April, I hardly knew ye. This month has just flown right by. Time is very strange these days–either it’s dragging on forever or it passes in the blink of an eye and neither one of those is a comfortable feeling.
My reading was pretty crappy this month, for me at least. I only managed to finish 10 books. I know that’s still a lot and more than some people read in a year but those are low numbers for me! I finished 7 SFF books and 3 Romances although at least 2 of the SFF books I read were also Fantasy Romances (at least three others had big romantic subplots) and 2 of the Romances I read had speculative fiction elements (alt-history and some fantastical fae type stuff). So. Romance is getting me through this pandemic by golly. You’ll see when May’s TBR goes up that I have Planned Accordingly.
Favorite Reads of the Month:
- Drowned Country by Emily Tesh. This was the sequel to Silver in the Wood and I LOVED IT. I love Henry Silver so much, he’s such a dramatic character, like a perfect Victorian drama queen. But he’s lovely. And the other characters are great too. Plus romance and adventure. Official review won’t be out for a while yet but definitely recommend picking up Silver in the Wood if you haven’t read it yet and then catching this one when it comes out in August.
- Seven Summer Nights by Harper Fox. This is another fantasy romance type book, although much lighter on the fantastic elements. It’s more of a historical romance with a touch of the fantastic. I kept hesitating on reading this one despite one of my friends yelling at me to read it and now I’m kicking myself for not reading it sooner. It’s got such lovely emotional depth to it.
- Blood Pact by Tanya Huff. This series continues to impress me! I love the character development we get in this one as things come to a head with the love triangle and Vicki’s personal life. Not sure what the next book’s going to be like because I don’t know if much can top this one (and even though I want more…perhaps this would have made a better end for things but I guess I’ll see.)
April’s Book Reviews:
Still doing a good job keeping up with my reviews! Here are all the ones I posted in April in case you missed them.
- The Other People by C.J. Tudor – 4.5/5 stars
- Mini Reviews: Vampire Short Fiction
- Full Moon Rising by Keri Arthur – 3/5 stars
- Jade City by Fonda Lee – 3.5/5 stars
- The Lightning-Struck Heart by T.J. Klune – 3.5/5 stars
- The Scar by China Miéville – 4.5/5 stars
- Popcorn and Poltergeists by Nancy Warren – 5/5 stars
- Mini Reviews: Stars Grow and Rebellion Brews by Kara Jaynes – 4/5 stars (each)
Other Posts:
I had a few other posts in April–a lot of r/fantasy related stuff going on! Still been doing good sticking with my ‘one discussion post a month’ goal. We’ll see how that goes as the months go on, I haven’t been feeling very creative lately so I have no new topics waiting around to be written about….
- 2020 r/Fantasy Book Bingo Reading Challenge
- Excerpt: Eden by Tim Lebbon
- How I Turned Into an Audiobook Listener
- 2019 r/Fantasy Book Bingo Wrap Up
- Introducing the r/Fantasy Modcast!
Plans for May:
Let’s first see how I did with April’s plans! In April I wanted to get started on the new bingo challenge and I didn’t really do that at all. Not off to a great start but the good news is there’s plenty of time. I also wanted to catch up with some review requests and I got two read so there’s that. I have one more older request and then I ‘accidentally’ got an eARC of Melissa Caruso’s new book whoops. Two steps forward, one step back. I’ve done, well, at least some work on starting to buckle down on my TBR Pile of Doom but obviously a lot more work is needed.
May is the month of Wyrd & Wonder and I am SUPER excited for that since it’s a fantasy themed event and I am alllll about fantasy (it’s in the name!). I think for May I’m going to have two goals – catch up on my review requests that I have left (luckily I don’t have many) and read whatever I’m in the mood to read while keeping my blogging up to date. (Okay, that’s kind of three things whoops.) Really that’s it. I’m setting the bar pretty low. For reasons.
And that’s it! How did your April go? Leave a note in the comments, I’d love to chat!
Way Too Fantasy 
I really hope you would reach your goals for May, and I am looking forward to Wyrd and Wonder too! I have made a TBR for it because I kept some books in waiting just for it and I am dying to read them!!
Thanks, Susy! I have made a small TBR for it, but they are all books that are more likely to be ‘mood’ reads for me. 🙂 Hope you enjoy your May reads!
I agree, April went super fast for me too! So weird. My reading hasn’t been that great either, I’m easily distracted these days. Waiting and hoping for life to get back to normal soon, sigh.
Soooo easily distracted, yes. On the one hand, I’m very much looking forward to getting back to normal. On the other hand, I’m scared we’ll go back too fast and what might happen from that. It’s a conundrum. Hoping May brings us a path forward!
Looks like you had a good reading month! I hope May is even better!
(www.evelynreads.com)
Thanks, Evelyn!
Sorry you didn’t get more book read in April! The time flew by for me too. I hope you have a better May! And happy Wyrd & Wonder!!!
Thanks, Brittany!
Romance & fantasy are also getting me through this craziness! At first, I was totally on board with just every contemporary that I could get my hands on, but then I read a reallyyyyy good fantasy with a romantic subplot, and now I’m swinging wildly back into wanting to read every fantasy book in sight, haha.
Most of the fantasy I’ve been reading has a lot of romance in it, it’s keeping me hanging on LOL.
Oh, you’ve read a TJ Klune. I have Lightning struck heart on my TBR. I’m glad to see you mostly enjoyed it. I loved reading Wolfsong ❤ Jen
I’ve read Wolfsong too and I LOVED that one, more than Lightning-Struck Heart but LSH was fun. I need to read the other Green Creek books.
Hope May bring better reading experiences for you. And I too need to catch up on reviews.
I’m looking forward to reading Drowned Country as well.
Thanks, it’s going better in some ways so far. I spent all day yesterday reading a comic online called Check, Please! which was all about hockey boys and romance and it was very sweet. Hope you enjoy Drowned Country!
I don’t know where April went. I think the fae stole it when we weren’t looking. Or maybe my head has turned into a pickle.
Anyway, 10 books is much better than my ‘slump’ reading although things are starting to pick up.
Happy May to you.
Lynn 😀
I’m with you, it may have been the fae!
Yeah, I know 10 is still quite a few but it felt like I wasn’t reading much at all because my reading dropped by at least 30%. Hope your reading improves! Have a great month, Lynn!
I had a pretty good April. Best book I read was Jade War; I know you didn’t enjoy Jade City as much as me but this was one of the best reading experiences of my life haha.
Glad you loved it so much! I do still want to check out the sequel at some point. Sometimes I wind up loving the sequels a lot more than the first book!
Someone has clearly broken time, and I’d appreciate if they put more effort towards fixing it, so it at least flows uniformly again. xD I didn’t feel like I did that well with reading this month, either. I only had 14 books, and most of them were either novellas or children’s books, so they took no time at all to read.
Oooh, I’m so glad to see you enjoyed Drowned Country! I’m really looking forward to reading Silver in the Wood soon (ish). Silver sounds like a fabulous character!
Here’s to hoping May goes better for all of us! And yay for Wyrd & Wonder. :3
Thanks! Yeah, April was a very bizarre month, much of it felt like it passed in a fog. I hope we all have a better May as well!