Strange, cowboys and a missed book! | 09.06.2024
Two book reviews, an article, a YouTube video and so much more for you to read in this edition!
👋 Hello
Hi! Welcome back to another bookish newsletter with your absolute favourite bookish nerd, Luke. This week I’ve got a whole load of stuff for you to check out. But first… HOW CRAP IS THE WEATHER! Have you seen that graphic online of how nearly all of Europe is getting great, sunny, warm weather and just the UK is getting average wet, cloudy weather? Fuming. But anyway… books…
First off, make sure you go and watch my latest YouTube video in which I recorded a vlog of me reading Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry as it was described by a fair few as one of their favourite books of all time. So go and watch that:
And then I spent some time in the week writing up an article on the books I read throughout May which did include The Stranger in her House by John Marrs this time, despite the fact my recent YouTube video and social media posts didn’t include it (I just forgot I’d read it and StoryGraph didn’t track the end date so it didn’t appear in my May books).
This morning I’ve then spent the past 2.5 hours writing and posting my reviews of Strange Sally Diamond by Liz Nugent and Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry - two books I was a big fan of. Scroll down for my reviews of those.
✍️ What I’ve posted since my last newsletter
LONESOME DOVE BY LARRY MCMURTRY BOOK REVIEW
“Lonesome Dove was a book that, I’ll admit, at first, I didn’t really get. I thought it was a generic cowboy story about a bunch of men talking, shooting and expressing misogynistic views over women. However, about halfway through something absolutely changed that for me. The characters started having transformative moments, I started to understand the deeper and higher stories and lessons McMurtry was trying to tell here. I began to fall in love with the characters and never really wanted it to end in the end. The more I think about Lonesome Dove, the more I want to read the sequel.”
STRANGE SALLY DIAMOND BY LIZ NUGENT BOOK REVIEW
“I think it was really brave of Nugent to write a main character like Sally. To constantly have to think outside of your own comfort zones to consider what somebody else’s physical and personal boundaries might be when writing a character must have been a real challenge, but she’s executed it wonderfully. Sally is a joy to read and makes the whole book worth reading. However, a story that never quite reached the heights I was expecting it to and an ending that sort of just petered out was a little disappointing for a book that a lot of people sung much praise about.”
THE 5 BOOKS I READ IN MAY AND WHAT I THOUGHT ABOUT THEM
“May was a great reading month. The Heart’s Invisible Furies is one of the best books I’ve ever read and will be for a very long time I imagine.
The Locked Door and The Stranger in Her House were both very solid thrillers that very much scratched that thriller itch I have at the moment.
Us certified for me that David Nicholls is defiinitely an author who I enjoy. His ability to combine humour with real down-to-earth and human issues is a talent I can admire.
And then Iron Widow was an absolute breath of fresh air – a relatively short fantasy novel with a great concept and no holds-barred action throughout.”
📖 What I’ve been reading this week
No One Saw a Thing by Andrea Mara
After finishing Strange Sally Diamond, I decided I wanted another little thriller to read alongside the larger The Rose Code and a fair few people over on my TikTok lives kept saying that No One Saw A Thing was really good so I decided to pick this up.
I’m only about 50 pages in so far and it’s quite interesting - there’s a lot of questions left to be answered though I feel like it’s fairly predictable at the moment. We’ll see if anything special happens.
The Rose Code by Kate Quinn
I really want to pick up The Rose Code more over the coming week as every time I do, I really enjoy it. However, whenever I go to pick up a book at the moment it’s No One Saw a Thing because I’ve got the audiobook for that and so I’m more invested.
I’m about 60 pages into this though and, as I said, really enjoying it!
📚 Book deal - buy 3, get one free (4 books for about £15!)
Somehow last week I completely forgot that it was a new month for 99p kindle deals.
So, I’ve had a look at some of the new deals and it may just be one of the best months of the year so far! Some bangers in here!
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