Poooosible November TBR

I’m a bit tentative in publishing this, as I don’t want to set a solid TBR in my second month back and one in which I’m starting a new full-time job. But there are a few books that I’d love to get to this month, so let’s get on with it! There is a readathon I’m wanting to take part in this month (comment and guess which one!) so those won’t be shown in this tbr as they’ll get one of their own later on. So that also reduces this tbr. I only actually have 2 books left.

First up is The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon. This is a big boi fantasy read which honestly is kind of intimidating, but I am definitely going to at least make more of a dent in this book in November! I’m not exactly very far through it right now, but from what I can tell we follow various people around this world who all have varying views on dragons, religion and rulers. I already have my favourite person to read from, and I fly through their sections! But I’m also interested in everyone within the story so overall I’m looking forward to reading some more throughout November.

And secondly, another book which I’ve already started but am nowhere near close to finishing is The Fountains of Silence by Ruta Sepetys. A historical fiction set in post-civil war Spain, this is not a time in history which I’m familiar with so I’m finding it really interesting to delve into that aspect of the book and to learn more about this time. There are already, despite me being barely into it, plot lines which are full of secrets and have me intrigued as to how they came to be and what impact they’re going to have on the story overall. This is another really big book, although it’s a smidge smaller than Priory.

Despite the fact that I’m loving them both, I’m not getting through them… as you’ll know if you saw my last post. I think it is, very stupidly, being worried about the pressure. I tend to baulk and not do things when there’s a lot of pressure on me to complete the task until the very last minute of the deadline. And of course there is no real deadline on reading these books. Not my best quality but one I’m working on and either way I’m still looking forward to reading these two books eventually!

Back Up with a Wrap Up!!!! (I hate myself)

My first wrap up now that I’m baaacckkk!!! I’ve not read loads this month, but I am slowly getting back into my reading patterns. I’m going to be starting a temporary 40hr a week job in November though, so I think that’s going to change up how I read and I don’t really know what’s going to happen. But I’ll keep my fingers crossed and focus on October’s reading for now!

 

 

The first book I finished in October was The Aliens are Coming by Ben Miller. This is a non-fiction read about the search for other life-forms on other planets, as well as delving into the secrets that the animals on our own blue planet hold. If you want to see my full thoughts for this book then check out my review here, but I ended up giving it 5⭐’s. It was the perfect “first book back” for me to pick up and I loved delving into so many little bits of a variety of sciences.

 

 

Second up was Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi and translated from Japanese by Geoffrey Trousselot. THIS BOOK. Oh. My. Word. This is now one of my favourite books of all time, and it’s making me want to re-read my prior fave to see if it beats it. (So obviously it’s a 5⭐ book for me) Check out my review of it here! This is a contemporary with a speculative twist which will clutch at your heart strings and made me cry. Such a beautifully written book with an amazing translation. Thank you to NetGalley for an eARC in return for an unbiased review (I promise it’s unbiased! This book is just amazing!)

 

Next up! I read Doctor Who: A History of the Universe in 100 Objects. This was gifted to me many years ago and whilst I was organising my shelves I just decided to pick it up and get through it. If you like Doctor Who this is definitely a great book, it’s a lot of fun and taught me a lot of little bits of information which I hadn’t known before. Overall, I gave this 3⭐s. Check out my full review here.

 

 

Penultimately, I read Five Get Gran Online by Bruno Vincent. This was sadly my least favourite Famous Five parody I’ve read so far, only getting 2⭐s. Check out my full review for more detailed thoughts but essentially this one left a bad taste in my mouth.

 

 

Lastly! I read Black Klansman by Ron Stallworth. I gave this read 3⭐s, it was a mixed bag for me. The non-fiction tale is incredibly interesting and I was facinated, and the writing style was fine. However, there were issues with repetition which marred my reading experience. A full review of this book will be coming out early-mid November so keep an eye out if you’re interested.

 

 

And that’s it! I “only” read 5 books in the month of October. However, I also read 150+ pages of a textbook and 100+ pages each of large books that I’m slowly working my way through. I’m under no illusions that this has been an amazing reading month, but I’ve loved getting back into the reading world. Both in my own head and online. Maybe this will be my new reading pace now that I’m out of education, but time will tell. You’ll just have to come back next month!

Thanks for reading!!

 

Getting Granny into the modern world

Another parody Famous Five book, slooooowly getting through all of these. I need to find the last few! This one has the five visiting their grandmother who they’ve not spoke to in a ridiculous number of years, she lives in Lancashire which is depicted as being rural and “backwards” in a tiny home.

She doesn’t have any real understanding of the Internet or its uses, so the five offer to help. And of course, everything goes wrong. This wasn’t my favourite book, I’m not entirely sure why but it just wasn’t as enjoyable as the others in this weird little series and I ended up only giving it 2 stars.

Maybe it’s because I’m from the North of England and I get fed up of it being depicted as backwards? Maybe it’s because I didn’t like how the five treated their Gran who isn’t their Gran and the actions of just everyone in this story. It just left me with a bad taste in my mouth. I definitely don’t recommend picking up this book if you’re wanting to look into the parody versions of the Famous Five books, as there are much better ones out there. But I’m still going to try and collect and read them all, as I do enjoy the nostalgia of my childhood and some of them have been entertaining.

Delving into the Doctor Who Universe!

I was reorganising my tbr (to be read) shelves a little as I was trying to squeeze in some of the books I brought home from Uni (as for the past few months I’ve just been hiding them under the closet 😀 ) and I ended up moving this big boi to shift some things around. I was about to slot it back into place and I just randomly decided that I was going to read it, so I did. Which was really nice because a lot of times before the big break I took my reading was dictated by what the internet would think I was “supposed” to have read.

This book is a mixture of fiction and non-fiction, with real world facts about shooting episodes or knowledge of real life events/people thrown in around these fictional items and events. I really liked this as it added another aspect to the book and brought the Whoniverse into the real world, making it seem like the writers believed it was real (which of course it is).

It’s definitely a niche book though, you likely won’t enjoy it if you don’t care about the show, or any of the book/comic/radio adaptations that it’s had over its long lifespan. But as a Doctor Who fan for many years, and someone who is still slowly working on watching all of the old series’, I really enjoyed this shallow dive and I’m glad I finally picked this book up! Cause damn it had been on my shelves a while!

Keeping it Sciency!

My first read after finishing up my thesis! Seeing as my masters degree is a science one, I decided to keep it in the family and go for a science non-fiction read for my first delve back into the bookish world. I picked this bad boy up randomly whilst in a charity shop, I grabbed a Stephen King book (11/22/63) and it was 2 for £1 (or £1 each) so I grabbed this as the cover is bright and it looked kinda interesting. I’m so glad that I did because I really enjoyed this delve into a variety of different areas of science, with Ben Miller explaining everything in simplistic detail and keeping it amusing as well.

We start off sticking quite closely to the topic of aliens, but as the book progress there are minor deviations made. Alien life is still the primary focus, but Miller pulls you back down to Earth to make you aware of what we can accomplish here which will help us when looking out towards the stars.

This was a really interesting read and one that I’m going to make my science loving boyfriend pick up, as I know he’ll really enjoy it. There was a lot of research put into this book and it really shows. If you’re at all interested in the search for alien life out in space, or just in a cool non-fiction sciency book, then I recommend picking this one up.