#RockMyTBR July Update (2020)

Hi everyone! I hope you’re all still doing well and enjoying the things that we are now allowed to do in a safe way.

For anyone who’s new to my blog, the #RockMyTBR Challenge, is a challenge originated by Sarah K at The YA Book Traveler, which I’ve kind of adopted for myself over the past few years. The challenge is pretty simple, you pick a list of backlist books from your TBR (ie books not published in the year that you’re reading them) and read them over the course of a year. I always pick 12, a book for each month and then every month I post an update of all the books I’ve been reading. In July, I read 3 books, slightly less than I have been reading since lockdown started in March, but two of them were over 500 pages and 3 is pretty standard for me on a normal year. Here’s what I read:

Girl Serpent Thorn by Melissa Bashardoust:

My Netgalley read for July, and thankfully I enjoyed it more than Girls Made of Snow and Glass! It’s definitely one of the more unique fairytales I’ve read, being based largely off Persian mythology but it was still quite slow in places and I wasn’t massively attached to the characters. I read this one from 12th June-11th July. Here is my review of it:

https://jjbookblog.wordpress.com/2020/07/13/girl-serpent-thorn-review-e-arc/

King of Scars (Nikolai Duology #1) by Leigh Bardugo:

My #RockMyTBR read for July. I have to admit I didn’t love this one as much as I expected to, I loved the characters but it was quite a slow paced book and Nikolai and Zoya’s story didn’t really seem to mesh well with Nina’s. I read this one from 27th June-14th July. Here is my review of it:

https://jjbookblog.wordpress.com/2020/07/20/king-of-scars-nikolai-duology-1-review/

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (The Hunger Games #0) by Suzanne Collins:

The prequel to The Hunger Games was one of my most anticipated releases of the year, and though I did enjoy it, I didn’t love it as much as I was expecting to. Though it was interesting to see what Panem was like just after the war, and to learn about the early days of The Hunger Games, it was very slow going and not as exciting as the original trilogy. I read this one from 15th-31st July. Here is my review of it:

https://jjbookblog.wordpress.com/2020/08/06/the-ballad-of-songbirds-and-snakes-review/

So that’s what I read in July, here’s what I’ve got coming up in August:

The Dead Queens Club-Hannah Capin

My August #RockMyTBR book, I’m a little bit over halfway through now and I’m really enjoying it. I love all the Tudor references, they’re making my Tudor nerd heart very happy and it’s a lot pacier than some of the other books I’ve been reading this year, so I’ve been getting through it a lot quicker.

The Court of Miracles-Kester Grant

My Netgalley read from last month that I just need to finish. Honestly I’ve struggled a lot with this one, it wasn’t quite what I expected and I really struggled with it, so I’m mostly just wanting to be done with it and move on now.

The Empire of Gold-SA Chakraborty

My audiobook from last month, that again, I just need to finish. I’m almost there, I’ve got about 12 chapters left to go, so I should be done by next week hopefully? I’ve enjoyed this but it’s definitely been a chunk of a book, I’m looking forward to reading some shorter audios after doing The Kingdom of Copper and The Empire of Gold back to back!

Not Even Bones-Rebecca Schaeffer

My August PIFM read for the YA Addicted Book Club I’m in on Goodreads. I’m really excited for this one, I’ve been wanting to read it for ages so I’m hoping that it lives up to my expectations.

Cinderella Is Dead-Kalynn Baron

My Netgalley read for this month, I’ve been hearing a lot of good stuff about this one so I’m hoping it lives up to the hype. I’m not usually a Cinderella girl, it’s not one of the fairytales that I’m particularly keen on but the fact that this is a black LGBTQIA+ retelling definitely makes it more intriguing to me.

Sightwitch-Susan Dennard

My audiobook read for this month, it’s a pretty short one so just what I need after finishing the Daevabad trilogy. I don’t always bother with novellas but apparently there’s stuff in this that’s important for Bloodwitch, so I’m going to give it a try.

Yet another ambitious TBR but since a couple of them are hangovers from last month that I don’t have much left to read of, I think it’s still pretty achievable. What have you guys read this month? Anyone else been reading a lot of chunky books recently? How is your Goodreads Challenge going? I’m on 28 out of 40 books and I’m still 5 books ahead of schedule so I’m feeling pretty confident that I’m going to smash my challenge this year! Let me know in the comments how you guys are getting on!