April was a fantastic reading month for me – I read 11 books and really loved all of them! I didn’t make a huge dent in my TBR this month (as you’ll see in an upcoming post), but I’ve done a good job of focusing on reading down some new releases and books I already own. All reviews are linked, check them out!
Books I read
Advance Reading Copies from publishers
In an unprecedented move, I read the entirety of the Saints of Steel series this month! Me, a notorious series abandoner! You guys probably know by now that T. Kingfisher is one of my favourite authors and I was totally sucked in to this marvellous world of adventure and romance. You can check out reviews for the first and second books – reviews for the other two are forthcoming – and I highly recommend picking up these charming, funny romantasy books.
I read three other ARCs this month and they were all fabulous. While Murder by Memory and The Notorious Virtues are currently out, Eat the Ones You Love is hitting shelves in June. None of these books are alike, but they were all fantastic reads!
Audiobooks
I’m trying to use audiobooks as a way to read down my shelves and I managed to listen to two books in April. Why only two? A Day of Fallen Night is 39 hours long! I listened to it in an attempt to:
- listen through my old Audible library (I made the switch to Libro.FM as soon as it launched in the UK and it is a fantastic service – read more here)
- get that 800+ page book off my shelves!
- prepare for Among the Burning Flowers releasing in September!
I’ll do a proper review later, but A Day of Fallen Night totally blew me away. It’s a strong contender for my best book of the year!
I signed up for the Queer Liberation Library on Libby and my very first hold came through on 30 April, so I managed to squeeze Our Wives Under the Sea in at the end of the month. It’s a beautiful story of grief and love, and one I think I’ll be contemplating for a long time. I’m so glad I’ve finally read it – my hardcover copy was languishing on my shelves for years.
Books from the TBR
Last but not least, I read two other books off my TBR in April. Great and Horrible News is a fun non-fiction book about historical true crime cases in London. It provides lots of context for laws and attitudes of the time, which I appreciated, and was a solid read.
I pulled The Midnight Game off the shelf in an attempt to begin clearing away books before packing them up (more packing! Always more packing!). I ended up getting totally sucked into the story and blasted through it in a single evening. It was a great YA thriller!
Books from publishers
Physical books
I received some beautiful book mail this week! The Incandescent by Emily Tesh is one of my most anticipated reads of the year – and it’s out this month! The hardcover is so beautiful and I can’t wait to dive in.
I also kindly received the Fever House duology from Black Crow Books! The first book, Fever House, is out now and The Devil by Name will come out later this year. They look like fantastic horror books and I’m so intrigued!
NetGalley books
I’ve once again done extremely well on NetGalley. As we are moving, I’m trying to request fewer physical copies and find myself turning to NetGalley more and more for digital review copies. All four of these books look amazing and will be out between June and September this year.
Books I bought
Oxford book haul
Look, I’m not proud of the damage I did. We took the day before and after the Easter bank holiday off work. I was at a loss for things to do on a beautiful Thursday, so I thought, ‘why not nip into Oxford’? I went to Blackwells, Waterstones, Scriptum (a marvellous stationary shop), and Lush. I undid a lot of the good work I did with my TBR reading, but it was so worth it. What a haul!
Other poor financial decisions
Outside of buying out the stock of two separate bookshops, I was fairly restrained in terms of book buying last month. I preordered a gorgeous edition of Stephen Graham Jones’ new book The Buffalo Hunter Hunter, which I started last night. I also went to a panel event called Unruly Women and picked up the two books that I didn’t already own – Spoilt Creatures (cults!) and Bright I Burn (witches!). I’m really looking forward to both of these books, alongside Carrion Crow (I’ve already read The Lamb and loved it).
Whew! That’s it for April. In May, I’m hoping to keep reading down the books I own and hopefully (????) not bring in too many new things. I’m currently reading The Devils by Joe Abercrombie (another highly anticipated release) and plan to dive into more audiobooks.
I Should Read That 
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