Mogsy’s Bookshelf Roundup: Stacking the Shelves & Recent Reads
Bookshelf Roundup is a feature I do every other weekend which fills the role of several blog memes, like Stacking the Shelves where I talk about the new books I’ve added to my library or received for review, as well as It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? where I round up what I’ve read since the last update and what I’m planning to read soon. Mostly it also serves as a recap post, so sometimes I’ll throw in stuff like reading challenge progress reports, book lists, and other random bookish thoughts or announcements.
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Hello December! Seriously, this year has flown by so quickly, though I can’t say I’m too sorry to see November behind me, since it was such a busy month. I didn’t read near as many books and only posted two reviews in the last two weeks! However, we did have an excellent time with the wrap-up of another successful SciFiMonth, and in other news, I completed NaNoWriMo for the fifth year in a row! I had aimed to finish my 50K words before Thanksgiving because we had family visiting for a week and I knew I would be getting no writing done, but I ended up squeaking by one day later (lesson learned: I am never pantsing it again.) All in all, I’m eager to get back to my regular schedule now that all the craziness is (pretty much) over.
RECEIVED FOR REVIEW & PURCHASED
So let’s get on to the new books! Some really exciting review copies showed up, and I also did some shopping. I didn’t actually spend much on Black Friday–at least, not on physical books (my digital purchases are another story…it’s so much easier to go nuts on $1-3 deals especially when ebooks/audiobooks take up no shelf space).
Dragon Hunters by Marc Turner – Physical ARC, with thanks to Tor. This is the second book of The Chronicle of the Exile series which I’ve actually been leaning towards continuing, so I was quite happy when this showed up!
A Criminal Magic by Lee Kelly – This one is in my top anticipated list for early 2016! Huge thanks to Saga Press for sending me an ARC, I’m very excited to read it.
Final Empire by Blake Northcott – I love Kickstarter goodies! I’ve backed the campaigns for Blake Northcott’s two previous Arena Mode Saga books so of course I had to finish up the trilogy.
Redzone by William C. Dietz – A couple Bookshelf Roundups ago I received the ARC for the third book of the Mutant Files series, even though I’ve only read the first book. So last weekend when I was at the bookstore, I decided to pick up book two to catch up!
Black City Saint by Richard A. Knaak – Physical ARC, with thanks to Pyr. Okay, I’m not a fan of Knaak’s World of Warcraft books, but I’m really curious to check out his non media tie-in fiction. DJ over at MyLifeMyBooksMyEscape liked this one, so I’m definitely interested in giving it a shot.
The Vanishing Throne by Elizabeth May – This book won’t be out in the US until next summer, but I bought the UK edition from The Book Depository earlier this month. I had won the UK edition of The Falconer from a Gollancz giveaway a couple years ago, and I need the books in my series to match, dammit!
The Exiled Earthborn by Paul Tassi – Paperback, with thanks to Talos. This second book of the trilogy is out already and I haven’t read the first one yet! I need to get on that.
No More Heroes by Loren Rhoads – Paperback, with thanks to Night Shade Books. Speaking of series I need to get on, all three books of the In the Wake of the Templars trilogy are out now, so I think it’s time to binge read!
Tower of Thorns by Juliet Marillier – Hardcover, with thanks to Roc. By now you’re all probably sick and tired of hearing me rave about how much I love this series, so all I’ll say is: READ THESE BOOKS! I was so grateful to receive this beautiful finished copy.
A Daughter of No Nation by A. M. Dellamonica – Hardcover, with thanks to Tor. I have not read the first book Child of a Hidden Sea, but I heard a lot about it when it came out last year. Anyone read this series? Now that I have book two, I’m thinking maybe I should take a look. What do you think?
The Absconded Ambassador by Michael R. Underwood – Tor.com continues to be awesome, sending along this e-galley of book two in the Genrenauts series. I really want to read The Shootout Solution!
My Best Friend’s Exorcism by Grady Hendrix – Earlier in the week I was approved for this eARC from Edelweiss. Grady Hendrix is author of Horrorstör, a quirky horror novel I enjoyed last year, so I’m really looking forward to his next book. Thanks, Quirk Books!
Into the Dim by Janet B. Taylor – I blame everyone who featured this one in their Top Ten Tuesdays (Debut Novels We’re Looking Forward to in 2016) lists this week! You’re all enablers! I loved the sound of this and so I went and requested it via Edelweiss…and got approved! Thanks HMH Books for Young Readers!
GIFTED
And now for something fun. As I said, I had family visit me this Thanksgiving, my parents who flew in from Vegas. But before they retired there, they worked and lived in Shanghai for years. When they left China, they bought me some cool bookish gifts…these badass Chinese editions of all the books in the Harry Potter series! My Chinese reading is really rusty at the moment (maybe grade 4 or 5 level!) so until I get back into practice I don’t know how far in the series I can get. Regardless though, these books make really unique and beautiful additions to my book collection.
My dad also handed me down his copies of the Three-Body Problem trilogy by Liu Cixin in its original Chinese. He told me he really enjoyed it, which might explain why the books are a little dog-eared and worn. Also, notice anything interesting about these Chinese editions? The illustrations! Anyone read the Tor English-translated versions and know if the visual components made it in them too? I hear it is common in places like Japan and China for novels to have a few pages of gorgeously rendered drawings. Hmm, I don’t think I’d mind too much if that tradition was adopted here. Hey, pictures aren’t just for children’s books!
REVIEWS
Here are the reviews I’ve written and posted since the last update, gathered together and listed here for your convenience and viewing pleasure. Whoa, only two!
Invasive Species by Joseph Wallace (4 of 5 stars)
Superposition by David Walton (4 of 5 stars)
AUTHOR SPOTLIGHTS
My thanks to the authors who stopped by these last couple of weeks!
Guest Post: “Writing Crazy” by Michael R. Fletcher
Guest Post: “Five Amazing Women in Ancient Rome” by Michael Livingston
WHAT I’VE READ SINCE THE LAST UPDATE
I’m what you’d call a Type-A personality, micromanaging my day with to-do lists, and I’ll even make timetables to schedule in my hobbies! However, I reached my limit at the end of November with NaNoWriMo and hosting Thanksgiving on top of a bazillion other things. Even with staying up late and adding a couple more hours of productivity to my days, there was only so much I could cram into 24 hours. My reading time plummeted as a result, but I still managed to finish five books! I’m working on the reviews for these now, so be sure to keep an eye out for them in the coming weeks!
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Have you heard of or read any of the books featured this week? What caught your eye? Any new discoveries? Nothing makes me happier than sharing my love for books, so let me know what you plan on checking out. I hope you found something interesting for a future read! Until next time, see you next Roundup! 🙂
~Mogsy/Steff~
The BiblioSanctum 
Well done for NaNoWriMo ! I tried to participate bu I failed miserably. I don’t think that I am much of a writer, every time I sat to write, I was thinking of things I could read 😛 I look forward your review of Black Wolves !
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I don’t consider myself much of a writer either, which is why I love NaNo because they encourage participants to write down words first, worry about editing and polishing later. I struggle with this because I am a perfectionist, but it also feels so good to let go and just write. 🙂
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I want some of those mine mine mine
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What are you excited to read? 🙂
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To start with I am really curious about that Elizabeth May series
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Oh, so true about digital books! I can’t resist them, and the very fact they don’t take space on you shelves (and need no dusting! never forget that 🙂 ) is quite an incentive…
I started “Black City Saint” yesterday and it looks quite promising: looking forward to your comments, of course 🙂
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Digital books also makes you forget how much you’ve bought because there’s no physical reminder staring you in your face making you feel guilty 😀
And ooh, I look forward to your comments on BCS too!
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Awesome haul this week! Please don’t tease me with Tower of Thorns, I can’t take it! I’m so ready to read it, that it’s not even funny. I hope you have fun with all of these babies!
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I can’t wait to hear your thoughts when you read Tower of Thorns!!! 😀
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Ooh nice! Those are new to me reads! Thought I did love Into the Dim! Happy Reading!
My STS will be up tomorrow, so be sure to stop by then!
Have a GREAT day!
Old Follower 🙂
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I found out about Into the Dim when I saw it on several blogs and I think yours was one of them. It sounded too good for me to resist, glad to hear you loved it!
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Excited to hear what you think of Criminal Magic. I know you’ve been looking forward to that one. And Love the chinese edition Harry Potter books and the original Three Body Problem! Not that I could read them, but hey! They have pictures, I could at least appreciate that 🙂
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I don’t think I read Chinese well enough to read The Three Body Problem so good thing I got the Tor English translations for that 🙂 I do love the pictures too though!
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Wait a minute, you read Chinese?? That is so cool:-) Those HP books in Chinese are the coolest things I’ve ever seen! Looks like we got a few of the same things, I’m hoping my copy of Criminal Magic is in the mail;-) And HUGE congrats on conquering NaNo. It’s a bear, and to try to keep up with blogging and reading is nearly impossible, but looks like you did it anyway!
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Well, I’m really rusty! Reading Chinese is hard because it’s not like English where you can work out the sound of a word from its spelling, you literally have to memorize characters and I’ve not studied the language for so long I’ve forgotten a lot. Until some of it comes back to me, I’m going to struggle a lot, and even then I probably wouldn’t be able to read a whole book without help. So, I guess I “read” Chinese depending on your interpretation! 😀
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I really need to read The Falconer! I’ve had it for ages.
Also, Type A personalities unite! I schedule just about everything and gamify it via Habitica.com…
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High five! I love lists. And schedules. And organization. I have so many book-related spreadsheets it’s not funny 😀
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Congrats on completing NaNoWriMo! That’s so much writing!
I hope that you’ll like Black City Saint!!! 🙂 Just curious: on that promo paper that comes with the arc, was there by any chance a quote from my review? A picture of Black City Saint used to be one of Knaak’s alternating home pages and it had little blurb from my review under the cover.
Those Harry Potter books, and The Three-Body problem are awesome! I didn’t know you could read Chinese. 在 大学，我 叫 奥德 了！
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I’ll have to check my copy of BCS! I got the book towards the “front end” of my Bookshelf Roundup period though, so the press release might have been printed earlier before blogger reviews.
And haha, I was only able to figure out “In high school, I was called ____” A nickname? I recognized those characters, but they must sound out something phonetically because I couldn’t figure out their meaning 😛
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Please do check! I’d really appreciate that! I actually sent that review to Richard back in August (well before I published my review) so I was curious to see if the publisher used anything from it.
I meat to say “college”… oops! Close enough 😛 However, “At college, I was called Aoˋ Deˊ !” I forget what it means, but it is phonetically close my name! That was how was our professor gave us all of our names.
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Those Chinese Harry Potter books look absolutely gorgeous and amazing and it will be so cool to see what small changes are made in the books in translation! I will be interested to see your review of Wolf by Wolf which is a book that has really caught my eye – it has such an intriguing premise.
Hope December gives you a little more time to read and…you know… sleep:)!
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Thanks, December is already proving to be more restful than November…that is, until the Christmas holiday rolls around, but I’ll take what I can get for now 🙂 I’m already getting back to my normal reading schedule.
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yay many great books there! And some I would love to try!!!! I hope you’ll enjoy them all. happy reading!
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Let me know which ones! 🙂
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Woah! You can read Chinese?! That is some serious badassness right there^^ I LOVE that you got Chinese HP editions and how pretty they are ♥ I am DROOLING over the fact that you got Into the Dim and I’m already anxious to read your thoughts on it! I still need to read The Falconer but I need to do so soon 🙂 I’ve heard good things about A Daughter of No Nation too 😀 I hope you love all your goodies here Mogsy! xxxx
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They’re very pretty…I wonder if the artwork was done original for these editions. I’m not sure I can read them since my Chinese is really rusty at the moment, but still, I love having them for my collection 🙂
And I’m so excited for Into the Dim! When I saw it on multiple lists a couple weeks ago, I looked it up and it sounds amazing 🙂
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Congrats on finishing NaNoWriMo! (*breaks out her cheerleader pompoms again*) Any plans on what you’ll do next with the story?
Ohhhhhhh The Vanishing Throne!! After that rollercoaster-flying-off-the-tracks ending to The Falconer, I really, really hope the next book picks up where the last one left off. That was just too cruel!
What did you think of Child of a Hidden Sea? That book’s on my TBR list, and seeing its sequel reminds me that I need to get a hold of the first book at some point.
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Thanks! And I’m not sure…usually my past NaNoWriMo projects have languished. I hit 50K words but I have a problem with finishing them, so there are a lot of incomplete novels floating around. One day I’ll take them out again to polish 🙂
And I know what you mean about the Falconer! That ending was C-R-U-E-L to the extreme. I’m going to have to sneak a peek to see what happens 😉
And actually I have not read Child of a Hidden Sea. I was hoping someone could give me some input. I know the reviews I saw last year were mixed!
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Congrats on the NaNoWriMo front 🙂 I failed, myself. There were just too many distractions in November *sigh* I hope to work on some short stories in the next few weeks, though!
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Thanks! And I know what you mean, good try regardless though! NaNo is a tough challenge especially in November when things are so busy. The important thing is you participate 🙂 Best of luck on your short stories!
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