February might have been a short month, but it’s been packed! I started out with a huge TBR, read most of it, got hit by massive pandemic brain and transformed fully into a potato, and I’m starting to feel moderately human again, now that the weather is improving.

I’m linking up with:

• The Sunday Post, hosted by Kimberly @ Caffeinated Reviewer.
• The Sunday Salon, hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz.
•  Stacking The Shelves which is hosted by Team Tynga’s Reviews
• The Monthly Wrap-Up Round-Up, hosted by Nicole @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction and Shannon @ It Starts at Midnight.

Goings-On

We started off with snow and now it’s lovely and sunny. Both of these I’m ok with, but the two solid weeks of miserable rain and clouds all the time in between really did a number on me. My self-care, general focus and ability to do basic things around the house all dwindled for a while there, but I’ve been doing much better since the weather’s turned sunny. Eating healthy, went on 3 walks this week, been spending time outside with my laptop and books.

We’re having a Small Press AMA series on r/fantasy, on Fridays, had a few presses so far and it’s been lots of fun, I’m very proud of this series:

• Wraithmarked Creative
• The Parliament House
• Tyche Books
•  Mountaindale Press
• Neon Hemlock Press
• Odyssey Books

I participated in Blackathon in February, I read all my Team SFF books but ended up too pandemic-brained to read the team horror/thriller ones and spent the second half of the month reading romances and more popcorny reads.

Books read

Blackathon: Team SFF

• Rita Woods: A character traverses Spiritual realm or heavily embodies Black spirituality/spiritualism  Root Magic by Eden Royce – audiobook – loved this middle-grade story with twins learning about Root Magic and Gullah culture in the 1960s, after their grandma’s death. Their relationship undergoing the strain of growing up was a highlight.
• Tade Thompson: A Black protagonist encounters an alien civilization or alien technology Dawn by Octavia E Butler This was also the Classics? Book Club on r/fantasy and it ended up being my favorite of the month. Everything about it worked well for me and I was very interested in all it had to say.
• Octavia Butler: Time travel is a major component to the story A Wish After Midnight by Zetta Elliott The first book I read this month. I really liked it, it’s about a modern-day teen sent back to the time of the Civil War and trying to survive there.
• Group Book: The Lesson by Cadwell Turnbull. I didn’t get along so great with this one, it was when my general outlook on life was woe, and this was written in a more literary style than I generally enjoy, although the premise itself was very intriguing.

Book-club reads

• Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky Loved it, my second favorite of the month, who knew I could love spiders so much?
• Half a Soul by Olivia Atwater  loved it too, short, fluffy and sweet
• City of Saints and Madmen by Jeff Vandermeer  Bookshop canceled my order so I didn’t get to read this one
• Dawn, mentioned above

Others

• Un fel de spatiu – Ion Hobana – I only read the first third of this collection of short stories, which was about underwater monsters, then it moved on to outerspace and I wasn’t in the mood for that
• Midnight Blue-Light Special by Seanan McGuire – shelved under popcorn read- this was fun, pretty light while still being exciting, just the thing for pandemic brain
• A Wizard’s Guide for Defensive Baking by T. Kingfisher – another one for light easy reading. This had A LOT higher body count than I expect from children’s books, but it was so much, creative and lovely

Currently reading:

I’m in a bit of a starting books phase, so currently reading many:

• Soulstar by C.L. Polk – having Robin be the PoV character is every bit as awesome as I’d hoped
• The Unbroken by C.L. Clark – I have an ARC for this, but since it’s only out in March I’ve pushed it back for March, will probably get back to it today after my brain’s rested with a few no-pressure reads.
• Voltaire in Love by Nancy Mitford – corrupted to the ways of historical little shit by a fellow mod, I’m loving this. It’s so much fun and Voltaire was such a funny asshole.
• Beowolf: A New Translation by Maria Dahvana Headly – BRO, I fucking love this. It’s amazing, so fun and works so well. Though I’m not used to poetry of any kind, so I need to pay more attention than usual to follow along.

This Week Month on the Blog

Posts:

• 84 Speculative Fiction Books by Black Authors – New Releases for 2021
• Guest post by Serenity-as-ice: Happy Lunar New Year! East/Southeast Asian-inspired recommendations 
• Can’t Wait Wednesday: Black History Month edition

Science Fiction or Fantasy books by Black Authors – some recs

Reviews:

(with which I am up-to-date!)

• Mini reviews – The A.I. Who Loved Me, Andrei Straja and The Girl in the Tower
• The Conductors by Nicole Glover
• A Wish After Midnight by Zetta Elliott
• Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky
• Dawn by Octavia Butler
• Mini reviews – February (Half a Soul; Root Magic; Midnight-Blue Light Special; Un fel de spatiu, The Lesson )

Stacking the Shelves

And I quote “So basically, gonna try to not buy many more books till April.” well … I bought less than half the number of books than I did in January, so that’s something. And I’ve read/started more than half the books I read, which is pretty ok

Audibooks:

• Dawn by Octavia Butler
• The Ghost Brigades by John Scalzi
• Escaping Exodus: Symbiosys by Nicky Drayden
• Amari and the Nightbrothers
• Soulstar by C.L. Polk
• Beowolf

Ebooks:

• A Wish After Midnight by Zetta Elliott
• The Lesson by Caldwell Turnbull
• Half a Soul by Olivia Atwater
• Fireheart Tiger by Aliette de Bodard
• Scarlet Odyssey by C.T.
• The Jasmine Throne by Tasha Suri – ARC

Print:

• My preorders for Library of the Dead by T.L. and Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse from Goldsboro are on their way, so I’m counting them for this month
• Bought last month but arrived this one: