reading is finally GOOD AGAIN!!🎉july wrap up 2023

Hello cuties, how are we doing? Are we doing good? Today we're gonna be doing my July wrap-up, talking through how July went for me and I just need to- I can't wait any longer to talk about it. We finally broke the f***. I am so happy. If you don't know, I didn't have any five stars in May or June and I feel like a good chunk of April as well. I was like in a five star draw. Five stars were nowhere to be found and we finally broke it with not one but two five stars this month. Finally! I feel like five stars for me have really been lacking this year. I've had a lot of like three stars, four stars, but five stars have been difficult to come by. So I'm really excited to chat about my reading. If you've watched my wraps before, we do all my reading stats at the start, then I just mention all the books I've read with their rating and then we get into my disappointment, surprises and hits. Because almost all of these books are in reading vlogs, I'm actually going to talk about one of the ones that isn't in a reading vlog, the only one I'm not going to talk about in depth that isn't on a reading vlog on my channel is A River Enchanted, but this is on a reading vlog on my Patreon. If you want to know more of my thoughts, it was fine. Basically, it's my thoughts on that. So yeah, shall we just get into it with the reading statistics? So in July, I read 13 books, which is always a good position to be in. I think to average 150 books, which is kind of my like push goal, is that a thing? My push goal this year. You have to average like 12 books a month, so we're on it, babes. We're doing it. Do you know what? I feel so amazing and strong and me. I believe this is the start of me now and nothing's going to change it. The amount of pages I read was 3,316. That works out to an average pages per day of 107 and an average pages per book of 255. I read quite a few shorter books this month because I did Summerween, which there's vlogs for all of that on my channel. So I read a lot of short books so that I could read seven books in seven days for that. And then I probably like didn't read for a week after Summerween. I could have read more, but like I didn't read for a week because I felt overwhelmed. That's the thing, whenever I read that many books in a short space of time, even if they're short books, it's like not about the amount of pages I read that kind of puts me into a little bit of a brief reading burnout. It's the amount of stories I consume. It's consuming that many stories and ideas. Like you can read a 500 page book and like three books that make up that same amount of page lengths, but those three books feel, I don't know, just like I've consumed more and sometimes I need a bit of a break after that. My average rating was a 3.7, which I think is my average rating for the year so far, which isn't super high for me. I feel like my average rating used to be a bit higher and the average time spent on my TBR was nine months. We had a lot of books that had been on my TBR for zero months, I had literally just acquired, and then we had some like I'll Be Gone in the Dark, which I think had been on my TBR for 54 months. So it all averages out to nine months. So let's look at the graphs, shall we? In terms of genre, I read one classic, three fantasy, five horror, oh yeah that was for that summary, I was like so many horror, um one non-fiction, one romance, two thriller. Is that it? Yes, that's it. That's my genre split. Again, a good split. No mystery this month, which always kind of makes me sad when I don't have a mystery. In terms of ratings, I had one two star, one 2.5 star, one three star, three 3.5 stars, five four stars, and two five stars. In terms of how I read the books, one was just an audiobook, seven books I read physically, and five I had a mixture of the physical and the audio. Usually I read a lot of books just physically this month. Usually I'm tending to listen to a lot of audiobooks with the physical book, that's kind of been how my reading has transitioned, but a lot of just the physical book this month. I did try out the audiobooks for a few of the books I had and I just didn't like them, so I didn't continue with them. In terms of audience, I read 11 adult, one I would class as new adult, and one YA. In terms of the format, I read two graphic novels, eight novels, one novella, one short story, and one anthology. In terms of series stats, I read one book that was part of series, nine that was standalones, and three first in the series. How many of those series am I continuing? Oh two, yes, we did add two series to my series spreadsheet this month. I don't want to talk about it. In terms of where I acquired the books, one was from Book of the Month, five were gifted, six were books I bought myself, and one was from Script. And in terms of author status, three were debuts, three were authors I'd read from before, and seven authors were new to me. I think that is all of the reading stats. So yeah, a pretty good, solid, average, nice, kind, lovely reading month. Let's get into all the books I read this month with their ratings. So first I read The Tea Dragon Festival, which I gave five stars. How could I not? How could I not? I'll Be Gone in the Dark, which I gave four stars. A River Enchanted by Rebecca Ross, which I gave 3.5 stars. The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz, which I gave five stars. What Moves a Dead by T. Kingfisher, which I gave four stars. The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe, which I gave three stars. You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight by Cailin Bayron, which I gave 3.5 stars. Bangs by Sarah Anderson, which I gave four stars. Horror Store by Grady Hendrix, which I gave 3.5 stars. Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield, which I gave four stars. Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado, which I gave four stars. Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yaros, which I gave two stars. And The Drowning Woman by Robin Harding, which I gave 2.5 stars. Okay, now it's time to talk about disappointments, surprises, and hits. And disappointment... let's just, let's just begin, okay? Let's not go there. I don't need to talk about Fourth Wing too much, because I just posted a whole vlog just for this book. Chances are, if you're watching this, you've probably seen that, or like, it's in your watch later. But I gave this two stars. I went into this with hope, okay? I know it's not my kind of book. I know romanticy. I've never really read them. I've never really wanted to read them. But I just wanted to know what the hype was about with this book. And I quickly discovered that you're all like, something's wrong. No, here's the thing. Some people said, why didn't you give this one star? And here's the thing. I can understand why people like this. I think it is entertaining. I think it is kind of a fun time. I think if you don't think too hardly, if you like squint and tilt your head and like turn face half away, then you can enjoy it. I mean, I don't know where to begin with my problems with this book. The world building is simultaneously overwhelming and truly unclear. And there's not enough of it, but there's also too much of it. The romance, I didn't care. The plot, I mean, it drags me. It took me two weeks to read this book. Other people are like, oh, it reads so fast. I read it in a couple of days. It took me two weeks, two weeks. I can't remember the last time it took me two weeks to read a book. I just like did not want to read it. Granted, it is the book I read after Summerween. And like I said, when I read that many books in a short period of time, sometimes I need a little break afterwards. So there was that. So like it's not entirely to blame, but like it's mostly to blame. Go check out the whole vlog if you want to know all my thoughts. But I just think it's stupid. And some of you, some people, I knew there were going to be comments on my forthcoming vlog of people trying to like convince me why certain aspects of the book make sense. And they just don't. Okay, you're fighting a losing battle. I feel like that's sounding quite Australian then. Fighting a losing battle. But I do, there's something about this. Like the ending of this, I'm like, if I had to read the second book, I could do it. I don't know. I'm undecided. I don't think I will. I think the chances of me not reading it to reading it are like 90-10. Do you know what I mean? I don't think I'm gonna read it. But you know, just go watch the vlog. Okay, I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to talk about it. I don't, I don't want to talk about it. I just thought it was stupid. The writing wasn't great. It had, I think the reason I don't like romances, often has those like cheesy like lines, like quick, quick whips, quick note, wit, I don't know. It was quick one-liners that people say and they, they annoy me. They annoy me. So there we have it. And then my other disappointment was The Drowning Woman by Robin Harding. This is the other book that I read this month that isn't in a vlog. I read it before I was co-hosting a book club on Sav from Riveting Reads channel and Ashley from Ashley's Little Library was there as well. I will leave the link for the live show if you want to go watch it down below because I do have a lot of thoughts on it. We spoke, we had a really good discussion about this book. This book, if you don't know, I didn't give a plot for Fourth Wing because you don't need to know, but this one, basically all you need to know is that our protagonist is recently homeless, she's living in her car and she one day saves a woman who is trying to drown herself and their kind of lives become entangled and linked and it's a thriller, like a domestic kind of thriller from there. I didn't love this. I gave it 2.5 stars. I didn't go into it expecting a ton because I hadn't actually heard of this before it was chosen for the book club but it just didn't work for me. I loved the first half of this but the second half, it just gets redonk. It gets redonk. Oh no, this has now gone downhill. There's a lot that didn't work for me with where this story went. I think the first half was great. We also have split perspective which isn't always my favourite and we have that thing where you read 100 pages from one perspective and then it switches to the other perspective and you read what has just happened in the last 100 pages from their perspective. Kind of condensed but the same thing again and I hate that. I really don't like it. I'm trying to think of what I can say without spoiling stuff because I didn't read it. I read it for the book club, not for a vlog and so my brain hasn't changed to think of what's a spoiler or not. There's just a lot of twists in the second half that I don't feel like the book pulled off, you know? I think there's a lot of prose to it. I really liked the main character at the start, Lee, who's the homeless woman. I thought her story was very compelling. I thought her perspective was a very interesting perspective to read from but I don't know. It also has one of those kind of like evil villain abusive husbands in it who, you know, that happens in a lot of thrillers but I feel like it was more of a caricature rather than showing some of the nuance that can happen in abusive relationships and I felt like, I don't know if that was entirely handled with care in my opinion. Yes, there are evil people who abuse their spouses or abuse other people but I don't think it was, I don't know, handled in a realistic way for me personally and he also had a lot of power. Like, we were just told if, you know, his wife were to escape him his men would immediately find that he has men all over the city. He's this well-connected lawyer but there was never, they would just tell us that all the time. There was never any actual showing of that but that's just one aspect. The main parts that didn't work for me were kind of the way that the story unraveled in the second half and I can't really tell you any of that. So there we go. I don't think I'm necessarily gonna pick up another Robin Harding again in the future if I don't have to. Her writing didn't entice me to try again and read more. Unlike, for example, Rebecca Ross River Enchanted from my book club which wasn't a disappointment but I just didn't love, there was something about this writing that I loved. I love Rebecca Ross's writing so I'm gonna probably continue with this series and try, um, Divine, is it Divine something? Her new book that everyone's reading. I'm intrigued by that. But yeah, Robin Harding, I think this may be the end of the road for us. I'm sorry. Then for surprises, I only have two this month and they're kind of like half surprises so we'll talk about them quickly. First is Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado. This is a kind of horror thriller weird anthology of like, I think, eight short stories in here and for me my average rating of all eight leveled out perfectly out of four. I had some fives, I had some threes, do you know what I mean? And it leveled out perfectly out of four. I was surprised by just how much I enjoyed some of the short stories in this. I was a little bit worried it was going to be a little bit too intelligent for me. Let me not short sell myself but do you know what I mean? Sometimes there's certain literature that I just feel like I'm not that kind of reader and I don't have to be, do you know what I mean? There's like other sides of booktube where like, everyone reads all the Booker Prize books and reads, I don't, that's lovely for them. That's not the kind of reader I am. I'm much more of a genre reader. You could never read let's face it because you are not that kind of girl. And there's just a few short stories in this that I thought were absolutely amazing. I absolutely loved the Law and Order SVU short story. What was the other one I loved? Is it Eight Bites maybe? I don't know, The Husband Stitch, the first one was really good. There was a lot of really good short stories in this and I was just surprised by how much I loved it and I think Carmen Maria Machado's writing is absolutely incredible. Some of my favourite writing I've read so I'm really excited. I know In the Dreamhouse is a heavier book but I'm still looking forward to getting to it. And then my other surprise I would say is You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight by Cailin Bayron and this is just because I hated Cinderella is Dead by Cailin Bayron and this was like my second chance and even though this is only a 3.5, I mean 3.5 is still a good rating but I mean it wasn't like a 4 or whatever, I still had some issues with it. I was surprised by just how much I enjoyed her writing in this because the writing for me was a real issue in Cinderella is Dead. This is like a YA slasher at a summer, they like act out horror nights every night and so it's like a summer camp and then people start disappearing and like turning up dead at summer camp and I thought the first half was a bit slow and the second half was a bit rushed. I wasn't entirely happy with like the villain of the book, it felt very unrealistic and I didn't feel- I feel like we needed 50 more pages to fully flesh that out and make it deserving of being the villain of this book but when this was good, it was good. When the pacing was there, when the horror was there, when like the gruesomeness was there, it was really good. They were my favourite scenes of it. And then it is time to talk about my hits of the month which we have two. First is the T-Dragon Festival by Kate O'Neill. I mean what is there to say? Literally, I am obsessed. I'm so excited, I'm definitely gonna finish this series this year guys. Let me just say that now, I'm gonna read the third one before the end of the year, I know what video I'm gonna be reading it in. This is the prequel to The T-Dragon Society and then the next one, The T-Dragon Tapestry takes place after the first book and this one, we're following this village as they discover this dragon that has been dormant in the woods and that's all you really need to know. We have the little T-Dragons in this of course who are little kind of like puppies who can brew tea basically. Let me find a T-Dragon. There'll probably be one at the start. There they are, that's the T-Dragons. These are just the most beautiful graphic novels to ever exist. They are cozy, they are comforting, they are heartwarming, they teach you so much about the world and about how we should treat others. I said in this I loved the aspect of community. I've been loving books this year that have community at the heart of them and the beauty of community. There's a character in this who uses sign language to communicate and all of the people in the village have learned sign language so that they can communicate with them as well. I read this twice when I read it, I read it twice like once in the next morning. I cannot get enough of these graphic novels. Once I read the third one I know I'm gonna go back into K.O. Neill's backlist and some of their newer books as well. I'm excited to read this to my kids one day. I think these books just distill down who you should be at the core of your human. I think they're absolutely gorgeous. Some of my, probably my favourite graphic novels I've ever read. Do I prefer them to Heartstopper? I think I might. Are you actually actually saying that? I love them, I love them. I mean I love Heartstopper, I love the Sheets series as well but there's just something about the T-Dragons that are incredible and like changed my life. And then my final five star of the month was The Writing Retreat. I said it, it was in my five star predictions. Everyone was like, what? That's like bold. Whoa Megan. Five stars. I loved it. I loved it. You need to read it guys. If you're like thinking about it, just go for it, okay? Just go for it and see what happens, okay? We're following these characters who go to this writing retreat of like their world famous favourite author and things get weird. That's basically all you need to know. I said in the vlog when I read this, this was the first book I read for Summerween, this is a mix of Catherine House and Bunny, right? It has that kind of like claustrophobic setting that Catherine House has, weird off-kilter stuff happening. It has those female relationship elements of Bunny. Honestly, I pride myself on that comparison because that was a good, you know, that was a good write. I loved this. I loved the writing in this. I loved the relationships in this. I loved the, they went off the rails. It's so good. It's so good. It just, I could not stop. I could not put it down. I could not put it down. Like you might read this off my recommendation, you might not like it. I can understand that everyone will enjoy this, okay? But I want you to read it. I want you to read it and report back and just tell me what you think. I can't believe this is a debut. I'm so excited for everything that Julia Bartz is going to put out in the future because this could be a new favourite author for me. Like this really went there in a way that I love thrillers to go. It got a bit weird. It got a bit outside the bounds of reality a little bit. Like it went off the rails and I loved it. I loved it. I loved it. I loved it. I loved it. I was so happy that I loved it as well because I was so sure I was going to. There was doubt. I never had any. So yeah, I cannot recommend it enough but go into it knowing you may not enjoy it. I can understand why this is a polarizing book. Okay everyone, that is my July wrap-up. Like I said, I will leave all the vlogs linked down below from this month that any of these books were in. I hope you enjoyed watching this. Let me know how July went for you. Let me know, did you have any five stars? Did you get out of any five star droughts that you had? Oh my god, I'm so happy. I feel like five stars are like in my reach again. In my- in the reach of my clammy little paws, guys. I have really small hands. Do you know that about me? They're like short and stubby. They're like tiny. I don't know if you guys can like- I need to like show you with someone who has normal sized hands. I have very small hands. Anyways, I'm just not like other girls. I have small hands. Anyways, I love you and I will see you soon in another video. Bye! Hands.