Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Show Us Your Books January 2020



January mood, every year. How about you? In that vein, SUYB Readathon coming at you Saturday! 

This weekend, starting at 8 AM on Saturday in whatever time zone you live in through 8 AM on Sunday, there is a SUYB readathon! It’s super informal but for those who like rules:

  • Read as many pages as you want
  • Read whatever kind of books you want
  • Read for as many hours as you can fit in
  • Tag us on IG with a hashtag we haven’t determined yet but will reveal before Saturday so we know who participates because there will be prizes (for those who don’t follow us, follow us at @saysjana & @lifeaccordingtosteph)
Rape and murder and poor treatment of women abound this month, so consider almost everything coming with a trigger warning. 

Here's what I've been reading since the last linkup.
Buy it links are affiliate links and buying through them supports this link up 
*are books read in December 2019 after the 12/9/19 linkup

Engrossing Reads
A Madness of Sunshine by Nalini Singh* - This made my favorite reads of 2019 as well. Superb writing and characters, which is not always the case in mysteries. The cover is a stunner which never hurts. OCNJ library hardback       buy it

The Janes (Alice Vega #2) by Louisa Luna* - Another Alice Vega, and she's as bad ass as she was in the first. I like this duo and hope there are more. Free copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review-book comes out January 21            buy it

Forgotten Secrets (Singing River Mystery #1) by Robin Perini - My first finished book of 2020, not a bad little mystery although romance in murder books always weirds me out a little. Regardless, a good way to kick the year off. Kindle ebook          buy

The Story of Stuff: How Our Obsession with Stuff is Trashing the Planet, Our Communities, and our Health - and a Vision for Change by Annie Leonard - Man, I wish people would read this. Particularly people who need to work on consumption (like myself). We can have all the eco-friendly bottles and reusable bags in the world but if we don't stop consuming and demand the way consumption works in regards to corporations and governments changes, we're not doing a damn thing. Really. I bought the least I've ever bought in my life last year and didn't die. Just because you can buy it doesn't mean you should. And about a million other important things that Leonard points out from how things are extracted from the earth to how they are produced, distributed, consumed, disposed of. Not a pretty picture but there are alternatives and she points a lot of those out too. Philly library book       buy it

Passed the Time Just Fine

The Girls with No Names by Serena Burdick* - I wanted to scream through much of this book for attitudes held toward women and girls and those who are "other," which has led to such pain for so many throughout history. Free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Everything My Mother Taught Me by Alice Hoffman* - A lot of punch in a little story. As always with a good short story, I'd read a full length novel of this. Free copy from Netgalley

The Wife and the Widow by Christian White* - It took me quite a while to get the "thing" about this book, which is a mark of good storytelling. Clever indeed. Free copy from Netgalley  in exchange for an honest review.

Cause to Fear (Avery Black Mysteries #4) by Blake Pierce* - Not my favorite in the series for many reasons, but I will continue on to book five. This was my last read of 2019, I finished it about 10 minutes before midnight on 12/31/19. Kindle ebook

A Version of the Truth by B.P. Walter - What a tangled web of rich men behaving very fucking badly. This was a good story. Paperback, own, passed on

The Not So Secret Emails of Coco Pinchard (Coco Pinchard #1) by Robert Bryndza - This reminded me of Bridget Jones but not as good. It was still a nice palate cleanser from the murder/police procedural books. This is the author of some of those very books - the Erika Foster series and the Kate Marshall series I just started - and he's quite good at not murdery things too. Kindle ebook

Where the Story Starts by Imogen Clark - If you like books that tie up nicely in bows no matter how improbable that might be, this one is for you. Another nice palate cleanser from murdery things. Kindle ebook

Not Worth It

Mr. Nobody by Catherine Steadman* - This was tough - I liked the confidential nature of the story telling, like the reader is being told things they shouldn't know...but the pacing was slow and the big mystery was a fizzle. Not one part of any of it seemed believable. Netgalley free copy in exchange for an honest review.

The Liar's Daughter by Claire Allan - Round and round and round. Too much round for too little payout and too much to swallow (pedophilia). Kindle ebooks

What You Did by Claire McGowan - Cripes, what a mess. I tore through it but was more and more disgusted by most of the people in the book as I went on. 


Did Not Finish



What have you been reading? 

Linkup Guidelines:
This link up is the second Tuesday of every month. The next linkup is Tuesday, February 11 2020
1. Visit and comment with both of your hosts, Jana & me, and check in with as many in our reading circle as you can - give some love to the later linker uppers! 
2. Link back to us in your blog post - if you want the button you can get it from that link


You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter



No comments:

Post a Comment

Tell me what you think, leave a comment! I'll reply to you via email if you have an email associated with yourself, otherwise, check back here for my reply. Your data will not be used to spam you or sold for others to contact you.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...
Blogging tips
Pin It button on image hover