What will I be reading in Autumn 2017?

It seems to me like the past week everyone has fallen through a pile of crunchy autumn leaves and landed firmly in the run up to Halloween and Christmas. All the names on Twitter are spooky (except mine, I’ll make do with some emojis because I can’t think of a good Halloween name!) and the season of book release upon book release is here. Time to cosy on up with a warm drink and a good book…

The first thing you should know is that my TBR is (hopefully) currently at a standstill – I’m trying not to buy any books this month, and hopefully not until Christmas! This excludes Fairyloot boxes so the books from those will be added to my TBR (and I’m fairly sure I know what those books will be!) but other than that, I won’t be buying any books. This is partly because my TBR is super huge, especially after YALC, and partly because I need to save money!

I don’t like to give myself an overly prescriptive TBR because I never stick to them. I want to be free to be able to pick up any book and be able to read it – and equally, sometimes I won’t be in the mood for a particular book, even if, at another time, I would instantly devour it.

I’ve read 75 books so far this year(!) and hoping to get to a hundred so the goal is 25 books before 31st December…

I’m reading a weird combination of books at the moment, but I’d like to finish Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie (I’m really enjoying this one and reading in preparation for the film which releases November 3rd), Delusions of Gender by Cordelia Fine (non-fiction about gender differences), Northern Lights by Philip Pullman (first time reading!) and Scarlet by Marissa Meyer (I have all of the rest of her books but just can’t seem to get through this one…).

My Kindle is nicely full at the moment – I’d like to read two of the Zoella Book Club, After The Fire by Will Hill and Girlhood by Cat Clarke before the year is out. I’d also like to read Fireblood by Elly Blake, before the final book in the trilogy is released in June 2018.

Hardbacks I’ve not got round to reading yet include Windwitch by Susan Dennard (in preparation for Sightwitch coming January 2018) and Stalking Jack The Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco (I was so excited for this one last year and still have not read it… story of my life!). I was also sent a beautiful copy of Warcross by Marie Lu which sounds amazing.

In the Shadowhunters world, I want to get up to speed with all the books before The Queen of Air and Darkness is released, which has been pushed up to May 2018. Whilst I’ll be reading Lord of Shadows next year, I’d like to get up to date with Magnus Bane and The Bane Chronicles as well as The Midnight Heir.

Staying with Fantasy, I have a wild ambition to read all the ASOIAF books and rewatch the entirety of Game of Thrones before the final season, and so I had better get on with reading A Clash of Kings by George R R Martin. I wasn’t the biggest fan of A Game of Thrones but I love seeing the foreshadowing that’s going on way back in the first books.

Over to New Releases, I am so excited for A Shiver of Snow and Sky by Lisa Lueddecke and thank you very much to Scholastic for sending me a beautiful copy (this is such a gorgeous book!).

I also plan on reading my YALC haul – a lot of these books release in 2018 and it’s coming round fast! I’m hoping to get into City of Brass by S. A. Chakraborty, The Taste of Blue Light by Lydia Ruffles, The Treatment by C. L. Taylor, This Mortal Coil by Emily Suvada… as well as 2018 releases including The Hazel Wood by Melissa Albert, The Fandom by Anna Day and The Truth and Lies of Ella Black by Emily Barr.

I’m also exciting to read more Margaret Atwood, and I hope to get through Alias Grace in time for the Netflix series that will be released in November.

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but I’m excited to see which books will be my favourites, and which may fall a little flat.

Have you read any of these books, and what are you planning to read this autumn? Let me know in the comments below or tweet me at @annalisebooks x

TBR 2016 : Personal Challenge Edition!

Updated: 24th April 2016 with books I have since read.

Hello!
It’s been a long time since my last post, mostly due to a lack of reading during university time. Reading just isn’t appealing to me at the moment, so I though I’d set myself some challenges over the next year to reduce my TBR pile and invigorate my reading.

Challenge 1: Kindle TBR

Using a Kindle really slowed down my reading, and I’m slowly making my way back to favouring a old-fashioned paper book. It’s so easy to stop reading a book on Kindle and forget about it – and I’ve abandoned quite a few books mid-read and left them there for a few months… ok, a few years.

This challenge is to read all the books that have been abandoned unread in the cloud.

1. Bright Young Things – Anna Godbersen
2. Superconductivity: A Very Short Introduction – Stephen Blundell
3. Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy
4. Bad Pharma – Ben Goldacre
5. Pushing The Limits – Katie McGarry
6. The Fiery Heart – Richelle Mead
7. Hard Bitten – Chloe Neill

Challenge 2: Finish ALL the series!

As well as abandoning books mid-read, I abandon series mid-series. I want to finish some series which have ended already, to achieve a sense of completeness (and so I can start some new series, naturally).

This challenge is to finish series that are worth finishing, and have already finished/will finish by the end of this year.

8. Night Huntress Series by Jeaniene Frost – One Grave at a Time, Up From the Grave

9. Bloodlines by Richelle Mead – The Fiery Heart, Silver Shadows, The Ruby Circle

10. Chicagoland Vampires by Chloe Neill – Hard Bitten, Drink Deep, Biting Cold, House Rules, Biting Bad, Wild Things, Blood Games, Dark Debt, Midnight Marked, Untitled… (This is definitely a challenge!)

11. Anna and the French Kiss series by Stephenie Perkins – Isla and the Happily Ever After

Challenge 3: Up To Date

There are a few series which have serious hype every time a new book comes out (Sarah J Mass, am I right?!) but I’m just not caught up with the latest book.

This challenge is to get up to date with series I’m seriously behind on, by the end of the year or the next release (whichever comes first).

12. Throne of Glass Series by Sarah J Maas – Crown of Midnight, Heir of Fire, Queen of Shadows

13. Illuminae Series by Amie Kaufman – Gemina (released 2016)

14. Normal Series by Holly Bourne – How Hard Can Love Be? (released Feb 1st, 2016)

15. Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin – Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, A Feast for Crows, A Dance with Dragons…

Challenge 4: You’ve Bought ’em so You Might As Well Read ’em.

I’ve got loads of books which are looking very very pretty on my bookshelf. I should probably read them.

This challenge is to read all the books on my shelf currently, that haven’t been read.

16. Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

17. Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

18. The Winner’s Curse by Marie Rutkoski

19. Asking for It – Louise O’Neill

20. The Name of the Wind – Patrick Rothfuss

21. The Kingdom of Little Wounds – Susann Cokal

22. The Finisher – David Baldacci

23. The Way of Kings – Brandon Sanderson

24. Rebecca – Daphne du Maurier

This post only really covers series I’ve already started or books I already own – there are loads of new books and series coming in 2016 that I’m looking forward to which will be covered in later posts.

Happy Holidays!

Annalise x