Stacking the Shelves: The Maiden Edition

 "Stacking the Shelves" is a weekly haul meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews and Reading Reality. It allows book buyers to share their accumulation of books with the online book-loving community.

This week has been hectic as a book collector. I feel like I've been checking messages all week trying to arrange a trade for a special edition. But at least that experience is kind of fun. I'd rather be busy negotiating books than doing adult things. Working, cleaning, and cooking are just not as thrilling. Now, you won't see the trade results for a bit, but I am excited for when the books do come in. It'll be magical, and I bet you have no clue what the titles are. XD

But on to this week's haul. First up, I have a bunch of new releases. I had preordered Fear the Flames by Olivia Rose Darling and Six Scorched Roses by Carissa Broadbent from Barnes & Noble. I also ordered the French edition of A Light in the Flame by Jennifer L. Armentrout. I ordered it from a site called FNAC, and it was delivered in like three days. I've never had an international company be so fast before. My Walmart exclusive edition of Goldfinch by Raven Kennedy also arrived. It arrived in an open ravioli-type package, but surprisingly, the book was fine. That same day, I also got Sorcery and Small Magics by Maiga Doocy from Orbit for review. I'm very excited for this one, and I hope to get to it in the next couple of weeks.

 

Next up, I have the Juniper set of the FBAA series. These have Poppy as the Maiden on the dustjacket spines. While this isn't my favorite design, seeing them in person has made me appreciate them much more. They're still waaaaaaay overpriced though, especially since the books themselves are the regular editions. The only thing different is the dustjackets. I bought this set on Mercari, so the resale prices were like $50 cheaper than the regular price. They are a little dinged on the corners, but nothing too terrible. They also came with the books, so I figured the cheaper price point was worth any risk that buying secondhand might have had. Now, I have to figure out what I'm going to do about the Flesh & Fire set that was just announced. I think I'm just going to get the dustjackets for those and slowly collect my own used/cheap copies of the books to put the jackets on.

And lastly, I have one lonely ebook. It's the Kindle Unlimited version of Goldfinch. I actually just started this one, and I'm sad that soon the Plated Prisoner series will be over. Although it's bittersweet, I definitely think it's time. The series grew so much over the years, and I know the author had some rough periods trying to get everything finished. It'll be good to see what new projects she works on now that this series is complete. 

Well, that's all for me. What books have you bought/received lately?

Stacking the Shelves: The JLA Insanity Edition

 "Stacking the Shelves" is a weekly haul meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews and Reading Reality. It allows book buyers to share their accumulation of books with the online book-loving community.

This week has been pretty successful in getting me on track. I've completed two two-mile runs this week so far. And hopefully by the time this post goes live, I'll have one more under my belt. Or at least a singular mile. I would've had more but Monday was a kind of meh workout. But as for the rest of my life, it's been pretty quiet, just work, sleep, eat, repeat.

But on to this week's haul. First up, I have the Bookish Box editions of the Flesh & Fire series by Jennifer L. Armentrout. You'll notice that every physical book in this haul is by JLA. It's quite interesting how nothing else arrived from other authors when I know for a fact that two other preorders shipped out recently. I've been very excited for these, though, so I'm okay that nothing else arrived. Honestly, the art on these is better than the FBAA editions, in my opinion, which is a bit sad because I like FBAA more. Oh well, I have plenty of other pretty FBAA copies. It's about time the F&F series got some nice book box editions.

 

Next up, I have the first two books in the Titan series by JLA. These were created and sold by the JLA Shop. They were honestly just kind of sprung on us. One day the shop announced they were coming and less than a week later, they were for sale. Then, they shipped out like one or two days later. Craziness. While I do think these books are pretty, and I'm happy to have them, I do think the slipcases they came in are kind of pointless, as the artwork on each is the same as each individual naked hardcover book. These editions could have been $20 cheaper without those slipcases.

 

And for the last physical book, I have the last edition in the Bloom Books redesign of the Covenant series. These things all shipped out so fast. I can't believe all of them are in my possession already. In comparison, the new Lux hardcover editions are coming out like six months apart. Those are also uglier, in my opinion. I've seen some UK Lux editions with similar covers to these Covenant ones, and I think I'm going to go for those. I'm really meh about these new Lux hardcovers.

And lastly, I have the ebooks. All of these except one are Kindle Unlimited downloads. Brutal Titan by E.V. Olsen was a random download. I didn't even realize it was free on Kindle until I noticed it didn't have the KU logo on my app. The other books I got from KU included Pucking Around by Emily Rath, Blood of Hercules by Jasmine Mas, Bite of Justice by R.L. Caulder, and The Veiled Kingdom by Holly Renee. Three of these are ApollyCon authors, and Blood of Hercules has just been getting a lot of hype lately so I was curious. 

Well, that's all for me. What books have you bought/received lately?

Stacking the Shelves: The Sus Etsy Listing Edition

 "Stacking the Shelves" is a weekly haul meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews and Reading Reality. It allows book buyers to share their accumulation of books with the online book-loving community.

Well, I'm trying to get back into a regular routine. Work, gym, sleep versus just work and sleep. I'm also still trying to finish some organization projects around my house. The good news is, I think I have the motivation to really make a pretty decent dent in it this weekend. Fingers crossed that motivation keeps up. I would have done a lot of it last weekend, but I ended up visiting my parents' house instead.

But on to this week's haul. First up, I have my physical books for the month. I have a pretty decent stack here. My FairyLoot edition of When the Moon Hatched by Sarah A. Parker arrived, along with two preorders from Barnes & Noble: The Games Gods Play by Abigail Owen and Somewhere Beyond the Sea by TJ Klune. I also ordered the Ukraine edition of A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire last month, and it arrived this week. I actually ordered it on a suspicious Etsy listing, so I wasn't sure if it would show up. It did, though, and I'm super grateful to have this method for future releases. For some reason, my bank does not like international purchases from Ukraine, so it was a whole ordeal trying to order from the bookseller last year. This is much easier.

 

I almost forgot to include this one. It wasn't sitting with the rest of my "new books" to wait for the weekly photoshoot. I found a cheap copy of If There's No Tomorrow by JLA on Mercari. It was in really good shape, so I went ahead and bought it. I wanted it to match my The Problem With Forever hardcover, so I couldn't just go for the paperback. I'm one book closer to owning all of JLA's backlist. I still have to get some of her adult contemporary romances and a couple of random YAs, but soon I'll be caught up. Then, I just have to read them. XD

And lastly, I have one ebook that I downloaded from Kindle Unlimited: Bite of Vengeance by R.L. Caulder. I'm conflicted with this series. The books are kind of just a cheesy paranormal why-choose vampire romance, but the covers are gorgeous, in my opinion. The author is going to be at ApollyCon, so I have to decide if I want to order the books or not. It's a tough call, and I doubt I make an official decision until closer to April. 

Well, that's all for me. What books have you bought/received lately?

August Wrap-Up & September TBR

This wrap-up is a little behind. I've been staring at my computer screen all day for work looking at spreadsheets, so it was hard to do the same thing during my time off. But, I finally made myself do it. August was a pretty decent month. My birthday came and went. I took some days off. It was nice. I got quite a bit of household things done, but there's still a lot more to do. I hope I can get it all done in September, but it's more likely it'll roll over into October too.

In this wrap-up, I’ll list the books I read, the books I reviewed, the books I bought/received, and my TBR for next month. Now, let’s get this bookish party started!

Books Read in August

Silver & Gold: 3 stars

Caged Wolf: 4 stars

Alpha Wolf: 4.5 stars

Feral Wolf: 4.5 stars

Wild Wolf: 4 stars

Born of Blood & Ash: 4.5 stars (my review)

Bite of Loyalty: 3 stars

I think this is my best reading month of the entire year. Both quality and quantity-wise! Huzzah! I read seven books this month. And although six of them were on Kindle Unlimited, I technically own four of the books in paperback. This means I got them off my physical TBR as well. Yay! So, in total, that's five physical books read. Unfortunately, though, none of these books were ones I owned prior to 2024. I'm still very behind on reading my pre-2024 unread books. Ugh. BUT, I had my first 4.5-star reads of the year! And there were three of them! Note: I rarely give out 5 stars these days. I reserve 5 stars for perfect books. Of which I've had very few lately.

Books Bought/Received in August

Here's where we get into the hard part. I dread doing it every month. Math is icky. I bought a total of 24 books in August and received seven that I didn't pay for in the month, which basically means they were preorders/ordered in July or free ebooks. Altogether, 27 of the books actually made their way to me in August.

For the seven books I received, I got two free Nook ebooks: Creatures of the Dark and A Game of Vampires by Caroline Peckham. Well, technically they're novellas and the Creatures of the Dark is an anthology, but I downloaded it because Caroline had a story in it. The other five physical books I received were all orders that I'd paid for in earlier months that only just arrived in August. Those include The Witch Collector LitHaven edition by Charissa Weaks, The Night Ends with Fire by K.X. Song FairyLoot edition, and the Dutch editions of A Soul of Ash and Blood, A Light in the Flame, and A Fire in the Flesh.

As for the 20 books I bought that I received, those consisted of the August FairyLoot Romantasy book, Bonded by Thorns by Elizabeth Helen; the entire Ruthless Boys of the Zodiac five-book series in the new covers and Wild Wolf by Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti; five editions of Born of Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout (three B&N editions, one Indigo paperback, and one regular hardback); the new Apollyon edition; the old original covers of the Covenant series (novella included); and The Love Archives anthology with a JLA FBAA story included.

 My preorders for the month included the Arcane Lady of Darkness set (books one and two) by Melissa K. Roehrich, FairyLoot's August Adult sub book, and the Ukraine edition of A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire by JLA.  

Currently Obsessed With

As for TV/films, I've only watched one thing.

Yep, that's right, I'm still watching Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. And I'm still hopping around from season to season. Part of me wants to watch the episodes in order, but then I find an episode that sounds boring or that I've already seen before and know I don't like, and I just decide to move on to the next episode/season. Other than that, I only rewatched half of E.T. with my sister on the very last day of August, so I won't finish it until September sometime.

September TBR

Okay, I'm being really lazy and just using last month's TBR pic because they're pretty much the same. I just have a couple of titles to add. Visions of Flesh & Blood by JLA, Dragon Rider by Taran Matharu, and Fortuna Sworn are all repeats. I have to read Fortuna Sworn in the next week or two for book club. It's short, so it shouldn't be too hard. I just have to pick it up. Other than those, I want to read Goldfinch by Raven Kennedy, which releases this month, though I'm not sure my copy will arrive in September, as I ordered from Waterstones and they take a bit to deliver. I also want to read Fair Catch by C.E. Ricci and The Prince's Poisoned Vow by Hailey Turner.

***

Okay, well, that's the month of August, plus some September sneak peeks, all wrapped up into one post. Do you have a wrap-up post for last month? If so, share in the comments!

Stacking the Shelves: The August Adult FairyLoot Edition

 "Stacking the Shelves" is a weekly haul meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews and Reading Reality. It allows book buyers to share their accumulation of books with the online book-loving community.

I skipped last week's Stacking the Shelves, as I only had a couple of ebooks to share. I figured it'd be easier to just do a single post with everything instead. My work life has been kind of hectic, so I'm taking it a bit easy when it comes to regular life activities. I just need a mental break sometimes, and blogging is not one of them.

But on to this week's haul. First up, I have my physical books for the month. I got my August Adult FairyLoot book, Long Live Evil by Sarah Rees Brennan; Beneath These Cursed Stars by Lexi Ryan FairyLoot edition; The Bound Worlds by Megan O'Keefe, which randomly showed up from Orbit (Thanks, Orbit! Hopefully I can get to it in October); and Happy Place by Emily Henry, which was given to me by my sister. She'd already read it, and didn't want to keep it because she doesn't keep books she's read. Weirdo. Lol.

And lastly, I have my ebooks. I downloaded The Last Dragon King by Leia Stone for free on Kindle. And similarly, I used promo credit from Amazon to buy Kings of Quarantine by Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti. So it was technically free. The other four are all Kindle Unlimited downloads: Fair Catch by C.E. Ricci, Bite of Betrayal by R.L. Caulder, Heartless Hunter by Kristen Ciccarelli, and Pucking Around by Emily Rath. 

Well, that's all for me. What books have you bought/received lately?