MID YEAR FREAK OUT TAG!

Hello everyone! How are you? I am trying to go back to schedule with blog-hopping and posting, and to be honest, I should write a review right now but… I am not in the right mood, and I decided to do this tag, even if in June I have posted some recaps but… who cares!
As per usual, choosing just one book it is impossible for me, so I tried my best to choose some of them but not too many. But I am not making promises here!

1. BEST BOOK YOU’VE READ SO FAR IN 2019:

 

In there we have two sequels and one standalone. Saint’s Blood is the third book in The Greatcoats series, and this is a series that I love. De Castell is masterful and just so brilliant. It is a grim book, with heroes that aren’t knights in shiny armor, but it is also a book about hope and about life. I loved it so much! And The Hanged Man is the second book in The Tarot Sequence. I loved the story, I loved the worldbuilding and I loved the characters. A lot. And I need the next one ASAP! And then we have a book from a new to me author, The Goblin Emperor. It is quite different from the other two, because this is a kind of positive book, and it is not that the other two are negative books, but… they are just too different. In any event, I loved this one too. And I loved it a lot!

2. BEST SEQUEL OF 2019 SO FAR?

 

This year I have dedicated quite some time to my favorite urban fantasy series, so aside from the sequels I have mentioned before, we have those: Storm Cursed is the eleventh books in the Mercy Thompson series and Mercy is such a great protagonist! To be honest, I have read more than one book from this series this year, and I loved them all, but I have chosen to just put one here. And the same can be said for Cast in Secret. I started this series this year, and so far I have read three books, and I have loved all of them. And then, on this list I couldn’t leave out Sweep of the Blade. Ilona Andrews is one of my favorite authors ever, so here we go!

3. NEW RELEASE YOU HAVEN’T READ YET, BUT WANT TO?

 

All three of them are on my Summer TBR, but I think that this is not cheating! I am really looking forward to those three books! Smoke Bitten and A Killing Frost are the latest published books in their respective series, and I love both of them, so I really hope to read them soon! And Of Dragons, Feasts and Murders is a book I am really curious to start. I haven’t read the main series, yet, but I am curious and I have read so many good things about it that I just need to read it!

4. MOST ANTICIPATED RELEASE OF THE SECOND HALF OF 2020?

 

I am really looking forward to both these books. Return of the Thief is the sixth book in the series and I loved the other so much! Eugene is such an amazing character and I really think that this series deserves some more hype! And then we have Sucker Punch. Anita Blake‘s series is my biggest guilty pleasure. I loved the first books in this series, and I know that the more we go on with them and the less good they became, in some respect, but I love this series so much, it was a safe port for quite some time to me, that I love it anyway, and I am always glad to go back to this world. And so here I am, waiting for the 27th book!

5. BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT?

I may be a tad unjust with this one, to be honest. Because I had some disappointment this year, but I have dropped them all so I don’t know if they count in there or not. But this one I have finished. And it wasn’t bad. But it wasn’t as good as the first book. I was expecting so much from this one and, in the end, it didn’t deliver. I cannot say that it was really bad but… I was disappointed.

6. BIGGEST SURPRISE?

 

Two of them were on my TBR since forever, Sufficiently Advanced Magic and Promise of Blood stayed there for an eternity, but I have managed to read them, and I loved them so much! They were just so good!!! And Tavern was sent to me by the author. I never heard of it before, but it was love at first sight! All three of them were amazing, and I loved them so much!

7. FAVORITE NEW AUTHOR (DEBUT OR NEW TO YOU) ?

This year was pretty great in this respect, because I discovered so many new authors to love, and I have written a post about them here, but since almost all of them are in this post too, the only one I have yet to mention is Krista D. Ball. I loved The Demons We See and I really hope to read the next one soon!

8. NEWEST FICTIONAL CRUSH?

This is a hard one, but I think I would go with Clef from Foundryside. I know that he is a key but… who cares????

9. NEWEST FAVORITE CHARACTER?

Well, I loved all the characters of the books I have mentioned so far, and so choosing just someone it is soooo hard! But I think I would go with Maia from The Goblin Emperor!

10. BOOK THAT MADE YOU CRY?

So far, no book made me cry, even if Saint’s Blood was an almost thing!

11. BOOK THAT MADE YOU HAPPY?

Here too the right answer is “all of the above books” but I would go with Foundryside because I was scared that this one would not be as good as I was expecting. But I loved it! It was just so good!!!!!

12. FAVORITE BOOK TO MOVIE ADAPTATION YOU’VE SEEN THIS YEAR?

I have said it in the post I wrote about the series I watched so far, here, and even if they weren’t a lot, I appreciated a lot The Witcher. It is not so best if we talk about adaptation per se, but I enjoyed the series anyway, even if I was fearing the opposite!

13. FAVORITE REVIEW YOU’VE WRITTEN THIS YEAR?

This is hard! I had fun writing The Goblin Emperor vs. Saint’s Blood because it was quite a strange review. Or not really a review but a comparison between two books that I have read at the same time, and they were opposite and yet similar. It was a strange experience and I tried to make it (and them) justice with this sort of review.

14. MOST BEAUTIFUL BOOK YOU BOUGHT OR RECEIVED SO FAR THIS YEAR?

I have bought the Italian edition of this one, but for once it is like the English edition, and it is just so beautiful, and so chunky and with the orange pages, and it has the same cover! But I haven’t read it, and I think I would give it to my brother soon, just to read and then it would come back to me! Alas, I would have to wait before reading this one, and I think that this is good, because I am not in the right mood for the physical books, or so it seems, but I hope its moment would come soon!

15. BOOKS YOU NEED TO READ BY THE END OF THE YEAR

 

I think it is from the beginning of this year that I say that I would read both Starless and If We Were Villains so maybe I’ll manage it before the end of the year! And I really hope to read something by Becky Chambers. I can’t believe it but I have a lot of her books on my TBR and yet I haven’t read any of them!!

Ok, that’s all for today! I am a bit late with this tag, but… oh well!!!

And what about you? Have you read some of those books? or do you want to read some of them? Let me know!

Happy reading!
S.