 Hello friends! How are we doing today? I am so excited because we're filming one of my favorite videos to film which is a book haul. I just love talking about books I've bought and I am very excited today because I think this is my biggest book haul ever. I don't know, I haven't run the numbers but it feels like it. We've got over 30 books to talk about today. Usually book calls around the 20 bookmark but I think those 10 extra books just added up somehow. So yeah, we've got like 32-ish, I don't know, books to talk about today and I generally feel like we've got so many good ones. We've got so many good books to talk about. I think my last book haul I looked up was mid-May. This is all the books I've hauled since mid-May. 32 books in four months. It's not bad, is it? No, that's fine. That's a low-key amount. Okay. I basically, my TBR hasn't gone up or down because I think I've read around that many books in the last four months. So shall we just get into it? I think I'm going to chat about the books I've hauled most recently because they're the ones I'm like super excited about and we'll go back in time to like mid-May when the first of these. I've gotten roughly laid out in chronological order. These are some of the ones I'm most excited for. So first, it's the next Thursday Medical book. I am so excited. If you're a regular here, you guys will know that the Thursday Medical Club, it's one of my favorite series of all time and this is the next one. This is the fourth in the series. We're having a break. If you haven't heard, there won't be a Thursday Medical Club next year or be a different series that Richard Altman is starting. So this is our last Thursday Medical Club in a while. I'm nervous, okay? I'm just gonna shut down and I don't want to talk about it. If you don't know, I mean I'm sure you do know, but we're following some elderly residents of this retirement home who are friends, who like to solve, try and solve cold cases of murders. But then murders start actually appearing on a doorstep and they're a very interesting group of characters. They are all so lovely and have such different characteristics but are so, oh, they're just like a little found family. I just love them. But this series also says a lot about grief. Obviously you're dealing with older characters and aging and like what it is like to age and I just love this series and Richard Altman has said this is his favorite in the series so far. This is the most emotional in the series so far and that I, he said in interviews, I was talking to my patrons about this last night, he said in interviews that in particular there's one character whose story I think we're gonna heavily focus on in this book. It's a character that always makes me cry. I don't know, he said it in interviews so it's not a spoiler. But there's a character, oh I'm not ready, I'm gonna cry, I know I'm gonna cry a lot. I've made the controversial executive decision to leave any books that I think are gonna be in the Goodreads mystery thriller category for that video. I've thought about it a lot, right? Because my two choices are read a lot of them beforehand so that I'm like ahead and don't have as many books to read or leave them all for the video. And last year, when I did this video last year, I didn't read The Bullet That Miss in the vlog but it's what I ended up voting for and that kind of feels like a bit of a let down. I'll probably end up voting for it. I imagine if this, The Bullet K Miss came third last year in the voting, I imagine this has to be nominated again. So I'm leaving it for that but if it's not nominated I'll be really sad because what's a girl supposed to do? Like, I wouldn't have read it. No, you've made the wrong decision. Then we have The Last Word by Taylor Adams. This is one that I've wanted to buy for a long time but I've been holding off on. This one is following a reviewer who writes a bad book review and the author like starts to stalk her which I just, that's camp. That's camp guys, that's camp. I have heard mixings about this but like I've said many times before, No Exit by Taylor Adams is my favorite like action thriller ever. I think it's the best. Like I don't think anything else comes close to touching it. So I'm hoping for good things but I hated Hairpin Bridge by Taylor Adams. I thought it was really bad. So where will fall on that scale? I don't know. Then we have The Christmas Guest by Peter Swanson. This was very kindly sent to me by the publisher and it's a short mystery thriller Christmas novella and I'm gonna read it near Christmas. It's my plan. I think it's about a girl who goes to stay with her friends family at this Cotswold Manor but there's like weird stuff. The family are like, they're a bit sus and maybe it's a sense into murder. I don't know. I really do enjoy. I've done it a few Christmas. I didn't do it last year but I did it the year before like reading Christmas mysteries, sort of Christmas murder mysteries around Christmas. Like I do like to read a good Christmas book around the Christmas time, a Christmas romance. I like reading Christmas books. That's what Christmas is about, isn't it? So I'm gonna read this later this year and I'm very excited. And then the last from this stack, my bookside wardrobe recently stack, is A Very Lively Murder by Katie Watson. This is the sequel to The Three Dahlia's, I forgot the name then, which if you've heard me speak about it before is a mystery where you're following these three actresses who have played this world famous detective over the years. Think kind of Urquiporo but like a young female detective version. And the first book is set at a fan convention at the author's family estate and murders start happening. And this one I think is set at a, yes, a lights camera murder. One of the actresses filming her first film as this detective and murder starts happening. The first book just felt like such a love letter to the genre of murder mystery that I'm just really excited to see where this series goes. Janice Hallett blurbs in, yep, yep, yep. Then I'm just quickly gonna mention wayward, Kate. Security! Can you please escort this lady over here Al? I bought this for the vlog where I read like the most popular books of the year. I read one from each genre that I hadn't read yet according to Goodreads. It was a list that Goodreads did. And this is what I chose for historical. We did not get along. Did I give it a 2.5 because if I did it's a two. I didn't like it. It promised me witches, didn't give me witches. It was triple timeline. We were set up to not like each other just with that. I'm sorry. Quick mention to what I've already read is Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Inge. This won my patron book club pick last month. And so I've already read this. I really enjoyed this. I gave it four stars. I didn't love it as much as Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Inge, but this is the story of a girl who is found dead. And it's the story of her family dealing with the aftermath of her, she drowned in a lake nearby. And it's dealing with the aftermath of her death. But we also go back in time to when the parents first met and kind of follow them through their lives. And it's really a story of like family and what parenting can breed. Like, well, you know, being in touch with your children's needs or being in touch with like what you are putting onto them can do. And I just thought it was a really beautiful book. And it's a lot. There was a really, really good book couple discussion we had so much to talk about. So I already read it. And then I did pick up the next in the Lady Hard Castle Mysteries. This was on the TBR Pluto like a couple months ago and I haven't read it. I don't have an explanation for you. And you may not get one. That's it. As far as I'm concerned, the issue is that I'm moving forward. You guys know I love the Lady Hard Castle Mysteries. They're my favorite cozy mystery series. This is like the seventh. Yeah, this is the seventh in the series. So I'm quite deep in at this point. There's an airplane accident in this one. In between shoals to the dog and duck and planning for the annual Village Show, the daring duo dust off the chrome board and go on to cover Bristol Aviation. Come on. Like, come on. Come on. It's a vibe. I love this. I love Lady Hard Castle and Flow. So I will read this at some point. I picked it up because it was on TBR Pluto. I was supposed to read it like two months ago and that didn't happen. Two other new releases from some of my favorite authors I'm really excited about. First we have Just Another Missing Person by Jillian McAllister. I read Wrong Place Wrong Time by Jillian McAllister for last year's Goodreads Mystery Story Awards. I don't think this will be in there because Wrong Place Wrong Time has more hype. Granted, this has only really just come out a couple weeks ago. So hype could build, but I don't know if this is going to make it onto the nominations. We shall see. This one, a girl goes missing. She goes down like a one-way alley. It never comes out again. And we're following the detective who is tasked with finding her. But in order for that detective's family to be safe, she must not find out what happened to the girl. So I'm hoping it will be, you know, Wrong Place Wrong Time played with time. In that, if you haven't read that book, our character's son kills someone and she goes back in time constantly. She keeps going back further and further in time to try and figure out what happened and stop it happening. This one I'm hoping will play with some conventions of the mystery genre a little bit because that's what I love so much about Wrong Place Wrong Time. So I don't know if this, I'm not counting on this being in the awards, but one that I think probably will be, because I'm gonna look at this when I do my predictions to figure out whether this will be or not. This is, you know, a bit iffy. But I can't remember a time when a Ruth Ware book did not make the top 10 of a mystery thriller awards in Goodreads. I'm figuring this out. I'm like Scooby and Shaggy, I'm solving a mystery. I feel like she always makes the top 10. I reckon you have to go quite far back in her uvra for her to not make top 10 because at this point like she's so popular and so successful. But this one, Zero Days, I am a bit nervous about because we're following a husband and wife, okay? And we know I'm not a big fan of like domestic thrillers, but I don't know if this is really that because basically this woman and her husband are hired by companies to break into like security systems and she finds her husband dead at their home and she's the main suspect. So it's a little bit like espionage. It's a little bit domestic thriller. It's a little bit murder mystery. I think without reading it, I can't be sure where this is going to fall like on that scale. But me and Ruth Ware, she is one of my favorite authors. I have given her three five stars, so she does qualify as a favorite author. But she can sometimes be hit or miss. I didn't love the it girl. And I'm just worried that she's going in directions that like aren't my favorite. So we shall see. Then I have got sent some amazing books by Book Break. There's some actually is another sec later in the haul. Two of these are the ones I'm most excited for. Two were sent unsolicited, but I'm still excited for. But the two that I requested firstly, this is a 2024 release. This comes out February 2024. It is called the anti-hunters guide to murder. Try not to say mother challenge. Failed. Now, if you know me, I don't know how often I speak about this, bargain hunt. The American, if you're not in the UK, you won't know what this is. But there's a show called bargain hunt right in the UK where basically like there's these two teams and they each get 300 pounds. They have to buy three items from an antique fair and they then go to auction and sell them. There's also a big show in the UK called Antiques Roadshow, which is being compared to, I don't watch Antiques Roadshow, but I do love, bargain hunt is my lunchtime slash dinner time viewing. I've watched every episode that's on BBC iPlayer. I've run out. I've had to stop watching it as much because I've run out of episodes. That's concerning. Come on. It's literally made for me. What antique would you kill for? I don't know if I've ever been more excited for a book in all honestly. And I think the author's mum was one of the main experts at Antiques Roadshow. So like we've got the expertise. I am so, I don't think I've ever been more excited for a book. Like it's literally written for me. I might have to read this soon. I might have to just like, I haven't got plans to, but I might just have to pick it up because I am so excited. And then another one, they really, I mean, this is like incredible. This is an incredible haul. Thank you so much to Bookbreak because another book that I'm going to have to read this soon. I might read it in one of my vlogs coming up in the next couple of weeks. Starling House by Alexi. This comes out in October this year. And I have mentioned this to you a few times and the plot always evades me a little bit. It's a gothic novel. There is Starling House and it's a bit weird and our girly, our main character is like, oh yeah, I vibe. But I don't care, right? It's gothic and look at the vibes. Look at the vibes. It's going to be beautiful. It's going to be lush. It's going to be, if you guys don't know, wants a feature which is, is definitely, I think it was definitely my top 25 books all time when I did eventually make that definitive list. And this, I just think it's going to be up there. I think Alexi Harrow is the writer for me. I am so into Starling House if you dare. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm going to read this soon. I think it's going to be incredible. So thank you Book Break. And then the two that they sent to me that I didn't request, but do sound interesting. So I don't know as much about these. We have This Stock Descent by Kaylin Josephson. I know this has been compared to Six of Crows, which gets me excited. Oh, we've got a family. I love a good family tree. And what's this? Oh, like a hierarchy of stuff. How exciting. But I've seen a lot of people, even on my Patreon, getting really excited for this book. So I am excited for it too, but I didn't know I thought about it going in. And then one, I literally got this yesterday actually. This is When Ghosts Call Us Home by Katja D. Bereka. This sounds so good. So when our protagonist was 12, she starred in her sister's amateur horror movie, The Movie Inspired a Cult. Five years later, her sister has disappeared and she has to find out what's happened. So I am guessing it's going to be a little, oh yeah, it's a little bit smeary. I'm really, really intrigued by this one. But I just want to say thank you Book Break for sending this to me. I'm very appreciative. This is not anything to do with you. This is to do with my long-running battle, long-running fight, my long-running nemesis of UK Book covers. Because I just want you guys to look at the US one. This is the, I think this is the final cover of the UK one. This is the US one. That gives you a vibe, right? It gives you, I'd be even more excited to read this if that, why can't we have the same cover? Like it's so gorgeous, okay? I mean, there's many books, the last word, like so many of these books, the US cover is better and I'm fighting a losing fight, you know? But this doesn't mean really, what does the cover matter? We all know it does matter, but at the end of the day, it won't affect my enjoyment of the book. So I'm really intrigued by this one. The other one that I got for a specific video and have read already was Murder in the Family by Kara Hunter. If you guys saw, I did a video where I tried to solve this book. I won't tell you how I did. I know actually that when I'm filming this, this came out in the US this week. When I really see this, it came out in the US this week. So if you are in the US and are interested in watching that video and solving it along with me, I know some people have been doing that and really enjoying it. Get your hands on Murder in the Family and read it along with me and solve it along with me in that video because I think that's probably the most fun way to consume the video. So yeah, this is fun. It's like a mix, completely mixed media, murder mystery and I had a lot of fun trying to solve it. Another two that I have already read, so I won't talk about these long, the Stationery Shop by Marjan Kamali and the Southern Book Cubs Guide to Saying Vampires by Grady Hendricks. I mentioned this yesterday in my full recommendations video but I read these for Jenny's Booktube Twin Test video and I really enjoyed both of them. These were both 4.5 for me actually. This one's a romance set in Iran during like the war there and this one's about mums killing vampires and I really enjoyed them both. So go check out that video if you want to hear more in-depth thoughts. This one was very kindly gifted to me off my Amazon Wishlist by one of my patrons, Charlie. This is one of the books that I'm most excited for and another one that I've been like hesitating about whether I read now or whether I save the Goodreads Wars because I think this will be nominated and that is The Only One Left by Riley Sager. Now me and Riley, as everyone does with him, have complicated history. Do you like me? Yes or no question? So yes or no question, do you like me? I've given him one star. Did I give him one star or two? Anyway, low. Didn't like final girls but I love the last time I lied. I really enjoyed the house across the lake which I know didn't a lot of people didn't enjoy but I've heard so many good things about this one. So we're following this old woman who many years ago all of her family died and many people believe that she killed them all and she's a mass murderer but I don't think there was enough evidence to convict her and now we've got our protagonist who's looking after her and Leonora starts to type her story of what happened for the first time and I've seen a lot of people really enjoying this. I've got a hair somewhere on my nose and I think I'm gonna love this. This is like maybe it's like a four to five star prediction. I want to say five star because Riley can surprise you, you know. You can think you're gonna love it and then you don't but I always say even with the ones I have in life from Riley like survive the night trash but you can have a good time. I look back on survive the night fondly even though I think it's terrible because I think you're gonna have a good time with Riley, you know. So I'm really really excited to read this. I hope it makes the top 10 and I read it in that video. Wouldn't that be fun? I think there's gonna be some surprises in there that I'm just not predicting though, you know. Then I've got a haul of six books that I bought when I went to London and visited some bookshops there which was a whole video on its own so I've already like technically hauled these. So we'll just run through them really really quickly. We've got Bad Gays, A Homosexual History by Hugh Lemmy and Ben Miller. I have wanted this for so long I almost bought it last time I went London to book shopping but it's just about like bad gays throughout history and I'm very excited. I think this one, the Goodreads Nonfiction or I know there's loads of nonfiction categories like maybe the history one but come on. It's just like I love the cover as well it's such a vibe. An unconventional history of homosexuality that subverts the notion of gay icons and queer heroes and asks what we can learn about LGBTQ history, sexuality identity through its villains and baddies. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. What a vibe. Then I also picked up London, A Guide for Curious Wanderers by Jack Cheshire. I follow him on Instagram. I think he has TikTok as well but he does like Secrets of London and this book is just taking you through all these little secrets of London and like history that is immortalised on the streets of London and it's definitely, I love all the pictures and it's just sounds like a really interesting read so I picked this up when I saw it. Then I got Eight Detectives by Alex Pavessi. I have heard mixed things from you guys about this one. I'm a little bit concerned. All my mysteries follow a simple set of rules and a mathematics professor worked these rules out. Then he disappeared. I think this could be something I enjoy. I think I can enjoy it. I think I remember Mara saying that she enjoyed this so I'm trusting Mara, not you. But it's one I picked up on a whim. I'd never heard of it when I picked it up and then a few of you have told me what you've thought about it since. But yeah I think I'm gonna enjoy that. Horace saw by Grady Hendrix. I have already read. I didn't love this as much as I think it's probably my least favourite Grady Hendrix I've read so far. This is the one that's like set out as an Ikea catalogue which is such a fun quag. But as a book I just feel like it wasn't my favourite. But I did enjoy it. I would recommend it. It's a kind of book that I feel like everyone would enjoy to some degree. I went to Forbidden Planet and I picked up this one summer by Julien Tamaki and Mariko Tamaki because I have read, which one is the one I've read? Oh I've read Laura Dinkies breaking up with me but I think that's Mariko and I just wanted some more another graphic novel and this one I really like the kind of blue tones of it. So I might not read this like soon because it's like summer vibes but I'm glad to have it on my haul. I should have read this whilst it was still summer. And then I picked up The Other Side of Mrs Wood by Lucy Barker. I love the cover of this. I think it's such a cool cover though where they like faces are made up. I love it. This one is to do with like Victorian spiritualism. I've read a few different books kind of based around this if you don't know. The Victorians were obsessed with like ghosts and spiritualism and seances and this one's to do with that and I think we're following the most celebrated medium in London but then stuff starts to go wrong. I don't know but I'm just interested. I love anything. I think this could be a really good autumn read you know. It's like Victorian ghosts, seances, spooky, dark, you know. That's history. Two that I received from Book of the Month when working with them recently we have Dark Corners by Megan Golding. Hey Meg. This is the sequel to Night Swim which I really, really enjoyed and in this one we got the same true crime podcaster following this case where we've got this man in prison and an influencer goes to visit him and then she's kidnapped and I'm guessing this would dive into some heavier topics and I thought those heavier topics that were covered in Night Swim were covered really well. So I'm very intrigued to like carry on reading from this series and then I also got Love Theoretically by Allie Hayes. You guys know I love Miss Allie. I have all of her books in the Book of the Month which I'm very grateful for. It just so happens that the months I've been working with them have been when these have come out so I'm very grateful. So this is her 2023 release. Gully is putting out like 10,000 books. She's already got another one coming out late this year and two announced for next year. Like what? Allie, relax. Take a deep breath, calm down. I don't know what this one's about. It's going to be another stem romance. What are the tropes in this? Is it fake dating again? It's fake dating again which was the love hypothesis. I would have thought she would have gone to a different trope but perhaps not. So thank you Book of the Month because these are two of my most exciting books. Then I've got another few that I got sent by Book Break. They're like literally like making my TBR for the better. First we've got the Kamogawa Food Detectives. I mean there's a cat. Far and nor did you own a restaurant known as Food Detectives capable of recreating a dish from their customers past that may well unlock forgotten memories and inspire ongoing happiness. I mean come on. It's cute, it's short. I feel like I'm gonna really enjoy this and it's a cat. I kind of like ask Rick because of the cat. Then we have Before We Say Goodbye by Toshikazu Kawaguchi. This is the fourth in the Before the Coffee Gets Cold series. Only with the first one but I own the whole series at this point. So it's like a little bit, you know, come on Megan, hurry up. It's a little bit of a problem but I'm hoping I might make progress in this series at some point this year in the next couple weeks. So like hold me to that, hold me to that. What is the next one? Is the second one Tales from the Cafe Before Your Memory Phase? I think it's Tales from the Cafe, right? I think it's this one, I don't know but I own them all. So I thought yeah might as well pick the next one up. One day I'll just read my whole way through the series. And then we have Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll. This one sounded really interesting. It's set in the 1970s and I think it's about like a mass murderer or like there's women going missing and our protagonist thinks that um the same man is responsible. I know this era in America was like big for serial killers, wasn't it? I think a lot of, am I right? Like a lot of serial killers that we know about today were like 70s and 80s. So I think this will obviously examine our relationship with true crime with with serial killers, with like idolizing serial killers with their victims. But I'm really interested. I've heard actually really good things from people who have been reading this so far so I should pick it up soon. We only have four books left guys, we are almost done. Okay two that I have read already, we'll just chat on these quickly. We have You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight by Kaelin Bayron. I bought this specifically I think because I knew it would be good for summer wean. It's about this like camp that holds fake like serial killer nights, like immersive serial killer nights but then maybe yeah there's a serial killer like at the camp one night and like our girlie's working there she's like oh my god I'm gonna die. I enjoyed this, it was a step up from Cinderella is Dead for me for Kaelin Bayron which I really did not enjoy. I think this is fun you know it's a fun short book but I think if it had been a hundred pages longer it would have been better because there were certain elements of this particularly look at the villain or like how long it took for us to actually get to the murdering and then when how quick the murdering was that I didn't love. So I think this could have been better if it was a little bit longer and then I have read Yellow Face by RF Kwong. I enjoyed this I get four stars. We're following June Hayward who best friend is Athena Lu who's like a literary darling and Athena dies in front of her one night and she steals her manuscript. Athena's Asian, June is white and it June is like the most terrible character ever. Like she just doesn't see you know she's just like Dalulu she doesn't understand what she's doing is wrong but yeah it examines the racism in the publishing industry, it examines cancel culture and how like Twitter works and like the attitudes of people on Twitter and stuff. One thing that I think this is very focused on race as a divider in publishing but I think it could have been even better if it had focused on other dividers in publishing like I think it could have brought in class as a privilege because publishing particularly like in terms of who publishing hires I think there is a big disparity in class and authors with class and I just think this book could have even better if it was a bit larger. I don't know it didn't feel as like babble in the poppy war feel like so like tomes of like I don't know I don't know how to describe it magnitude right and this is more of like a thriller contemporary satire and I don't I didn't as although it's discussing of course important things I didn't feel it had the same gravitas that her other books had and she doesn't have to write books like that all the time but I think we could have brought in even more elements like class like I mentioned and it would have been even better. And then finally two sequels that I got my hands on one is for one that I haven't even read the first book yet. I got death and a parish by Reverend Richard Cole this is the sequel to Murder and Even song where we're following a priest as he solves murders in his little town it's similar I think to the Thursday murder club and I just picked up because I wanted the dogs okay I wanted I wanted the spray ditch of the dogs and I didn't want to wait too long and not get them so I don't know anything about this sequel and I don't want it because I don't want to spoil the first book but it's cozy mystery I think that this is a bit cozy and Thursday murder club people often class Thursday murder club as a cozy but I don't think it quite is it has a bit more grit dealing with upsetting topics than I think cosies usually do and I think this is more on the cozy side and then a sequel I'm so glad I picked up is the Shadow cabinet by Juno Dawson I just read in my last vlog if you haven't seen it Her Majesty's Royal Coven and it was a five star so I'm so excited to pick this up we're following Her Majesty's Royal Coven is the witchy department of government in the UK and I said in that one I loved I loved the first one but I said I would love for it to go more into the politics and how the witchy coven relates to like you know mortal politics and people have said it doesn't this one so I am so excited I love the first one so much and I just think I'm gonna love this one too and I'm just so excited I think it's had such a lovely tone of voice I loved the way it was written it was funny but it was sincere it was heartwarming I loved it so very I'm so glad I picked up the hardcover with the sprayed edges signed of the second one I'm so glad I pre-ordered this because like I'm a genius so there we have everyone that is my biggest book haul ever perhaps please let me know any of these books I haven't read yet which ones are you most excited to see me read read which ones are you most excited to see me read which ones have you read please let me know which ones from here you have read and enjoyed because I need to know what to prioritize and I'm excited to read all of them so I hope you enjoyed this video if you got to the end of the video what shall we comment comment a bird emoji for styling house comment a bird down below if you got to the end thank you guys so much for watching and I'll see you very soon in another video bye