TBR Picks For May

As previously discussed, from this month onward I'm going to read the oldest book on my list, plus a Stephen King novel.

My oldest book is The Examiner by Janice Hallett, which I've had since the 14th November 2025.

My first Stephen King book is Carrie.

I'm still going to choose another 10 books, because it's fun! And they are:

1. Book I've been putting off/don't fancy - Box 88 by Charles Cumming. When Chris was buying me books for Christmas, he took a chance and bought me a couple of random ones, including this. It's an espionage thriller, which is not something I'd choose for myself.

2. Grey book - In The Woods by Tana French. Funnily enough, this is the other book that Chris chose randomly, and to be honest, I could've chosen this for the first prompt, as it's also one that I've not really been wanting to read. [And it's the only grey book I've got]

3. The author's first name begins with 'M' - Blood Over Bright Haven by M.L Wang. This is one of my priority books.

4. Under 300 pages - Graveyard Shift by M.L. Rio. 108 pages! Those first three are all quite chunky, so I've chosen what I think is the shortest book I've got.

5. Top shelf (free pick) - The House On Cold Hill by Peter James. I chose this because it's a big hardcover that I don't want on my shelf, but actually on reading the blurb it sounds like a haunted house story, so I might actually enjoy it!

6. Kindle TBR (free pick) - Diavola by Jennifer Thorne. This was a difficult choice, but I've had this one since January, so I thought I'd go 'oldest' again (although this is also a priority book).

7. Black Book - Hare House by Sally Hinchcliffe. My copy is mostly black, and also has black sprayed edges.

8. Bottom shelf (free pick) - All The Colours Of The Dark by Chris Whitaker. Another priority choice.

9. Non-fiction - To The Edge Of The World by Tilar J Mazzeo. One woman. One ship. One astonishing true story.

10. Set in the early 1900s - Mrs England by Stacey Halls. Quite a few to choose from, so just picked this at random.

Let's see how I get on in May!

April Reading Wrap Up

A real mixed bag this month. A couple of five star reads, but a few DNFs too. I feel like my reading has been slower than usual; this may be a combination of reading quite a few non-fiction, and also because towards the end of the month I finally got around to catching up on all the Outlander series 8 episodes (so far).

1. Rainforest by Michelle Paver. 

I was really looking forward to this but didn't enjoy it as much as I'd hoped I would.

2. Beautiful Ugly by Alice Feeney. 

A DNF; I'm definitely not into thrillers as much as I once was

3. The Sword Of Kaigen by M. L. Wang. 

My first 5 star read for a while, I was very pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed this!

4. Ascension by Nicholas Binge. 

Quite enjoyable, though some of the science aspects lost me.

5. Glimmers by Nadia Narain and Katia Narain Phillips

A DNF, but kind of a 'skimmed through it and got the idea' one.

6. Little Addictions by Catherine Gray

Another DNF, same as above.

7. Hold On To Your Kids by Dr Gordon Neufeld and Gabor Mate

Really interesting book about parenting and ensuring that you are your child's 'compass'. One to re-read and make notes on.

8. Dark Voyage by Helen Susan Swift

A disappointing DNF. I was really looking forward to getting into this series, but the writing style really put me off. It had loads of good reviews though, so maybe it's just me?

9. Mortimer and Whitehouse: Gone Fishing

This was an extra book choice because I wanted another kindle book to read. I started reading it on my kindle, but then switched to the audiobook, which wasn't exactly word for word the same. It was funny and poignant, just like the tv series. (So sad to hear the news today that Ted has gone to the big briefcase emporium in the sky).

10. A Head Full Of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay

This was decent, I don't remember much about it now.

11. Tress Of The Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson

An enjoyable, swash-buckling kind of adventure, but cosy fantasy isn't really my thing, and I'm a bit worried about whether I'll enjoy other Brandon Sanderson books.

12. The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

Saved for this month as it was a book club choice. Big twist at the end!

13. The Watchers by A. M. Shine

Peeping Toms with teeth and claws. Might watch the film.

14. Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy

Gorgeous book about family, love and loss, and the effects of climate change.

TBR choices that I didn't manage to get around to:

The Witches At The End Of The World

Red Queen 

We Used To Live Here

I'm putting these back on the shelf, but if I pull out the same prompts, I'll re-choose these again.

Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy

Started: 25.4.26

Finished: 30.4.26

Paperback

TBR Prompt: From the bookshelves / free pick

Well. This book has just broken me. Gorgeous, five stars. Beautifully written, I really liked the short chapters from different POVs. The island setting, so wild and atmospheric, was a character in itself. I loved the Salt family, and Rowan too, though I took a little longer to warm to her. The whales, seals, penguins, albatrosses - I was willing them all to survive. I thought the thriller aspect was believable, and the evidence of climate change was very real and frightening. I did not expect the ending. 

The Watchers by A. M. Shine

Started: 16.4.26

Finished: 28.4.26

Kindle

Extra TBR Prompt: TV/Movie adaptation

I shouldn't really have chosen this book, because it's meant that I haven't finished the full TBR list that I originally chose for April, but nevermind.

This is a book about a group of people who find themselves trapped in a building (the 'coop') in the middle of a forest. One side of the coop is a huge window which turns into a one-way mirror at night, so that they can't see out, but someone, or something, can see in. They can go out during the day, but they must be back by the time the light switches on inside, so that The Watchers can... well, watch them.

I did quite enjoy this book, I was certainly intrigued about who or what The Watchers were, though it's always a bit of an anti-climax when it's actually revealed. There were a couple of plot points which confused me, but overall it wasn't bad. It was made into a movie in 2024, I believe.

The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

Started: 23.4.26

Finished: 25.4.26

Paperback

Book club choice

I've had this book since September 2025 (which is a long time for me, because I have a high book turnover!), but I've been hanging on to it for a while since I found out it was a book club choice for this month.

A woman murders her husband, and then refuses to speak for the next six years. A psychotherapist wants to help her tell her story. I didn't really warm to the characters; both the doctor and patient (via her own journal) were quite unreliable narrators and it was clear that we weren't going to get the full details until the end. When it came, it was quite a twist!

Tress Of The Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson

Started: 17.4.26

Finished: 23.4.26

Paperback

TBR Prompt: Green book

This is the first Brandon Sanderson book I've read, and I wasn't sure about it at first, which I think is why it's taken me longer than usual to finish it. He says he was inspired by The Princess Bride (I've seen the film, but haven't read the book), and this has quite a fairy tale, swashbuckling adventure feel to it. The world building was interesting - the spores kind of gave me constant anxiety - and as it's part of the Cosmere it seems I might come across them in other books. The narrator of this one was revealed to be someone called Hoid, who also appears in some other novels, and even though this is a standalone, maybe it would've helped if I'd read the books that come before it, I don't know?

I'm coming to realise that cute and cosy fantasy like this isn't really my cup of tea, and I'm a bit worried that other Brandy Sandy books might have a similar tone to this one. I did enjoy it, and it was funny in places, but that's not really what I'm looking for from my fantasy novels. I want to read Mistborn and The Stormlight Archive, but are they going to live up to my expectations or not? 

A Couple Of Ideas...

I've had a couple of thoughts about my TBR list going forward. 

I think I've mentioned before that I have a spreadsheet with all my books listed (books that I own, and books that I still need). I can filter the list by the date that I acquired a book, and I think that every month I'm going to go right back to the 'oldest' one on the list, and have that as one of my choices. I do have a TBR prompt for 'oldest book on list', so if I happen to pull that prompt, then I'll just choose the next oldest.

I do think that, as my tastes are changing, I have some books which I'm not really too keen to read any more, and I think this is one way to make sure that I don't keep ignoring those books. If I decide to DNF them, that's fair enough, but at least I've given them a try.

I've also been thinking about doing some kind of author challenge. I did think about trying to read every Agatha Christie book, just because there are so many for me to work through. But the thing is, I'm not really a murder mystery fan! So I've gone for another obvious choice - Stephen King. I know it's almost sacrilege to say this, but I'm not really a Stephen King fan either! Not disputing that he's an amazing and prolific writer, but I can't say I've really enjoyed the books of his that I have read. But it's been years since I've read any, so maybe I was a bit too young to appreciate them.

I went to his website where you can see a list of all his work, by publication date, and there is a lot. A VERY LOT! So I've decided to only focus on the novels; I'm not including novellas or short stories or collections or anthologies or anything like that (I have read a few of the short stories, like The Shawshank Redemption [which I actually did enjoy] and [is it called] The Body? The one that was made into the film Stand By Me?)

So I've now got a list of his novels, oldest to most recent. I was looking for the books on Amazon at the same time as I was making the list, and there were two that I couldn't find. I thought maybe they were really old / least popular ones, so I deleted them from my list, but I think I have since found them. But I can't be bothered to add them back into the list! As I said, I don't even really like Stephen King so I don't want to get obsessive about this. I think I'm going to try and read one SK book a month, starting with the oldest (which is Carrie) and working forwards. Although I've added all the kindle versions to my Amazon Wish List, I don't really want to spend much money on them (I bought The Shining because it was on a 99p deal), so I think I may actually request them from the library instead. I've placed a hold on Carrie so hopefully that'll come to me in time for me to read it in May.

As for my TBR Jar, I think I'll still continue to pick out my ten prompts, because most months I seem to manage to get through more than 10 books, especially because I usually DNF at least a couple.

So that is my new reading plan for May onwards!

A Head Full Of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay

Started: 11.4.26

Finished: 17.4.26

Paperback

TBR Prompt: Body part in the title

This is the story of Marjorie, a 14 year old girl who starts to display problematic behaviour. Is it mental illness or something else? A psychiatrist doesn't seem to have helped, so her father, turning increasingly towards his faith, brings in the local priest who believes she may be possessed by a demon. Told from the POV of her younger sister Merry, we watch the gradual unravelling of the family as they seek to understand what is happening, even resorting to being filmed for a reality TV show. It remained ambiguous as to the cause of Marjorie's behaviour; her explanations for it varied between believable and far-fetched.

There are a few nods to horror films (an obvious one being The Exorcist) and other horror writers (and even one to Mr Tremblay himself!) which he explains in his extended liner notes at the end of the book; I enjoyed reading these.

 

Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing

Started: 14.4.26

Finished: 16.4.26

Kindle / Audiobook

TBR Prompt: Blue book

After I DNF'd Dark Voyage, I wanted another Kindle book to read, so I used my TBR Jar and pulled out the prompt 'blue book'. Looking through my Kindle options I had a few, and I chose this one. After reading a couple of chapters, I realised that I could listen to the audiobook with one of my Audible credits (I need to use them up so that I can cancel my subscription), so I've partly read and partly listened to this. I have to say, the audiobook is quite different from the kindle version, there's a lot more of Paul and Bob just chatting. It loosely follows the format of the book, but it's certainly not word for word. I didn't mind that though, because listening to these two just nattering about fishing and generally being a bit silly is actually quite relaxing! 

Dark Voyage by Helen Susan Swift

Started: 12.4.26

DNF: 13.4.26

Kindle

TBR Prompt: Set in the early 1900s

I really wanted to like this book, as it's the first in a series of five, I believe all set in Scotland (I'm not sure if they're connected). I made it to page 30 but I just couldn't get past the awful dialogue, it felt so stilted and wooden. This, in turn, made it very hard to even begin to like or get a feel for the characters. It's a DNF, and I'll be removing the other books from my TBR list.