Mortal Coil, a review

We’re at book 5 in the Skulduggery Pleasant series and things are starting to get dark! I’m not sure if you saw my recent update about being SUPER BEHIND on reviews (I read this in June 2021 for Pete’s sake) but my catch up reviews are going to be a lot more succinct so that we can get up to date!

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The series is really starting to turn towards YA now, with a lot of themes of death and torture in this book. But it still has the amazing Landy humour and I found myself struggling to put it down!

We are introduced to a lot of major players in this book, as well as seeing the constant development of Val and her relationship with Skulduggery and the rest of the magical world. As this was a reread for me I adored seeing how all of these pieces were planned out by Landy to slot into place in the later books!

For my CAWPILE rating I gave this book:

Characters: 8

Atmosphere: 8

Writing: 7

Plot: 8

Intrigue: 8

Logic: 7

Enjoyment: 9

Which gives an overall score of 7.86, being a 4 star read.

It’s not my favourite Skulduggery book, but it does have some incredibly important plot points and seeds planted for later books which was a lot of fun to revisit.

The Faceless Ones, a review

Skulduggery is back and just as mad as ever!

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As always when reviewing series (and keeping the review spoiler free) this is gunna be a difficult one! This is the third book in the series and so much has happened since book one!

There’s so much depth to this middle grade series. Even at this point there are so many characters whose morals and choices are in a very grey area, the violence and gore has gone up a notch too. I don’t remember being phased by it at the time I read it as a kid… but maybe that’s just me?

The sarcasm and wit doesn’t slow down at all in this book, and the punches and fight scenes just keep coming. I’m still loving the character development of Valkyrie and seeing her both blossom in the magical world whilst pulling away from the “real” world.

The ending of this one is a cliffhanger of epic proportions, so make sure you’ve got book four handy for when you finish! As always I’m loving this series and loving this reread!!!

On CAWPILE I rated this:

Characters: 10

Atmosphere: 8

Writing: 8

Plot: 9

Intrigue: 8

Logic: 9

Enjoyment: 9

Which gives me a total of 8.71 rating which is a 4 star! Is anyone surprised? We all know I adore this series and I’m loving doing this reread along with everyone!

If you didn’t know, I’m actually quite a bit further ahead than this. I’m just behind on my reviews lol. And I’m still loving all of the books!! Can’t wait to delve into my reviews of them for you guys!

Highlight here for trigger warnings: loss of a friend, violence, death, kidnapping

August Readathons?

Guys. Tell me. What readathons do you know about in August? There are already three on my radar which I’m crafting my tbr around, but I’m curious to know which ones are out there!

Of course I’m still taking part in the Dead Famous Readalong hosted by Hannah from LadetteM to read Skulduggery Pleasant. We’re simply reading each book each month, so there’s no specific prompts for this other than “read the book”. But if you’d like to check out the announcement video then here it is for your viewing pleasure!

Then we have the Mary Shelley-a-thon hosted by Caitlyn from Mad Cheshire Rabbit where all of the prompts relate to the woman who created her favourite book, Frankenstein.

The prompts for this readathon are:

1. Read a book by Mary Shelley

2. Read a poetry collection or a book by a poet

3. Read a book that was published in 1818/1831 or a book by an author who was born in either of those years (+/- 5 years)

4. Read a book you keep saying you will get to but still haven’t

5. Read a book set in the late 1700s or the early 1800s

6. Read a book in a country the author was not from/a book that features travel

7. Read a horror/gothic

Becca from Thebeccafowell is co-hosting The Royal Readathon: Sidekicks which is all based around Disney side characters which is so cute!

The prompt for this readathon are:

Olaf – A book under 300 pages

Mushu – A book with a dragon

Sebastian – A book with music

Gus Gus – A cheesy book

Chip – A Middle Grade or a children’s book

Hei Hei – A book with comedy

Pascal – A book with a colourful front cover

Abu – A book with greed

Ray – A book with death

Pegasus – A book with mythology

And lastly but never least, Olivia is co-hosting a Shakespeare themed readathon named All the World’s a Page which I’m super excited to take part in! It’s round two of this readathon after it went so well last year and even though I don’t have any Shakespeare related books to read, I’m pretty sure I can squeeze the prompts to fit on my tbr books! You can do as many of as few of the prompts as you like so don’t be put off by how many there are!

The prompts for this readathon are:

Character Tropes:

You Have a Twin, I Guess? – Read a book in a duology.

The Inevitable Cross-Dressing – Read a queer book.

Villain Monologue – Read a book focusing on a villain, antagonist, or antihero, OR one you think will have a dramatic character arc (positive or negative.)

The Fool With All The Wisdom – Take a chance on a book you’re unsure about.

Band of Brothers – Read a book with multiple points of view or an ensemble cast.

Underrated Female Character Outshines the Main Character – Read a book by a BIPOC female author

Lavinia Speaks – Read a book by a disabled author.

Story Tropes:

Fake Your Own Death Because That Will Definitely Solve This Problem – Give a book or author “a second chance at life” – a book you’ve DNFed, a second chance author, etc.

It’s a Problem Play So Your Punishment is Marriage – Read a book with a romance element in it.

Even Instalove Sounds Beautiful When You Write It, Will – Read a book with pretty writing AND/OR a writing style you love.

Definitely Not Set in England, I Promise – Read a book set in a country you don’t live in. History,

But Add Even More Drama – Read a book that blends historical fiction + another genre: fantasy, romance, etc.

Does This Play NEED Three Parts? – Read a book in a series.

You Just Missed the Character You Really Needed To Talk To – Read a book you’ve been meaning to read for a while.

Surprise! Magic Actually Exists for Plot Convenience – Read a book with magic in it.

I’ve Been Dying for the Last 50 Lines: Read a big book (can decide what ‘big’ means).

There is a 99.999% chance I won’t be doing all of the prompt’s for Olivia’s readathon but I’m looking forward to fulfilling some of them! So come on, let me know what other readathons there are for August! Or if you know some for the other months in 2021 let me know so I can get prepared now!!!

July 2021 TBR

As I write this I look over to my tbr stack, sat on top of my shelves. Jesus christ that thing is BIG. Wish me luck.

This month, as always, I’ve went overboard on my tbr. There’s two readathons in here, one is the Dead Famous Readalong, and one is a Jane Austen-a-long that Caitlyn from Mad Cheshire Woman showed me and oh look now I’m reading 2 Austen novels this month (god damn it woman). So let’s get into my far too big tbr.

Starting off with the Skulduggery Pleasant books, the next book for us is Death Bringer by Derek Landy. This is book 6 in the series, so we’re finishing off the second trilogy. I never clicked when I first read them that the books were split into trilogies so I’m looking forward to realising this when I read the end of this one and to seeing how this all wraps up. Then I also have The End of the World by Derek Landy which is the 2012 world book day novella which slots in here, and finally the stories from the Armageddon Outta Here collection which lay between this book and the next. A lot of Skulduggery to read! Last month I found out that I actually read through these books faster than my normal speed, at about 200 pages an hour, and that really helps to know when getting through these chonkers!

For the Jane Austen readathon I’m hoping to pick up Persuasion in a FlipBack format I have, and also Lady Susan which is included in a bind up I have of all of Austen’s works. I think Lady Susan will be my first read of the month because it’s nice and short and will get me into the swing of things. With Persuasion coming later one. I honestly haven’t even read the synopsis of these so I couldn’t tell you what they’re about!

As of writing there is one book I don’t know about. And that is my tbr jar pick. I do this live as I film my video and I haven’t filmed yet! So unless by some luck I pull out one of the 4 books I’m about to mention, I’ll be reading another book from my tbr this month too! I’ll make a little separate post once I know what that one is.

For the 4 I do know? Let’s start with the biggest which is Labyrinth by Kate Mosse which is a historical fantasy that I’ve been putting off for a solid 4 years because it’s over 700 pages long and I’m a wimp. Simple as. But this year? This month? This. Is when I’m finally getting to it (oh dear god I really hope so). We follow two different time frames, one in near modern day and one back in the 1200s, and they intersect somehow. It sounds really interesting and I have the entire trilogy on my tbr so I really should actually read one of them!

Checkmate by Malorie Blackman is up next. This is the third book in the Noughts & Crosses series which I’ve been slowly re-reading lately. If I’m remembering rightly this follows characters which telling you about would spoil the first book. So I won’t say. But it’s a fantastic series which spins the narrative with whites as the minority and Black people in power. It’s an amazing series and I’m so glad that I’m re-reading this as an adult because I’m getting so much extra from it that childhood Abi missed.

The Perplexing Theft of the Jewel in the Crown by Vaseem Khan is the second book in the Baby Ganesh Detective Agency series and this is going to be such a fun read! A “cosy mystery” sort of read set in India (and written by a British Indian), I love that this takes the traditional Doyle/Christie format and moves it away from that Eurocentric setting whilst retaining the quaint charm and vague silliness of those books!

And lastly we have Prodigy by Marie Lu, the second book in the Legend series. I first read Legend years ago now, and I found it pretty good. It’s a standard YA fantasy/dystopian where you follow one person on one side and another on the other. I enjoyed the writing and somehow still remember the outline of the plot so I’m hoping that I’ll enjoy diving into this one!

And that’s it (she says after listing 9 and a bit books), that’s my July tbr! Let me know what you want to read this month. Do you have a stupidly long tbr like mine? Or do you have something slightly more achievable? Let me know!

June TBR 2021!

Something a little different for my blog! I show my tbr’s on my channel and on my bookstagram (to be read, the pile of books I want to read that month) but I don’t tend to show them here! I think that’s mainly cause I don’t want to have to go through the hassle of editing the post #lazy so I’ve decided to just try out text post versions. No book covers. Nothing fancy. But here is my tbr!

To start with the “obvious” (if you follow me) I’ll be continuing to read War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy this month (I’m reading a chapter a day with Olivia from Olivia’s Catastrophe and we’re really enjoying it!!). Hopefully we’ll hit book Eleven next month!

As I’m taking part in the Buzzwordathon hosted by Kayla from Booksandlala I’ll be reading Dear Amy by Helen Callaghan, this is a thriller following a woman who receives a letter from someone claiming to be a girl who went missing 20 years ago. I’m hoping that cause this is a thriller it’ll be a nice quick read!

Each month I’m also taking part in the Dead Famous Read-a-long hosted by Hannah at LadetteM along with Bekka from the Comic Book Sanctury, Aly from the Chaotic Reader and Emma from EmmaNovella. We’ve reached book 5 in the Skulduggery Pleasant series which is Mortal Coil by Derek Landy. This series follows a young Irish girl who discovers magic via a talking skeleton detective and goes on to join him in saving the day! This is one of my favourite series and I’ve read every single book that’s published so these are all re-reads for me! I also want to re-read Apocalypse Kings which is a novella which only came out this year for World Book Day. Of course I only read it for the first time recently but this is where it chronologically sits so I want to pop it in here!

Then whilst filming my tbr I picked out my tbr jar pick for the month, which turned out to be Dark Places by Gillian Flynn! This follows a girl who’s family were all brutally murdered leaving just her and her brother. Her evidence put him behind bars but there are people who think he was innocent. I’ve never read any Flynn before so I’m hoping for good things!

Now finally onto the 3 “random” books on my tbr!

First up is Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen! I actually own 2 copies of this. One is a standard book, but one is a more magazine format, and although they have the same illustrations the magazine ones are coloured. I’m not sure which copy I’m going to pick up, and considering I measure page count I’m not sure which one I’ll be using for that either. But either way I’m wanting to read the book this month.

Then we have Pet by Akwaeke Emezi which was gifted to me by the lovely Olivia (mentioned above). This follows a young girl who was raised in a world where monsters have been defeated, but then Pet appears. But are they a monster? Or are they protecting the city from the real monsters? I loved Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi so I’m super excited to read more from this author!

Last but by no means least, Touch by Claire North is the final book on my tbr for June. The synopsis on this one is pretty sparse. With one touch she can take over your body for however long she wants. And that’s who we’re following! I’ve read 2 books by North so far and adored them both so I’m really excited for this one and I hope it’ll be a quick read!

And there you have it! My June tbr! I’ve been trying to be nicer to myself lately so if I don’t manage to complete the tbr then it’s not the end of the world. I will read my War and Peace chapters each day, and I will aim to read my tbr jar pick, the Skulduggery book (but only Mortal Coil, Apocalypse Kings doesn’t matter so much) and the buzzwordathon book. And Pet. Just cause I want to. But the rest would just be bonus books. We’ll see how I do, fingers crossed!!

What do you want to read in June? Have you read any of these? Let me know in the comments!!
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