November wrap-up

One more month down, one last month to go! I'll bring everyone up to date with my numbers for the year, but first my favorite books of the month!

My favorite book of the month was Single White Incubus by EJ Russell. A cute paranormal romance about an Incubs and a bear shifter who sign a contract to marry each other on accident, but fall in love. It's part of the same universe as another series I read this year about three Welsh fae who fall in love, and whose lovers help sort the problems back in the fae lands. They appear in this series as secondary characters. LGBT romance. If you like that sort of thing, I definitely recommend both series. Currently reading the second of this series now, about the pair they were supposed to get married to.

The runners up for my favorite books of the month:

Nimona by Noelle Stevenson, a graphic novel about the kindest villain you've ever met, his sidekick, and his arch nemesis. Utterly adorable, and if you like stories with a mix of science and fantasy, and anti-heroes, this one is just lovely.

Across the Green Grass Fields by Seanan McGuire, the sixth book in the Wayward children series, about a girl who discovers a secret about herself that causes her to run away from school and ends up in a place where all the beings and animals are horses. Centaurs, unicorns, pookah, and more. I think this might be my favorite of the series so far. Her secret is one I'll keep to myself, but if you want stories about the more silent groups in the LGBTQIA banner, this one is definitely worth reading. The whole series is, really.

And my last runner up is Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Saenz. This one's about two lonely boys who befriend each other the summer of 1987, and what they learn about themselves and each other by being friends. This one's gotten a lot of buzz and a sequel, and it's definitely well worth a look.

All great books, all with LTBT+ rep, all definitely worth checking out.

I finally listened to Frankenstein by Mary Shelley this month, which of course was my oldest book of the month, or even the year, really. It was shorter than I realized, but it was fascinating to see what media have done with a story that was so very different from any movie version I've seen. It was first published January 1st, 1818, though she did rewrite it at one point, so there are two variations on her story. I definitely recommend if you are a fan of the classic movie monsters. Of the three classics I've read (Frankenstein, Dracula, and Phantom of the Opera), I do have to say my favorite has been Phantom of the Opera, but I'm surprised how much I enjoyed all three given the fact that I'm not really a fan of this period of English lit.

The newest book I read this month was Across the Green Grass Fields, which you can read my mini-review of above. It came out November 17 of this year. 

A busy month, as I was participating in NaNoWriMo, but I still managed a total of 24 books. As of today, I am now at 338 out of the 350 books I've challenged myself to read. That means I have twelve more books to read to get to 350 books. I think that next year, I'm going to start at 100 books, and if I hit that before July, I'll increase it to 200, but otherwise, I'm going to leave it as it is. Still, it's been a grand adventure this year. I'll wait until January to write up all the series I managed to finish this year. The first part of the year, I definitely devoured several, so I know it will be a long list. I have a feeling January will be full of posts about my 2021 reading. 

Now for stats. I only finished one series but I didn't DNF any books in November, so that's something. The types of book I read: three were ebooks, one was physical, and the other ninteen were all audiobooks. Of the books I read, fourteen were written by men, and ten by women. Twenty one had male main characters, and only six had female main characters. Seventeen had strong LGBTQ content, but only two had central non-white characters. The audience for the books I read: six were YA, and eighteen were Adult. Aside from my usual Romance as my top Genre, my other top two were Contemporary and Supernatural. I'm pretty sure the Supernatural were the leakover of books from spooky season, and Contemporary was because most of those took place in modern day. 

My current and future reading:

Currently I am reading:

• The Darkest Minds (The Darkest Minds #1) by Alexandra Bracken (52%)
• This Rough Magic (A Shot in the Dark #1) by Josh Lanyon (50%)
• The Nobleman's Guide to Scandal and Shipwreck (The Montague Siblings #3) by Mackenzi Lee (35%)
• Wolfsong (Green Creek #1) by TJ Klune (29%)
• Vampire With Benefits (Supernatural Selection #2) by EJ Russell (28%)
• The Hidden Kingdom (Fairest #2) by Lauren Beukes (at least halfway, but no pages, so not sure)

My Current Libby list to read:

• The Girl in the Tower (The Winternight Trilogy #2) by Katherine Arden
• Our Dark Duet (Monsters of Verity #2) by Victoria Schwab
• Iron Kissed (Mercy Thompson #3) by Patricia Briggs
• The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms (Inheritance #1) by NK Jemisin

Reading is all over the place now. Just things that have been lying around, things I've been waiting for from the library, and things I've been trying to get in before the end of the year.

My Library Hold list next 5:

• Foundation by Isaac Asimov
• The Wolf (Black Dagger Brotherhood: Prison Camp #2) by JR Ward
• Malice (Malice Duology #1) by Heather Walter
• Proven Guilty (The Dresden Files #8) by Jim Butcher
• The Hero of Ages (Mistborn #3) by Brandon Sanderson

And I have 4 more after those, so I've got lots to read now. Maybe enough through the end of the year. We shall see.

Hope everyone who celebrates Thanksgiving in the past two months had a great one. And I hope you all are enjoying the slide into the winter holidays, no matter which you celebrate. See you all next year with a whole new set of reading posts!