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A place for book reviews and films.
📖 Current read - Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer
📚 51/50

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🍁 fall flat lay 🍁

@booksbynino tagged me to make my own fall stack, so here it is! I tagged a few friends to make their own, but no pressure as always ☺️

💭 Do you like fall? Or are you a spring/summer person like me?

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🎃👻 Last, Now, Next Spooky Edition 🕷️🦇

Fully committing to spooky season this year. I finished reading Wednesday Used To Live Here a couple of days ago which was a solid start to the month and currently working through Styx, Exquisite Corpses and the new Audible Dracula (which is really good so far). Next up I have a few choices but have shortlisted the ones shown.

What are your reading plans for October?

Tagging a few to share yours.

#lastnownextreads #booksta #spookybooks #booksofınstagram

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🧟🕷️ SPOOKY SEASON STACK 👻 😈

As spooky season approaches I'm hoping to read some more of these. I've already kicked things off with Ring Shout and The Ship of Death, both were great reads. Have you started any spooky reads or what's on your tbr?

Tagging a few to share your spooky stacks 🧟🧛☠️

#spookyseason #horrorbooks #thrillerbooks #booksta #octobertbr

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4x4 bookish challenge 4️⃣

It feels like a hot minute since I have participated in a challenge, so I was most appreciative when @thesimplebookreview tagged me in this new trend!

No doubt you will recognise several of these titles from my previous posts because yes, books stay on my tbr for an age before I read them, and when I highly rate and enjoy a book, I will find a way to repeatedly remind everybody of it 🫠 Terribly sorry (sort of) x

I am not sure if I have mentioned but East of Eden is phenomenal and it will be living in my mind rent free for the foreseeable future 🤠

As always, anyone who fancies joining in, please do so! I have tagged a few people who I think may find it fun to get involved though 🫶🏻

Have we got any books in common across the 4 categories?

#bookstagram #bookish #booklover #bookreviews #reading

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Picnic basket book challenge 🧺

Petition for there to be a better basket emoji. As much as I like the phrase 'put all your eggs in one basket', there are many other things I would rather take to a picnic x

This is such a cute and fun trend, and yet again one I am incredibly late to get involved in because I am the least timely gal in existence! Despite being tagged a good 2 weeks back by the wonderful @v.big.bookstack 🫶🏻 I am only now getting around to it. Then again, it is still Summer, the season for picnicking ☀️

Scouring my previously read books for suitable titles that fit each prompt was... interesting, but I feel I chose some decent ones! My most questionable choice is Bliss Montage for 'What is in the basket' but if you focus on the cover design, it works (love me some oranges 🍊)

Even though most of bookstagram has beaten me to it, I am still going to tag a few people who I do not believe have shared theirs and who may find it fun ✨️

#bookstagram #bookish #booklover #bookreviews #reading

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Book covers that exceed the read 📓

Surely the phrase 'do not judge a book by its cover' was designed to be ignored? Even if a book does not promise to be a knock out read, if the cover is pretty, bold or fun, I am shallow enough to be lured in 😌

I am mainly enticed by a novel if the blurb delivers or I see decent reviews, but the artwork on the cover or sleeve do play a perhaps unnecessarily large part in my final decision 😶‍🌫️ I am just a basic bookish girl x

I rated all of these titles around the 3 star mark, 3.5 at the highest. If I was scoring them on their designs however, they would be much closer to 4 or above ⭐️ When I see fruit, birds, detailed imagery or bold prints, I am quick to admire 🤩

Cannot say I have seen anything similar to this on bookstagram so dare I make it a new challenge/tag? Why not. I am committing to it 🫡

Of course anyone who fancies joining in can do so, but I have tagged a few people! 🏷

#bookstagram #bookish #booklover #reading #covervsbooktag

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✨ my tbr confessions ✨

Thank you @booksbynino @bookwormbeales and @bristolbibliophile for the tag!

I’m a big mood reader so I like having options, but I have a large number of books on my tbr that even this can’t justify… And there are so much more books that I want to read but don’t own yet.

I’m not adding any more books to my tbr this year though, I need to stay reasonable and I have enough books to last me through the next couple of months. And, full honesty, I actually have a few books on my tbr that I’m not necessarily very excited to read anymore, and I don’t want to make that mistake again…. In my defence, though, I think I’ve figured out my reading tastes a lot better now. That took me a while but I think I’ve got it!

I’ve tagged a few friends to give this challenge a go if they want to, but as always, no pressure!

💭 What’s a book on your tbr you regret buying?

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📚 poetry in spines 📚

After I saw @booksbynino @readby.meg and @abbysgbooks their beautiful poems, written with nothing but book titles, I had to give the challenge a go myself.

In turn, I’ve tagged a few friends who might enjoy giving this a go, but no pressure as always!

My poem ended up quite long and the differing sizes of the books didn’t help with making a stable stack, so I took multiple photos to reflect how I intended the structure of the poem to be.

Here it is! 🐍🌌

This is where the serpent lives:
Fifth Sun,
The sea ringed world,
East of Eden

Devils, bound
The lack of light
(This) state of siege,
the arsonists’ city
Babylonia

Till we have faces,
The dust never settles
(We are) fugitive pieces
(in) one hundred years of solitude

The idiot!
To go on living,
living in Your light
Against the loveless world;
(a) minor detail

I’ll tell you when I’m home
(in) the secret garden,
(in) the shadow of the wind
The wind in the willows

Serenity.

(Cover painting: sunset on the pond with storks by Maurice Hagemans)

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When I started reading Seascraper, I was a bit unsure as to whether or not I liked it. It took me a minute to get into the writing, which is the complete opposite of everyone else's experience of immediately loving the writing. But I soon found my stride and was hooked by the 30 page mark.

Seascraper follows Tom, a shanker, whose job is to harvest shrimp from the shore of the sea. He lives in a very closed world almost to the point of claustrophobia, having inherited the business from his grandfather. The way in which Tom works, with horse and cart, gives him a quality that makes him seem much older than his 20 years. This timeless quality, which follows Tom around, was a deliberate decision by the author and one that worked very well. You could swear the book was set in the very early 20th century, but with cultural references such as Elvis and Roy Orbison being mentioned, we know we're in a much later period.

The book lacked chapters but did come in parts. This didn't inhibit the reading experience but rather pulled you along, not wanting to stop. It propels you along much like a movie would, this paralleling with one of the key characters, Edgar, a movie director. He seeks the assistance of Tom to take him out onto the foggy shore so he can gather reference footage for a film he wants to make.

Much like the shoreline with its close fog and dangerous sinkholes, making it a hard place to navigate, the characters also come with inherent flaws. Tom, who would rather be playing his guitar and singing folk songs, is relied upon for income by his mother. Edgar, who wants to make the next big movie, has his own flaws.
At only 130 odd pages, this book was deeply atmospheric and quite moving, and its characters will stick with me for some time to come.

Thank you, my lovely bookclub pals @annathebooksiread @bookswerestuff @readingisadoingword and @lizziehumphreys101

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