Top Ten Tuesday #195

Hi all! I hope you’ve all had a good week since I last did one of these, Uni is well and truly back in swing now, and as well as making more progress on my project proposal, I’ve finished the second round of revisions for my novel and sent them back to my critique partner and made more progress on the sequel, so I’m feeling pretty good about what I’ve accomplished so far. I’m also heading out to the New Voices Roadshow event in Edinburgh tonight, and I’m super excited as I had a great time last year and this year, my friend Nicola is coming with me, which should be great!

Anyway, since it’s Tuesday, I have another Top Ten Tuesday for you all, courtesy of Jana over at That Artsy Reader Girl. This week we’re talking all about the 2018 releases we need to catch up on and WHOA BOY, I have A LOT. I actually did really well on 2018 releases last year, almost half of the books I read last year were new releases, but of course there are so many new books out every year that I have plenty still to catch up on. Here are the ones I need to get to most urgently:

1. Vengeful-VE Schwab

I KNOW. I KNOW. I got the book the week of it’s release, I was super excited, I had just finished Vicious and I really should have just dived in, but I didn’t and now it still sits languishing on my shelves. Vengeful is a number one priority for 2019 though, and since VE Schwab isn’t publishing much new stuff this year, I figure that will give me time to catch up on this mammoth.

2. Not Even Bones-Rebecca Schaeffer

I was so excited about this one last year, but just didn’t find the time to squeeze it in. I’m hoping that this year however, I will finally get the chance to enjoy all of Nita’s monsterly adventures, I love a good villain book and this one sounds perfect.

3. The Guilty Feminist-Deborah Frances-White

I’ve briefly mentioned The Guilty Feminist podcast before on this blog, but now I have The Guilty Feminist book to enjoy. I kind of put it on the backburner last year, because obviously fiction is higher priority for me than non-fiction but since I’m trying to change that somewhat this year, I’m definitely going to attempt to squeeze this book into my reading life in 2019.

4. Thunderhead-Neal Shusterman

I really enjoyed Scythe when I read it in 2017, but I put off reading Thunderhead simply because it’s on the longer side (over 500 pages is on the longer side for me, OK!) and I just didn’t have the chance to get to it over the summer last year. I’m hoping to change that this year though, but I might not remember everything from Scythe, it’s been so long!

5. City of Ghosts-VE Schwab

I really have no excuse for this one, it’s very short, I could have easily squeezed it in last year, but I didn’t and that’s totally on me. I’m hoping to finish it before the sequel Tunnel of Bones comes out this year though.

6. To Kill a Kingdom-Alexandra Christo

This one’s going to be my March TBR book, and I’m super excited for it because my friend Hannah loved it which is pretty much an automatic indicator that I will too, since our taste in books is incredibly similar. I’ve actually yet to hear a bad thing about it, so I’m hoping that means I will love it as much everyone else does.

7. Reign of The Fallen-Sarah Glenn Marsh

This is another of my TBR books, so I will definitely be getting to it this year, but probably not until later in the year. This book sounds so amazing, bisexual necromancers? YES PLEASE.

8. Becoming-Michelle Obama

I got this book from my mum for Christmas (well done mum!) and obviously I’m dying to read it, because it’s Michelle Obama, of course it’s going to be amazing. This one is quite high priority for me, since I need to finish it by Easter so my mum can borrow it!

9. Grace & Fury-Tracy Banghart

Again, I probably should have been able to fit this in last year, but I just didn’t. I love the sound of this one, a feminist fantasy all about sisters? Did you ever hear a more Jo book in your life, I don’t think so!

10. The Tattooist of Auschwitz-Heather Morris

Just when I think I’m getting tired of WWII stories, another one pops up that sounds really interesting. This book is based on the true story of Lale Sokolov, the real life prisoner who acted as the tattooist at Auschwitz prison, marking the prisoners with their numbers as they came in. I have heard some iffy things about the historical accuracy of this book, but it still sounds interesting, so I’m willing to give it a chance.

11. The Surface Breaks-Louise O’Neill

Last year was a great year for mermaid books, unfortunately I missed most of them! Anyway, this is Louise O’Neill’s retelling of The Little Mermaid and I’m super excited for it because knowing her, it’s going to be super feminist and just all around brilliant.

12. Hamilton and Peggy: A Revolutionary Friendship!-LM Elliott

I’m going to be reading this next month, as part of my Hamilmonth preparations (ie books I’m reading before going to see Hamilton at the end of February), and I’m really excited because there aren’t many books that focus on Hamilton and Peggy, it’s usually Hamilton and Eliza (though I do have one of those too).

13. Catwoman: Soulstealer-Sarah J Maas

I’m a little apprehensive about this one, as I’m not a massive superhero lover and I didn’t do too well with Wonder Woman, but I’m hoping Sarah J Maas will work her magic once more and I’ll fall in love with her version of Catwoman, also I’m very interested to see how she tackles a standalone, since I’ve only read series from her before.

14. Bygone Badass Broads: 52 Forgotten Women Who Changed The World-Mackenzi Lee

Given that I’m a history nerd, and especially love learning about women that mainstream history kind of forgot, this book is totally perfect for me and I cannot wait to dive in and see which women Mackenzi Lee chose for her book.

15. City of Brass-S.A. Chakroborty

Honestly, I am terrible because I won an ARC of this in a giveaway two years ago, and I really should have read it by now, but it’s quite a chunky book and I just haven’t had the time. Hopefully this year will finally be the year that I tackle this beast.

16. A Court of Frost and Starlight-Sarah J Maas

Honestly, I’m not sure if I’ll read this one before the year is over, because I haven’t read A Court of Wings and Ruin yet and I already have one behemoth from Maas to finish (Kingdom of Ash), so I’m not sure if I can handle ACOWAR and this on top of that. Still, I guess we’ll see!

So there we go, those are the books I missed out on in 2018, most of which I’m hoping I will have finished by the end of this year, though that might be a little optimistic! Have you read any of these? Did you like them? Which ones should I push to the top of my TBR? Let me know in the comments!

I will be back next week with a new TTT, this time we’ll be talking about the Ten Most Recent Additions To My TBR list. In the meantime, since I’m going to the New Voices event tonight, you can expect a recap of that up on the blog sometime in the next week.