So this week I found out about Top 5 Tuesdays, a weekly blog topic run by Bionic Book Worm. So I decided to join in! You can find Bionic Book Worm and join the fun by checking out the topics for the month here.
This week’s topic is Summertime Reads! As it’s going into Winter here in Australia, it’s been a while since I’ve read something summery, but here goes…
I bought this book for a summer trip to Thailand a year ago. I started on the plane and just couldn’t put it down, got no sleep, and managed to complete it before the plane touched down. It was magnificent! Such a wonderful and bittersweet story about an old Hollywood starlet and the love(s) of her life.
This was another I read in Thailand and was such an uplifting and happy read – perfect for summer! It tells the story of Don Tillman, a man with Aspergers who tries to find the perfect partner for himself by creating The Wife Project, a questionnaire designed to find the perfect partner. In the process, he finds out a lot about love and it’s such a fun read.
This is one one of the funnest books I’ve read all year – I was so incredibly happy reading it. I absolutely loved all of the characters, it had the perfect amount of romance, drama and adventure for summer!
This is such a lovely little book – it is the perfect book for summer. It features a beautiful friendship between the two youngest humans on Earth, as they watch the world slowly end. There are lots of twists and turns, and whilst I didn’t expect the ending (and at the time wished it had been a bit less happy – I’m a killer for a book that hurts me), it’s definitely a book for a chilled, summer read.
This book is definitely a tearjerker but I think it has a really lovely message, and feels very summery to me. It tells the story from the point of view of a cat, Nana, and his owner, Satoru, as Satoru tries to find someone to look after Nana – though we don’t know the reason why. As a cat owner, this was so hard to read as Nana was so confused about why Satoru would want to give him away and it was just so so beautiful and sad and wonderful.
2019 has been FIERCE so far with its new releases and I am already falling behind. And yet there are so many great releases to still look forward to it this year, it makes me so sad to think that there is no way I am ever going to be able to read them all.
Today, I bring you the first of my Top 5 recommendations – expect to see these every few weeks. If you have any Top 5 suggestions you’d like to see me write, drop me a comment and let me know! They can be as random and wild as you want – from my Top 5 magic systems, to my Top 5 books featuring cats (I can’t wait till I write that one!) But for now, here are my Top 5 2019 releases (still to come.)
Lesbian. Necromancers. Do I need to say more?! Necromancy is one of my favourite fantasy powers, in part, I won’t lie, because Dorian was a necromancer in Dragon Age: Inquisitions and he is such an important fictional character to me, and therefore I support all things necromancy. But also, because necromancy just has the perfect amount of creepiness and darkness that it’s so appealing. Release date: 10 September (just in time for my BIRTHDAY!)
Okay I’m almost cheating with this one, since it’s a mere few days before this is realeased, but I have been waiting for this book for what feels like forever and I can’t WAIT to read it. IWYATB is about a person who comes out as non-binary to their family, and they’re thrown out of their home. It sounds both heartbreaking and heartwarming and everyone should go pre-order this immediately. Also, Mason created an awesome Spotify playlist for this which made me cry at work and so therefore I think everyone should listen to it (you can check the playlist out here). Release date: 14 May
The cover for this book is just stunning. Audre, a 16 year old from Trinidad, has found out she is being shipped off to the US after her very religious mother caught her with the pastor’s daughter. This book calls to me with the talk of religion and queerness in the blurb as it was something that really f**ked me up as a teen and so I can’t wait to read this one. Release date: 17 September
Okay you guys but this book sounds AMAZING: humanity now lives under the ocean becasue of climate change. The protagonist, Leyla, is a British Muslim who’s father has been arrested and she enrols in an underwater marathon to try and win a prize that will free him. This has such a great premise and I am very excited to read it. Release date: 29 October
Another hella gay one, another that is almost cheating because it’s out in just a few days. I am SO SO SO SO excited. This is a romantic comedy where the First Son of the United States falls in love with a British Prince. The two have to fake a friendship in order to fix the relationship between the US and UK after pictures leak of the two in a confrontation at a wedding. Release date: 14 May
And that’s my Top 5 books still to be released in 2019! Let me know if you are as excited as me to read any of these books, and if you have any suggestions for a Top 5 list, drop me a comment.
Thank you for reading the very first of (hopefully) many bookish posts here at Anxious Nachos. I’m Rachel and I’m here to talk to you all about the many books I’m reading and loving.
I thought I’d start with a little introductory post that would give everyone an idea of the type of books I read and enjoy. So without further ado, here are…my Top 5 books I’ve read so far in 2019!
2019 is the first year in quite a while that I have properly got back into reading, and I’ve already read so many excellent books that narrowing it down to just 5 was so tricky.
There is one book I’ve read this year which I had no problem deciding to put on this list. It has become one of my absolute favourite books, it is ABSOLUTELY SPECTACULAR: The Fever King by Victoria Lee. The Fever King was released earlier this year, and I picked it up after spotting it on a ‘Best queer books releasing in 2019’ list. It tells the tale of Noam, a queer Jewish immigrant, in a post-apocalyptic America. Lee combines science and magic into a fantastic, unique magic system. A full review will follow for this title, but suffice to say, it is my favourite book I’ve read so far this year, and I fully expect it to be a contender for my favourite book of the year. I couldn’t sleep the night I finished this book because I couldn’t stop thinking about it. The sequel, Electric Heir, is out in March 2020 and I cannot. wait.
The next book on my list is a bit different from my normal reads. I picked it up after V.E. Schwab kept recommending it and I am so glad I did. It is the marvellous If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio. If Were Were Villains opens when you meet Oliver, a man who has just spent 10 years in prison for murder. The story jumps back and forward between the present day, where Oliver is telling the true story of what happened to the police officer who investigated the murder back when it originally happened; and then the past, which takes place at a elite arts school and follows Oliver and his 6 friends as they study Shakespeare. This book is absolutely beautifully written, and it twists and turns until the very last page. The ending is just…..Gah. I have no words.
I won’t say much about this third book, it’s a book I completed very recently and there will definitely be a full review to follow in the next week or so. Do You Dream of Terra-Two by Temi Oh I think might be my favourite sci-fi book EVER. There’s not a huge amount of focus on technology or space, instead, it is very character-driven which I loved. Do You Dream of Terra-Two follows 6 teens who have been training to go to space in search of a new, habitable planet (Terra-Two). It follows them as they launch their mission and is very much focussed on how space travel and the mission affects each of the characters. Absolutely fantastic, more will follow on this book soon..
The Book of M by Peng Shepherd was the first book I bought when my hard copy purchasing ban ended (a move to Australia and lack of space at various flats very much limited my buying power). But The Book of M caught my eye as it has such a pretty cover and looked beautiful in the bookstore. Set in what feels like a very near future, people start losing their shadows. And it turns out that shadows were where memories were stored. The book follows the story of Ory and Max, a couple who escaped to a hotel in the woods when people started losing their memories. However, when Max loses her shadow, she runs away from Ory to avoid causing him any pain at seeing her deteriorate. The story then switches between Ory’s point of view, as he tries to find Max, and Max’s, as she tries to reach New Orleans, where ‘something’ is happening. This is another one that has an ending that hurts (appears to be a theme in this list), but it felt very unique and I really loved reading it.
The last one for this list is very special one for me. I read it very early in the year, and it was so fabulous and magical and I cannot recommend it enough: Witchmark by C.L Polk. This book was really what propelled me to start reading in earnest again, because I was so happy at seeing the diverse cast and the beautiful queer relationship that it made me want to go find more awesome diverse books to read. Witchmark is set in what feels like a Edwardian England, where noble families use their powers to control the nation. Miles Singer was born less powerful than his sister, and thus was destined to spend life enslaved to his family’s desires. Not willing to suffer this, he went to fight in his country’s war. When he returned, he started work in a hospital, where he treats those suffering mentally after the war. His powers give him a gift for healing, but when a patient is murdered and his powers are revealed, he has to investigate the death. I struggled when I first read this to find words other than MAGICAL to describe this book, because that’s what it truly is. It features such an interesting magic system, and yet feels like it could’ve been taken out of a history book, the setting is so realistic. Add the fierce character list, and it really is just such a wonderful read. Witchmark has a sequel coming out in 2020 with Grace, Miles’ sister at the helm, and I am so interested to see her thoughts on what happened in the first book.
And that’s it for my first post! In working out this list, I noticed two very clear themes that come through:
Queer books are killing it in 2019. Expect to see quite a lot of amazing books featuring queer characters on this blog. This year so far, I’m very much reading for teenage me who would’ve killed to see such awesome queer books on her shelf (but instead had to resort to fanfiction).
I like to be hurt: 3 of the 5 books on this list had endings which absolutely killed me
Let me know what you think of these reads, or if they’re on your TBR!
Goodbye from me, and Draco (my cat)
What a babe.
P.S. Okay so I’m cheating with the whole ‘Top 5’ and giving a special mention to The Poppy War by R.F Kuang which I only finished last week and which was phenomenal.
Anxious Nachos 