A rose in a desert can only survive on its strength, not its beauty 🌹 Read a book with a romance in the story – The Secret Science of Magic by Melissa Keil 🌹 Read a book published in June of any year
How It Works Ten books each month is a lot, so there will be 5 different levels. So pick which level you want to do and that’s how many items you will need to check off.
3)”June is the gateway to summer…..”[Jean Hersey] Read a first book in a series.
4)”June has never looked more beautiful than she does now, unadorned and honest, vulnerable yet invincible.”[Marie Lu] Read a book with a strong yet vulnerable MC – Legally Blonde by Amanda Brown
7)”Everything good, Everything magical happens between the months of June and August” [Jenny Han] Read a book with magic or miracles in it. – Blood Crime by Kim Harrison & Gemma Magno
Duration: 1st June – 30th June 2019 Number of books: 3 Hosted by:Bookworm Bitches
There are 3 tasks, you only need to read three books to finish this challenge. Or pick one task and read 3 books for that one task. Thank you Lori for help with the ideas!
I’ve had lots of things due, and not much time to do anything. Which has meant stress, and a lot of random reading. Easy reads that can fill up my mind with happy thoughts… rather than making me remember what studies I have to do.
Title: The Crow Palace Author: Priya Sharma In: Black Feathers (Ellen Datlow) Rating Out of 5: 4.5 (Amazing, but not quite perfect) My Bookshelves:Family, Horror Dates read: 27th April 2019 Pace: Medium Format: Short story Publisher: Pegasus Books Ltd. Year: 2017 5th sentence, 74th page: It was when she realised that she didn’t sound like other children.
Julie has returned home to the Crow Palace after years away. Her father’s loss begins to uncover secrets and horrors from the past, making her question everything she is and knows.
This final story in the Black Feathers collection gave me a very uncomfortable feeling. It was a good story to end on, but it was definitely one that made me seriously uncomfortable. It had that open-ended finale that makes you think that the spawn of crows will continue off into the sunset without anyone to stop them.
One of the creepiest things about birds is their tendency to
kill their siblings. The oldest and strongest often kills the smaller, younger
sibling. And quickly. It seems so normal in the avian world, but when you graft
that onto humanity, it’s just a little too spine tinglingly horrifying. Especially
when you create a young, innocent and soulfully beautiful younger sibling to
match the older, more detached one.
Family is difficult. Even when you are born into a good
family, it’s difficult. But when you have one with some incredibly scary
secrets and a haunted history… cue the goose bumps people!
Title: Enclave Author: Ann Aguirre Series: Razorland #1 Rating Out of 5: 4 (Really good read!) My Bookshelves:Dystopia, Science fiction, Zombies Dates read: 23rd – 24th April 2019 Pace: Medium Format: Novel Publisher: Square Fish Year: 2011 5th sentence, 74th page: “We need a place to rest before the last leg of our journey,” I told Fade.
Welcome to the apocalypse.
In Deuce’s world, people earn the right to a name only if they survive their first fifteen years. By that point, each unnamed “brat” has trained into one of three groups – Breeders, Builders, or Hunters, identifiable by the number of scars they bear on their arms. Deuce has wanted to be a Huntress for as long as she can remember.
As a Huntress, her purpose is clear – to brave the dangerous tunnels outside the enclave and bring back meat to feed the group while evading ferocious monsters known as Freaks. She’s worked toward this goal her whole life, and nothing’s going to stop her, not even a beautiful, brooding Hunter named Fade. When the mysterious boy becomes her partner, Deuce’s troubles are just beginning.
When she and Fade discover that the neighboring enclave has been destroyed by Freaks, who seem to be growing more organized, the elders refuse to listen to their warnings and exile Deuce and Fade. As the two are guided out of the dead city by Fade’s long-ago memories, they face dangers, and feelings, unlike any they’ve ever known.
I was kind of surprised by how much I loved this story. I remember really enjoying Secret Heart an age ago when I read Kisses and Curses, but then this book just kind of sat on my bookshelf, waiting. It also reminded me of how much I love dystopia books. I read this entire thing cover to cover in a day (if you don’t count the three pages I read before bed the night before). Not only was it an amazing story, but it was also filled with fun characters, gritty challenges and a great commentary about the world around us.
I fell in love with Deuce from a fairly early point in the
story. Whilst she is incredibly tough and independent, she is also an innocent.
Which becomes more and more obvious as the storyline unfolds. The shattering of
her world again and again is a little gut wrenching. As is the fact that every time
you think she’s triumphed over something, things come crashing down all over
again. It made it almost impossible to put the book down, but it also made it quite
an intense emotional roller coaster. After all, I think that I’m a tough and
independent woman, but I’m pretty sure that if I was tested all of my naivety
would come flooding out…
Although this story is full of so many twists and turns, emotional
turmoil and a huge level of confusion as to what’s going to happen next, it
does have a happy ending, of sorts. It’s rare that I’m not sure where a story
is leading, so I thoroughly enjoyed my confusion over this tale. I also loved
the ending. It doesn’t finish off the story in any way, shape or form. But it gave
a reprieve from the trials that Deuce and Fade are forced to go through. A
point in the overarching story line that gives you a chance to stop and pause. But
one that makes you want to continue on with the series.
Title: Tunnel Vision Author: Rachel Nussbaum In: The Mammoth Book of Dieselpunk (Sean Wallace) Rating Out of 5: 4.5 (Amazing, but not quite perfect) My Bookshelves:Contemporary, Dieselpunk Dates read: 27th April 2019 Pace: Medium Format: Short story Publisher: Robinson Year: 2015 5th sentence, 74th page: I stick it in the padlock and swing the doors open.
The prospector has two leading ladies in his life – Alma and his drill, Jules. But when one of them is threatened he finds out what he is truly made of.
We all get tunnel vision sometimes. Decide that something is
or isn’t going to happen and do anything that we can to ensure that it turns
out the way that we want. But, I’ve never had tunnel vision in… well, a tunnel.
Underground.
I thought at the beginning of this story that it would be a bit
of a romance tale. After all, it starts out with a prospector visiting a woman
that he clearly has feelings for. And one that seems to return those emotions.
But then he goes to his second love, a giant drill, and things start to go a
little skewy… he discovers illegal activity, is forced into giving up one of
his most treasured possessions, and finds a way to triumph in the end.
Unlike some of the other Dieselpunk stories I’ve read so
far, this is one that has a clear, happy ending. There isn’t anything in it
that is ambiguous, and it is just incredibly sweet and fun.
Title: Spellbook of the Lost and Found Author: Moira Fowley-Doyle Rating Out of 5: 5 (I will read this again and again and again) My Bookshelves:Freaky, LGBTQI, Magical realism Dates read: 16th – 21st April 2019 Pace: Medium Format: Novel Publisher: Corgi Year: 2017 5th sentence, 74th page: Big bones, big meat, I’m a meal of a girl.
One stormy summer night, Olive and her best friend, Rose, begin to lose things. It starts with simple items like hair clips and jewellery, but soon it’s clear that Rose has lost something bigger, something she won’t talk about.
Then Olive meets three wild, mysterious strangers: Ivy, Hazel and Rowan. Like Rose, they’re mourning losses – and holding tight to secrets.
When they discover the ancient spellbook, full of hand-inked charms to conjure back lost things, they realize it might be their chance to set everything right. Unless it’s leading them towards secrets that were never meant to be found…
I had absolutely no idea what to expect from this novel. It is my first by Moira Fowley-Doyle, it is my first magical realism story and although the blurb sounded intriguing, it’s probably not one I would have picked up based on the cover. It was suggested as part of the Around the Year in 52 Booksreading challenge. And boy am I glad. I absolutely loved this book.
The three different storylines set throughout this story seem
to stretch an age, but, in reality they only take about a week. The different perspectives
(some on the same moments, some on very random experiences) move you along at a
kind of slow pace time wise. But in activities… it’s a whirlwind of intrigue,
adventure and social context.
Fowley-Doyle isn’t afraid to talk about marginalised teenagers. Of the five main characters, two are severely abused, one is from a not so healthy background (but not abusive), one has what would be considered a disability, and they are all kind of messed up, but in different ways. This doesn’t include the fact that the sexual orientations in this story range from hetero to homosexual and through the gambit of bisexual. There’s honestly a character that everyone can recognise themselves in. And that’s not even beginning to touch on the discussions around women’s rights!
I had to create a “freaky” shelf in my collection for this
book. Not because this was scary (that’s the horror shelf), but because after turning
the last page, I lay in bed feeling stunned and incredibly uncomfortable. Most
tales that deal with magic blur the lines, but still have that element of
fantasy in it. This tale doesn’t do that. Even in the closing, there are
moments when they seem to explain away all of the weird happenings, but just
not quite… the darkness that seeps through the story kind of lingers. And it
just feels… well, beautifully, tragically… freaky.
Title: The Faerie Cony-catcher Author: Delia Sherman In: Sirens and Other Daemon Lovers (Ellen Datlow & Terri Windling) Rating Out of 5: 4.5 (Amazing, but not quite perfect) My Bookshelves:Fae, LGBTQI Dates read: 20th April 2019 Pace: Medium Format: Short story Publisher: EOS Year: 1998 5th sentence, 74th page: For answer then, he tightened his grip upon those fair and ruddy jewels that Peasecod brought to his marriage-portion, and so wrought with them that the eyes rolled back in his lover’s head, and he expired upon a sigh.
Nick thinks that he is wise and well aware of the dangers of being on his own. But when he runs across a fae woman, he finds out that maybe he’s not quite as wise as he thinks… Will this lead him to his happily ever after, or something a little more sinister?
I’ve read enough Delia Sherman short stories by this point to realise that they’re never going to go the way I expected. Ever. And yet, I still thought that I knew roughly how this was going to go at about the halfway point. I was partly right – there is a happy ending. But it really wasn’t the kind of happy ending that I thought it would be… or the kind of coupling that I was expecting.
Without giving away the ending of this story (and why it is
in the LGBTQI shelf), I can tell you that one of the characters is really not
what I thought they were. And the reaction to this was kind of beautiful. I
thought that this was going to go haywire incredibly quickly. However, it led
to a great happy ending. And an acceptance of people who are just a little bit
different from ourselves.
This short story is in a collection of tales that are not going to fit the romance bill. But they do fit the scope of slightly twisted, kind of weird, and incredibly intense storylines. The off-kilter and unexpected storyline worked so well in this collection and now I can’t wait to pick up not only my next Delia Sherman story, but also read the next short story in the Sirens and Other Daemon Lovers collection.
Title: Beluga Days Author: Nancy Lord Rating Out of 5: 4 (Really good read!) My Bookshelves:The Coast, Conservation, Non-fiction, Oceans Dates read: 25th February – 20th April 2019 Pace: Slow Format: Novel Publisher: The Mountaineers Books Year: 2003 5th sentence, 74th page: We headed for the bay, about ten miles from Anchorage, and found the whales, white backs rising, then disappearing.
Living in the waters adjacent to the city of anchorage, the beluga whales of Cook Inlet, Alaska, once seemed countless. But after sharp declines, this isolated and genetically distinct population is now endangered.
Beluga Days brings to life coastal Alaska and the complex relationships that coalesce in a mad theater around the beluga whale crisis. In the company of regulators, environmentalists, researchers, businesspeople, whale lovers, and hunters, Nancy Lord explore the challenges of protecting whales and habitat while respecting Alaska Native traditions.
First published in 2004, Lord’s timeless story is part personal journey and part inquiry into the processes of science and politics. Today, the Cook Inlet beluga population has begun a slow recovery, assisted by the protection of the Endangered Species Act and increased public awareness.
It took me a little while to get through this novel. Not
because it wasn’t incredibly interesting and fun, but because it is a great,
easy read. You can read a chapter, put it down, and then pick it up a week or
two later. There is so much information in this novel that my head is still
reeling from it hours after I have turned the last page.
Most of the books I read around conservation are about grass
roots efforts to save an animal, species or landscape. This was a little more formal
in the outlook. Where many of these journeys are an incredibly personal
anecdote that is incredibly difficult to put down, this was filled with
information about the bureaucracy, politics and many different peoples who are directly
involved in the lives and livelihoods of the Cook Inlet Belugas.
I know next to nothing about Belugas. They’re not a species of whale that happens to be anywhere near Australia. And I honestly don’t read many books about marine animals – my area of obsession tends towards the terrestrial animals. So not only was I finding out amazing amounts of information about this cutely funny looking mammal, but I was also finding out a lot of information about the ecosystem in which they live and the society which surrounds its shores. One of the parts I loved about this book was that it investigates all of the different stakeholders in the health and safety of the Cook Inlet Belugas. This starts with Lord discussing her own insight into these whales and her own experiences in finding out more and more about their endangered status. Then she starts to delve into the scientific practices of research and understanding. Following this, the politics and requirements of the legislation in protection are investigated. And, finally, to round everything off beautifully, the needs and wants of Native Americans are talked about. By discussing every single angle of the debate, Lord is able to provide a uniquely diverse and well thought out discussion of just what the Cook Inlet Belugas are facing, and just how they might be saved.
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Earth and Skye 