I’ve been chunking my down through the mass of books I’ve received for various things. I thought I was making a dent, but then the Hugo Award Nominations list came out this week and well, never mind that idea. I’m attending Worldcon this year (it’s in Seattle) so I’m eligible to vote on the Hugos. And I will. I’ll get a packet of electronic versions of most of the nominees, and I already have some, and I’ve already read some. I’m really looking forward to the podcasts of the nominated short works because those were excellent last year. But it does mean more books. It’s a good thing I mostly get ebooks, otherwise my house would fall in!

This week’s prettiest covers look like A Fellowship of Librarians and Dragons – because how could a combo of those two things go wrong? – The Passengers on the Hankyu Line and The Wind Weaver. The books I’m most curious about are Felix Grey and the Descendant and A Gentleman’s Murder. The books I absolutely picked up for the titles are Cosmic Love at the Multiverse Hair Salon and How to Have a Killer Time in D.C.. the  two I’m most looking forward to reading are Single Player and, no surprise here,  A Fellowship of Librarians and Dragons.

What’s new on your stack this week?

For Review:
Broken Country by Clare Leslie Hall
Cosmic Love at the Multiverse Hair Salon by Annie Mare
Counting Backwards by Binnie Kirshenbaum
Deep End by Ali Hazelwood (ebook + audio)
Early Thirties by Josh Duboff
The Eights by Joanna Miller
Felix Grey and the Descendant by Mario Theodorou
A Fellowship of Librarians and Dragons (Adenashire #2) by J. Penner
Francine’s Spectacular Crash and Burn by Renee Swindle
A Gentleman’s Murder (Eric Peterkin #1) by Christopher Huang
The Ghostwriter by Julie Clark
Gold Coast Dilemma by Nana Malone
How to Have a Killer Time in D.C. (Oliver Popp’s Travel Guides to Murder #1) by Sam Lumley
The Influencers by Anna-Marie McLemore
The Listeners by Maggie Stiefvater
Parents Weekend by Alex Finlay
The Passengers on the Hankyu Line by Hiro Arikawa, translated by Allison Markin Powell
Shroud by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Single Player by Tara Tai
The Unworthy by Agustina Bazterrica, translated by Sarah Moses
The Wind Weaver (Reign of Remnants #1) by Julie Johnson

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I certainly have an interesting assortment of books this week. At least, an assortment of book covers. The proof of the interesting-ness of the books, of course, is in the reading.

The prettiest covers this week look like A Fate Forged in Fire, My Demon Hunter, and Original Sinner. The books I’m most looking forward to are All Superheroes Need PR and The Stand-in Dad. I would have included Trap Line, but I finished that earlier in the week and reviewed it. I needed a bit of a reading pick-me-up to get me out of a bit of a slump, and that story was JUST RIGHT.

The book I’m most curious about this time around is Head Cases, and the two I absolutely picked up for their titles are The Grimoire Grammar School Parent Teacher Association and My Father Always Finds Corpses because WOW those set up some interesting possibilities.

What fascinating covers – and titles – are in your stack this week?

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For Review:
Abigail and Alexa Save the Wedding by Lian Dolan
All Superheroes Need PR (Supers in the City #1) by Elizabeth Stephens
Along Came Amor (Primas of Power #3) by Alexis Daria
Consider Yourself Kissed by Jessica Stanley
Detective Aunty (Kausar Khan Investigates #1) by Uzma Jalaluddin
A Fate Forged in Fire (Bonded to Beasts #1) by Hazel McBride
The Grimoire Grammar School Parent Teacher Association by Caitlin Rozakis
Head Cases (PAR Unit #1) by John McMahon
Isola by Allegra Goodman
The Matchmaker by Aisha Saeed
My Demon Hunter (Hell Bent #2) by Aurora Ascher
My Father Always Finds Corpses by Lee Hollis
Not So Fast by Karen Booth
One Death at a Time by Abbi Waxman
Original Sinner (Original Sinners #1) by Kait Ballenger
Something Cheeky by Thien-Kim Lam
The Stand-in Dad by Alex Summers
The Summer Guests (Martini Club #2) by Tess Gerritsen
Tell Them You Lied by Laura Leffler

Purchased from Amazon/Audible/Etc.:

Trap Line by Timothy Zahn (ebook + audio)

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First, biggest and most important thing – even bigger than this stack – is that tomorrow begins Reading Reality’s OMG 14th Annual Blogo-Birthday Celebration Week! The first post on Reading Reality occurred on April 4, 2011, and my own birthday is the following day, April 5, hence Blogo-Birthday. There will be giveaways every single day starting tomorrow, so please be sure to visit every day to see what’s happening.

And now back to our regularly scheduled stack o’ books!

This week does have some pretty covers, doesn’t it? My personal faves this time around are The Glass Garden, Last Twilight in Paris and Where the Rivers Merge. The creepy cover awards definitely go to Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng, Kiss of the Basilisk and Motheater. What I have a LOT of this time around are cute covers, particularly but not limited to Just Our Luck, Maine Characters and Temple of Swoon. The books I’m most curious about are The Case of the Missing Maid and A Trinket for the Taking. I feel a mystery mood coming on!

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For Review:
Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker
Can’t Get Enough (Skyland #3) by Kennedy Ryan
The Case of the Missing Maid (Harriet Morrow Investigates #1) by Rob Osler
Close Your Eyes and Count to 10 by Lisa Unger
The Country Under Heaven by Frederic S. Durbin
The Dark Maestro by Brendan Slocumb
Death on the Island by Eliza Reid
The Filling Station by Vanessa Miller
Freakslaw by Jane Flett
The Glass Garden by Jessica Levai
The Griffin Sisters’ Greatest Hits by Jennifer Weiner
Home and Away by Rochelle Alers
Immaculate Conception by Ling Ling Huang
Just Our Luck by Denise Williams
The Kennedy Girl by Julia Bryan Thomas
Kiss of the Basilisk (Split or Swallow #1) by Lindsay Straube
Last Twilight in Paris by Pam Jenoff
Loose Lips (Ghostwriter #2) by Kemper Donovan
Maine Characters by Hannah Orenstein
Motheater by Linda H. Codega
North (Hunter Squad #2) by Anna Hackett
Rooms for Vanishing by Stuart Nadler
Run for the Hills by Kevin Wilson
Sleep by Honor Jones
Temple of Swoon by Jo Segura
A Trinket for the Taking (Magical Trinket #1) by Victoria Laurie
Where the Rivers Merge by Mary Alice Monroe

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This bunch sure is interesting, isn’t it? The one that jumps out at me is The Malice of Moons and Mages. There’s something about the way the greens are so very gemlike and/or shiny even in the typography that just snares my attention. I don’t think it’s spectacular in any way, but it’s simplicity is just done really, really well.

I think the two prettiest covers are The Bane Witch and For Whom the Belle Tolls. I also confess that I adore the pun of Belle. The book I’m the most curious is A Bloomy Head because I’m, well, curious about a romance featuring Regency era cheesemakers. And that hand-drawn cover did draw my attention.

The one I picked for the title is Disco Witches of Fire Island. The description looks interesting, but it’s that title that got my attention first!

What’s new on your shelf this week? What are you most looking for to?

For Review:
Advent (Exlian Syndrome #1) by Seth Ring
The Bane Witch by Ava Morgyn
Blood on Her Tongue by Johanna van Veen
A Bloomy Head (Regency Cheesemakers #1) by J. Winifred Butterworth
Charming Devil (Gilded Monsters #2) by Rebecca Kenney
Disco Witches of Fire Island by Blair Fell
The Divine Flesh by Drew Huff
Drop Dead by Lily Chu
For Whom the Belle Tolls (Hell’s Belles #1) by Jaysea Lynn
Gothictown by Emily Carpenter
Home of the American Circus by Allison Larkin
The Keeper of Lonely Spirits by E.M. Anderson
Kiss Me, Maybe by Gabriella Gamez
L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future Volume 41 edited by Jody Lynn Nye
The Malice of Moons and Mages (Broken Bonds of Magic #1) by N.V. Haskell
The Manual for Good Wives by Lola Jaye
The Missing Half by Ashley Flowers with Alex Kiester
Modern Divination (Spells for Life and Death #1) by Isa Agajanian
My Inconvenient Duke (Difficult Dukes #3) by Loretta Chase
Passing Through a Prairie Country by Dennis E. Staples
The Perfect Stranger by Brian Pinkerton
Pomona Afton Can So Solve a Murder by Bellamy Rose
Senseless by Ronald Malfi
Shopgirls by Jessica Anya Blau
The Shots You Take by Rachel Reid
This Book Will Bury Me by Ashley Winstead
What is Wrong with You? by Paul Rudnick
Woodworking by Emily St. James

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While spring may not have officially sprung where you are, it certainly has around here. At least this week. Next week could be wintry again. As a great writer once said, “Climate is what you expect. Weather is what you GET.” Truer words…

In this week’s stack, I clearly have more than a few gems – even if they don’t turn out to be the ones that I think will be going in.

The prettiest covers here, IMHO, are When the Tides Held the Moon, The Gods Time Forgot, and A Dagger of Lightning. Have I ever mentioned that blue is my favorite color? You might have guessed.

Down in the Sea of Angels is doubly highlighted this week, as it also belongs on that ‘pretty cover’ list AND is the book I’m most looking forward to. I adored the author’s The Circus Infinite a few years back so I have really high hopes for this one!

And then there’s the one I picked up purely for the title. If you can’t guess, it’s I See You’ve Called in Dead because damn I’ve been tempted a time or two myself, and it wouldn’t surprise me at all to learn that every person who has EVER had a day job of any kind has also felt that temptation a few (dozen or hundred) times over the course of any number of jobs. What about you?

For Review:
A Dagger of Lightning by Meredith R. Lyons
The Death of Us by Abigail Dean
Death Upon a Star (Evelyn Galloway #1) by Amy Patricia Meade
Down in the Sea of Angels by Khan Wong
The Ephemera Collector by Stacy Nathaniel Jackson
Firebird (Fire That Binds #1) by Juliette Cross
Flirting Lessons by Jasmine Guillory
Fun for the Whole Family by Jennifer E. Smith
Gifted & Talented by Olivia Blake
Glitter in the Dark by Olesya Lyuzna
The Gods Time Forgot by Kelsie Sheridan Gonzalez
Hardly a Gentleman (Accidental Brides #2) by Eloisa James
Hero by Katie Buckley
House of Blight (Threadmender Chronicles #1) by Maxym M. Martineau
I See You’ve Called in Dead by John Kenney
The Imagined Life by Andrew Porter
Julie Chan is Dead by Liann Zhang
The Last Session by Julia Bartz
The Maid’s Secret (Molly the Maid #3) by Nita Prose
Nowhere by Allison Gunn
Pictures of You by Emma Grey
Polybius by Collin Armstrong
The Pretender by Jo Harkin
The Raven Scholar (Eternal Path #1) by Antonia Hodgson
Say You’ll Remember Me by Abby Jimenez
Some Like It Scot by Pepper Basham
The Staircase in the Woods by Chuck Wendig
Sweet Obsession (Dark Olympus #8) by Katee Robert
Swept Away by Beth O’Leary
Terrestrial History by Joe Mungo Reed
When the Harvest Comes by Denne Michele Norris
When the Tides Held the Moon by Venessa Vida Kelley

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So many books, so little time! Forever and ever, AMEN!

The prettiest covers in this week’s stack are the blues. Or they have the blues. Or a bit of both, come to think of it. I’m referring specifically to The Jewel of the Blues, Malinalli, North is the Night and A Stirring from the Depths. The one I’m most tempted by just because of the cover, is Interstellar Megachef. Because that donut looks mouthwatering. The one I’m really curious about is The Last Hamilton, partly because I just finished The Girl from Greenwich Street about Alexander Hamilton, but mostly because I’m wondering why someone being the very last of those particular Hamiltons would be so fascinating as to generate a thriller. We’ll certainly see!

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For Review:
All the Missing Pieces by Catherine Cowles
All the Other Mothers Hate Me by Sarah Harman
The Antidote by Karen Russell
Back After This by Linda Holmes
Beartooth by Callan Wink
Big Breath In by John Straley
Claire, Darling by Callie Kazumi
Clever Little Thing by Helena Echlin
The Close Up by Pip Drysdale
Count My Lies by Sophie Stava
Cross My Heart by Megan Collins
The Devil’s Charm (Heirs & Spares #1) by Megan Frampton
A Girl Like Us by Anna Sophia McLoughlin
Hot Air by Marcy Dermansky
Interstellar Megachef (Flavour Hacker #1) by Lavanya Lakshminarayan
The Jewel of the Blues by Monica Chenault-Kilgore
The Last Hamilton by Jenn Bregman
Malinalli by Veronica Chapa
North is the Night (Tuonela Duet #1) by Emily Rath
The Other People by C.B. Everett
Pick Up by Nora Dahlia
Rose of Jericho by Alex Grecian
Saint of the Narrows Street by William Boyle
The Serpent and the Wolf (Dark Inheritance #1) by Rebecca Robinson
A Stirring from the Depths by Kait Waterhouse
Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One by Kristen Arnett
Tell Me What You Did by Carter Wilson
The Three Lives of Cate Kay by Kate Fagan
We Lived on the Horizon by Erika Swyler
We Would Never by Tova Mirvis
Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy
Yeonnam-Dong’s Smiley Laundromat by Kim Jiyun

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“Another month ends. All targets met. All systems working. All customers satisfied. All staff eager and enthusiastic. All pigs fed and ready to fly.”

YUP! Still true, sarcasm and all.

Also YUP I have too many books, a condition that is likely to continue for a while yet. My favorite title out of this week’s stack is Nothing But Murders and Bloodshed and Hanging by Mary Fortune, because really, doesn’t that sum up a whole lot of the mystery and thriller genres – especially with the author’s last name as a bit of icing on the bloody cake?

For Review:
33 Place Brugmann by Alice Austen
Barbara by Joni Murphy
Blood Beneath the Snow (Blood & Souls #1) by Alexandra Kennington
Boy by Nicole Galland
The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones
Club Contango (Tracerverse #2) by Eliane Boey
Deep Cuts by Holly Brickley
Dissolution by Nicholas Binge
The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami
Exquisite Ruin (Labyrinth #1) by AdriAnne May
Fake It Like You Mean It by Megan Murphy
Fan Service by Rosie Danan
A Forty Year Kiss by Nickolas Butler
Galaxy Raiders: Abyss (Galaxy Raiders #1) by Ian Douglas
A Gentleman’s Gentleman by TJ Alexander
Homegrown Magic by Jamie Pacton and Rebecca Podos
I Leave It Up to You by Jinwoo Chong
The Jackal’s Mistress by Chris Bohjalian
Jameson (Hunter Squad #1) by Anna Hackett
The King’s Messenger by Susanna Kearsley
Lucky Night by Eliza Kennedy
Nothing But Murders and Bloodshed and Hanging by Mary Fortune
Nothing Serious by Emily J. Smith
Once Was Willem by M.R. Carey
One Good Thing by Georgia Hunter
Our Infinite Fates by Laura Steven
The Paris Express by Emma Donoghue
rekt by Alex Gonzalez
Saltwater by Katy Hays
The Savage, Noble Death of Babs Dionne by Ron Currie
Two Truths and a Lie by Cory O’Brien
The Witch who Trades with Death by C.M. Alongi
You Deserve to Know by Aggie Blum Thompson

If you want to find out more about Stacking The Shelves, please visit the official launch page

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The two biggest categories in this week’s stack are ‘pretty’ and ‘pretty creepy’, with some bleed over between the two as there are a few with pretty covers and creepy descriptions. I’m thinking particularly of The Moonlight Healers, as the cover IS pretty but the description makes me wonder A LOT what that pretty flower really is! The Prince’s Heart, on that other hand is just plain pretty, while Something in the Walls is definitely creepy!

I’ve been thinking creepy thoughts this week because I’ve come down with the creeping crud, otherwise known as a terrible cold. So I’ve been kind of creeping around the house, leaving a trail of empty cough drop wrappers in my wake. The cats, however have decided that (a) the wrappers make fun toys, (b) I need their nursemaid attention and (c) I make an extra, extra warm cuddle buddy. So I’m well taken care of. Until I’m, well, well.

For Review:
The Adjudicator by Susan Daitch
The Black Orb by Ewhan Kim
The Crimson Road by A.G. Slatter
Enemy of My Dreams by Jenny Williamson
Famous Last Words by Gillian McAllister
Future’s Edge by Gareth L. Powell
The Inheritance by Trisha Sakhlecha
Level: Unknown by David Dalglish
The Moonlight Healers by Elizabeth Becker
The Outsider by Jane Casey
The Prince’s Heart by Ben Chalfin
Something in the Walls by Daisy Pearce
Strange Pictures by Uketsu, translated by Jim Rion
Supersonic by Thomas Kohnstamm
A Tropical Rebel Gets the Duke (Las Leonas #3) by Adriana Herrera
Wake Up and Open Your Eyes by Clay McLeod Chapman
We Are Watching by Alison Gaylin

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This is, well, this is a lot. And it’s only the beginning of a deluge that probably won’t taper off much until fall. And some of you are probably wondering if I’ve lost my mind, wondering when I’m going to manage to read all of these, or both. Most likely both.

Consider this the annual posting of the disclaimers, of which there are basically two.

First, I am (again) on a book awards committee for the American Library Association. This year it’s The Reading List, which selects the best books of the year for adult fiction in eight genres, Adrenaline (read as thriller), Fantasy, Historical Fiction, Horror, Mystery, Relationship Fiction (AKA Women’s Fiction), Romance and Science Fiction. A significant portion of the books I’ll be picking up for the rest of the year are FOR the committee. I never say which ones, and it’s more difficult to tell with this particular committee as it’s the kind of stuff I read anyway. I probably won’t even mention the committee again by name until next January when our deliberations are done, dusted and distributed.

While it’s particularly germane right now because of the size of this stack and the stacks to come, I (a) don’t have to read all the books the committee requests. There’s a winnowing process that condenses the already ginormous number into a semi-manageable mass. Which leads to (b), that even without whatever committee I happen to be on, in the end – for very long definitions of end – I only read about half of what I receive. Some books turn out not to be for me. Sometimes it’s the right book at the wrong time and I pick them up again later, and sometimes that’s it for always. And sometimes the ’round tuit’ just doesn’t come around. This is part of what makes ebooks so marvelous. If I had this many physical books coming in, my house would have fallen in a LONG time ago!

For Review:
An Age of Winters by Gemma Liviero (ebook and audio)
At Dark, I Become Loathsome by Eric LaRocca
Bitter Passage by Colin Mills (ebook and audio)
ChloroPhilia by Cristina Jurado, translated by Sue Burke
The Crash by Freida McFadden
Crush by Ada Calhoun
Eleanore of Avignon by Elizabeth DeLozier
The Family Inside by Katie Garner
The Garden by Nick Newman
Hungerstone by Kat Dunn
Immortal (Celestial Kingdom) by Sue Lynn Tan
The Legend of Meneka (Divine Dancers #1) by Kritika H. Rao
The Lotus Shoes by Jane Yang
The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley
The National Telepathy by Roque Larraquy, translated by Frank Wynne
One Message Remains by Premee Mohamed
The Relationship Mechanic (Peach Blossom #2) by Karmen Lee
The Shiver Tree by Holly Searcy
The Starlight Heir by Amalie Howard
The Strange Case of Jane O. by Karen Thompson Walker
A Tiny Piece of Blue by Charlotte Whitney
Trust Issues by Elizabeth McCullough Keenan and Greg Wands
Untethered by Angela Jackson-Brown
Variation by Rebecca Yarros (ebook and audio)
A Very Bad Thing by J.T. Ellison (ebook and audio)
We All Live Here by Jojo Moyes

If you want to find out more about Stacking The Shelves, please visit the official launch page

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