My TBR is more daunting for May as I'm hoping to finish at least 20 books. Why? No idea! But when in doubt about the world, read until your brain is too tired to keep you up at night. What are your reading plans for May?

Some time ago What Victoria Read posted a video entitled 'The Ravenclaw Booktube Tag".  I was so intrigued that I instantly sought out a Hufflepuff tag as that is, proudly, my Harry Potter house. (We had Cedric.. we win everything.) Low and behold, I found one created by the lovely Abigail's Book Corner which you can watch HERE. So without further ado, I'm going to get stuck in and embrace my inner Puff. 

If you want to do either of these tags, consider yourself tagged! What's your Harry Potter house? And which book do you think symbolises your house the best?

By now, you know the drill. I enjoy my Birchbox subscription and like to show you what I receive each month in a bid to help you decide whether this is a beauty box that would benefit you. Did I remember to choose a curated beauty box for April after my mishap in March? No, no I did not. So instead we had another month of surprise products, which is both fun and terrifying. $15 may not seem like a lot to some people, but I personally want to only receive beauty products each month that I can foresee myself using up by the time next month's Birchbox lands in my mailbox. Did this one seem worthwhile to me? Read on to find out.

Brand: Beauty Protector

Product: Protect & Oil

Full-sized details:  $28

Sample size received: Doesn't have the amount on the bottle, but I'm assuming 15ml.

This argan oil for your hair is said to go a long way as it's recommended you only use 1-3 drops per use on damp hair. I've said it before but I'll say it again, though I do enjoy receiving hair care products in my box it sometimes feels like overkill when there are multiple items. I don't go through oils, serums, or hair creams fast enough to make it worthwhile. I've only received hairspray and a heat protector once, which I think would be the most beneficial of the hair care family as it'd be something you could use daily. Will I use this? Yes, but I may not need to open it for awhile. 

Brand: Marcelle

Product: BB Cream Golden Glow

Full-sized details: $29

Sample size received: 7ml

This is probably my second favourite product in this box. I enjoy receiving these type of makeup products as it's something I might actually contemplate buying full-sized. However, I'm not entirely sure how the shade works. Whether it's a 'one shade for all' deal as it can be worn as a makeup base, or if it's dependant on what you've put on your Birchbox makeup profile. If you know, please tell me.

Brand: NatureLab TOKYO

Product: Perfect Smooth Blowout Lotion

Full-sized details: $12

Sample size received: 30ml

This is a take it or leave it product. It's affordable, which I guess is a good thing if you really like it, but it's not exactly what I hope to get in my monthly box. It smells orangey, doesn't have a very clean ingredient list, and doesn't quite appeal to me. The packaging is also just 'meh'. Definitely the low point of my April box.

Brand: Stila Cosmetics

Product: Beauty Boss Lip Gloss - Synergy

Full-sized details: $15

Sample size received: ?

Over the past year or so, there's been many Stila products in my Birchboxes. I like the brand, I think their lip products have great staying power and the packaging is always appealing. It's always a risk receiving lip colours as it may not be to your liking, which begs the question, will I actually wear this? I'm not sure. But I'm excited to give it a go. 

Brand: Sunday Riley

Product: Good Genes All-in-One Lactic Acid Treatment 

Full-sized details: $85

Sample size received: 5ml

I love this skincare brand. I find their products show me results without weeks of usage, and they feel like a luxurious treat to try as the full-size pricing can be quite steep. 5ml skincare products like this will usually last me until my next box, which I personally appreciate. It's a great way of trying different skincare brands but not just for a one-off use that won't really sell you on anything. 

All in all, this was a mixed box. I will make it my mission to have more control over my May box, I just need a fair few alarms as the curated boxes sell out shockingly fast. Which product from this box would you be interested in trying? 

*This makes for a great cold pasta salad the follow day if you're a fan of leftovers, or picnics.

What's your favourite food to take on picnics? If you're able, I strongly recommend venturing to your garden for a picnic during this lockdown. It feels like a outing, without breaking the rules. A great way to get out of the house, especially if you have children. 

I can't believe it's already been 3 months since I wrote The First Quarterly TBR post, it's insane. Since my first post, the entire world has been thrown into the deep end and we're all just trying to keep safe. Who saw that coming? The only semi positive that this pandemic has had on our lives, is that we now have more time to read. (I truly believe that it's important to try and see the good in our current lives, even if we're saying it through fake optimism. Fake it til we make it, people.) I am having to carry 3 books forward, which are The House On Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, and Red At The Bone by Jacqueline Woodson, I've decided to fully remove The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin for now, and will instead include it in a TBR for Fall. I recently read Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson and it's fulfilled my desire for a high fantasy novel for the time being. So, what's on the cards for the next few months? Read on to find out.

I choose a non-fiction to read each month, usually it's a random pick but for May I know I'm going to be picking up this memoir for the Mentalhealthathon. Though it's weird to say that I'm excited to pick this up, I am. This seems like a book that's going to make me laugh, sob openly, and grab my highlighters. I'm ready to be broken.

One Day

by David Nicholls 

Do I only want to read this because Hazel Hayes said it's one of her favourite books? Maybe. Though it has been on my shelves since the movie came out and I did that thing we all do, I said "I'm going to read the book before watching the movie!". So.. it's now years later and I've consumed neither. Jokes aside, this book does seem straight up my street.

Scythe
by Neal Shusterman
A world with no hunger, no disease, no war, no misery. Humanity has conquered all those things, and has even conquered death. Now scythes are the only ones who can end life and they are commanded to do so, in order to keep the size of the population under control.

This is my most adventurous book of this TBR pile. I have no idea whether I'm going to enjoy this YA dystopian novel, but everyone I follow through Booktube seems to give it 5 stars, even those who aren't huge fans of this age range and genre, so I'm very intrigued.

The Shadow of the Wind
by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Barcelona, 1945: A city slowly heals in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, and Daniel, an antiquarian book dealer’s son who mourns the loss of his mother, finds solace in a mysterious book entitled The Shadow of the Wind, by one Julián Carax. But when he sets out to find the author’s other works, he makes a shocking discovery: someone has been systematically destroying every copy of every book Carax has written. In fact, Daniel may have the last of Carax’s books in existence. Soon Daniel’s seemingly innocent quest opens a door into one of Barcelona’s darkest secrets--an epic story of murder, madness, and doomed love.

This is one daunting novel, but I really want to read it. Am I terrified? Yes, beyond belief. But I have faith in myself to pick this up. So many people adore this book about books, and after shopping my husband's book stash, I found the sequel. So if I love this, yay! I can instantly continue!

A Closed And Common Orbit
by Becky Chambers
This is the sequel to A Long Way To A Small Angry Planet which I read last year and really enjoyed, as it's a continuation of the first in the series I won't give you a synopsis to prevent any possible spoilers. This series is very reminiscent of the TV show Firefly, so if you like character driven space operay goodness, check it out. It's heartfelt, fun, and very comforting to read.

The Shining Girls
by Lauren Beukes
In Depression-era Chicago, Harper Curtis finds a key to a house that opens on to other times. But it comes at a cost. He has to kill the shining girls: bright young women, burning with potential. Curtis stalks them through their lives across different eras until, in 1989, one of his victims, Kirby Mazrachi, survives and starts hunting him back.

This sounds like such a fun twist on a classic thriller, but the not-so-shiny reviews on Goodreads keep making me put this on the back burner, which is silly as people raved about The Silent Patient which I disliked. Will this be another case of an unpopular opinion? Here's hoping! Also, how pretty is this cover? It's definitely swaying me into picking it up.

We Were The Lucky Ones
by Georgia Hunter
It is the spring of 1939 and three generations of the Kurc family are doing their best to live normal lives, even as the shadow of war grows closer. The talk around the family Seder table is of new babies and budding romance, not of the increasing hardships threatening Jews in their hometown of Radom, Poland. But soon the horrors overtaking Europe will become inescapable and the Kurcs will be flung to the far corners of the world, each desperately trying to navigate his or her own path to safety.

I've recently stopped picking up so many historical novels set around WWII, not for any specific reason, I just haven't really been in the mood. However, the non-stop positive reviews of this debut novel has put it right atop my anticipated TBR. I'm not usually a huge fan of books that span across a few generations of a family (think Pachinko by Min Jin Lee) as I haven't yet read a book that hasn't felt disjointed because of how much time it's trying to cover. Hopefully We Were The Lucky Ones will be the exception..?

March was a decent reading month for me, but as we go into April I'm fighting what appears to be a reading slump. Did I burn myself out, or is the inability to go to the library affecting my mental state? Yes, and probably yes. Here are all the books I got to in March.

The Pisces 

by Melissa Borden

“Maybe [the ocean and I] were on the same side, comprised of the same things, water mostly, also mystery. The ocean swallowed things up--boats, people--but it didn't look outside itself for fulfillment. It could take whatever skimmed its surface or it could leave it. In its depths already lived a whole world of who-knows-what. It was self-sustaining. I should be like that. It made me wonder what was inside of me.”

Did I kick off my March by reading merman erotica that was disguised as women's fiction? Yes, yes I did. This is about Lucy, a woman who is simultaneously going to a support group for 'love addicts' while receiving quacking orgasms from a merman come nightfall. Basically. This book left me speechless but a variety of reasons. The blatant idiocy of the protagonist, the animal abuse, the licking of menstrual blood, and the various moments that left my head cocked in utter confusion. I've written an entire review for this novel as I has so many thoughts, check that out here (I'll also put in a link at the bottom of this post) But, yes, no. I can't recommend this.

Rating: ★★

The Immortalists
by Chloe Benjamin

“The cost of loneliness is high, she knows, but the cost of loss is higher.”

A group of siblings visit a psychic as children, and get told the exact date in which each of them is going to die. From there we follow each individual sibling to their deathbed. We watch as the psychics words affect their decision making, and brings up the question 'would their paths of been different if they hadn't known? Would that of changed their fates?'. I regrettably DNF'd this at approximately 50%. I tried to go through it both physically and as an audiobook, but  was just so... bored? That's mean to say, I know. But I couldn't find it in me to care at all where the story was going, and all the characters felt too stiff. Maybe I'll eventually pick this back up, but for now, it's a pass from me. Have you read this? Should I give it another chance?

Rating: N/A


I'll Give You The Sun
by Jandy Nelson

“Maybe some people are just meant to be in the same story.” 

This is a YA contemporary that's been sitting on my shelf for years but after seeing that @BooksWithEmilyFox gave it 5 stars, I got intrigued and put it instantly back onto my immediate TBR. In this we follow twins, Noah and Jude, and watch as their lives go onto different paths after one gets into art school and the other doesn't. This is a slow burn of a book, but I really enjoyed it. It had the right amount of angst and poeticness without seeming pretentious. It spoke about loss, depression, passion, sexuality, first loves, and the expectations put upon teenagers. And yet the book was written with both grace and specks of humour, it never felt heavy. I laughed, cried, and stayed up far too late in a bid to finish it. Would definitely recommend the audiobook.

Rating: ★★★★★ (4.5)

Lock Every Door
by Riley Sager

“Because here’s the thing about being poor—most people don’t understand it unless they’ve been there themselves. They don’t know what a fragile balancing act it is to stay afloat and that if, God forbid, you momentarily slip underwater, how hard it is to resurface.”

Jules is a recently single woman who has found what seems to be a perfect job - house sitting an apartment in the high profile complex the Bartholomew in central Manhattan. For a big sum of money she just has to follow a few simple rules: No visitors, no nights spent away from the apartment, and no disturbing the other residents, all of whom are rich or famous or both. But when a fellow apartment sitter goes missing, Jules begins to unravel the dark secrets of the building. I enjoy Riley Sager's books. They aren't predictable nor do they have drunken mum's as the protagonist, yay! Due to my extensive horror knowledge I did foresee the twists coming in this, but that didn't affect my overall enjoyment of the book. If you like thrillers that feel original and have an eerie atmosphere, be sure to add this to your TBR.

Rating: ★★★★★

You Are Not Alone
by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen 

“Some people contend there are two primal fears. The first and most basic is the end of our existence. The second is isolation; we all have a deep need to belong to something greater than ourselves.”

Shay Miller is your average New Yorker. But when she witnesses a suicide on the subway, her life spirals fast. She can't get the woman out of her minds eye. Because of this she goes to the memorial to pay her respects, it is there that she meets Jane and Cassandra - sisters who bring Shay into their inner circle with welcomed arms. They give her a makeover, help her find a new place to live, and all-in-all help her become a better version of herself. But soon she finds that she's stepped entirely into the dead girls shoes. Was this all just a wacky coincidence, or did the sisters plan this? I haven't had great luck with the other books written by the authors, I find the naïve young girl protagonist they like so much to be a pretty annoying thriller trope. However, this wasn't terrible. I listened to it on Scribd, which I strongly recommend you do too. If I had read this physically I imagine I would've gotten lost in the multitude of POV'S. Will I remember this book in a years time? Probably not, but it was enjoyable for what it is. A fast paced thriller with some predictability. I stand by my statement that I think Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen's books are unworthy of the hype surrounding them, but if you enjoyed either The Wife Between Us or An Anonymous Girl, pick this up. And if you want an introduction into this author duo, I'd recommend going with this book first as it is their best.

Rating: ★★★ (3.5)


In Five Years
by Rebecca Sable

“It feels impossible how much space there can be in this intimacy, how much privacy. And I think that maybe that is what love is. Not the absence of space but the acknowledgement of it, the thing that lives between the parts, the things that makes it possible not to be one, but to be different, to be two.”

What if you get a glimpse into your future, but everything is different? When Dannie wakes up in what seems to be an alternate future, where she's no longer engaged to her perfectly matched boyfriend and is living in a completely different apartment, her mind feels a little bruised. Can five years be this different? But after a very strange encounter with this stranger and some of the best sex of her life, she wakes up back in the past and puts the entire thing down to just a really odd dream. But when the mysterious man from her future starts dating her BFF Bella, she begins to question everything.  I didn't know what to expect from this novel as the premise is confusing no matter how it's put. However, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I loved this book. It was much more centred around the friendship dynamic between Dannie and Bella than it was romantic, and I do thing that aided in my enjoyment. If you read one book from this entire blog post, go with this one.

Rating: ★★★★★

A Pale View Of Hills
by Kazuo Ishiguro

“As with a wound on one's own body, it is possible to develop an intimacy with the most disturbing of things”

I read Never Let Me Go last year and adored it, so I was interested in reading more of Ishiguro's work. This was a short novel with a premise that seemed right up my street. Set in both the current time and the past, we read the life story of Etsuko, a Japanese woman who has just lost her daughter to suicide. Muddled in her grief, we read about the years she spent in Japan during the wake of World War II and how she came to live in England. This is a hard book for me review, as I did enjoy the story but found the pacing a little odd. I read it in a total of three sittings, and yet it felt like it took me weeks. The writing was beautiful but slow. It's a book that has to sit with you for a few days, like Normal People by Sally Rooney, as it feels too full of a story to absorb right away. Does that make sense?

Rating: ★★★

Misery
by Stephen King

“Writers remember everything...especially the hurts. Strip a writer to the buff, point to the scars, and he'll tell you the story of each small one. From the big ones you get novels. A little talent is a nice thing to have if you want to be a writer, but the only real requirement is the ability to remember the story of every scar. Art consists of the persistence of memory.”

When popular author Paul Sheldon gets into a car wreck and wakes up with his legs splintered, high on medication, with a large busted woman (King really wants us to know this) acting as his nurse. Annie Wilkes is Paul's biggest fan, and she'll do anything to help him. Even if it means keeping him with her forever. I keep trying with Stephen King books, but they always tend to let me down in some way. This was a similar case. I found Paul to be a very dislikable protagonist and Annie didn't have any redeemable qualities to help me sympathise or 'get' her. It was a very slow moving novel, and I strongly disliked the chapters of Paul's book. They felt pointless and didn't line up with the actual story in any way, so they felt pointless. I don't know. Many will say I should just completely give up on King, but I really want to understand why so many people adore his work. And the audiobooks put me to sleep. Yay?

Rating: ★★★ (2.5)

Jane Eyre
by Charlotte Bronte 

“I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself.”

Do I get my reading badge taken off me for not giving Jane Eyre 5 stars? I liked this book, I really did. In fact the first half surprised me as I kept wanting to read 'just one more chapter' which I wasn't expecting with a hefty classic like this. But you can probably see where this is going, the last half disappointed me. I found the turns that the story took too weird, and I couldn't find it in me to ship Jane and Rochester. Jane deserved better. All in all, a solid 4 star read. Glad I read it, but I can't see myself ever picking it back up.

Rating: ★★★★


My Squirrel Days
by Ellie Kemper

“One of my great hobbies in life is feeling sorry for myself. Nothing makes me feel more alive than when I suspect I have been wronged. Oh, the energy!”

This was my non-fiction read for March, which is a challenge I've set myself to read at least one non-fiction from my physical TBR each month. (Who else hoards non-fiction but never actually gets to it?) Memoirs are hard to review as 1) you're reading about the authors life, so you can't really criticise the books contents, and 2) nothing I say is likely to persuade you into picking it up if you have no interest in Ellie Kemper. However, this book disappointed me in the sense of it mostly being about her childhood and not her career/motherhood. I was hoping for more of an insight into the world of Kimmy Schmidt, however she only touched on the show in the final chapter. I don't know, there was just something about this book that felt disconnected. I never felt like I got a personal look at the author as it seemed to be written more for comedic value rather than an opportunity for her to help fans get a more in depth look into the woman she is. Eh.

Rating: ★★★


Local Girls
by Alice Hoffman 

“...he had a way of taking your hand which made it clear he'd have to be the one to let go.”

This slice-of-life novel by the beloved Hoffman is centred around a Long Island neighbourhood and the Samuelson family. In this family we have a terminally ill mother, a young girl who is feeling love for the first time, and a brother who has given up everything in a bid to be the man of the family. I went into this expecting something more along the lines of Little Fires Everywhere or Firefly Lane, but instead I turned each page expecting the book to suddenly take a magical realism spin. Hoffman has a magical way of writing, but I don't think it translated as well into this less than 150 page novel.

Rating: ★★★


The Year After You
by Nina De Pass

“I'm surprised to find that here, I may have finally found a place where I imagine myself surviving.”

Cara is a teenage girl who lost her best friend G in a car accident. Because of the depression that spouted after her lost, her mother sends her to a boarding school in Switzerland. There Cara meets a group of friends that could have the ability to help her go through her grief, but she has to learn to let them first. For a debut novel, this was beautifully written. Did it have some YA predictability? Yes, but in a similar style to We Are Okay by Nina Lacour, you find yourself looking past it because of the purity of the book. It didn't fall into any cliches, and the characters were all believable in their teenage ways. Much like Booksmart, there were no 'villain' characters. Everyone was just dealing with their own crap. One notable thing that I appreciated from this novel was how the adults were actually wiser than the kids. They weren't assholes. And they weren't pointless. They were trying to help throughout, but Cara just couldn't see it. All too often in young adult contemporaries, the parents/authority figures are useless to the teenage characters. To summarise this hefty review, I really enjoyed this book and I look forward to reading the authors future work.

Rating: ★★★★

Such A Fun Age
by Kelly Reid 

“I don't need you to be mad that it happened. I need you to be mad that it just like... happens.”

A young black woman is accused of kidnapping a white child when she was only acting as the girls nanny. This starts a domino effect with the girls life, and the parents of the child. I didn't know what to expect from this book as I'd seen it everywhere online without once seeing an actual review. So I randomly started the audiobook one day, and before I knew it I was 100% invested. This is a story about class, race, and the 'white saviour' complex we all too often see in media. I found all the characters beautifully flawed, and truly liked everyone even when they were doing the most infuriating of things. In many ways it reminded me of a mix between Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams and Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng. If you liked either, give this novel a go.

Rating: ★★★★