December 2017 book haul

Hello, my fellow book lovers! In December, I got 11 books, 8 of which I bought myself. I initially didn’t want to post this month’s book haul because I’m ashamed I spent so much money on books. My dog Sansa needed an emergency surgery and I ended up spending over €500, which is something I can’t afford. I am currently unemployed because of my mental health, so I’m not earning any money, yet I keep on spending it. Anyway, I absolutely wish this haul wasn’t as big, but it is what it is.

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More photos can be found on my bookstagram!

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synopsis: On September 5, a little after midnight, Death-Cast calls Mateo Torrez and Rufus Emeterio to give them some bad news: They’re going to die today. Mateo and Rufus are total strangers, but, for different reasons, they’re both looking to make a new friend on their End Day. The good news: There’s an app for that. It’s called the Last Friend, and through it, Rufus and Mateo are about to meet up for one last great adventure and to live a lifetime in a single day.

I have access to the audiobook of They Both Die at the End, but I stopped listening to it after one minute already because I wasn’t feeling the narrator. I know, I know, I probably needed to get used to it, but I would rather read a physical copy instead anyway. I read History Is All You Left Me a couple of months ago and really liked it, so I can’t wait to pick this up. I’ve been meaning to read More Happy Than Not by Adam Silvera for years, but the price never drops, so I still don’t own that book!

synopsis: In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned — from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules.

Enter Mia Warren — an enigmatic artist and single mother — who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.

When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town–and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia’s past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs.

Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng is one of my favourite books of all time, so I had to buy Little Fires Everywhere! I wanted to read it ASAP, but I’ve been saving it as my first read of 2018. I hope my expectations won’t be too high, because I’m expecting to love it as much as Ng’s first novel!

synopsis: Amina has never been comfortable in the spotlight. She is happy just hanging out with her best friend, Soojin. Except now that she’s in middle school everything feels different. Soojin is suddenly hanging out with Emily, one of the “cool” girls in the class, and even talking about changing her name to something more “American.” Does Amina need to start changing too? Or hiding who she is to fit in? While Amina grapples with these questions, she is devastated when her local mosque is vandalized.

I am so excited to read Amina’s Voice, which is a diverse middle grade novel. It’s only 208 pages long, so I’ll probably read it soon. I possibly love the spine of this book even more than its cover; the colour is gorgeous.

synopsis: When Aladdin discovers Zahra’s jinni lamp, Zahra is thrust back into a world she hasn’t seen in hundreds of years—a world where magic is forbidden and Zahra’s very existence is illegal. She must disguise herself to stay alive, using ancient shape-shifting magic, until her new master has selected his three wishes.

But when the King of the Jinn offers Zahra a chance to be free of her lamp forever, she seizes the opportunity—only to discover she is falling in love with Aladdin. When saving herself means betraying him, Zahra must decide once and for all: is winning her freedom worth losing her heart?

As time unravels and her enemies close in, Zahra finds herself suspended between danger and desire in this dazzling retelling of Aladdin from acclaimed author Jessica Khoury.

Fadwa @ Word Wonders adores The Forbidden Wish, and since we seem to have similar reading tastes, I decided to purchase it. I’m very keen to read more fantasies in 2018, especially standalones.

synopsis: There are only three things that matter to twelve-year-old Alice Alexis Queensmeadow: Mother, who wouldn’t miss her; magic and color, which seem to elude her; and Father, who always loved her. The day Father disappears from Ferenwood he takes nothing but a ruler with him. But it’s been almost three years since then, and Alice is determined to find him. She loves her father even more than she loves adventure, and she’s about to embark on one to find the other.

But bringing Father home is no small matter. In order to find him she’ll have to travel through the mythical, dangerous land of Furthermore, where down can be up, paper is alive, and left can be both right and very, very wrong. Her only companion is a boy named Oliver whose own magical ability is based in lies and deceit—and with a liar by her side in a land where nothing is as it seems, it will take all of Alice’s wits (and every limb she’s got) to find Father and return home to Ferenwood in one piece. On her quest to find Father, Alice must first find herself—and hold fast to the magic of love in the face of loss.

I am not a fan of the Shatter Me trilogy, but I’ve heard Furthermore is entirely different. In 2017, the majority of the books I read were young adult contemporaries. Though I really grew to love that genre, I’d like to read a variety of genres next year, including middle grade novels. I especially love the cover of Whichwood, so I really hope I’ll love this novel so I can buy the next instalment.

synopsis: A contemporary YA novel that examines rape culture through alternating perspectives.

Alex Craft knows how to kill someone. And she doesn’t feel bad about it.

Three years ago, when her older sister, Anna, was murdered and the killer walked free, Alex uncaged the language she knows best—the language of violence. While her own crime goes unpunished, Alex knows she can’t be trusted among other people. Not with Jack, the star athlete who wants to really know her but still feels guilty over the role he played the night Anna’s body was discovered. And not with Peekay, the preacher’s kid with a defiant streak who befriends Alex while they volunteer at an animal shelter. Not anyone.

As their senior year unfolds, Alex’s darker nature breaks out, setting these three teens on a collision course that will change their lives forever.

The Female of the Species has received so many glowing reviews, I couldn’t help but be interested in it. Admittedly, I keep purchasing books that examine rape culture, but I don’t pick them up because I know those reads won’t be comfortable. I really need to prepare myself to read them, but one day I will because I know how important these books can be.

synopsis: Reina Castillo is the alluring young woman whose beloved brother is serving a death sentence for a crime that shocked the community, throwing a baby off a bridge—a crime for which Reina secretly blames herself. With her brother’s death, though devastated and in mourning, Reina is finally released from her prison vigil. Seeking anonymity, she moves to a sleepy town in the Florida Keys where she meets Nesto Cadena, a recently exiled Cuban awaiting with hope the arrival of the children he left behind in Havana. Through Nesto’s love of the sea and capacity for faith, Reina comes to understand her own connections to the life-giving and destructive forces of the ocean that surrounds her as well as its role in her family’s troubled history, and in their companionship, begins to find freedom from the burden of guilt she carries for her brother’s crime.

The only person I “know” who has read this book, is My Name is Marines. I read a couple of adult fiction books this year and I really enjoyed them, so I want to read even more literary fiction in 2018.

Is it just me, or are adult fiction novels more expensive than young adult ones? I was able to find a copy of The Veins of the Ocean for only €10, but most of the time, hardcover editions of adult fiction are easily twice that much!

synopsis: In Amy Poehler’s highly anticipated first book, Yes Please, she offers up a big juicy stew of personal stories, funny bits on sex and love and friendship and parenthood and real life advice (some useful, some not so much), like when to be funny and when to be serious. Powered by Amy’s charming and hilarious, biting yet wise voice, Yes Please is a book full of words to live by.

I don’t own many physical copies of non-fiction books, but I bought Yes Please for less than €3! Perhaps I will read the paperback and listen to the audiobook in the meantime, because I’ve heard many positive things about the latter.

synopsis: An approved textbook at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry since publication, Newt Scamander’s masterpiece has entertained wizarding families through the generations. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is an indispensable introduction to the magical beasts of the wizarding world. Scamander’s years of travel and research have created a tome of unparalleled importance. Some of the beasts will be familiar to readers of the Harry Potter books – the Hippogriff, the Basilisk, the Hungarian Horntail … Others will surprise even the most ardent amateur magizoologist. Dip in to discover the curious habits of magical beasts across five continents …

I read Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them exactly a year ago, but I wasn’t a big fan of it. You can read my review here. One of my main complaints was that I couldn’t visualise the fantastic beasts. Recently, however, an illustrated edition was published, so naturally I had to add to my ever expanding Harry Potter collection! I received this gift from my dad ❤

synopsis: Nine months. Two weeks. Six days.

That’s how long recovering addict Sophie’s been drug-free. Four months ago her best friend, Mina, died in what everyone believes was a drug deal gone wrong – a deal they think Sophie set up. Only Sophie knows the truth. She and Mina shared a secret, but there was no drug deal. Mina was deliberately murdered.

Forced into rehab for an addiction she’d already beaten, Sophie’s finally out and on the trail of the killer—but can she track them down before they come for her?

Far From You by Tess Sharpe is one of my favourite reads of 2017. You can read my review here. I already owned a paperback copy, but I prefer hardbacks, especially of books I really love. This was another gift from my father.

synopsis: Two half-sisters, Effia and Esi, are born into different villages in eighteenth-century Ghana. Effia is married off to an Englishman and lives in comfort in the palatial rooms of Cape Coast Castle. Unbeknownst to Effia, her sister, Esi, is imprisoned beneath her in the castle’s dungeons, sold with thousands of others into the Gold Coast’s booming slave trade, and shipped off to America, where her children and grandchildren will be raised in slavery. One thread of Homegoing follows Effia’s descendants through centuries of warfare in Ghana, as the Fante and Asante nations wrestle with the slave trade and British colonization. The other thread follows Esi and her children into America. From the plantations of the South to the Civil War and the Great Migration, from the coal mines of Pratt City, Alabama, to the jazz clubs and dope houses of twentieth-century Harlem, right up through the present day, Homegoing makes history visceral, and captures, with singular and stunning immediacy, how the memory of captivity came to be inscribed in the soul of a nation.

I only got three gifts this Christmas and all were from my dad. Homegoing was the third present. I borrowed this novel from the library and absolutely loved it, so I had to own a hardcover copy. You can read my full review here.

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These were all the books I got in December. I really hope I won’t buy as many books in 2018 because 1) I have enough books on my TBR already and 2) I’m running out of money. Having said that, so many amazing books are being published in 2018, I don’t know whether I’ll be able to stop myself from purchasing them.

         

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