Four Month Wrap Up *whoopsies*: May Edition

Honestly, what the actual fuck.

I just realised that I had made a TBR post for may…and then never did a wrap up for may or for any of the other months that have passed.

I need to rectify that immediately.

I’m going to start with wrapping up the books I read in may, then june, july and august. for some reason, instead of my mental health resulting in me not reading, it has had the opposite effect and i have never read more than i have in the past few months.

in each month’s wrap up section, i will also briefly mention statistical stuff – like, the amount of pages I read, the amount of books in different genres, etc.

i am going to try and not make this too text heavy, so i will be only giving a few sentences for each book (unless i have a lot of feelings). I won’t be giving a summary of what each book is about because I don’t want you to be here for the next 67 years.

EDIT: this will now be a series of four posts that will be published consecutively.

Shall we begin, my loves?

Let’s start with two short classics I read. I read both Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte and A Woman of No Importance by Oscar Wilde.

A Woman of No Importance by Oscar Wilde was my Oscar Wilde play for the monthn of May. I had read The Importance of Being Earnest in April, so I really want to continue reading his works since I absolutely adore him and his writing. This play did not disappoint at all. I freaking adored it so much. I connected so much to the characters, especially Mrs Arbuthnot and I found the ending scenes with her and her son so powerful and wonderful. I actually listened to this as an audiobook which I am so happy I did, because I was able to listen to a fully casted play and it just enhanced my enjoyment of the story and the characters and especially the writing! Oh, how Oscar Wilde writes. I want his words tattooed all over my body.

4.5. stars.

Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte was my second Anne Bronte novel that I have ever read (the first being The Tenant of Wildfell Hall). I don’t really remember much about the Tenant of Wildfell Hall only that I really enjoyed it so I went into this book with the knowledge that I enjoy Anne Bronte’s writing. Which I did, so much. I thoroughly enjoyed it but I felt that it was so short that it fell flat for me. I just wanted more!

3.5. stars.

I then read The Year the Maps Changed by Danielle Binks for the AusYABloggers blog tour and I am so happy I was able to do so. I wrote a full length review for the book here as part of the blog tour, so read that if you would like. All I want to say about this book is that it is important. It is an important book to read whatever age you are, so please do it.

4.5 stars.

I also read The Wrongful Death by Kenneth B. Anderson as part of the WriteReads blog tours and I did quite enjoy it. If you want to see my full thoughts as well as links to the previous books in this series, click here.

Surprisingly, I decided to venture into the world of Middle Earth and read The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkein for the first time in my entire life. This book was not on my original may tbr list, but I picked it up because I have been meaning to read the entire series for the longest time and I took the plunge (I still have yet read The Lord of the Rings but i do want to this year). I did really enjoy it. I found the writing to be engaging and immersive, and even though I had never read it prior to this time, I found it to be really cozy? Like i was coming home. It was a beautiful sensation.

4 stars.

The next book was interesting to me. Before anyone attacks me in the comments though, I did enjoy it but it wasn’t what I was expecting in terms of writing and possibly plot? It was Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng. It was good. It wasn’t fantastic, but it definitely was impactful and engaging. I found it a slight struggle though to get through the first 200 pages. I feel like Celeste Ng’s writing lends itself to subtleties.

4 stars.

Hungry Like the Wolf and Wolf Trouble by Paige Tyler were books one and two in the **SWAT series that were fun little paranormal romance reads that I gobbled up because I felt like it. Nothing much to say, only that they were fun and romance-y. It’s about a werewolf super SWAT team and the women they fall in love with.

3 stars to both.

I’m going through this list chronologically, according to my goodreads if you didn’t notice.

So the next book I read is the love of my life. I read this book in twelve days because of how tight it held my heart in its metaphorical hands. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. I didn’t expect to love this book so much but fuck do i love this book. This book changed me somehow, but I don’t know how, I only know that it impacted me deeply. If someone asked me to explain why I loved this story, I would shrug my shoulders in confusion – because I don’t know why. There isn’t one thing that I loved about this book. It was everything, I think. See!? I still don’t know. All I do know is that when reading it (and listening to the audiobook) I would get emotional as hell, I was cheering for these characters, shocked at their idiocy and decisions, in love with the writing – hell, I even enjoyed the chapters upon chapters just about agriculture and farming. I saw it play out like a movie in my head.

FIVE MOTHERFUCKING STARS.

Check, Please! Book 1 and 2 were the next two books I read in may and these were re-reads. I finally have the two bind-ups of the web comic as graphic novels and I was just so happy that I re-read them. This series has a special place in my heart because i love these characters so very much.

5 stars to both.

Although 2020 has been shit overall, it did broaden my reading horizons as well as introduce me to new favourite authors.

TJ Klune is one of those new favourite authors. I was able to read The House in the Cerulean Sea and I completely fell in love with Klune’s writing as well as the story and the characters. It was honestly perfection for me. I cried, I laughed, I was there with the characters going about their business. Klune writes the best ‘found families’ and that will be a hill that I will die on.

5 stars.

The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden was a breath of fresh air. Literary fantasy has never been so stunning and brilliant. I loved this book so much (as well as the other two books in this trilogy which I read in June). The magic system, the incorporation of russian folklore as well as history was done so effortlessly that it felt real. Vasya is a badass and I love her so much. This book did have a slight pacing issue, only because it spend so much time growing Vasya up and building her character – which I didn’t really mind. These books are not plot heavy but they are absolutely fabulous.

4 stars.

If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio was a shock. I love dark academia – y’all know that The Secret History by Donna Tartt is one of my all time favourite books – and I had been meaning to read this book for forever and I was in the mood, so i did. it was fantastic. it wasn’t perfect, but i had so much fun reading it. I love oliver so much and he james SO MUCH and that ending KILLED ME.

4.5 stars.

In the last five to six days of May, I read Bloom by Kevin Panetta (4 stars); Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood (3 stars); Frankestein by Mary Shelley (3.5 stars); Shadow Flight by Christine Feehan (4 stars) and If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho translated by Anne Carson (5 stars).

Bloom was a really adorable graphic novel that i recommend to everyone who has a heart. Hag-seed was…not great. Didn’t enjoy it as much as I was anticipating but still good. Frankenstein was an interesting read – I swear at the start Victor and that dude, what was his name? well, i was like YES GAY I AM HERE FOR THIS. Don’t tell me you didn’t feel the vibes, my dude. Shadow Flight was a christine feehan novel and i think that speaks for itself. you need to forget that feminism exists when you read Christine Feehan books. also, if you read one Christine Feehan novel, you have literally read them all. If Not Winter was an eye-opening, almost spiritual experience. Anne Carson is a goddess.

That’s it for the month of may! In terms of stats, I read a total of 19 books:

four were classics
two were middle grade
four were fantasy (i am including christine feehan’s book as fantasy as well as TJ Klune’s?)
three were graphic novels
two were paranormal
one poetry
three were adult fiction (literary? i don’t know)

Across those 19 books, I read an approximate total of 6526 pages. If my calculations are correct haha.

I gave: