Top Ten Tuesday: Book titles that remind me of a song

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week's theme is Bookish Wishes (List the top 10 books you’d love to own and include a link to your wishlist so that people can grant your wishes. Make sure you link your wishlist to your mailing address or include the email address associated with your e-reader in the list description so people know how to get the book to you. After you post, jump around the Linky and grant a wish or two if you’d like. Please don’t feel obligated to send anything to anyone!). 

I always feel a bit uncomfortable with this topic. I don't really have a wishlist and I would feel uncomfortable putting one up in the hope that someone would gift me something, and feeling uncomfortable if no one did!

Instead, I am bringing you 10 books with titles that remind me of a song. And you are welcome for any earworms that you might receive as a result of this post. I certainly gave myself some!

Best Days of Our Lives by Helen Rolfe - This phrase reminds me of the chorus of Thank You by Dido where one of the lines is  I want to thank you for giving me the best day of my life. (my review)

Is She Really Going Out with Him? by Sophie Cousens - Makes me think of the Joe Jackson song that was released in 1978. It's a very catchy tune!

Girls Just Want to Have Sun by Jo Lyons - This is an obvious play on the title Girls Just Want to Have Fun by the fabulous Cyndi Lauper

You Can't Hurry Love by Susan Buchanan - Phil Collins anyone? And look, there's a sloth on the cover. 

Someone I Used to Know by Paige Toon - The song title is actually Somebody That I Used to Know by Gotye and Kimbra, but it's close enough to make me thing of the song. 

I Knew You Were Trouble by Sandy Barker - Now we are in our our Taylor Swift earworm era. I feel like if I went looking hard enough I would find quite a few Taylor adjacent titles. (my review)

Don't You Forget About Me by Mhairi McFarlane - Back to the 80s with Simple Minds for this one!

Over the Sea to Skye by Sue Moorcroft - The title of this song is actually The Skye Boat Song and it is a very old song, originating in Scotland in the 19th century. You may also be familiar with it as the theme song for the Outlander TV series. I will have my review up for this book later in the week.

Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow by Claudia Carroll - Not quite as old given that it was originally released in 1960  the title of this song by The Shirelles is sometimes shown as Will You Love Me Tomorrow but the lyrics include the word still. 

Suspicious Minds by Martin Edwards - Edwards has a whole series featuring detective Harry Devlin where several of the books have song titles. I chose this one because I love both the Elvis and Fine Young Cannibals versions.

Can you think of other titles which remind you of a song. I am sure there are lots!

Top Ten Tuesday: Purple!

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week's theme is Books with My Favorite Color on the Cover. Now, if you take a look around my blog, you might notice one main colour. So it should be no surprise that my post this week features the colour purple. It could be the title is purple, the whole cover or just part of the cover. I did think I had done a post like this before, but apparently not!

French Chateau Escape by Gillian Harvey - Purple text and France!

When We Were Friends by Samantha Tonge - Can't get much more purple than this!

The French Chateau Dream by Julie Caplin  - I am sure I could find some more books with lavender on the cover

Battle Royal by Lucy Parker - I chose this one because of the purple dress

One French Summer by Gillian Harvey - More France. 

Cooking with Fernet Branca by James Hamilton-Paterson - I wasn't a big fan of this book but it is very purple.

Lilac Skies by Shivani Bansal - Same with this one!

Elodie's Library of Second Chances by Rebecca Raisin - I really like Rebecca Raisin's books and this was no exception! 

Someone I Used to Know by Paige Toon - Purple!!

How to Mend a Broken Heart by Rachael Johns - Rachael Johns is an autobuy author for me, no matter what colour the cover is.

Top Ten Tuesday: Fancy fonts

 

 

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This 

week the theme is

Typographic Book Covers (Book covers with a design that is all or mostly all words. You can also choose to do books with nice typography if that’s easier!) (Submitted by Mareli @ Elza Reads)


It is interesting when you look at trends in covers. If we look at historical romance as an example. Not too long ago most covers were clinch covers with women in gorgeous dresses but these days it isn't as standard. Now, there are font covers or cartoonny in amongst the big dresses.


I haven't focussed on just one genre, but here is my Top Ten Tuesday post featuring typographic book covers.

One for the Money by Janet Evanovich - The reality is that you could have picked any one of the Stephanie Plum books as they are pretty much all typographic covers!

Love Stories by Trent Dalton - Given that this is a selection of very short stories, this cover makes sense as there isn't one single story to tell

Someone I Used to Know by Paige Toon - Plenty of rom-coms have wordy covers!

The Year the Maps Changed by Danielle Binks - This cover is very eye catching.

The Great Passage by Shion Miura - This book is all about the words, inside and out!



The People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry - All of Emily Henry's covers have been wordy so far.

Red White and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston - Such a fun cover and book!

Normal People by Sally Rooney - Quite a few of the covers for this book have bold typography on the cover.

Don't You Forget About Me - Another author who has a lot of these style of covers.

Me Before You by Jojo Moyes - This cover does not convey the emotional nature of this book at all!

Do you like typographic covers?

Top Ten Tuesday: Most Recent Additions to my TBR pile

 

 

 

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week the theme is Most Recent Additions to my TBR pile. 

Let's start with my library loot!

The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak - I saw this recommended at The Chocolate Lady's Book Review Blog and thought it sounded very interesting

The Last Piece of my Heart by Paige Toon - I recently read my first Paige Toon, but it isn't going to be my last

And now my one click purchases

The Pasha of Cuisine by Saygin Ersin - I was attracted to this one because it sounds like an interesting historical foodie novel!

Must Love Babies by Kelly Hunter - Kelly Hunter is one of my favourite Australian contemporary romance writers.

Sunrise Over Sapphire Bay by Holly Martin - I don't even know why I got this one. Maybe it was a freebie.

These next two are from Audible:

Hogfather by Terry Pratchett - I listened to this just before Christmas and I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell - I have heard such good things about this author but never read her, or listened to her.

And then there are the books that I received for Christmas. One of these was a book that I requested. The other two were books that I received as part of Naughty Santa. Have you ever played that? The idea is that everyone takes it in turn to pick from the pile of presents or choose to steal one of the presents that someone else has. I was the second to last person to choose so I stole a Sodastream from someone else, but then someone stole the Sodastream from me. I then picked up the last present rather than steal from someone else and it contained two books.

Gastro Obscura: A Food Adventurer's Guide by Cecily Wong and Dylan Thuras - This is the one that I did request for Christmas!

The Art of Happiness by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Howard C Cutler - I might keep this one. Maybe.

The Accidental Prime Minister by Annika Smethurst- Pretty sure I will never, ever read this one!

Have you read any of these?

This Week I....

I'm reading....

If you follow Sheila at Book Journey you would now that each year she hosts an event called First Book of the Year, where she asks you to take a picture of yourself with the book that you are planning to read as the first book of each year. I don't necessarily plan that far in advance and so mine needs to be a retrospective picture, but I thought I would share it here. My first book that I finished this year is Someone I Used to Know by Paige Toon. It was a really good book to start the year with.

Today, I also finished The Girl from Paris by Ella Carey which I will be posting a review of tomorrow  as part of a blog tour.

I have also read one chapter of The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison so expect to hear more about that next week.

I'm watching...

I've had the last week off and we have managed to watch quite a lot of  TV during that time and it has been quite varied from Sing! to Death to 2021,

We started watching Book of Bobba Fett, the latest Star Wars spin off and started rewatching Friday Night Dinners which is one of our favourites. We also finished watching season 2 of The Witcher which we really enjoyed. My husband got a soundbar for Christmas so we put that on and then turn it up and listen to Henry Cavill booming through the room!

I also started a New Zealand series called Under the Vines, which looks like a bit of fun. I think I will continue it at some point.

My favourite thing I watched this week was an Australian series called Love Me! It is about a family from Melbourne who we observe as they experience love in the context of a major event in their lives. It is adapted from a Swedish series. I really, really enjoyed it, and loved the way it showed this lovely city that we live in!

Life

All of the visitors who were here have now gone back home and I am back to work tomorrow. These last ten days have been a good mix of rest, some because it was required, some because it was was so darn hot. There was also social events, activities. I am not quite sure I am ready to go back to work, but we do have a plan for another week off in the next month or so. We'll see.

Our New Years's Eve was very 2021. We had plans to go to my sisters for dinner and a swim (it was very very hot here on the day), but it was cancelled at the last minute because she was identified as a close contact and so had to isolate. Instead, we got takeaway and started watching Friday Night Dinners from the beginning. We were in bed at 10.30.

We went to the museum to see an exhibition on Treasures of the Natural World which was very interesting. Today, we wandered around the Botanical Gardens seeing an augmented reality art exhibition called Seeing the Invisible. It was a much cooler today so it was lovely to wander around the gardens looking for the installations, which aren't really there! It was very cool.

Reading challenges

I mentioned last week that I am going to be doing the Aussie Author Challenge and the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge (which you can still sign up for here) but I am also going to be doing the WWII challenge hosted by Becky (details here)

The other challenge I am going to participate in is the Twelve Challenge. The idea is that you Read 12 books recommended by 12 friends in 12 months. These are the books that I have so far

1. Unorthodox by Deborah Feldman (Karen)

2. The Carrier and the Swift by Minette Walters (Bree)

3. The Painted Man by Peter V Brent (my husband)

4. The Thicket by Joe R Lansdale (BFR)

5. Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna (Kelly)

6. Last Night at the Telegraph Club (Leslie)

7. Dear Mrs Bird by A J Pearce (Bookgazing)

8. Beginners Luck by Kate Clayborne

9. Still Life by Sara Winman (Anita)

10. Modern Marriage by Filip Vukasin (Lisa)

11.

12.

I am sure that I will fill the last two places in due course.

Festive treats...

The season for festive treats is nearly over. This week I watched Messy Christmas which was an Italian movie. The premise was that there have been no babies born in a small Italian village for years and now they need a new baby for the live nativity. They approach the local Muslim community to see if they can use one of their children. 

Here are the festive treats I have read, listened and watched so far this year:

1. Flora's Travelling Christmas Shop by Rebecca Raisin (book)

2. The Happiest Season 

3. The Christmas Secret by Karen Swan (book)

4. Love Harder 

5. A Castle for Christmas

6. Hawkeye

7.  Christmas Train - Paul Kelly (music)

8. Christmas with my Father

9. Wintertime Dreams: A Parisian Christmas- Tatiana Eva-Marie and the Avalon Jazz Band (music)

10. Single all the Way

11. Christmas in Rome

12. Christmas in Paris

13. The Hogfather (Audiobook)

14. Christmas on the Farm

14. Messy Christmas

Posts from the last two weeks

Top Ten Tuesday: Best Books of 2021

Historical Fiction Reading Challenge: January 

Weekend Cooking: I've Been Good!

Six Degrees: Rules of Civility to Venetia

I've linked this post to It's Monday, what are you reading? as hosted by Book Date