#ThisorThat #ReaderEdition
My toxic trait is I will often not use a bookmark and just expect that I will remember exactly what page I was on. I will actually just close my book and hope for the best. I‘ve never dog-earred a book before. I also have never tried annotating besides for school, and I‘m not even sure what I would write if I did try it. I love some ambience music in the background 🎶

Ghastly ⭐️ (😉) I loved this one even more than the first! I decided to try the audiobook this time around, and it made the experience even better. I love the humor and the style of these books, and I enjoyed the mystery even if I didn‘t guess any of the plot twists. When the epilogue started, I actually went sheet white and gasped out loud 😱 but by the time it was finished I was giggling 🤭 I adore this series and can‘t wait for the next book!

⭐️ 🚞 🔪 📝 (tagged book, which is hilarious and so so good!)
⭐️⭐️ I‘m very excited to start Where the Dark Stands Still by A. B. Poranek
⭐️⭐️⭐️ I frequently recommend Fredrik Backman :)

#WondrousWednesday @Eggs

I received this book from @Ericalambbrown for the Jolabokaflod swap a while back, and finally found time to read it. I switched between audio and my print copy. Anderson is so very imaginative and wove a unique and touching tale. I found myself tearing up quite a bit. There‘s nothing I love more than a fairy tale with Baba Yaga. It was the pick me up I needed, and I look forward to trying Anderson‘s other books!

#WondrousWednesday @Eggs

#ThreeListThursday #TLT @dabbe
1. From Below by Darcy Coates ~ One of my all time favorites!
2. The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien ~ It took two attempts to actually remember what I‘d read with this one. Massive respect to Tolkien, but his writing style is just not for me
3. The Water Horse by Dick King-Smith ~ I had plans as a kid to reread this book every year for some reason, but quickly got distracted by reading new books

#WondrousWednesday @Eggs
🐣 Fredrik Backman, Yangsze Choo, and Katherine Arden!
🐣 My favorite genre is magical realism and retellings, so Vassa in the Night by Sara Porter is my favorite.
🐣 This is tough! I‘m not one for series…but I think I‘ll go with Katherine Arden. I liked her Winternight and Small Spaces series. I read a lot of series as a kid but as an adult I prefer standalones.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC! This time we are with the characters from Pride & Prejudice. I enjoyed how Gray expands on the lives and motivations of background characters like Anne de Bourgh or Charlotte while staying true to Austen‘s work. I wasn't as invested in the mystery in this one and the series is very slowburn but it was a solid 3.75 🌟‘s and I look forward to the next in the series.

#TLT @dabbe Thanks @Eggs for the tag!
My 3 fav short stories/novellas are:
🌼 Morrighan by Mary E. Pearson
🌼 How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories by Holly Black
🌼 A Psalm for the Wild Built by Becky Chambers

🩵 My favorite holiday to spend with my family is Halloween. My dad and I will watch Halloween 1978 every year and comment on how much we love the houses in the background.
🩵 My dad!
🩵 My cousins, sisters, and I were really big on clue. We‘d play it everytime we got together and at one point made our own board that included a velociraptor as a murder weapon and the Rock as a suspect.
#WondrousWednesday @Eggs

My friend picked The Midnight Library for our book club. I was very familiar with the book but skeptical about the concept, thinking it would be a tearjerker and make me feel like a trainwreck. Instead, I found it to be hopeful and reflective. I ended up binging it in a day and am glad my friend made me give it a try. A little bit cheesy towards the end but a solid 4 🌟‘s.

🏫 I‘ve learned how to work effectively in a team, and that I really enjoy it.
🏫 I‘m currently a PhD student and teaching assistant.
🏫 In another life, I‘d be a marine archaeologist. I want to be by the ocean and near ships.
Thanks for the tag @Eggs #WondrousWednesday

I found the movie on Netflix and decided to play it on whim, and it ended up becoming my new favorite movie. I was excited to find out it was a book and quickly bought a copy. The book is very different from the movie, such as The Prince is far darker and more unlikeable. However, I appreciate both as separate medias. I loved Lemon and Tangerine just as much as I did in the movie. Looking forward to trying out more of Isaka‘s work! 4 🌟‘s

I‘m a diehard GBBO fan, and I‘ve recently been reading more whodonits, so I had high expectations for this one. I think it fell short for me in terms of characters and how the plot played out. It‘s hard to explain, but I just felt disappointed in the reveal, how the competition happened, and how things ended. I will say I‘m a little suspicious there are more nefarious things going on behind the scenes of baking shows in general now lol.

#ThisorThat @monkeygirlsmama

This was a nice cozy romance to start my new year. While it was a nice light read, the plot wasn‘t really there for me. I have to agree with a lot of the criticism this book got. I‘m demisexual, and I didn‘t think the representation was really there with Ellie‘s character. I also hated how all of the other characters, but especially Jack, treated her. I felt like Jack owed Ellie a big apology, not the other way around.

I recently watched Bullet Train (2022) and it quickly became my favorite movie (anyone else love Tangerine and Lemon?). I was really craving a thriller/murder mystery with comedy kind of like Bullet Train in terms of genre and found this book at the library. I couldn‘t put it down! It had great humor and a killer that shocked me. I can‘t say I cared for any of the characters but looking forward to the sequel.

Thank you @Ericalambbrown for the amazing Jolabokaflod gift! I apologize for the late post, I had to go out of state for a family situation and put my mail on hold. Everything is getting better now, and it was lovely to come back home to this fun swap! #Jolabokaflodswap #Jolabokaflod @MaleficentBookDragon

I got my package sent out today! It should reach its destination by Friday. I forgot to include the card in the package so it‘ll be arriving separately ❄️☃️🎄🛷 #Jolabokaflodswap23 #Jolabokaflod @MaleficentBookDragon

Don‘t Call the Wolf is a retelling of the Glass Mountain, and I thought it was a very imaginative retelling. I adored the writing style, the two main characters, the romance, the mythological monsters, and the side characters. The only thing I didn‘t love was where Ross decided Ren ended up in the epilogue. I didn‘t think it matched her character super well. Otherwise, 5 ⭐️‘s and a new favorite!

I think I prefer Grey Bees by Kurkov. I wasn‘t wow‘d at the ending like I was hoping. I think the comedy of this book went over my head, because I was mainly annoyed and bored with Viktor. I preferred side characters like Sergey and Sonya and didn‘t find myself caring what happened to the MC. I‘m not sure I‘ll pick up Penguin Lost. I usually enjoy deadpan dark comedies but I didn‘t find myself laughing at any part of this one.

Thank you @AmyG for the lovely swap!!! I can‘t wait to dig into the candy and crack open a book tomorrow 🎃👻💀🖤🧡#HHS23 #HauntedHollowSwap

This was a soft pick. It‘s very easy to scare me, so this book left me feeling very unsettled. I enjoyed the haunted house and the details of the past residents of the Arrington state. I thought the addition of the podcast, and representation with a bi main character who also has type 1 diabetes was great. I didn‘t like the ending very much. The “resolution” didn‘t make sense to me, and I was upset with how Holly‘s story ended.

1. F*ck
2. Uffda
3. Bag (but with a Minnesotan accent lol. I get ragged on a lot by coworkers)
@dabbe #TLT

Reading has been incredibly slow this month, but I received these adorable Halloween themed cookies as a gift. It was the pick me up I needed after a rough midterm. Hoping to make some progress on Death and The Penguin and The Girls are Never Gone.

I‘m saving:
🔥 Bonfire night
🎃 Halloween
🧶 Knitted Sweaters (the majority of my winter wardrobe lol)

@Cupcake12

I got my #HHS shipped out today! It should take around 4 days to arrive. 🎃👻💀🐈‍⬛🦇🧡 #HHS23

🎃 I love Pumpkin Spice cake! Especially with cream cheese frosting.
🎃I prefer a good ghost story. I‘ve never been able to really get into mysteries.
#TwoforTuesday

I‘m a little late with this, but last week I received #athingaday from @DinoMom and it made my day! I put the coffee pins up at my cubicle in my grad office 😊🍂☕️💛

I received my #HHS package! Super excited 🎃👻🦇🧡🖤 #HauntedHollowSwap I‘m just waiting on a few more items to arrive and I‘ll be shipping my swap out 😊

I love it!! Thanks for the lovely swap @Kshakal 🍂🎃 #FFF #FallingForFall @Chrissyreadit @Avanders

I love middle grade fiction! I find middle grade novels to be so wholesome. I don‘t have to worry about a middle grade novel going too far and I often find them way more creative than adult fiction. I‘ve started leaning away from YA because I get tired of the tropes, but I find YA to have way more diversity than adult fiction. I get a good mix of middle grade and adult fiction with some YA once in a while.

#SundayFunday @BookmarkTavern

I received my fall swap (top left) and sent mine out (bottom right)! #FallingForFallSwap 2023 @Kshakal @Avanders @Chrissyreadit 🍁🍂🥮🎃

1. Definitely a black cat with a cliché name like Salem or Jinx ?‍⬛
2. Slewfoot by Brom - the ultimate feminist rage and revenge novel set in Puritan America
3. I was Marty McFly in high school
4. I love fuzzy cute socks ? I‘m a size 7
5. This is a tough one! I think Ichabod Crane (it definitely needs a make over but I love The Legend of Sleepy Hollow)
6. Caramel apples covered in nuts ??
#HauntedHollowSwap @wanderinglynn

#HauntedHollowSwap #HHS23 @wanderinglynn

#HauntedHollowSwap #HHS23 @wanderinglynn my spooky Pinterest board: https://pin.it/3YuBFLu 🎃👻💀🦇☕️

I loved the 1995 Sense and Sensibility with Alan Rickman as Colonel Brandon. There was not nearly enough scenes between Marianne x Brandon to flesh out their romance more like I was hoping Lauren Lane would add to the original book.

What an incredible book. It‘s a very accessible read, written beautifully and explaining the turbulent history of one of the most critical nations in our current world affairs. Figes explored Russian history through its attachment to historical myths from the Kyivan Rus to the present day. He didn‘t shy from tackling Russia‘s unprovoked war on Ukraine, either. I‘d love to have coffee with Figes and chat about the ideas in his book.

I got exactly what I wanted. Jane Austen‘s Persuasion + 🌶️🌶️🌶️ No more and no less lol. Now it‘s on to the wild and wanton edition of Sense and Sensibility!

When I was working at B&N, I frequently lied when customers asked me if I read and liked certain books they were thinking of buying. It was usually Colleen Hoover or Sarah J Maas, and it would‘ve been really awkward if I was honest and told them I despise Colleen Hoover and I‘ve tried Sarah J Maas and didn‘t like her. So I would say positive things instead and it made the customer happy with their choice 🤷🏻‍♀️#SundayFunday @ozma.of.oz

My two friends and I took a trip to Duluth before I start grad school and another joins the youth conservation core. I‘m in love with boats and the Great Lakes (so clear!) that I‘m having a blast. So many fun maritime and boat books, time on the beach, and in the water. Found a delicious gf and vegan restaurant as well. It‘s a must to live on a coast sometime in the near future 🌊 My fav part so far is watching giant boats come and go!! 💗 ⬇️⬇️⬇️

I had my last day as a bookseller before I transition into a grad student! I‘m going to miss being surrounded by books all the time and all of the knowledge I gained about the book publishing world. I‘m not going to miss the constant temptation to buy books! I‘m looking forward to starting my studies in August though!

💐I also decided to go for a more fun username. I changed from @MadelineMccrae to @RosePressedPages 💐

My first adventure into a sapphic romance! It had just the right amount of spice and interesting characters. I would have to say this was more of a soft pick because I found Herrera‘s writing to be very repetitive. I think that‘s why I‘ve struggled with reading romance recently is that there‘s just not enough plot to keep me focused and I ended up skimming the last 30 pages. I‘m honestly not sure how I feel about the ending resolution though.

I was excited when I saw this was being released since I‘m very unfamiliar with the Slavic pantheon. This ended up being a little disappointing because it very briefly went over some Slavic gods and then instead focused on folktales. The folktales selected were very repetitive in that they were different variations of the same story most of the time. I love folktales, but it can be hard when hatred towards women is so prevalent in each story.

1. Unequal Affections
2. The Late Mrs. Willoughby
3. Fourth Wing
4. Inanna by Emily H. Wilson
5. Tolstoy by Rosamund Bartlett
6. Kakuriyo by Waco Ioka
7. Andrey Kurkov
8. Tatsu from the Way of the House Husband
9. Only Mostly Devastated
10. The Fairy Tellers by Nicholas Jubber
11. War and Peace B&N leather bound edition
12. Between Savage Tides by Anela Deen (can‘t wait for it to be published!)
#MidYearBookFreakOut

I‘ve always been so curious what drug use was like before people realized drugs are very bad for you and no, cocaine should not be used to treat sinus issues... Ohler answered all my questions by examining drug usage in the third reich and it was just as wild and dark as you would expect. It was well researched, written, and I learned a lot. The background is a poster advertising meth. Apparently meth chocolates were a thing…💊🍫

This was so good I read it in one sitting. The title caught my attention and the plot sounded super interesting. It wasn‘t until I finished it that I found out it‘s a modern queer retelling of Grease (it didn‘t click for me 🙈). I loved the main romance, the character growth, and the tearjerker side plot. It wasn‘t perfect but I just loved it so 5 ⭐️‘s. I‘ve struggled to enjoy romance novels for a long time, so I highly recommend this one!

This was quiet but stark lit fic about a man living in the grey zone of Ukraine and his journey to find a place for his bees to pollinate. It reminded me of Fredrik Backman‘s writing. I really loved the MC Sergey Sergeyich for his soft and observant soul. We see how Sergeyich reckons with the war in his relationships with his frenemy neighbor Pashka, the Ukrainian soldier Petro, his ex-wife, the Tatars he meets in Crimea, and his beloved bees 🐝💛

1. Edinburgh (City of Bones by Victoria Schwab) and I did! Someday, Ukraine.
2. I just finished Grey Bees by Andrey Kurkov and it was so good. I definitely recommend if you‘re looking for a new lit fic
3. Mesopotamia by Serhiy Zhadan
#wondrouswednesday @Eggs

Happy Pride Month! 🏳️‍🌈 I‘ve only recently learned about my own identity as queer/bi & acespec, so it was very meaningful to read about someone else‘s journey and challenges. I could connect with Maia‘s experience being asexual, and it was powerful to see how em came to terms with eir gender identity. My reading has been super slow, but I‘m hoping to read more queer books and learn more about other LGBTQIA+ experiences and my own 💗