Always Me

      On Friday's I take part in two weekly link ups - The Friday 56, currently hosted by  Anne @ My Head Is Full of Books , and Book Beginnings, hosted by  Rose City Reader .  For The Friday 56, you choose a book, a book you have just finished, a book you are about to start, your current read, and share a line or a few lines that grab you (but don't spoil anything) from page 56 or 56% of the way through the ebook. Post it and share your post's url on Freda's most recent Friday 56 post. As for Book Beginnings, you share the first sentence or so and your initial thoughts, impressions, or whatever else it inspires, and then link up your post's url with Rose City Reader. Happy Friday everyone!  This week I'm spotlighting one of my  Nevermore-athon books,  Mina and the Undead  ( Mina and the Undead  #1) by Amy McCaw .  I've been meaning to read this for ages so I'm glad this was one of the group books. Beginning: When I was about ...

  Happy Thursday everyone! Welcome back to  Books from the Backlog , the weekly linkup I'm taking part of which is hosted by  Carole's Random Life in Books .  This is a great way to put a spotlight on books that I've had sitting on my shelf for awhile.  I don't know when I'll get to my weekly featured book, but I hope to some time hopefully soon. This Week's Neglected Book: Death Comes As Epiphany  ( Catherine LeVendeur #1) by Sharan Newman Published: 1995 (my copy), originally 1993 Genre: Historical mystery My Copy: Format: Mass Market Paperback Pages: 336 Where I Acquired It: A friend gave it to me. Summary (From Goodreads): Entering the Convent of the Paraclete in order to conquer her natural willfulness, twelfth-century novice Catherine LeVendeur travels to the Great Abby of St. Denis, where she uncovers a plot involving stolen gems, mad monks, and murder.  Why Did I Add It? Historical mysteries can be fun. I don't think I've read any se...

  Happy Tuesday everyone!  Welcome to Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by  That Artsy Reader Girl .  This week's topic is a Genre Freebie, so I'm going to be featuring Fantasy Sequels I Still Need To Read.  I really enjoyed the first books in each series, but for some reason I haven't continued them yet and really want to some time in the future.  Without further ado, here we go in alphabetical order: Cybele's Secret ( Wildwood #2) by Juliet Marillier Evil Dark ( Occult Crimes Unit Investigation #2) by Justin Gustainis The Faithless ( Magic of the Lost #2) by C.L. Clark Fire ( Graceling Realm #2) by Kristin Cashore Magic Burns ( Kate Daniels #2) by Ilona Andrews Midnight Blue-Light Special ( InCryptid #2) by Seanan McGuire Moribito II: Guardian of the Darkness ( Moribito #2) by Nahoko Uehashi The Oleander Sword ( The Burning Kingdoms #2) by Tasha Suri Redemption Song ( Daniel Faust #2) by Craig Schaefer Ruthless Vows ( Letters of Enchantment #2) by Rebecca R...

    Happy Monday everyone and welcome back to Music Monday! Let's share some songs we've been enjoying lately!  If you would like to play and I really hope you do, please see the rules and link up below. Rules: Every Monday share a few songs you've been enjoying lately.  It doesn't have to be a specific genre, new, or one of your favorites - just something you'd like to share with others.  If possible, share a music or lyric video of the song and your thoughts on the song(s), artist(s), and/or music video(s). If you would like to participate in Music Monday, please join the link up by sharing your post's url.  Welcome back again!  Today, I'm featuring a couple of ambient mixes from  Era eScapes .  These are great to read to, by the way.  Give a listen to Autumn Nights and Rainy Night at the Forgotten Academy : You are invited to the Inlinkz link party! Click here to enter

Happy Saturday everyone!  Today, I'm featuring my wrap up and mini reviews of my Spell It Out Reading Challenge 2024.  I started this challenge at the beginning of last July (you can see my original tbr here) and now that I've completed it, I figured I'd better share my results since I somehow neglected to do so for my 2023 challenge.  As a reminder, the rules for this challenge are pretty easy because you just have to read books to spell out your name by using book titles. So I read 14 to spell books beginning with the letters that make up my first name and blog name, LAUREN ALWAYS ME.  Without further ado, keep reading to see what I thought of the books I read for this challenge: ❋   ❋  ❋   The Library of the Dead  ( Edinburgh Nights  #1) by T.L. Huchu  is an enjoyable atmospheric fantasy novel.  I was hoping that the library element would have played a larger part in this story, but I still liked getting into this Edin...

    On Friday's I take part in two weekly link ups - The Friday 56, currently hosted by  Anne @ My Head Is Full of Books , and Book Beginnings, hosted by  Rose City Reader .  For The Friday 56, you choose a book, a book you have just finished, a book you are about to start, your current read, and share a line or a few lines that grab you (but don't spoil anything) from page 56 or 56% of the way through the ebook. Post it and share your post's url on Freda's most recent Friday 56 post. As for Book Beginnings, you share the first sentence or so and your initial thoughts, impressions, or whatever else it inspires, and then link up your post's url with Rose City Reader. Happy Friday everyone!  This week I'm spotlighting one of my  Spell It Out Reading Challenge 2025  books,  Nekropolis  ( Matt Richter  #1) by Tim Waggoner .  I've really liked what I've read from this author and this sounds something like Dan Chambeaux meets Eric Ca...

  Happy Thursday everyone! Welcome back to  Books from the Backlog , the weekly linkup I'm taking part of which is hosted by  Carole's Random Life in Books .  This is a great way to put a spotlight on books that I've had sitting on my shelf for awhile.  I don't know when I'll get to my weekly featured book, but I hope to some time hopefully soon. This Week's Neglected Book: The Dragon and the Raven by G.A. Henty Published: 2020 (my copy), originally 1885 Genre: Historical adventure My Copy: Format: Trade Paperback (with absolutely miniscule print!) Pages: 124 Where I Acquired It: I won it! Summary (From Goodreads): The Dragon and The Raven is a tale of England before it was England, back in the days when the Saxons were dealing with the raiding Vikings during the 9th century. The story follows young Edmund who is forced, at only fourteen years of age, to become a warrior and defend his land. Edmund becomes a member of a crew on the ship called The Dra...

Happy Wednesday everyone!  Today, I'm sharing my seventh update and mini reviews for the  Read Around the World Challenge .  Of the 46 books for the 46 European countries on my original  tbr , I managed to complete 5 in July for a total of 33 completed so far.  You can check out my profile here on the challenge website  here .  Keep reading to see my thoughts on the books I read this month: ❋   ❋  ❋   ❋ A Death in Malta: An Assassination and a Family's Quest for Justice  by Paul Caruana Galizia  had been on my radar for quite awhile.  I knew this was a recent case, but for some reason I had it stuck in my head that it from a long time ago. What they went through is horrifying. My review is also on Goodreads and The StoryGraph . ❋   ❋ The premise of  Blackout  ( Blackout  #1) by Marc Elsberg  sounded interesting, but it just fell off for me midway through.  It's marketed as a thriller, but I w...

Happy Tuesday everyone and welcome to my seventh and final  2025 Popsugar Reading Challenge  update with mini reviews!   In July, I read 6 books for a total of 50 completed out of 50.  I can't believe I finished my challenge!  I found a lot of great books with this year's challenge.  Keep reading to see my thoughts on the books I read in July:  ❋   ❋ I liked the idea of  The Sanatorium  ( Detective Elin Warner  #1) by Sarah Pearse , but it just didn't work out for me. The first maybe fifth of it seemed like it could have potential, but after that it just lost me. I wish there was a lot more atmosphere for the setting than there was, and the main character was just irritating. But, there was a note left behind in it from the previous owner. It's a double side square from Arizona Inn on 2200 Elm St., Tucson, Arizona and has some real gems on it from what I can make out. For example: "When you stop you drop," "Keep going forw...

Happy Tuesday everyone!  Welcome to Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by  That Artsy Reader Girl .  This week's topic is Beach/ Beachy Reads, but I've decided to continue that series I've been working on and feature my Favorite Books Beginning With The Letter P.  Without further ado, here we go in alphabetical order by title: Peter Darling by Austin Chant Phantom Pains ( The Arcadia Project #2) by Mishell Baker Piranesi by Suzanne Clarke Posthumous Education ( Fred, the Vampire Accountant #8) by Drew Hayes A Prayer for the Crown-Shy ( Monk & Robot #2) by Becky Chambers The Prestige by Christopher Priest The Princess Bride by William Goldman The Priory of the Orange Tree ( The Roots of Chaos #1) by Samantha Shannon Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir Protect the Prince ( Crown of Shards #2) by Jennifer Estep What are some of your favorite books beginning with the letter O?  As always, thanks for visiting my blog and perhaps even commenting down below!