Category: sunday summary

Sunday Summary – 22 October 2017

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Aren’t the weeks just flying by?! I cannot believe it is Sunday already… AGAIN!
It really will be Christmas before we know it!! (Don’t hurt me for pointing out the unequivocal truth – honestly, it’s sneaking up on me too!)
To get away from that slightly depressing thought, let’s talk about books instead!
 

Books Read

IT
This week has once again been dedicated to making my way through IT by Stephen King. When I prepared my Sunday Summary post last week I set myself the challenge of trying to get the book read by today. This week has presented a few interruptions to my usual reading time, so had you asked me yesterday if I was going to achieve my target, I would have said no.
I managed to catch up yesterday though (I read over 200 pages as well as all the housework, washing and other Saturday jobs) so now I have about 155 pages left to read until the end. It’s a new day and I’m going to push myself to get it finished. It’ll be a relief not to have to carry it around anymore! Plus the paperback cover has suffered a little having been carried around, but I knew it was going to happen. I just have to remind myself it shows the book is well loved every time I start crying on the inside.
 

Books Discovered

I have been very good this week – for me! Yes, I still bought a book.
A Plague of Giants
I saw a pre-release review for this book and I knew instantly I wanted it, so I bought it on release date, 19th October. I mentioned in my Sunday Summary on the 8th October that I had added it to the list – but now I can officially celebrate owning a copy!!
That is literally it for this section this week. It feels like a ghost town. I’ve been so absorbed in reading I think to even look for anything new. Not that I need to exactly, my TBR well and truly testifies that.
 

Coming Up…

Normally I would post a review on Tuesday. Whilst I am on track to get IT finished by then, I think my review would be rushed if I dived in straight away. Therefore I am changing up my schedule a bit! I feel like I am always talking about books I love, so on Tuesday, I am going to be publishing a “Top Ten” post featuring books I was disappointed with. My review of IT is going to be published on Friday – I haven’t even finished the book yet and I am already looking forward to sharing my thoughts on it!
My review of IT is going to be published on Friday – I haven’t even finished the book yet and I am already looking forward to sharing my thoughts on it!
As always I’ll be rounding up the week on Sunday – and hopefully, I’ll have a bit more to talk about next week!
What have you been reading?
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Sunday Summary – 8th October 2017

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Hi everyone!! Welcome to the Sunday Summary, in which I post every week to update you on my reading progress during the week just gone and to advise you of what you can expect on my blog next week. So… here we go!
 

Books Read

This week I managed to squeeze two of the books on my TBR into my schedule, which I am very pleased about. Both of these books are review copies which I have very kindly been provided with in exchange for an honest review.

GoodReads – The Kitsune in the Lantern
GoodReads – The War Queen
The first book I was provided with was The Kitsune in the Lantern by Daniel Curry and the second being The War Queen by J M Robison. If you’re interested in finding out more, check out the Coming Up section below!

Books Discovered

Every week I manage to find books I really want to read and it gets added to the never-ending list. Not that I’m complaining – at all!! The great thing about connecting with other bloggers is that you get to see what they have been reading and potentially discover something new!
cat reading military

Source: Giphy

Pretty much all of the additions to the TBR this week are as a result of reading other bloggers reviews! The two exceptions are that a good couple of months ago Stephen King’s Mr Mercedes was recommended to me at work by probably THE MOST unbookish person on my team… but that’s okay. He seemed to enjoy it, so I’m sure I will! I also discovered The Bone Season via Instagram and added that to the list.

The other books I added to the TBR this week are Moonrise by Sarah Crossan, Gerald’s Game by Stephen King, Blackwing by Ed McDonald and A Plague of Giants by Kevin Hearne. This last book is due out locally on the 19th October so as soon as it’s out, I’ll be getting myself a copy!


I also bought myself two books this week, including Brave New World by Aldous Huxley and A Magnificent Obsession: Victoria, Albert and the Death that changed the British Monarchy by Helen Rappaport. That title is far from catchy… just saying. It’s what it says on the tin though, I’ll give it that. This year I have been making a conscious effort to read more classics and I also know appallingly little about the British Monarchy… Oops!

Coming Up…

I am really looking forward to next week! I am just about to start reading IT by Stephen King and I have a number of review-related posts coming up on the blog. On Tuesday I am reviewing the last book on September’s TBR list, Making History by Stephen Fry.
Remember above I mentioned I was reading two review copies of books? Well, on Thursday I will be publishing an interview with Daniel Curry, the author of The Kitsune in the Lantern. My review of the book will be published on Friday. I hope you get to join the discussion!
On Sunday I’ll be posting my Sunday Summary again and tidying up the loose ends I always seem to have.
If I don’t see you around and about the blogosphere before then, I’ll see you on Tuesday!!
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Sunday Summary: 1 October 2017

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Good morning, from a very dreary, windy and rainy Sunday here!!
Another week comes and goes, and this one ends with the realisation that my holiday is over and I have to go back to work tomorrow…
I would much rather talk of the week of freedom I have had as opposed to the week ahead, so I’ll get straight on with it!
 

Books Read


On account of having the week pretty much to myself and only odd jobs to do around the house, I managed to get a fair bit of reading done! I started reading Dunstan last Sunday and at the point of writing my last Sunday summary, I was about 25% of the way through it. Well, I managed to finish this book on Wednesday this week and following on from finishing it, I picked up Making History by Stephen Fry. It was the first time I had ever read one of his books and I didn’t know what to expect. I actually picked this up as it was recommended to me by a work colleague and I wasn’t disappointed! I finished this book on Friday!
 

Books Discovered


I haven’t spent a single penny on books this week… *faints* I must be all shopped out from last week!! That being said, I have added books to the TBR, being Invictus by Ryan Graudin, Before It’s Too Late by Sara Driscoll, The Weight of Shadows by Karl Holton and That Inevitable Victorian Thing by E. K. Johnston.
I also noticed this week that a few of my blogging peers (yes you guys!) have been reviewing the latest novel by Allison Pearson, How Hard Can It Be? which was published last month. It got me thinking back to my school days and I remember starting to read the first book of this now series, I Don’t Know How She Does It. Regrettably I never finished the book, but I loved what I had read… so I’ve decided I am going to pick it up again. It also got me thinking about another quite different series I started reading back at school, being The Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind. I’m as far as the fifth book of the series, being Soul of the Fire.
I have been paying a lot of attention to some of the books going around the blogosphere lately and I have added one final book that has a lot of discussion lately… A Darker Shade of Magic by V E Schwab!
A Darker Shade of Magic
 

Coming Up…

Tuesday is review day – as always, and this week I am reviewing The Maze Runner by James Dashner. This is one of the exceptions to the rule in that I actually watched the film of this first. I still preferred the book though. More about that on Tuesday!!
On Friday I am taking part in a book tag. Technically I wasn’t tagged, it was kind of an open for all, but I decided to give it a go as it will let you all get to know me better. Hopefully…
Lastly, as ever, I will follow up the week with another post just like this one!!
If you have any thoughts I would love to hear from you! Have you read any of the books mentioned?
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Sunday Summary: 24 September 2017

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Hi guys!! Hope you are having a lovely weekend!!
I don’t know about you, but this has been a pretty mental week for me. Some of you may know that I was away on a short break earlier on this week, so I actually didn’t pick up a book for two days! TWO!! I had to on the third, since I had a several hour boat trip home to kill some time on. The lack of internet may also have swayed my decision…
 

Books Read


On account of being away for those few days my reading game has been pretty weak. I started The Maze Runner by James Dashner last Saturday night; I finished this yesterday and I have read about 25% of Dunstan by Conn Iggulden. I told you it was bad.
I’ll console myself with my pile of shopping instead.
 

Books Discovered

I get to this stage every week and feel like I should be going to Confession in church. I lack two things to be able to do this though. Firstly, I’m not remotely religious. Secondly, I have absolutely no intention of promising to stop buying books.


So, I bought two. Two isn’t so bad, right? That’s what I tell myself. I bought The Sun God’s Heir, by Elliot Baker and Red Sister by Mark Lawrence. Whilst the former is a completely new discovery to me, I actually added Red Sister to my TBR back in April this year. The opportunity came up to buy this book at a discount, so I took it!
As well as purchasing books, I have added a number to the TBR this week. I set myself up on Twitter last week and it has proven to be very useful for connecting with other bloggers and writers too! So much so, over the next two months I have four ARC’s to read! Exciting times! I’ll tell you a little more about them when I publish my reading list for the month they are being read and reviewed in!

As well as the books I have purchased, I have added quite a few books to the pile that I am yet to buy, including Stalking Jack the Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco, The Stone in the Skull by Elizabeth Bear, Consider Phlebas by Iain Banks and 99 Red Balloons by Elisabeth Carpenter.
Finally, my last addition to the TBR is The Scorch Trials by James Dashner, as I completed reading The Maze Runner yesterday.
 

Coming Up…

So this next week I am blessed with some additional time off work and no other major commitments, so I’ll be able to fit lots of reading in!
On Tuesday, as usual, I will be publishing a review of one of my latest reads. This week, it is Bad City by Matt Mayr. This is his first novel so I’ll certainly be keeping an eye on any further releases from this new author!
As I have time on my hands I am also bringing you an extra little cheeky blog post this week!! On Thursday I am going to be reviewing my TBR pile again and having a sort out using the meme created by Lia @ Lost in a Story.
As the first of the month begins on Sunday, and I am too fond of my Sunday summaries for organising myself, I am instead publishing my October Reading List on Friday and my Sunday Summary will be published as usual.
I hope you all have a fantastic week ahead! What books are you reading?
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Sunday Summary

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Sundays come around far too quickly and today is no exception! The only bonus is that tomorrow is a bank holiday here (yay!)
The Sunday Summary is a post I am going to be submitting weekly from now on to let you guys know how I am getting on, what I have been reading throughout the week, tell you about books I have discovered and added to the never ending TBR pile and lastly,  what to expect coming up in the following week.
 

Books I have Read

Following on from last Sunday I finished Lady of the Rivers by Philippa Gregory on Monday night; the review for this book I posted on Friday and can be found here. If anyone is interested in historical fiction I would highly recommend reading this book, as it gives background to the beginnings of the Wars of the Roses without too much nitty gritty detail.
On Tuesday I began reading Extracted by R R Haywood, a science fiction book based on the concept of time travel. I haven’t read any science fiction for a while so this made a refreshing change! I am yet to post the review for this book, but it will be coming your way on Tuesday so keep your eyes out for that if you would like to hear my thoughts.
As well as finishing Extracted on Friday night I also started reading the eagerly anticipated Pet Sematary by Stephen King. I can happily hold my hands up and say I have never read anything in the realms of the horror genre before and so far, being approximately half way through the book I am not disappointed. With Stephen King as the author I didn’t think I would be, but you can never be sure until you try. The review for this book will also be published in the near future and I hope you can check it out.
 

Discovered Books

I have added a lot of books to the TBR pile this week. It’s no wonder I don’t stand a chance of ever seeing the pile in a manageable state (and preferably less than 100 books – next joke!).
This week is quite rare in that I have acquired a number of physical books. The majority of books I purchase are on kindle due to cost and convenience of being able to carry them everywhere I go, but this week I have three books added to the bookshelf in my hallway. They are:-

  1. Eagles in the Storm – Ban Kane
  2. Kill the Father – Sandrone Dazieri
  3. The Good Life – Martina Cole


I always love a book bargain when I can get one. Eagles in the Storm and Kill the Father were purchased in my local supermarket at two for £7 – which is a really good offer bearing in mind you could easily spend this on one book alone!
The best bargain of the week has to be Martina Cole’s The Good Life. My sister is a customer of a UK mobile network that allows customers to buy the book they have on offer every week for £1… yes you read that right! She lets me know what the book is every week and if I’m interested she will get it for me. As it happens, she is visiting this weekend so I managed to get this book quickly.
I have also downloaded two books for my kindle this week, including:-

  1. Mayflowers for November: The Rise and Fall of Anne Boleyn – Malyn Bromfield
  2. The Elizabethan World – Lacey Baldwin Smith


 
You can tell I’m being a bit of a history geek lately but I’m excited all the same!
 

Coming Up…

I figured as well as telling you what I have been doing, it would be nice for you all to know what will be coming up on my blog next week.
As mentioned above, Tuesday’s post will be a review of Extracted by R R Haywood. I always try to avoid spoilers, so if anyone is concerned about that please be assured I try my hardest not to give anything away.
Friday brings to us the start of a new month so I will be publishing my reading list. This month I was too ambitious in adding six books to the list, but as it happens I had to add one to the DNF pile (hopefully only temporarily). Next month I have only added five books to the list to read but if I get ahead of myself and manage to squeeze in another, I’ll keep you posted.
Lastly I will be posting again next Sunday with another weekly update! Until then, I hope to see you around
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Source: Giphy

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