{"id":34721,"date":"2025-01-18T12:41:16","date_gmt":"2025-01-18T12:41:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/entertainment\/books\/books-on-my-winter-2023-2024-to-read-list-the-book-lovers-sanctuary\/"},"modified":"2025-01-18T12:41:16","modified_gmt":"2025-01-18T12:41:16","slug":"books-on-my-winter-2023-2024-to-read-list-the-book-lovers-sanctuary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=34721","title":{"rendered":"Books On My Winter 2023-2024 To-Read List \u2013 The Book Lovers’ Sanctuary"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Top Ten Tuesday was created by\u00a0The Broke and the Bookish\u00a0in June of 2010 and was moved to\u00a0That Artsy Reader Girl<\/a>\u00a0in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. <\/p>\n

Previous Top Ten Tuesday Topics<\/h2>\n
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Some of you may have noticed that I have missed a couple of Top Ten Tuesday posts recently \u2013 which is unusual for me \u2013 and also that I\u2019ve become very much behind in my reviews \u2013 which is distinctly not unusual by this point in the year! Things had got a little on top of me recently, I have to say \u2013 my father\u2019s illness, my daughter\u2019s needs, my own health (a burst ear drum, minor in the big picture!) And then an Ofsted Inspection on top of everything else, with mock exam marking\u2026<\/p>\n

But, I am back and let\u2019s return to the books with the regular seasonal tbr update. As always, please bear in mind that I never really have a to-be read list, nor do I really plan my reading at all. I am \u2013 as I have said before \u2013 totally a mood reader. But, at the moment these are the books that I might get around to reading over the winter.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s start with my current read: the gentle, familiar milieu of Sophie Hannah\u2019s Poirot in a Christmas setting, and the final parts of the Children of Blood and Bone\u2026<\/p>\n

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And now, turning to the future wintry reads\u2026<\/p>\n

Prophet Song, Paul Lynch<\/h2>\n
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The explosive literary sensation: a mother faces a terrible choice as Ireland slides into totalitarianism\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

On a dark, wet evening in Dublin, scientist and mother-of-four Eilish Stack answers her front door to find the GNSB on her step. Two officers from Ireland\u2019s newly formed secret police are here to interrogate her husband, a trade unionist.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ireland is falling apart. The country is in the grip of a government turning towards tyranny and when her husband disappears, Eilish finds herself caught within the nightmare logic of a society that is quickly unravelling.<\/p>\n

How far will she go to save her family? And what \u2013 or who \u2013 is she willing to leave behind?<\/p>\n

Exhilarating, terrifying and propulsive,\u00a0Prophet Song<\/em>\u00a0is a work of breathtaking originality, offering a devastating vision of a country at war and a deeply human portrait of a mother\u2019s fight to hold her family together.<\/p>\n

Impossible Creatures, Katherine Rundell<\/h2>\n
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Sold by her mother. Enslaved in Pompeii\u2019s brothel. Determined to survive. Her name is Amara. Welcome to the Wolf Den\u2026<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Amara was once a beloved daughter, until her father\u2019s death plunged her family into penury. Now, she is owned by a man she despises and lives as a slave in Pompeii\u2019s infamous brothel, her only value the desire she can stir in others.<\/p>\n

But Amara\u2019s spirit is far from broken. Sharp, resourceful and surrounded by women whose humour and dreams she shares, Amara comes to realise that everything in this city has its price. But how much will her freedom cost?<\/p>\n

The Wolf Den<\/em>\u00a0is the first in a trilogy of novels reimagining the long overlooked lives of women in Pompeii\u2019s lupanar. Perfect for fans of Pat Barker\u2019s\u00a0The Silence of the Girls<\/em>\u00a0and Madeline Miller\u2019s\u00a0Circe<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The Wolf Den Trilogy, Elodie Harper<\/h2>\n
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Sold by her mother. Enslaved in Pompeii\u2019s brothel. Determined to survive. Her name is Amara. Welcome to the Wolf Den\u2026<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Amara was once a beloved daughter, until her father\u2019s death plunged her family into penury. Now, she is owned by a man she despises and lives as a slave in Pompeii\u2019s infamous brothel, her only value the desire she can stir in others.<\/p>\n

But Amara\u2019s spirit is far from broken. Sharp, resourceful and surrounded by women whose humour and dreams she shares, Amara comes to realise that everything in this city has its price. But how much will her freedom cost?<\/p>\n

The Wolf Den<\/em>\u00a0is the first in a trilogy of novels reimagining the long overlooked lives of women in Pompeii\u2019s lupanar. Perfect for fans of Pat Barker\u2019s\u00a0The Silence of the Girls<\/em>\u00a0and Madeline Miller\u2019s\u00a0Circe<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The Year of the Locust, Terry Hayes<\/h2>\n
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If, like Kane, you\u2019re a Denied Access Area spy for the CIA, then boundaries have no meaning. Your function is to go in, do whatever is required, and get out again \u2013 by whatever means necessary. You know when to run, when to hide \u2013 and when to shoot.<\/p>\n

But some places don\u2019t play by the rules. Some places are too dangerous, even for a man of Kane\u2019s experience. The badlands where the borders of Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan meet are such a place \u2013 a place where violence is the only way to survive.<\/p>\n

Kane travels there to exfiltrate a man with vital information for the safety of the West \u2013 but instead he meets an adversary who will take the world to the brink of extinction. A frightening, clever, vicious man with blood on his hands and vengeance in his heart\u2026<\/p>\n

Tress of the Emerald Sea, Brandon Sanderson<\/h2>\n
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The only life Tress has known on her island home in an emerald-green ocean has been a simple one, with the simple pleasures of collecting cups brought by sailors from faraway lands and listening to stories told by her friend Charlie. But when his father takes him on a voyage to find a bride and disaster strikes, Tress must stow away on a ship and seek the Sorceress of the deadly Midnight Sea. Amid the spore oceans where pirates abound, can Tress leave her simple life behind and make her own place sailing a sea where a single drop of water can mean instant death?<\/p>\n

Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, Brandon Sanderson<\/h2>\n
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Yumi has spent her entire life in strict obedience, granting her the power to summon the spirits that bestow vital aid upon her society \u2013 but she longs for even a single day as a normal person. Painter patrols the dark streets dreaming of being a hero \u2013 a goal that has led to nothing but heartache and isolation, leaving him always on the outside looking in. In their own ways, both of them face the world alone.<\/p>\n

Suddenly flung together, Yumi and Painter must strive to right the wrongs in both their lives, reconciling their past and present while maintaining the precarious balance of each of their worlds. If they cannot unravel the mystery of what brought them together before it\u2019s too late, they risk forever losing not only the bond growing between them, but the very worlds they\u2019ve always struggled to protect.<\/p>\n

Welcome to the Hyunam-Dong Bookshop, Hwang Bo-Reum<\/h2>\n
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There was only one thing on her mind.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2018I must start a bookshop.\u2019<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Yeongju did everything she was supposed to, go to university, marry a decent man, get a respectable job. Then it all fell apart. Burned out, Yeongju abandons her old life, quits her high-flying career, and follows her dream. She opens a bookshop.<\/p>\n

In a quaint neighbourhood in Seoul, surrounded by books, Yeongju and her customers take refuge. From the lonely barista to the unhappily married coffee roaster, and the writer who sees something special in Yeongju \u2013 they all have disappointments in their past. The Hyunam-dong Bookshop becomes the place where they all learn how to truly live.<\/p>\n

A heart-warming story about finding comfort and acceptance in your life \u2013 and the healing power of books.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Starter Villain, John Scalzi<\/h2>\n
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Warning: supervillain in training. Risk of world domination.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Inheriting his late uncle\u2019s business proves complicated. It\u2019s also way more dangerous than Charlie could ever have imagined. Because his uncle had kept his supervillain status a secret \u2013 until now.<\/p>\n

Divorced and emotionally dependent on his cat, Charlie wasn\u2019t loving life. Although they weren\u2019t close, news of his Uncle Jake\u2019s death didn\u2019t help. And that was before Jake\u2019s rivals (seriously vengeful ones) ambushed his funeral. Now Charlie must decide if he should stay stuck in his rut, or step up to take on the business, the enemies, the minions, the hidden volcano lair . . .<\/p>\n

Even harder to get used to are the sentient, language-using, computer-savvy cats \u2013 and the fact that in the organization\u2019s hierarchy, they\u2019re management. If Charlie does say yes, this lifeline could become a death wish. Because there\u2019s much more to being an Evil Mastermind than he suspected. Yet could this also, finally, be his chance to shine?<\/p>\n

The Land of Lost Things, John Connolly<\/h2>\n
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Twice upon a time \u2013 for that is how some stories should continue\u00a0<\/em>. . .<\/strong><\/p>\n

Phoebe, an eight-year-old girl, lies comatose following a car accident. She is a body without a spirit, a stolen child. Ceres, her mother, can only sit by her bedside and read aloud to Phoebe the fairy stories she loves in the hope they might summon her back to this world.
But it is hard to keep faith, so very hard.<\/p>\n

Now an old house on the hospital grounds, a property connected to a book written by a vanished author, is calling to Ceres. Something wants her to enter, and to journey \u2013 to a land coloured by the memories of Ceres\u2019s childhood, and the folklore beloved of her father, to a land of witches and dryads, giants and mandrakes; to a land where old enemies are watching, and waiting.<\/p>\n

To the Land of Lost Things.<\/p>\n

Silver Nitrate, Silvia Moreno-Garcia<\/h2>\n
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Montserrat has always been overlooked. She\u2019s a talented sound editor, but she\u2019s left out of the boys\u2019 club running the film industry in \u201990s Mexico City. And she\u2019s all but invisible to her best friend Trist\u00e1n, a charming if faded soap opera star, even though she\u2019s been in love with him since childhood.<\/p>\n

\u2018Gripping and unusual\u2019\u00a0\u2013 Guardian<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Then Trist\u00e1n discovers his new neighbour is the cult horror director Abel Urueta, and the legendary\u00a0auteur\u00a0<\/em>claims he has a way to change their lives \u2013 even if his tales of a Nazi occultist imbuing magic into highly volatile silver nitrate stock sounds like sheer fantasy. The magic film was never finished, which is why, Urueta swears, his career vanished overnight. He is cursed.<\/p>\n

Now the director wants Montserrat and Trist\u00e1n to help him shoot the missing scene and lift the curse . . . but Montserrat soon notices a dark presence following her.<\/p>\n

As they work together to unravel the mystery of the film and the obscure occultist who once roamed their city, Montserrat and Trist\u00e1n might just find out that sorcerers and magic are not only the stuff of movies . . .<\/p>\n

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Upcoming Top Ten Tuesday Themes<\/h2>\n

December 19:<\/strong>\u00a0Books I Hope Santa Brings\/Bookish Wishes
December 26:<\/strong>\u00a0The Ten Most Recent Additions to My Bookshelf (Maybe share your holiday book haul?<\/em>)
January 2:<\/strong>\u00a0Favorite Books of 2023
January 9:<\/strong>\u00a0Most Anticipated Books Releasing in the First Half of 2024
January 16:<\/strong>\u00a0Bookish Goals for 2024
January 23:<\/strong>\u00a0Books I Meant to Read in 2023 but Didn\u2019t Get To
January 30:<\/strong>\u00a0New-to-Me Authors I Discovered in 2023<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n