June Book Haul

So last month I went entirely too far with the book-acquiring and told myself I absolutely needed to slow down. For once, I actually did! I am so proud of myself for this tiny little stack lol. Just 6 books in June, including one pre-order incentive. Not too shabby!

Pre-order Incentive

Memento by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

Purchased

Deaths for the Ladies (and Other Disasters) by Norman Mailer

These Witches Don't Burn by Isabel Sterling

The Modern Faerie Tales by Holly Black

Empress of Forever by Max Gladstone

Sorcery of Thorns by Margaret Rogerson (I actually got 3 copies of this! OwlCrate, FairyLoot (shown here) and the original US version, sent from S&S)

That's it! What's the prettiest book you acquired this month? Let me know in the comments!

Books I Plan to Read This Summer

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week we're discussing the books we plan to read this summer. I already talked about five yesterday in my 5-star Predictions post, so if you want to see the first half of this TBR, head that way.

1. Here There Are Monsters by Amelinda Berube. I don't totally know what this is about but it's being pitched as The Blair Witch Project meets one of my favorite books ever, Imaginary Girls. That's all I really need to know. Sisters, secrets. I'm ready for some YA horror in my life.

2. Empress of Forever by Max Gladstone. I recently picked this one because there was a lot of yelling on Twitter. That's it. I knew nothing except that it is supposedly feminist sci-fi. I already started it and I'm already in love with Viv.

3. The Tenth Girl by Sara Faring. This is another one I don't know too much about. As with any thrillers or horror novels, I just like to be as blind as possible going in because I don't want to guess the twist too early. I love this cover though, and I'm excited to get scared.

4. Heartwood Box by Ann Aguirre. So the publisher tweeted about this and said it was a YA thriller with a bit of a sci-fi edge? I'm here for it. Let me unravel all the mysteries.

5. The Merciful Crow by Margaret Owen. My friend Gaby raved about this one so obviously I had to grab myself a copy. I've been sort of struggling with fantasy this year but I'm hoping this can rope me back into my love for the genre.

What books are you planning to dive into this summer? Let me know in the comments!

5-Star Predictions

Approximately seven thousand years ago, I wrote my first 5-star predictions post. I picked out five books I thought I'd love to pieces and set out to read them. Reader, it did not go well. There were DNFs. There were low ratings. I still haven't even touched the final book on the list. What we're going to do today is pretend that never happened, and start fresh. I present to you five new 5-star predictions.

Winter by Marissa Meyer. This is probably cheating because I'm currently reading it already, but it actually was what inspired me to write this post to begin with. I'm having so, so much fun finally finishing The Lunar Chronicles, and it made me nostalgic for the period of time in which they were published. I was reading more back then and just having a really good time doing so, and I've been getting that feeling back through Cress first, and now Winter.

Courting Darkness by Robin LaFevers. Every other book in this series was a 5-star read for me so it stands to reason that this will be, too. I'm excited to get to know new characters as well as revisit the old ones, Sybella particularly. I really can't wait and I don't know why I've been putting it off.

Circe by Madeline Miller. I mean, we've all read The Song of Achilles by now, right? If you haven't, stop reading this post and go pick it up right now. That's one of my all-time favorites and so I'm sure Circe will be just as amazing.

Finale by Stephanie Garber. This is the only one I'm actually a little bit iffy about. I have a particular ship and I just don't know how I'd react if it sunk. Say what you want to say, but my enjoyment of this book will really hinge upon who Tella ends up with. Hopefully, it will still be an enjoyable read for me, but it won't be 5 stars, I can tell you that much.

Bright We Burn by Kiersten White. I think this is a given. No matter what happens in this I will be both happy and SUFFERING and I will be thankful for it.

I'm really looking forward to reading all of these sometime very soon! I'm hoping that along with writing this post, the fact that all of these are likely to be extremely positive reading experiences will keep me motivated and accountable. I will have a wrap-up/conclusion post for this, I swear!

Mid-Year Book Freakout

I've done this tag every year since it came out. I love it. It's not quite the middle of the year yet, but I am halfway through my reading challenge so I thought now would be a good time. Plus this is just a really fun post to make. 

First, some stats. I've read 28 out of 50 books toward my challenge so far. That's 7,300 pages, and 700 minutes of audio listening. I've reread 2 books so far this year and currently reading my 3rd reread.

questions

1. What has been the best book of the year so far?

Easily. I love everything about this series, honestly, and The Wicked King just upped the ante in all the best ways. Jude is a new all-time favorite heroine and Cardan is a new all-time favorite.. love interest? Antagonist? Both? Who knows! Give me The Queen of Nothing right now please.

2. What has been the best sequel you've read this year?

After experiencing a bit of a disappointment with Beneath the Sugar Sky, I was a little bit wary going into this one. But WOW did I love it. It brought back all the beautiful feelings of Every Heart a Doorway. How Seanan is able to perfectly capture feelings of longing and homesickness, all in just 150 pages or so. This was incredible and heartbreaking and poignant and I loved it so so much.

3. What are some new releases you want to get to soon?

Okay, so, I am notoriously bad at getting to new books in a timely manner. Either I read things well before they come out, or like four years later. There's no in between lol. Some 2019 releases that come to mind are These Witches Don't Burn, Finale, We Hunt the Flame, The Candle and the Flame, Wicked Saints, and Nocturna.

4. What books are you most anticipating in the second half of 2019?

SO. MANY.

Don't even speak to me until I've read this, okay?

I'm also pumped for Technically You Started It, The Merciful Crow, The Guinevere Deception, Gideon the Ninth, and Ninth House. 

5. What book has been the biggest disappointment for you this year?

I thought this was going to be charming and helpful like the blog was to me but it fell flat in pretty much every way. This book spent way more time telling you who it was for than it did giving any sort of cleaning tips. It droned on and on about how cleaning sucks and life is busy but we gotta do it anyway, and then that was it. It was frustrating and not even funny.

6. What book was the biggest surprise?

Not really a book so much as an entire genre. I was never one for romance books before. I don't have anything against them but I am much more of a fantasy reader who enjoys a romance as the subplot. I need romance in books! But I just never really read contemporary romance. But I've read a few this year so far and I've been having so much fun. You'd think with my own love life woes that I'd stay away but I'm actually really enthusiastic about trying even more.

7. Who is your newest favorite author?

I haven't read any authors more than once this year except Holly Black, who I've been a fan of for almost 20 years yikes. Anyway, there are some authors I'm excited to read more from: Christina Lauren, Rachel Hawkins, and Lily Anderson being chief among them. 

8. Who is your newest fictional crush?

Cardan. And Jude too if I'm being honest. 

9. Who is your newest favorite character?

I know I'm about thirty years late to this series, but listen. It's long. I'm tired. But I finally read book one (and am reading book 2 right now) so I can finally say I am a fan of Dany. I stan. 

10. Has any book made you cry this year?

This book yes is a contemporary romance but it is not at all light and fluffy. It deals a lot in grief, specifically with the main characters' loss of her parents. She grows up without her mother, and her mother left a sort of guide/list of rules for her father to follow. I sobbed so many times when Macy would talk about her mom. As the mother of a daughter my chest aches thinking of Rosie having to deal with the things Macy does.

11. What book made you happiest this year?

This may seem like a strange choice, given that this book is mostly about exploring grief, but hear me out. You know that feeling when you're reading exactly the kind of book you're in the mood for, exactly the kind of book you love? I had that feeling when I read this book. It was just so good and so perfectly what I like in my books, that I thoroughly enjoyed the reading experience. It made me happy.

12. What is the best adaptation you watched this year?

I watched The Hate U Give on Valentine's Day as a way to get me away from any romantic anything, and that movie was amazing! It was such a loyal adaptation as well as being its own thing. It was entertaining and engaging and just, so so good.
 

13. What is the most physically beautiful book you bought this year?

 Technically this was a trade not a purchase, but it's SO STUNNING. The blue-sprayed pages are an extra nice touch too. I love it.

14. What are some books you need to read by the end of the year?

I have an extensive list that will most certainly not get done in time. But here are a few: I want to reread the Scarlet trilogy by A.C. Gaughen, reread the His Fair Assassin books so I can get to Courting Darkness. Winter, Stars Above, Finale, Lady Smoke, Wicked Saints, Bright We Burn, Sorcery of Thorns, Aftercare Instructions, Somewhere Only We Know. Whew, wish me luck!

What's the best book you read this year?

Ten Unpopular Bookish Opinions

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week we're talking about unpopular opinions. As the founding member of the black sheep club, I can tell you I have plenty of those. I hope I don't step on any toes with this post, but I think we're all adults here, so let's get into it.

1. The book as an object is not sacred. I see people lose their crap over dog-earing, highlighting, and things like that. You look in the comments on any booktube video and see viewers extremely unahppy that the youtuber dared to DROP her book. Remember when Anne Rice blew a gasket over crafting with an old copy of her book? Yeah, I don't believe in any of that. To me, the story is what's important. The book itself, as a bound stack of paper and ink, is no more sacred than any other object. Obviously I have physical books that are important to me because of who gave them to me or where I was when I got them, but your random old paperback? No.

2. I prefer eBooks. I have a pretty sizeable library of books I own, don't get me wrong. I love a beautifully designed hardcover as much as the next person, and of course the tactile experience of reading the big floppy fantasy paperbacks. But as a mom of two tiny babies, nothing beats the portability and convenience of an eBook. I can read on the go, I can read on my phone, I can carry just about every book I own in my purse. I love the accessibility of being able to change the color, font, and the font size.

3. I love Twilight. Okay, so maybe that's a bit of a stretch, but the truth is I'm tired of seeing it disparaged. The relationships were squicky at best, but there was a lot of creativity in the series. I think it's great in that it gave so, so many girls something to connect to. It broke open doors for speculative YA. I just think it's great for so many reasons, including the vampires sparkling! And shitting on it in this year of our lord 2019? TIRED.

4. Reading is not a marker of a Good and/or Smart Person. I think us bookish types have the tendency to become snobby and almost look down on those who don't read. But let me be the first to say there are different ways to be smart. For example I don't know anything about fixing things or anything about computers, while maybe there are people out there who aren't readers but can do those things! They're still smart! There are also other ways to experience storytelling, from films to theater to video games. None of these hobbies or interests are inherently better than the other and bookish people need to quit acting like it.

5. I have no interest in any HP material outside of the original 7 books and the original 8 films.  This one comes from the latest HP announcement: more books! And I feel like I'm the only one in the world who doesn't care. I don't care about the Fantastic Beasts stuff, Pottermore, any of it. The most I've really gotten into "branching out" was the video game for Order of the Phoenix. I also don't really care or want to know about what JK Rowling is tweeting about. I want HP to stay in its little bubble in my heart, un-fucked with.

6. Speaking of HP, I unship Ron and Hermione. I'm just gonna leave this here and go on.

7. Throne of Glass started great and turned into trash and ACOTRASH has always been trash there I said it. ACOTAR is just bad, the ships are bad, the writing is bad, it's not clever, it's not smart, it's not surprising. Worst of all, it bled into the later Throne of Glass books and ruined a perfectly acceptable series. Her new series will probably be terrible too but is that gonna stop me from reading it? Of course not.

8. I've DNFd a book on the first page, and have no regrets. There absolutely nothing in me that feels compelled to finish a book I'm not enjoying. Life is too short and I have too little time. I've stopped a book on the first page, and I've stopped as late as 80%. I know some people just physically can't but idgaf!

9. I love love triangles. This is one of my favorite YA tropes and I just can't get enough of it. I love the tension, I love that usually it's a metaphor for choosing your own path in all areas of your life. I love love, so two love interests means twice the romance!

10. I prefer standalones.  Which makes reading difficult as a reader who vastly prefers fantasy over everything. But there's something special about picking up a book and reading a single, contained story, whether that's a nice short one-sitting read, or a giant tome that you can really sink into. I like knowing how things end and where the characters go without having to wait a year or even longer for the next installment. I still read series obviously, but I just love standalones!

Do you agree with any of my unpopular opinions?

Wilder Girls by Rory Power

Wilder Girls by Rory Power
Published on July 9th, 2019 by Delacorte Press
Genre: Speculative fiction, horror
Pages: 368
Source: Publisher
Goodreads
🌟🌟🌟🌟

It's been eighteen months since the Raxter School for Girls was put under quarantine. Since the Tox hit and pulled Hetty's life out from under her.

It started slow. First the teachers died one by one. Then it began to infect the students, turning their bodies strange and foreign. Now, cut off from the rest of the world and left to fend for themselves on their island home, the girls don't dare wander outside the school's fence, where the Tox has made the woods wild and dangerous. They wait for the cure they were promised as the Tox seeps into everything.

But when Byatt goes missing, Hetty will do anything to find her, even if it means breaking quarantine and braving the horrors that lie beyond the fence. And when she does, Hetty learns that there's more to their story, to their life at Raxter, than she could have ever thought true.

Trigger warnings: a group of people are gassed, two suicides, body horror/gore, guns

Have you ever read a book that felt like it was written just for you?

From the very first page, I knew I was going to love Wilder Girls. Hetty's voice was so easy for me to sink into, almost like a slightly more polished stream of consciousness. The world she's stuck in was so fascinating to me, the Tox so sickening and grim right from the start. I just dropped everything and couldn't put it down once I started. I haven't stayed up until the wee hours of the morning just for a book in a very, very long time, but I had to do that for this one.

The life on Raxter is turning monstrous. Not just the wildlife, like the feral deer or the oversize coyotes or the rabid bears, but the girls too. The Tox, a mysterious disease ravaging through the island, came in a year and a half ago and turned the students of this small boarding school in alien, horror versions of themselves. Girls are coughing up teeth, growing gills, their hands are scaling over, their spines are growing ridges. And it's not in any way pretty or romanticized. The disgusting effects from the Tox are just that--disgusting. There's no prettying up of what's happening here, so if you're at all affected by body horror, proceed with caution. This book is gruesome and ugly, just the way I like them. And I was absolutely dying to find out what was causing it. As each flare-up got worse and worse, as each girl dropped, her fingers turning black and her eyes going lifeless, the panic in me rose to fever levels. I couldn't turn the page fast enough.

Hetty, Reese, and Byatt were everything. I loved each of these three girls with my whole heart. I loved Byatt's sureness, her confidence, the traces of Bad Girl and unlikeability in the face of everything happening around her. I loved her friendship with Hetty, the way they'd do anything for each other. I loved quite literally everything about Reese. Give me an angry closed off girl with a trigger finger, glowing hair, and a crush on her best friend, and I am putty in your hands. And then there was Hetty. Strong, adaptable, proactive Hetty who is wracked by guilt and shame and pushes those feelings down down down so she can do what needs to be done. I loved these girls, I can't say it enough. Their emotions felt so real to me, the reactions to one another's actions. Their jealousies and their softness for one another, how they always had each other's backs. And I really appreciated how it never felt like one was the third wheel. You just can't imagine the three of them without each other, which makes the events in this book even more painful.

This book was so many things at once and it pulled it all off so well. It was horror, first of all, terrifying and gory, the kind of horror that makes your skin crawl with imaginary wounds and bugs. It felt a lot like a post-apocalyptic story, with how cut off from the rest of the world these girls were. Surviving without heat or electricity, eating expired, rationed food, fighting each other the barest necessities like blankets and stale crackers. It also had a sort of zombie outbreak movie quality to it. You know that feeling when they discover patient zero at, say, a medical facility, and everything goes to shit? There were parts of this novel that felt like that, though there aren't any actual zombies in it.

Oh, and the book is hella, hella gay, too.

Wilder Girls was everything I wanted it to be. It felt like a mirror reflecting back the worst traits of humanity, our monstrousness, and it terrified me. It scared me and creeped me out in the way all body horror does. I'm constantly longing for darker, grittier, worse worse worse, and Rory Power freaking delivered. Bad girls, monsters, survival, and a terrifying disease. If a feminist Lord of the Flies meets horror, monsters, and plagues sounds like you're idea of a good time (it sounds like mine!) then you really, really need to pick this book up. It was incredible.

May Book Haul

Wow so it's been a good, long while since I last posted a book haul. It would be physically impossible to collect all the books I've gotten since the last post, so I only went with May and umm, it's bad, y'all. I need to take several steps back from book buying and lean in to book reading. I went way, way overboard.

ARCs

Eight Will Fall by Sarah Harian

Are You Listening? by Tillie Walden

The Tenth Girl by Sara Faring

Sorcery of Thorns by Margaret Rogerson

Gifts

The Grisha Trilogy by Leigh Bardugo

Speak: the Graphic Novel by Laurie Halse Anderson

Glitter by Aprilynne Pike

A New Hope by Alexandra Bracken

Trade

Nocturna by Maya Motayne

Purchases

Hot Dog Girl by Jennifer Dugan

Warrior of the Wild by Tricia Levenseller

Kingsbane by Claire Legrand

Finale (UK HC edition and OwlCrate Edition) by Stephanie Garber

Prince Charming by Rachel Hawkins

Aurora Rising by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

The Candle and the Flame by Nafiza Azad

A Storm of Swords by George R.R. Martin

The Bride Test by Helen Hoang

Red, White, and Royal Blue by Casie McQuiston

Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me by Mariko Tamaki

eBook Purchases

Meet Cute by Helena Hunting

Top Secret by Sarina Bowen and Elle Kennedy

eARCs

Winterwood by Shea Ernshaw

The Lady Rogue by JennBennett

The Grace Year by Kim Liggett

 eARCs

Reverie by Ryan La Sala

The Last to Die by Kelly Garrett

A Treason of Thorns by Laura Weymouth

Thirteen Doorways, Wolves Behind Them All by Laura Ruby

eARCs

Crier's War by Nina Varela

The Orchid Throne by Jeffe Kennedy

Heartwood Box by Ann Aguirre

The Last Witness by Claure McFall

Ten of My Favorite Retellings

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week we're discussing our favorite genres. I couldn't narrow it down, so I decided to go with ten of my favorite retellings. 

1. A Study in Charlotte by Brittany CavallaroThis is the book that really inspired this list. I recently read it while on vacation and thought it was so clever. I love the Sherlock Holmes stories and love finding new retellings and reimaginings of it. Usually, though, it's just a new way to tell Sherlock's story. With this book/series, it's entirely new characters while holding onto the mysteries and deductive reasoning we all love so much from the originals.

2. The Song of Achilles by Madeline MillerI couldn't possibly write a list of retellings without mentioning the GOAT. Patrochilles is the ultimate ship, this book has beautiful writing, and if you live just to have your heart crushed like I do, why haven't you read this yet?

3. Blanca & Roja by Anna Marie McLemore

This is a retelling of Swan Lake and it's one of my all-time favorite books. I actually just read an interview with the author as a refresher before writing this post and I'm getting a little bit misty-eyed. I loved this story so, so much. I don't really have words to express how important Roja is to me. Everything about this book is just pure and unadulterated perfection.

4. Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge

This is also another all-time favorite. I am absolutely obsessed with Beauty and the Beast as well as the story of Hades and Persephone (so much so that I'm writing my own version.) I always struggle with the retellings though. I feel like they miss the point of the story and they almost always fail to capture the characters' beastliness. But Cruel Beauty gets it in a way I've never been able to capture since.

5. The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly by Stephanie Oakes

So this book takes a much lesser known story, The Girl Without Hands, and wrenches it into our world and our time. This book really isn't for the faint of heart, but the juvenile detention center setting, the religious cult backgrop, and the fact that the main character's hands have actually been chopped off... well, I just couldn't say no. It was hard to read but well worth it.

6. Blood and Sand by C.V. Wyk

First of all, when is the sequel coming?? I'm dying over here! Anyway, this book answers the question "what is Spartacus was a girl?" And it does so in blindingly badass fashion. This is action-packed from start to finish and hits a lot of tropes I love, like warrior men and women romancing, bands of warrior men bound together by battle, and arena fighting. Give me this and a thousand more sequels.

7. And I Darken by Kiersten White

Another gender-bent historical reimagining! This time, Vlad the Impaler is a young woman and she's here to kill everyone and everything in her path. These books are beautiful and painful and there's really nothing else out there quite like them. I love the relationships between the three main characters, including the very troubled sibling bond between Lada and Radu. I still haven't read the finale because I'm just not ready to say goodbye.

8. Cress by Marissa Meyer

The entire Lunar Chronicles series for sure, but Cress holds a special place in my heart. I love Cress's character so much. There's just something special about a female character who is soft and loving and feels everything with her whole heart. She's an idealist and a romantic and I just love her so much, okay??

9. Scarlet by A.C. Gaughen

So it's possible that this is the problematic fave from this list but I can't help but stan for this trilogy. Very few books have gotten to me at such a deep emotional level the way this one has. I just wanted to protect Scarlet from everything but I couldn't. This series imagines Will Scarlet from Robin Hood as a girl (okay, apparently I really like this idea of changing the genders of male figures?)

10. Grim edited by Christine Johnson

Like all short story collections, there are a few duds, but this anthology of dark fairy tale retellings has quite a few gems in it too! Saundra Mitchell, Jeri Smith Ready, and Sonia Gensler all have stories in here that I can still remember like five years after reading. If you can't tell, I absolutely love retellings, so having this many in one place my was my happy place lol.

What are some of your favorite retellings?

May Wrap-Up and June TBR

So this month was an emotional roller coaster for me, with everything getting drowned out by grief at the end of the month. I don't want to talk about it now, so we're just gonna get right to the bookishness.

What I Read

A Study in Charlotte by Brittany Cavallaro 🌟🌟🌟.5

So much fun! This was my plane read while traveling this month and it was a great way to escape the woes of three hour layovers lol. A good mystery that was fun to solve with two main characters I deeply care about. I wish I had started this series sooner for sure.

Prince Charming by Rachel Hawkins 🌟🌟🌟

Another vacation read. I couldn't connect my kindle to the resort's wifi for some reason, and this was the only book I had downloaded aside from A Clash of Kings which is decidedly not beach reading lol. But I'm so glad! I had a blast reading this. It wasn't perfect by any means but it was transportive and entertaining.

Dear Ijeawele, or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 

🌟🌟🌟

I've been wanting to read this author for a while and this short essay seemed like a good introduction to her writing. I did think it was a bit introductory and basic, and a little narrow in the heteronormativity of it all, but a quick refresher for feminism never hurt anybody.

Wilder Girls by Rory Power 🌟🌟🌟🌟.5

Damn near perfection. This was everything I wanted it to be and more. Lord of the Flies meets boarding school meets GAY AS HECK meets monsters! It was so good. It had a survivalist guide, a patient zero zombie flick vibe. I wanted to sink into it and never come out. Very gory though!

Reading Quirks by The Wild Detectives 🌟🌟.5

A cute, quick graphic novel. Will likely appeal to a huge amount of people if publicity gives it the right push. I didn't love it but I found it to be relatable a lot of the time. The art was just a tiny bit confusing though.

The Dispatcher by John Scalzi 🌟🌟🌟🌟

This was free on Audible for memebers so I snatched it up because no matter what the book's about, Zachary Quinto reading to you is sure to be a good time. I wasn't expecting anything and ended up greatly enjoying this. The change to our world is so small and yet it has huge ramifications, which gave me a lot of food for thought. I could honestly read a 20 novella series of these two characters solving crimes in this world, it was that good. 

 

TBR

I'm in a major reading slump currently. I was doing really well considering my life honestly, but it all came screeching to a grinding halt. I really hope to pull myself out of it with a few highly anticipated releases that I've been looking forward to for months.

The Kingdom by Jess Rothenberg 

This is my current read and I am obsessed. It's so good! I love mysteries and I love fantasy and sci-fi, so when you blend a mystery with SFF I am yours!

Sorcery of Thorns by Margaret Rogerson

I'm a little bit wary of this one beacuse sexy fae and Charlie Bowater illustrations just ring all my SJM alarms, but I'm going to give a try anyway since I'll have three copies by the end of the month, not including my eARC lol. I've never read a book about a Great Library type of setting so that does excite me. Plus the cover is just beautiful.

The Right Swipe by Alisha Rai

I've been trying to get more into romance these days because I just need some feel good reading with guaranteed happy endings. I love this cover and I'm excited about the inclusion of modern technology and online dating. I hope I love it.

We Hunt the Flame by Hafsah Faizal

I'm just like everyone else on this planet when I say I've been dying for this. And I've had the arc forever but haven't read it! Now's the time since I have a beautiful, stunning finished copy in my hands. I need some palce to escape and this sounds like exactly that.

What was the best book you read in May? What are you excited about for June?

Summer 2019 Bookish Bingo

It's that time again! I'm back with another round of Bookish Bingo. Honestly, this feature is my favorite part of blogging and I love how many people join in every quarter. Thank you!

If you're new to Bookish Bingo, basically it's a bingo card full of bookish prompts. Over the course of three months, we try to get as many bingos as possible, and some even aim to cover the whole card. You can use one DNF and only one book per square. There are no really hard and fast rules, everything is up to your own interpretation. The only guideline that is super strict is that everything must be read during the months of June, July, and August.

I'm going to share my personal TBR for the summer Bookish Bingo card

Pink Cover: Red, White & Royal Blue
Animal in the Title: The Merciful Crow
Reread: Dark Triumph
LGBT: Crier's War
Series Finale: Finale
Graphic Novel: On a Sun Beam
Romance: The Right Swipe
Orange Cover: Priory of the Orange Tree
WoC Author: We Hunt the Flame
2019 Debut: The Candle and the Flame
Strong Parent Bonds: The Raven King
Favorite Author: Aurora Rising
Blue Cover: Her Royal Highness
Historical: Mortal Heart
Speculative Fiction: Annihilation
Beach or Island Setting: 
Illustrated Cover: Hot Dog Girl
Man vs Nature: Beauty Queens
Sunshine on Cover: The Beast Player
Cover Change: The Heart of Betrayal
Food on the Cover: Hungry Hearts
Bookish Themes: A Sorcery of Thorns
Page to Screen: A Storm of Swords
White Cover: Aftercare Instructions