Today we’re back talking about the books on our summer TBRs! I’m such a mood reader that I don’t read any specific genres during the summer, but I do love fast paced reads for at the beach. I’ve picked ten books I’m really hoping to get to over the summer months!
1. The Hunting Party – Lucy Foley
All of them are friends. One of them is a killer.
During the languid days of the Christmas break, a group of thirtysomething friends from Oxford meet to welcome in the New Year together, a tradition they began as students ten years ago. For this vacation, they’ve chosen an idyllic and isolated estate in the Scottish Highlands—the perfect place to get away and unwind by themselves.
They arrive on December 30th, just before a historic blizzard seals the lodge off from the outside world.
Two days later, on New Year’s Day, one of them is dead.
The trip began innocently enough: admiring the stunning if foreboding scenery, champagne in front of a crackling fire, and reminiscences about the past. But after a decade, the weight of secret resentments has grown too heavy for the group’s tenuous nostalgia to bear. Amid the boisterous revelry of New Year’s Eve, the cord holding them together snaps.
Now one of them is dead . . . and another of them did it.
Keep your friends close, the old adage goes. But just how close is too close?
2. Phoenix Extravagant – Yoo Ha Lee
Dragons. Art. Revolution.
Gyen Jebi isn’t a fighter or a subversive. They just want to paint.
One day they’re jobless and desperate; the next, Jebi finds themself recruited by the Ministry of Armor to paint the mystical sigils that animate the occupying government’s automaton soldiers.
But when Jebi discovers the depths of the Razanei government’s horrifying crimes—and the awful source of the magical pigments they use—they find they can no longer stay out of politics.
What they can do is steal Arazi, the ministry’s mighty dragon automaton, and find a way to fight…
3. Nocturna – Maya Montayne
Set in a Latinx-inspired world, a face-changing thief and a risk-taking prince must team up to defeat a powerful evil they accidentally unleashed.
To Finn Voy, magic is two things: a knife to hold under the chin of anyone who crosses her…and a disguise she shrugs on as easily as others pull on cloaks.
As a talented faceshifter, it’s been years since Finn has seen her own face, and that’s exactly how she likes it. But when Finn gets caught by a powerful mobster, she’s forced into an impossible mission: steal a legendary treasure from Castallan’s royal palace or be stripped of her magic forever.
After the murder of his older brother, Prince Alfehr is first in line for the Castallan throne. But Alfie can’t help but feel that he will never live up to his brother’s legacy. Riddled with grief, Alfie is obsessed with finding a way to bring his brother back, even if it means dabbling in forbidden magic.
But when Finn and Alfie’s fates collide, they accidentally unlock a terrible, ancient power—which, if not contained, will devour the world. And with Castallan’s fate in their hands, Alfie and Finn must race to vanquish what they have unleashed, even if it means facing the deepest darkness in their pasts.
4. House of Salt and Sorrows – Erin A Craig
In a manor by the sea, twelve sisters are cursed.
Annaleigh lives a sheltered life at Highmoor, a manor by the sea, with her sisters, their father, and stepmother. Once they were twelve, but loneliness fills the grand halls now that four of the girls’ lives have been cut short. Each death was more tragic than the last—the plague, a plummeting fall, a drowning, a slippery plunge—and there are whispers throughout the surrounding villages that the family is cursed by the gods.
Disturbed by a series of ghostly visions, Annaleigh becomes increasingly suspicious that the deaths were no accidents. Her sisters have been sneaking out every night to attend glittering balls, dancing until dawn in silk gowns and shimmering slippers, and Annaleigh isn’t sure whether to try to stop them or to join their forbidden trysts. Because who—or what—are they really dancing with?
When Annaleigh’s involvement with a mysterious stranger who has secrets of his own intensifies, it’s a race to unravel the darkness that has fallen over her family—before it claims her next.
5. Heir of Fire – Sarah J Maas
Consumed by guilt and rage, Celaena can’t bring herself to spill blood for the King of Adarlan. She must fight back…
The Immortal Queen will help her destroy the king – for a price. But as Celaena battles with her darkest memories and her heart breaks for a love that could never last, can she fulfil the bargain and head the almighty court of Terrasen? And who will stand with her?
6. The Black Hawks – David Wragg
Life as a knight is not what Vedren Chel imagined. Bound by oath to a dead-end job in the service of a lazy step-uncle, Chel no longer dreams of glory – he dreams of going home.
When invaders throw the kingdom into turmoil, Chel finds opportunity in the chaos: if he escorts a stranded prince to safety, Chel will be released from his oath.
All he has to do is drag the brat from one side of the country to the other, through war and wilderness, chased all the way by ruthless assassins.
With killers on your trail, you need killers watching your back. You need the Black Hawk Company – mercenaries, fighters without equal, a squabbling, scrapping pack of rogues.
Prepare to join the Black Hawks.
7. Ten Thousand Doors of January – Alix E Harrow
In a sprawling mansion filled with peculiar treasures, January Scaller is a curiosity herself. As the ward of the wealthy Mr. Locke, she feels little different from the artifacts that decorate the halls: carefully maintained, largely ignored, and utterly out of place.
Then she finds a strange book. A book that carries the scent of other worlds, and tells a tale of secret doors, of love, adventure and danger. Each page turn reveals impossible truths about the world and January discovers a story increasingly entwined with her own.
8. Stormblood – Jeremy Szal
Vakov Fukasawa used to be a Reaper, a biosoldier fighting for the intergalactic governing body of Harmony against a brutal invading empire. Now, he fights against the stormtech: the DNA of an extinct alien race Harmony injected into him, altering his body chemistry and making him permanently addicted to adrenaline and aggression. It made him the perfect soldier, but it also opened a new drug market that has millions hopelessly addicted to their own body chemistry.
But when Harmony tells him that his former ally Reapers are being murdered, Vakov is appalled to discover his estranged brother is likely involved in the killings. They haven’t spoken in years, but Vakov can’t let his brother down, and investigates. But the deeper he goes, the more addicted to stormtech he becomes, and Vakov discovers that the war might not be over after all. It’ll take everything he has to unearth this terrible secret, although doing so might mean betraying his brother. If his own body doesn’t betray him first.
A vibrant and talented new voice in SFF: alien technology, addictive upgrades, a soldier determined to protect his family, and a thief who is prepared to burn the world down . .
9. The Girl and the Stars – Mark Lawrence
In the ice, east of the Black Rock, there is a hole into which broken children are thrown.
On Abeth the vastness of the ice holds no room for individuals. Survival together is barely possible. No one survives alone.
To resist the cold, to endure the months of night when even the air itself begins to freeze, requires a special breed. Variation is dangerous, difference is fatal. And Yaz is not the same.
Yaz is torn from the only life she’s ever known, away from her family, from the boy she thought she would spend her days with, and has to carve out a new path for herself in a world whose existence she never suspected. A world full of difference and mystery and danger.
Yaz learns that Abeth is older and stranger than she had ever imagined. She learns that her weaknesses are another kind of strength. And she learns to challenge the cruel arithmetic of survival that has always governed her people.
Only when it’s darkest you can see the stars.
10. King of Scars – Leigh Bardugo
Nikolai Lantsov has always had a gift for the impossible. No one knows what he endured in his country’s bloody civil war—and he intends to keep it that way. Now, as enemies gather at his weakened borders, the young king must find a way to refill Ravka’s coffers, forge new alliances, and stop a rising threat to the once-great Grisha Army.
Yet with every day a dark magic within him grows stronger, threatening to destroy all he has built. With the help of a young monk and a legendary Grisha Squaller, Nikolai will journey to the places in Ravka where the deepest magic survives to vanquish the terrible legacy inside him. He will risk everything to save his country and himself. But some secrets aren’t meant to stay buried—and some wounds aren’t meant to heal.
So those are ten books on my summer TBR. If you’ve read any of these I’d love to know what you thought, as well as what books you have on your summer TBR!
The Cold is in Her Bones is the dark and compelling Medusa retelling you didn’t know you needed.
Little Creeping Things is a dark and compulsively readable thriller from Chelsea Ichaso. The story follows Cassidy, a teenage girl struggling with the guilt of starting a fire that killed her neighbour when she was a child. On top of the guilt she is frequently bullied by Melody Davenport, one of the most popular girls in town. At party Cassidy jokes about murdering Melody and days later Melody goes missing in the exact way Cassidy suggests. As Cassidy begins to panic she receives a text – I’m so glad we’re in this together. Cassidy must race to discover who murdered Melody and prove she had nothing to do with it.
1. Pine – Francine Toon
3. The Book of Koli – M R Carey
5. Shade’s Children – Garth Nix
7. In Plain Sight – Marion Todd
9. All Your Twisted Secrets – Diana Urban
11. Aurora Burning – Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff
13. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes – Suzanne Collins
17. The Turn of the Key – Ruth Ware
Juno Dawson is one of those authors that I’ve always wanted to try but never got around to. When I heard about Wonderland, a story inspired by Alice in Wonderland I knew I had to give it a go. The story follows Alice, a young girl living the life of luxury thanks to her mother’s successful career as a crime writer. When her friend Bunny mysteriously vanishes, Alice will do anything to find her. While searching she discovers an invitation to Wonderland, the most elite party of the year. Determined to find Bunny, Alice pushes herself from her comfort zone and goes in search of her friend, but what will she find down the rabbit hole?
Midnight’s Twins is the first in an all new fantasy trilogy from Holly Race. The story follows fifteen year old Fern, who has always felt like an outsider in her family. When she uncovers secrets surrounding her mother’s past, Fern discovers the magical dream world of Annwn. Annwn is protected by Knights and when Fern’s twin brother Ollie is chosen to join them, Fern must do everything she can to prove she is one of them too.
Mirage was one of those books that I thought sounded quite interesting and order a copy of and then sits on your TBR for absolutely ages. Eventually I picked it up and I absolutely devoured it. I couldn’t put it down and it was one of my favourite reads of 2019. It was fast paced, I loved the characters and the plot was so engrossing. I love the doppelganger trope and I think it’s done so well in this book. I’ve been eagerly awaiting this second instalment because I’m desperate to know what’s going to happen next. I have really high expectations for this one, so fingers crossed it lives up to it. The release date has been pushed back to August which I’m a bit sad about, but thankfully there isn’t too long to go. There is also a change in the cover design and while I like the new cover I do prefer the simple design of the first book and I’m going to be so sad they don’t match. If you haven’t picked up Mirage yet you can read my full review 
1. The Alchemist of Souls – Anne Lyle
2. The Waking Land – Cally Bates
3. The Hollow Tree – James Brogden
4. Embers – Sandor Marai
5. The Thousandth Floor – Katherine McGee
6. In Dark Service – Stephen Hunt
7. Crimson & Bone – Maria Fiorato
8. Emperor of the Eight Islands – Lian Hearn
9. Replica – Lauren Oliver
10. Wicked By Design – Katy Moran
Magic For Liars first caught my eye when I saw it described as ‘Veronica Mars at Hogwarts’ and while this is a murder mystery set at a magic school, the story was very different from what I expected. Dark and twisty, the story follows Private Investigator Ivy Gamble as she is asked to investigate the death of a teach at a secret magic school. A school where it just so happens her estranged twin sister Tabitha works. Struggling to uncover the truth when everyone around her has magic and she doesn’t, Ivy must face the truths of who she is, and use everything she’s got to uncover who carried out such a gruesome murder.
I must admit that part of the reason I decided to pick this up is because I was sucked in by that gorgeous cover. After reading the synopsis I thought this would be a perfect quick horror read, something spooky that I could read in one sitting. What I got wasn’t really what I had expected. It’s a unique and engaging story, following our unnamed narrator as he carries out exorcisms across the country. When he comes across the Prosper of Schanz, a man revered throughout the country as a genius and man of science, he discovers the Prosper is possessed, but what will the cost be if he exorcises him?
The Bibliophile Chronicles 