I am…woefully behind, I know. I have another post ready to go that I’ll try and work on tomorrow, but I am currently on a layover in the Dallas airport on my way to Las Vegas for this years Labor Day Oasis Spanking Party. Wish me luck. I’m anxious as fuck, dealing with big feelings, and convinced I won’t play at all. July was a busy month for me, reading (or listening) wise. Part of that is because I listened to another entire series by CJ Archer – her Necromancer series. It wasn’t nearly as gruesome as I was expecting and included some fun pop culture things. To my surprise when I started, it had ten books! But it was good and Archer’s writing is easy distracting listening for me. I also tackled a “classic” that I’d never read – Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea! It was…a lot. But not bad – good story but holy droll writing at times.
- This is Kristin Harmel’s newest novel, The Stolen Life of Colette Marceau, and she’s one of my favorites for WWII historic fiction and this is a really creative plot that touched on some fun pop culture things also. Can you imagine incorporating Robin Hood into fiction like this? Read it.
- The Last Necromancer series by CJ Archer – these are historically set and the plot is very Archer – young woman, magic power, but not coming far out of reality for it all. It’s well incorporated into a normal Victorian (I think?) setting.
- Her Majesty’s Necromancer
- Beyond The Grave
- Grave Expectations
- Ashes to Ashes
- Of Fate and Phantoms
- Veiled in Moonlight
- Vow of Deception
- The Wisdom of Madness
- Ok this next book was weird, to be honest. I understand what Sarah Bernstein was trying to do with Study for Obedience, but this book was more…literary study belonging in an academic journal, than a book appealing to a wide audience. I’m not surprised it won awards for the writing but it really is a leap in terms of a book to just read, even if you enjoy very literary fiction and such.
- Now The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus drew me in in a way Study for Obedience did not. Emma Knight weaves an intriguing tale that had me wondering at times if it was going to veer into thriller territory. But it is, at its core a contemporary coming of age and family drama, but not gratuitous. Really enjoyed it.
- This quirky read by Anne Tyler was just that…a sort of blip? The main character of Three Days in June is a bit baffling (and probably suffering from depression) but it felt like a real look into three days in someone’s life and refusing to draw it out to an unreasonable length made it really enjoyable.
- After reading Anthony Doer’s All The Light You Cannot See, I really wanted to read Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand League’s Under the Sea (it’s mentioned in there, but I won’t give it away) and I finally got around to it. This book was LONG. Too long IMO, but the story was good. If I had been reading the physical copy, I’d have skipped over most of the naturalist descriptions of sea creatures to be honest. It was truly over kill – but for the time period, very normal. It also was oddly poignant and relevant to current times, which I found fascinating.
- This next book absolutely enraptured me. I would say Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy was much better than her Migrations which I read in 2023. This is easily in the top 5 books of the year for me. It’s listed as a mystery/thriller but it wasn’t…scary or anything. It’s truly just a well written story with a plot that I actually didn’t guess right away which was nice. It was just so good and the characters are so fleshed out and humanly flawed in a good way.
- The final jaunt of July was The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson and I really enjoyed it. I had recently read an article about the Kentucky “blue” people and this really was a great little fictional tale including them. It takes liberties with the timeline but it is, after all, fiction.
What are you reading? What do you think I should read? Right now I am working through the Doomsday Series by KJ Charles but I’ve read a bunch in August and I promise it won’t take me until the end of September to write the round up! I am also running a book club on The Woodshed Initiative Discord server (shoot me an email if you’re interested in joining) and we just read Exhibit by RO Kwon for August. September’s read will be one of my personal August reads that I loved, The Phoenix Pencil Company.
-M
