It’s the school holidays and I entirely failed to post something on Monday, but figured I’d better get my June round up done before it’s August.

What I read

A lot more than I did in May!

Quick stats:
19 books read
94 out of 150 so far
22 ahead of schedule
1 BABAL*
2 Val McDermids
5 new authors
9 library books

June’s five star reads:

Any Old Diamonds (Lily-White Boys #1) – KJ Charles
Alec – really Lord Alexander Pyne-ffoulkes – hires the Lily-White boys to steal a set of diamond jewellery from his estranged father. Only that means he has to pretend he wants to reunite his fractured family, and do so while not falling for Jerry, the Lily-White member who’s pretending to be his gentleman friend. Lots of twists and turns and double-crosses that kept me guessing to the end.

The Prince and the Player (Prince Pact #1) – Nora Phoenix
Tore is a European Prince masquerading as a regular college student, and Farron is actually a regular college student. One who has a hard time accepting the obviously rich and privileged Tore onto the football (soccer) team. So they keep going head-to-head, even though Tore’s rather baffled about why Farron seems to hate him so much. And then, because we all know there’s a fine line between love and hate… What’s not to like? (And I say that as someone with zero interest in football.)

June’s four star reads:

Kill Joy (A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder #0.5) – Holly Jackson
Having read the main three books in the series I then discovered this short prequel so of course I had to read it as well. Pip showcases her critical thinking skills as she and her friends take part in a murder mystery evening. This was fun – more light-hearted than the main books as nobody actually died – and I liked Pip’s answer better than the supposed real one.

How to Bite Your Neighbor and Win a Wager (Guides for Dating Vampires #1) – DN Bryn
In a world where vampires generally pay for blood poor ones, like Vincent, go hungry. His solution is to feed off sleeping humans here and there. His latest meal is Wesley, who just happens to need a vampire as bait so he can get into the lab which was responsible for the death of his mother. So he does the obvious sensible thing. He offers his blood to Vincent and plans to betray him later. Only Wesley’s actually really nice (for a vampire) and it gets harder and harder for Wes to plan to sacrifice him when he’s already falling for him. This was fun but a bit slow at times as everyone had a lot of guilty feelings they needed to think over.

Bookshops and Bonedust (Legends and Lattes #0) Travis Baldree
Set before Viv opens her coffee shop in Legends and Lattes. Viv is injured and her crew dumps her in Murk to recover. There she discovers a bookshop in need of an overhaul and a love of reading. Definitely a cosy fantasy though there was a baddie in need of dealing with too.

Blue Genes (Kate Brannigan #5) – Val McDermid
Infuriatingly the 2 in 1 collection of books 4 & 5 in the series had the books in the wrong order. So I read 5 – which had minor spoilers for 4 in it – first. As always Kate has a lot on her plate. One, investigating the death of a fertility doctor who has been practicing under another doctor’s name. Two, catching a gang of fraudsters pretending to sell people quality gravestones. Three, finding out who’s ruining gigs for a band new to the city. It’s surprising which one of these turns out to be the deadliest.

Clean Break (Kate Brannigan #4) – Val McDermid
Kate’s off on a jaunt through Europe as she tracks down some very skilled art thieves. Complicated by the fact that Richard (her non-PI boyfriend) has followed her and is trying to help. If that’s not enough, she’s also on the trail of industrial sabotage of cleaning products which has left two people dead.

Death Comes to Marlow (Marlow Murders #2) – Robert Thorogood
Judith gets a strange phone call, inviting her to a party of a man she’s never met, and who references her experience in solving murders. When he dies at the party of course Judith gets involved and brings her friends Becks and Suzie along to help. While I definitely didn’t solve this, I had some ideas which seemed to escape the detectives (both professional and amateur) which turned out to be right.

The Reptile Room (A Series of Unfortunate Events #2) – Lemony Snicket
As the series name suggests things don’t get any better for the Baudelaires. They are sent off to live with herpetologist Montgomery Montgomery who they love, but who ends up dead at the fangs of the Incredibly Deadly Viper. But also at Uncle Monty’s house is his new assistant Stephano who bears a striking resemblance to Count Olaf…

Northanger Abbey – Jane Austen
Finally – a Jane Austen book I actually really enjoyed. Catherine is fun and doesn’t take things too seriously. In fact, she lets her book-fuelled imagination run away with her when she’s invited to stay at the gothic Northanger Abbey.

Prince Material (Prince Pact #2) – Nora Phoenix
Another undercover European Prince (the princes are friends hence the ‘pact’ in the title between them all to have one year living as normal people) goes to college in America. Floris is escaping a bit of a scandal and had intended to keep his head down and study, but his roommate is distractingly cute. This was a very sweet friends-to-lovers story.

The Prince’s Playbook (Prince Pact #3) – Nora Phoenix
Having loved books one and two of course I went straight on to read number three, and I’m avidly waiting for book four which is out later this month. Prince number three is Nils who has decided to spend his year in America coaching college ice hockey. Specifically Adan, who has a chance of going pro. I’m not usually a fan of power imbalance romances but the age gap here was small and it was written really well.

The Pelican Brief – John Grisham
I made a new list of all the books and authors I’ve always meant to read and haven’t yet. In a nutshell law student Darby Shaw writes a brief suggesting who is responsible for the murder of two supreme court justices, and within days someone is trying to kill her. The White House, the press and the FBI are all involved and she doesn’t know who to trust. I found this frustrating at times as Grisham managed to have about twenty different character POVs (only one of them female) and consistently started sections or chapters with ‘He did this and he did that,’ without any real context or clues as to who the mysterious he was. I found it slow going to begin with, but it did get much pacier and intriguing as it went on.

Highland Getaway – Amber Eve
Rosie is looking to escape her disaster of a life, so when she gets an invite to be an influencer at a highland hotel which is just about to open, she jumps at the chance. Only, the invitation was meant for another Rosie, and she knows it. And not long after arriving everyone else does too. Very fun, though I did guess the twist.

June’s three star reads:

Generation Hex (Moonshadow Cove #3) – Molly Harper
The grand finale of the story about the ghost trapping sisters of Moonshadow Cove. The first two books hinted that oldest sister Perry would fall for James, their contact at the Red Jasper Society (who police witches). And she does. Honestly, I tuned out a bunch of times as despite the build-up to the big battle against the Seaworths it seemed to take ages for anything to happen. Even the girls ganging up with the trio from Shadow House couldn’t bump this up to four stars.

Blueberries for Sal – Robert McCloskey
This is one of those quintessential picture books for kids (if you’re reading American lists that is). Obviously, I am not the target audience but honestly, it was sort of dull. And also, silly.

The Undetectables (The Undetectables #1) – Courtenay Smith
I wanted to like this tale of three girls and their ghost friend who is permanently stuck in a cat costume. But they spent way more time whining about how they didn’t know who the murderer was and how to find out than they did actually investigating. And I worked out who it was before they did.

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June’s two star reads

Five Get Into Trouble the graphic Novel – Beja & Natael
I’ve already reviewed this so enough said.

You Can’t Scare Me (Goosebumps #15) – RL Stine
I decided to read one I hadn’t read before, but then found that I had logged this one as read. Yet it didn’t seem at all familiar – or it could have been that it was so forgettable? Kids try to scare other kid who never falls for it, then they all get scared at the end. If you’re going to make a story supernatural don’t throw it in almost as an afterthought.

June’s one star reads

Thankfully none.

Not yet rated, as I didn’t finish them in June:

• The Tiny Magic Bookshop (Tiny Magic Series #1) -August Bloom
• The Rilloby Fair Mystery
• Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde – RL Stevenson

What I watched

• A few episodes of the Simpsons and Richard Osman’s House of Games
• Red, White and Royal Blue (for the second time)

What I did

• Brodie and I completed a new Lego jigsaw together
• I finished my library model and even got the lighting all wired up and working
• We had a daytime watch-along of Scotland’s first world cup match where I read my book instead of watching the game, followed by Irn Bru floats
• Went for a walk and lunch in Tayport and fed the ducks and swans
• Visited the botanic gardens which have been slated for closure thanks to the university’s atrocious management of their finances
• Celebrated 150 years of Brodie’s school being open

How was your June?

*Books About Bookshops and Libraries