I’m a TAD belated in uploading this one but better late than never,
hey!? Of course, I pledged myself into the Goodreads reading challenge and this
year I’ve challenged myself to read 50 books. It’s the same amount that I pledged
to last year, but I do think I’m being slightly optimistic this year. I won’t
have half as much free time as I did last year, so we’ll have to see how it
goes. I will say, however, that I’ve gotten off to a pretty good start, having
devoured six whole books in the month of January.
The first book that I read was one that I read as part of a book tour
hosted by Little, Brown Book Group: The
Dry by Jane Harper. You can read
my full review of the book here
if you so wish. I particularly enjoyed this one and devoured it quite quickly.
We all know I love a good thriller, so if crime fiction or psychological
thrillers are your cup of tea then I fully recommend that you give this one a
go.
I treated myself to a beautiful copy of Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt
Vonnegut over the Christmas break and I finally got around to finishing
reading it in January. I’d been meaning to read Vonnegut for a while so it was
good to finally be able to say that I’ve managed it. I’ll be moving onto Cat’s Cradle next as I enjoyed the
intricacies of Vonnegut’s prose very much.
My cousin treated me to a few books for Christmas, one of these being
the YA contribution Holding Up the
Universe by Jennifer Niven. If
you saw my post-Christmas
book wishlist then you’ll be fully aware that I was planning on reading
another book by Niven so it was
actually quite nice to receive this one and get a taste of her writing style. I
absolutely LOVED Holding Up the
Universe. It was everything I love about YA fiction all wrapped up in one
novel and just what I needed after an incredibly stressful Christmas period.
Penguin Random House provided me with a copy of my next January read: Girl
Unknown by Karen Perry. Again,
this was a book that was right up my street and it didn’t take me long to read
the entire thing. This book surprised me in that its ending completely threw
me: I had absolutely no chance of guessing it, and trust me: I tried. Of all
the books I read in January, this is probably the one that I’d recommend first
and I rewarded it with a very positive 5* review.
I happened to take part in quite a few book tours over January: I was
lucky enough to have been invited to take part in the Burned and Broken tour, a crime fiction novel by Mark Hardie. Again, I really enjoyed
this book (it’s becoming a bit of a recurring theme this month: I honestly
haven’t read a bad one!). This one was full of intrigue and questions and
fulfilled the crime fiend within me. You can read my full review of this one here,
if it so compels you.
My final book of the month was one I read based on a recommendation from
one of my work colleagues: The Trap by
Melanie Raabe. She’d picked up the
book herself as a gift for her sister-in-law and after reading the blurb, I
knew I had to read it too. Translated from the German, this one was a short one
and I sped through it, disappointed to come to the end but pleased to have had
the pleasure of such a vivid and exciting tale. I definitely recommend this one
to absolutely anyone: it’s been nominated for a number of different awards, I
believe, and it is most definitely deserving of these nominations.
What did you read in the month of January? Let me know in the comments:
I’m always on the lookout for more books to add to my ever-growing to-read
list.
