March 2022 Wrap Up

Hi everyone! Today I’m sharing my wrap up for March, which as far as number of books goes, has been my best reading month so far! I’m very happy to say that I finished 8 books and I can’t remember the last time I was able to do that.

Before we get into the books, let’s talk some stats first! The 8 books I read totaled 2,726 pages, which is pretty good! My average rating was 4.44, and I had four 5 star, one 4.5 star, one 4 star, and two 3.5 star reads, so a pretty good reading month for me. Finally, 5 were audiobooks, 2 were e-books, and 1 was a physical book.

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A Curious Beginning by Deanna Raybourn – ★★★★★
I’m so glad that I decided to start this series, it’s definitely become my ‘guilty pleasure’ series. I’ve been listening to the audiobooks and the narrator is so good! I love the voices she does for most of the characters (except for Veronica’s aunt, but she doesn’t show up too often). Veronica andStoker have such great chemistry, and they make a great team. I did feel bad for Veronica with the events that happen in this book, finally finding out what happened with her parents. I loved how easy it was to follow along with the mystery and you could solve it alongside them, instead of some mysteries where they suddenly know the answer by the end of the book. You’re going to see in the rest of this wrap up that I listened to the first 3 books in this series in March, so a lot of my thoughts will be repeated!

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The City of Dusk by Tara Sim – ★★★★☆.5
This was one of the ARCs that I read in March, and I really enjoyed it! I do have a full review up on my blog if you’re interested in more details, but I loved the characters in this book a lot, especially Taesia and Julian, who I totally ship together. I also really enjoyed reading about Risha because she was a lot different than I expected a necromancer to be, and I think things will be really interesting with Nik’s storyline in the next book. The last 25% or so was super intense, with lots of reveals and an epic battle. The way this book wraps up makes me want the sequel ASAP, and I just can’t even imagine where things will go next.

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A Perilous Undertaking by Deanna Raybourn – ★★★★★
I seriously love this series, and how each book tackles a new mystery but still has an overarching plot across the series as a whole. I know this is fairly common with a lot of different genres, but as a fantasy reader I don’t see this too often in my books so it makes this series so much fun! I still definitely ship Veronica and Stoker together, and there were so many witty lines that I found myself actually laughing, especially with this book as they tackle a case that has connections to a ‘den of iniquity’. I love that we can see more and more of Veronica and Stoker, and the interactions they have with those around them. I wonder how long it will take for this slow burn romance to finally come to a head, but I’ve seen some people say that it does happen eventually!

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Wild and Wicked Things by Francesca May – ★★★☆☆.5
This was the other ARC that I read in March, and it was enjoyable, but not a new favorite. I think that really comes down to the fact that I’m not the biggest fan of The Great Gatsby, and this takes a lot of inspiration from that story. I liked the setting and the magic, and the characters were interesting but it just felt like something was missing. I felt like there were a lot of loose ends, and certain things could’ve been better explored and expanded upon, such as Annie’s father and the war and why it was a magical war. In fact, it took me longer than I would like to admit to realize this is an alternate history kind of book. This book is definitely more of a book that’s about the ~vibes~ that it has, and I think it did hit the nail on the head for a dark and witchy book. If you want to see my full review, check it out here!

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A Treacherous Curse by Deanna Raybourn – ★★★★★
Again, this series is just fantastic and it’s so easy to just go straight into the next book! I still love Veronica and Stoker, and the chemistry they have is great and the slow burn romance is driving me crazy because I just want them to finally acknowledge their feelings! I liked the Egyptian history and archaeology that was included in this installment, and as always, I loved how they solved the mystery! This is quickly becoming a favorite series, and I would love to get physical copies of this series so I can reread them and maybe even annotate them! I’m currently listening to the fourth book, A Dangerous Collaboration, and I’m very excited to see more of Veronica and Stoker, and especially seeing how things work out with Stoker’s brother and his evident interest in Veronica!

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Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America by Ijeoma Oluo – ★★★★★
This is a book that I loved, but it also infuriated me because it just makes everything seem so unfair for women, and especially women of color. I’ve been trying my best this year to read more non-fiction, and I had this one on my list for a while so I’m glad I finally was able to read it. I loved the insights that we got into how society is failing all of us with the way it perpetuates this idea that the white male is the top of the pyramid, because as this book so eloquently points out, they get there just by virtue of being white and male and not through talent or hard work for the most part. Definitely worth the read, and I certainly will be trying out the author’s other book, So You Want to Talk About Race.

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Only a Monster by Vanessa Len – ★★★☆☆.5
The premise of this one was so interesting, with monster families who have a familial magic, but then also all monsters are able to time travel by stealing time off a human’s life. I saw a lot of early praise for this book, and a lot of people said it was pretty dark. Maybe I just read a lot of super dark stuff, but to me this was pretty tame and actually seemed to me to be on the younger side of YA. I did still enjoy this book, and I actually liked that it didn’t end on a cliffhanger so I’ll be interested in seeing where the second book goes, because it definitely left room for a sequel while still wrapping up quite a bit in just this book. I did read through this one quickly, so it was nice to be able to just fly right through a book!

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Comfort Me With Apples by Catherine M Valente – ★★★★☆
I’ve seen quite a few people read this, and since it was short and I was looking for a final audiobook for the month I decided to give it a shot. I did enjoy it and I’ve actually thought a lot about it after I finished it, but I also would have a hard time really explaining what I liked about it. It’s definitely a weird story, and I think it’s a retelling of a story from the bible, and as someone who isn’t familiar at ALL with any of those, I’m not sure if I’m correct or not, or what changes and commentaries this had on the original. I did like how it just kind of had this eerie atmosphere, and I just had an unsettled feeling as I listened to the audiobook which I enjoyed.

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What books did you read in March? Have you read any of these books, and if so, what were your thoughts? I’d love to chat!