Down the TBR Hole #33

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Hello Hello! How are you?

Today is my last day of classes before my half-term break and as soon as noon rolls around, I’m dashing home and getting snuggled under a blanket with a pile of books to keep me company!

I’m glad to be back today for this post, you may have noticed but I wasn’t able to get a Down the TBR Hole post up last week because I was so busy and not really feeling myself, but I’m happy to be back. I’m not sure whether I did any damage on Goodreads since last time I did this post, so we will have to discover it together!

You know the drill if you haven’t ever read any of my Down the TBR Hole posts before but you want to find out why I started and what rules to follow to do your own TBR list purge on your Goodreads, head over to the first edition of this post to find out more!

This week’s TBR purge is going to be starting with a total of 3,761 books on my Goodreads “Want to Read” shelf, so it would seem I was actually able to remove two books from the list since last time (yay!). As usual, I will be looking through the next 20 books on this shelf and starting at #306.

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GOODREADS “WANT TO READ” SHELF

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One Hundred Birds Taught Me to Fly: The Art of Seeking God by Ashley Mae Hoiland

I can already tell that I might be taking this book off my list because I am not religious and I do not like books about God. That being said, the cover is really pretty, so I will read the blurb to find out more. And… yeah, nope, this is definitely not my type of book, I don’t want to “walk down the path of godliness”, so this is going to be swiftly removed from my list.

REMOVE

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Why Religion?: A Personal Story by Elaine Pagels

I feel like rolling my eyes at myself, I really don’t know why I decided to add this book to my list. It seems like a more academic view of religion, but it is really not something that interests me, so again, this is an easy choice.

REMOVE

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My Glory Was I Had Such Friends by Amy Silverstein

We have a third nonfiction autobiography on the list today (the first two were also memoirs), I haven’t heard of this one before! It sounds like a really endearing and heartfelt book, it seems like a beautiful story of friendship and I usually really like friendship in books, but I really don’t fancy this one for some reason, so I am going to let it go.

REMOVE

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In Our Mad and Furious City by Guy Gunaratne

Now moving onto contemporary fiction and I find that this cover is very jarring, so I’m not a fan. The blurb is fairly vague, and I kind of get the gist of what this book is supposed to be about, it’s not something that I want to read about, so I will remove this book from my TBR.

REMOVE

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New Poets of Native Nations edited by Heid E. Erdrich

The first thing I have to say about this book is YES, I don’t know why, but I have always been really fascinated by Native Americans and their stories, so at first glance, this book is really up my alley. It sounds like an amazing anthology and one I’m sure that I’m going to love, it seems to have roots in all areas of life from family to politics and being part of a tribe, so I am definitely keeping this one on the list.

KEEP

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The Overhaul: Poems by Kathleen Jamie

Another poetry book, we have a really varied list today already and it’s another one I’ve never heard about, but it’s about Scotland I believe, and that’s another thing I’m interested in, so I have high hopes the blurb will be enticing. It seems kind of vague to me and I don’t really know what it will be about, but I’m feeling generous today so I want to give it a shot.

KEEP

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Into English: Poems, Translations, Commentaries by Martha Collins, Kevin Prufer

This sounds kind of interesting, however, it feels like something really academic, I basically did this for 3 years for my undergrad studies and even though it’s still something I like, I’m not sure I would enjoy it as much as I would have I read it last year while it was still something I was studying for instance.

REMOVE

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Say Something Back by Denise Riley

I suppose I’m on a poetry bandwagon this week, I seem to have had a lot of poetry on this list since I started doing these posts and it’s really weird because it’s my least read genre aha! The synopsis really confused me and I have no idea what this book is supposed to be about, I don’t think it would be my thing anyway so I will get rid of it.

REMOVE

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Serious Sweet by A.L. Kennedy

Back to some literary fiction and one I’ve never seen or heard about! The blurb didn’t grab my attention at all and I gave up reading it halfway through, I don’t like mundane and boring type settings like this one as you know, so this is an easy remove.

REMOVE

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A Scattering by Christopher Reid

And now we are back to poetry with another unknown-to-me-book. The blurb is only a sentence long and apparently, this book is a tribute to the author’s wife as she was dying, this doesn’t really feel like a book I would want to pick up, unfortunately.

REMOVE

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Eye Level: Poems by Jenny Xie

More poems on my TBR, oops. Another one I’ve never heard of before but I kind of like the cover! This actually sounds like a really great collection of poetry with themes such as travel and finding ourselves, however, I’m not feeling it at the moment, so I’m going to let it go for now and maybe add it again later!

REMOVE

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The Penguin Book of Russian Poetry by Robert Chandler

Oh look, more poetry lol! I actually must have added this one to my list before I discovered this collection on Instagram. I found a post that had loads of books that were collections of stories in different themes made by Penguin (I think, there might be others too), but I found it really intriguing and added them all to my list. I’ve actually never read Russian poetry nor have I any idea of which authors are successful in this genre, I’m actually really fascinated now and I’m definitely going to try to pick it up soon!

KEEP

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The Exhibit by Lauren Eggert-Crowe

More poetry so this must be a poetry week! The cover is creeping me out and the blurb is so vague, I have no idea what it’s about but it seems really spooky and it’s not my thing at all so I’m not even going to attempt it!

REMOVE

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The Favorite Sister by Jessica Knoll

Oh! We’ve changed bandwagons! This is a mystery book and I feel like I have seen it before but I’m not sure. The synopsis was a bit all over the place and fairly hard for me to understand, just the first bit really drew me in, but as it went on and there were more things explained about the characters, I really didn’t want to pick it up. As you know, I’m not a fan of family secrets plots, so this is not one for me.

REMOVE

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Tin Man by Sarah Winman

I have definitely heard of this book before, it was actually on Bookstagram quite a lot a while ago and I love that cover, it reminds me of a Van Gogh painting! It’s a contemporary story about love, and that is usually the type of thing that I wouldn’t want to pick up, but there was something about the blurb that I really liked, so I think I am going to give it a go one of these days!

KEEP

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The Readymade Thief by Augustus Rose

Another unknown-to-me mystery book, I’m not 100% sure about it to be honest. It was the type of synopsis that I find really intriguing but also not that great. It has a great premise but I think the blurb dragged on and made me lose interest, which is a shame really. I might add it again one day, but I think I prefer concentrating on some more mysteries for now.

REMOVE

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The Education of Margot Sánchez by Lilliam Rivera

This is a YA contemporary and again, it’s an unknown-to-me book. I’m not a fan of family troubles in contemporary books and although I may have picked this up when I was a teenager, it just isn’t something I would want to read now, so this is an easy choice.

REMOVE

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The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner

This was another really popular book on social media a few years ago and I added it to my list because of how many times I saw it, but I have absolutely no idea what it’s about, just that it’s contemporary fiction, which isn’t really my cup of tea on the best of days. It sounds a bit like Orange is the New Black which is a series I’ve been meaning to watch for years, but this book actually sounds like a boring version of that, I didn’t really get a feel of what this book would be about, so I don’t feel like picking it up.

REMOVE

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Heather, the Totality by Matthew Weiner

I have to say that this week has been full of really weird covers that I don’t like and again, I’ve never seen this book before but it is contemporary fiction. It sounds very weird to me, and it’s another family dynamics type of book that I have no interest whatsoever in reading, so I’m going to remove this one.

REMOVE

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Everything You Want Me to Be by Mindy Mejia

I’m finishing this week with a mystery and I feel like I’ve seen this one about quite a lot, but I really hate the cover. I’m struggling a bit with this one because it sounds like a book I would potentially enjoy, but I really hate the cover and I also don’t really like how the main character seems to be portrayed. I think I’m going to give it a miss but if you’ve got any good mystery recommendations, I’d love to hear about them!

REMOVE

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Well, this was another good week, I had a mixed bag of books and genres on this list, some really weird sounding ones and I have no idea where they came from or how they got on my list. Thankfully, there were a few really intriguing ones that I decided to keep.

Out of the 20 books that I went through today, I was able to remove a total of 16 books, taking my Goodreads “Want to Read” shelf down to 3,745 books, which I’m really happy about! Newt week’s purge post will start at #310!

That’s all for now, I hope you enjoyed this post, see you soon, stay safe,

Ellie xx