August 2026 Wrap Up

So my reading for August very much did *not* go to plan – as in, I barely read anything. I blame travel + moving house + post-thesis burnout. Let’s just say this is going to be a very brief wrap up.

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Overview from the Storygraph

So, as you can see I only finished one book, although I did make a decent amount of progress through one other as well.

Book Read

I had to change the title of this section from ‘books read’ to ‘book read’… how sad is that. It wasn’t even one of the books on my TBR!

The only book I read this month was a random historical romance – the title and cover of which are both awful (the title doesn’t even make sense for the content, since there’s no seducing and no negative result or reason why one shouldn’t seduce said Scot… also they’re both Scottish so I don’t know who is seducing who?)

It was a fast read if a bit forgettable and I only picked it up because I saw it recommended on a Reddit thread about books similar to the Under the Oak Tree series by Suji Kim and was intrigued. To be fair to the person who suggested it – there are a LOT of similarities. However, I think the brevity of the story made both the romance and any other plot elements fall a little flat for me. I gave it 2.5 stars.

Books Progressed or DNF’d

I made quite a lot of progress in Taiwan Travelogue by Yáng Shuāng-zǐ (and also went to a book event with her and her translator and got my book signed)! I’m really enjoying it, it’s just taking me a bit longer to read. I also got a few sections further through Save the Cat! Writes A Novel by Jessica Brody.

I also tried to read one of the few Ilona Andrews books that I haven’t read on the train (Iron and Magic, which is a Kate Daniels spin-off/villain redemption story), but I actually ended up DNFing, which I think is an Ilona Andrews first for me since I generally find their books consistently entertaining, even though there are definitely ones that I prefer over others.

I don’t think the book was bad by any means (and I didn’t really get far enough in to make a judgement, but the quality seemed on par with later Kate Daniels books), but I read Ilona Andrews books for entertainment and I was also in a bit of a slump, so when the male lead started hooking up with the female lead’s servant (just before their arranged marriage) I decided to DNF – it’s just not the kind of male lead or relationship dynamic I enjoy reading it about when I’m looking for a fun romance (even though I usually really like arranged marriages, I prefer it when the people are involved are trying to make it work rather than having flings with their other half’s subordinates). Again, nothing wrong with the book, it just wasn’t the dynamic I wanted to read. Maybe I’ll pick it up again in the future when I’m feeling less slumpy, who knows?

On the Blog

I didn’t make many blog posts this month either – in fact I posted more in the first week whilst finishing my master’s thesis than in the rest of the month combined.