Mogsy’s Bookshelf Roundup: Stacking the Shelves and 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 serves as a recap post so sometimes I’ll also throw in stuff like reading challenge progress reports, book lists, and other random bookish thoughts or announcements.
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Here are the new books added to my shelves this past fortnight. Thank you to all the wonderful publishers and authors who sent me review copies! I also broke down and did some shopping. Isn’t it crazy how books just seem to, like, jump into your shopping cart of their own accord, or miraculously appear in your home? IT CAN’T BE EXPLAINED!
RECEIVED FOR REVIEW:
Barsk: The Elephants’ Graveyard by Lawrence M. Schoen – My thanks to Tor for this ARC and for inviting me to take part in the blog tour happening in December. So be sure to keep an eye out for my review and a giveaway this winter!
The Alchemy of Chaos by Marshall Ryan Maresca – A surprise ARC in the mail, but a really good surprise! I’m loving the author’s books set in the world of Maradaine, so I can’t wait to read this next one, though the cover is a bit too…magenta? Thanks, DAW!
The Geomancer by Clay Griffith and Susan Griffith – A beautiful finished copy showed up this week, courtesy of Pyr. It looks so great next to my other Vampire Empire books! My review of this book will go live soon along with an international giveaway, so stay tuned.
Linesman by S.K. Dunstall – Audiobook CDs, with thanks to Recorded Books. This was a book I really wanted to check out this summer, so I’m thrilled at this opportunity to review the audio.
Chains of the Heretic by Jeff Salyards – Grimdark and military fantasy fans, if you haven’t read the books of the Bloodsounder’s Arc yet, I urge you to check it out. This it the third book, and I’M SO PUMPED FOR IT! Thank you to Night Shade Books for the ARC!
Shadows of Self by Brandon Sanderson and Air and Darkness by David Drake – These two surprises arrived from the good folks at Tor this week, a finished copy of Sanderson’s latest as well as the fourth book of David Drake’s Books of the Elements series (though I hear it can be read as a stand alone, which is great!)
In Constant Fear by Peter Liney – Thank you Jo Fletcher Books for sending me book three of The Detainee dystopian trilogy. Apparently it’ll be a movie soon, with speculation that it’ll be like The Hunger Games for adults (by the way, most of the main characters in this book are 65+…I’ve always kinda pictured protagonist Clancy as Clint Eastwood in my head). And ha, what’s up with the covers this week and the color magenta?
Skinner Luce by Patricia Ward – I was actually contacted earlier this month by the publicist asking if I’d received this book yet in the mail. It never made it for whatever reason, but when I told the publicist this she made sure to zip this eARC over straight away! My thanks to Talos/Skyhorse and their awesome team. This urban fantasy looks great, and I’m loving that cover.
The Drowning Eyes by Emily Foster and Patchwerk by David Tallerman – Tor.com isn’t slowing down at all with their new novellas; in fact they’re just getting started. I’m grateful to them for sending e-galleys of these two highly anticipated January releases.
Tremontaine Episode 1: Arrivals by Ellen Kushner – If you like serials, you gotta check out Serial Box – they were kind enough to send over this digital advanced copy of the first episode of their second series, Tremontaine, which looks crazy good!
The Flux by Ferrett Steinmetz and A Borrowed Man by Gene Wolfe – Thank you to Audible Studios for these review copies. No way I’m missing out on The Flux after how much I adored the first book, and A Borrowed Man is a perfect clone story for SciFiMonth.
The Unfortunate Decisions of Dahlia Moss by Max Wirestone – Audiobook review copy courtesy of Hachette Audio. What can I say, I’m a sucker for geeky books and I just couldn’t resist the mention of MMORPGs in the description. It’s a Pavlovian reflex at this point.
GIVEAWAY WINS/PURCHASED:
The Diabolical Miss Hyde by Viola Carr – I won this from a giveaway earlier this year hosted by Melliane from Between Dreams and Reality. So happy when it turned up this week, I’ve been wanting to check this book out for a long time!
Cold Iron by Stina Leicht and The Just City by Jo Walton – I could not resist a couple purchases from Book Outlet (I had a coupon! You can’t ever NOT use a coupon for books! Think of the children!) They only had a few copies of both left for cheaps, so I snapped them up. Cold Iron has been on my TBR for a while, but The Just City I just had to check out after all the rave reviews I saw for it this year.
A Thousand Pieces of You by Claudia Gray and City of Savages by Lee Kelly – I found a lot of great ebook deals this month too, anywhere from $1-3 a pop. I confess these weren’t the only two I picked up, but honestly it’d be too appalling to feature everything here. Saga Press has a handful of titles on sale so I picked up City of Savages, and I also grabbed the deal for A Thousand Pieces of You because I just finished Claudia Gray’s Star Wars book and OMG it was amazing. Whoever said that readers don’t tend to follow media tie-in authors to their other work, they don’t know me.
The Death of Dulgath by Michael J. Sullivan – Kickstarter reward, WAHOO! I backed at the trade paperback tier, but it’s nice to be able to get an early digital copy.
The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers – I got this book to prepare for a special SciFiMonth read-along in November, organized by Over the Effing Rainbow. If you’re interested in joining, hop on over there to find out more. I’m excited about this one, I’ve heard a lot of amazing things. Like, A LOT.
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. It was a great fortnight, all four stars and above.
Walk on Earth a Stranger by Rae Carson (5 of 5 stars)
The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth Dickinson (4.5 of 5 stars)
Beyond Redemption by Michael R. Fletcher (4.5 of 5 stars)
Thorn Jack by Katherine Harbour (4 of 5 stars)
The Kingmakers by Clay Griffith and Susan Griffith (4 of 5 stars)
Ancillary Mercy by Ann Leckie (4 of 5 stars)
Envy of Angels by Matt Wallace (4 of 5 stars)
Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo (4 of 5 stars)
Our Lady of the Ice by Cassandra Rose Clarke (4 of 5 stars)
AUTHOR SPOTLIGHTS:
My thanks to the wonderful authors who stopped by these last couple of weeks and took their time to speak with me!
Guest Post: “Girls & Dragons” by Katherine Harbour
Guest Post: “Tough Traveling: The Good Thief” by Kristi Charish
WHAT I’VE READ SINCE THE LAST UPDATE:
I came down with a cold earlier this week. Again. But reading-wise, these last couple of weeks have been pretty great. For the most part, I had a good time with the books you see below; four of them I even rated above 4 stars, which has got to be some sort of record for the year. Because of my illness, I was reading more but writing less, so I’m still falling behind on reviews, but they’re coming.
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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 
Ooo you have some good ones there! I read the preview excerpt of Barsk from netgalley – so far I am very intrigued by the uniquely imagined world. And you read Mystic as well! Can’t wait to hear your thoughts on those two 🙂 The other books all look like good ones, too (Shadows of Self, eep!!).
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Yes, I’m very curious about Barsk, as I’ve been told it is a very unique and out-there book. I like the sound of that 🙂
Mystic review is coming soon, I hope you’ll check it out! An interview with the author will be up early November too, he’s an awesome guy!
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Yay! Can’t wait 🙂
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So many booooooooooks
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Wow! What a great haul! I hope you love everything!!!
Danielle @ Life With Two Boys
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OOh nice new reads! Those are pretty much new to me ones! See a few in the last pictures that are familiar though! Hope you enjoy them all!
My STS will be up tomorrow, so be sure to stop by then!
Have a GREAT day!
Old Follower 🙂
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So many pretties. :heart eyes:
Cover art for The Drowning Eyes is gorgeous. Tor.com seriously upped their novella game, I bought several in last couple of months.
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They really have. Everything I’ve read from them so far has been decent to good. And I’m not a big novella person, I think I’ve mentioned that a lot, but I think Tor.com is slowly going to change that! 🙂
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I am so excited for The Alchemy of Chaos and the Death of Dulgath! You’ve read and received some seriously awesome books *TBR list gets longer*
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I’m so excited about DoD as well! When I saw the author was doing a kickstarter I just had to jump on it. They’ve been awesome with updates, and I hear they are going to the printer soon, so maybe I will wait for the physical copies to arrive.
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Sorry to hear you got sick again. I hope you’re feeling better. I can’t resist a good ebook deal either. You should list the books you got though. Then I can check out the deals too. 🙂 Just what I need, more books. Happy reading! Feel better.
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Ever since my daughter started preschool I’ve been getting sick every month. Three year olds are little germ machines! Anyway, sure, most of my deals were from the Kindle dailies and the monthly deals page. Saga Press has Lagoon, Persona and City of Savages on there. I also picked up Tracer by Rob Boffard for a couple of bucks 🙂
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Haha yeah, I bet. Thanks for sharing. 🙂
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First, I’m super curious to see what you thought about The Fifth House of the Heart (one of my favorite books of the year!) And I am salivating over Barsk. I meant to request it, so maybe I still will. It sounds so different from most fantasy:-) Awesome haul, gah, 10 books in 2 weeks! I swear I would kill to have that much reading time. You are very lucky:-D
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OH MY GOD I LOVED THE FIFTH HOUSE OF THE HEART! 5 star review coming soon…on Halloween, of course 🙂
And you really must get on audiobooks. I don’t actually get to read a lot during the week, but I get to listen a ton. I cannot go through a day doing mundane things like cooking, gardening, driving the kids, working out, vacuuming, walking the dog etc. without an audiobook chugging away at the background. Since I listen at 2x speed, the average audiobook clocks in at ~5 hrs for me which means every 2-3 days I finish an audiobook.
This week was different because was sick though, I was a walking contagion so I actually got a lot of reading time to myself when everyone avoided me 🙂
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I am SO EXCITED TFHOTH is a 5 star review for you!!!! I was so happy I requested that book, you just never know what gems are out there, right??
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I really need to read The Fifth House of the Heart! And I’m curious, did you finally finish Crown for Cold Silver?? 🙂
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I did, I FINALLY DID! I had zero motivation to read it anymore, but I don’t DNF and now I’m just really glad to get it off my to-read pile…even if it took more than 8 months.
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Shadows of Self *squee* I can’t wait to read your thoughts on that one Mogsy!! Especially now that I’m caught up with The Alloy of Law 😀 I’m also curious to see how you’ll make out with A THousand Pieces of You! You’ve gotten a ton a pretties, I need to check some (a lot) of these out LOL! Happy reading^^ ♥
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I saw your review for AoL, I’m so glad you enjoyed it! I’m also very curious to tackle A Thousand Pieces of You, I so loved Claudia Gray’s writing in her Star Wars book. I’m sure her style could be completely different in her other books, but still I’m willing to give it a shot 🙂
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Is that another novella I see!? 😛
I don’t think I read many review for Iron Cold Iron, but I’m still excited to read it. For some reason, unknown to me, Flintlock in the snow sounds like a genius combination.
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It is! I’m going to try to keep up this whole novella reading thing. People have been telling me for years how perfect novellas are to throw into the reading routine, as in they make for good breaks in between longer novels, and I’m just learning this for myself now, lol.
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Ooooh!! So many books! I cannot wait to get round to Shadows of Self. It keeps looking at me and I almost can’t resist the temptation!
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I can never resist a new Sanderson book either 🙂
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I’ve been hearing good things about The Drowning Eyes, and of course the cover art is gorgeous. I was hyped to read Soundless but after hearing people’s critiques I think I may need to pass. Sorry to hear that you’ve been sick – I hope you’re feeling better! 🙂
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Thanks, I’m feeling better now! 🙂
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Soooo many of these I want to read too. Maybe I should move The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet up my list…
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I am so excited to read that book!
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Ooooh, you finished Mystic? 🙂 Did you like it? (Silly of me to ask, since you’ll be reviewing soon, so I’ll find out then, too. *lol*)
I’ve also heard a lot of good things about The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet. By a lot, I mean A LOT. Looking forward to reading your thoughts on it.
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I did like Mystic! I’m glad someone told me beforehand that it’s like crossover adult/YA because that prepared me for the tone of it. It’s very unique though, with a very charming story. My review’s actually going up tomorrow so I’ll probably be more coherent there, lol 🙂
And I’m SO excited to start The Long Way. I hear awesome things about it!
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