pickI wish I loved this book more, but it ended up being a soft pick for me. The concept was very intriguing, but it also felt a little draggy through the middle bits. I've been kind of sad lately, so I'm not sure if this book really was pretty melancholy, or if it just felt that way to me 😂 But look at that GORGEOUS cover! I honestly may keep it just because it's SO pretty.
Here are my weekend goals for the #JustOneMoreChapter readathon. I just stared Bride last night, but would love to finish it plus the next two in the queue!! The weather is looking gorgeous and we have a ton of little projects to get done, but I am hoping to squeeze in plenty of reading, too!!
#HauntedShelf #ScreamTeam
September was super hectic and stressful, but it feels like things are finally starting to calm down and find their equilibrium again! And I'm finally feeling like picking up some books!!! So join me this weekend (Friday-Monday) for a lil readathon. And if you're a part of #HauntedShelf, enjoy a little point stacking as well 😁
@PuddleJumper
#ScreamTeam @ImperfectCJ
pickThis book followed the pattern of other Barclay books I've read: intriguing concept, good pacing, likable characters - but then goes off the rails a bit right at the end and leaves me confused about the WHY behind the villain(s). A soft pick, because for me to really love a book, I need to get that full-circle satisfaction of everything clicking together in the end.
pickThis one landed as a soft pick. It kept me glued to the pages while I was reading it, but I felt a little let down by the ending. This seems to be a common theme for me with this author.
This one is on its way to you @bookandbedandtea !! And @Jerdencon - I received Her Every Fear this week!! #TravelingThrills
pickOne of my goals for October is to get back into posting regular reviews!! I started this one in September as a #KindredSpiritsBuddyRead – I had never really heard of it before and wasn‘t sure what to expect. Irving recounts a trip to Spain, where he spends several weeks living in the semi-ruined palace of Alhambra, just outside Granada. While parts of this book bog down with Irving‘s enthusiastic historical facts (apparently he was there to ⬇
Good morning, friends!! Hope things are feeling autumnal (or springy!) where you are. I LOVE October and am SO excited to see what all our new trees look like this fall!! A reminder that any books you read for BookSpin/Bingo this month count as a HauntedShelf readathon if you are participating, and bingos scored can also be counted as bingo points!! Happy reading, everyone!!
Standard monthly text below ⬇
Good morning, everyone! The moment you have all been waiting for!! Our official #BookSpin number is FOURTEEN! Our official #DoubleSpin number is SEVEN!! I have thoroughly enjoyed looking at everyone‘s lists & am really looking forward to seeing your reviews!!
My next post will be the #BookSpinBingo card. I am NOT tagging anyone on that post!! If you want to bingo, please just check my profile for the card. This saves me having to double tag ⬇
Somehow, it's already time for October's #ISpyBingo board!!! Anyone is welcome to join!! Find these items anywhere on a book's front/back cover or spine!! One book can check multiple prompts.
All of the 2025 boards can be found here - https://www.canva.com/design/DAGVO4NctsY/-lGsmflP3sUW9FsAung8hg/view?utm_content...
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Well, we are less than a week away from OCTOBER! Generally, fall is my favorite but also my busiest season. Things also went a bit off the rails this month, so things have been bonus chaotic!! Hoping to get back on track in October (my birthday month!!). It is FINALLY raining (before this week we had gotten less than an inch altogether since July 29!) and we are excited to see what colors all our new trees are!!
All this is a very rambly way of ⬇
@JoeMo - While on a lovely autumnal walk, you come across an empty house. Inside, you find a crackling fire, a steaming pot of tea, and a pile of books from your TBR. Surely there's no harm in sitting down to read a few pages. Surely it's not possible that while you think you've only spent a few minutes reading in this cozy nook, centuries have passed...
You've been #TrappedinaSpookyHouse !!
@PuddleJumper
While I'm a day late posting my #FallingForFallSwap pic, I was early to open it 😂 @BarkingMadRead thank you so much for everything!! I had a crap week and treated myself to a little present from you every day (which is also why there aren't as many Reese Cups in the picture as you sent 😆) I love everything!!!!
@Avanders @Chrissyreadit - Thank you so much for hosting as always!!
My #FallingForFallSwap package is finally on its way east!! And I received my package several days ago and just have never gotten around to posting about it, so I apologize!!
Thank you so much for hosting @Avanders @Chrissyreadit !!!
pickI really enjoyed this installment. I think my favorites are the ones where they are in Sleepyside. I can't remember if the solution to this one seemed as obvious to me when I was growing up as it did when I was reading it this time around. Also, I genuinely had in my mind that Jim's stepfather had died in the house fire of book 1?! But apparently I made that up completely 😂 Biggest issue was that the sister of the poor lady in Illinois is⬇
Happy September, everyone!! Here is our #BookSpinBingo board for this month!! Free spaces have lined up super nicely with our Spins, so here's hoping for a fantastic reading month!! As always, let me know if you have any questions!!!
Regular monthly text/info below ⬇
Good morning, everyone! The moment you have all been waiting for!! Our official #BookSpin number is ONE! Our official #DoubleSpin number is THIRTEEN!! I have thoroughly enjoyed looking at everyone‘s lists & am really looking forward to seeing your reviews!!
My next post will be the #BookSpinBingo card. I am NOT tagging anyone on that post!! If you want to bingo, please just check my profile for the card. This saves me having to double tag ⬇
We are less than a week away from SEPTEMBER!! September of TWENTY-TWENTY-FIVE HOW IS THIS REAL LIFE!?!?!
But seriously, time is flying as always, and if you'd like to join in this month's #BookSpin/#BookSpinBingo (before or after your mini-existential crisis, whatever works best 😂) it's time to start thinking about your lists!!
The weather here has finally cooled off (it's a PERFECT morning and the windows are OPEN) so I am feeling good ⬇
Here is September's #ISpyBingo board!!! As always, everyone is welcome to play. Items can be found on a book's front cover, back cover, or spine. I personally play each board for a full year, so take however much time you like to make the challenge work for you!!
Happy hunting!!!
so-soI personally found this to be one of the weakest of the series so far. The plot was really choppy and a bit random (gun runners??) and, more aggravating, the gang just felt like they kept making really dumb decisions? Let's get in a boat with a stranger!! Let's go swimming all alone when the pool is closed and no one is around!! Let's leave Trixie & Honey alone in the hotel after we said the hotel wasn't safe!! Let's run off with two people we ⬇
I was trying to choose some fun, summery colors, but it kind of looks like a baby announcement 😂 ANYWAY here is August's #BookSpinBingo card with both BookSpin and DoubleSpin numbers set with two free spaces in each of their columns!! Super stoked to see how everyone does this month - can't wait to see all of your boards!!
Below is my usual monthly text/info -
Good morning, everyone! The moment you have all been waiting for!! Our official #BookSpin number is NINETEEN! Our official #DoubleSpin number is TWENTY!! I have thoroughly enjoyed looking at everyone‘s lists & am really looking forward to seeing your reviews!!
My next post will be the #BookSpinBingo card. I am NOT tagging anyone on that post!! If you want to bingo, please just check my profile for the card. This saves me having to double tag ⬇
Time for my favorite swap of the year!! #FallingForFallSwap 🎉 Check out this post https://www.litsy.com/web/post/2886960 for the sign-up link!!!
As always, thank you for hosting @avanders @chrissyreadit 💕 💕 💕
Well, we are somehow only a week away from AUGUST!!! August!!! This has been a hot summer around here (although my weather app says it's not as hot as it was in 1999 when a bunch of records were set so I guess I'm grateful?? 😂) which usually means I read more, but we have just been SO busy!! We FINALLY closed on our old house this past Monday after being under contract since before Memorial Day, which means I can stop lugging my lawn mower over⬇
August #ISpyBingo board!!!
As always, anyone is welcome to join!! Find items on the front or back covers or spine of your book. If you'd like to see all the 2025 boards/play all the boards all year, they are here - https://www.canva.com/design/DAGVO4NctsY/-lGsmflP3sUW9FsAung8hg/view?utm_content...
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Okay, here are a few options for the next round of #TravelingThrills !! @Jerdencon @bookandbedandtea
pickRunning a little behind with June's #BobWhiteBuddies read, but better late than never!! I really enjoyed this one, despite all the coincidences that let everything work out perfectly 😂 One thing I really liked was the way that Trixie gave Neil the benefit of the doubt instead of jumping to conclusions about his motives. Like the last book, the gang comes through here as feeling compassionate. Even though they frequently focus on fundraisers to
Good morning!! Look at this lovely July card the BookSpin Fates have granted us! Two free spaces in the BookSpin column!! And one each with the DoubleSpin column and row. Hope you all are using this hot weather as an excuse to sit in front of a fan, sip some lemonade, and read!!! 😁
Regular monthly text/info below ⬇
Good morning, everyone! The moment you have all been waiting for!! Our official #BookSpin number is FOUR! Our official #DoubleSpin number is ELEVEN (so close to 12 😂)!! I have thoroughly enjoyed looking at everyone‘s lists & am really looking forward to seeing your reviews!!
My next post will be the #BookSpinBingo card. I am NOT tagging anyone on that post!! If you want to bingo, please just check my profile for the card. This saves me ⬇
so-soThis is one of those weird books that I like less every time I read it. When I first read it ~age 11, I loved it: Black Beauty except a dog! But subsequent rereads as an adult have made me look at this book a little more critically. My main complaint is that there isn't actually a story. In BB, we have a clear linear story, from birth to final home. But Joe is just a collection of random sermonettes against animal cruelty. I think that as a child⬇
Bwahaha here I am actually remembering to post the new #ISpyBingo board in a timely manner! Miracle!!
Anyway, here are July's prompts. As a reminder, anyone can play. These items can be found on the front cover, back cover, or spine of the book. You can try to get them all in a month, or keep this board in play for longer, whatever works for you!! I personally have been adding a new board every month but plan to give myself a year to clear each ⬇
Oh my gosh, there is only one week of June left!!! Which means we are only a week away from being HALF WAY THROUGH 2025!!! I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that years begin with “20“ so we can all see how well I'm doing with the passage of time 😂 Anyway, I hope everyone is having a lovely summer so far (or a cozy winter, depending on where you are!). We are in the midst of an intense heat wave, unusual for this early in the ⬇
pickPresumably I read this book back when I purchased it for a quarter back in 1997, but I have no memory of it 😂 A Scholastic Book Club reprint of a 1932 story, this one was perfectly fun but not particularly engaging. But I probably would have liked it better when I was the age for which it's aimed. Soft pick.
pickThis one kept me turning the pages, but for me the motivation for the villain wasn't strong enough to make the ending make sense. However, I've always been a little terrified of elevators, and now I'm not sure I'll ever get on one again 😂 Although ironically, I was expecting more elevator terror than I actually got. Soft pick.
#Read2025 - 34/100 TBR books read @DieAReader
#BookSpinBingo
pickWell, Litsy won't let up upload an image today. Ah well. This sequel to Pollyanna is almost like two books in one. The first half takes place only about a year after the first book ended. P is able to walk again and is happily living with Aunt Polly & her husband. When Aunt P & Dr end up going abroad, P goes to stay with a woman in Boston, and we kind of get a repeat of book 1, with P spreading sunshine and happiness to all and sundry. However, ⬇
Okay, friends, here is the June #BookSpinBingo board!! I like the way every row got its own free space this month 😂 I used a light blue marker and after I uploaded the picture realized that it's kind of pale in the photo but hopefully everyone can see it okay. If not, I can reupload it with a darker blue!! May was my best reading month for a while, so I have high hopes for June. Hope everyone is heading for a fabulous summer!!!
Usual stuff ⬇
Good morning, everyone! The moment you have all been waiting for!! Our official #BookSpin number is TWELVE (again 😂)! Our official #DoubleSpin number is TEN (...also again??) !! I have thoroughly enjoyed looking at everyone‘s lists & am really looking forward to seeing your reviews!!
My next post will be the #BookSpinBingo card. I am NOT tagging anyone on that post!! If you want to bingo, please just check my profile for the card. This saves ⬇
Sorry, gang, totally spaced on posting June's #ISpyBingo board!!
As always, if you want to track on Storygraph, the challenge is here - https://app.thestorygraph.com/reading_challenges/85a6eb78-a914-4e84-a200-9073f75...
And if you would like to see ALL the 2025 boards in once place (especially since I can't seem to remember to post them in a timely manner 😂) the link to the Canva document is in the comment below!!
All are welcome to play!!
pickI really enjoyed the 13th Trixie Belden book. The banter and teasing between the Bob-Whites was just like I remembered - and just the right amount of flirting between Jim and Trixie!! 😍
@BookmarkTavern was saying how it would be fun to know who ghost-wrote which books, so I did a little research yesterday, but it just looks like that list doesn't exist! The best information I could find is linked below, but it's a lot of hypotheticals. ⬇
pickMy sister loaned this one to me quite a long time ago, but because historical mysteries aren't usually my jam, it's been lingering on the TBR pile. I finally picked it up, and honestly it was super adorable. I really liked the characters and even though not everything quite worked, it worked enough 😂 and I'll definitely be reading book two.
pickI had mixed feelings about this one. It was super engaging and I could hardly put it down while I was reading it. But the whole explanation/plot twist at the end just didn't really work for me. I don't know what I wanted, but it wasn't what I got 😂 A soft pick. I liked it, but don't see myself rereading it later.
so-soAnother classic off the list. I can't say I enjoyed this one. Maggie honestly got on my nerves. I was thinking about it while writing my GR review, because in some ways she reminded me of Helen from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, but I really respected Helen and had pretty much no respect for Maggie, and I was trying to figure out why. I think it's because Maggie's brother is her god. Everything she does is based on whether or not he will approve. ⬇
pickThis book was really similar to the first one in the series, with likable MCs and no smutty scenes, which I prefer. There were times that Ellie annoyed me, and I really wish we could have gotten Jake's POV, but overall this was a pleasant read. I'm mostly posting this because I don't like covers with real/real-looking people on them, so I created a new cover for this book and put it on myself. Slightly crooked, but I like it so much better than ⬇
pickThe post is mostly to say that I am pretty sure my library edition has the cover for The Sign of the Twisted Candles 😂
@Librarybelle
panI actually really love the book Bambi and have read it and its sequel (Bambi's Children) several times. So I was excited to randomly come across another reprint of one of Salten's works. I had never heard of this one, although by reading GR reviews I discovered that it was apparently the (incredibly loose) inspiration for DIsney's The Shaggy Dog. Sadly, this book was a huge disappointment. First off, it's plain boring. Set during the Renaissance ⬇
pickNow that I'm down to only a handful of years to read to complete the #192025 challenge, I've turned to my shelves to see if I can fill any gaps. This slim story by Grace Livingston Hill checked of 1946, plus got an unread book off my shelf!! It's a perfect pleasant little story - Aunt Marilla is adorable - but too short to really build any kind of tension or actual romance between the two main characters. A soft pick, but one I won't reread.
Well, my efforts to deny reality aren't working - June is only a week away!!! I have to admit that I'm excited about the longer days and warm evenings. Plus, everything around here is busting out into flowers and it's super happy!! But... JUNE!? 😂
If you are planning to #BookSpin it's time to start thinking about your list!! I'm excited to see what everyone has planned. Do you like to read summery/beach reads in the summer, or just whatever ⬇
pickPublished in 1980, only four years after Belenko's escape from Russia (and well before the fall of the Berlin Wall), this book was quite fascinating. Belenko actually had more or less the ideal situation in Russia as the MiG-25 pilots were highly valued and treated well (by Soviet standards). Reading about his slow recognition of the cognitive dissonance between what he was being taught about his country vs the west and what he could actually ⬇
pickSadly, the sequel to Ashlords had even fewer phoenix-horses 😞 This book is all about the war, and while it overall did work, the ending where everyone just suddenly is going to get along despite generations of being enemies felt... unlikely lol (If we just take all the money from the rich people and give it the poor people, then everyone will be happy!!! ...riiight) But still, it was an engaging read with characters that I liked. These books ⬇
so-soThis book had all the ingredients that I should enjoy, but somehow they just didn't work here. Miss Carter is a middle-aged woman, never married, who lives by herself in a small flat in London and works for the censor's office during WWII. Through a series of events, she finds herself in possession of an ifrit (i.e. genie). Part of the reason this book didn't quite work for me was that the ifrit's magic never really made sense to me. Apparently ⬇
pickThis is one of those books where I loved the concept more than the execution. It's a great world with an intriguing idea - the existence of horse-phoenixes, whose ashes can be mixed with different elements to create a horse with different powers when it rises again in the morning. My problem: I wanted MORE about these horses, but they ended up just kind of being a tool for the story. The other issue is that this book was about a (phoenix) horse ⬇
![[tagged book]](https://image.librarything.com/pics/litsy_webpics/icon_taggedBook@3x.png){kind=icon}
#ISpyBingo - Fruit (not apple)
#GottaCatchEmAll - Cute But Deadly
#PumpkabooHunt @PuddleJumper
#Read2025 - 58/100 TBR Read @DieAReader
#FictionalTraveler - @julieclair
#BookSpinBingo 4h