May Reading Round Up

Total books read this month: 11

Book Ratings

You Can’t Hide.  Karen Rose 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Beach House Summer. Sarah Morgan 🌟🌟🌟🌟

Fairy Godmother.  Mercedes Lackey 🌟🌟🌟. 5

A Whisker of Trouble.  Sofie Ryan 🌟🌟🌟. 5

Twilight Shadows.  Emilie Richards 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

The Librarian.  Salley Vickers 🌟🌟🌟🌟

A Mother’s Heart.  Carmel Harrington 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

South of the Buttonwood Tree.  Heather Webber 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Court of Thorns and Roses.  Sarah J Maas 🌟🌟🌟

The Last House on the Street.   Diane Chamberlain 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

New to me authors:

Mercedes Lackey
Salley Vickers
Sarah J Maas

Top Books for May

Looking forward to reading in June

Very likely ones.

Review of Reading Goals for May.

• five books read from my print TBR. – yes
• read more of Pride and Prejudice – not sure I read any
• read a book from library – yes. The Last House on the Street by Diane Chamberlain.

Main Reading Goals for June

• read five more books from my print TBR
• continue to read Pride and Prejudice
• read a library book if one comes in

Linking up with Nicole from FeedYourFiction Addiction.

March Reading Round Up

Total books read this month: 13

I enjoyed most of the books I read this month. I did find the Lyn Kurland audiobook a little tedious (3 stars)  and Robyn Carr and Susan Mallery  did not quite live up to my expectations.  3.5 stars.  All the others were rated by me as 4 stars. Except my two top books which I gave 5 stars.

New to me authors:

Alyssa Cole
Bella Osborne
Janette Oke
Lily King

Formats/Sources

Audiobooks. 3
Paperbacks from TBR: 5
Library: 1
Review: 4

Top Books for March

Looking forward to reading in April

From my own shelf and two for review.

Review of Reading Goals for March

• Read five books off my print shelf.   Yes.
• Read my three review books. Yes.  Four actually.
• Keep reading a chapter most days from Pride and Prejudice.  Ouch, very few pages.
• Maybe fit in a Kindle or library book.  One library book.

Main Reading Goals for  April

• read five more print books off my TBR shelf
• read at least one library book.
• Re focus on Pride and Prejudice.

Linking up with Nicole from FeedYourFiction Addiction.

February Reading Round Up

Total books read this month:12

New to me authors:

Sarah Henning (Throw Like a Girl)

Ellen Oh. ( Finding Junie Kim)

Top Books for February – three five star books.

Looking forward to reading in March

Three review books for this month.

Review of Reading Goals 2021

Five books read from my print TBR.  I read six last month so total of 11.  So one book ahead of goal.

Other facts:

4 books were audiobooks.

One review book only. (That’s good!)

One Kindle book.

One Library book.

It was a good reading month. If I didn’t give them five stars, all the rest were four stars!

Pride and Prejudice Reading. I only read 4 chapters. Oops. I am on page 288.

Main Reading Goals for March.

• Read five books off my print shelf.
• Read my three review books
• Keep reading a chapter most days from Pride and Prejudice.
• Maybe fit in a Kindle or library book.

Linking up with Nicole at Feed Your Fiction Addiction.

January 2022 Reading Round UP

 Total books read this month: 13

New to me authors:

Nancy Naigle

Ratings.  Which are totally arbitrary, depending on enjoyment.

Most books were four stars and Goodbye Again by Mariah Stewart and The Moon over Kilmore Quay by Carmel Harrington three stars. Top book was five stars!

Top Book for January

Nostalgic reread of older book by Nora Roberts. I listened to it and really enjoyed that. David Stuart narrated and he was very good. It is about found family and three older men taking in ten year old Seth. Plus a romance between Cam the oldest and Seth’s social worker – Anna. It retained the five stars I had given to it previously many years ago when I read the print version. A feel good story!

Looking towards reading in February

The only review book I intend reading. As I love Fiona Lowe as an author I am anticipating a good read.

I will want to read at least five books from my actual print shelf as well.

Main Reading Goals for February

I am doing a slow read of Pride and Prejudice. I reached Chapter 22 by the end of January. I aim for a chapter most days. It has the notes that go with it so that takes a bit of glancing at as well.

Keep an eye on my five main reading goals for 2022. I have started well on reading from my own shelf. It has been a bit of a challenge to stop myself from buying new books before I have read the three off my shelf first. However in January I read six off my shelf, which entitled me to two new books. As I am reading Go Tell the Bees that I am Gone with its almost 900 pages that may put a damper on buying for awhile! It could take most of February to read!

Thank you

To Nicole for a book that I won a couple of months ago from her monthly wrap up. It arrived in January.

Linking up with Nicole from FeedYourFiction Addiction.

December Reading Round Up

Total books read this month: 14

New to me authors:

Josi Kilpack
Julie Cantrell
Gill Hornby

Top Book for December

Okay so I am biased! So what!

Looking forward to reading in January

I don’t have any big “must read” publishing books for January that I know about. I am planning to get started on my goal of five books off my actual print shelf per month. One book I do have in mind is a memoir that published in 2021. A very interesting story of a woman and family who started a big quilting business in Missouri. I learned so much about quilting from her via her videos. And well… I might have bought quite a bit of fabric from her shop online!!

Linking up with Nicole from FeedYourFiction Addiction.

Five Steps to Choose a Book

There are always good reasons to choose a book we want to read. This time it’s because…

1. I take part in Nicole at Feed Your Fiction Addiction‘s monthly link up for the round up for the month of what we have read. Attached to that is a giveaway and she let me know I’d won a recent month. Very exciting… winning a book hasn’t happened for a long time.
2. So the choice was anything off Nicole’s Goodreads shelf that she hasn’t read. Because it’s her way of reading the book the winner picks, it makes her read it.  She even says the winner and herself could do a joint review of the book. I am still considering that.
3. As I looked through her list I could see we had some points of intersection. And eventually after a bit of indecision, I settled on an author I haven’t read but have heard a lot about.
4. So an author I haven’t read, plus it is fantasy and I rather  like a fantasy book every so often, not too often, but now and again. It is also in the YA range and I don’t mind that now and again.
5. Finally I looked at the reviews.  Out of the people I follow on Goodreads

          Fifty readers had given it           Five stars.

Then a large number of four stars and some three stars. And horror eight 3 stars and even a one star.

Hmm I thought, some readers didn’t like it but it will be interesting to compare when I’ve read it. Do I agree?  However final decision was made on the count that of the readers I respect like Kimberley, Freda, Shelleyrae, Kathy, Berls and Bev all liked it. A couple of others who I respect had marked it lower and so they will be reviews I look at more closely after I read the book.

So decision made and Nicole is kindly going to send me the UK version of the book. You can see it on the left. The USA cover is on the right.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

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November Round UP

Total books read this month:  11

New to me authors:

Roisin Meaney.  Irish Author. And yes I would read another book by her.

Top Books for November.

My two 5 star books. One a print book and one an audiobook. January LaVoy bumped up Legacy  to a five star read for me as the narrator.

Cottage by the Sea – Think this one might be my favourite Debbie Macomber book. Sad beginning, wonderful characters and loved the found family aspect and everything working out for the best. Perfect comfort read.

Looking forward to reading in December.

A review book – the final instalment of the Devlin and Falco series, due out on 14th of December.

Review of Reading Goals for November

I did read almost  two kindle books after  every one print book, however I only got two from  my own Kindle shelf. I would have liked more, but that’s the way. With three Kindle review books – it added up to five.

Three audiobooks completed this month. Three print books – one from the library and two from my own shelf.

Main Reading Goals for December.

Read some Christmas books! I have acquired quite a few recently!

Linking up with Nicole from FeedYourFiction Addiction.

October Reading Look Back

Total books read this month:16

The month just seemed to stretch and I  got lots of books read – for me.

New to me authors:

Patience Griffin

Top Book for October

I am picking this one because it just had that point of difference and the magic of story.

A Book that Surprised me.

It took me a little while to worm myself inside this book and family, but once there I was in there rooting for this immigrant family. And while it was about immigrant experience it was really universal and applicable to us all.

Looking forward to reading in November

This one just arrived and no doubt I’ll find space somewhere to read it in November.

Review of Reading Goals September

I wanted to concentrate on actual books on my bookshelf and I picked five that I highlighted in a post and I read them all. As well as a few others. Nine of the sixteen I read came off my actual shelf. I was especially happy to finally pick up and read the first two Sue Barton books and I hope to read more at some point. I have about six of them.

I also worked out how to remember where I picked up a book recommendation by noting it on Goodreads. I know not everyone uses Goodreads but I prefer it to noting something in a notebook and while it is a little clumsy the way you note on Goodreads where you picked up the recommendation it works and its how I’ll go from now on.

So as I write this post I am reading Cottage by the Sea and I know I picked up on this book from the podcast Currently Reading and it was Meredith who mentioned it. And… I am really enjoying it.

Main Reading Goals for November

*Books on Kindle – This month I want to focus on Kindle books, pick five I want to read and maybe a few more as well.

Linking up with Nicole from FeedYourFiction Addiction.

September Reading Wrap

Total books read this month:12

New to me authors:

Ali McNamara
Lucy Parker
Carol J. Perry

Top Book for September

Second one in the series. I am hooked.

Book that Most Surprised me.

I have had this book sitting on my shelf for awhile now, and kept putting it off because well when a husband and wife are really happy and then she gets terminally ill. Not really calling to me. Yet once I was reading it I was sucked in, in spite of its more serious subject. Still so well written and the characters were great.

Book that I least liked.

It was a second chance romance, but well, it just didn’t hit the mark with me.

Looking forward to reading in October

Review of Reading Goal for September

My main goal was to read up my Netgalley review books and catch up on them. I didn’t have that many but I had fallen behind.  I caught up and so now I can relax a bit about them. Only 4 I think in the queue.

Libby App at the library. Our library has now switched to this app and it is a lot friendlier. I tried it out and listened to Faro’s Daughter by Georgette Heyer. Not her best book but still good enough.

I cut back my Audible Credits to one a month and I will see how that goes. I still have 8 in hand and some books not listened to.

Main Reading Goal for October

Read some of the more recently acquired books sitting on my print TBR shelf. So a sort of 2:1 ratio. Two print books from my TBR or the library and then one Kindle, be that mine or Netgalley.

Linking up with Nicole from FeedYourFiction Addiction.

August Reading Wrap Up.

Total books read this month: 13

New to me authors:

Steven Rowley
Lea Wait
Ali Mc Namara

Top Book for August

Very hard to decide! I think I’ll just note that I really liked The Guncle and will be reading more by Steven Rowley. Told with great compassion and love.

I Was Reminded…

I really enjoy a good historical romance. They are such fun. The Lisa Kleypas book was delightful, and The Grand Sophy on audiobook was so entertaining. Light and fluffy sure, but made me laugh and that’s always a good thing.

Looking forward to reading in September from my bookshelf

I do have a load I’d like to read but as you’ll see for my goal for September other books come first.

Review of Reading Goals for August

My goal was just to read what I really wanted. So I only read books that I knew I didn’t have to review and I sunk into books I felt like reading as I chose the next book.

Main Reading Goals for September

Well now, I need to gain ground a little and read the review books I ignored in August and then the ones I had on my calendar for September as well.

Our library has now decided to change to the Libby app, so I want to explore that for library audio books to see if improved over last one. Plus I usually get two credits per month at Audible, I have 8 in hand and may just need to cut back to 1 credit a month. I have a heap in my library to listen to as well.

Linking up with Nicole from FeedYourFiction Addiction.