Tag Thursday – The Do I Have That Tag

It’s time for Tag Thursday! This one I’ve stolen from the lovely Steph over at A Little But A Lot she did this way back in March last year, but I bookmarked it to do at some point. February seems like a good time! You can find her post here. Now onto my answers and in news that will surprise noone a lot of these are still sitting on my shelves unread…. Oops…

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Do You Have a Book With Deckled Edges?

I had to Google what they meant by deckled edges but yes I do have one! Furyborn by Claire Legrand

When assassins ambush her best friend, Rielle Dardenne risks everything to save him, exposing herself as one of a pair of prophesied queens: a queen of light, and a queen of blood. To prove she is the Sun Queen, Rielle must endure seven elemental magic trials. If she fails, she will be executed…unless the trials kill her first.

One thousand years later, the legend of Queen Rielle is a fairy tale to Eliana Ferracora. A bounty hunter for the Undying Empire, Eliana believes herself untouchable–until her mother vanishes. To find her, Eliana joins a rebel captain and discovers that the evil at the empire’s heart is more terrible than she ever imagined.

As Rielle and Eliana fight in a cosmic war that spans millennia, their stories intersect, and the shocking connections between them ultimately determine the fate of their world–and of each other.

I re-read the synopsis for this and I’m now wondering why on earth I’ve not read it. It sounds wonderful! If you’ve read it tell me, am I missing out? Or does it sound better than it is?

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Do You Have a Book With 3 or More People on the Cover?

I do! All Your Twisted Secrets by Diana Urban. This one just happens to be sitting on my shelves facing outwards so was probably the easiest of this whole tag to find!

Welcome to dinner, and again, congratulations on being selected. Now you must do the selecting.

What do the queen bee, star athlete, valedictorian, stoner, loner, and music geek all have in common? They were all invited to a scholarship dinner, only to discover it’s a trap. Someone has locked them into a room with a bomb, a syringe filled with poison, and a note saying they have an hour to pick someone to kill … or else everyone dies.

Amber Prescott is determined to get her classmates and herself out of the room alive, but that might be easier said than done. No one knows how they’re all connected or who would want them dead. As they retrace the events over the past year that might have triggered their captor’s ultimatum, it becomes clear that everyone is hiding something. And with the clock ticking down, confusion turns into fear, and fear morphs into panic as they race to answer the biggest question: Who will they choose to die? 

The blurb on Goodreads assures me this is one for fans of One Of Us Is Lying and classics like Agatha Christie. I enjoy both so I am looking forward to getting to this. I’ve already a stack of books I’m planning on reading in February so I might aim for a March read. If you’ve read it let me know if I should bump something from my February stack!

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Do You Have a Book Based on Another Fictional Story?

This time it’s even one I’ve actually read! Heartless by Marissa Meyer

Long before she was the Queen of Hearts, Catherine Pinkerton was just a girl who wanted to fall in love.

Catherine may be one of the most desired girls in Wonderland, and a favorite of the unmarried King of Hearts, but her interests lie elsewhere. A talented baker, all she wants is to open a shop with her best friend. But according to her mother, such a goal is unthinkable for the young woman who could be the next queen.

Then Cath meets Jest, the handsome and mysterious court joker. For the first time, she feels the pull of true attraction. At the risk of offending the king and infuriating her parents, she and Jest enter into an intense, secret courtship. Cath is determined to define her own destiny and fall in love on her terms. But in a land thriving with magic, madness, and monsters, fate has other plans.

Heartless is the origin story of the Queen of Hearts from Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland. I really enjoyed this story and always intended to read some more of Marissa’s books, but I’ve still not got to any yet!

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Do You Have a Book With a Title 10 Letters Long?

This was a lot of scanning shelves but I managed to find one! The Surgeon this is a book I’ve had for a long time and is probably one of the first modern adult crime books I read, it came free with Company magazine when I was about 16…

IN BOSTON, THERE’S A KILLER ON THE LOOSE…

A killer who targets lone women, who breaks into their apartments and performs terrifying ritualistic acts of torture on them before finishing them off. His surgical skills lead police to suspect he is a physician – a physician who, instead of saving lives, takes them.

But as homicide detective Thomas Moore and his partner Jane Rizzoli begin their investigation, they make a startling discovery. Closely linked to these killings is Catherine Cordell, a beautiful doctor with a mysterious past. Two years ago she was subjected to a horrifying rape and shot her attacker dead.

Now the man she believes she killed seems to be stalking her once again, and this time he knows exactly where to find her…

This one has never been reviewed on the blog, and I fell behind with the series around the time a couple of books were released in the UK and US with two different titles and I got confused with which I’d actually read! Maybe this will be the year I catch up, or start to…

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Do You Have a Book With a Title That Starts and Ends With the Same Letter?

This was another long period of scanning bookshelves but eventually I found Déjà Dead by Kathy Reichs

The meticulously dismembered body of a woman is discovered in the grounds of an abandoned monastery.
‘Too decomposed for standard autopsy. Request anthropologic expertise.’

Enter Dr Temperance Brennan, Director of Forensic Anthropology for the province of Quebec, who has been researching recent disappearances in the city.

Despite the cynicism of Detective Claudel who heads the investigation, Brennan is convinced that a serial killer is at work. Her forensic expertise finally convinces Claudel, but only after the body count has risen…

Tempe takes matters into her own hands, but her determined probing places those closest to her in mortal danger. Can Tempe make her crucial breakthrough before the killer strikes again?

This is the first book in the Tempe Brennan series that went on to inspire the TV series Bones. I say inspired because book Tempe and TV Tempe are too very different characters, I have to confess I think I prefer TV Tempe…

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Do You Have a Mass Market Paperback Book?

Is this an American thing? Aren’t all paperback books mass market?

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Do You Have a Book Written by an Author Using a Pen Name?

I’m cheating slightly with this one as the book is still on the shelves in my childhood bedroom and not in my current flat but Mary Poppins Comes Back by P. L. Travers

Pulled down from the clouds at the end of a kite string, Mary Poppins is back. In Mary’s care, the Banks children meet the King of the Castle and the Dirty Rascal, visit the upside-down world of Mr. Turvy and his bride, Miss Topsy, and spend a breathless afternoon above the park, dangling from a clutch of balloons.

I must confess I didn’t know that P. L. Travers was a pen name until this prompt when I promptly Googled pen names and then scrolled through a very long list looking for someone whose book I actually owned! Apparently P. L. Travers was actually called Helen Lyndon Goff. Also this cover >>> isn’t actually the version I own, I have an old plain cloth covered edition which I believe came from my grandma, I’m not sure if it was one my mum had when she was little… I will always remember the trip to visit the Topsy-Turveys! I was so pleased when I saw it pop up in the film Mary Poppins Returns.

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Do You Have a Book With a Character’s Name in the Title?

I actually have a few, but the first I was drawn to is Amelia Fang and the Barbaric Ball by Laura Ellen Anderson.

Meet Amelia Fang.

She loves playing Goblin Tag, and cuddling her pet pumpkin, Squashy. She hates going to her mum and dad’s boring Barbaric Ball. Oh, and one more thing – Amelia is a vampire.

When the spoilt prince of Nocturnia captures Squashy, Amelia must plan a daring rescue. But things in the Kingdom of the Dark may not be all they seem…

Join Amelia on her first abominable adventure. She won’t bite!

I actually have several books in this series, and my God daughter has them all! Now it’s finished I’m going to have to find something else to buy her! The series is just a lovely series filled with wonderful characters! Laura actually illustrates the books herself as well and I love her style!

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Do You Have a Book With Two Maps in it?

I don’t think so… And short of going through literally hundreds of books I’m not going to find out for sure… What I do have is the Waterstones edition of The Highland Falcon Thief by M. G. Leonard and Sam Sedgman. It has a map with the route the train takes but also comes with a drawing featuring the layout of the train… Does that count?

Harrison Beck is reluctantly joining his travel-writer Uncle Nat for the last journey of the royal train, The Highland Falcon. But as the train makes its way to Scotland, a priceless brooch goes missing, and things suddenly get a lot more interesting. As suspicions and accusations run high among the passengers, Harrison begins to investigate and uncovers a few surprises along the way. Can he solve the mystery of the jewel thief and catch the culprit before they reach the end of the line?

I actually only read this a couple of weeks ago which was how I remembered about the map and layout drawings! It’s also filled with more wonderful drawings by the super talented Elisa Paganelli! I was a little late to the party but I do also own the second, and the third book in the series which was just released this week and I’m looking forward to getting stuck into them both!

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Do You Have a Book That Was Turned into a TV Show?

I actually have quite a few, I’ve got a lot of crime series which have been directly adapted or inspired TV series like Vera, Shetland, Rebus, Bones and Rizzoli and Isles. But I’m going to go with Northern Lights by Philip Pullman as I think this is the most recent adaptation I have sitting on my shelves. Although there are another couple of books which I think are currently in development.

When Lyra’s friend Roger disappears, she and her dæmon, Pantalaimon, determine to find him.

The ensuing quest leads them to the bleak splendour of the North, where armoured bears rule the ice and witch-queens fly through the frozen skies – and where a team of scientists is conducting experiments too horrible to be spoken about.

Lyra overcomes these strange terrors, only to find something yet more perilous waiting for her – something with consequences which may even reach beyond the Northern Lights…

I think I might have been a young teenager when I first read this series and I fell in love with the trilogy. I’m long overdue for a re-read as I want to re-read them before I read the Book Of Dust trilogy and I’ve been sitting on La Belle Sauvage since publication day….

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Do You Have a Book Written by Someone Who is Originally Famous for Something Else (celebrity/athlete/TV personality)?

I’ve got a few memoirs sitting on my shelves but I’m not sure if that’s cheating for this prompt. So instead I’m going to go with The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman as it’s fiction!

Four septuagenarians with a few tricks up their sleeves
A female cop with her first big case
A brutal murder
Welcome to…
The Thursday Murder Club

In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely friends meet weekly in the Jigsaw Room to discuss unsolved crimes; together they call themselves The Thursday Murder Club. Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim and Ron might be pushing eighty but they still have a few tricks up their sleeves.

When a local developer is found dead with a mysterious photograph left next to the body, the Thursday Murder Club suddenly find themselves in the middle of their first live case. As the bodies begin to pile up, can our unorthodox but brilliant gang catch the killer, before it’s too late?

In the UK at least Richard is probably most well known for being the man with the facts on Pointless (and also for being very tall). I’ve not actually read this yet – this isn’t coming as a surprise to anyone is it… I have actually put it in my February book stack as I’ve heard good things. If you’ve read it let me know if it should be one of the first books I pick up this month!

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Do You Have a Book With a Clock on the Cover?

Another one that took a lot of searching and then turned out to have been staring me in the face the whole time! Cogheart by Peter Bunzl

Some secrets change the world in a heartbeat…

Lily’s life is in mortal peril. Her father is missing and now silver-eyed men stalk her through the shadows. What could they want from her?

With her friends—Robert, the clockmaker’s son, and Malkin, her mechanical fox—Lily is plunged into a murky and menacing world. Too soon Lily realizes that those she holds dear may be the very ones to break her heart…

Murder, mayhem and mystery meet in this gripping Victorian adventure.

This one should have come to mind so much quicker given that one of the main characters is a clockmaker’s son. I’ve read this one and the follow up Moonlocket, which means I’ve still got another two in the series to go!

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Do You Have a Poetry Book?

Not a traditional one in terms of an anothology. However I do have a couple of novels written in verse including Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo

Camino Rios lives for the summers when her father visits her in the Dominican Republic. But this time, on the day when his plane is supposed to land, Camino arrives at the airport to see crowds of crying people…

In New York City, Yahaira Rios is called to the principal’s office, where her mother is waiting to tell her that her father, her hero, has died in a plane crash.

Separated by distance – and Papi’s secrets – the two girls are forced to face a new reality in which their father is dead and their lives are forever altered. And then, when it seems like they’ve lost everything of their father, they learn of each other.

Papi’s death uncovers all the painful truths he kept hidden, and the love he divided across an ocean. And now, Camino and Yahaira are both left to grapple with what this new sister means to them, and what it will now take to keep their dreams alive.

In a dual narrative novel in verse that brims with both grief and love, award-winning and bestselling author Elizabeth Acevedo writes about the devastation of loss, the difficulty of forgiveness, and the bittersweet bonds that shape our lives.

As has become my common refrain I’ve not read this yet but I have heard fantastic things about it, I know it was voted the best YA Fiction book in the 2020 Goodreads awards too… A summer read I think!

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Do You Have a Book With an Award Stamp on it?

Not a stamp as such but my copy of Queenie is a later version that is gold and has The British Book Awards – Book Of The Year 2020 printed at the top

Queenie Jenkins can’t cut a break. Well, apart from one from her long term boyfriend, Tom. That’s definitely just a break though. Definitely not a break up. Stuck between a boss who doesn’t seem to see her, a family who don’t seem to listen (if it’s not Jesus or water rates, they’re not interested), and trying to fit in two worlds that don’t really understand her, it’s no wonder she’s struggling.

She was named to be queen of everything. So why is she finding it so hard to rule her own life?

I picked up this one towards the end of last year, everyone had raved about it and I spotted it in Waterstones while I was picking up some books as gifts so I thought why not! Still not actually gotten around to reading it of course…

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Do You Have a Book Written by an Author With the Same Initials as You?

I managed to find one (if you ignore the middle initial) It Ends With You by S. K. Wright

‘If I’d told the truth, it would have been fiction’

Everyone loves Eva. Beautiful, bright, fun, generous – she’s perfect.

So when her dead body is found in a ditch in the local woods the only thing anyone wants to know is: Who could have done this?

It has to be Luke, her boyfriend. He has the motive, the means, the opportunity and he’s no stranger to the police.

Even though the picture is incomplete, the pieces fit. But as time passes, stories change.

Told from six narrative strands, this cleverly woven and utterly compulsive novel challenges preconceptions; makes you second, third and fourth guess yourself; and holds an uncomfortable mirror up to the way societies and systems treat those they perceive to be on the outside.

This is another that’s been sitting on my shelf unread for a while, and now I’ve shared the blurb as part of this post I’m wondering why I’ve not yet picked it up. Young adult thriller with multiple points of view?! That sounds like exactly my type of thing!

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Do You Have a Book of Short Stories?

Yes! I’m doing well at this (probably a sign I have too many books)

Return to Lewis Carroll’s Wonderland with this stunning collection of original stories from today’s biggest children’s authors – Peter Bunzl, Pamela Butchart, Maz Evans, Swapna Haddow, Patrice Lawrence, Chris Smith, Robin Stevens, Lauren St John, Lisa Thompson, Piers Torday and Amy Wilson.

Tumble down the rabbit hole again to find out what happens in Wonderland without Alice there. Is the Queen of Hearts still ruling with an iron fist? Does the Mad Hatter still have to go to tea? And will Tweedledum and Tweedledee ever resolve their argument?

More than 150 years since Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was first published by Macmillan, revisit Carroll’s amazing cast of characters – including the Queen of Hearts, the Mock Turtle, the Dormouse, the Cheshire Cat and Alice’s Sister in these brand-new stories, that will bring a new generation of readers to Wonderland.

I was gifted this in part of a box swap. There are some great children’s authors who have contributed to this so I’m looking forward to finally getting to it!

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Do You Have a Book That is Between 500-510 Pages Long?

I may have cheated here and relied on Goodreads rather than checking all of my books to confirm the number of pages. So if it’s wrong blame them! Apparently Fever Of The Bone by Val McDermid has 501 pages

‘You should have been a detective. If there’s one thing the last year has proved, it’s how good you are at finding things out. Things that are buried so deep nobody even thinks twice about them. The sort of things that turn people’s lives inside out once they’re exposed.’

Meet Tony Hill’s most twisted adversary – a killer with a shopping list of victims, a killer unmoved by youth and innocence, a killer driven by the most perverted of desires.

The murder and mutilation of teenager Jennifer Maidment is horrific enough on its own. But it’s not long before Tony realises it’s just the start of a brutal and ruthless campaign that’s targeting an apparently unconnected group of young people.

Struggling with the newly awakened ghosts of his own past and desperate for distraction in his work, Tony battles to find the answers that will give him personal and professional satisfaction in his most testing investigation yet . . .

I managed to successfully counter balance the darkness of this one by reading while lying on a sun lounger in the back garden of the house we rented for a couple of weeks in Barbados. That trip was a great graduation gift to myself!

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Do You Have a Book That Was Turned into a Movie?

There are some obvious ones I’m not going to give blog space to, so instead I’m going with Me Before You by Jojo Moyes.

Lou Clark knows lots of things. She knows how many footsteps there are between the bus stop and home. She knows she likes working in The Buttered Bun tea shop and she knows she might not love her boyfriend Patrick.

What Lou doesn’t know is she’s about to lose her job or that knowing what’s coming is what keeps her sane.

Will Traynor knows his motorcycle accident took away his desire to live. He knows everything feels very small and rather joyless now and he knows exactly how he’s going to put a stop to that.
What Will doesn’t know is that Lou is about to burst into his world in a riot of colour. And neither of them knows they’re going to change the other for all time.

I’ve read a couple of Jojo Moyes’ books and enjoyed them and I know this is probably the most hyped of them all so I picked up this one and After You when I saw them both on offer. Not actually read them yet though… Or seen the movie to be honest but I know one exists!

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Do You Have a Graphic Novel?

Yes! I only own two and they’re recent additions, I’m going with When Stars Are Scattered by Victoria Jamieson and Omar Mohamed

Omar and his brother Hassan, two Somali boys, have spent a long time in the Dadaab refugee camp. Separated from their mother, they are looked after by a friendly stranger. Life in the camp isn’t always easy. The hunger is constant . . . but there’s football to look forward to, and now there’s a chance Omar will get to go to school . . .

With a heart-wrenching fairytale ending, this incredible true story is brought to life by Victoria’s stunning illustrations. This book perfectly depicts life in a refugee camp for 8-12 year olds

This was the first graphic novel I have ever owned, it was sent to me by the lovely people of Faber Childrens. This tells the true story of Omar and his experiences growing up in a refugee camp. It is both heartwarming and heart wrenching but I think it tells such an important story and I think everyone should read it and get a bit of an insight into what that life is really like. It’s aimed at a middle grade audience so it’s a really accessible format which I think can only be beneficial.

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Do You Have a Book Written by Two or More Authors?

The first that jumped of the shelf when I was looking for something for this prompt was Dear Haiti, Love Alaine by Maika Moulite and Maritza Moulite.

Co-written by sisters Maika and Maritza Moulite, and told in epistolary style through letters, articles, emails, and diary entries, this exceptional debut novel captures a sparkling new voice and irrepressible heroine in a celebration of storytelling sure to thrill fans of Nicola Yoon, Ibi Zoboi and Jenna Evans Welch!

When a school presentation goes very wrong, Alaine Beauparlant finds herself suspended, shipped off to Haiti and writing the report of a lifetime…

You might ask the obvious question: What do I, a seventeen-year-old Haitian American from Miami with way too little life experience, have to say about anything?

Actually, a lot.

Thanks to “the incident” (don’t ask), I’m spending the next two months doing what my school is calling a “spring volunteer immersion project.” It’s definitely no vacation. I’m toiling away under the ever-watchful eyes of Tati Estelle at her new nonprofit. And my lean-in queen of a mother is even here to make sure I do things right. Or she might just be lying low to dodge the media sharks after a much more public incident of her own…and to hide a rather devastating secret.

All things considered, there are some pretty nice perks…like flirting with Tati’s distractingly cute intern, getting actual face time with my mom and experiencing Haiti for the first time. I’m even exploring my family’s history—which happens to be loaded with betrayals, superstitions and possibly even a family curse.

You know, typical drama. But it’s nothing I can’t handle.

I first heard about this a while ago, I think around it’s US publication date, and then there was a bit of a gap until it finally published in the UK. It finally popped through my letterbox at the beginning of December to find me smack bang in the middle of a reading slump. I’m hoping to get to this one soon as I really enjoyed the extract I read way back…

That’s it! We have reached the end, if you’ve made it this far thank you for sticking it out! I won’t tag anybody in it, it’s so old now you’ve probably already done it but if you haven’t and fancy taking it on consider yourself tagged! Please come back and drop me a link so I can check out your answers!