 Hello my darling extraterrestrials! I am Kim, this is Dustmotes in Velikor, and this is a haul video. Not one, but two different book festivals rolled into town in the last few weeks, so roll tape. Hey Kim, where are we right now? We're at the LA Festival of the... And are you excited? Yes, I am absolutely stoked. Like you don't understand. I do understand. Because look at this, I mean you can't even see the full scope of what we're looking at, but like, there are so many booths. There are literally over 800 booths. Like, oh my goodness. There's a whole section just for YA, I'm really psyched. I'm approximately very excited. This was my first time at the LA Times Festival of Books, and that was really fun. And just massive, like, so many people. And it was my second year at Yal West, my friend Allison went with me. And there were so many arcs. Advanced reader copies for anyone willing to queue up for them. You stand in line, you get a free book. It was brilliant. So today I'm going to show you my advanced reader copy haul. First up is Grace and Fury by Tracy Banger. It's coming out in July. This one is about two sisters who are cogs in an oppressive machine that is built to keep women down. The older sister Serena has been groomed her whole life to become a grace, which is basically a nationwide pageant to choose the next three members of the superior's harem. They don't use the word harem, but it's a harem. Women in this country are supposed to be soft-spoken, ornamental, and illiterate. It's illegal for a woman to know how to read. Nomi, Serena's younger sister and handmaiden, conned her brother into teaching her to read at a very young age, and thus has grown up fiery, disagreeable, and passionate. But just when everything starts to look like it's going to turn out alright in their lives, Nomi is chosen as a grace in Serena's place. Everything just kind of snowballs from there. I was a little worried about this one because the back says a story of fierce sisterhood for fans of the selection and caravall. And neither of those books were my favorite books. So I was a little worried, just a little bit. But this one very quickly takes a turn that I didn't expect. Everybody gets beaten with the character development stick, just everyone. So if you like revolutions, check this one out. The next one I started reading was The Assassin's Guide to Love and Treason by Virginia Bodecker. First of all, great title, and I really love this premise. Basically, in the Elizabethan era, Catherine Arundale was raised Catholic when it was illegal to be one in England. When her father is murdered by the Queen's men for his faith slash treason, she chooses as a boy and flees to London to bring the news of his demise to his co-conspirators and to join their plot to murder the Queen. Toby, a spy in Her Majesty's service, not quite Elizabethan James Bond, but comparisons could be made, is setting up a trap for any would-be assassins emboldened by the recent pro-Catholic rumblings, a trap in the form of Master Shakespeare's newest play. It's romantic, it's funny, there's cross-dressing cross-dressers and bisexual confusion. The characterization of Master Shakespeare himself is just so on point. Like, I was laughing out loud in public. I really need to stop doing that. This one comes out in October. Some of you are gonna be really excited about this one. West, by Edith Patau, is the sequel to East, which came out in 2005, and everyone adores. I have not read it, so I'm gonna hold off on reading this one so I don't accidentally spoil myself. But according to the desk cover, this one is about Rose going off on an adventure to rescue her beau, who in the last book got turned into a bear. Not a very good description, I know, but given that I haven't read the first book, I don't know what's spoilery, so I don't want to expound too much on the little that I know. But she wrote a sequel and it's coming out in October, so has all for that. Mother Knows Best by Serena Valentino. Okay, my friend Allison was at the fair with me and we got in the Disney line just to get in the Disney line. She's a Disney file, she was gonna take whatever they had. She was crossing their fingers that they had, like, pins that had Marie on them. But what happened when we got to the front of the line was they were like, look at all of these books, you can take one. And she looks down, and like, she goes, and the guy who's been talking to us, like, it's like he's worried that she's not okay. Which to be fair, she wasn't. She loves these books. She just about died right there. This is the fifth volume of the Disney villains series and it delves into Mother Gothel's origin story. The premise of the series is that every villain was once the hero in their own story. I am a self-professed snob and the first book was a little pedestrian for me which Allison will never forgive me for. But she swears by them. So I will persist in trying to read this series and, hey, look, I've already got volume five. This one comes out in August. Next up in my ARCs acquired at Yall West book haul is Always Never Yours by Emily Wibberley and Austin Siegmund Broca. Siegmund Broca. Those are two very specific names. This one comes out at the end of May. Megan is always the one right before the one. All of her boyfriends find their true loves immediately after dating her. Deciding not to focus on her tragic love life, she declares that all she wants to do is get through her school's extracurricular requirement with, like, minimum effort. So she auditions for the school play and gets cast as Juliet. So much for that plan. High school romance, possibly some hijinks. This is going to be a sweet summer laying out by the pool kind of read. It comes out at the end of May. Next up is Once A King by Erin Someril. This comes out in December of this year. I'm drawing some Arthurian parallels from the swan. Magic and the women who wield it have been persecuted for generations. But the new young king wants to change all of that and enlist Lyra, a young woman who channels wind to help him ease the tension in his country. The summary says high stakes fantasy full of romance, magic, and revenge. So you know I'm there. Lastly, I sat in line for an hour at the end of the day waiting for this one. City of Ghost by Victoria Schwab. This one comes out in August. A slim volume, written for middle grade readers. This follows Cass when her family, no. A young woman able to talk to ghosts. A young woman able to talk to ghosts. I'm going to say that because it's called City of Ghost. Okay, this book follows Cass, a young woman able to talk to ghosts. When her family moves to Edinburgh, Scotland, she gets a crash course in being a medium from a city full of restless apparitions. It's Victoria Schwab. I'm gonna love it. Seven, seven advanced reader copies from Yal West this year. I also got a bunch of bookmarks and this Hotel Valhalla pass. Which I just think is funny because I love Magnus Chase. Oh my goodness. And then I got a bunch of buttons. Stories have a life of their own from The Fandom by Anna Day. One of my absolute favorite quotes from Strange, The Dreamer, which is, the library knows its own mind when it steals a boy we let keep him. Keep your secrets close because I dared... Oh, did I drop one? Welcome to Weep. It was impossible, of course. But when did that ever stop a dreamer? From dreaming. Sorry. Truncated the quote. And then this one from All About Mia by Lisa Williamson says, perfection is overrated. Which is just a sentiment I can really get behind. I dropped the one from Give Me Some Truth by Eric Gainesworth, which says, live out loud. Basically, book festivals are the best. This one made me flash back hard to when the Scholastic Book Fair used to come to our elementary school and my mother sent me in with a check. She was like, I don't care. Just go buy books. Yeah, I was a book addict even then. So tell me, what upcoming books are you the most excited for? Does anybody want to rage at me for not having read East? Apparently it's a classic. And I haven't read it. The comment section below is available for your opinions, disbelief and derision alike. Adios, though.