Happy Tuesday everybody! Also – yay! – double post!
Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly post currently hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. It celebrates lovely lists, wonderful books and the bookish community. This week’s topic is Books I Did Not Finish. Like last week’s prompt, I feel it’s rather self-explanatory. Of course, I’ve chosen to DNF several books in my life – more than ten, definitely – so I’m going to pick the ten most recent ones.
Here we go!
Witchmark by C.L. Polk: This one… I dunno, I was intrigued by the premise, but I think I was just so distracted and stressed by my job at the time that I couldn’t get into it (I’m pretty sure it was the holiday season). I remember distinctly not being in the mood for reading at the time as well. (Attempted to Read: 2020)
The Wife Upstairs by Rachel Hawkins: So yeah, I know everyone loved this book, but I just couldn’t get into it. To be fair, I couldn’t get into Jane Eyre either and I know they have their differences, but… I dunno, I guess it’s not really my genre or whatever? (Attempted to Read: 2021)
Children of Ragnarok by Cinda Williams Chima: This one hurt. This was one of my anticipated reads of November 2022, and it just wasn’t doing it for me. I’m not even really sure what it was about it in particular; honestly, I think it was several different things. (Attempted to Read: 2022)
Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree: I wanted to like this one. Actually, I wanted to love it. But it was waayyy too slow for me. I think I made it to around 16% before I threw in the towel. I was bored. (Attempted to Read: 2022)
The House Witch by Delemhach: I loved the premise for this one too… but the writing killed it got me. Like I loved the world and the characters, but this book needed an editor. It has a lot of potential though… (Attempted to Read: 2022)
Gods of the Wyrdwood by RJ Barker: Yet another one of the books on my anticipated reads list – this one for July 2023. I couldn’t even make it past the first couple chapters. This one just didn’t grab me at all. (Attempted to Read: 2023)
The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson: I’d been wanting to get into The Stormlight Archive for a while, though I was extremely apprehensive about it because all the books are over a thousand pages long each. Annnd… I couldn’t get into it. I gave this book over two hundred pages, as well. I think I got so burned out from it, actually, that it put me in a reading slump. So yeah, it wasn’t for me. (Attempted to Read: 2023)
Stars and Smoke by Marie Lu: And a third representative from the anticipated reads list appears – this novel from the March 2023 list. I just… I dunno, I think I got a third of the way through this before the characters just irritated me too much. I’ve also found that as I get older, I can’t stand how Marie Lu writes hyper-intelligent characters. (Attempted to Read: 2024)
Ordinary Monsters by J.M. Miro: I dunno, I just couldn’t get into this one. I didn’t grab me at all, really. And I gave it over a hundred pages. I just don’t think it was for me, unfortunately. Dunno what it was about it, though. (Attempted to Read: 2024)
I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons by Peter S. Beagle: This one… I might actually go back to, eventually. Even though it was slower, I enjoyed a lot of what was going on here. But I made the unfortunate decision to start reading this a few days before Christmas, a holiday that – as much as I love it – always distracts and/or stresses me out. So maybe I’ll give this one another shot someday. For now, however, it will remain unfinished. (Attempted to Read: 2024)
What books have you DNF-ed recently? What are DNF-ed novels that bother you the most? Why do you typically DNF books?
As always, thanks so much for reading, and I hope that you have an amazing day/night!
It’s that time of year again – the time of year where I recommend books for the season! My recommendations of autumn books of 2024!
It’s unfortunately a bit later than I had intended it to be this year (I had planned to get this post out yesterday or the day before), but it’s still October so it’s not too late. (Though it’s definitely later than when I did this post last year.) Also, because it’s spooky month I might also recommend some spookier books and not just books with that are autumn themed or have fall vibes in general.
I usually try to make this a list of five, but we all know how that goes. Especially since I’ve read such perfect books for this list in the past year or so!
A curmudgeonly professor journeys to a small town in the far north to study faerie folklore and discovers dark fae magic, friendship, and love, in this heartwarming and enchanting fantasy.
Cambridge professor Emily Wilde is good at many things: She is the foremost expert on the study of faeries. She is a genius scholar and a meticulous researcher who is writing the world’s first encyclopaedia of faerie lore. But Emily Wilde is not good at people. She could never make small talk at a party—or even get invited to one. And she prefers the company of her books, her dog, Shadow, and the Fair Folk to other people.
So when she arrives in the hardscrabble village of Hrafnsvik, Emily has no intention of befriending the gruff townsfolk. Nor does she care to spend time with another new arrival: her dashing and insufferably handsome academic rival Wendell Bambleby, who manages to charm the townsfolk, get in the middle of Emily’s research, and utterly confound and frustrate her.
But as Emily gets closer and closer to uncovering the secrets of the Hidden Ones—the most elusive of all faeries—lurking in the shadowy forest outside the town, she also finds herself on the trail of another mystery: Who is Wendell Bambleby, and what does he really want? To find the answer, she’ll have to unlock the greatest mystery of all—her own heart.
When I read this book last November (and its sequel in January when it came out), I was immediately drawn to the impeccable autumn vibes that it had. Like, they were absolutely perfect – everything felt so cozy. I loved it.
It also helps that Encyclopaedia also takes place in the fall – that’s right everyone, this book’s got a fall setting as well! The epistolary nature of the novel also brings out the cozier vibes even more. Not to mention just about everything about this book is perfect on its own. Just. Read it.
When Alex Easton, a retired soldier, receives word that their childhood friend Madeline Usher is dying, they race to the ancestral home of the Ushers in the remote countryside of Ruritania.
What they find there is a nightmare of fungal growths and possessed wildlife, surrounding a dark, pulsing lake. Madeline sleepwalks and speaks in strange voices at night, and her brother Roderick is consumed with a mysterious malady of the nerves.
Aided by a redoubtable British mycologist and a baffled American doctor, Alex must unravel the secret of the House of Usher before it consumes them all.
This one’s gonna be one of my spookier recs on the list. I really enjoyed how unsettling What Moves the Dead ended up being. Not to mention, it was an excellent retelling.
I should probably note that its sequel, What Feasts at Night, also has a few of the same vibes, but I ultimately preferred book one. It just does everything better.
Perfect for fans of everything from Lockwood & Co. to The Haunting of Hill House, this gothic graphic novel follows a young medium with the gift—or curse, as some might say—to communicate with the dead. This ghost story “powerfully, tenderly, and empathetically examines death, grief, and the afterlife” raved Kirkus in a starred review!
Dorian Leith can see ghosts. Not only that, he listens to their problems and tries to help them move on to the afterlife. It’s a gift that’s made him an outcast to everyone in town. That is except for his dearly departed grandmother, who he’s partnered with to turn this paranormal ability into an honest living, and the local bookshop owner, who seems to be the only non-deceased person willing to give him a chance. But it’s all worth it to Dorian, who feels like he’s been given a bigger purpose. A chance to save those who cannot save themselves.
Then one day, the key to Death’s Door is stolen, trapping all the ghosts in the land of the living. Since he’s only one who can see them, the spirits rely on Dorian to retrieve the key before it is too late. If they can’t move on, they’ll soon be consumed by a ghostly rot that has begun to plague them.
As it continues to fester and spread, and the ghosts become desperate for relief, Dorian must do whatever it takes to find a way to bring peace to the restless dead—even if that peace comes at the cost of his own….
I feel like I’m cheating a bit with this one, because it’s also gonna go on the next list that I do, but I can’t not put it here either. Ever since I read it this past summer, I’ve known that The Ghostkeeper absolutely belonged on my Fall Recs List for 2024. The autumnal vibes are just too perfect.
It also works as a spooky recommendation as well. There’s just so much ghostly activity going on here, not to mention the gothic and gaslamp fantasy aesthetic it has going on. Like it said – it’s too perfect not to include here.
High Fantasy with a double-shot of self-reinvention
Worn out after decades of packing steel and raising hell, Viv the orc barbarian cashes out of the warrior’s life with one final score. A forgotten legend, a fabled artifact, and an unreasonable amount of hope lead her to the streets of Thune, where she plans to open the first coffee shop the city has ever seen.
However, her dreams of a fresh start pulling shots instead of swinging swords are hardly a sure bet. Old frenemies and Thune’s shady underbelly may just upset her plans. To finally build something that will last, Viv will need some new partners and a different kind of resolve.
A hot cup of fantasy slice-of-life with a dollop of romantic froth.
Including Legends & Lattes here also feels like cheating, but for a different reason than above. Confession: I actually DNF-ed this book. Yep. That’s why it feels kinda disingenuous to me.
BUT! But, but, but – even though I stopped at 20% I’d read enough of it to know that it has the right kind of vibes for this season. Like, it totally already felt like a Fantasy Coffee Shop AU, and there’s really no better fall feeling than that. And honestly, I adored this aspect of the book. (It was the pacing that was the problem for me, and only the pacin. So freaking slow, ugh!)
A family flees the crime-ridden city—and finds something worse—in “a brilliantly imagined horror story” by the New York Times–bestselling author (The Boston Globe).
After watching his asthmatic daughter suffer in the foul city air, Theodore Constantine decides to get back to the land. When he and his wife search New England for the perfect nineteenth-century home, they find no township more charming, no countryside more idyllic than the farming village of Cornwall Coombe. Here they begin a new life: simple, pure, close to nature—and ultimately more terrifying than Manhattan’s darkest alley.
When the Constantines win the friendship of the town matriarch, the mysterious Widow Fortune, they are invited to join the ancient festival of Harvest Home, a ceremony whose quaintness disguises dark intentions. In this bucolic hamlet, where bootleggers work by moonlight and all of the villagers seem to share the same last name, the past is more present than outsiders can fathom—and something far more sinister than the annual harvest is about to rise out of the earth.
Credited as the inspiration for Stephen King’s Children of the Corn, Thomas Tryon’s chilling novel was ahead of its time when first published, and continues to provoke abject terror in readers.
Everything about Harvest Home screams fall. The setting, the corn festival, the vaguely unsettling atmosphere in the background. Everything.
I really can’t say anything else because I don’t want to spoil anything about this book (because I like it so much), but just know that it has both the fall vibes and the spooky vibes. (Also, it inspired Stephen King to write Children of the Corn guys. Come on.)
France, 1714: In a moment of desperation, a young woman named Adeline meets a dangerous stranger and makes a terrible mistake.
As she realizes the limitations of her Faustian bargain-being able to live forever, without being able to be remembered by anyone she sees- Addie chooses to flee her small village, as everything she once held dear is torn away.
But there are still dreams to be had, and a life to live, and she is determined to find excitement and satisfaction in the wide, beckoning world-even if she will be doomed to be alone forever.
Or not quite alone-as every year, on her birth-day, the alluring Luc comes to visit, checking to see if she is ready to give up her soul. Their darkly thrilling game stretches through the ages, seeing Addie witness history and fight to regain herself as she crosses oceans and tries on various lives.
It will be three hundred years before she stumbles into a hidden bookstore and discovers someone who can remember her name-and suddenly, everything changes again.
In the vein of The Time Traveler’s Wife and Life After Life, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue is by a New York Times bestselling author
V. E. Schwab’s genre-defying tour de force.
Addie LaRue has it all guys. Demons, magic, curses, and cozy Bookshop AU vibes. It is yet another book perfect for fall reading. And just a good book in general.
Of course the vibes are there, but it’s also just all in the novel’s atmosphere as well. Just. Yeah.
#1 New York Times best seller Booklist Editors’ Choice 2015 – Youth Named a Best Book of 2015 by Time Magazine, School Library Journal, Barnes & Noble, NPR, PopSugar, The Millions, and The News & Observer
Simon Snow is the worst Chosen One who’s ever been chosen.
That’s what his roommate, Baz, says. And Baz might be evil and a vampire and a complete git, but he’s probably right.
Half the time, Simon can’t even make his wand work, and the other half, he starts something on fire. His mentor’s avoiding him, his girlfriend broke up with him, and there’s a magic-eating monster running around, wearing Simon’s face. Baz would be having a field day with all this, if he were here–it’s their last year at the Watford School of Magicks, and Simon’s infuriating nemesis didn’t even bother to show up.
Carry On is a ghost story, a love story and a mystery. It has just as much kissing and talking as you’d expect from a Rainbow Rowell story – but far, far more monsters.
Honestly, dark academia in general always feels right to read in the fall. And Carry On is certainly no different in that regard. It helps that at least half of the novel takes place in autumn.
It also helps that there are quite a few supernatural goings on. ‘Cause not only does it feature witches in the form of mages, but ghosts show up too. And we can’t forget about the vampires too, of course. So, once again, we don’t just have autumnal vibes here, but spooky ones, too.
What books have you been reading this fall? Have any of them had any autumn or spooky vibes? Do we share any of the same favorites?
And if course, thank you to everyone so much for reading, and I hope that you have an wonderful day/night!
Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly post currently hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. It celebrates lovely lists, wonderful books and the bookish community. This week’s topic is Books Involving Food (That Aren’t Cookbooks). It was submitted by Cathy @ WhatCathyReadNext and Hopewell’s Public Library of Life.
This one was interesting! Here I go!
Legends & Lattes: I feel this one is obvious.
Mooncakes: I feel this one is also obvious.
Yumi and the Nightmare Painter: Painted and Yumi spend a significant amount of time at Design’s ramen place.
A Wizard’s Guide to Defensive Baking: Again, I feel this is another obvious choice.
Dreadful: Garlic Festival! 🧄🎉
Kingdom of the Wicked: Emilia’s family owns and manages their own restaurant. The food descriptions made me hungry, and were one of the few things I liked about this book.
Otherworldly: Ellery works at a diner. It’s also where they and Knox meet. Knox also has a goldfish cracker addiction.
The Lost Story: There’s so much discussion about Golden Apple Christmas Cake in this book. And there’s a recipe for it at the end of the novel.
The Ghostkeeper: Much like The Lost Story, there’s a bakery item featured here. Also like The Lost Story, there is a recipe for a bakery item – Fife’s Fantastical (Ghostly) Scones – featured here.
Did you think I’d dropped this post? Because I did, haha. Especially when I saw that the last time I did this was like eight months ago. But I was feeling it, so here’s another one!
Now, as I’ve said before, it’s not that I only read unpopular books, it’s that I don’t only read the popular books. I also don’t read hardly any of the really popular books, because those are usually nonfiction or memoirs (which I don’t usually like), or they have a TON of romance (which I also don’t usually like).
This post is primarily going to focus on SFF novels, mostly because SFF is primarily what I read. It’s gonna be of five books, because I don’t want it to get too long. So, without further ado, let’s get into it!
(Also, I just noticed that I’ve done over 300 blog posts. Um wow, that’s a lot.)
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NOW A STARZ ORIGINAL SERIES
Unrivaled storytelling. Unforgettable characters. Rich historical detail. These are the hallmarks of Diana Gabaldon’s work. Her New York Times bestselling Outlander novels have earned the praise of critics and captured the hearts of millions of fans. Here is the story that started it all, introducing two remarkable characters, Claire Beauchamp Randall and Jamie Fraser, in a spellbinding novel of passion and history that combines exhilarating adventure with a love story for the ages.
One of the top ten best-loved novels in America, as seen on PBS’s The Great American Read!
Scottish Highlands, 1945. Claire Randall, a former British combat nurse, is just back from the war and reunited with her husband on a second honeymoon when she walks through a standing stone in one of the ancient circles that dot the British Isles. Suddenly she is a Sassenach—an “outlander”—in a Scotland torn by war and raiding clans in the year of Our Lord… 1743.
Claire is catapulted into the intrigues of a world that threatens her life, and may shatter her heart. Marooned amid danger, passion, and violence, Claire learns her only chance of safety lies in Jamie Fraser, a gallant young Scots warrior. What begins in compulsion becomes urgent need, and Claire finds herself torn between two very different men, in two irreconcilable lives.
Confession: I actually bought this a couple of years ago, intending to read it. I even started watching the Outlander TV series to get me hyped up about it.
But, I dunno, I guess it’s just not for me, ’cause I only made it through the first episode of the first season, and I never so much as cracked the spine on the novel. And then, later that year, I ended up donating it along with several other books I had bought but either didn’t care for or never ended up reading.
So yeah, at this point, I don’t think I’m gonna read it. Outlander and all of its sequels are very long. And, after looking into the series, I just don’t think it’s for me.
An Instant #1 New York Times, USA Today, and Indie Bestseller
A Barnes & Noble Best Fantasy Book of 2023 An Amazon Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Book of 2023
When an injury throws a young, battle-hungry orc off her chosen path, she may find that what we need isn’t always what we seek.
Set in the world of New York Times bestselling Legends & Lattes, Travis Baldree’s Bookshops & Bonedust takes us on a journey of high fantasy, first loves, and secondhand books.
Viv’s career with the notorious mercenary company Rackam’s Ravens isn’t going as planned.
Wounded during the hunt for a powerful necromancer, she’s packed off against her will to recuperate in the sleepy beach town of Murk—so far from the action that she worries she’ll never be able to return to it.
What’s a thwarted soldier of fortune to do?
Spending her hours at a beleaguered bookshop in the company of its foul-mouthed proprietor is the last thing Viv would have predicted, but it may be both exactly what she needs and the seed of changes she couldn’t possibly imagine.
Still, adventure isn’t all that far away. A suspicious traveler in gray, a gnome with a chip on her shoulder, a summer fling, and an improbable number of skeletons prove Murk to be more eventful than Viv could have ever expected.
Around the fall of 2022, after hearing about all the endless hype and love for Legends & Lattes, I decided to give it a go and downloaded it into my Kindle. Spoiler Alert: I thought it was suuuper boring and ended up DNF-ing it, I think at around 16%. And I never looked back.
So, as you can imagine, when I heard about a prequel / companion novel to it being released last year, you can guess that I wasn’t at all interested. And I’m still not. As of now, I have no plans to give Legends & Lattes another shot, not do I ever plan on trying our Bookshops & Bonedust. And that’s all there is to it.
Red Queen, by #1 New York Times bestselling author Victoria Aveyard, is a sweeping tale of power, intrigue, and betrayal, perfect for fans of George R.R. Martin’s Game of Thrones series.
Mare Barrow’s world is divided by blood—those with common, Red blood serve the Silver-blooded elite, who are gifted with superhuman abilities. Mare is a Red, scraping by as a thief in a poor, rural village, until a twist of fate throws her in front of the Silver court. Before the king, princes, and all the nobles, she discovers she has an ability of her own.
To cover up this impossibility, the king forces her to play the role of a lost Silver princess and betroths her to one of his own sons. As Mare is drawn further into the Silver world, she risks everything and uses her new position to help the Scarlet Guard—a growing Red rebellion—even as her heart tugs her in an impossible direction.
One wrong move can lead to her death, but in the dangerous game she plays, the only certainty is betrayal.
I’m going to keep this one short and sweet. The cover looked cool on this one, so I checked out the synopsis. But, it didn’t hook me, so I never picked it up. And I still don’t have plans to – I’m just not interested in the Red Queen series.
THE BOOK BEHIND THE THIRD SEASON OF GAME OF THRONES, AN ORIGINAL SERIES NOW ON HBO.
Here is the third volume in George R. R. Martin’s magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings. As a whole, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, bringing together the best the genre has to offer. Magic, mystery, intrigue, romance, and adventure fill these pages and transport us to a world unlike any we have ever experienced. Already hailed as a classic, George R. R. Martin’s stunning series is destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction.
A STORM OF SWORDS
Of the five contenders for power, one is dead, another in disfavor, and still the wars rage as violently as ever, as alliances are made and broken. Joffrey, of House Lannister, sits on the Iron Throne, the uneasy ruler of the land of the Seven Kingdoms. His most bitter rival, Lord Stannis, stands defeated and disgraced, the victim of the jealous sorceress who holds him in her evil thrall. But young Robb, of House Stark, still rules the North from the fortress of Riverrun. Robb plots against his despised Lannister enemies, even as they hold his sister hostage at King’s Landing, the seat of the Iron Throne. Meanwhile, making her way across a blood-drenched continent is the exiled queen, Daenerys, mistress of the only three dragons still left in the world….
But as opposing forces maneuver for the final titanic showdown, an army of barbaric wildlings arrives from the outermost line of civilization. In their vanguard is a horde of mythical Others–a supernatural army of the living dead whose animated corpses are unstoppable. As the future of the land hangs in the balance, no one will rest until the Seven Kingdoms have exploded in a veritable storm of swords….
This one’s another case of me attempting to read other novels in this series before ultimately deciding to drop them. I actually somehow made it through A Game of Thrones when I read it like ten or so years ago, but I only got about a third of the way through A Clash of Kings before DNF-ing it.
I really, really wanted to like this series. I’d been told over and over again that GRRM was the king of fantasy and that these books (and, at the time, the HBO TV series) was amazing. So I picked up the first two books (I always like to have another book queued up), and started reading. And, I thought they were waaayy too slow. And I was bored.
But I’d been told multiple times that you just have to keep reading and wait for it to get good, so I continued reading and ended up finishing the first one. But I could only make it through about a third of the second before I had to call it quits. I just couldn’t wait till two or three hundred pages into the third book for action to happen. Altogether, that’s over two thousand freaking pages I’d have to slog through in order for me to read the good stuff. And I was not going to wait that long, nor was I willing to waste any more time on the series.
A sumptuous and epically told love story inspired by A Thousand and One Nights.
Every dawn brings horror to a different family in a land ruled by a killer. Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, takes a new bride each night only to have her executed at sunrise. So it is a suspicious surprise when sixteen-year-old Shahrzad volunteers to marry Khalid. But she does so with a clever plan to stay alive and exact revenge on the Caliph for the murder of her best friend and countless other girls. Shazi’s wit and will, indeed, get her through to the dawn that no others have seen, but with a catch… she’s falling in love with the very boy who killed her dearest friend.
She discovers that the murderous boy-king is not all that he seems and neither are the deaths of so many girls. Shazi is determined to uncover the reason for the murders and to break the cycle once and for all.
So, real talk, I’d actually never heard of this book until about two years ago, when I started more BookTube. And the stuff I heard about it didn’t make me interested in reading it. Still not interested, by the way. So yeah, that’s kind of all there is to it.
So yeah, that’s another post where I talk about books I’ll probably never read. And wow, they were all novels that were part of a series. Sorry it’s been so long, if anyone was actually waiting on another one of these posts. I’ll probably continue this series, though it’ll definitely be another few weeks.
What popular books have you never read? Why haven’t you read them?
So, this year, I was fortunate enough to read a lot of books. Unfortunately, I didn’t like – or, at the very least, couldn’t get into – a few of them enough to finish them. Yes, this is that list. So, here I go.
Note: Though this list is numbered, it isn’t ranked by my enjoyment of the novels. It’s ranked by the order that I attempted to read the books in.
Witchmark (The Kingston Cycle #1) by C.L. Polk: This one is cheating a bit since I technically tried to read it at the very end of last year. I didn’t not like the book – not at all! – I was actually pretty interested in it. The problem was I attempted to read it around the winter holidays last year, and I was incredibly busy – much more so than this year even. I’ll probably give this another try eventually.
Cress (The Lunar Chronicles #3) by Marissa Meyer: I want to finish The Lunar Chronicles. I really, really want to finish The Lunar Chronicles. But both times that I’ve tried to finish Cress it just doesn’t happen; for some reason I couldn’t bring myself to finish reading this book. I will say that both times I’ve made an attempt, something came up, so I’ll probably try again sometime. I really want to finish this series, after all.
Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree: Everyone loves this book. I wanted to love this book. But it was just too slow-paced for me, I guess.
Children of Ragnarok (Runestone Saga #1) by Cinda Williams Chima: I was very excited for this release, because I love a lot of Chima’s books. But I just couldn’t get into this one, and I found the characters to be kind of bland and not as likable as from her other novels. That and the repetitively used and (presumably) Norse-based words almost gave me a headache. The plot also took a bit too long to start getting off the ground. I mean, a hundred plus pages? Come on…
The House Witch by Delemhach: This book seemed so cozy and fun. It seemed like it has a bit more plot, and it also seemed a bit more faster paced than Legends & Lattes (which if already DNF-ed at this point), so I had some hopes for it. But alas, I just didn’t care enough about this book to get into it. It also felt under-edited there was some dialogue and naming conventions that took me out of the story.
