Lazy Day Literature: July 2022

Sunday, July 31, 2022

LazyDayLit's JULY 2022 Reading WrapUp & Challenge Progress

GOODBYE JULY!!!

Hello readers!

July was another month filled with graphic novels & audiobooks and I ended up reading 20 books in all for the second month in a row!

We had a lot of excess heat and lightning storms in July which kept us inside reading or playing family games most days but it was also a really good month with a camping trip, a beach day, and lots of swimming.

We've also been prepping for our third year of homeschooling and I'm looking forward to all the new stories and nonfiction resources we will use. I may attempt to keep a weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly update on our homeschool and KidLit reads here on the blog but that really depends on how much time I set aside! Blogging has taken the backburner this year but I'm still sharing our reads over on instagram!

Did you get any extra reads in over the summer?

GRAPHIC NOVELS I READ IN JULY

BOOKS I FINISHED IN JULY

AUDIOBOOKS LISTENED TO IN JULY

Started But Haven't Finished

CHALLENGE PROGRESS

ABC CHALLENGE

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

20 / 26

JAN: +7

C, E, G, H, L, N, V

FEB: +5
A, B, M, P, R

MAR: +2
F, W

APR: +1
T

MAY: +2
O, S

JUNE: +1
D,

JULY: +2
I, U

It's In His Kiss
Ugly Love

BookRiot's READ HARDER Challenge

JAN: 1/24
FEB: 4/24
MAR: 4/24
APR: 4/24
MAY: 5/24

JUNE: 6/24

JULY: + 3

7. Read a romance where the protagonist is over 40:
Lore Olympus Vol 2 (Hades is 2000+ yrs old)

16. Recommended by a friend with different reading tastes:
Ugly Love by Colleen Hoover

21. A queer retelling of a classic in the canon, fairytale, folklore, or myth:
The Girl From the Sea by Molly Knox Ostertag

The52BookClub Reading Challenge

18 / 52

JAN: +5
FEB: +3
MAR: +1
APR: +2
MAY: +2
JUNE: +2

JULY: +3

2. Featuring a library or bookstore:
The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd

17. Picked based on the spine:
On A Sunbeam

21. Published by Simon & Schuster:
Ugly Love

PopSugar Reading Challenge

Jan: 4 / 40
Feb: 7 / 40
Mar: +1 = 8/40
Apr: +0 = 8 / 40
May: +2 = 10/40
JUNE: +5 = 15/40

NEW TO ME AUTHORS

JULY:
Jillian Tamaki
Mariko Tamaki
T. Kingfisher
Peng Shepherd
Molly Knox Ostertag
L.M. Elliott
Rio Youers
Colleen Hoover
Thi Bui
Gwenda Bond
Hester Fox
Tillie Walden

And that's about it for stats!

Happy reading!

Friday, July 15, 2022

Amari and the Night Brothers by B.B. Alston (Middle Grade Fantasy Book Review)

Amari and the Night Brothers
(Supernatural Investigations #1)
by B.B. Alston
Published by Balzer & Bray
on January 19, 2022
Genre: Middle Grade, Fantasy
Length: 416 pages
Ages: 9+ years

Goodreads | Amazon | B&N | BookDepository

Synopsis:
Quinton Peters was the golden boy of the Rosewood low-income housing projects, receiving full scholarship offers to two different Ivy League schools. When he mysteriously goes missing, his little sister, thirteen-year-old Amari Peters, can't understand why it's not a bigger deal. Why isn't his story all over the news? And why do the police automatically assume he was into something illegal?

Then Amari discovers a ticking briefcase in her brother's old closet. Meant for her eyes only. He's left her a nomination for a summer tryout at the secretive Bureau of Supernatural Affairs. Amari is certain the answer to finding her missing brother lies somewhere inside, if only she can get her head around the idea of mermaids, dwarves, and magicians all being real things, something she has to instantly confront when she is given a weredragon as a roommate.

Amari must compete against some of the nation's wealthiest kids who've known about the supernatural world their whole lives and with an evil magician threatening the whole supernatural world, and her own classmates thinking she is an enemy, Amari has never felt more alone. But if she doesn't pass the three tryouts, she may never find out what happened to Quinton.

My Thoughts:

Amari Peters desperately misses her brilliant older brother, Quinton, who had gone off to pursue a confidential career and mysteriously disappeared in the process. Things at her school aren't going so well thanks to bullies so when she gets an acceptance letter to a special summer camp that her brother had preemptively nominated her for, she jumps at the chance, knowing that it's her best chance at finding out what happened to her brother.

Thanks to her brother's nomination, Amari becomes an initiate at the Bureau of Supernatural Affairs and is introduced to the secret world of the supernatural. Determined to become a Junior Agent like her brother before her, Amari prepares and competes for a career at the Bureau while also trying to solve the mystery of her missing brother.

This is a really fun read filled with magic, mystery, supernatural beings and creatures such as were-dragons, trolls, phoenixes, and more.
There's an underlying mystery that motivates the main character throughout the book. Great character development.

I can't wait for the sequel!

Friday, July 1, 2022

LazyDayLit's JULY 2022 TBR & Reading Goals

Hello July!

I read twenty books in June thanks to a new library card & too much rain/heat to spend much time outdoors. I'm hoping for a similar month but also need to catch up on reviews and stuff so I may take it easy, depending on my mood and how much of an escape I need, I suppose.

What has been your favorite book to escape into so far this year?

MY JULY HOPEFULS

For Review