The Terror of Knowing

I can’t believe we’ve already reached July. It’s scary how fast the first half of the year has gone.

This June has been… well, interesting to say the least.

I finished my job at Teesside University on Tuesday 21st and was suddenly and abruptly very sad to realise I wasn’t going to be working there anymore. My coworkers got me a lovely card and a Waterstones gift voucher, because they know me too well. Then I had a job interview on that Thursday at Liverpool University and I’m still waiting to hear back from that so it doesn’t look brilliant in terms of whether or not I did manage to get the job. Job hunting is a whole different issue that really effects my already pretty shaky self-esteem so it’s not exactly been a barrel of laughs this month. In other news (I swear I’m almost done), we lost my nanna this past weekend so it has been a few weird and unsettling days, to say the least. It probably still hasn’t really sunk it, and won’t until the funeral, but we’re all keeping busy until then.

But the fall out from that combined with job hunting means I probably won’t read a huge tonne of books in July… or maybe I will, as a form of escapism. Who can tell? Only time, it seems.

Now onto the books I did read this past month…

In June I read a total of 8 books – 5 fiction (4 fantasy, 1 contemporary) and 3 non-fiction, which somehow amounted to a total of 3031 pages. I say somehow, I know exactly why I read so many pages – a little thing called #readasoiaf.

1. Assassin’s Apprentice (Farseer Trilogy #1) by Robin Hobb 
Rating: 3/5
Genre: fiction; high fantasy; epic fantasy
Pages: 392
Read: 23rd May – 5th June
Read for?: Hobb-A-Long readalong | Review Here

2. Not That Kind of Girl by Lena Dunham
Rating: 3/5
Genre: non-fiction; memoir
Pages: 265
Read: 7th June

3. Treats by Lara Williams
Rating: 3.5/5
Genre: fiction; short story
Pages: 125
Read: 12th June
Read for?: Reviewed for Cuckoo Review

4. A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire #1) by George R.R. Martin
Rating: 4/5
Genre: fiction; epic fantasy
Pages: 801
Read: 26th May – 12th June
Read for?: A re-read for the #readasoiaf readalong

5. When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
Rating: 5/5
Genre: non-fiction; memoir
Pages: 225
Read: 13th June – 14th June

6. A Darker Shade of Magic (Shades of Magic #1) by V.E. Schwab
Rating: 4/5
Genre: fiction; fantasy
Pages: 386
Read: 13th June – 22nd June
Read for?: A re-read in preparation for YALC

7. Girl Up by Laura Bates
Rating: 4/5
Genre: non-fiction; feminism
Pages: 326
Read: 24th June – 27th June

8. A Gathering of Shadows (Shades of Magic #2) by V.E. Schwab
Rating: 5/5
Genre: fiction; fantasy
Pages: 511
Read: 22nd June – 30th June
Read for?: Catching up with the series in preparation for YALC

And that takes us right up until today.

As far as this coming month goes, I’ll be continuing to make my way through the books on my Summer TBR and hopefully I will stick to that since I’ll be attending YALC at the end of July and I really do need to be prepared for that.

July will be a better month I think/I hope, but, hey, in terms of reading I think June wasn’t too shabby at all! If I do say so myself…

Which books did you read this month? Any new favourites? Have you, or are planning to, read any of those I mentioned above? Comment below, I’d love to hear how your reading is going.