Lovely people, you may have noticed a dearth of book videos around here. I didn’t just forget, I promise. But I wasn’t sure weekly book chats were really the way forward, considering they’re mostly just me talking rubbish for five minutes. So I decided that the time I took to do those vids might be better used elsewhere, and a monthly book chat would be a better way to talk about books, beginning with my May reading pile.
However, there are two problems with this.
- I have the memory of a goldfish, and forget what books I read.
- I forget how to do the talking thing when I don’t practise.
But, you know, we got there. Other than the bit where I call Ken Follett Dan Follett, and the whole Abdominal Snowman thing. But other than that.
I ended up squeezing a lot of books into one vid, and decided once I was done that a rating system was a good idea. It’s a good shorthand for talking about books, although it lacks a lot of the nuances of a full review, and I always get annoyed that Certain Sites don’t allow you to award half stars (I tend to round up, if you’re wondering). So I shall be implementing a cookie system from now on. (This has no relation to how many cookies I ate while reading the book. That statistic will probably be a lot higher).
Here, then, are my ratings for the month:
- How to Be a Pirate, Cressida Cowell: 5 cookies and a cup of tea. Out and out MG fun with dragons, pirates, cursed treasure, and the importance of embracing your differences.
- The Thief of Always, Clive Barker: 5 cookies. Well-written, entertaining MG with a likeable protagonist and wonderfully scary villains. Only no cup of tea because maybe things turned out a little too neatly at the end.
- Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, Ransom Riggs: 3 1/2 cookies. Maaaybe 4. Well-written, but a little hard to really connect with the characters due to overly formal writing, despite the POV being that of a teenager.
- The Holy Sh!t Moment, James Fell: 4 cookies. Interesting and practical look at how to create moments of epiphany in life. Could have been a bit less long-winded.
- Fall of Giants, Ken Follett: 5 cookies and a cup of tea (although you’ll need a lot more than that to get through this book. It’s huge!). Fascinating, generally well-written account of intersecting lives in the build-up to, during, and immediately following WWI.
- Bird Box, Josh Malerman: 3 cookies. Good writing and great concept for the monsters, but I never cared enough about the characters for it to be really suspenseful. Plus I didn’t like the ending.
And there you have it. This isn’t all my May reading, but they are the books I talk about in the video. So watch on for more!
Now, over to you, lovely people – what have your favourite reads of the month been? And I’d also love to hear your thoughts on the new monthly format! Let me know below!
bird box, book chat, book recommendations, book review, clive barker, cressida cowell, fall of giants, james fell, Ken Follet, the thief of always