Literature: July Books

Instead of writing individual reviews for all the books I have read, I am just going to condense them into what I have read each month.

At the beginning of 2019, I set myself the task on Goodreads to read 120 books this year, which means I need to read about 2 a week. Between January and June, I managed to read 70 books.  And throughout the past month due to being sick and off work for a couple of weeks I managed to read 26 books which bring me up to 96 books.

Because I have read 26 I have decided this time just to list the books under the genres instead of unpacking them at the end.

So here goes:

Christian

• Safely Home by Randy Alcorn
• James for You by Sam Allberry
• 5 Things to Pray for Your Church by Rachel Jones
• Happiness by J.C Ryle

Fiction

• Elizabeth is Missing by Emma Healey

Crime / Thriller

• Big Sky by Kate Atkinson
• The Delicate Storm by Giles Blunt
• Black Fly Season by Giles Blunt
• Good and Valuable Consideration by Lee Child & Joseph Finder
• Cleaning the Gold by Lee Child & Karin Slaughter
• Faking the Murderer by Lee Child & Kathy Reichs
• The Magpies by Mark Edwards
• Murder of the Magpies by Mark Edwards
• The Last of the Magpies by Mark Edwards
• Follow Me Home by Mark Edwards
• Because She Loves Me by Mark Edwards
• The Lost Daughters by Joy Ellis
• The Murderers Son by Joy Ellis
• The Fourth Friend by Joy Ellis
• The Guilty Ones by Joy Ellis
• The Girl in the Spider’s Web by David Lagercrantz
• The Chain by Adrain McKinty

Autobiography

• Stumble to Rise by Gina Whitlock Fletcher
• The Yorkshire Shepherdess by Amanda Owens
• Words Escape Me by Sandy Semple

Non-Fiction

• Spilling the Beans on the Cat’s Pajamas by Judy Parkinson

So as you can see the most read books fall under the Crime genre and some authors have appeared more than once – Giles Blunt, Lee Child, Mark Edwards, and Joy Ellis.

The four books by Joy Ellis are in a series which follows DI Jackman & DS Evans who are part of the Fenland Police. I really enjoyed these books and was drawn to the characters and how all of them within the team just look out for each other as family. They are very well written books and it makes me want to read the other series available by Joy Ellis.

Three of the books by Mark Edwards is in a series - The Magpies, Murder of the Magpies and Last of the Magpies – with the first two being short stories. These are very well written books and revolve around two characters who are having issues with their neighbours who are making their life total misery. On reading this I decided I would be nice to all my neighbours in case they turn out to be like the ones in this series.

Adrian McKinty has written a few books which have a following but he has never had a breakthrough novel until now with The Chain which has been on the Saturday Times Bestseller List for three weeks in a row (so far), and it is being made into a movie. Not bad going for a man from Northern Ireland. And it is an amazing book and I don’t want to give much away about it but just now that for every child kidnapped, another must be taken. Otherwise The Chain will be broken. A must-read book.

Out of the 26 books read this month, one thing is noticeable – there were no children’s books read – and I usually try to read one each month! Just got caught up in the crime wave!!