TSS: April 2011 Reading Wrap-Up

I can hardly believe it’s already May – I’m sure it was Christmas just a week ago! April has been an excellent month with a lot of leisure time. We’ve had an extra bank holiday in the UK for the royal wedding, so I am deep into my second four-day weekend and enjoying it immensely. I think I can speak for everyone when I say that I wish royalty got married more often! It was also quite a lovely wedding. I’ve mainly ignored all the build-up and endless speculation, but found myself glued to the TV when it was happening, as it was almost like watching a real life romance. I had never expected them to look so very much in love, for whatever reason, and I find myself genuinely happy for them and hoping that this marriage actually works out.

Anyway, on to the reading! I have been doing a lot of reading with my free time, as always, plus the Read-a-thon was this month, which added up to a total of 22 books read for this month. I don’t think I’ve read so much in a month since I started working!

Fiction

The Winter Rose, Jennifer Donnelly
These Things Hidden, Heather Gudenkauf
A Marriage of Inconvenience, Susanna Fraser
Howl’s Moving Castle, Diana Wynne Jones
Shades of Milk and Honey, Mary Robinette Kowal
Dreams Underfoot, Charles de Lint
Lady Isabella’s Scandalous Marriage, Jennifer Ashley
Royal Weddings, Stephanie Laurens
Russian Winter, Daphne Kalotay
The Dark Enquiry, Deanna Raybourn
Must Love Hellhounds, Charlaine Harris et al
13 Rue Therese, Elena Mauli Shapiro
If I Stay, Gayle Forman
The Paris Wife, Paula McLain
The Color Purple, Alice Walker
Anne of the Island, L.M. Montgomery
The Four Ms Bradwells, Meg Waite Clayton

Non-fiction

Amo, Amas, Amat, Harry Mount
Heretics, Jonathan Wright
Touching the Void, Joe Simpson
The Bookseller of Kabul, Asne Seierstad
Petite Anglaise, Catherine Sanderson

My favorite non-fiction book for the month is easy – Heretics by Jonathan Wright is the obvious front runner! I’m struggling to choose a fiction favorite, as always, but I loved The Color Purple, If I Stay, The Paris Wife, Howl’s Moving Castle, and Russian Winter.

On the agenda for May, I am planning some book lists – I have never done one before, but with two potential European trips for later this year, I really want to ensure I get some good location based reading in. I’ll be posting about those as and when I make them up. I also have a number of books I’d like to get to: