Book Busters Read-a-Thon | TBR

It's time for another Readathon! This time, it's a Readathon hosted by Elena Reads Books on YouTube, called the Book Busters Readathon. It runs from September 30th to October 6th.
I thought this one looked very unique because it has a card to base your TBR on - the goal is to complete a row left to right:

I'm rather busy this week, so I'm going to take this very casually and some of my options are a bit loose or open - so they might be a bit spur of the moment. I figured I'd just make a little stack of options, and then dive right on in!

A BESTSELLER

• I'm starting with a bestseller that I plan on finishing this Readathon, and that is The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins. I'm exactly 200 pages in at the moment, meaning I'm a bit over halfway so I know I'll finish it sometime this week!

FEMALE MAIN CHARACTER

• I... haven't really thought about this option yet, though I might end up rereading The Penderwicks on Point Mouette by Jeanne Birdsall for this one. Another option is Julia Vanishing or another book off the library shelves that I find intriguing at the time!

YELLOW ON COVER

• I definitely plan to read The Penderwicks on Point Mouette for this one, and if I end up reading that for the previous challenge, I'll continue on with the Penderwicks series and read The Penderwicks in Spring. Although I'm now realizing I could read a couple of Nancy Drew mysteries... 

WRITTEN BEFORE I WAS BORN

• I'm thinking of reading a classic for this one. More specifically, Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. I've never read it but I really do want to. Another option, of course, is Hamlet by William Shakespeare. (I'm not sure why I put "of course" there. It's not like that was a particularly obvious answer.)

or SHORT STORY COLLECTION

• I might end up avoiding the classic route completely and opting instead on Slasher Girls & Monster Boys, a collection of what I believe to be horror short stories. I'm a scaredy-cat, but these would be perfect for that chilling October mood!

COVER BUY

• Honestly, I'd be very impressed with myself if I made it this far. If I did, my strategy would be to choose a random book from the library based solely on the cover, which might actually be fun! 

There's another sort of scorecard, of participation points. These rows don't have to be done in any particular order: 

Here I am, posting a TBR. I also plan on posting a Wrap Up, a currently reading photo on Twitter, reviewing a book on Goodreads, and you can bet I'm building a pillow fort tomorrow to cozily read in! 

I'm sorry this post is a bit all over the place, but I always love participating in Readathons, and I can't wait for what will hopefully be a fun and successful week of reading!

July & August | Reading Wrap Ups

I ended up reading 8 books over the course of the past two months! (Although one was a reread and one was a collection of short stories...)

JULY:

1. Tales From The Shadowhunter Academy by Cassandra Clare (and others) - There were a lot of people who helped out with writing this book, but I didn't feel like listing them all... whoops! My individual ratings for each story are linked above, but as a whole I felt positively about this bind-up. I wasn't the biggest fan of The Bane Chronicles, so my great like for this book came a bit out of left field for me! Out of the ten stories featured, my favorite was probably Nothing But Shadows. It makes me so excited to read The Last Hours trilogy when it comes out...
2. Like a River Glorious by Rae Carson - This one is the sequel to Walk On Earth a Stranger and follows a girl who can sense gold... during the time of the California Gold Rush. I've always loved reading about the Oregon Trail (and similar scenarios) just because it's something I don't see too often. I loved the last book, and this one was amazing as well. I liked how it delved into more sensitive issues - such as the treatment of women, Chinese immigrants, and Native Americans during this time.
3. Hamilton: The Revolution by Lin-Manuel Miranda & Jeremy McCarter - This was a shameless reread but NO REGRETS. I love-love-love this book (thing?) and I listened to the soundtrack while reading the book (thing) this time, which only heightened the experience for me. Hamilton - while one of the only musicals I've listened to - is definitely my favorite musical, and I have so many memories with it already that I know I'll hold on to for a very long time.
4. Of Fire and Stars by Audrey Coulthurst - When a book makes you want to write, you know it's good. I loved the atmosphere of this one. The world and characters and mystery all just positively screamed "fantasy" to me (to be fair, it was a fantasy novel. And a great one, at that) and I just loved it. I'm not usually a huge fan of romance in books, but I adored the romance in this one and thought it was so cute! It was trope-y in places, but I didn't mind in the slightest.
5. Tokyo Heist by Diana Renn - Oh boy. Such mixed feelings on this one, honestly. I love a good mystery, and my experience reading this was great. I participated in Twitter's "reading sprints" and interacted with other readers and generally had a blast. The actual book was just okay to me. I felt like a lot of things were sort of convient, because the characters were so young. Also, the writing felt a bit too tell-not-show for my tastes. It was fun to read and very quick, though!

AUGUST:

1. The Murderer's Ape by Jakob Wegelius - A novel translated to English from Swedish, featuring a gorilla protagonist named Sally Jones. This was absolutely lovely. It takes place in many different settings, as Sally Jones tries to prove the innocence of her human friend after he's sent to prison for murder. The characters were strong and the writing was skillful. I realize it was translated to English fairly recently, but it deserves way more reads than it has. I enjoyed it immensely!
2. On Writing by Stephen King - I have a confession: while I enjoyed this book, I didn't love it as much as everyone else seems to. A lot of the stuff I'd been lucky enough to have learned in English classes of the past! However it was cool to get to know more about his life and who he is, and I appreciated the tips on editing!
3. Now I Rise by Kiersten White - The sequel to the Vlad the Impaler gender-bent retelling And I Darken. But oh man, And I Darken seems like backstory for this novel. It was dark, riveting, opposing, action-packing, intriguing, political, and just overall epic. I love both of the characters - Lada and Radu - although I enjoyed Radu's chapters a bit more this time around. I really can't wait for the conclusion of this saga, although I'm dreading this trilogy's end at the same time.

TOP THREE:

My top three books of these eight were probably...

• Hamilton: The Revolution
• The Murderer's Ape
• Now I Rise

Although I read lots of good books these past couple of months! Happy Autumn (or... almost Autumn) everybody! I'm excited for hot cocoa, sweaters, rain, Halloween and - of course - NaNoWriMo!