March Book Haul

The plan had been to not buy any books this month outside of what came via Night Worms. I was going to work through my library stack and mayhaps read one of the several books I actually own. And honestly, I was doing so well. More library books were going back then, coming home, and I had my eye on a couple of books on my shelves. I so very much had this because it was a book ban; it was just a plan to read what I actually had in the Lair. Making a list of new books I wanted to own, and adding other books to my 'for later' shelf at the library. Everything was fine.

Until it clearly wasn't. Edmonds now holds a Night Market once a month, within in walking distance to my house. I love this for me, I do love a little market full of things and stuff, and even better food. Wouldn't you just know it, Lost the Plot mobile bookstore was there. Well, I had to go support Ash and get a book off my list. Just one book, it supports a local business, and I managed to go to the Edmonds Bookstore with friends and spent zero dollars. So one book was fine.

It was not one book. Then there was a stop at Third Place Books, two more books acquired. One that I didn't even realize was out yet, or how small it actually is. I do look at page counts when it comes to favorite authors. Then I found a book about death that sounded hilarious, and I'm such a sucker for coffee table books. Which is ironic since I don't actually own a coffee table. Still, here we are.

Then it was off to a day trip to North Bend, where they just opened a manga store that I have been itching to go to. Because I have definitely started my manga era. So we popped in there to maybe take a book or two off my list. One book off my list, one book that sounds terrifying, and I cannot wait. So those always came home with. And, I would love to tell you that I managed to get a hold of myself and stopped.

Nope, I had to run into North Seattle to return a movie, and it was a nice day, so I walked to my old stomping ground of the U-District. Ended up at the bookstore there just to waste some time before my train. It was fine until I realized they had a book I've been looking for forever, so I snagged it. Then! Yes, then again, I realized J.H. Markert's new book was out. So that came home with me, too.

For those keeping count, that's seven new books, seven. I wanted to go into April with zero new books. Upside is it's single digits. So I guess it could be worse, but still, there was a plan. I had a plant, and it was going to be great because I have so many books that need reading. I guess there's always April. You know the month that is also Independent Bookstore Day/Weekend. Guess we'll try again in May.

HAPPY READING!!

April Spotlight

 

Every year, campground manager Kate sends out a pamphlet titled “How to Survive Your Camping Experience.” It includes a list of rules to help campers have an enjoyable experience and hopefully survive any encounters with the campgrounds other…inhabitants.

With the campground in the throes of a bad year, it will take more than a list of rules to keep everyone safe. Monsters that were previously lying dormant are starting to stir and they’re waking up hungry. Among them is the Lady in Chains, a creature feared by both human and inhuman things alike.

Her reappearance creates an upheaval in the balance of power in the campground by renewing an old grudge with the harvesters, who are willing to sacrifice anyone they get their hands on in order to gain an advantage. On top of all this, the man with the skull cap has started taking an unusual interest in Kate. But with the harvesters on the prowl, the Lady in Chains hunting her down, and a sinister spider infestation, Kate is going to need all the allies she can get, even if those allies aren’t actually…human.

HAPPY READING!!

March Wrap Up

 Well, hello there! It's hard to tell whether there's another batch of winter hiding in the lovely spring weather we've had in the PNW the last few days. Still, it's been nice to be in the sun for longer periods of time. Don't get it twisted, I do love the dark and cozy winters. All curled up with my cat and a heated blanket. However, I'd also love to get out on my patio and read in the sunshine. Go outside to read at the park on the long days. Very excited for that!

March was a pretty solid reading month for me. A lot of library books this month, which was good because that stack was getting a bit crazy. Hopefully, I'll be able to knock off some books I own from that TBR. I've pulled a few that I'd love to read over the summer. Spooky stuff that'll be great for the long days of being the only one home. Super awesome for me!

Here's to hoping I keep reading like I did this month through the summer! No slumps, no too busy, just chilling. Cause look at these March stats:

Books Read: 7
BINGO Books: 2

Pages Read: 1432

I hit two more squares on BINGO this month: Stand Alone and Multiple Narrators. Both were great books, and the stand-alone square got me first BINGO of the year! Which means I'm already ahead of last year, where I got a whole zero! I'm close to a second BINGO in the middle, and not far off in a few other places. So I have hope I might just hit the goal of three BINGOs this year.

HAPPY READING!!

Waiting on Wednesday

 

Can't-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Wishful Endings to spotlight and discuss the books we're excited about that we haven't yet read. Generally, they are books that have yet to be released, but don't have to be. It is based on Waiting on Wednesday, hosted by the fabulous folks at Breaking the Spine.

There are locations in this world where the light doesn’t seem to reach. Where, no matter how illuminated the place might be, shadows creep in too strongly to fight back.

A suspiciously empty gas station rest stop in the middle of the night, littered with googley eyes... A doctor’s office, where a bottle of booze and a tear-stained folder wait on the desk... A tech millionaire’s haunted kitchen... A Bible-quoting ventriloquist’s dingy apartment... A yoga retreat in the middle of the desert, silent except for the screaming...

These supernatural and sinister locations are your destination, and bestselling author Nat Cassidy will be your guide. Featuring the Bram Stoker Award–nominated, critically acclaimed novella Rest Stop (one of Esquire’s Best Horror Books of 2024), along with a number of other original short stories, some which have never been published before, I Know A Rest Stop and Other Dark Detours is a travelogue down twisting side streets and through alleyways where the darkness has eyes...and teeth.

Let’s hope you make it home in one piece—if the ghosts, gory visions, and splatterpunk nightmares don’t get you first.

HAPPY READING!!

New Release Tuesday

 

Retail worker Emmett Truesdale has never fit the Southern California mold of six-pack, suntanned masculinity. Over three hundred pounds, he carries the weight of his childhood trauma and millennial ennui around his waist and in his soul. After trying every diet under the sun, he remains stuck—in his dead-end job, in love, and in his body.

Desperate for help, he enrolls in a clinical trial for a new weight loss product called Obexity. The treatment is as horrifying as the results are miraculous and as Emmett sheds pounds at superhuman speed, every part of his life improves overnight.

Unfortunately, Obexity comes with some killer side effects, including lost stretches of time and overwhelming cravings. Worse, people who were cruel to him have started disappearing and when the police warn of a cannibalistic killer on the loose, he fears that Obexity is turning him into a monster. But how can he give it up now that people are finally starting to treat him like he’s human?

Nerve-racking, sinister, and at times surreal, Nothing Tastes as Good is an unputdownable thriller that combines The Substance with the best of Stephen King and keeps you guessing until the final page.

HAPPY READING!!

Cover Runway Sunday

    

They say you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but we all know we do it. Sometimes, the cover initially catches our eye, drawing us to give a book a closer look. It's the first thing we see, our first impression. Every Sunday, I'll post some of my favorite book covers. Coming soon!

After surviving a shadowed childhood, Mallory Webb is ready to start fresh as a theater major at her mother’s alma mater, a sanitarium turned liberal arts university in Rhode Island. Landing the lead role in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet feels like a dream—until the blood-soaked wraith that caused her mother’s death resurfaces after years of quiet. With nothing to go on but cryptic symbols in an old college notebook, Mallory hopes the reason behind her mother’s haunting lies somewhere on campus, and resolves to find answers before she meets the same fate.

She’s surprised to make an unexpected ally in Ezra Pierce, the magnetic fourth year directing the play, and takes solace in their undeniable chemistry. But Ezra is a master secret keeper, and it’s clear he knows more than he’s letting on about Saskia Garin, Mallory’s elusive understudy whose past eerily mirrors her own.

When an ancient, bloodthirsty evil calls to collect a bargain that dates back to the New England vampire panic, Mallory, Ezra, and Saskia will have to untangle the tragic ways in which their histories are linked—and face the devastating consequences of their own star-crossed love story.

HAPPY READING!!

Waiting on Wednesday

 

Can't-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Wishful Endings to spotlight and discuss the books we're excited about that we haven't yet read. Generally, they are books that have yet to be released, but don't have to be. It is based on Waiting on Wednesday, hosted by the fabulous folks at Breaking the Spine.

Every year, campground manager Kate sends out a pamphlet titled “How to Survive Your Camping Experience.” It includes a list of rules to help campers have an enjoyable experience and hopefully survive any encounters with the campgrounds other…inhabitants.

With the campground in the throes of a bad year, it will take more than a list of rules to keep everyone safe. Monsters that were previously lying dormant are starting to stir and they’re waking up hungry. Among them is the Lady in Chains, a creature feared by both human and inhuman things alike.

Her reappearance creates an upheaval in the balance of power in the campground by renewing an old grudge with the harvesters, who are willing to sacrifice anyone they get their hands on in order to gain an advantage. On top of all this, the man with the skull cap has started taking an unusual interest in Kate. But with the harvesters on the prowl, the Lady in Chains hunting her down, and a sinister spider infestation, Kate is going to need all the allies she can get, even if those allies aren’t actually…human.

HAPPY READING!!

New Release Tuesday

 

Eight years ago, a boy took up an axe and slaughtered a dozen people. That odd, troubled boy, Jericho Dodd, has been dead and buried in his father’s yard for years, but ever since that massacre, Crow Island has been a dark and unsettling place.

When Jericho’s father begins digging up the past he buried, a compulsion to dig sweeps over the island and soon everyone else is obsessively churning up dirt, desperate to uncover buried secrets. The compulsion leads to violence and as neighbors turn against each other, the island’s famous tupelo honey, harvested from trees deep in a swamp, changes too.

As dread and paranoia seep up from the ground, it becomes clear that the island itself needs something from its residents–before it digs itself apart for good.

Be careful what you unearth from the dirt before this surreal horror novel can worm its way into you, too.

HAPPY READING!!

Cover Runway Sunday

    

They say you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but we all know we do it. Sometimes, the cover initially catches our eye, drawing us to give a book a closer look. It's the first thing we see, our first impression. Every Sunday, I'll post some of my favorite book covers. Coming soon!

SUMMER 1983. A blood-soaked summer camp counselor is found staggering down a country road. The sole survivor of a horrific massacre, Mary tells a nightmare of a masked maniac wielding an old skinning knife. Arriving too late to help, her boyfriend Tom Bailey is plagued by guilt.

SUMMER 1992. The camp reopens as Camp Summer Fun. Now a sheriff’s deputy, Tom doubts this is a good idea, but the camp has been refurbished, the counselors hired, and the little campers are on the way. Responding to reports of a blood-curdling howl near the camp, he again arrives too late to save anyone except a single brutalized teen. The killer nowhere to be found.

Hoping to catch the killer and finally right his mistakes, Tom reconnects with Mary. She's convinced that the killer is not human but instead a rural legend known as the Hungry Hare.

The sheriff wants the case closed, but refuses to believe in folklore. Mary dreams of revenge for her friends. And Tom hunts for any traces of the real or fictional. But the murderer could be closer to home than anyone expects.

The Hare is coming and is so, so hungry…

HAPPY READING!!

April Edmonds SBC

 

Holy cow, 51 people showed up to read with us last night! 51! My mind was blown, actually. I'm still wrapping my head around the fact that we nearly filled Leftcraft with readers. I cannot thank everyone who made time last night to come out and read with us. Two whole years of Silent Reading in Edmonds, and so many of you showed up. Thank you so much. I mean, look at this pile of books! Even two audiobooks!

If you couldn't make it out to read last night, never fear, we'll be back at Leftcraft on April 15th at 7pm to read again! Celebrating spring with one hour of Silent Reading. We hope to see you in April!

HAPPY READING!!

Waiting on Wednesday

 

Can't-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Wishful Endings to spotlight and discuss the books we're excited about that we haven't yet read. Generally, they are books that have yet to be released, but don't have to be. It is based on Waiting on Wednesday, hosted by the fabulous folks at Breaking the Spine.

There are locations in this world where the light doesn’t seem to reach. Where, no matter how illuminated the place might be, shadows creep in too strongly to fight back.

A suspiciously empty gas station rest stop in the middle of the night, littered with googley eyes... A doctor’s office, where a bottle of booze and a tear-stained folder wait on the desk... A tech millionaire’s haunted kitchen... A Bible-quoting ventriloquist’s dingy apartment... A yoga retreat in the middle of the desert, silent except for the screaming...

These supernatural and sinister locations are your destination, and bestselling author Nat Cassidy will be your guide. Featuring the Bram Stoker Award–nominated, critically acclaimed novella Rest Stop (one of Esquire’s Best Horror Books of 2024), along with a number of other original short stories, some which have never been published before, I Know A Rest Stop and Other Dark Detours is a travelogue down twisting side streets and through alleyways where the darkness has eyes...and teeth.

Let’s hope you make it home in one piece—if the ghosts, gory visions, and splatterpunk nightmares don’t get you first.

HAPPY READING!!