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This really nailed that creeping dread aesthetic - I didn‘t quite manage to work it all out before the reveal, I was on the money for parts of it and anxiously in the dark for the rest.

I was super chuffed to see my beloved DWJ‘s Chrestomanci series get a passing mention too!

Can‘t believe I‘m in the final days of my great Canadian adventure already 🤔 time truely does fly when you are having fun!

This book is nice and twisty - I‘m looking forward to untwisting it!

After almost a year of anticipation and planning a holiday around a concert… it‘s HAPPENED! I had so much fun at Toronto‘s night 3 of Taylor Swift‘s Eras Tour. I‘ve never heard such loud and prolonged screaming 🤪 (or paid quite that much for a bottle of water) but it was all such a blast! From making the friendship bracelets and trading them in line to the bathroom to singing along with all the songs - a night to remember!

This had moments of great potential but Ben was something of a wet blanket the entire time and Ezra, while sweet didn‘t have enough personality to be a particularly interesting character.

Listened to the audio and got a little lost with the changing character points of view. Had some beautiful turns of phrase but ultimately felt like listening to a movie script more than anything else which isn‘t my jam.

Tense times for Mercy - but as always she manages to get herself in and out of trouble.

A low angst grumpy/sunshine romance that grows between neighbours over Christmas decorating. Just the ticket for my first festive book of the season.

Last year I didn‘t read as many Christmassy books as I‘d hoped so past me set some reminders. I‘m already behind schedule 🤣 but I have just started The Geek Who Saved Christmas and it‘s a delight.

It‘s been ages since I‘ve read YA and honestly this was so much fun! Even if my millennial heart did die a little bit at the shade directed at 00s (or earlier) technology. Part coming of age, part library based horror, part romance - all a great time.

My tbr list is really just a list of suggestions

In which Whyborne makes a series of questionable decisions and is forced to reexamine some things that he had always felt were true, about his family and his place in it - and Griffin & Christine remain supportive (even though they both would be well within their rights to slap him)

It‘s not as picturesque as yesterday‘s reading spot - but I‘m enjoying a little respite from the wind (and lunch!)

Obsessed with this carpet!!!

The whole library is a delight - warm and homely, with artwork on the walls and lots of shelf talkers to help you find things. Was impressed with their library of things and signage (the library I work at is allergic to signage)

Current reading spot

(Bow River, Banff facing Sulphur Mountain)

I mostly picked this up because an *Australian* cozy mystery is something a bit different! The “quick guide to Aussie lingo” at the start gave me a chuckle.

I had a good time reading this, it‘s got all the right ingredients to set Ruth up as a reluctant amateur sleuth - and I‘ll be interested in reading the next instalment - because I love mysteries about uncovering family secrets.

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I‘m finally off on my 🇨🇦 adventure.

I‘ve completed two of the three ✈️ legs - Melbourne to Sydney to Vancouver and now I‘m waiting for my connecting flight to Calgary.

I‘m so tired 😴

I was really enjoying this one - Mercy trying her best to investigate the murder that landed her friend, Zee in jail, right up until Mercy is magically coerced and the aftermath of that scene. This is as far as I got when I first read these back in the late 00s… I do wonder if that was why but none of this story felt familiar to me so I‘ll never know for sure.

“Marco doesn‘t believe in optimism.” - Jake

The most reluctant of the Animorphs has a really rough time - my favourite part was when he convinced the others that the best plan was morphing into lobsters to escape pursuit and jumping into a lobster tank at a supermarket (they got sold and almost ended up as dinner).

Marco can‘t catch a break (except for that one nice moment with his dad at the end). The stakes continue to rise! Great instalment.

This leaned a little too heavily on angsty miscommunication for me - I wanted the resolution to come MUCH sooner than it did… (and for it to feel a bit more substantial)

The strength of this book was in its lively bunch of secondary characters - but overall the story dragged out longer than it needed to.

I‘m not at all sure how you‘d go about describing a book like Moonbound - it‘s many things, blended quite beautifully together - best enjoyed, I think, if you just go with it. It‘s weird and meandering, it features gorgeous turns of phrase and deals with life, the universe and everything.

I‘m so close but I have to go to bed 😭

Do I put my phone in flight mode and hope it doesn‘t disappear? 🙃 I‘m on set up and first desk in the morning so it‘ll be well into the afternoon before it‘s audiobook time…

It‘s giving that book shop in Belle‘s provincial era 😍

Did I rationalise a trip to the bookstore today because it was near the “resilience” workshop I had to attend? Yes, yes I did (I used the same logic while buying 🌮 for lunch) and it was the best thing about having to attended said workshop (which to be fair wasn‘t as tedious as I expected)

Playing around with displays again (I mean sure, I could have shelved non fiction but this was loads more fun)

My last book chat of the year (because I‘ll be on annual leave for the actual last one of the year).

4 books a month, February through to October has taken up a significant amount of my reading time, and it has at times been a struggle.

Kind of excited to not have to check if the library has holdings of a book before I start reading something for the next couple of months! Hello random kindle titles I‘ve been putting off!

I‘m glad this wasn‘t the first Janice Hallett book I read because it‘s really on the strength of her other books that I finished. I had faith that everything would pull together in a compelling way but I didn‘t love that this book comprises solely of audio transcripts… I feel this held it back somewhat even though with Smithy‘s background - it makes sense. So I loved it and hated it at the same time.

My other goals for the day were to go to Uniqlo and try on the heat tech long sleeve t-shirts… since I‘m ✈️ into colder weather soon & don‘t have much in the way of winter/fall weather clothing (I‘m very much a she‘ll be right kind of dresser 😜 & most of the time I am right). Anyway these ones have a scoop neck and layer well with my dresses… and now I‘m at the laundromat! Doing all the washing!

My main goal for this lovely sunny Saturday was to celebrate Love Your Bookstore Day by finding two penguin books to buy so that I could get a Personal Penguin. I was perusing the shelves, by publisher logo, with such a serious expression that a bookseller asked me if I was ok? 🤣 I don‘t usually notice who publishers the books I read but today‘s lesson was that it‘s generally not Penguin 😅 but I found two to take home eventually!

Big day of bookmail today!

I get everything delivered to my grandparents and watching my Nana read the quotes on the box with a look like 🤔🤨 was both awkward and hilarious.

Pushing back on the *can‘t have fun on a week night because I have work in the morning* crowd by attending a concert on a Tuesday night. I‘ve been looking forward to this for ages!

Ahh folktales, they go from kinda sweet to kinda dark in the blink of an eye - and I love that about them!

Gorgeous illustrations as you‘d expect from Jon Klassen and a story that I‘ll definitely be thinking about for awhile. May we all be blessed with an Ottila as a friend and not foe.

Great authors note at the end about how he came across the folk tale originally and how folk tales change over time.

“Then she took the bone pieces and threw them into the flames. She poured her tea into the tea cup and drank it as she watched the pieces burn to ash.”

This was an absorbing and atmospheric read - steeped in Welsh mythology and Arthurian legend, the story of a lost and lonely girl who wants answers to her past and is finally close to those answers, although they are not at all what she was expecting. If this was a duology, I‘d say this was a perfect opener but it appears to be a stand-alone and as such, has too many loose ends to be a truely satisfying read.

“It was Margaret Dunhaven‘s opinion that a marriage that constrained her to drink stale tea could not be described as ‘convenient‘ in any meaningful sense of the world.”

Great opening line. I could quite happily have read a full length novel rather than just this little gothic fantasy novella - because parts of the plot were definitely galloped through to get to the conclusion… it was quite fun tho - and happily read with my evening meal.

Adding some confetti to my Friday night!

Would we call this cozy horror? Mara has always felt slightly apart from her family and without a solid plan for the future has just been drifting along… but then her cable show famous cousin gets her a job on his haunted house show… and things start to click into place - until the lines between fake haunting and real haunting blur. I did pick the twist, but I really enjoyed the flow on effect of it - something a little bit different!

Second book in and Mercy has had to rescue her love interests from being kidnapped AGAIN? (To be fair not all of them were kidnapped in the last book - but as the saying goes - if I had a nickel for every time an alpha werewolf got kidnapped and then rescued by Mercy Thompson… I‘d have two (three?) nickels).

Having a great time with this series reread so far.

I do love a book that‘s been in print for so long that it‘s cycled through a lot of different covers…

I didn‘t think the concept for this one was as strong or interesting as Alperton Angels BUT I was still glued to the pages and was successfully lead up and down several garden paths, without ever really being suspicious in the right direction… which doesn‘t happen to me all that often - another well crafted story from Janice Hallett.

Published in 1918 this was an interesting peek into the early 20th century - into the lives of 3 women and how they intersect with the titular solider - a well to do, country gentlemen who was called to serve in WW1.

Equally fascinating was the introduction by Michelle Dean and the glimpse into the authors life and experiences.

This series is going to become an all time favourite because it really does have it all - action, banter, long buried secrets on the verge of resurfacing, a glorious found family of people trying very hard to do their best after the world hasn‘t been very kind.

This book starts off with Rune and Co trying to work out how to get Max out of his (unwanted) marriage contract to the Hanged Man & things escalate from there.

Buddy read with @julesG

Ultimately a very uneven collection of stories - when they are good, they are very good but otherwise it was a bit of a slog 😔 THAT COVER THO!!

But since I‘ve discovered some new to me authors - I think it was time well spent. I‘m quite looking forward to reading more from Darcie Little Badger and Tade Thompson.

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The age ranges (and therefore the relationship age gaps) in this series are WILD…

I was having a great time last night/earlier this morning until I realised I was on the Monday MORNING shift and not the AFTERNOON shift as expected…

Photo/Meme from the IG of littlebookishfairy

I have never seen an episode of Sailor Moon… and therefore am somewhat new to the magical girl genre - I loved it! They had me at magical girl union.

Some big and tough topics dealt with in a light and very relatable way - short & sweet!

Book chat day! Realised part way through describing Dreadful that my chosen books this month are all - kinda hard to explain 🤭 luckily it was mostly regular attendees and they are used to my chaotic attempts at convincing them to read books I‘ve read!

I love the worlds that P. Djèli Clark creates & this one was no exception. A dark fantasy with plenty of humour, our MC is an assassin of the dead cat tail assassin guild, & her night - which begins with the accepting of a contract to “shiv” someone during carnival, is about to go extremely sideways.

I hope we get to meet Eveen again, I‘d love to see her discover more about her past & to rebuild her destroyed book collection of heroic tales.

What a madcap tale! It feels like it has a cast of thousands and we all tumbled through the story together in a bit of blur - as a misunderstanding by the Governor balloons into a potential international incident as various government branches try to save face by inventing intelligence, which quickly spirals out of control… all this set against the looming independence of Nwkwami from British rule.