I spent half of February in Dublin, saw James McAvoy on stage for my birthday, and read some brilliant books. So really? It’s been a pretty amazing month, whatever the weather.

Reading Round-up

The next few months will see me balancing ARCs with Subjective Chaos nominees, and likely failing to keep on top of my reviews (although I’m determined to do better than last year). This month proved that my sense of balance remains as off-kilter as ever, so it’s mostly been ARCs. Oops?

• Bitesize Books: Sunset Mantle – Alter S Reiss  ★★★★
• The Wolf of Oren-Yaro – K S Villoso  ★★★
• The Library of the Unwritten – A J Hackwith  ★★★★☆
• Fleet of Knives – Gareth L Powell  ★★★☆
• Echo Cycle – Patrick Edwards  ★★★★
• Hidden Wyndham – Amy Binns  ★★★★

Additional Reviews

I am continuing to chip away at my back-log in reviews. It’s starting to feel like I might even – gasp – catch up by the end of March. Famous last words, I know…

• Bone Silence – Alastair Reynolds  ★★★
• Head On – John Scalzi  ★★★★
• The Light Brigade – Kameron Hurley  ★★★★
• Circe – Madeline Miller  ★★★★

Stacking the shelves

February is my birthday, which isn’t a notable reason to refrain from acquiring MOAR BOOKS. Besides, Gareth L Powell was in London to sign Light of Impossible Stars on my birthday, so it would have been rude not to, right?

Reading statistics

My goal – always – is to read diversely and to love every book. This year, I’m also planning to read more backlist. I have joined some challenges, but this year they’re more about fun and helping me pick my next read than pushing me to read specific things.

Books read: 14 / 70 | Game of Books: 116 / 600

• 3 off the shelf (i.e. not bought in 2019)
• 6 ARCs
• 4 bite-size (excl. short stories)

Authors: 6 male (43%) / 8 female (57%) / – trans, non-binary or genderfluid (0%)

• Authors of colour: 2 (14%)
• LGBTQIA authors: 4 (28%)
• Non-US / UK based authors: 2 (14%)

CHALLENGES

Nope, still haven’t started my Contrition of a Bad SF Fan Backlist Bingo challenge. Shhh. This one is on the back burner until after Subjective Chaos.

February saw TheAromaOfBooks select the number 12 for the #BookSpin challenge – conveniently, a novella for me as I had so many reading commitments for February that I was afraid it would be another month where I tapped out of BookSpin. Instead, I inhaled Sunset Mantle in 24 hours because my word it’s a compelling 192 pages of epic stubbornness.

In spite of being drawn to books that all begin with the same letter (look, it’s a Top Ten Tuesday waiting to happen), I managed to cross a few more letters off my LitsyAtoZ challenge (hosted by BookishMarginalia).

Letters completed: 9 | B, E, F, H, L, O, S, T, W

What’s coming up?

The Subjective Chaos Kind of Awards nominees have been announced and the reading is in full swing (well, the rest of the panel are making headway; I’m chaotically reading other things. I’ll catch up. It’ll be fine. Fiiiiiiiine).

And if you listen carefully, you may hear a drunken barbarian boasting of treasures at the back of the tavern – or a grim-eyed bard singing of terrors – or a charismatic old magician dropping vague hints and waggling his eyebrows. Yes, it’s that time folks – we’ll about to open the rolls for this year’s Wyrd and Wonder, so all of you with a hankering to spend May travelling fantastical realms can make your mark and announce your intentions (which is to say: come back tomorrow to sign up!)

Was February kind to you?