Hey, everyone!
I hope you’re all staying safe, staying home, and washing your hands. As for me, school is switching to online-only for the rest of the semester, and although my work isn’t closing (yet), so I can’t stay at home as much as I would like to, I only work part-time, so I have a lot of time on my hands over the next couple of weeks. I’m hoping to use that to do a bunch of reading, in addition to the online schoolwork I have to do.
This is not a TBR post. There are a lot of books on this list, and I don’t really think I will realistically be able to get through all of them in the next couple of weeks (though if the self-quarantine rule continues indefinitely, I suppose it’s possible). These are just some of the books on my TBR that are catching my eye the most at the moment.
The Kingdom by Jess Rothenberg
I started reading this book a while ago. I don’t want to say much about my thoughts on it, since I haven’t finished it yet. I have been enjoying it so far, but honestly at this point I’m pretty sure it’s gonna be a three-star book for me and trying to get myself to read the rest of the book when I know that has been hard. Especially since I just recently got 4 new books that I’m more interested in, never mind the books on my backlist that I still want to read… it’s been a little hard to motivate myself to pick up The Kingdom. Hopefully I will, though.
This book is set in a super high-tech theme park called the Kingdom, where our main character, Ana, and her sisters live. Ana and her sisters are what is known as Fantasists, genetically engineered/artificial intelligence princesses who are supposed to be perfect and beautiful. But things have been going wrong in the Kingdom, and when Ana meets a new employee named Owen, she starts to feel something that isn’t supposed to be possible: love. We flash back and forth between present day, where Ana is being put on trial, accused of murdering Owen (that’s not a spoiler—it’s discussed on, like, page one of the book, and is also in the synopsis), and Ana’s perspective in the past, describing events leading up to the trial.
The Paper Magician by Charlie N. Holmberg
I know nothing at all about this book. I did a Google search one day for fast fantasy reads/standalones, and one of the authors someone recommended was this author. I’ve never heard of them before, and I think this book is not a standalone, but it was what I could find at the library, so I picked it up. And I still haven’t read it, unfortunately. I am excited to, though.
The Cruel Prince by Holly Black
I did it. I finally fell for the hype. Everyone in the world seems to be in love with this book, and with the series in general, but I had been avoiding picking it up for a really long time, because… well, I don’t really know why, honestly. I guess because I’m always a little suspicious of hype, and I tend not to want to outright buy books by authors I’ve never read before (though actually, I’m not sure that I haven’t read her before—I have a vague recollection of reading The Coldest Girl in Coldtown and feeling meh about it, but I think that was before I got a Goodreads account, so it’s not marked on there and I can’t confirm that).
Plus, I used to think that I didn’t really like fair folk stories, based on some bad experiences I had with them when I was younger. But then, recently, I read The Enchantment of Ravens and enjoyed it (I rated it 3 stars on Goodreads, but it’s probably more like a 3.5 or even a 3.75). Because of that, I decided that maybe I should give faerie stories more of a chance, and I figured, where better to start than the whole world’s favorite fae story—The Cruel Prince. So here we are.
I’m actually super excited to read this book.
Nevermoor: The Trials of Morrigan Crow by Jessica Townsend
I know: very different vibes from the last book. But honestly, I bought it for a lot of the same reasons: the hype.
This one hasn’t been hyped nearly as much as The Cruel Prince, but a couple of my favorite BookTubers have loved this book, so when I saw that the paperback was on sale for $5 at my local Barnes & Noble, I decided, why not? (Admittedly, said $5 book has a bright yellow “sticker” on it advertising the discount that is not a sticker but a permanent part of the cover, which is a little maddening, but I can deal with it.)
This is the first book in a middle grade fantasy series that follows a girl named Morrigan Crow, who was born cursed. She is blamed for all of the misfortunes in her town, and worst of all, the curse says she is fated to die on her eleventh birthday. Basically, Morrigan has it pretty bad. Then, she meets a man named Jupiter North, who sweeps her away to a magical city where she has to compete in dangerous trials in an attempt to escape her fate.
I don’t read much middle grade, other than rereading old faves like the Percy Jackson series, but this one has gotten such great reviews that I want to give it a try. I’m hoping it’ll be a quick, lighthearted read that can help distract me from all the things going on in the world right now.
Words of Radiance by Brandon Sanderson
This is where this list really gets ridiculous. Words of Radiance is over a thousand pages long. I do really want to read this book soon, because I’m trying to reread the first three books in the Stormlight Archive before Rhythm of War comes out in November. I may not be able to read this whole book before April 3rd, when regular, in-person classes are (supposedly) going to resume at my university, but I should be able to get at least some reading done.
The Kingdom of Back by Marie Lu
This is one of the books I got from my Book of the Month box recently. I don’t know much about it, but I’ve read and enjoyed pretty much all of Marie Lu’s books (though nothing so far has beat Legend for me), so of course I had to buy this one. I think it’s about “the other Mozart,” as it says on the back cover, his sister, who was also a musical prodigy, but whom no one talks about.
I’ve been trying to branch out, since I have a pretty bad habit of reading exclusively fantasy, with a little sci-fi thrown in there from time to time, and this is historical fiction (though I think there’s some magic thrown in there, too—I can’t give it up, I guess). Hopefully I enjoy it.
The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes
This is another book from my Book of the Month box. It’s a historical fiction about travelling librarians, which was really all I needed to hear before I added it to my box.
I have this bad habit of getting books from Book of the Month and then not reading them because, honestly, most of the books they have are not the kinds of books I tend to gravitate towards. But I subscribed to it in the first place because I wanted to force myself to read outside of my box a little more, so hopefully this book will help me with that.
I’m going to stop there before I end up listing every unread book on my shelves. But those are some of the books I’m most excited to read at the moment.
How are all of you doing with the COVID-19 outbreak? Are you planning on getting a lot of reading done while you’re staying home? Let me know down below, and remember, stay safe and wash your hands!
Thanks for reading, everyone! I’ll see you soon!
-Ariel