September Wrap-Up!

Hello people! I hope you all are good, and that your September was a good month! I am happy because Autumn is really here and it was a great month all around. Yes, I was tired, and I was tired a lot, but I managed to read a lot of amazing good, watching even a couple of movies, and spend some quality time with my boyfriends, my parents and my puppy. So I cannot ask for more!

September was Self-Published Fantasy Month and taking part in it was amazing! I have read some great books that were waiting on my TBR and I discovered new authors and books!

Books read: 23 (3 DNF) + 2 short stories
Physical books Vs ebooks: 4 vs 21
ARCs: 10

The Amazing Ones!

To be honest I gave 5 stars to only one of them, the other one is around the 4.5 mark, but I loved both of them. And both of them were compelling, and fascinating, and really talked to me. The Forest God is a very short novella, but it has it all. And it was an amazing and memorable reading. Cast In Fury was maybe not so amazing, but I immersed myself in the story, and the characters are slowly becoming old friends. And I found the reading quite on point, we have a lot going on in there, sure, but the main focus was the danger of people who are scared of the unknown and of the diverse. Aside the fast-paced story, and the complex and interesting world-building, we have some food for thoughts. And I enjoyed it so much!

The really really good ones!

I was really lucky in October, because I did read some pretty amazing books, the only problem is that I need more of them! The Thief Who Pulled on Trouble’s Braids was a fast-paced book with a lot going on and some pretty amazing characters. Now I need to read the sequels, because I haven’t had enough of them! Fortune’s Fool was another great reading. I kept this one on my TBR for quite some time, and I have to thanks Self-published Fantasy Month for it (as for a lot of the other books I have read this month) because it gave me the opportunity to read and love it. It is not perfect, there were some things that buggered me while I was reading it, but I enjoyed it a lot! It is quite a chunky book, but it kept my attention and my interest alive! The God’s King Legacy was a book with two separate short stories in it, and it was just so good! It is on the grim side, and it is the right book if you love fights and battles, but it was original and with some really interesting characters! The Best Laid Plans was a novella and a prequel for this series. It is really short, but we get to know an interesting MC, he is a thief and a sort of lizard man, witty and promising and we take a peek in a world that seems interesting. It was short, but we get action, and a feel for the main story. And I am really really curious! 

Burn Bright is the last published volume in this series by Patricia Briggs, that is a companion series to the Mercy Thompson one. I really really enjoyed this one! We manage to see more of Lea around, and even if I don’t like her as a character, it was pleasant to discover more of her. A Killing Frost is another urban fantasy, and one that I really loved too. Ok, I am here waiting for this damned marriage to happens, but this aside I was captivated and moved by it. At one moment my eyes were wet!!! And it was about something that didn’t matter to me so much. I don’t know how something like this was possible, but here we are! My Lady Choosing was the right book at the right time. It is a gamebook and it was fun! It is something different and it is the right book if you want to take a break, relax yourself and have a but of fun out of it! Heroes at Risk is the fourth book in this series, and I am really glad to be back to this world, and to this character. It is a good series, and I really think it deserves more hype (and more love), especially because the MCs are amazing (and ok, I may be biased because sometimes I see myself in Lee and it is astounding!) and the banter is great! 

Sapiens it a non-fiction book, and it was a really interesting read. It is very easy to follow, it is well written and presents some interesting and new (to me) theories and ideas. I loved it and even if I started it with some expectations, since it was highly recommended to me by a couple of coworkers, I would have never thought to enjoy it so much. Really, if you want to read something with interesting new point of views on a theme that is, more or less, known to everyone well, try this! You won’t be disappointed! The Vampire Knitting Club was on my TBR since I discovered this series on Way Too Fantasy. I found the idea brilliant and her enthusiasm is really contagious! And I am so happy to have finally read this first book. It is a pleasant cozy mystery with knitting vampires. I don’t think I have to add something else! The Nightmare We Know was an amazing sequel, and I loved it! We have amazing characters and an interesting plot! I need the next one and I need it now!

The really good ones!

Orconomics was a book that I really wanted to read, I had some high expectations from it, and even if we didn’t start with the right foot, we became friends in the end. And now I am looking forward to the sequel. Limbo is an original book, with interesting ideas and a lot of interesting characters from different mythology and folklore. Speaking about personal taste, I can say that this one was not a favorite of mine, But I am glad to have read it. Weird Things Customers Say in Bookshops was a fun reading, the ideal one to take a break. And The White Road was pleasant. I loved the first three books in this series, but I find the others not so good. I am not saying that they are bad, just that they are not as good. But I enjoyed my time with Alec, Seregil and Micum.

This was a complete surprise. A surprise because I wasn’t counting on finishing it before September ended, and a surprise because I didn’t think that this book was for me, but in the end I loved it. Or at least some parts of it. The first time I started it, it was a “wrong moment/wrong book” thing, so I dropped it waiting for a better time. But I was convinced that it wasn’t the right book for me, in the right moment I could appreciate it, sure, but really enjoy it? Nope. And it was so, partially. The first part of the book is not really my cup of tea. It is not bad, it is really interesting, but I wasn’t hooked up or so invested. Even if I was mad, because… well, it is a maddening book! But then… wow! Something changed and it was all magical. And epic. And beautiful. And I couldn’t put it down!

The Ok Ones!

Senlin Ascends is really original and imaginative. The idea of it and the world-building are really something but, sadly, this is too much dreamlike and kafkian for my tastes. The Four Profound Waves is a book that I am really happy to have read, because it has some interesting points, and I think that we need more book of this kind but, again, it wasn’t really the right book for me. Fates of Ruin is not bad, but it is not good either. We have a ton of different POV and the thing could have been good but… it wasn’t played so well. And the characters were plain. We have one of them with more color to him, but the other ones weren’t so well developed, sadly.
And then we have The Witch’s Diary. This is a perfect read for October and it was a surprise, since I receive it from the Editor the other day, and decided to try it out on the spoor of the moment. It is an enjoyable and fast book, and I would talk more about it soon.

The DNF!

Graves of Wrath was an urban fantasy and is setted in Paris, so I was expecting to be hooked up from the beginning. But the characters weren’t the right kind, all of them are the kind of character who takes the entire world on his/her shoulder. It is not my favorite kind of character, at all. But I could have been ok with it, if we had one of them, but all three of them? Nope, I am sorry. Never Die started well. The first sentence of the book hooked me up. And then my interest disappeared. Just like that. And Angelbound. Maxon was ok with the first POV, but just so boring with the second one. And since we just have this two POVs, I just hadn’t in me to continue it.

Series:
Finished: 3 last published volume
Continued: 2

Well, this wasn’t bad at all! I wasn’t counting on this month to continue my project with the series, since it was dedicated to new indie books, but it seems like I managed to accomplish something nonetheless. And I am so so happy!

My Reviews:
–Knight Watch by Tim Akers
–Limbo by Thiago D’Evecque
–The Nightmare We Know by Krista D. Ball
–The Four Profound Waves by R.B. Lemberg
–A Killing Frost by Seanan McGuire
–Orconomics by J. Zachary Pike
–The Forest God by Jamie Lackey
–The Thief Who Pulled on Trouble’s Braids by Michael McClung

This was a very long post! Sorry about that! September was a great month and I hope October would be good, too! I won’t do a TBR for it, I just mood read the entire month, since I had a TBR for September, and I would do a TBR for November too, since it would be an entire month for sci-fi and I am soooooo looking forward to it!

And what about you?  And have you read some of the books I have mentioned? And what have you planned for October?? Let me know!!!

Happy reading!
S.