world make her heart ache and whose smiles make her pulse beat faster? Are the evils of this agreement really in the service of a much greater good? Or will she betray her entire nation by protecting those she loves the most?
RELEASING: April 30th
When her best friend is sacrificed to the devil, she’ll go to hell and back for him.
Plain, poor, plus-size, and autistic, Alesta grew up trying to convince her beauty-obsessed kingdom that she’s too useful to be sacrificed. Their god blessed their island Soladisa as a haven for his followers, but to keep the devil at bay, the church sends a child sacrifice to hell’s entrance every season―often poor or plain girls just like Alesta.
With a head full of ideas for inventions, Alesta knows her best shot at making it to adulthood is to design something impressive for the festival exhibition so she might win a spot in the university―acceptance could guarantee her safety. But Alesta’s flying machine demonstration goes awry, a failure that will surely mean death. What happens is worse: Her best friend and heir to the throne, Kyrian, takes the blame expecting leniency but ends up sacrificed in her place.
To stop the sacrifices forever, Alesta plans to kill the monster that killed her friend. Prepared to save her kingdom or die trying, she travels to the depths of hell only to find Kyrian―alive, but monstrously transformed.
There is no escaping hell or their growing feelings for one another, and the deeper they descend into hell, the closer they come to uncovering a truth about the sacrifices that threatens to invoke the wrath of not only monsters but the gods as well.
RELEASING: May 7th
In a country divided between humans and witchers, Venus Stoneheart hustles as a brewer making illegal love potions to support her family.
Love potions is a dangerous business. Brewing has painful, debilitating side effects, and getting caught means death or a prison sentence. But what Venus is most afraid of is the dark, sentient magic within her.
Then an enemy’s iron bullet kills her mother, Venus’s life implodes. Keeping her reckless little sister Janus safe is now her responsibility. When the powerful Grand Witcher, the ruthless head of her coven, offers Venus the chance to punish her mother’s killer, she has to pay a steep price for revenge. The cost? Brew poisonous potions to enslave D.C.’s most influential politicians.
As Venus crawls deeper into the corrupt underbelly of her city, the line between magic and power blurs, and it’s hard to tell who to trust… Herself included.
The Poisons We Drink is a potent YA debut about a world where love potions are weaponized against hate and prejudice, sisterhood is unbreakable, and self-love is life and death.
RELEASING: June 4th
In this queer reimagining of an Arthurian legend, Knights of the Round Table Lancelot and Tristan set out on a quest to find the missing magician Merlin but instead discover an unexpected romance perfect for fans of The Prince and the Dressmaker and Squire.
When Merlin goes missing and Camelot falls under attack, King Arthur sends his estranged half-sister, Morgan le Fay, and esteemed Knights of the Round Table, Tristan and Lancelot, to find him. As the reluctant trio travels through Albion saving towns from treacherous foes and battling fae, their bonds deepen, and sparks fly between the two knights. Before they can sort through their complicated feelings, an unexpected dark force appears, bringing what just might be the end of Camelot.
From debut author James Persichetti and new talent L.S. Biehler, Tristan and Lancelot: A Tale of Two Knights will sweep readers away with an epic quest and a love story for the ages.
RELEASING: June 18th
Mulan meets Iron Widow in this thrilling silkpunk fantasy about a girl who must disguise herself as a boy and enter the famed and dangerous Engineer’s Guild trials to unravel the mystery of her father’s murder.
Eighteen-year-old Aihui Ying dreams of becoming a world-class engineer like her father, but after his sudden murder, her life falls apart. Left with only a journal of her father’s engineering secrets and a jade pendant snatched from the assassin, a heartbroken Ying follows the trail to the capital and the prestigious Engineers Guild—a place that harbors her father’s hidden past—determined to discover why anyone would threaten a man who ultimately chose a quiet life over fame and fortune.
Disguised as her brother, Ying manages to infiltrate the guild’s male-only apprenticeship trial with the help of an unlikely ally—Aogiya Ye-yang, the taciturn eighth prince of the High Command. With her father’s renown placing a target firmly on her back, Ying must stay one step ahead of her fellow competitors, the jealous guild masters, and the killer still hunting for her father’s journal. Complicating everything is her increasingly tangled relationship with the prince, who may have mysterious plans of his own.
The secrets concealed within the guild can be as deadly as the weapons they build—and with her life and the future of her homeland at stake, Ying doesn’t know who to trust. Can she avenge her father even if it means going against everything he stood for, or will she be next in the mastermind’s line of fire?
So yeah, these are all of the books coming out in the next three months that I’m interested in possibly reading. What books are coming out soon that you’re looking forward to? Do we share some of the same ones?
Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope you have an amazing day/night! I also hope that everyone who celebrates had a great Easter yesterday – and here’s a late Happy Easter!! 🐇🐥🥚🧺
